Dreams by Starlight

By Staci Stallings

Chapter 1

Grateful for the minimal shield that her wire-rimmed copper and gold glasses afforded, Camille Wright sat in the counselor's office digging her fingernails into her palms and praying that things could get no worse.

"I have to be honest, Camille," Gerald Marsh said as he shook his gray and silver-streaked head. "I am looking at this, and I'm saying t o myself, 'Okay, she's got the grades, but I want somebody with something other than just academic abilities." He held up her transcript. "I see nothing here that leads me to believe you would do well with anything other than books."

Camille let the long, limp strands of her dead-weed blonde hair fall into her face as her shoulders shrank over her chest. "I thought that was a good thing."

"It is, but so are other things-like speaking and sports and music," Mr. Marsh said. "I'm just saying if you'd take a class that's not purely academic, it'd sure help your chances of getting into Princeton."

She didn't say anything-she couldn't. Her stomach was wound around the air in her lungs so tightly that even breathing was asking too much of her system at the moment.

"I was thinking you could choose between debate and drama," Mr. Marsh said, holding the class schedule across the desk so she could see it.

"How about Journalism?" Camille asked, her voice squeaking on the word.

Mr. Marsh shook his head. "You're not hearing me. You need something where you have to get up in front of people."

"Band," she said quietly as her hand pushed back her hair and then let if fall back exactly where it had been.

"The marching band has already been on the field working for three weeks, and the symphonic band is your only other option." His narrowed eyes surveyed her. "But if I'm not mistaken you don't even play an instrument."

"I could play the tambourine or something. That can't be too hard."

Slowly he looked down at the transcript on his desk and then back up at her. "Drama or debate?"

It sounded like a death sentence. She didn't want to do either. She wanted to take another math class or computers, anything other than the two classes staring at her from that class schedule.

Her gaze finally dropped back to her fingernails. "Drama."

"Good." Mr. Marsh wrote the course choice on her schedule. "Now, about your SAT scores."

* * *

"Hey, it's J.P. and Ariana, back from summer vacation," Seth Taylor said, ambling up to his locker with his black and gold backpack slung over his shoulder.

"It's the S man," Jaylon Patrick Quinn said, raising his hand, which Seth immediately hit in greeting. "Senior year. Can you believe we finally made it?"

"Are you kidding me? I was born for senior year." Seth's arm stuck out from under his off-white with red plaid lines button down shirt as he opened his locker and shoved his belongings into it. "How about you, Ari? You excited about this new adventure?"

Putting a long, slender hand to her mouth, Ariana Vandivere yawned as if she had never been so bored.

Jaylon laughed. He laid one arm across her shoulders and shifted his books to his other hip. "So what do you have first thing?"

"Chemistry," Seth said as an annoyed smirk crossed his freckled features. "You?"

He hadn't even been yet, and Jaylon was already tired of it. "English."

"English?" Seth raised his red-blonde eyebrows. "Yikes."

Jaylon shrugged. "You have English sometime, too. Don't you?"

"I wouldn't know. I haven't looked that far down my schedule yet."

Jaylon shook his head, causing his feathery brown locks to fall across his eye. Retrieving his hand from her shoulders, he swooped it back as the tall, leggy brunette by his side yawned again.

Seth laughed. "You know, Ari, if I didn't know better, I'd think you didn't get enough sleep last night." He slammed his locker just as the bell sounded above them.

With a kick, Jaylon pushed away from the lockers. "Let the agony begin."

"Maybe I could go to the nurse's station and tell them I'm sick," Camille said, actually feeling more sick than well at the moment.

"For the whole year?" Lexie Everson, Camille's best friend, asked with a shake of her head. "I don't think that'll work."

Camille's slender shoulders sank even lower until they almost touched the table. "There has to be some way out of this. I mean, drama? Ugh."

After a slow survey of her friend, Lexie shook her head and laughed.

Camille narrowed her eyes in frustration at her friend. "What?"

"You act like you're being sent to the gas chamber."

"I am," Camille said pitifully as the table pulled her head all the way down.

"It could be worse." Lexie's cocoa-colored hand brought another bite to her mouth, and she ate that bite while Camille's mind searched through its files trying to find anything that could conceivably be worse. "Marsh could've signed you up for debate."

Camille lifted her head only inches from the table. "Ha. Ha."

Lexie's almond gaze stared back at her friend playfully and then caught on movement by the cafeteria doors. Her shoulders did that slow seductive relaxation at the sight. "Besides any class where you can look at Jaylon Quinn all period is okay in my books."

Camille glanced over her shoulder at the strong face, framed by the wispy, brown hair that seemed disheveled and perfect at the same time, and she shook her head. Still watching him cross the cafeteria, a flicker of hope slipped through her. "The only good thing is, with Ariana around, I don't have a prayer of getting anything more than a line or two."

