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Authors: Michael Kearns
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dirty blond hair and a face that was undeniably beautiful but unnervingly void of joy, Art projected something I understood. Virtually every girl at Normandy Junior High desired him. And so did at least one boy: me.
Although we never spoke, not one word, Art communicated with me in ways that other boys didn’t. Our eyes told each other secrets as we brushed by each other in hallways crowded with “normal” kids. Our unspoken entanglement may have sprung from my hopeful imagination, but what transpired one night in Art Robinson’s bedroom both confirmed my suspicions and ended my fantasies.
Art took his father’s shotgun, inserted it into his mouth and shot his movie star face into thousands of bits and pieces that splattered onto the walls of his bedroom. Blood everywhere.
This was the second suicide I’d experienced (and I was only thirteen years old). I could sense a pattern emerging. There was something about boys who killed themselves that pulled me into their orbit.
It was 1963, the year of the Kennedy assassination, but I will forever remember it as the year my fantasy boyfriend blew his brains out. In the troubled mind of a heartbroken teenager, Jackie Kennedy’s tragedy was no more monumental than mine. If only he’d told me, I could have saved him. Maybe I could have also saved Rick.
CHAPTER 13
How did I deal with the hurt? Acting, of course. Bob Goddard, the entertainment writer for the St. Louis Globe-Democrat , wrote, “Better add another one to our town’s burgeoning roster of talented young people. Mike Kearns, that is, who’s doubling in brass this week as leading man and director of the Carsonville Players’ production of The Children Are Listening . He’s also directing and taking the leading role in The Pied Piper with the Pasadena Players. Mike’s an honor roll student and is headed for a theatrical career.”
Seeing my name in the paper made me feel alive. I read it over and over, imagining how the assholes who made fun of me and beat me up would interpret each word; “talented … leading role … a theatrical career.”
During the first few weeks of high school, I was cast in The Red Mill , Normandy High’s annual musical theater event, held each fall. While it was a supporting role, it was rare for a freshman to be cast in a speaking role.
John Austin, a senior, played the romantic lead, a role that I hoped he’d play in my life. Less wounded than Art, John was graceful, gentle and shy. Blond and a bit pale, he epitomized the look of a sensitive young man—in other words, soft. One smile in my direction sustained me for hours.
The Thespian Society historically put on the spring play, directed by Colleen Wilkinson, the drama teacher, who had a nasty reputation as an uptight, unmarried woman of a certain age who took out her frustrations on her students. Even worse was the way she treated her band of thespians, braying directions and belittling them if they didn’t meet her standards of excellence.
Even though it was unlikely that a freshman would be cast before becoming a member of the Thespian Society (which couldn’t happen until your sophomore year), I summoned the requisite courage and went to the tryouts for Harvey .
All the auditioning male actors were instructed to read one of Elwood’s monologues, even though it was pretty much assumed that the role of the slightly daft character whose best friend is an imaginary rabbit would go to John Austin.
Miss Wilkinson was as steely as reported, but she did pay attention to me. “Not bad,” she said, which I later understood was not in keeping with her abrasive manner.
I was not cast in Harvey , made doubly painful because I wouldn’t be able to spend all those days after school in rehearsal observing the process of John becoming Elwood.
About a week before Harvey was set to open, I ran into John. This was a fairly frequent occurrence, since I’d mapped out where he was throughout the
Although we never spoke, not one word, Art communicated with me in ways that other boys didn’t. Our eyes told each other secrets as we brushed by each other in hallways crowded with “normal” kids. Our unspoken entanglement may have sprung from my hopeful imagination, but what transpired one night in Art Robinson’s bedroom both confirmed my suspicions and ended my fantasies.
Art took his father’s shotgun, inserted it into his mouth and shot his movie star face into thousands of bits and pieces that splattered onto the walls of his bedroom. Blood everywhere.
This was the second suicide I’d experienced (and I was only thirteen years old). I could sense a pattern emerging. There was something about boys who killed themselves that pulled me into their orbit.
It was 1963, the year of the Kennedy assassination, but I will forever remember it as the year my fantasy boyfriend blew his brains out. In the troubled mind of a heartbroken teenager, Jackie Kennedy’s tragedy was no more monumental than mine. If only he’d told me, I could have saved him. Maybe I could have also saved Rick.
CHAPTER 13
How did I deal with the hurt? Acting, of course. Bob Goddard, the entertainment writer for the St. Louis Globe-Democrat , wrote, “Better add another one to our town’s burgeoning roster of talented young people. Mike Kearns, that is, who’s doubling in brass this week as leading man and director of the Carsonville Players’ production of The Children Are Listening . He’s also directing and taking the leading role in The Pied Piper with the Pasadena Players. Mike’s an honor roll student and is headed for a theatrical career.”
Seeing my name in the paper made me feel alive. I read it over and over, imagining how the assholes who made fun of me and beat me up would interpret each word; “talented … leading role … a theatrical career.”
During the first few weeks of high school, I was cast in The Red Mill , Normandy High’s annual musical theater event, held each fall. While it was a supporting role, it was rare for a freshman to be cast in a speaking role.
John Austin, a senior, played the romantic lead, a role that I hoped he’d play in my life. Less wounded than Art, John was graceful, gentle and shy. Blond and a bit pale, he epitomized the look of a sensitive young man—in other words, soft. One smile in my direction sustained me for hours.
The Thespian Society historically put on the spring play, directed by Colleen Wilkinson, the drama teacher, who had a nasty reputation as an uptight, unmarried woman of a certain age who took out her frustrations on her students. Even worse was the way she treated her band of thespians, braying directions and belittling them if they didn’t meet her standards of excellence.
Even though it was unlikely that a freshman would be cast before becoming a member of the Thespian Society (which couldn’t happen until your sophomore year), I summoned the requisite courage and went to the tryouts for Harvey .
All the auditioning male actors were instructed to read one of Elwood’s monologues, even though it was pretty much assumed that the role of the slightly daft character whose best friend is an imaginary rabbit would go to John Austin.
Miss Wilkinson was as steely as reported, but she did pay attention to me. “Not bad,” she said, which I later understood was not in keeping with her abrasive manner.
I was not cast in Harvey , made doubly painful because I wouldn’t be able to spend all those days after school in rehearsal observing the process of John becoming Elwood.
About a week before Harvey was set to open, I ran into John. This was a fairly frequent occurrence, since I’d mapped out where he was throughout the
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