Excerpt Two

Boy Toy Boy Toy
Excerpt Two: From Part One, "Teen Play"

By Michael Craft

Wednesday, August 1

I have always scoffed at superstition, but there are doubtless those who will chide me for tempting fate with my glib tone. (In retrospect, I concede that my smug humor may have been brash, for tragedy did indeed prove to be looming. Still, I am reasonably certain that the impending calamity was rooted not in my offhand cockiness, but in the premeditated scheming of a killer.)

"Mica," said Thad brightly to a girl who strolled past, in front of the stage, "I didn't know you were here tonight."

She stopped, turning to eye Thad with a blank expression that barely acknowledged his existence. Her features were pretty, if hard. Her fingernails (the word talons sprang to mind) were lacquered black. Her gleaming black hair was long and straight, chopped severely above a pert butt clad in a stretchy, black miniskirt that pushed the envelope of modesty -- though modesty was clearly a concept that had never crossed her radar. She was of course pencil-thin. She told Thad dryly, "I didn't think to report my presence. If you really need to know, I'm just keeping an eye on baby brother." She smiled so faintly, it must have hurt.

Neil whispered in my ear, "I think that's Mica Thrush, Jason's older sister."

"What a fright," I whispered back. She and Thad were talking about something; he was asking how long the rehearsal would last.

With a low chortle Neil said, "Jason and Mica -- typical spoiled rich kids."

"Hey," I reminded him, "Thad Quatrain is a ‘rich kid.'" By now, Jason had noticed his sister in the auditorium and, from the stage, joined the conversation with Thad and her.

"Yes," Neil conceded, "but Thad's hardly ... typical.'"

"Of course not," I agreed, mocking blind parental pride. "He's ours."

Exactly what happened next is not clear to me, as I was still gabbing with Neil, but at some point I became aware that Thad's conversation with Jason had grown agitated, even heated. Other people's chatter was quelled by this, and everyone in the theater, cast and crew alike, turned to listen.

Jason now rose from where he was sitting and stepped to the edge of the stage, stuffing his handkerchief in his jeans. He paused, looked Thad in the eye, and told him through a sarcastic smirk, "I see you brought your two daddies tonight. Are they proud of their boy toy?"

His words had the predictable effect -- all present were stunned silent. The sheer bigotry of Jason's attack, delivered with such bald arrogance, was meant not only to degrade Neil and me, but worse, to question the nature of our relationship to Thad and, in doing so, to hurt and humiliate him. As intended, Jason's words did hurt Thad. I could see it in the boy's face, in the way his body seemed instantly drained of energy, of life.

I wanted to rush to Thad's defense, but anything I might have said would be perceived as a defense of myself. Oddly, I felt no urge to mount a counterattack against Jason's adolescent homophobia. Rather, it was his mean-spirited bravado, his jock-boy swagger, that tempted me to forgo eloquence and simply slap the shit out of him.

Weighing all this, I felt paralyzed, wondering why the hell Denny Diggins didn't do something, or at least say something. After all, he was in charge here -- he had the authority and responsibility to maintain a semblance of decorum among his troupe. But silence reigned.

Finally, when someone did speak, it was Thad. The color had returned to his face, and I was delighted to read the intent in his grin. He had wisely decided to brush off Jason's attack by trivializing it, as it deserved. He would respond to the words of an ignorant bully by bullying back, but with humor. Paraphrasing the closing words of act one, Thad said, "Keep it up, Jason, and you may not live till opening night. Remember, I'll be waiting in the wings."

A ripple of laughter and a chorus of ooh's drifted through the theater, lightening the tension.

But Jason wouldn't let it rest. "Ooh," he said, picking up on the feigned fear voiced by the others and tossing it back at them. "I'm quakin', Thad. I'm shakin' in my boots." In a girlish voice, he asked the heavens, "However will I sleep tonight?" Then, focusing again on Thad, he said, "That's a pretty lame threat, coming from you, boy toy."

This elicited another round of ooh's from the crowd.

But it was Kwynn Wyman, Thad's friend who'd been yakking onstage with Jason during the break, who spoke next. She sauntered downstage next to him, paused, and in the hot glare of the floodlights, snorted loudly, smelling him. She said, "That's a pretty lame comment, coming from you, Jason -- considering that cheap perfume you're wearing."

Others nearby waved their hands and held their noses, confirming that it was Jason who'd overdone it with the aftershave that night. And Kwynn's description of it was dead-on -- the flowery scent was anything but manly. Jason's sister, Mica, dropped her steely composure and was the first to burst into laughter, quickly followed by others. Neil and I allowed ourselves a hearty chuckle, but Thad restrained himself, choosing instead to bead Jason with a quietly amused, unflinching stare of victory.

"Now, people, people!" scolded Denny, at last coming to life, rapping his hands. "Enough of this ‘teen play.' We've got work to do, people! Places, everyone. Act two." He turned, calling up to the control booth, "Frank? One minute till blackout."

The cast rushed to take their positions onstage. The crew disappeared behind the scenes. Denny returned to his director's table in the fifth row. Neil and I chose seats near the middle of the auditorium. As the houselights began a slow fade, I mused about the petty skirmish we'd just witnessed -- Jason's slur, Thad's threat, Kwynn's comeback. They all seemed so…well, so juvenile, so inconsequential.

(Or so I thought. I hadn't a clue that little Tommy Morales would soon be called upon to save the show.)