Clonazepam and the amateur incident

Clonazepam and The amateur incident.

“You know what? Fuck off, all of you!” she yelled at the top of her lungs.

As soon as those words left her mouth, a stunned silence enveloped the dressing room with its heavy presence. Nobody made a sound, nobody moved an inch. The boiling anger that had once filled every nerve of her being, retreated out of her body; leaving her with nothing but cold regret, as she finally registered the hatred in every set of eyes that surrounded her, pinning her to the ground. In that breathless instant, it dawned on her. That, was a huge mistake.

 Her heart twisted in fear. ‘Oh shit’ her mind whispered.

Her body snapped into action. In one fluid movement, she shoved her hands inside her hoodie pocket, and stormed out of the main dressing room before anyone could stop her. Two seconds later, her fellow actors shook off their initial shock, and immediately went after her. Multiple angry shouts echoed around her; demanding, attacking her relentlessly; insults that she couldn’t quite make out resonated through the tiny hall that she was sprinting through. She didn’t dare to look back. She had to get out of the theatre premises now.

Exiting the hallway that lead to the main staircase, she turned slightly to close the door, and shivered as soon as she saw for an instant the faces of her furious coworkers right behind her; trying to reach her with their arms extended, reminding her briefly of a hoard of zombies thirsty for blood as she slammed the door forcefully between them;  trying to put as many obstacles as she could between her and the fiends that used to be her family.

She was having trouble breathing. Guilt, panic, and a sudden burst of cold sweat; washed down her neck and spine, as she sprinted down the stairs leading to the lobby. She had never done something so brash. Her mind jumped from one idea to the next, looking frantically for a way to fix this mess. She was out of plans, out of remedies, out of hope. There is no going back.

Her heart skipped a beat as she suddenly recognized her director’s voice one flight of stairs on top of her, bellowing her name. She couldn’t tell if his voice sounded angry, upset or concerned. The voice was moving closer to her, he was probably following her as well. Dread crawled inside the pit of her stomach. She didn’t want to face him.

Hoping to beat him to the door, she leaped over the last couple of steps with an ungraceful hop, landing badly on her right foot. A sharp pain traveled from her ankle to her knee, her steps faltering to a full stop. She bent over to rub her throbbing knee with trembling hands.  ‘There goes my dancing career’ she thought unamused as she rose up and desperately limped her way towards the exit. She cursed inwardly as she felt the rippling pain from her knee increase with each step. She quickly came to the conclusion that she would not be able to make it to her parked car in time.  As her mind raced, she tried to come up with an escape plan.

The guard from the entrance didn’t even glace at her as she rushed past right beside him, his eyes fixed on his phone, scrolling his touch screen with his chubby thumb mindlessly; oblivious to the loud commotion that was going on in front of him. She reached towards the glass doors of the main entrance, terrified that she would be blocked from freedom in the last second. The icy air from outside immediately hit her face as she finally lurched out of the building. A breath of relief escaped her lungs.

Now what?

 A bit stricken by the sudden icy cold sensation pressing on her tear-stricken face; she pivoted to her left abruptly without looking, almost body slamming into an old couple who were in line waiting to buy tickets for tonight’s show. Flushing with guilt, she mumbled a quick apology to them before shoving her way through the crowd that was outside the theater. She could feel the hot glares from the couple piercing the back of her head as she scurried away.

She absently hoped nobody recognized her face from the billboards hanging on top of the building. She doubted any of them would see the resemblance between the perfect whimsical face portrayed in the show’s posters, and her currently disheveled face. She did worry that her bright red hair would give her away though.

She belatedly regretted her choice of outfit; sporting the cast members official hoodie with the show’s logo printed plainly on the back. People probably thought that she was a stage employee that had a nervous breakdown before the show or something. Covering her hair and face with the hoodie cap as best as she could, she tried to camouflage herself in crowd, looking for a place to hide temporarily.

A glimmer of hope surged within her as a bright neon sign right next to the theater caught her eye, an idea forming as she walked toward the white, green, and orange sign.

