She loses Lissa for a while, and when the crowd thins she sees her again, further down the street, speaking to a tall young man in a flannel shirt rolled up to the elbows. Lissa is telling a story, gesticulating, and the man is laughing, leaning in to hear. She watches as they pass a cigarette between them. So this is Declan, Lissa’s boyfriend. Hannah feels a strange shifting at the sight of him. A recognition, almost, and a disappointment that threatens to prick the evening’s magic and let in something darker. Lissa sees her and waves, and Hannah makes her way slowly towards them.

The tall young man turns towards her and takes her hand in greeting.

Somehow, he does not seem like an actor.

“Hey,” says Lissa. “Hannah, this is Nath.”

Lissa

SHE DOES NOT CONTACT NATHAN AND HE DOES NOT CONTACT her. Often though, she replays the kiss in her mind—taking it out when she is alone in bed at night, or in the morning, as she comes to consciousness. She has not heard from Hannah for days. She trusts Nathan has said nothing—still, she hears it, a faint yet shrill alarm, ringing somewhere at the edge of thought.

She throws herself into the life of the play. Klara’s approach is starting to work—they are indeed becoming less English, their acting is raw, there is blood in it and sinew and bone. And as Klara grows happier with her cast, the cast, in the way that happy casts do, is becoming a living, breathing entity of its own. The actors arrive earlier and stay later, taking pleasure in watching each other’s scenes. They begin to run the play from start to finish, feeling its rhythm, the places where it needs pace, the moments when it needs to slow down and feel itself breathe. When a scene becomes sticky, or does not feel alive, the actors step out of the play text and use the Meisner technique to observe each other, keeping in character, repeating what they see, before moving back into the scene again.

Michael suggests they sing together—an idea taken up enthusiastically by the rest of the cast—and so they learn a Russian folk song and rehearse it in the morning before they start work, Michael strumming a few chords on the guitar while they sing.

As they move towards opening night, Lissa can feel her own performance improving; her body feels different, there is indolence in it: heat and sadness and sway. Even Johnny is softening. Since the day he made her cry, something has shifted in their relationship, and Lissa finds with surprise that she looks forward to their scenes above all.

The evening before her technical rehearsal, her phone rings—Hannah.

Lissa stares at the name and waits. After a moment there is the buzz of a message. She picks it up, calls voicemail, brings it to her ear.