"True," Lexie said, and then she looked at her friend and shrugged. "So don't worry about it. They'll probably put you on make-up detail or something."

Her mind said she should be offended by the comment, but still Camille's heart hoped that the universe would be so kind. "From your mouth to God's ears."

"Class," Mrs. Allen called from the stage as students milled about the auditorium. She clapped twice in a vain attempt to get their attention. "Please, come on up and take your seats."

With an exasperated shake of her head, Camille pushed away from the shadow she was hoping to hide in for the next year. Keeping her gaze on her feet, which were swathed in darkness somewhere beneath her, she walked down the center aisle and slipped into a fourth row seat. The majority of the class sat in the first three rows until it was clear that only she and two other similarly be-speckled and reluctant thespians would be the only ones in the fourth row.

"Good." Mrs. Allen, a forty-ish ex-dancer with cinnamon-colored skin and a voice that seemed to come from her toes, moved like grace personified from the edge of the auditorium to the center. "I'd like to welcome you all to Theatre Production. I'm sure we are going to have a wonderful year together. First, I'd like to go over the ground rules."

Camille studied the chipped peach paint on her fingernails. No matter how hard she tried, she could never keep polish on them for more than a day. She forced her attention back to the stage.

"...and no matter what, remember that every person is here to learn. There will be no making fun of anyone. Is that understood?" Mrs. Allen's gaze swept across her audience.

In front of Camille, heads nodded, and although she was in the back, it felt like every gaze in the auditorium was on her. With her around, the others would have plenty of laugh material. She closed her eyes, slid further down into the seat, and pursed her lips together trying to remember why it was she was here.

"Good. Now, I'd like you all to come up onto the stage," Mrs. Allen said, pulling them forward with welcoming arms that looked like a willow trees branches blowing in the wind.

Students stood, filed out of the rows, up the steps, and onto the stage. They stood in various spots around the stage shifting their feet and their gazes nervously even though there wasn't a soul left in the audience.

"Okay, we're going to start with breathing exercises." Mrs. Allen pulled her body and shoulders up a full inch.

Camille swallowed and pushed up her glasses. Breathing. That couldn't be too hard.

An hour later when Camille walked out of the auditorium after stuffing her new drama book into her backpack along with the others, she fought to stay invisible in the middle of a crush of students. The air flowing into her lungs stung.

"So, how was it?" Lexie asked as Camille grabbed most of her books out of her locker.

"Awful."

"Really? What did you do?" Lexie asked with concern.

Making as much noise as possible, Camille slammed two books back into the locker. "We breathed for a whole hour."

Lexie raised her jet-black eyebrows. "Yeah, that sounds like real torture."

"I know how to breathe." Camille swung her backpack to her shoulder angrily. "I've been doing it for 17 years now."

"So, great, an easy A then."

"Yeah, real easy," Camille said just as Lexie grabbed her arm in a death grip. "Hey. That hurts."

"It's him," Lexie said as her eyes widened into two full moons as she gazed down the hallway.

Camille looked in the direction Lexie was staring and shook her head. Jaylon Quinn. He was good-looking but really, he wasn't a god or anything. "Come on."

"Where are we going?" Lexie asked in surprise.

"Single dipped cones on me. To celebrate making it through our first day of senior year."

* * *

"I'd like everyone to get a partner," Mrs. Allen said the next afternoon as Camille and the rest of the class stood on stage. Very few were even brave enough to make eye contact. "We're going to practice mirroring."

A collective groan went up from the group, and Camille looked around wondering what mirroring was and knowing at the same time it would be far worse than breathing.

"Want to partner?" a nice looking blonde-headed guy, who suddenly stood at her elbow, asked.

Camille shifted her hair and shrugged. "Whatever."

"Okay." Mrs. Allen walked among her charges. "The object of this exercise is to create a perfect mirror for your partner. Choose which of you will go first, and the other person is to match their partner's body language and facial expression as perfectly as you can. Basically, you are to be your partner's mirror. You may begin."

The blonde-headed guy who was at least six inches taller than Camille glanced at her shyly. "Umm, you want to go first or should I?"

"I don't care. You can-if you want," Camille said, looking around at their fellow-students who were already well into the exercise.

"Okay," her partner said with a small smile. He struck an innocent pose with his head slightly tilted to the side.

Camille cocked her own head and watched him for his next cue. Slowly he raised his arms in a stretch and then bent to one side, which she followed to perfection. It felt strange to be only inches from someone she didn't know but even more strange was watching that person without being able to look away. They both came back to the center, and her arms followed his down.

