Misfit Theater Company 2

26. Selene

It's been a week since Thatcher left, and it's finally hitting me that my life is going to be very different now. Especially since Moth went to Hollywood during the week for an audition for the first time.

So I sit here in theater as everyone around me celebrates Mrs. Permala's announcement of our next show: Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. Auditions start today, but Mrs. Permala has asked that anyone with a large role in the last play work on the tech crew. I'm backstage painting set pieces with Emma, Sean, Paige, Layla, and the rest of the cast with large roles who are here today. That apparently doesn't include Moth and the other people who played the actors in A Midsummer Night's Dream, but Moth is in Hollywood today anyway, so... I'm the only misfit here.

Emma takes out her phone and sets it in an empty glass we are supposed to use for paint brush cleaning water, so that the sound amplifies. "This is a playlist favorite of mine," she says, "called 'Sing Along Essentials' so that we can jam."

"I'd really rather not," Layla mumbles.

"No one cares," Emma replies, half-jokingly, "it's happening."

She presses play on her phone and sets it down in the glass as Journey's "Don't Stop Believing" just barely projects over the sounds of auditioning from the stage.

Layla groans, but gets back to painting. She's probably in a bad mood, because she won't get to be onstage for this one. It's a shame, really. She'd be a great Scrooge.

Paige leans over to me. "How's it going?" she asks.

"Good, just missing Thatcher."

She nods. "I get that. Well, I don't really. Ugh, sorry... I meant I can understand how that feels." She looks around and then continues to speak to me, but this time in a whisper: "I've been trying to give you space, since I know I'm not your favorite. But I'd really like to be friends if we can."

Her apology hits me like a gut punch. I knew I wasn't being fair to Paige, but I didn't apologize. Now she's apologized to me, so I need to make sure the next thing I say comes out as sincerely as I want it to.

"Paige, you don't need to apologize. I was wrong. I was jealous and trying to cling onto Thatcher for dear life, but he left anyways. He just went to Hollywood instead of another girl. I shouldn't have hated you for that, though. It was my problem, not yours."

"Don't stop believing," Emma and Sean sing in unison, using their paint brushes as microphones.

Paige and I laugh at this, breaking the tension. She turns back to me. "Thanks," she says.

"I'd like to be friends," I say.

"Cool," she says with a smile. "I'll message you this weekend."

It's the end of the era of the misfits, I think, and the beginning of a new era.

At the end of the day, Gina finds me at my locker. "Hey girl," she says.

"Hey Gina, what's up?"

"I may have gotten you a present, and by that I mean, I definitely did. Can I give you a ride home? It's in my car."

"Yeah, of course, I'm never going to object to an opportunity to be lazy."

"Thought you'd feel that way. C'mon, I'm parked out back."

Gina and I walk together out to the student parking lot behind the school, chatting effortlessly about our days, about our upcoming quiz in Mr. Taylor's class, about her boyfriend Dylan. Whatever comes up. It's like the old days, only now I have seen enough proof that she's really working to change that I don't need to feel on guard. It's nice.