Page 1 of The Dramatic Life of Jonah Penrose
One
“And then our bodies, woven as one, shall lie together in golden fields. The bounds of Troy, the destructions of war and wrath of the Gods, lover, we can forget it all. Come with me, across the sea, come with me, come with me.”
—“Come with Me,”The Wooden Horse, Act Two
The glittering champagne kisses of New Year’s Eve slowly turned into cotton candy blossoms and buttercream tulips. London thrived in the spring; the buildings blushed at the rays of sun, which allowed the greenery of its parks to flourish once again. Sugarcoated pecans and mulled wine gradually morphed into cherry sweet cocktails and chocolate eggs. Jonah lived for the spring; the long dark days and even longer nights faded away, and duller skies held a promise of sunshine behind dusky clouds. Everything became far less serious as soon as April hit. An infectious sense of childhood seemed to grasp the population and transformed down-turned lips into coy smiles. The flirtation of the sun with its rays of warmth bubbled behind seductive glances and lingering touches. Even the throbbing pain at the front of Jonah’s head caused by a copious amount of alcohol from the previous evening seemed somewhat less devastating now blossoms lined the trees.
God, how much drink passed his lips the night before? The evening came to him in fragments, a puzzle with far too many pieces, and he didn’t have the energy to find the edges, let alone complete it.
An award show.
No, not just any award show, the fuckingOliviers, the thing he’d watched on TV year after year back home nestled between his parents. He remembered observing the glitz and glamour of it, the stars of British theatre coming together for a night celebrating the arts all under one roof. And, like some divine miracle, he’d been allowed to stand with the pinnacle of talent in the industry at the Royal Albert Hall and it wasn’t a dream, he wasn’t sitting at home imagining himself on the screen; he’d finally made it. For the first time in his life, he didn’t feel like a spectator. He, Jonah Penrose, had beeninvited.
He rubbed his hand across his forehead and groaned as he turned toward his window, bedsheets tangling between his limbs as he tried to gauge the time. The movement churned his stomach, and he balked, bile singeing the back of his throat, which he swallowed down with a grimace. The unmistakable taste of tequila burned his gums, and he swore at himself for drinking the vile stuff yet again. Tequila, with its seductive voice and voluptuous curves, told him he could do anything; it provided an outrageous sense of confidence and said he should absolutely buy more shots.
Salt. Tequila. Lime. And repeat.
He should have stuck to the champagne. The flutes didn’t allow him to drink to excess; they made him stand tall and sip politely, not throw the drink back then suck on a lime for dear life. If only he hadn’t spent his late teens drinking shots the color of drain cleaner and not caring about refining his palate, then maybe champagne might have been more seductive. Golden bubbles. Long slim stem to wrap his hand around. No, he needed to stop sexualizing drinks to excuse his hangover. He didn’t even need an excuse last night because he knew, as soon as his name echoed throughout the theatre, champagne simply wouldn’t cut it.
He’d won.
The moment still didn’t register in his mind.Hisname sounding out, followed by a deafening round of applause and hands grasping him, launching him to his feet as he gawped in complete bewilderment. Despite the thumping haze of pain echoing inside his skull, he could still see the inside of the hall as clear as day. Shining black stage,walls of gold and plush red velvet chairs. Jonah always knew his soul belonged in the theatre; it flourished from a tiny seed nestled between the floorboards and grew into something brimming with decadent petals and vibrant colors. But last night, in the Royal Albert Hall, he saw he belonged to an entire garden full of outstanding flora. For a few seconds, the world slowed down; the noise dulled, and he fully took in the scene surrounding him. Bodies, hundreds of them, stretched out and circled up, up, up into the balconies. The people glittered, they shone in freshly pressed suits and silk dresses dipped in moondust with smiling faces kissed by glimmering stage lights. The same lights shone on him.
