Margaret Atwood - Hag-Seed

Monday, March 4, 2013.

On Monday morning Felix wakes early, his dream still haunting him. What was it? There was music in it, and someone moving away from him into the trees. He wanted to call out, ask them to wait, but he couldn’t speak or move.

DREAMS, he should have written on his whiteboard. It’s surely a main keynote. My spirits as in a dream are all bound up. How many people in the play fall asleep suddenly or talk about dreaming? We are such stuff as dreams are made of. But what are dreams made of? Rounded with a sleep. Rounded. It chimes so exactly with the great globe itself. Did Shakespeare always know what he was doing, or was he sleepwalking part of the time? In the flow? Writing in a trance? Enacting an enchantment he himself was under? Is Ariel a Muse figure? Felix can picture a whole different Tempest, one in which…

Shut up, he tells himself. Don’t add anything more to the mix. The guys have got their hands full as it is.

Drinking his first coffee, he peers out the window. It’s overcast and freezing cold: the pane is scrolled with his gelid breath. A front must be moving through. There’s been sleet during the night; maybe there will be power lines down. There will also be black ice, treacherous because invisible. The sanders must have been along the road, though, so he should be fine if he drives slowly.

Today they’ll be shooting his first Act I scene with Ariel, in full costume. He stuffs his animal cloak into a green garbage bag, adds the fox-head cane. Then he inserts himself into his outerwear: quilted coat, fleece-lined boots, heavy gloves, red and white faux-wool tuque with a bobble on top, two bucks at the Value Village in Makeshiweg, said Anne-Marie, who presented it to him because she didn’t want his head to get cold. “We need the junk in your skull,” she said, which was her gruff way of putting it. She claims to disdain sentiment.

“Have you made peace with WonderBoy?” he asked her, keeping his voice neutral. “Is he still bothering you?”

“He wants to be my pen pal,” she said. “Write me letters, once we’ve done the play.”

“That’s a terrible idea!” he said too vigorously. “Then he’ll know your address, and when he gets out, he’ll try to — I trust you said no.”

“Just let me get through this,” she said.

“You’re leading him on,” said Felix. “Is that fair?”

“We haven’t shot the big love scene yet,” she said. “You’re the director. You want an Ooo scene or a Meh scene? Because if I say a definite no, it’ll be Meh .”

“You’re ruthless! That’s unethical,” he said.

“Don’t preach, I learned from the best. Everything for the play, right? That’s how you put it twelve years ago. As I recall.”

That was then, Felix thought. Would I say it today? “I’ll talk to him,” said Felix. “Straighten things out.”

“You’re not my real dad,” she said. “I can deal with this. It’ll be all right. Trust me.”

Dressing for the shot, she’d taken her hair out of its bun, given it a windblown look, and stuck in a few paper flowers. She’d made the dress herself: white, but raggedy at the hems, with a sash of knitted twine. One sleeve was off the shoulder. Bare feet, of course. A little bronzer, a little blusher, not too much. Altogether dewy.

The scene was everything Felix could have wished: wide-eyed innocence on her part, rapt enchantment. WonderBoy was impeccable: respectful but imploring, the embodiment of yearning desire. When he said, “Oh you wonder!” and reached out as if to touch her, then let his hand hover as if restrained by glass, he would have melted steel. He was more than convincing.

I hope she won’t destroy him, thought Felix. But he’s a con man, don’t forget. A con man playing an actor. A double unreality.

He does one last check in the mirror. He’s lost weight over the past weeks, he’s slightly gaunt. His eyes have the intent stare of a caged hawk, but he can make that work for him during his scenes: the stare, the glare. Bent on his prey, but also agitated, distracted. He turns his head sideways, eyes his profile. Add a pinch of scariness, a dollop of Dracula? No, better not.

He winds his scarf around his neck, then follows the white plume of his breath out to his car. The car, miraculously, starts. This is a good omen. He is fond of good omens right now.

Miranda hasn’t forgotten her decision: she’s determined to be in the play. She accompanies him to the car — he can feel her there, behind his left shoulder — but at first she won’t get into it. Is she afraid of it? Is she remembering the last time she was in a car, on that trip to the hospital when she was three, wrapped in blankets and running a high fever? He hopes not.

Too late, too late. Why hadn’t he noticed, earlier, the flushed cheeks, the quick breathing, the drowsiness? Because he wasn’t there, or else he was there but immersed in some arcane scheme or other. Cymbeline— was that the project that had triggered his absence? That he’d found more precious than his loved darling? His fault, his most grievous fault.

He explains the car to her, slowly and carefully. It’s a magic flying machine, he tells her, something like a ship except that it runs along the ground on wheels. He shows her the wheels. The smoke coming out of it doesn’t mean it’s on fire, it’s from the engine. The engine is what makes it go. He will be in charge of the car, so there’s nothing to fear. She can ride in the back, right behind him. If she wants to be in the play that’s how they have to get there. It will be almost like flying through the air.

Luckily there’s no one around watching him talk out loud, or to see him opening the back door of the car for a person who isn’t there.

Once they get going she appears to enjoy the experience. Trees, farmhouses, and barns whizz by; she’s curious about them all. People live in the houses? Yes, people. So many people! So many trees! “You like this, my bird?” he asks her. Yes, she does like it. But where is the play?

“We’re getting closer to it,” Felix tells her.

They pass a gas station, then the mall near Fletcher Correctional: so colorful, with its holiday decorations still in place! So many other flying machines! Then they’re going up the hill, then through the gates. He explains that the fences are to keep people inside, and also to keep other people outside. There are guards, he says. She doesn’t ask why but wonders if the guards will want to stop her from entering. “They won’t see you,” he tells her, “invisible as thou art,” and she thinks this is a great joke.

At Security she goes through the scanner with him and doesn’t even cause a blip. That’s my tricksy spirit , he beams at her silently. Silently, she laughs. Such a pleasure to him that she’s so happy!

“How’s it going, Mr. Duke?” Dylan asks him.

“We’re ironing out the kinks,” says Felix. “I’ll be in tomorrow, by the way, even though it’s not a program day. I’ll be delivering some equipment. Can you put it in a locker or something until we need it?”

“Sure thing, Mr. Duke,” says Madison. Felix has to explain the uses of everything he brings in, or the purported uses: the other, secret uses he’ll keep to himself. They’d questioned, for instance, all those black outfits: the sweatshirts, the pants, the ski masks, the gloves. Puppetry, he’d said. The Japanese method. Black light. He’d told them how it worked. Like Bunraku.

“No shit,” Madison had said, marveling. They think Felix knows so much neat theatrical stuff.