Simone

I am 30 minutes late for tech call because I vainly applied a peel-off face mask that only reddened my skin. I don’t care, because soon enough all of our faces will be red from laughter and the heat of overcrowded backstage spaces.

In the tight room, the drama teacher’s office on stage left, we memorialize Vine through recitations of past favorites, discuss our love for the line “Boyioyioiyoioyoi” in Beyonce’s “Countdown,” and, most intimately, share confessions after poking a doll with safety pins. Actors come in with snappy requests for costume repairs and Scotch tape, to which we concede.

Through the show, one at a time, we head to stage to do our quick changes. Right after the song about loving Charles Manson/Jodie Foster, I successfully remove Olivia’s dress without screwing up her mic. This is the only time I have to be responsible all night.

The show is over, and so is Halloween, but we’ve spent the past hours providing costumes for the production, so why not preserve the spirit of dress up? Eliza, Elana, Zahra, and I dress up as Ricky, Angela, Plastic Bag, and Jane, from American Beauty, respectively. We head to Quick Chek to garner the necessary soft drinks and quarts of ice cream required to enjoy a party.

At the after-party, we gather around a kitchen island with all the other tech crews, the pit band, the actors, and a lucky extraneous few we’ve decided can participate with us, and belt—the trained amongst the tone deaf—the jukebox showtunes of our time. We are the dancing queens, young and sweet, only 17.

I am so happy. ♦