Her entire concentration was focused on him-not as a person but as her own reflection. He put his arms out at his sides and twisted, an action that baffled her for a moment as she started to turn in the same direction he did and then realized that a mirror would turn the other way. Immediately she reversed her course, just as he reversed his. Her body jerked from the fluidity of the previous moment, and the concentration dropped from her grasp.

She squeezed her eyes closed trying to get it back, but when she opened them again, her partner was doing a cross-body toe-touch that she had somehow missed. Quickly she tried to imitate him just as he straightened back up meeting the top of her forehead on the way down.

The crack of her skull sent tiny white pulses spiraling through it. "Oww!" she yelped, backing away from her partner but her heel snagged on the student behind her and before she realized what was happening the hardwood stage floor was rushing toward her. "Ahh!"

In less than a heartbeat she hit the wooden slats with a thud. For a minute she didn't know what part of her body hurt worse-her head or her tailbone. In the next breath, however, she realized that every other person on the stage was staring at her.

Like a displeased drill sergeant Mrs. Allen walked up as several students around the stage snickered. "What's going on over here?"

"I'm sorry," Camille's partner said, clutching his own head as he offered Camille a hand up. "I didn't see her coming down."

Mrs. Allen regarded them with a look that could've cut glass. "You see, class, this is a perfect example of what happens when you break concentration on stage for even a second." She planted both hands on her hips and shook her head in annoyance. "Learn from this people."

She walked away from the disaster as Camille scrambled to her feet and resumed her place in front of her partner. Once there, however, she had to blink twice to get her head to stop spinning.

Her partner leaned in to her. "Sorry about that."

"Don't worry about it," she whispered back, brushing her jeans off and readjusting her glasses as she willed the heat pulsing through her ears to subside. "It was my fault."

"Okay," Mrs. Allen said with a clap of her hands. "I see that mirroring is a little advanced for the second day, so we're just going to try to do some more breathing exercises. Maybe we'll try this again next week."

Oh, good, Camille thought. Something to look forward to.

"Hey." The blonde-headed guy sprinted up the aisle to Camille's side as she tried to make a quick exit. "I didn't catch your name."

Her spirit surrendered to the mortification. "Why would you want it?"

"That was an accident," he said, mirroring her steps through the hallway. "Besides, somebody had to break up the monotony."

"I hear you there," Camille said still walking but no longer trying to get away from him.

"So?" he asked after they had walked several steps. "I still didn't catch your name."

"Camille." She swung her braid to the other shoulder and put out a falsely positive hand. "Camille Wright."

He smiled a toothy white smile. "Well, Camille Wright. It's nice to meet you. I'm Nick. Nick McGee."

"It's nice to meet you, Nick," Camille said, wishing he hadn't just been witness to her most embarrassing moment ever.

"Well, Cami," Lexie said, apparently not realizing Camille's shadow was actually walking with her. "So, how bad was drama today?"

Heat seared over Camille's ears. "Lexie." She cleared her throat, and swung her braid in the other direction. "I'd like you to meet Nick McGee."

Camille watched as Nick stopped in the same breath that Lexie's face fell in utter shock.

"Hi," Lexie breathed as Nick took her hand and smiled.

"Hi." Their gazes locked, and for a full second Camille felt totally invisible.

"Well, I'd better get going," Nick said finally dropping Lexie's hand but not her gaze. "I guess I'll see you tomorrow, Camille."

"Sure," Camille said, knowing neither one of them heard the word.

Nick turned and disappeared into the crowd, but Lexie never moved.

"Oh, man." Camille turned to her locker in exasperation. "That's got to be the most embarrassing thing that's ever happened to me, and for me, that's saying a lot." She looked over at Lexie who hadn't moved. "Lexie, hey!" Frustrated at having no one listening to her plight, Camille waved her hand in front of her friend's face. "You still in there?"

"Sure," Lexie said, but Camille knew Lexie hadn't even heard her own voice.

"They really should have two separate drama classes-at least." Ariana clicked her tongue in annoyance as they sat in a small booth at Sal's Place, the local kids' hangout, Friday night. "I mean really, are they kidding me, putting someone like her in a class with us? Jeez. It's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard of."

"It was that bad?" Seth asked over his cheese fries.

"Worse," Ariana said, shaking her head.

Jaylon nodded, trying to be more diplomatic about the situation than his girlfriend was being, but not really succeeding. "We started with breathing yesterday. Breathing. That's like preschool drama, and you should see these kids. They couldn't breathe right if someone did it for them. Does not bode well for the Spring Production from what I can see."

"Ugh! If I don't get into Julliard, my life will be over," Ariana said like the drama queen Jaylon had so gotten used to appeasing over the past three years.

