Miss Jefferson

Chapter 14

About an hour later, I had jumped off of Lafayette's table over one hundred times.

By then, I was exhausted, irritable, and I kept messing up the steps.

"Take a few minutes." Lin suggested. I accepted.

"You okay?" Daveed asked me, his voice quiet.

"I just don't understand..." I mumbled.
I felt like there was a fiery blade going through my gut, but it was also cold and cruel.

"Jada," Daveed placed his hand on my shoulder. "I should've called you."

"No," I shook my head and pulled out my phone, showing him the short text conversation that had occurred that morning. "I knew something was wrong, but not until today."

"This doesn't make any sense," he said in disbelief. "He's never acted like this before—"

"Don't make excuses for him."

"I'm not." He said, with a hint of anger in his voice. "He can make excuses for himself. I just don't understand how this could be him. I don't know him like this."

"Yeah, well you also don't know him romantically, so that might also be a bit of a barrier to your understanding."

"But you know him romantically, and you don't understand?"

I exhaled. "Yeah, I don't think anyone is gonna understand him right now." My words came out hasty and light.

"Jada," he started, but stopped as my phone buzzed.

"Jasmine says he's headed this way." He said, handing me my phone again.

"I'll go down to her dressing room for a few minutes."

"I'll text you or something when Lin is ready to go again."

I nodded. "Thanks, Diggs."

"Sure thing, kiddo."

I rolled my eyes and took a more obscure hallway down to the dressing rooms, looking for Jazzy and Anthony.

I knocked on the open dressing room door, peeking around the doorframe.

"Hey," I said softly.

Jazzy looked up from the couch that she and Ant sat on.

"Hey!" She stood and crossed the room, her arms encircling my shoulders. "How are you doing?"

"I'm fine, just taking five."

She pulled back, gazing at me seriously. "It's okay to not be fine."

"I know." I sighed. "I don't know how I ought to feel about it."

"I know how I ought to feel about it." Anthony grumbled under his breath.

"Ant," I said exhaustedly, "please don't start."

"Why shouldn't I?" He demanded.

"It's not that big a deal—"

Jasmine snapped her fingers. "Nope, I'm gonna stop you right there. It is too a big deal."

"Ain't nobody gonna do my girl like that!" Anthony yelled.

"Anthony, please." I begged.

"Look, if it doesn't bother you, then good for-"

I interrupted him. "I don't know if it bothers me! It makes me feel...weird, but that's all I know. I don't know what to think yet."

"Cast to the stage." Lin's voice said over the intercom. "Run through of 'Guns and Ships' with Lafayette understudy."

"Crap." I muttered.

Jazzy gave me a sympathetic look. "Let's just get it over with. Then we can do the show, and then we can go home."

"Maybe I can come over to your place?" Anthony suggested to me.

I nodded. "Sounds fun. Are you free, Jas?"

She shook her head. "Not tonight. You guys do your thing and we can schedule something with all three of us some other time."

We agreed, and headed up to the auditorium.

"One more time today, Jada, and then we're done with understudy rehearsal." Andy said.

"Okay, thank you." I replied, grateful to almost be done.

They began the music, and I took my place.

I was vaguely aware of Oak and Martha in the back, watching me. I forced myself to ignore them.

'Don't let it throw you off.' I told myself. 'You're better than this.'

My cue came, and I began. I'd say it was a big success: I rapped the part correctly, and didn't die when I jumped off of the table.

The music cut out, and Alex gave me a thumbs-up.

"Perfectly on-time, Miss Jefferson!" He said.

I smiled. "Thanks, Lac."

"Okay, cast! Show starts in two hours!" He called to everyone else.

We dispersed off, and Daveed and Ariana found me.

"Flawless execution, as always." He said sarcastically.

"He means you slayed like a queen." Ariana piped in.

"It didn't make me nervous today, but I'm sure I'll faint onstage when I have to do it for real." I said, disregarding their compliments.

"Oh, shut up!" Daveed exclaimed. "You're gonna bring the house down."

"Now let's go warm up!" Ariana took hold of my arm and led me to the other ensemble members.

We amused ourselves by doing front-walkovers and flips and such for the next hour and a half.

That's one thing I enjoyed about being in a group of people who are all as flexible as me; you get to do stunts together. It's not much, but it's really fun.

When the five-minute-call was heard over the intercom, we were doing hair and makeup. All last minute tasks were nearly complete, except for everything regarding Leslie Odom Jr., because we all know he never got ready at all until five minutes.

Sasha and I were almost done with our eyeliner when we heard a sickly sweet voice.

"Is this the ensemble room?"

"Yeah," I answered, not looking away from my task until I'd finished. "Okay, Sasha, I'm done."

She turned to look in the mirror and blinked a few times. "Flawless. Your turn."

I sat still while she applied the black color to the top of my eyelids. "And...there." She put the pencil away and stood up.

I stood as well, pinning the last piece of my hair into place as Sasha turned towards the newcomer in the doorway.

"Hey, can I help you?" Sasha asked.

The voice answered. "I was just looking for Oak. Did he go up already?"

An alarm went off in my head. I tried not to allow my expression to betray what I felt, but Emmy noticed.

"I haven't seen Oak," she said, rushing over to me and hurrying me out of the room. "But I'm sure he's around. Sorry, Martha."

"Oh, that's okay! Thank you anyway." Martha replied sweetly as Emmy practically dragged me up the stairs to the backstage.

"Emmy, please!" I wriggled out of her grasp.

"That was close." Sasha ran up after us, followed by Ariana.

"What was close?" I asked, knowing that faking naivety was futile.

"Jada." Ari gave me a look.

"Okay, okay," I raised my hands in surrender. "You got me. But I'd prefer not to think about any of that now." I said as the intercom called places.