Page 9 of Cleats and Pumps

Theweekflewby.Anton didn’t give me much time other than work. Work, which we did day and night, often going to bed only when I didn’t have the energy to go on, then getting up, caffeinating myself only to do it all again.

We worked on the manuscript first, defining the scenes and deleting the ones that didn’t make sense or weren’t as appealing as the others. Jim was all about that part. I learned the first day we’d been together that he’d helped write several of the most popular musicals on and off Broadway. That made me feel even more special to have him looking at my crazy attempt at writing.

That wore off fast enough, though. Jim was ruthless and, at first, rubbed me the wrong way. At least until we went back and read the manuscript, and I saw how brilliant his edits had been. Rodrick or Anton threw the songs in to show how it worked out.

It became clear that Jim was, in fact, a genius. With his tweaks, well, more like ax murdering of scenes, the story flowed beautifully, even if it was still only in my mind.

It took all week to get the storyline to its first draft stage, as Jim put it. Had he said that at the beginning of the week, I’dhave been offended. Now that I saw how intensive the process of writing them was, I knew he wasn’t wrong. We were just at the beginning, and many more edits were needed.

Rodrick stepped in, and thankfully, he had a gentler approach with the songs than Jim had with the storyline. “Your music is so beautiful, but we’ve made a few tweaks, especially to the first song.” I nodded, interested in hearing what he meant. “Okay, so this is what we had in mind.”

He began playing a song I hadn’t heard before. It certainly wasn’t one of mine. As he played it, I began to see images in my head. Men dressed all in black swirling across the stage, singing, “Not you, not you.” The music wasn’t right, but the words certainly were. When he stopped, he looked at me.

“The beginning of your manuscript left a lot of questions. Why was he dreaming? Where did the drama start?”

Anton cleared his throat. “When I first received the manuscript, Keith told me you wrote it to help you get over someone. It made sense to us that we’d start the musical with some drama explaining that to the audience.”

The three men stared at me as if they were waiting for me to explode. Instead, I laughed. “It’s a perfect beginning, but why don’t we open the scene with this?” I said, explaining how Gregory had broken my heart. Not so explicitly that it gave the real story away, but in a few words, we could accent the song, and make it a better intro.

“Perfect, that’s perfect,” Jim said. “Now, let’s get on with the music.”

I winked at Rodrick and asked if I could have the piano seat. “Let’s twist the melody a bit and make it more robust. High-energy dancing would fit nicely here, creating a few more kicks and upbeat moves into the scenes.” I began playing, and when I came to a perfect stop, I said, “We can use cymbals to accent a kick here.”

I played it several times and showed where a few strategic moves could be placed. “Then when we come to this point,” I said as I ended the song and ran my fingers down the keys playing a descending scale, “the guy can push Alec, the main character, down the rabbit hole.”

To my surprise, all three men clapped. “Bravo, that’s brilliant and a perfect way to start the story.”

We worked the rest of the morning to refine the song and finally print the sheet music. Another week passed quickly as we reviewed each song, refining and making them work better for dance routines.

We wrote and rewrote the music to bring in as much emotion as possible from each performance. It was exhausting, but fuck if it wasn’t some of the most fulfilling work I’d ever done.

By the weekend, I was ready for a break. My mind had turned to mush and my body ached with a need for physical exercise.

Jim and Rodrick left Friday afternoon, leaving Anton and me alone. “You up for a tour of the house now?” Anton asked, and the smirk told me exactly what he had in mind.

“Um, yeah, I mean, if you’re still interested,” I said. There had been no more flirting between us, and the two times I tried to show interest, Anton completely ignored me.

“I’m interested, but… well, the work had to be done first. I couldn’t let my desire get in the way.”

I cocked my head to the side. “Anton, what do you really think of me?” I asked, getting right to the point. I hated dancing around an issue.Just get on with it, had always been my philosophy.

“I, well, you’re very talented and smart and have a great gift for music, and screenwriting too, apparently.”

“No, I don’t mean like that. Do you like me? More than just professionally?”

“Um, well, I’m quite a bit older than you.”

I sighed. “Yes, that’s true. Okay, well, I think I’ll go take a nap, and maybe we can order takeout from that amazing Chinese place again. The food was great,” I said and turned to go up the stairs.

“Wait,” Anton said behind me. “Of course, I’m interested in you more than professionally, but I am older than you, and we have the musical. Do you really want to compromise that for a quick roll in the hay?”

I chuckled. “No, I don’t. But for the possibility of more, I’m interested… and the roll in the hay. I’ve thought a lot about hay rolling with you, Anton.”

He smiled. “I can say the same about you. The truth is, I am a bit gun-shy.”

He walked toward his living room, gesturing for me to follow. When we were seated on his extremely modern but surprisingly comfortable sofa, he sighed. “I was in a relationship with a man just a few years older than you. I fell for him, harder than I should’ve, but… well, let’s say he got a better offer and left me with a shattered heart.”

I put my hand over his. “I was convinced I was in love with a guy several years younger than me and it ended so poorly I wrote a musical.”

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