Beautiful Monster 2(18)

 
I nodded, trusting him absolutely. Whatever Liam was planning, I knew that it was going to be good.
 
 
 
 
 


Chapter 6: Liam
 
 
 
I hadn’t expected such support from others. Mind you, I hadn’t expected that anyone at all would actually know anything about the plan at all, but Connor told me that Amy and I had become a beacon of hope for the rest of the world.
 
Of course, there were many vampires who wanted to remain vampires, and would hate us for transforming them back. I could only hope that we could keep ourselves secret and safe long enough to execute the plan, which I had no idea about. Amy, especially lately, was keen to see Selene dead, but I told her time and time again that we wouldn’t execute it until we were ready. While Sarah and Amy tried to find her Shield origins, I paced the corners of my mind, trying desperately to figure out a solution. But it wasn’t until I went to a production meeting for Phantom that things began to be clear to me.
 
“We’ve set auditions for next week,” Katya announced as she came in and we all settled in. “Full panel of judges, open school auditions.”#p#分页标题#e#
 
“The mass choreography is coming along,” Miss Nailer said, back from her sick leave. She was so unlike Porsche, so stiff and rigid, that I felt it hard to draw comparisons to both as dancers. “They’ve all been taught, at least once, so now it’s just a matter of going over them a hundred times. It’s going to be harder especially for non-dancers. But right now, it’s good.”
 
“We’ve started production on the sets,” Devon volunteered. “The famous chandelier is going to take the most work, and we’ll need two or three, because it goes through a lot.”
 
I nodded, barely listening. I could disappear for months on end and I knew my team would handle things. They were beyond competent, some of the best in the industry. When I had first come to the school, they had accepted me graciously, despite knowing, loving and working with Peter for many years before. But they had never treated me like a Hollywood actor looking for a job. They had gone about their duties, asking my opinions and sometimes overriding me, but always including me. For the first time in a very long while, life was about being on a team, about working together. It was a change for me, as I was used to being the most important and most catered to person in the room. But as I quickly discovered, it was a change I needed. Without them, this school would have failed long ago and they recognized that. I didn’t know how to teach, I didn’t know how to manage, and I certainly didn’t know how to deal with children. But I did know how to act, and they helped me use that in every aspect of my life. I’d been at the school 4 years now, arriving at 23 and feeling 18 with my lifestyle. Now, I felt I had matured 10 years to my proper age in the short time I was here.
 
Except my heart reminded me that I was eternally 23.
 
“I’ve finally done the scene breakdown,” Katya said, as she passed around thick packages of paper.
 
I really didn’t want to be in the meeting. I’d rather be anywhere else but the boardroom, looking at a scene breakdown for a show that was eight months away. My mind began to wander and I wondered if, in eight months, these meetings wouldn’t mean me rushing off into a basement. I wondered if after a late evening meeting, I could take Amy out to dinner, linger in a fancy restaurant, and wander home under the streetlights with her, kiss her under the moonlight and not have to worry about bloodlust, about transformation.
 
“I’ve added in something that will make us a bit different than some of the other productions. After Down Once More, the cast of the opera Don Juan will run off stage and into the audience, searching for the Phantom. We will even take some audience members on stage, and enlist them into helping kill the phantom.”
 
“How about we kill one of them?”
 
Katya raised an eyebrow. “What?”
 
“Each night, one person we choose will be killed by the Phantom. We can tell them when we take them backstage to costume them. Doesn’t have to be difficult, Phantom can just sweep in and kidnap them away.”
 
Katya’s eyes lit up, and she made a note in her program. “Yes, I love it! Alright, moving on…”
 
“I have to go.” I stood up suddenly, making everyone stare at me. I gathered the scene outline. “Sorry, I have a meeting… another meeting…” For someone who used to act on a regular basis, I couldn’t come up with a line to save myself this time. “This looks great, Katya. Add in that scene and we’re good to go. Bye!”