Read Online The Me You See by Shay Ray Stevens - Free Book Online

them
something different, otherwise you just fade into their memory as being in a
show that was just like every other show they have ever seen.”
    She looked through the monologue books and couldn’t find
anything she liked so I went through my stash and gave her a copy of a piece
from Patient A .
    “Try this,” I said. “It’s pretty deep. It will set you
apart. And they will never guess you are only thirteen.”
    “I’m almost fourteen.”
    “Yeah,” I said, tasting the saliva that had collected in my
mouth.
    She skimmed through the paper I’d handed her.
    “What’s it about?”
    “A young woman who gets diagnosed with HIV.”
    “Oh god, really? Are you sure?”
    “Yes. I’m sure.”
    So she started reading it. Her voice shook with nerves
through the first paragraph.
    The first time I was tested for HIV, the test
wasn’t conclusive. So I had another one. That was inconclusive, too. So I had
one more. Five days after I turned twenty-two, the results came back positive.
The doctor gave me some time alone, before my folks came in. I began to cry. I
looked out the window, and the clouds were moving against the sun, swirling.
     But the farther she read down the sheet I had handed her,
the better she sounded.
    My mother was the first to come in. She knew as
soon as she looked at me. She came around and just lunged onto the bed and
cried and hugged me and pushed my hair back and...comforted me. She talked
about her own parents, who’d been killed years before in a car accident and how
they’d be waiting in heaven for me, along with Grandma Zebleckas and even their
dog that died, too. I think if she could have put everything that had ever
lived into heaven for me at that moment, she would have.
    By the time Stefia had reached the end of the monologue, I
was completely captivated by her voice, her face, the way her mouth formed the
words that others had written, the way she conveyed a meaning beyond what the
author had known.
    When we’d calmed down, my father came in. That
was harder... He shook, and he cried... I said, “Put your head on my shoulder,”
and he did. And I... petted his head, and said, “It’s going to be ok. We’re
going to get through this.” And Mom was rubbing his back, and he just kept
crying and crying. He kept saying it had to be a mistake, that he didn’t
believe it, that it can’t be. It just can’t be. And I said, “Dad, it is.”
    After a full ten seconds of silence and multiple deep
breaths, she asked, “Well, how did I do?”
    Oh. God.
    How could I even attempt to describe how she’d done? Even
if my throat wasn’t completely dry I would not have even known the words to
explain the passion, the intensity, the emotion. All from an almost
fourteen-year-old girl.
    She was a natural.
    Oh. God.
    “Really, really well,” was all I could get out before I had
to swallow.
    And that was the understatement of the year. People always
talked about actors who were naturals, people who were just born with the art
in their blood. I had never believed it was possible. I figured talented actors
took a ton of classes and honed their art through mentors who had done the same
thing. Have a love for the craft? An interest in the art? Sure. But to be a
complete stage virgin, cold read through a monologue…and totally nail it?
    I’d found a diamond. I’d struck gold. And this girl was
going to bring the Crystal Plains Theater to life.
    “You should audition for the part of Candace in the
upcoming show,” I said, calmly.
    “Why?”
    “Because you look the part.”
    I handed her a copy of the script, and she thumbed through
the first few pages scanning for Candace’s lines.
    “But…Niles, it says Candace is the lead female.”
    “Yes. You can handle it. I have faith in you.”
    “But…it says here that Candace is seventeen. I’m only
thirteen.”
    “You’ll be fourteen in a few days,” I said. “And besides,
people always mistake you for way older. Look, this is acting. It’s