"Don't worry, Honey." Jaylon rested his arm over her side of the booth. "We're going-just like we planned. Even Mrs. Allen can't mess that up."

Chapter 2

"So, are you still seeing stars?" Nick asked Camille with a laugh on Monday afternoon.

She looked up from her seat mid-way from the front of the auditorium and closed her Physics II book. "No, they left sometime Sunday night."

"You're lucky," he said with a smirk as he leaned against the chair back in front of her. "I woke up with them again this morning."

"Class!" Mrs. Allen said as she pulled a blackboard onto the stage. "Let's get started. Take out your notebooks and pens, please."

"Joy for joy," Nick said under his breath as he straightened. "Come on."

Camille stumbled to her feet and followed Nick wishing there was some way to run the other direction. He went all the way down the aisle where he turned into the third row, right. She didn't want to follow him that far forward as the fiasco from Friday continued to replay itself in her mind, but he had been so nice to her, she didn't see any other option. Carefully she wound her way into the row of seats and sat down next to him.

He laid his books on his lap as she quickly pulled her own notebook from her backpack and pulled one of the pens from behind her ear.

"Today we're going to talk about your other assignments for this class besides actual acting," Mrs. Allen said not even waiting for the class to get quiet. "First of all we're going to discuss play analysis. When you are presented with a new character to play, you take your first cues from the script. That way you don't approach a character from different angles in each scene.

"The point of playing any character-no matter how small or large the part-is to understand the motivations of that character and to convey them to the audience whether you're speaking or not." Mrs. Allen turned toward the blackboard. "Every character has a story arc that has a beginning, a middle, and an end, and each character must come to some conclusion by the end of the play, most if not all characters are changed somehow by the action of the play."

She turned back from the blackboard and began pacing the stage in front of them as all gazes followed her. "You, the actor, are responsible for making that happen in a believable, realistic fashion. One way to divine a character's motivation is to read and analyze the stage directions for that character."

Once again at the blackboard she rolled the chalk in her hands for a moment and then began copying in very small letters the words on the sheet clipped onto the board she held in the other hand. "For example, if you have these stage directions for a character: indulgent, jovial, hoarsely, fury, crying, rising, emphatic, exasperated, very annoyed, morosely, hoarsely, heavily, glare, morosely, awkward, roars, irately, very courtly, gallantly, marches off, hastily, stares, cannot hold it back, stomps, roaring, marches, hardly notice, nonplussed, uncertainly, very annoyed, outraged, astonished, endeavors to control voice, in a wrath, snatches, in a sputter of ire, with dignity, toss, marches, very angry, reluctantly, with patience, vexedly, dourly, exploding, nonplussed, frowning, red-faced, stares hard, teeth in cigar, stares, heavily, irate surrender, shakes the cigar, marches out and slams the door, grasps his wrist, twisting him half to his knees, angrily, throws him away, with contempt, stands motionless, gently, harshly, heavily, indulgent, gently, curiously, consenting, gently, smiles, offers an arm, serving, not noticing, embarrassed, gently, reasonably, testily, tolerant, angrily, glares, stare is unbelieving, even a little fascinated, gruff, mildly, goes to his knees . . . What can you tell me about this character without ever reading a single line of dialogue?"

"He's a control freak," Jaylon Quinn said from the other side of the auditorium, and immediately Camille's attention snapped to him.

"Interesting," Mrs. Allen said with a nod. "And how do you know the character is a he?"

Jaylon shrugged. "Cigar? Twisting an opponent to his knees? Offered an arm? Women don't do that kind of thing, and at the end he went to his knees."

"Very observant. Okay, so how do you know he's a control freak?"

"Well." Jaylon shifted in his seat and scratched the bridge of his nose. "He's alternately angry then gentle, then angry again, then gentle. And then when things really get out of his control, he sputters with ire and explodes. I think that he thinks he's really in control, but he's not."

"How can someone believe he's in control if he's really not?" Mrs. Allen asked as though she had never considered this question.

Jaylon shook his head as his gaze narrowed in concentration. "He's trying to put on this gallant, dignified front, but for some reason he feels out of control so he does everything he can to get control again."

Camille couldn't tear her gaze from Jaylon's profile across the room-not because of the straight jaw line or the feathers of hair-but because of the depth of his words and the certainty with which he spoke them.

"Would anyone else like to add anything to that observation?" Mrs. Allen asked, looking at the rest of the class.

"I think at the end he comes to some realization," Nick said in full voice right in Camille's ear causing her to jump back to reality.

"Why do you say that?" Mrs. Allen asked.

Nick pointed his pen at the blackboard. "He goes to his knees. Someone who's a control freak doesn't go to his knees. That shows weakness, vulnerability. Control freaks refuse to be vulnerable."

