When I was in the tenth grade, I decided to take five extra classes on top of my school classes, totaling to a whopping nine classes in one semester, as opposed to the usual four. I was drowning. I was caught in a torrent of assignments and essays and tests and quizzes, and I was drowning. Nobody seemed to notice my slow descent into exhaustion. I kept going, and going, and going, because there was nothing else I could do. When I was in the tenth grade, I decided to join the fall play. Most of my friends were in theatre. My best friend was in theatre. I probably wouldn't like it, but it wouldn't hurt to give it a try. I was right. I didn't like it. I loved it. I stepped on that stage, and suddenly I could breathe. I had broken out of the water, there was a glorious burn of oxygen in my lungs, and I could breathe. I wasn't me. I wasn't an overburdened, exhausted, burn-out of a kid. I was just another character. It was freeing. I loved it. I had such a small role, but nothing could ever compare to the exhilarating feeling of being on stage. Of being up there, being someone other than myself, someone who could just discard their problems like a heavy jacket. I was no longer drowning. I was treading water. Someone had given me their hand and pulled me out of that frigid riptide. I was no longer drowning. I took comfort in the fact that it wasn't me, on that stage. It was a butcher, or a driver, or a dancer, or whatever I needed to be in that moment. And I took comfort in the fact that no matter how the audience hated me, it wasn't me that they hated. It was hard work, and for all intents and purposes I should have been even more tired. But every time I stepped on that stage, I was invigorated. It was like a shelter in a downpour. In all honesty, theatre saved me. I found it easier to complete the rest of my assignments. I didn't find day-to-day life to be such a chore. I was freer, and happier, than I had been in a long, long time. The minute I stepped on that stage, and the water cleared out of my lungs, I knew this was what I was going to be doing for the rest of my life.

The girl who seemed on top of the world often gasped for air, thrown and battered by the waves of an angry sea. If you asked her what was wrong; if you asked her how she felt; if you asked her to explain everything awry she'd hold her tongue, smile, and say “nothing.” Looking back though, I know she was depressed. I know she was anorexic or quickly on her way to being so. I know she was falling apart at the seams. Kids would steal her food the one day she had it just to throw it away before her eyes; tears would swell and pour out while she sat alone in the dark corner of class; body, mind, and heart would ache ferociously till she yearned for her eyelids to close and fall in an unwakeable slumber. When her head felt too heavy to lift, when she felt herself breaking and anxiety creeping up this girl woke up everyday and kept waking up everyday for one reason and one reason only: rehearsal. “All I have to do is get through today, just one more day. 15 more hours. . . 10 more hours. . . 5 more hours. . . 1 more hour.” I look back now, transported through this window of a skinny, smiling girl in costume holding a bouquet of flowers standing next to her family. Her hair shines gold, her eyes glimmer blue, her flowers beam pink. I still have my hair and my eyes and those flowers are still my favorite, but everything past the frozen frame feels beyond seas. On the first day of rehearsals this girl stood in the choir room doing something she never dared do, sing. Sing so people, if they listened, could hear her. As time moved on this girl learned new choreography and danced in the lobby, danced like no one was watching. This girl put everything out on stage like she didn't have a care in the world. She would sing and she would dance and she would act and she would let herself go free. This girl smiled everyday from 3:15 to 5:00. Smiled till her cheeks hurt and she thought she couldn't bare it anymore. The time after school in the lobby dancing, in the auditorium blocking, in the choir room singing, was her escape. Her portal to a fairytale land where she would do anything to keep returning. Once, while she ran in gym, the room began to spin and her guts threatened to pour out on the floor. The teacher sent her to the nurse's office and the nurse tried to send her home, but she refused to leave school. She had rehearsal and she needed it to get through the day. If she went home she'd have to go through a strenuous 12 hours without any help; without any escape. She needed to keep coming back to that mystic land, but closing night was quickly approaching and the fairytale reaching its ending. With her bullet, she grasped for the last wire ropes, something to anchor herself for the few coming months till the leaves fell off the trees and the cold brewed in and the next story would begin. The ropes fell fast and the anchor proved faulty. The ever changing world proved too much for this porcelain girl. To a stranger, this frozen moment encapsulates a girl having the time of her life, and in that one moment they'd be right, but soon after the waves smothered her, and this time she didn't have a reason to get out of bed. Weeks passed by since that photo was taken and she thought herself ready to say goodbye. A loss of hope, a note in her head, a plan in place, she dragged her body around school for what might be the last time. Walking to the class which knew her tears well, she froze. Stared. A poster hung on the wall “audition for the fall play” she read. Her blue eyes glimmered after being dark for so long. She knew she could do it, she knew she could get through the day, and she did, and everyday since. Years have passed by since that photo was taken on opening night, and now, though I no longer drown, rehearsal still gets me out of bed on the worst of days. I walk new halls that aren't so familiar with my tears, I see new classmates now young adults, I sit in new rooms in the center of a lit class. I have a new self-confidence, a new self-worth, new ways to cope if I feel my past begin to haunt. I am no longer a porcelain girl, I am an adaptable young woman with only one true constant: theatre. I will never give up my constant, for it remains my anchor if the sea begins to churn.

