I just saw Austin Miller, who played Hawk on “Days of Our Lives” in the touring company of “Hairspray” last week. Damn, he’s a fine performer. Why didn’t we see this on Days? Why didn’t they keep him instead of bringing NewPhil back? And dang if he doesn’t fill out a tight T-shirt perfectly. Him and the guy who played Kevin, both. Ooooh, visual.
And then the tidbits start hammering at my imagination. Who names their lily-white kid “Hawk”? Why was he such an asshole. How can I abuse the poor boy (since all I seem to do is torture Shawn). And then *this* sprang into my head and there you have it. Instant story.
I found it ironic, the opposites of his Days character and Link. Bully to tolerant, inclusing good guy. Hmmm, why do I always get story ideas that way? So instead of using a real person, I’m slipping Hawk into the life of Austin, and then shoving him into bed with Shawn, because this is always about Shawn. Right?
(Hee-hee. Shawn figured out who’s the killer! But he’s cried wolf too often, so he’s gonna go after it alone, and you always know how that turns out!)
Anyway, I have in mind a series of Shawn Douglas Brady stories under the catch-all and tittilating banner “I Was A Teenaged Alien’s Sex Slave!” and I’m not talking Cassie. Here is story 8 or 9 of the yet-unwritten series.
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OVERTURE
“I don’t know, Belle,” Shawn Brady reiterated for the fourth time in as many days. “I don’t know who sent the tickets to my parents’ house, I don’t know why they had Philip’s, Mimi’s or our names on them, and I don’t know what “Hairspray” is about.”
“It’s a John Waters’ movie,” Mimi popped up, dragging her boyfriend Rex’s through the ornate lobby of the Salem Grand. “I just hope whoever sent them isn’t upset Philip had to stay on base tonight and I brought my honey!”
Rex DiMera cum Brady smiled down indulgently at the love of his life. “It’s possible whoever sent them doesn’t even know Philip is in the Marines. After all, it was sent to Shawn’s parents, not the apartment *or* Salem U.”
Shawn knew that look well. When the womenfolk get something in their heads, you could only grin and bear it. “Anyway,” he emphasized, hoping to derail another go around of ‘guess what’s going on’. “They opened the lobby, we can go sit down.”
“I just hope it’s not some bad,” Belle sighed, letting Shawn guide her to the auditorium.
“Sending the four of us front row seats on opening night doesn’t strike me as the killer’s modus operandi,” he pointed out.
Belle smiled happily. “I just love it when you talk all lawyer-y like.”
It took a moment to take off coats and settle into their front row center seats. The foursome let the sounds of the crowd wash over them as they perused their playbills.
“I don’t recognize any of the names,” Mimi piped up.
Rex showed her his. “This is the guy from the movie about the porn industry! You know, the ‘get-it-upper’!”
“What?” Belle asked sharply. The crowd softened at the noise. Shawn just slid a little further down into his seat. He unfortunately started the DVD player the morning after their little adult filmfest, and knew exactly what movie his cousin was talking about.
Mimi hastily closed Rex’s booklet and shoved it in his lap. “That’s okay, honey, we can look at this later.”
“Shaaaawn,” Belle whined, crunching her playbill in her hands. “I don’t know any of these names either. Who could have sent us sixty-dollar tickets?”
He was spared having to reply by the arrival of the conductor, sticking his head above the partition of the orchestra pit and examining the crowd.
“Hello!” the blond, youngish man cheerily greeted them. “I’m Jim. How are you folks doing tonight?”
“We’re good,” Mimi replied happily. “I’ve seen really fantastic reviews about this show. On the web.”
Jim beamed and stood up higher. “Let me guess, you’re Shawn and Belle,” he said, pointing out Salem’s most popular twosome. “And that makes you Mimi and Philip!”
Rex immediately pulled Mimi back and leaned in front of her, shouting, “how did you know that!” at the same second Mimi tried to explain about her boyfriend.
“Who sent those tickets?” Shawn growled, leaning forward. His patience had been frayed lately with all the deaths.
“You’ll find out in about five minutes,” Jim replied with a laugh, dropping down and out of sight. He popped back up sporting a baby blue sequined jacket. “Just hang here in the auditorium after the show.” A blue light flashed behind him and he reached for a phone handset. A nod and a few words Shawn couldn’t make out, and Jim disappeared again as the house lights dimmed.
The heavy bass started beating and overture began. And true to Jim’s word, when the cast appeared onstage and started singing the big opening number, Shawn knew who had sent them tickets, and why none of the names in Playbill sounded familiar, and why they had nothing to fear. It had been a few years since high school, after all. Belle’s whispered “oh, my God,” and Mimi’s muffled squeal couldn’t dim his grin.
Answered in the beaming, smiling face of his old basketball teammate, Hawk Miller.
WOUNDED HAWK
Based on “Days of Our Lives”
by Kevin H Robnett
ACT I
If he didn’t have to grin and dance in front of eight hundred people for the next twenty minutes, he’d be tossing his cookies in the dressing room. They came. They were sitting there twenty feet in front of him looking shocked, happy and confused.
“You’re off tonight,” Jordan hissed as they left the stage. She’d been harping on him ever since he joined the cast. He knew it was more about his inexperience, but it got old quickly.
“Hometown,” he responded curtly, already heading to the men’s dressing room for his change. It was apparently a good enough answer since she didn’t follow him in. Good, she’d missing seeing him upchuck diner.
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During the twenty minute intermission, Hawk found a quiet, dark spot to drink his bottle of water. Calmer now after the looong first act, he reflected on his mixed up emotions.
They hadn’t got up and walked out. He could tell they enjoyed the show so far especially when he gave his big first act number an extra bump and grind. In fact, Mimi and Shawn looked about ready to jump up from their seats after it was over. Belle seemed subdued but still fascinated, and the stranger on the end….
Rex, his brain supplied, and it shook him, that he knew the space alien on sight and had already attached him to Shawn and Belle. Sometimes it took days or weeks for the Spectator to catch up to him,
“Hey,” a quiet voice intruded on his solitude. He couldn’t help but grin at Carly, who played the lead of the show and the girl who wins his heart. Only nineteen, she seemed far older than his own twenty-one, even though they both had the same empty resume before starring in this behemoth. Virgins together, scared, lonely, his closest friend on tour, or anywhere. “Those your friends in the front?”
She was the only person he had told about his plan. And even then, he’d left out the complicated back story. “They’re the ones I sent tickets too,” he hedged.
Letting it drop at that, Carly sat down beside him. “And what was that during the platter party?”
Hawk shook his head, not really knowing how to explain. How he saw Chloe instead of Tracy, unable to take a stand against what he knows is wrong. How art imitated his life and every night he’s reminded of his cowardice and failure. Karma can be such a spiteful bitch.
“I wasn’t a nice person in high school,” he whispered, leaning on her shoulder as his own flagged. “Link hits a little to close to home anyway, and with them watching, it’s like high school all over again.”
Her arm snaked around his shoulder, giving what comfort she could. “Maybe when they see the second act, they’ll realize you’re not that person any more.”
“Places” the speaker called, and she was already letting go and standing up, heading toward her mark. He watched her leave, having a little more time before his own cue came up. How could he tell her that he didn’t think he’d changed, that he felt like the same cowardly piece of shit from high school. Hiding, lying. How needed to hear lips other than hers, other than his own, tell him he’d changed. How so desperately he wanted absolutions for his sins.
And how once he truly bared his soul, Shawn Brady would hate him even more.
(So far, so good….. The End for now)
Going on vacation soon, so who knows what will pop up during the week of forced inactivity!