A Beauteous Flower Ch. 14

A wild thought flashed in Madison's mind to run after him and grab him around the knees and beg his forgiveness and plead to go to the prom with him, and tell him she was in love with him, but then she remembered that wasn't really what everyone else expected or wanted, so she didn't do it. Instead, she slammed the door and burst into tears and ran up the stairs to her room where she cried until she threw up and then cried some more.

Somewhere in the middle of the night when she was between bouts of sobs and vomit and the full-moon came out and shown through her window, she picked up her phone to call Todd and apologize, but then she saw the congratulatory texts from the drama club girls and she had to respond and say "thank you" to all of them. When she finished with that, she saw the congratulatory texts from her cheerleader friends, and she had to respond to all of them. Then Miles Face-Timed her and she had to be smiley and happy and supportive of his decision that they couldn't go to the after-prom parties because he had a big showcase coming up and he needed to get his rest. Miles was going to a big-time university to play big time football after all. He needed his rest and she understood that she had to understand that if she was going to be with a guy like Miles. It was still the great high school girl's dream though. Right?

The next night was opening night of the play and she saw Todd backstage. He lingered in the shadows and tried not to be noticed. At various intervals throughout the previous night Madison had wild little hopes that she could somehow rescue the situation with Todd, but now that she saw him alone, sad and hidden in the shadows she felt so guilty that she couldn't even bring herself to approach him. How could he ever forgive her? Unable to think of anything to say to him, she went to get ready and there in the dressing room she found a dozen wilted pink roses on the table with a card. Her hands trembled as she opened and read it. It wasn't signed but she knew exactly who gave her the roses.

"If we shadows have offended, Think but this, and all is mended--

  That you have but slumbered here, While these visions did appear.

  And this weak and idle theme, No more yielding but a dream,

  Gentles, do not reprehend. If you pardon, we will mend.

  And, as I am an honest Puck, If we have unearnèd luck

  Now to 'scape the serpent's tongue, We will make amends ere long.

  Else the Puck a liar call. So good night unto you all.

  Give me your hands if we be friends, And Robin shall restore amends."

It took everything she had not to burst into tears and vomit again. Before her eyes was the proof that all hope of amends with Todd was gone and it tore at her heart. The idea that Todd had given up on them nearly broke her emotionally and mentally and she looked around with bleary eyes in hopes she would see him and could tell him that he must not give up on her, on them, and that if he could ever believe in her the way he did the night of dress rehearsal then she would make it all up to him.

But he wasn't there.

Instead, Todd was somewhere lost in the shadows, and she didn't see him again until he walked on stage and gave a performance so emotionally charged that it left the audience enraptured. Except this time there was no intense blue stare. There was only a shy glance up over her head. She had lost him, and she knew it for sure even though Todd played the part of Romeo to near perfection.

After the final curtain, the crowd's delirium required Todd to go out on stage alone to accept a standing ovation. But after, when everyone backstage looked for him to tell him what a great job he had done, he simply disappeared into the shadows, and no one could locate him.

The next day was Saturday, so no one saw Todd again until he came out on stage for the afternoon matinee and managed to give an even better performance. Then came Saturday evening when he performed so well the audience roared for him to appear for another solo curtain call. Madison hoped to talk to him and waited for him to come off stage, but immediately thereafter he melted into the shadows again.

By Sunday morning the school grape-vine was abuzz with news of his titanic performances and tickets for Sunday night's final performance were hotter than ever. There were rumors that people were actually scalping the tickets and the faculty advisor was positively rapturous. The drama club girls were agog with admiration for him and even the cheerleaders couldn't help but be impressed with Todd. Yet Todd did not appear to accept their praise and adulation. He kept out of sight, wrapped in shadow and silence.

At the final show on Sunday night, Todd gave a performance so tinged with pain and sadness that everyone in the cast, including Madison, missed their cues and forgot their lines as they marveled and sobbed. The crowd cheered the exhausted Todd out onto the stage twice after the final curtain where everyone stood and shouted "bravo", applause thundered around him and someone brought him a bouquet of flowers.

As Madison watched him wave his humble acceptance of the crowd's adulation, he looked so alone on stage and his eyes were never bluer or sadder than when he turned and accidentally met her gaze. She had thought she might wait and ambush him with an apology and a passionate kiss at stage right, but he exited stage left and vanished into the shadows, so she decided that wasn't really what she wanted or expected anyway and when he didn't show up for the cast wrap party, she told herself she didn't really care.

On Monday Todd was the talk of the school, but no one knew where to find him. Madison looked for him, just a little because she really wasn't expected to look for him, but she never saw him. Some of her fellow cheerleaders speculated on whether Todd had a girlfriend or not and Madison had to walk away or yield to a sudden urge to snatch them all bald and tell them to stay away from Todd. But she didn't do that because she was happier with Miles and the high school dream. Right?

The rest of the year came and went and very infrequently she would catch a glimpse of Todd alone with a book, but before she could go and see him, she got busy with something else, or he would vanish. By this time, she and Miles were exclusive, and she had yielded her virginity to Miles on the beach the night of Senior Skip Day. That too was as it was supposed to be, and she supposed she was happy because everyone else expected that of her, even though the sand was uncomfortable on her back and Miles made goofy faces when they had sex and it felt like the moon spied on her while she committed some undefined, but monstrous crime.

