energy into the theater. Vivien freely admitted it was a relief to have so much activity—normal activity—going on in the abandoned building, especially after what had happened just a short while ago.
She’d looked around backstage and found nothing that could have created that eerie, long shadow…and the realization made her stomach more than a little queasy.
The teens were loud and rambunctious, calling out to each other, laughing, and—since someone had brought a speaker—blasting music that was, surprisingly, from artists she recognized.
She could feel the place waking up.
She wanted to stand out there on the stage and sing “Climb Ev’ry Mountain” or “Defying Gravity”—something bold and anthemic.
Vivien opened the huge rolling garage door, which allowed in a lot of light and fresh air to the backstage area, and did the same with all of the other doors. Dumpsters had been set up in the parking lot, and the gloved and masked volunteers began the process of removing trash and damaged parts of the theater: broken chairs, tattered curtains, set pieces that could no longer be used, boxes of old programs, mildewed and shredded office supplies, paint, hardware, and other miscellaneous items. The basic structure of the building was sound, and most of the interior walls were as well, except for one corner in the back where a small leak in the roof had created some damage. There, rotting boards and mildewed flooring had to be taken up and disposed of. Three of the football players attacked that task with alacrity—and sledgehammers.
“Miss Savage, what about these?” called one of the students. “Do they go or stay?”
There were too many of the teens for Vivien to know their names, but she thought the girl was Stephanie—a member of the pom squad and the daughter of a blacksmith (an actual blacksmith!) who lived in town.
She came over to find Stephanie and one of her friends flipping through a stack of large framed photos of shows that had been done over the years. There were more than two dozen of them, and they were each the size of a movie poster, depicting productions from the 1920s through the early 1990s. The Wizard of Oz, The Nutcracker, Noises Off, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Hamlet, and more.
These were the spirits, the ghosts that lingered—and now they had faces and shapes to go with them. She felt a shimmer of awareness as she looked through the images, feeling the burst of joy and intensity that glowed from the actors in each exuberant shot.
“Definitely keep them,” Vivien said, noting that they seemed to be in good shape except for the dust and dried dirt on the protective glass. “We can hang these in the front lobby and on the walls in the house—and we’ll continue the tradition and make our own.”
“Miss Savage! Can you come here?” called one of the guys from the wings.
She left the pair of girls with rags and glass cleaner and answered that call—and then went on to see to countless others that took her all over the building.
It wasn’t until the volunteers had been there for over an hour, with Vivien answering nonstop questions and giving direction, that she had the opportunity to step back onto the main stage. There’d been no strange breezes, no shifting in the air, no unexpected lights or shadows…and for that, she was grateful.
And yet trepidatious. It was as if she were waiting for another shoe to drop.
With that in mind, with an icy chill reminding her of the creepy shadow and the strange lights, Vivien walked upstage to the back, where the words GO OR DIE had seemed to burn.
As before, there was nothing there.
But this time, she went all the way up to the rear of the stage and examined the black wall carefully, using her flashlight. To her right were two cheerleaders using push brooms, sweeping up dust off into the wings. To her left were more volunteers gathering up miscellaneous pieces of garbage and fabric that been left on what were probably prop tables. Someone was testing the floods and spots, and lights were coming on and off, making her feel like she should start singing “Stayin’ Alive.”
The wall was blank and empty, with no sign of anything that could have been glowing letters.
She was just about to walk back downstage when something made her look up. Maybe it was the blazing crimson light that was blazing down on her as if she were in a red-light district (someone was having a lot of fun