Page 30 of Sawyer

“What was?”

“Your performance. Your reading. Heathcliff. He came…alive.You’re a gifted actor, Sawyer. Truly.”

“Oh,” he says, running a hand through his thick, dark-blond hair. “Okay.” He looks around the stage and grins at the rest of the cast. “Thanks, everyone!”

The rest of the rehearsal flies by in a blur of ensemble-building exercises and drama games meant to loosen us all up and help us get to know one another as actors. Ten o’clock arrives all too soon.

“Cast!” calls Bruce from the middle of the stage. “It turns out I know the guy who owns the Purple Parsnip, and you’re all invited over for a beer or two on me!”

“Parsnip closes at nine on Tuesdays,” mutters Vera.

“Not tonight it doesn’t, Miz Grumpypants,” says Bruce. “Aaron, close up shop here and meet us over there. Everyone else, follow me!”

I look at Sawyer, who’s standing next to me after our final exercise of the night. “Are you going?”

He glances at Reeve and McKenna. “Depends. We came together.”

“Oh.” Disappointment, unexpected and sharp, surprises me.

Reeve bounces over to us. “Can I have a beer?”

“Are you twenty-one?”

“No. But, Gran let me drink champagne at Tanner and McKenna’s wedding.”

“Okay. One beer, then. One.”

“Yes!” she cries, running back over to McKenna. “He said I could have one!”

“She looks up to you a lot,” I say.

“She looks up to all of us,” he answers. “She has no memories of our mom.”

“I’m sorry for that. I don’t remember my mom very well either. She left when I was eight.”

“I remember you telling me that. Mine died when I was four,” he says softly.

“Do you remember her?”

“Sometimes IthinkI do,” he says. “But I don’t know. My grandparents, dad, and older siblings have told stories about her throughout my life. I’m not really sure what’s a real memory and what’s a fabricated memory based on a story I’ve heard.”

We’ve paused across from each other, standing on the edge of the stage, while most of the cast, led by Bruce, have already left the theater. Aaron quietly pushes a broom across the stage. It’s quiet and intimate, and I’m not anxious to leave.

“Why didn’t you go to college?” I ask him.

“Wasn’t for me,” he says, jumping off the stage and grabbing his fleece jacket from the first row. When he puts it on over his head, I get a peek of his taut stomach between his jeans and T-shirt. Muscled and flat, with a sprinkling of wiry, dirty-blond hair that disappears south of his waistband, it’s Greek-god perfect. My breath catches. My cheeks flush. Memories of the summer before last coming rushing back to me, and for a second, my knees feel weak.

“You okay?” he asks.

“Fine!” I chirp.

I jump off the stage, shrug into my own coat and pull on my mittens.

Think about something else. Talk about anything else. The weather!

“October nights in Skagway are about ten degrees warmer than they are in Fairbanks, but it’s still cold here,” I inform him, apropos of absolutely nothing. If my cheeks were pink a second ago, they must be scarlet now.

“Um. Yeah. I guess that’s true.” His eyebrows furrow. “Sure you’re okay?”

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