“Five minutes!” calls the stage manager.

“I also got him a little tipsy. Okay, break a leg, ladies. I can’t wait to see the show!”

She winks and goes off.

“I’m so nervous,” says Aimee.

“It’s no big deal,” I say, looking as cool and collected as humanly possible. “You’re fine. Everyone will love it. And if they don’t, then fuck ’em. But they will.”

She nods. “Okay.”

“It’ll be great. I promise.”

I hold up a pinky. After a moment, she holds up hers, too, and links it with mine. Electricity buzzes between us, coursing through my bones starting at that joint.

“Okay, okay. We got it. Let’s do it.”

The din of conversation quiets outside as the lights go down. Aimee and I walk out onstage, concealed by the curtain, and take our places.

A wave of adrenaline goes through me. I take a deep breath. The curtains open. The spotlight lands on Aimee and me.

Showtime.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

“That’s not why! Okay?” I say the line loud and firm but allow the despair to come through. We’re almost at the end of act one. It’s gone well so far, but I can sense that the audience isn’t particularly moved. “Please, if we’re going to this stupid reunion, then let’s go. Let’s go now.”

It’s the scene where Hailey is about to tell Lola she’s a ghost.

Aimee, as Hailey, looks at me from across the stage with her arms crossed. She comes over to me and lightly smacks my legs off the chair so she can sit.

When she does, she leans forward and whispers so that no one else can hear, “Do it your way.”

“I’m sorry, I’m not trying to be a drag,” I say, loudly, ad-libbing, then whisper under my breath, “What?”

She must be noticing the lukewarm response in the room too.

“End the scene your way. You were right, it should be Lola who tells Hailey.” She says it quickly and quietly before going back to projecting, standing and walking a few feet away to say, “Tell me why you’re so scared of going in to get this stupid time capsule. I know it’s not the breaking-and-entering part; you stole enough vibrators from Spencer’s Gifts to prove that crime isn’t the issue here.”

The audience laughs in surprise, even though I doubt they have Spencer’s in Ireland. I laugh too, taken off guard by the freestyle.

“You’re right, it’s not the crime part.” I stand also, then let the smile fade as I briefly rub my own shoulders awkwardly before letting my arms fall to my sides. “Hailey, there’s something I have to tell you.”

She pauses. “Okay, what?”