A/N: 4 characters are Rose, Olivia, Rose's Autocorrect (RA), and Olivia's Autocorrect (OA). I wrote this scene for Emerson Festival for my school as the opening scene for our devised piece and it is my favorite thing I've ever written! Enjoy (: ---------------------------------------------------------------- (lights go up on Rose & Olivia) Rose & Olivia: (talking to themselves) Do I text her? Do I not text her? Do I wait for her to text me? Do I get ignored for a third day in a row? Do I suffer again? (beat) I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna text her. (Taking out their phones and “texting”) Hi! Rose: Wow, two minds think-- RA: Alight. Rose: Right? Olivia: … Alight? Rose: Damn autocorrect. I meant-- RA: Rewrite. Rose: DAMN IT! Not rewrite. ALIKE! ALIKE! Olivia: (uncomfortable) Right… anyways, you looked really-- OA: Bountiful. Olivia: Today, Rose. Rose: I looked bountiful? Olivia: SHIT. NO, no. Rose: Autocorrect? Olivia: Yeah, what I meant to say was that you looked-- OA: Bootylicious. Rose: OH? Olivia: BEAUTIFUL! Rose: What? Olivia: Nevermind. Rose: Alright… Uh, are you going to the football game tomorrow? Olivia: Nah. Those things give me-- OA: Acupuncture. Rose: Umm. Okay! Thats cool. Olivia: ANXIETY! ANXIETY! Rose: This conversation is giving me anxiety. OA: Smelly. Rose: OKAY LISTEN-- Olivia: IT'S MY AUTOCORRECT I SWEAR! SORRY. I AM SORRY. S-O-R-R-Y. GOD. JUST MY LUCK. Rose: Haha, it's-- RA: Fish. Olivia: (confused) Blub? Rose: Blub? I meant fine. Olivia: Fine… um-- I have something to ask you. Rose: Alright-- RA: Lay on me. Olivia: That's a first. Rose: LET'S NOT GO THERE. I WAS TRYING TO SAY LAY IT ON ME. LIKE TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT TO ASK. Olivia: Do you wanna-- OA: Go drought with me? Rose: There's a drought? Where? Olivia: OUT! GO OUT! Rose: Outside? Olivia: No! Rose: I'm confused. Olivia, what are you trying to say? Olivia: ROSE WILL YOU PLEASE-- OA: HATE ME! Rose: I don't want to hate you. I really-- RA: Dislike you. Olivia: What? Rose: WHAT? Olivia: So that's how you feel about me? Rose: NO! AUTOCORRECT! I LIKE YOU, Olivia! I DON'T WANT TO-- RA: Date you. Olivia: I AM SO CONFUSED. Rose: HATE. I don't want to hate you. Olivia: Okay. Mine was autocorrected too. I definitely don't want you to hate me. I meant to ask if you would like to-- OA: Debate me. Rose: In what? Olivia: DATE. DATE ME. Rose: So you want me to debate whether I should date you or not? Olivia: Wow. That autocorrect actually worked out. Will you? RA: Guess. Olivia: No? Rose: YES. Yes. I want to date you. Olivia: Nice. Rose: Nice. Olivia: Cool. Rose: Cool. Olivia: Thank you for saying yes. (END)