"Well," Mrs. Allen said with a nod, "I'm impressed. The character the two of you just described is from a play called, 'The Miracle Worker.' Has anybody heard of it?"

Most of the heads in the room nodded.

"Could someone tell me what the play is about?"

"Helen Keller," someone offered from in front of Camille.

"Good, Kara, and what was remarkable about Helen Keller?"

"She was born blind and deaf," someone else from the other side of the auditorium said.

Mrs. Allen nodded and gestured to the small letters on the blackboard. "So, is this describing Helen Keller?"

"No," several students said at once.

"Then who is it describing?" Mrs. Allen asked, and the auditorium fell silent for a beat.

"Her father," Jaylon said with a conviction that yanked Camille's gaze back to his face.

Instantly Mrs. Allen smiled. "Very good, Jaylon. Mind telling me how you came to that conclusion?"

"Well, we've already said that it's a he, so that rules out the mother. And we've said he feels out of control. I think having a blind and deaf daughter-especially if you're used to being in control of things-would make you feel out of control. It follows that it's the father."

Mrs. Allen's head fell in respect. "You see. You haven't read a single line of the play, and yet look how much you know about this character." She laid the chalk in the tray and rubbed her hands together. "That will be your first assignment. In your books, the first play is 'The Glass Menagerie' by Tennessee Williams. Your assignment is to choose one character and read through only the stage directions for that character, picking out words that describe motivation. Then I want you to write a 400-word paper describing that character based solely on his or her stage cues."

Camille wrote the assignment in her notebook.

"This is due Friday when you walk into class," Mrs. Allen said, and Camille transferred that information to her notebook as well just as the bell rang.

In surprise she looked at her watch, having not realized so much time had evaporated. She closed her notebook, shoved it into her backpack, and stood.

Nick swung his own backpack to his shoulder and stood. "You going to your locker?"

"Uh, yeah," Camille said as she swung the backpack to her shoulder.

"Mind if I tag along?" Nick asked, following her out of the row.

She shrugged not really seeing a good reason to tell him no, and together they walked out of the auditorium. In the hallway, students rushed in a myriad of directions around them.

"That was some class," Nick said.

"Yeah. I never realized you could get so much information from the stage directions. I thought they were just like there. You know?"

Nick nodded just as they reached her locker.

"Hey, Lex," Camille said to her friend who turned and immediately froze. "I missed you at lunch."

"Yeah," Lexie said never so much as glancing at her friend.

Camille looked back from her locker and raised a concerned eyebrow. The two of them looked like they'd just been transported to an alternate universe where other students weren't jostling them like a liquid in a blender. She shook her head. "So, are we going to my place or not?"

"Umm, yeah, of course," Lexie said, and Camille was sure Lexie had no idea what she'd just agreed to.

"Great." Camille yanked her backpack from the floor and pulled three more books out of her locker. "Then let's go." She took hold of Lexie's arm and turned her toward the door. "We'll see you later, Nick."

"Okay," he said as if he was talking to a ghost. "See ya."

Camille was halfway down the block to the bus stop before she let Lexie's arm go. However, she knew with only one look at her friend that if she let her out of her sight, Lexie might end up at the far ends of the earth and never be found again.

Wordlessly, they walked to the city bus stop, mounted the steps, and rode to Camille's stop. Every so often Camille would look over at Lexie and shake her head. She had never seen Lexie like this-not in ten years, and although she would never have admitted it to anyone, it scared her. With one look at some mildly good-looking boy, her friend had completely forgotten she even existed. Her gaze found the back of the bus seat and then the floorboard.

Reflexively she pulled her books down to look over her homework for the evening. The first book her glance chanced on was Experiments in Drama, and she smiled. If everyday could be like today, she could almost envision herself enjoying the class. If they just didn't have to get on stage. She pushed that thought away and grabbed her Chemistry II book. Important things first.

* * *

Camille managed to stay out of Mrs. Allen's sights the whole week, and on Friday she laid her paper on the stack of others being sent to the center aisle. She shrank back into the darkness of the seats, praying they wouldn't have to go on stage today. Out here, in the darkness was where she belonged-more than that, it was the only place in the auditorium where her body knew what to do.

On stage it was as if everyone in the whole world was looking at her, waiting for her to fall on her face again. It frazzled her nerves to the point that crashing off the stage into the front row was not an improbability.

"I thought we'd take a little break today and play wink murder," Mrs. Allen said from her perch on the center of the stage.

'Wink' sounded okay, but 'murder' could be a problem, Camille thought, shifting in her seat.

"I want you all to come up here." Mrs. Allen pushed her hands under her and vaulted to her feet as her students filed slowly up onto the stage. "Now, I want you all to sit in a circle facing each other."

