‘… It is my lady, O, it is my love! O, that she knew she were!’
In front of Olivia two eighth-grade girls were swooning over him. ‘I wish he was my Romeo,’ said the one that had a red ponytail.
She smiled with the knowledge that he was hers. A few weeks ago, she’d been a bit paranoid about how he felt about her. Now, since his visit to Transylvania, she was sure of Jackson’s commitment to her, even if he was an A-list Hollywood dreamboat.
Olivia bit her bottom lip and wished again that she would be cast as Juliet, to play opposite her Romeo.
As Jackson said his last line, Ivy unclipped the itching powder. Garrick was up next and she had to be ready to make her move.
I’m going to make sure Garrick’s audition is the highlight of the day, she thought. Not because he was a good actor, but because he was going to be doing a very good impression of … a person with itching powder down their shirt.
Jackson bowed to thunderous applause, with a few shrieks as well.
Ivy squinted against the glare of the stage lights and saw that there were definitely more girls in the audience than were auditioning. Some of the girls from school must have snuck in to watch Jackson’s audition.
When the noise quietened down, Ivy called out Garrick’s name. She unfolded the top corner of the bag, ready to spring when he came close enough.
Garrick leaped out of his seat and his three Beastly friends, Dylan Soyle, Kyle Glass and Ricky Slitherman, started whooping. He looked a little out of place wearing a skull-and-crossbones T-shirt and scruffy black jeans. He hadn’t exactly made an effort to be presentable for his audition.
‘Garrick is the man!’ shouted Dylan.
Garrick leered at the crowd, waving like he had a hundred fans screaming his name, and sauntered up on stage.
Ivy knew she was going to have approximately one millisecond to accomplish her mission – and she had to be subtle, too. If he spotted the bag, he’d know what she was trying to do.
Garrick was approaching fast.
‘Hey, babe,’ he said when he was about three steps away. ‘Make sure you mark down that I’ve been on TV before. Jackson’s not the only one with on-screen experience.’
Ivy forced herself not to roll her eyes. Garrick had been on TV during a lame stunt where he’d crawled out of a coffin at a funeral – it had been a complete mess that Ivy had had to clean up.
‘Why don’t you mark it yourself?’ she said slyly, holding out her clipboard. ‘Right here on my list.’
As Garrick craned over to scrawl ‘TV star’ beside his name, the back of his T-shirt gaped open. Perfect. Ivy didn’t waste a second. She tipped the beastly powder right down his collar.
‘Thanks, babe,’ he said, handing the pen back to her.
‘My pleasure,’ she said, grinning.
Then he strolled out on to the stage, confidence oozing from his every pore.
Three, two, one.
Garrick froze. His shoulders twitched. His right arm waggled. Ivy smiled.
‘Uh, can I do my audition later?’ Garrick blurted, doing a little wiggly dance.
‘No time outs, no do-overs. It’s now or never, Garrick,’ said Camilla firmly.
Ivy remembered the agony of itching all over her legs – and she had been able to abandon all dignity and scratch herself. Garrick couldn’t melt into a frenzy because he was on stage in front of half the school.
Thought you could cheat and sabotage Jackson? Ivy wanted to say. Not on my watch.
Garrick glanced over at her, eyes watering, and she waved the bag at him, so he knew exactly what had happened to him.
He started doing a strange little dance, like a four-year-old desperate for the bathroom.
He spluttered out his first line, ‘But, but, but, soft?’ It sounded more like a plea than a declaration of love.