Home

“Fifteen minute, people, fifteen minutes!”

Madeline, one of our assistant stage managers, called our fifteen minute warning. I tensed, feeling the knot of nerves in my stomach double in size. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes as Janine, one of the show’s make-up artists, finished applying the necessary green paint to my face. She’d already done my arms, hands, neck, back, and chest, and we were just waiting for them to dry before I put the rest of my costume on. My long black wig was perched on its stand on my dressing table, waiting for me to put it on. The room around me was bustling with activity as the rest of the company prepared.

“We’re running a bit late tonight,” Janine said, trading the green paint for smoky grey eye shadow. “I hope you’re warmed up.”

“Oh yes,” I said, trying not to smile or move my face too much until the paint had fully dried. “Nick made us do 45 minutes of warm ups half an hour ago. I’d say we’re good.” It was opening night, and Nick, our director, had made sure we were very ready.

This night had been eight weeks coming, since I had left my home in Kitchener, Ontario, and moved to New York City to take the role of Elphaba in Stephen Schwartz’s Wicked, on Broadway. The company, which consisted of roughly 40 people, had been working like mad for two months to be ready for tonight’s grand opening. The three preview shows we’d done for the sponsors and the press had been very well received, but this was the first show we’d do for the general public, and we were all buzzing with excitement.
Janine finished with my make-up, secured my wig on my head, and shooed me from my chair.

“Five minutes,” Madeline called as I passed her to go into the ladies’ bathroom for one final pit stop before show time.

I had never been so nervous and so excited all at the same time. I was the lead in the show, which was a huge responsibility, and to top it all off, my father, favourite aunt, and younger cousin were all in the audience, and in the third row, no less. I wanted to do a spectacular opening night, not only to prove to myself that my hard work had paid off, but to show my father that the sacrifices I’d made when I moved were well worth it. The adrenaline was pumping, and I couldn’t wait to get on the stage.

I finished in the bathroom fairly quickly, careful not to wash the paint off my hands, then went to take my position in the wings. The intro music began, the house lights dimmed, the stage light blazed, and the show began.

Everything clicked during the performance that night, every note was right, every step was sharp, and the dialogue flowed like water. At one point, when I was hoisted on the wires above the stage for the show’s powerhouse song, “Defying Gravity”, I was able to see past the bright lights, and saw that the house was packed, and there wasn’t an empty seat. My heart soared every bit as high as my body and my voice in that moment, and I didn’t ever want it to end. To think I had six months of this to look forward to made me almost giddy with pleasure. Before I knew what was happening, however, the show was over, and we were taking our fourth curtain call, to a standing ovation.

The backstage area was absolute chaos as the we all took off our costumes and make-up, and congratulated each other on a spectacular show. The opening night reception was being held in the lobby half an hour later, and we buzzed about the possible celebrities we’d heard would be there as we changed clothes. I skipped trying to get the green paint off at my dressing table, and headed right for the shower, after Janine removed my wig.

Ten minutes later, freshly showered, I sat at my dressing table to apply my regular make-up for the reception. As I carefully applied my mascara, Nick came up and sat beside me, grinning so hard it looked like his face would split in half. For such a small man, about 5’2”, he had more energy than ten people twice his size and half his age. He had just celebrated his 35th birthday the week before, but he was still considered young to be at the helm of a show as large and as important as Wicked. He was a slave driver, but we loved him anyway.

“Fantastic show tonight, Charlotte,” he said, leaning over to hug me briefly. Normally people shortened my name from Charlotte to Charlie, but since I’d had Charlotte put in the programme, that’s what he called me.

“Thanks,” I said, blushing slightly. “The audience was awesome, really responsive, so that helped.”

“Was your dad out there?” Nick knew my dad’s opinion of the show was important to me, as I’d told him many times over coffee after rehearsals.

I nodded. “Thanks again for getting my family tickets to the reception tonight,” I said, smiling at him in the mirror as I began brushing out my hair. “They’ll love it, especially Deanna.” Deanna, my cousin, was celebrating her 15th birthday that weekend, and the trip to New York was part of her gift.

“No problem,” Nick said, patting my shoulder as he stood up. “I have to go schmooze for a bit, but I’ll see you later at the party.”

His seat wasn’t vacant for long. Lisa, my roommate, flopped down beside me, her curly blonde hair piled on her head in a messy up-do, with tendrils falling becomingly around her face. “Almost ready?” she said, grabbing my lipstick from the table and sampling it on her wrist.