She got inside the Seven-Eleven that was conveniently situated next to the theatre; the smell of burnt coffee and detergent comforted her senses as she crossed the convenience store, and hid behind the cookies and pastries aisle. She would wait here until the show started and then she could safely limp her way to her car.

Feeling finally safe, she bent over; panting, trying to calm her heart and even out her breathing; droplets of sweat sliding from her nose to the floor.

After a while, she sat down on the white tile floor, knocking in the process a Key Lime Pie Oreo box with the brush of her arm. Staring at the metallic blue and green box lying in front of her, a shaky sigh escaped her lips. Her reality, like the cookies crashing all of a sudden in front of her.

Did she just… completely ruin her acting career?

She hugged her knees to her chest, trying desperately not to wince in pain and attract any unwanted attention toward herself. Her bruised knee protesting with the movement.

She really should have thought twice before leaping that way that she did. She was always the worst dancer in her ballet classes. She couldn’t fathom now why she thought it was a great idea to try and skip the stairs with a fucking ‘Saut de Chat’.

She shook her head. She never thought twice, and that was her ultimate doom, she thought darkly; as she started to recall the events leading to this week; trying to figure out exactly where everything went wrong.

She was so lucky she was cast in this musical. After months of auditions and callbacks, she made the cut. She was working with probably the most talented musical theatre actors in the country. The pay was good, the production was big enough. The director whom she loved, was a genius and a good man. She got along with all of the actors. She couldn’t be more blessed. Her career had never been better.

But after of couple of months, her fellow actors seemed to start to get tired of her existence. The jokes that she would often tell that once made them smile and giggle, where now met rolling eyes. Her enthusiasm was met with sarcasm. Within weeks, the annoyance turned into full blown intolerance. Everybody made mistakes each show, and usually they were very forgiving and patient with each other…except with her.

If she made the slightest mistake during a scene, they would whisper harshly at her between scenes ‘What the fuck was that?!’ ‘How can you be so clumsy?’ ‘You are grabbing my hand wrong’ Once after a small mistake she made during a scene transition, she could feel how one of them got immediately angry. On the intermission, she immediately apologized to him, trying to defuse the situation beforehand. His response was a loud “You FUCKING AMATEUR! Stop apologizing and get your shit together.” After that he casually turned around to keep talking to his fellow co-star as if nothing had happened. The both started laughing and completely ignored how tears slid through her cheeks right in front of them.

She never apologized again after that.

She could ignore the snide comments for the most part. She usually told herself that the disgust she heard in their voice was probably her imagination; that the daggers she could feel from their glances was her persecutory anxiety speaking for her. Maybe they were that way because they only wanted to help her be a better performer. Maybe she deserved it.

A week after the ‘amateur’ incident; she could sense how the cast turned against her one by one. She could hear whispers and giggles from the hall coming through the dressing room, and each time she would open that red door; everybody would stop speaking immediately, looking at her with disdain; making her feel left out, and that they were probably taking about her.

She often spoke about this situation with her therapist -every actor needed one to stay sane-. They would often come to the conclusion that the benefits outweighed the downsides of being in the show. She was getting good money, her name was often mentioned in the theatre community, she was a fan favorite. If she survived maybe the director would cast her in different roles in the future. She only needed to endure the rest of the season, and she could move on.

She had been avoiding everyone for weeks, trying to disappear in the background and trying to be perfect in her role so their attention could go elsewhere.

She often fantasized about the possibility to go back in time to fix things… maybe if she didn’t speak so loudly from the start, they wouldn’t hate her. Maybe if she could prevent every micro mistake, they would tolerate her; maybe if she didn’t talk about her cat that one day, maybe if she didn’t apologize that time, she would be friends with everyone. Maybe if she wasn’t so awkward, if she had been assertive and drawn the line right from the beginning, this wouldn’t be happening.

She had never been good at confrontations. Maybe if she went back in time with what she knew now; she would have taken the weekend off last week to grieve instead of showing up to the theatre.