"I bet they don't do this at Julliard," the tall reed-thin girl with the blunt-cut, barely shoulder length, just-lighter-than-ebony hair that Camille recognized as Ariana Vandivere said as she folded herself onto the floor theatrically. Her creamy white skin coupled with the severe straight skirt told Camille with one look that Ariana hadn't sat on many floors. Right next to drama queen Jaylon Quinn knelt and then sat without so much as a word of complaint, and it occurred to Camille that he could make planting petunias on Neptune look perfectly realistic.

Giggles sounded around Camille as she forced her gaze away from Ariana and Jaylon. A picture of him shrouded in a dim auditorium expounding on the intricacies of a fearful father flooded her mind. Quickly she pushed that thought away too and straightened her jeans that were a bit too tight for sitting on floors.

"The object of this game is for the murderer to kill everyone in the circle before someone else guesses who the murderer is." Mrs. Allen handed out regular playing cards around the assembled circle, her voice taking on the air of a Masterpiece Theatre narrator. "The murderer kills people by winking at them, but he or she does it in such a way so as to not get caught by anyone else. When you get winked at, you must die-in whatever manner you choose. All I ask is that when you die you don't hurt yourself or anyone else."

Nervous laughter flitted across the group as they sat looking at each other.

"If you catch the murderer, you get a bonus five points on your analysis paper. If you are the murderer, and you do not get caught, you receive ten points. If you die, you're out of luck."

Camille sat up straighter with the raising of the stakes.

"Now, I want you to look at your card, but don't show it to anyone else. If you have the ace of spades, you are the murderer. Good luck everyone. You may begin."

Uneasy gazes flitted from face-to-face as Camille surveyed each face in the group. Most were merely average, a few more striking, and one of them was now a murderer. A shriek erupted right next to her, and Camille turned just in time to watch Nick fall over-dead from a wink.

She steeled her nerves, swallowed the ridiculous trepidation that jumped into her chest, and looked back at the group. After several heart-stopping moments a gasp sounded across the room, and immediately another student slumped forward. Camille's attention was locked on the fallen girl just long enough for another student at her left to clutch his chest and wheeze his final breath. Her mind fought to remind her nerves that this was just a game, but her nerves weren't getting the message.

"AAHHHH!" one student yelled, jumping to his feet and running for the stairs where he stumbled forward, then backward two steps before falling dead on the top step.

More nervous laughter surrounded her as Camille looked over the "dead" bodies into the eyes of each of the remaining students. A scream yanked her attention to the girl sitting right next to her and then another sounded across the room, and she watched Jaylon fall forward, where he twitched for a moment before falling still.

"It's Mark," a girl from her right shrieked.

"Shoot!" Mark slapped his hands on the stage as everyone laughed.

"Good job, Tessa." Mrs. Allen stood and beckoned to the boy still draped over the top stair. "Keane, you can come back now." She dealt out another round of cards, and the game began again.

Tony, Jill, Darrin, Cathy, Stephanie. One-by-one they were each unmasked before they could fell more than a few victims. However, by the end of class they were facing the craftiest murderer yet. Fourteen students lay dead on the floor already-only five remained, four potential victims, and one killer. The bell rang, but not a single student in the auditorium moved.

Camille's nerves jumped to the surface as she felt Nick's shoulder brush hers. The two of them were locked in a deadly hunt. She could feel it. She fought to keep her gaze on the faces in the circle.

"That's the bell," Mrs. Allen said, standing when it seemed no one else had heard it.

"No," Nick said instantly. "We want to finish this."

Without taking her gaze off her adversaries, Camille nodded. One at a time, she scrutinized the remaining male faces-Nick, the blonde hair, the blue eyes; Mark, buzz-cut red hair and freckles framing the hazel eyes; Jaylon, the high cheekbones rising beneath the steel hard eyes; and Keane, the ash blonde hair moused to attention and playful mischievous green eyes. Just then as she watched him, Keane's face contorted in horror.

"Oh! OH! OH!" Keane screamed in a voice that would've shattered the eardrums of a person in the back row had there been one.

Camille's gaze locked for a single moment on Jaylon's profile-it was the direction Keane had been looking just before his demise. His eye fell closed-killing Mark just as Camille and Nick jumped up simultaneously.

"It's Jaylon!" they both shouted, pointing at him from across the circle and pulling all gazes to them.

Jaylon's gaze snapped to them as Camille shrank behind Nick for shelter from the searing look.

"Very good." Mrs. Allen came toward the circle clapping. "But I guess the two of you'll have to split the five points."

Nick shrugged and put his hand up for Camille. "We win! Good job."

"Thanks." Awkwardness leaped over her as she reached up to slap his hand but barely touching it instead.