“Almost,” I said. I quickly blow-dried my hair as she played with my make-up. When I’d arrived in New York, my hair had been long, about halfway down my back, and a deep coffee colour. Now it was shorter, to just past my shoulders, layered, and was more of a chestnut colour, with auburn and blonde highlights in the front layers. It was new, it was fresh, and most importantly, it was easier to put under the wig each night. I loved it.

“I think we’re pretty hot tonight,” Lisa said, posing beside me in front of the mirror. Her slender frame was clothed in a deep red strapless dress that ended quite a bit above her knees. I envied her confidence as I took in my own floor-length forest green dress, with medium width straps and an empire waist. It was beautiful, yes, but tame compared to Lisa’s dress.

I laughed as I put my lipstick in my purse. “We sure are,” I agreed, rising and putting on my silver hoop earrings. “Okay,” I said as she linked her arm through mine. “Let’s do this.”

The reception was held in the spacious lobby of the theatre, with tables of food lining the walls, and a big bar set up at the back. As a rule, the performers weren’t allowed to go out into the reception until everyone else was already there, so as to make a grand entrance. Everyone would clap and cheer, then the party would start. It was tradition. We joined the rest of the company, huddled at the top of the stairs in the seating area of the theatre, waiting for Nick to take us out. He had to put us in order, chorus first, then the rest of us by the size of our parts. Lisa and I had to go last, as the two leads, with Sean Bryant, the male lead, on my other side.

“Ladies, stunning as usual,” Sean said, taking my hand. He kissed my cheek. “Great job tonight,” he whispered. Sean was about 30, very sweet, and incredibly talented, having just starred in as Corny Collins in Marc Shaiman’s Hairspray. He’d also been in a recent revival of Les Miserable, as Marius, among other things. He was a major player in the theatre world, and we were very lucky to have him in the show, as Fiyero.

“You, too,” I said, squeezing his hand. Lisa had the biggest crush on him, and I would probably catch hell from her later for holding his hand, but I was too pumped up to care at the moment. She knew I had no interest in him, having a beautiful boyfriend of my own, even though I never got to see him. But that wasn’t important at the time either.

I loved greeting the audience, at least, I had so far during the previews, when we’d had to do photos and interviews for all of the theatre magazines. I couldn’t wait to see my dad, either, to see what he’d thought.

After another ten minutes of waiting, Nick finally let us go in, in order, of course. The applause got louder as each group went out, and by the time we finally got to go, the noise was deafening. It was such an adrenaline rush, to see all the flashes and hear the applause again, and to see everyone up close this time. I couldn’t keep the smile from my face.

When the excitement of our entrance had died down, we began to mingle with the crowd. I looked around for my dad and finally worked my way over to where he was sitting with Aunt Tess and Deanna, in the area where tables and chairs had been set up. It took me a good 15 minutes to get to them, however, because of all the well-wishers I had to greet on the way.

“Charlie,” Deanna squealed when I finally got over to them. She jumped out of her chair and hugged me. I couldn’t believe how grown up she looked, in her baby blue dress, with spaghetti straps and matching shawl, her dark hair in an elaborate French twist. She looked 20, not 15.

“Did you enjoy it?” I asked as I hugged Aunt Tess. She was stunning, as well, her blonde hair sleeked back, straightened for once, rather than curly like it naturally was, in a bun at the nape of her neck. Her dark purple pants suit was very sharp, and suited her perfectly.

“We loved it, honey,” she said, squeezing me extra tight. “You were amazing!”

“Thank you,” I said, then turned to my dad. “Well?” I said, smiling lightly. “Was it worth it?”

He hugged me fiercely, tears in his eyes. “I don’t like you living here, but, honey, that was amazing,” he said, pulling back to look at me. “You were born to be on the stage.” He hugged me again.

“Charlie, who are these fabulous people?” Lisa breezed over to us, a glass of champagne in each hand. She gave me one.

“Lisa Montgomery, this is my Dad, Paul Madison, my aunt, Tessa Madison, and my lovely cousin, Deanna,” I said.

“Ah, Miss Glinda,” Aunt Tess teased, embracing her. “Beautiful job, honey.” Aunt Tess always made people feel like they’d known her for years. I knew she’d get along with Lisa just fine.

“We have a surprise for you, Charlie,” Deanna said, practically bouncing up and down with excitement. “Uncle Paul, can I tell her now?”

Dad chuckled. “Of course you can, sweetheart,” he said, smiling at her.

“Surprise?” I said, setting my glass on the table. I saw Lisa’s eyes go wide, then felt a hand cover my own. I gasped, then I recognized the wonderful scent, and felt the familiar warm body against my back. It could only be one person.

