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said, clinking my cup to hers.
    “Happy new year.”

    I showered in a tiny white-tiled bathroom Avril had “colorized” by adding a yellow daisy curtain, a matching floor rug, and photographs of wildflowers arranged on the wall beside the medicine cabinet.
    I dressed in dark slacks I’d stuffed in my carry-on and buttoned up the black chemise Avril had purchased for me the night before, wearing it untucked. Judging from the full-length mirror in the bedroom, everything fit the look of a New York winter: basic flats, a red wool scarf I borrowed from Avril, and finally, my made-for-Manhattan leather jacket.
    “Can you get yourself back to the subway?” Avril asked as I cut across the living room and rattled open the latches and chain locks on the apartment door.
    “Think so. See you at the Carney later, right?”
    “Right after your rehearsal with Tabby,” Avril said, teasing me as she refilled her coffee. I gave her a friendly “oh, shut up” look before closing the door behind me.
    Life had been so easy in Chicago with Avril, and our yearlong stint in Grease was the icing on the cake . Avril played the female lead, Sandy, and I was one of the sassy (but nameless) Pink Ladies. It didn’t matter that my name wasn’t written in lights on a marquee, and I really didn’t think much about it. I was happy to be working in a career field known for an 85 percent unemployment rate.
    What kept me financially afloat was a commercial I shot for a nighttime cold medicine, Drowz-U-Tab. That one-day commercial shoot rewarded me with $8,500 per quarter in residuals, a “performance” fee paid to actors whenever the commercial aired on TV. $30,000 for one day of sitting up in bed and pretending to suffer the insomnia associated with a runny nose. The truth was, after that first check arrived, I never slept more like a baby.
    But all good things must come to an end. The last Drowz-U-Tab check arrived the week after the plush red curtains closed on Ben Hughes’s all-that-and-a-milkshake production of Grease. That’s when Avril boarded a jet to Boston for the next act in her breezy, triumphant career, and I was set adrift in a sea of icebergs.
    I stepped off the subway car in midtown Manhattan, a short twenty-minute ride. The smell of hot tar and diesel fuel thickened the air like the breath of a dragon. I walked the remaining blocks to the dance studio, studying the faces of New Yorkers on the street. It was time for Scene 2 with Tabby Walker. I prayed I’d do better this time, hold my tongue, and be the person my faith said I was.

    With closed eyes I recited my lines, practicing a Zen-like concentration. I stood in the middle of the makeshift stage Tabby and I had constructed using folding chairs and an Asian rug we found rolled up in a closet. I juggled the recitation of Audrey Bradford’s words with hitting my mark or remembering to bolt out of a chair when I recited a certain line in Act 1. After I’d surprised Tabby by knowing the script off book the day before, she’d decided to up the ante on New Year’s Day, running me through all the stage blocking for Act 1 and 2 in a single morning. What was her problem?
    Tabby threw a line to me from her do-it-yourself director’s chair, Ben’s master script open on her lap like a fifty-state road atlas. I began to perspire as I concentrated on my lines and moved to the correct stage positions Tabby had marked out on the rug and the studio floor. I thought about the difference watching Ben’s rehearsal DVD would have made, but it was too late for that now. I also ignored the dirty looks Tabby gave me when I messed up, and just did the best I could.
    After a long monologue, I stood in character, eyes still closed, waiting for Tabby to throw me my next cue. Silence. I opened my eyes to find Tabby lost in a text message on her cell phone. I cleared my throat.
    “Okay, we’ve been at this long enough,” she said. “It’s almost eleven thirty. Someone is supposed to bring