Shooting Star by Cynthia Riggs

dropping torrents of rain. An appropriate prelude to opening night of this play.
    The stage manager would have to read the part of Frankenstein’s bride as well as the part of Justine. He cursed Dawn Haines and her lack of professionalism. Dawn was ideal for the role, good voice, good figure, and a stage presence hard to define. Bratty, snippish, spoiled, but a fine actress.
    Nora was a fine stage manager, but no actress. She had a shrill voice and no sex appeal. Resented the idea of projecting sex appeal. She’d trudge onto the stage, he knew, read the lines accurately but woodenly, and trudge offstage again.
    He wanted a drink badly. To hell with AA and the agreement with his sister-in-law. When the theater turned Equity, he’d tell the backers she had to go. Maybe then she’d understand.
    A drink. Becca had always liked him best after he’d had a drink or two. Every time he’d sobered up, their marriage went on the rocks. At which thought he envisioned himself with a Jack Daniel’s, rattling the ice cubes and being terribly witty.
    He thought about her grubby affairs every time he went on the wagon. Bob Scott. What could she possibly see in that dirt-caked landscaper? When Scott tried out for the part of the Arctic explorer, Dearborn’s first reaction had been to send him packing. His second reaction was to give the guy the role. Smother
him with his lack of sophistication. He sighed. And just then, his phone rang.
    “Yes?” he answered wearily.
    “Dearborn, darling!”
    “Becca,” he said with surprise. “Where are you?”
    “On Island, darling. Just got in from Boston. Getting soaking wet outside the ferry terminal. Do I hear you have a play opening tonight and no actors?”
    Dearborn groaned. “A death and a kid missing.”
    “The play must go on.”
    “That’s theater,” said Dearborn.
    “Have you talked to my holier-than-thou sister?”
    “Unfortunately, yes.”
    “What did she say about all this?”
    “What you’d expect.”
    “She’s appalled at your insensitivity, isn’t that right?”
    Dearborn grunted.
    “The ghoulish public will flock to the theater?”
    He grunted again.
    “I know my sister.” Becca’s voice rose. “She pulled the wool over Aunt Fifi’s eyes. Actress, indeed. Ruth can’t act her way out of a wet paper bag. Auntie had no right to give her that building.” Dearborn could hear her tapping her fingernails on the phone. “I’m the actor in the family, and always have been. Ruth and her, quote, community theater. Piffle!”
    “‘Piffle’?” Dearborn’s spirit lifted slightly. “Do you plan to come to the opening tonight?”
    “Can you guarantee that my dear sister will not be there?”
    Dearborn thought about his wife’s voice and her ability to project it. How she could move her body to denote aggression or submission or dejection or wild sexuality. He wanted her badly.
    “You’re not saying anything, darling,” Becca purred.
    “I can guarantee Ruth won’t be there.”
    “Maybe I’ll come, then,” Becca murmured.

    Dearborn thought for a moment, then cleared his throat. “You wouldn’t consider going on stage tonight, would you?”
    “Moi?” said Becca. “Moi ? With no rehearsals? You’re joking. I don’t even know what the hell play you’re putting on.”
    “Frankenstein.”
    Becca’s laugh rose from cello through viola to violin, trembled with vibrato, tossed out a bassoon note or two, warbled into a flute aria, and ended with a tympanic rumble. “And what part am I expected to play, the bride of Frankenstein?”
    “Yes,” said Dearborn, astonished that she’d identified the very role he wanted her to play. “You’d be perfect.”
    “Darling, I’m speechless!” murmured Becca. “A bride made up of discarded human parts, partially decomposed, stitched together with wire, limbs that don’t quite fit the torso?”
    “No, no,” said Dearborn. “That’s Frankenstein’s monster. He constructs the monster in his college