“Orlando!” I cried, spinning around and throwing myself at him, fighting off tears. Orlando was Orlando Bloom, my amazing boyfriend. It had been eight long weeks since I’d seen him, and I’d missed him horribly. We’d only been together for two weeks before I started Wicked, but it felt like he’d been around forever. I’d talked to him briefly on the phone only four days before, and he hadn’t said a word about coming to the opening night show. I’d thought he was still in the Bahamas, working on the sequels to Disney’s wildly popular Pirates of the Caribbean.

“What are you doing here?” I said, pulling back to look up into his chocolate brown eyes. “And why didn’t you tell me?” I kissed him, square on the lips, loving the feel of being back in his arms.

He laughed, that beautiful sound I’d missed so much, and handed me the bouquet of pink roses he’d been holding. “I wanted to surprise you, darling,” he said, crushing me against him again. “I’m here for three days, that’s all I could get.”

“I’ll take whatever you can give me,” I said, handing Deanna the roses, then cupping his face in my hand as my eyes filled with tears. I kissed him again. “God, I missed you.”

“I missed you, too, love,” he said. “You were every bit as beautiful tonight as I knew you’d be.”

“Oh, the show!” I laughed. In the excitement of seeing him again, I’d forgotten that he’d probably seen my performance. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

“Uh, are you going to introduce me?” Lisa was standing beside Aunt Tess, her jaw almost on the ground.

“Sorry, Lise,” I said, turning back to my family. Orlando slipped his arm firmly around my waist. “Lisa Montgomery, this is Orlando Bloom, my boyfriend. Orlando, Lisa is my roommate.”

They shook hands, and Lisa winked at me. “You’ve been keeping some pretty big secrets, Charlie, dear,” she teased. I hadn’t told her or anyone else who my boyfriend was, only that I had one. We needed to keep things low key to avoid headlines and rumors in the media. Besides, no one would have believed me anyway.

“Sorry,” I said again, blushing as Orlando kissed my cheek. “We’ve been so busy, I guess it just slipped my mind.” I saw Aunt Tess grin up at my dad.

“I’ll deal with you later,” Lisa said, grinning. “So I’m guessing you’ll be sharing our little hole in the wall for a few days,” she said to Orlando.

“Actually, I booked the penthouse at one of the best hotels in the city,” he said, glancing down at me. He looked over at my dad and flushed slightly. “I’ll, uh, I’llstay there,” he added quickly.

I blushed hotly as I saw Dad’s disconcerted look. He knew we were together, but that didn’t mean he had to be comfortable with us sleeping together.

“Uh, don’t you have rounds to make, my dear?” Aunt Tess said, breaking the tension. “You go ahead and do what you need to, we’ll be here.”

As if on cue, Nick came over to us. “Charlotte, darling, I need you,” he said, then did a double take as he saw Orlando. “Holy crap,” he said.

“What’s up, Nick?” I said, as Orlando grinned down at me.

“I knew we had a high profile crowd tonight, but I didn’t expect an A-lister to be wrapped around my star,” Nick said, his hands on his hips. “Mr. Bloom, a pleasure.” He offered Orlando his hand.

“Likewise,” Orlando said as he shook it. “You’ve done a great job with this production.”

“High praise,” Nick said, his eyebrows rising to his forehead. “Do you know our Miss Thing here?”

“You could say that,” Orlando said, smiling. I was tucked against his side, right where I wanted to be.

“Nick, Orlando’s my boyfriend,” I said, detaching myself begrudgingly. “What do you need me to do?”

“There are some very well-to-do people over here who want to meet you, baby,” Nick said, linking his arm with mine. “Lisa, honey, we need you, too.” He paused. “Hell, bring Orlando with us, and let’s make this a
party.”

“No, no, you go ahead,” Orlando said. He softly caressed my cheek. “This is your night, darling, I’ll be here when you’re done.”

“You’d better be,” I said, reaching up to kiss him lightly on the lips. I hugged Dad, Aunt Tess, and Deanna. “Anything you want, you get, and I’ll be back in a bit.”

Nick whisked Lisa and me away and we spent the rest of the night meeting people and signing programmes, and giving interviews and taking pictures. I swear, by the end of the night I saw spots in front of my eyes from all the flashes.

I finally managed to work my way back to my family around one o’clock in the morning. They were all sitting at the table they’d been at before, and Deanna was leaning on Orlando, her eyes barely open.

“I’ll meet you at home,” I said to Lisa as I went over to them.

“We have a lot to talk about,” she said, and gave me a hug. “And you’d better bring that beautiful man home tonight.” She winked and ran over to a group of our friends from the company.