He’d allowed himself to dream of it happening, winning an award, of course he had. He even wrote out an acceptance speech in the notes app on his phone while steaming rice the week before. But the reality he found himself in didn’t seem to compute with real life. The sheer talent surrounding him—actors, directors, costume designers, musicians, technicians, choreographers—took his breath away. The love of theatre drummed through them, it created an electric wave of joy Jonah could honestly say he’d never experienced before. Gratitude, respect, and passion. And every single person in the vast auditorium looked directly at him.
The memory was enough to make his stomach turn. He recalled he seemed to forget how to walk properly. His feet lifting and landing at an unnatural pace, knees bending too much, an impression of a drunk person stumbling out of a taxi in the middle of the night. Bambi on ice. He worried his suit didn’t fit right, too big, too small, and oh shit, what if he tripped, what if his mouth stopped working and no words came to him when he stepped onto the stage and in front of the microphone? His suit, picked out by Sherrie, the most fashion-forward person he knew, fit him like a glove, and he needed to just bloody relax, but in the moment, his mind looped the sound of internal screaming and, inexplicably, the song from the Coco Pops advert he hadn’t thought about since he was five.
A blur of color swarmed around Jonah as he neared the stage—hands clapping, clothing fluttering, someone from the back of the hall hollering his name, Sherrie, no doubt—and he forced himself to think about walking more so he could actually get on the stage. Out of the corner of hiseye, just to his left, he saw a flash of blond hair and a face he recognized, but it quickly faded into the rest of the noise only to leave a foot jutting out into the aisle. Were they trying to trip him? He shook his head, no, no one would trip him, not while on his way to get his award, not on purpose, and he glanced at the body the foot belonged to just in time to see them shift in their seat, taking their wayward foot with them.
When he finally made it up the six stairs to the presenters and background of cheers, a bronze statue of Laurence Olivier found its way to his hands, the bust more weighty than he expected, and there he stood, looking out at a sea of faces, all smiling, some more than others, and he fought back the urge to cry. He’d been chosen, out of all the amazing people in his category, people he’d admired for so long whose careers were stunning and filled with success, and he’d been chosen as the winner.
He remembered, for the briefest of moments, he tried to find his father’s face in the crowd. Broad nose, wispy gray hair, and soft blue eyes reminiscent of the sea back home. He could picture his smile, warm, the smile he looked for constantly as a child, consistent and safe, but it couldn’t be found; his father wasn’t there. Silly, really, for him to even try to look for him, but he became a boy again, searching for his dad in a crowd, the familiar comfort of knowing he wasn’t far.
Words caught in his throat, the tears that had threatened to fall seconds before inching closer and closer until he shook his head and took a deep breath and spoke, the obligatory thank-yous spilling from his lips at such a pace he couldn’t keep up. He didn’t know if he’d thanked everyone. He tried, he waved his hand to the company sitting in the stalls and the others sitting higher in the balcony, trying to encompass them all, probably failing miserably, but his brain and body were no longer his. He was just a puppet in an expensive suit who didn’t know how to walk without looking like he’d just shit himself. The minutes he spent on the stage didn’t lodge themselves in his memory; they didn’t happen, not really, not to him, his body moved him without thought, a dance created by invisible strings. However, his lack of memory of those important moments didn’t take away from the fact hehadwon an Olivier Award. Jonah Penrose. Best actor in a musical.
Holy shit.
Jonah moved from his bed, feet skimming along the wooden floor, one sock still on, the other somewhere in the crumpled suit beside the bed, and he lurched toward the bathroom. His knees smacked against the tiles as his hands gripped the rim of the toilet seat and he vomited. Tequila. Tequila. Tequila. A terrible idea, such a stupid idea, though ingenious at the time. He remembered the bar, The Roundhouse, the place the cast and crew often congregated after a show, and the chosen after-party spot once the photos and niceties wore off at the award ceremony. The air clung to his skin, the night unnaturally warm, though the heat may have come from the permanent flush on his cheeks after clutching his award and beaming at cameras for over an hour. Bodies pressed against him, the cast, front of house, strangers, and he didn’t care, they all showered each other with words of eternal love spurred on by the tequila shots floating across the bar. He thought of Bastien, Sherrie and Omari, their arms wrapped around him, lips pressed to his cheeks as they danced happily at the bar. The evening a celebration for them all.