They didn't make love though. She never allowed herself to make love with Miles even though everyone expected that from her. Instead, she merely fucked Miles and she always felt a little empty after sex with Miles because Miles wasn't... Romeo. She never allowed herself to complete that thought and realize that, in her fondest wishes and dreams, Romeo had nice big square hands with manly veins along the back and blond hair and sad blue eyes. She couldn't think that because that thought made her sick to her stomach and she shouldn't feel that way because she had what every high school girl dreamed of. Right?

More time passed and finally graduation day arrived, and the last time she ever saw Todd was when he gave the valedictorian speech at graduation. His hair had grown shaggy again, and it flowed down and hid his acne pocked face. His suit fit badly, and his shoulders slumped. He gave off an aura of quiet, dignified, and painful capitulation and resignation. No one knew what to expect from Todd and his speech, but he didn't disappoint. In fact, it was magnificently poignant, intelligent, and deeply moving.

"Society is no comfort to one not sociable," Todd commenced in a trembling voice.

Then his voice grew stronger and clearer, and the content of his speech cast a spell of stunned, guilty silence. Todd's sad blue eyes stayed hidden behind his hair as he softly painted an excruciating portrait of life as a High School weirdo. It was so painful and vivid that everyone looked down and shuffled their feet uncomfortably at the thought that they had, passively or actively played a part, however small, in Todd's tale. Many, Madison included, shed tears under the spell his words wove.

As the speech drew towards it's close, Todd paused, and his sad blue eyes searched the crowd until he finally locked eyes with Madison. In that moment of connection, Todd's bottom lip quivered with emotion, his blue eyes welled up and Madison heart throbbed in sympathetic anguish and guilt. She wanted to go to him and tell him that she loved him, but that wasn't what anyone expected of her, so she sat stock still, welded in place by the deep sadness she witnessed in Todd's blue eyes. Finally, Todd spoke to her for the last time and he, very elegantly and sorrowfully, exited her life for good with a quote from Hamlet.

"Adieu. Adieu. Adieu! Remember me."

Again, applause thundered for Todd. As he did after the play, he acknowledged it with a single wave and went back into the shadows. No one could even remember if he had received his diploma. Someone posted his speech on Youtube and it went viral with over two million views. Of course, as is to be expected of the internet, some of the comments were cruel and derisive, but the vast majority of the comments were positive and sympathetic. While she read those comments, Madison cried miserably because she had been the final element that gave Todd the words that made him into an internet celebrity. Rumor had it that some local media wanted to interview him about the speech, but after that day Todd just vanished and so the interview never happened. Soon everyone forgot Todd as the prospect of college approached. Well, almost everyone forgot Todd. Madison didn't forget Todd, because she couldn't forget Todd.

It's not that Madison did not try so hard to forget Todd. She partied and smiled and told herself and everyone else that she was so happy and that she lived her life with no regrets. Well, just maybe she wasn't so totally happy because she had unfinished business with Todd. Because of that unfinished business, Madison got really drunk under a full moon and in her drunkenness, got a wild urge to call and try to resurrect her Romeo, her Todd, and rescue him and herself from the shadows of sadness and heartbreak. But while she tried to find his number in her contacts list, she remembered his sadness and heartbreak was her fault. She decided that just couldn't admit that out loud to anyone, least-wise herself or Todd, because that would mean that the high school dream of Miles and the prom wasn't really all a high school girl could expect or want.

As she consoled herself with the thought that Todd probably wouldn't answer his phone anyway, Miles showed up. In her blotto mood she fucked him and then she passed out with Mile's arm draped possessively over her shoulders and twin bruises on her ankles where Miles had held her legs while he pounded his cock into her like a fourth and goal quarterback sneak. She cried a little the next day, not because it hurt or because she felt used or violated, but because despite the fact it was empty and not in any way intimate, she had enjoyed the sex and that was all she deserved. She deserved to have a relationship with a guy that treated her like a trophy and handled her like a football for what she did to her Romeo; her Todd.

Then Miles went to a big football college while Madison went somewhere closer to home and he played football and occasionally, when Miles had time between practices and appearances and parties, he and Madison got together and had sex. Her relationship with Miles went on as a deluded and distorted parody of every high school girl's dream. She no longer thought about Todd every day, but when she did, she still felt guilty, even though she smiled brightly for every Instagram picture she posted of her and Miles together after football games.

Madison finally broke up with Miles after their sophomore year when Miles stayed at college for winter break to work out and it turned out that he worked out with a cheerleader as well as a girl on the basketball team and a girl from the swim team and a girl who was his math tutor and Madison lost track after that. At that point Madison wasn't even angry with Miles. All she could really admit to was relief that he had made her decision easy.

With the end of her relationship with Miles and all his grunts and goofy faces, she finally had to face what she had done to Todd. She discovered that she couldn't forgive herself and Todd couldn't forgive her either because he had gone into the shadows of her past, never to return and, just sometimes in quiet, lonely moments, that brought a tear to her eye. Unable to make it right between Todd and herself, she resolved to pursue the life everyone expected of her, and she buried her guilt and the story of Todd deep inside of her. She would get on with it and meet everyone's expectations of her and marry a handsome man who had money and clout and gave her everything her heart desired. It was what she deserved after all, for what she had done to her Romeo.

For what she had done to Todd.