"Have a good weekend, everyone," Mrs. Allen called as the students filed off the stage and out of the auditorium.

"Good job." Jaylon extended his hand to Nick without bothering to address Camille.

"Thanks," Nick said as he descended the stairs. "I was starting to think we had a master killer on our hands."

Jaylon nodded respectfully. "But you brought me down anyway."

Nick grabbed his books from the seats. "Yeah. Better luck next time."

At the door Ariana joined them, and Jaylon draped a casual arm over her shoulder. "So, you want to join us for some after-school beverages at Sal's?"

Camille shrunk even farther back, cowering behind her books. She knew the invitation did not include her.

"No can do," Nick said with a shake of his head. "Camille and I already have plans. Isn't that right, Camille?"

In utter shock Camille looked at him and then readjusted her glasses. "Oh, umm, sure. We're going . . . to the . . . umm, library." It was all she could think of, but once it was out of her mouth, she knew how lame that sounded.

"Oh, well." Ariana fanned out her long, straight hair and smile the fakest smile Camille had ever seen. "That's too bad."

"Yeah," Jaylon said, looking at Camille as though she had just appeared there out of thin air. "Too bad."

Camille's gaze searched the near-empty hallway for anything resembling shelter as the tips of her ears went red-hot.

"Well, we'd better get." Nick took hold Camille's arm and steered her in the other direction. "We'll see you guys Monday."

Jaylon shrugged once and then turned in the other direction.

Her mind was in turmoil. "Do you mind telling to me what just happened?"

Nick sighed. His face went hard as he dropped her arm. "They're jerks." Dismissively he shook his head. "They think they own the whole darn place and everybody in it. It just gets to me sometimes."

Camille nodded her complete understanding of that fact. Then she scratched her braid. "Mind if I ask you something else?"

"Sure," he said, glancing at her as they walked.

"How did you know I wasn't the killer?"

"Oh, that's easy." A smile broke over his face. "You were sitting too close to me for it to have been you."

Her gaze dropped to the floor in embarrassment as she thought back to the stage and realized that they had been shoulder-to-shoulder although the stage was big enough to get thirty people between them if need be. Instantly the fire seared across her ears.

"Besides, Jaylon's the only one I know that could kill that many people without getting caught," Nick said as they approached Camille's locker.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Camille asked.

Nick shrugged. "I just know how he operates." Then he turned his attention to Lexie who was already leaning against the lockers watching them. "Hey, Lexie. How was your day?"

"Other than I'll never get all of this homework done, pretty good," Lexie said with a shy smile.

Camille threw her stuff into her locker and pulled out everything she needed for the weekend. With a swing she mounted the backpack on her shoulder and grabbed her other books. The only thing left in her locker was her drama book.

"Jeez, Camille," Nick said just as she slammed her locker closed. "Do you always take all your books home?"

She looked down at the books in her hands as her shoulders slumped over them. "I'm a little behind."

Nick raised an eyebrow at that and shook his head before shrugging. "Well, take care, you two. I'll see you Monday."

"'K. See ya," Camille said, wishing she could wave but not daring to even try it.

They stood in the middle of the empty hallway and watched him walk away.

"He's nice," Camille finally said as she turned for the door.

"Ugh," Lexie said as though Camille didn't have a clue. "He's more than nice. He's dreamy. So what do you know about him anyway? Is he going with anybody?"

"I don't know. We just kind of ended up together in drama. I know he's a senior, and he's been in drama since freshman year. That's about it."

Lexie wrinkled her face in annoyance as they mounted the bus steps. "You've spent two weeks with the dreamiest guy in school, and you didn't even bother to find out if he's going with anyone? What kind of moron are you anyway?"

"The kind who's not going to ask for you if you don't start being nice to me," Camille said with a smirk.

"Oh, would you?" Lexie actually bounced in her seat. "And find out about his family, too."

"Well, what do you want me to do, run a background check on the guy?"

Lexie's eyes widened. "Could you?"

Camille looked at her friend and laughed. "I'll find out as much as I can."

* * *

The Community Center was jammed with kids when Jaylon strode through the door Saturday morning. So far his plan was working to perfection. Ariana's idea of fun Saturday entertainment was walking though the mall until your feet fell off, and he had long-since begged off of that scene. Seth was usually busy with either his car or someone else's, and Seth had decided long ago that having Jaylon around anything mechanical meant several extra hours spent fixing everything Jaylon broke, so Seth no longer even asked.

In fact, although he and Seth had become friends in third grade, when they hit high school, that friendship had changed. Each of them had found their own paths, and their friendship transformed from spending every, single waking moment together to just spending time together when the opportunity presented itself.

That void had been filled by Ariana, and to Jaylon, that was just fine. He had a friend who never demanded anything and a girlfriend who demanded everything. They were a perfect fit.

