a moment and turned away, as if it had been one of those small brown birds that flitted into the building some mornings and perched high on the support beams beneath the glass ceiling. Some stopped following the cork when they noticed the ceiling, the spattering of stars amazingly visible overhead. By God, they thought, it’s a school night and look at where we are.
“Plus,” Marisa added, letting the frothy bubbles spill over her fingers for a moment. “My mom always says to celebrate small victories.”
“Don’t tell me you have a bottle for every one of those demands.”
Marisa smiled. “No. But I bet he does,” she said, gesturing at Peejay.
* * *
Kenji scratched the back of his neck. “I mean, it’s not really the same thing,” he said to Peejay, who was looking at him so intently it made Kenji feel he was, at least for the moment, the only person that mattered to him. “I can make stuff up having to do with, like, character motivations or adapt to weird things other people say.”
Peejay snapped his fingers and beamed. “That. That’s all I need.”
Celeste had her doubts about Peejay and why everyone seemed to adore him, especially after she’d witnessed his tirade at the green room. But now she could kind of see what they could. Peejay treated others like people, like they mattered. Even if he was using them, even if he told them he was using them, he seemed to still see them as people.
“Pretend this is a scene and you’re in my shoes. You’re playing me. What do you do? Adapt to the situation, go with it.”
Kenji felt a little put on the spot. The spot was usually comfortable for him, at least within certain parameters. He looked out at the audience. Some were whispering to each other, casting hateful glances at Marisa. Glances he happened to be in the way of. Being told “no” all his life had been terrible, a soul-squashing way to grow up, sure, but he’d become accustomed to it. This? This sheer hatred? It rattled him. He didn’t like to be reminded of its presence in the world, much less be in its path. It was so much worse than his dad not understanding him.
“Forget them,” Peejay said, confidently reaching to turn Kenji’s chin back to meet his eyes. “You’re a guy trying to throw a party at a school with no entrances, and the supplies for your party are mostly outside. That’s the situation. What do you do?”
Kenji studied Peejay, disarmed by the reminder of the party. He hadn’t planned on attending, since all he’d thought about was the showcase. But he knew that, all around, people must be whispering about it. That it was fueling their anger, had led them to escalate from thrown pencils to backpacks.
“Okay,” Kenji said, meeting Peejay’s warm eyes. He stared into the distance, letting his vision blur the way he always did right before starting a scene. It was his way of softening his mind, making it malleable, preparing to accept any situation. He nodded to show he was about to start, that he had entered the magical world of pretending. Then, in a convincing, albeit cartoonishly heavy Italian accent, he yelled, “It’s a pizza party!”
Immediately he waved his hand in front of his face, as if trying to erase the words from having been spoken. “God, no. What. I’m sorry. Ignore that, I don’t know what that was.”
Celeste clapped a hand over her mouth to keep the laughter from spilling out (all the while recognizing that she had laughed, that the sign for the improv showcase she’d seen hours ago promising this had not misled her). Peejay pressed his lips into a tight line and blinked slowly. A few of the angry people were staring at Kenji’s outburst, waiting for an explanation.
“Sorry,” Kenji said again, this time to the crowd, for the moment forgetting the dynamic at hand. He apologized to Peejay, and one more time to Celeste, who could only shake her head, her hand still clamped over her mouth. “Let’s start over?” he suggested.
“Let’s,” Peejay agreed.
Kenji stared off into the distance again. Peejay and Celeste braced themselves for what was to come.
They waited for nearly a minute, exchanging glances, not wanting to pressure Kenji. His eyes refocused, and his lips parted, ready to impart his imaginative wisdom. Then he closed his mouth again and pulled his glasses off so he could rub his eyes. “I need a scene partner, or something.”