She shut her eyes, trying to suppress the sobs that threatened to escape her. Her mother died last week. She suffered an aneurism last Monday and died that same Friday in the hospital. All alone. She was performing in the show when her mom passed away. She didn’t even find out until she turned on her phone in the subway later that night on her way home. She remembered the dread she felt when she noticed the 16 missed calls for the hospital, and the way her breath left her lungs before fainting after she heard the news.

She was afraid to ask the production if she could take the rest of the weekend off. She already felt that she was walking on thin ice with them, knowing very well that the cast reported every single of her mistakes with production all the time and she didn’t want to get in any more trouble. She knew if she missed a show, they would find a way to kick her out.

She showed up, the very next day. She asked briefly to the stage manager if she could have an aspirin because her head hurt from the Clonazepam that she had been prescribed by her therapist that morning to be able to keep it together. The stage manager and the director were the only people she told that her mother had died the night before. They were concerned for her and wanted her to take the weekend of, but she refused. Knowing the true consequences.

Even though her heart was heavy, and that she didn’t dare think or speak about her mother, fearing what her cast mates would say to her, she gave excellent performances both on Saturday and Sunday. She briefly thought about taking clonazepam more frequently before shows because it would stop her racing thoughts about making small mistakes. She gave less of a fuck.

Two days later she received a call from her producer. He wanted to speak to her immediately via Zoom. She agreed, thinking that he had found out about her mother and wanted to call her to check up on her and give her his condolences.

It turned out, that the reason for the Zoom meeting was taking place, was because several cast members reported that she was taking heavy drugs before this weekend´s performances, endangering the show and the rest of the actors; that, and several old reports as well that said that she was hostile towards her fellow actors.

She was dumfounded at first by the accusations, she figured that probably someone had probably overheard her conversation earlier and used that information against her. Bubbling rage consumed her. Not now, not right after her mother’s death, not the day she needed to decide in which fucking vase her remains where to be kept for eternity. She was done being everybody’s emotional trash can.

She blurted out everything. The amateur incident, the snide remarks, the envy, everything. She set the producer straight about the clonazepam, she sent him her medical prescription. He was utterly shocked by all the information dumped on him by her in a rant that lasted several businesses. They agreed they would have a general meeting next Friday with production, staff, musicians and actors in the main dressing room, to see what was going on.

Fast forward to Friday and the meeting happened. The producer talked about the clonazepam, the mistreatment, about everything. They fucking denied everything. It was her word against their word. They said that she was an amateur, that she didn’t know what she was doing, that she was terribly miscast, that she wanted to sabotage the show, that probably she was lying about her mother’s death.

That was it.

Now she was here, cowering in the floor of the Seven-Eleven right next to the theatre. Her character had no understudy, no back up, the show was probably going to be cancelled if she didn’t appear soon. She hoped it did get cancelled though, she thought vehemently. It served them right.

After so many years, taking shitty call center jobs in the morning so she could pay her unaffordable rent and to pay countless acting, singing and dance classes; after so many days where she would gag while eating instant noodles for the 17^th time each month, she finally got her dream part. But now after one abrupt comment, she was probably out.  She didn’t know if she cared or not at that moment, she was more concerned about the pain from her knee that wasn’t going away.

Feeling the waves of pain that emanated from her knee which intensified with each movement, she stood up to buy some ice for the swelling. This is so unfair, she angrily thought. Maybe if she could go back in time, she might as well could just not skip those last stairs like a moron.

As soon as she stood up, she froze.

Her director was standing in the entrance, looking at her with wide eyes.

He reached an arm towards her as if she was a frightened doe.

“Lucy…”

“I’m not going back in there” She responded with a calm that she didn’t quite feel. She didn’t want to get torn apart anymore. She needed to stand her ground.

“We need to talk.” he said with an equal calm voice. He took a step closer to her.

She stepped back, knocking a couple of instant ramen cups from the shelve behind her. She grimaced, feeling suddenly ashamed and embarrassed by her clumsiness. “You should probably go back to the theatre” she said with a quavering voice. “Time is running out. The show is about to start and you don’t have a female protagonist.” she continued.

“I don’t care about the show right now” he said while he gently reached for her hand. He smiled, clasping her sweaty hand with his own larger one.

“We have all the time in the world.”