"Jaylon," Mrs. Dixon, his direct supervisor, said with a glint in her eye. "The kids are so excited about this."

"They're ready?" he asked, trying not to sound like his heart might burst out of his chest at any moment.

"Yeah, they're already on the stage. You've got about 18 of them signed up. Are you sure you'll be able to handle that many?"

"Piece of cake," he said with a confident smile.

"Great." Mrs. Dixon handed him the list. "I'm here if you need anything."

Jaylon nodded and walked casually to the auditorium. Dressed in black pants, suspenders, and a gray-and-white striped shirt topped with a burgundy tie not to mention towering over the elementary kids, he looked every bit the part of the new teacher in town although he had never taught a class in his life.

"Please have a seat on the stage." His stage voice boomed through the auditorium. He looked over the kids who would be his charges for the next semester if all went well as they found a seat and got quiet. Jaylon had to fight not to laugh at how serious and awestruck they all looked. "I have a list of your names, but instead of reading it, I'd like for each of you to stand, say your name, and tell us your favorite thing to do." He surveyed the circle. "Let's start over here."

With heads ducked and gazes glued to the floor the students stood one by one and introduced themselves. As they did, Jaylon checked the name they gave against the list, listened for their favorite things, and then matched the two pieces of information with the face. Once all of the children were finished, Jaylon walked around the circle, and the gazes followed him.

"And my name is Jaylon Patrick Quinn." When he reached the opposite side of the circle, he sat down. "My favorite thing to do is to get up on stage and make audiences happy. Who can tell me what an audience is?"

Several hands went up.

"Katelyn?" Jaylon asked a small round-faced kid with a huge pink bow in her hair.

"It's the people who aren't on stage," Katelyn said.

"Very good. And can someone tell me what the people on the stage are called?"

Hands went up all around him.

"Cory?"

"Actors."

"Very good," Jaylon said. "Boy, I have a smart class."

Soft giggles wafted around him.

"Today we're going to practice being actors who can't talk," Jaylon said. "It's called pantomime. I'll show you how to do it first, and then I'll let you try."

Two hours later Jaylon was having the time of his life working to get out of an imaginary box when the parents started to show up to retrieve their kids. He heard the kids talking non-stop about the morning as their parents led them out, and he smiled. Volunteering had been a good idea.

When the last child had been collected, he walked back out to the office and told Mrs. Dixon he was leaving. On his way out of the building, he checked his watch. 12:25. He had more than two hours before he had to be at Ariana's. That was plenty of time to make his other stop of the day.

His metallic navy Camaro Z28 flashed through the streets of Ridgecrest, New York, as he crossed town to the Hollybrook Care Center where he whipped into a parking spot with the precision of hundreds of practice runs. He grabbed the book on the passenger's seat, hopped out, and strode across the parking lot and into the building where he greeted the receptionist.

"Elana will be happy to see you," the receptionist said as he signed the guest book.

With a smile he stepped over to the elevator and punched the button. The elevator dinged, and the doors slid open. He stepped on and punched the button for the basement. When the doors opened again, the smell of a place too sterile invaded his nostrils.

The pace of his steps increased on the white tile until they brought him right up to a set of heavy double doors. He punched in the code and then pushed through the doors. He had rounded still another corner before he met anyone.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Gosa," Jaylon said to the man bent over a walker taking steps so tiny it seemed that he wasn't moving at all. "How are you today?"

"Humph," the old man said, peering for a moment into Jaylon's eyes.

"Yeah. I'm here to see Grandma. Have you seen her lately?"

"Humph," Mr. Gosa said again.

"Oh, well, I'll be sure to tell her you said that." Jaylon laid a gentle hand on the old man's shoulder. "You take care of yourself. Okay?"

"Humph."

Jaylon walked passed the man and into Hollybrook's Alzheimer's Wing.

"Hey." He leaned on the nurse's station desk with both elbows. "How's everything?"

"Elana's in the sitting room," Ms. Lawson, the ebony-black head nurse, said with a smile.

"Got it." Jaylon pushed away from the desktop and ambled through the unit to the little room that overlooked the garden outside. There, in a wheelchair wrapped in her worn pink and yellow afghan, sat his grandmother. "Good afternoon, Beautiful."

He bent and kissed her cheek, and she looked up at him with unseeing eyes.

"Mr. Gosa said to say, 'Hi' when I came in." Jaylon leaned in closer to her ear. "I think he has a thing for you."

His grandmother just stared at him.

"Look what I brought." He held up a thin volume of Shakespeare's sonnets with a wink. "Just for you." Carefully he sat down on one of the vacant chairs and opened the book. "I think we left off with number 71."