Page 23 of Method Acting

I pointed to my ears. “My mother would say they’re not painted on.”

He sipped his drink, looking around the darkened café. “Plenty of things bother me. Some more than others.”

“So I won’t touch your face,” I said. “When we’re acting like boyfriends and shit. You need to tell me where it’s okay to touch, where it’s not okay. If we need to be... affectionate in public. I don’t want you to be uncomfortable.”

“Well, you don’t need to make it weird.”

“I’m saying this shit so it doesn’t get weird.”

“I’ve had boyfriends and... whatever. I let them touch me. Personal touch is fine.” He made a face. “God, you make me sound like a freak. I’m not a germaphobe or anything. Or a prude, or whatever. I just like my personal space, and I don’t like crowded places. If there’s too many people... it just gets overwhelming.”

That sounded like an overreaction. Or a sore spot. An exposed nerve, perhaps.

“It’s okay, Amos. Whatever you want to do. I’m down.” He might not like talking about this, but we needed to figure out some details. “You know what you need to do?”

He rolled his eyes. “This’ll be good,” he mumbled.

“You need to act.”

He looked at me then. “To act?”

I nodded and slid out of the booth. “Let’s do something stupid, like Hairspray.”

Amos scoffed. “Hair—where?”

I looked around. “Here.”

“What the hell for?”

“To get used to each other.”

“I don’t need to act out a scene from the worst musical of all time to know you. The fact you suggested Hairspray tells me all I need to know. You could have at least suggested West Side Story or Rent. Or Hamilton, for god’s sake.” He slid out of the booth. “What you can do is put the chairs up on the tables for me so I can mop the floor.”

Well, yes. That I could do.

I’d done a few tables when he came back out with the mop and bucket. He started behind the counter first, and as I lifted another chair up onto the table, I thought about what he’d said.

It says all I need to know about you.

What did he choose? West Side Story or Rent. What did they say about him?

Both great choices. They told me he was an outsider, someone who struggled but was a fighter. Someone who was brave. A classic. Cool, vintage.

While I was generic.

Maybe he was right.

I slid another chair onto a table, and another... and it reminded me of something. Something I’d always loved, secretly, and watched a dozen times. And I wondered if I could show him a small piece of the real me.

If I could be brave like him.

Before I lost my nerve, I took out my phone, found the instrumental on YouTube, and pressed play.

As soon as the music started, Amos stopped mopping and watched me. But in that moment, I wasn’t in the Bean Necessities after closing time.

I was transported to a stage, to Broadway, in front of a full audience, with a full orchestra.

Transported to the barricades in some French revolution.

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