“It looks like we’re all ready to crash for the night,” I said as I settled myself on the chair next to Orlando, and kissed him quickly. “I’m about done here, so we can go any time.”

“I’ll take everyone back to the hotel,” Dad said, standing up. Aunt Tess helped Deanna to her feet. “You were stunning tonight, baby. We’ll meet you for breakfast in the morning, okay?”

I nodded. “Of course. Ten o’clock at the hotel,” I said. “We’ll be there.” I stood up and hugged them. “Thank you for coming tonight. I love you.”

I watched them leave, then turned to Orlando. His long dark hair was pulled back in a ponytail at the nape of his neck, and he was wearing a beautiful grey silk shirt over black dress pants, with a black jacket. He was absolutely amazing, and I realized then just how much I’d really missed him. I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled his head down to me so I could kiss him. Shivers raced through my body as his fingertips grazed the bare skin at the top of the back of my dress. I was painfully aware of how long it had been since we’d been together physically. Just his scent was driving me mad.

“We can leave now,” I said, giving him a look he knew very well.

He smiled down at me and leaned down to kiss my neck. “Are you trying to tell me something, love?” he whispered, his hand sweeping up my bare arm. My knees almost buckled.

“You two crazy kids get out of here.” Nick came floating back over to us before I could answer. “Boy, take this girl home, she’s swaying on her feet.” He had no idea that fatigue wasn’t what was making me weak. He
kissed my cheek. “You were brilliant tonight, my love. Go get some sleep.”

“We will, Nick,” I said, smiling. “I’ll see you tomorrow night.” He floated away again. “Orlando, can we please go home?”

“Yes, love, we can go,” he said, and led me toward the door. “Do you want to go to your flat, or to the hotel?”

“I told Lisa I’d be home tonight, so we should go to my place,” I said as he held the door open for me. “You haven’t seen it yet, either.”

“Sounds good,” he said. “I don’t care where we go, as long as we’re together.”

He hailed a cab and we were home within five minutes. The Wicked producers had set up the members of the company who weren’t from New York, or who didn’t have a place of their own, in an apartment building a few blocks from the theatre, but with New York traffic, it took time to get there. It probably would have been faster to walk, but the sidewalks were dirty with the early winter slush, and it wasn’t safe at that time of night. When we finally got there, we took the elevator up to the sixth floor, where Lisa and I had one of the only two apartments on the floor. Sean and another of the main males, Chris, were in the other one.

“Home sweet home,” I said as I unlocked the door and threw my keys on the table in the entrance way. The apartment was a bit bigger than the one I had in Kitchener, but because there were two of us living in it, it seemed small sometimes. Luckily, Lisa’s room was at one end, and mine was at the other, separated by the living room, kitchen, and dining room, and we each had our own en suite bathroom. It gave us more privacy than most roommates get.

“It’s nice,” Orlando said, but he wasn’t really looking at the apartment. He was too busy pressing me to him and kissing me deeply, a kiss I had been waiting for all night. As his tongue swept into my mouth, I almost collapsed against him, it felt so good. I pulled him backward toward my room, not letting my mouth lose contact with his. I slipped my hands inside his jacket and pushed it off his shoulders, grinding my body against him. His hands were everywhere on my back, straying into my dress and pulling down the zipper. I couldn’t get close enough, couldn’t do enough all at once.

I slammed the bedroom door behind us and fumbled with the lock, not wanting to turn from Orlando to pay attention to it. I finally got it locked, and began working on the buttons on his shirt. He pushed my dress down so it pooled at my feet, leaving me in my slip, then scooped me up in his arms and laid me on the bed, coming down on his elbow beside me. He finally broke the kiss.

“Charlie,” he breathed, stroking his hand down my arm. “You are so beautiful.” His eyes roamed over my body. “I want to look at you.”

“Well do it quickly,” I teased, stroking his cheek, my body burning for him. “I’ve got better things in mind for us.”

“You cut your hair, love,” he said, plunging his fingers into it.

I tensed slightly. I never thought that he might not like it. “I did,” I said cautiously.

He looked at me for a minute, then smiled. “It’s gorgeous, darling,” he said, then sank his face into it, inhaling deeply. He began nibbling on my ear, his hands straying over my body.

“I love you,” he whispered as he came down on top of me. “I love you so much.”

I arched up against him, shoving his shirt down his arms, and reaching for his belt. “I love you, too,” I said, reveling in the feel of his weight on me. “Orlando, make love to me.”

And he did, slowly, expertly, gently, and again and again.