The Wooden Horsewon seven awards. The nominations were overwhelming in themselves, but winning? They could now add those accolades to the five-star reviews and sold-out performances. Jonah felt the doubt in the pit of his stomach beginning to lessen. He’d proven himself. Achilles, the role of a lifetime, one he’d poured his heart and soul into, one he’d molded and nurtured, truly belonged to him now no matter what anyone else said.
The floor tiles felt cool against his back as he lay down on them, his chest heaving as he wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. Sun streamed in through the bathroom window, and the sounds of Camden Town spilled into the room, took one look at him on the floor, and left again. A laugh escaped his lips, a thing of pure joy as little sparks of the night before pushed their way to the forefront of his mind. He wanted to scream, to fling the front door open and run down Castle Road to alert all the residents that their house valuations had increased as they now lived on the same street as an Olivier winner. His skewed perception of the win and the impact it might have on the unsuspecting residents on Castle Roaddidn’t matter. He wanted the world to know; he needed to tell everyone, his mum, the woman who walked her dog past his window every morning, even the grumpy man in the corner shop near the tube station.
His laughter stopped abruptly as he recalled the first person he called once he’d downed a few shots at The Roundhouse. He should have called his mum. Did he even thank her in his speech? God, she would kill him if he didn’t. Either way, he didn’t call her; he called Edward instead. He could remember his hands shaking as he pulled his phone from his pocket, a mixture of too much alcohol and the bitter chill of the night air working its way over his body as he stood outside of the building where the joyous noise from inside became dulled. The desire to hear Edward’s voice, the need to revel in his praise was greater than any happy tears his mum may shed over his triumphant win.
Jonah sat up, his stomach turning over itself, and he swallowed down another mouthful of vomit as the floor tilted beneath him. Something didn’t feel right; not just his head or the perpetual sensation of being in motion, something else, something awful, something his brain desperately wanted to scrub away.
Edward.
His voice sounded strange on the phone the night before, far away, like he’d submerged himself in water. Edward listened to Jonah speak, he let him talk and talk and talk until he stopped and a vacuous silence lingered between them. Did Edward say anything? Did he offer congratulations? Jonah couldn’t remember, all he could recall was the taste of tequila on his lips and the promise of more alcohol on the horizon.
Jonah tentatively rose to his feet; he braced himself against the wall and caught a glimpse of his reflection in the mirror above the sink. His unruly curly brown hair clung to his forehead, his skin a deathly shade of ivory, so pale he could have been masquerading as a ghost, and a rather hideous one at that. He averted his gaze, the devastation of his appearance sickening in itself, and clambered back to his bedroom, the walls morphing in an entirely unhelpful way. As he reached for his phone on the nightstand, his fingers missed it, and he acknowledged the fact he wasn’t hungover but actually still drunk and forced himself to grab it likea toddler reaching for a wooden train. Chubby mitts, his dad would say, clumsy chubby mitts.
A plethora of messages awaited him along with three missed calls from his mother, who’d apparently stayed up late to watch the awards on TV the night before. But nothing from Edward. Jonah looked at the vacant space in the bed. The side wasn’t technically Edward’s, since they didn’t live together. But it belonged to him, regardless. A fluttering feeling wormed its way into the center of his chest, an unnerving sensation akin to the final moments before a drop on a roller coaster. Edward should have been there. He should have joined him at The Roundhouse and downed shots of tequila with him. They should have woken up together and complained about how much they drank and vowed never to do it again before having lazy hungover sex in the shower. Jonah stared at the screen of his phone, then clicked the green dial icon, his breath frozen in his throat as he listened to it ring and ring and ring until—
“Jonah?”
“I won an Olivier Award, did I tell you?” The words came before his brain clicked into motion. “Best actor in a musical.”
