Luke Williams - The Echo Chamber

6 June

That strange girl came back this morning. But this time, she just put down a crate of her own, painted white in contrast to mine, positioned herself in front of me, in my direct line of sight, face a foot from my face, and stood still as a statue herself. Copying my exact pose. For the full twenty-seven minutes she was there — according to the clock tower — passers-by just kept passing by, staring, to be sure, but at her, instead of me. No one stopped to put money in my tin. Don’t know if they found the whole scene too strange or too intimate — it felt both — they just walked straight past me and my odd, inverse shadow. She was dressed all in white, gauzy white fabric like paper with the light shining through it. And her face all smeared in black boot polish! Between us, this channel of silence, despite the mad noise of the crowd all around. But though we stood in identical poses, and though I now had a clear image of her, I still felt like it was her looking at me, because, I suppose, the rules of our game meant that she could, if she chose, move any time she liked. But also, there was something — what’s that word from the Commandments — covetous? — something about her stare, trying to claim me, her look pinning me as though she was a butterfly collector and me a brittle and unwieldy specimen. There was a kind of effort in her stare. Then, abruptly, she broke out of her position, stepped down, picked up her crate and strode briskly off. And it really was like she’d pinned me in place, because I realized, after she had left my line of vision, that I would have run after her, had I been able. And this bothered me. Me, who never runs after anyone.

What a joy to transcribe from Damaris’ diary!

8 June

Fuck fuck fuck. He only caught me! Didn’t see him till it was too late. I was looking out for her. When he came out of nowhere I really did fucking freeze. His face went as white as mine in mime. We open tonight, he says, You’ll need your rest, and sends me back to the b’n’b telling me, We will talk about this later. So I’m lying here now picking at the bobbly bedspread, supposedly resting up for tonight, half of me wondering what the fuck he’s going to do about all this — if he gets me kicked off the American tour! — while the other half wonders if she came back to find me this afternoon.

9 June

We opened last night. Full house. We went down well but we won’t know what’s what till the papers tomorrow, if there’s even any mention of us. He was completely satisfied with my performance. And I don’t mean by that that I was satisfactory, more that everything he was hoping for, I did. I felt that even on stage, but he could hardly look me in the face when he told me as much afterwards. Not after running into me in the street like that. I have betrayed him. Made a fool of him for the second time in two weeks. Afterwards, we had drinks in the theatre bar. I looked for her, but she was not there. Instead this Orcadian chick with those faraway fisherman’s eyes some have. I asked about her colleague, a bit embarrassed when describing her, and she says, Oh you mean Evie. She’s away looking after her da. She wasn’t able to tell me any more. So I invited her to come and have drinks with us. But she was shy of me as pretty girls often are, and said she couldn’t, she was working. D came down later, said how much he’d loved the show. I noticed the kinds of looks he attracted, and the look he gave in response. Acknowledging their acknowledgement of his fame, as though it was he who had recognized them. And it made me think of her. Evie. That look she gave me that first night. As though she knew me.

10 June

So this is how he’s getting his revenge. He’s using the reviews as an excuse. Some are cautious, some are catty, some are raving. And one was smutty. I didn’t look virginal enough to play the title role, ha!

Ha!

He thinks what the reviews are saying is that something is missing. He wants to freak ’em all out, he says. So this is what he’s done: in the mornings, we’re rehearsing the whole show again, with me as the boy and Jack as the girl. I have to forget my part and learn Jack’s and vice versa. Everyone else has to play to me where they played to Jack and vice versa. Unlearn in order to create he says, with a foxy smile, aimed straight at me. The cheese weasel. We both know what this is about.

16 June

Exhausted. Sleep walked through rehearsals. He says I’m miming being a mime. Ha. Ha.

17 June

Today in rehearsals, when me and Jack were tripping up on bits of our old roles that remain like debris in our memories, he said again, Unlearn to create! Unlearn to create! No, I screamed. DESTROY! I screamed louder, DESTROY TO CREATE. Then I kicked a jug of water across the stage which smashed hysterically, and I walked out.

18 June

Last night was our last night and the opening of the reversed version. We all felt something. It felt right. And knowing this, we felt exhausted. After a few drinks, we said our goodbyes until Oxford next week and slipped off separately into the night. A hot night in Edinburgh, damp heat off bare skin and the smell of sweat mixing in with reefer and patchouli. Got a bit stirred up by all that and found myself wandering down a cobbled side-street when someone grips my elbow.

It’s her. That bird. Evie.

You’re better as the boy, she said. When she smiled it threw me a bit. A real freak when she smiles. Nothing wrong with the smile itself except it doesn’t belong to her face. It’s like one of those children’s flip-books where the pages are cut into top, middle and bottom sections which you match randomly. The top half of her face does not go with the bottom half.

I’ve been to every one of your shows, she said. This did not surprise me.

We ducked into a bar, to a tiny table in the corner where the walls were all pasted over with playbills and covering those a slight sheen of condensation from the heat of the summer bodies pressed in together, and we ordered some red wine, and I said, How’s your Dad? Mad, she says, and we both laugh, surprised. That’s where you get it from then, I say, and she doesn’t smile at this but says, What do you mean? And I chuck her under the chin. Last time I saw you you were more of a statue than I was myself! An experiment, she mumbles. I don’t know if the mumbling is her being embarrassed about admitting this or because I just touched her face. Both, I realize. What kind of experiment? An experiment in (mumbles). In what? I cup my ear, miming, Pardon? I still can’t hear. I lean closer. She can see down my shirt. No bra as usual. She jumps back like she’s been burned. An experiment in what? SILENCE she says, louder than she meant. Asked her to explain. The essence of mime is silence. She says this quietly. The essence of mime is imitation, I say. And I tell her where the word comes from. It’s how we learn. How we learn to do anything. By copying. And then I notice that we are both in the same pose, elbows up on the table, chin in hands, and when she clocks that I’ve clocked this I look straight at her. She drops her gaze. You are a vessel of silence. She is mumbling again. I am a mirror, I say. What you see is what you see. So I tell her what he said in our first ever rehearsal, in his little speech about mime (a contradiction in terms): ‘The fire which I see flames in me. I can know that fire only when I identify with it, and play at being fire. I give my fire to the fire.’

I reach out my fingers as though to stroke her face. Again, she jumps back, fearing to be burned. I reach for my cigarettes instead. After the wine came whisky. She asked me about the statue thing. Why I did it. So I told her. I like being looked at. I’d imagine you get looked at anyway. It’s very zen, I said, just emptying yourself out like that.