Redline Riot

The cue light

When a lighting board failed in the middle of a youth theatre matinee, Luca Estrin finished the show from a ladder. The director called out scenes from four rows back. Luca changed the lamp angle by leaning to a careful spot and getting two fingers under the barn door. Afterward everyone thanked the young leads, who had the sense to keep saying their lines. Luca loved how tightly the crew had had to work. After half an hour of retelling the story he had somehow acquired a second ladder and a more precipitous climb. Ty Beck packed the cables while Luca found new people to tell.

The two have worked on the same Nightjar City lighting calls since their first summer out of school. Ty picks up on exactly when Luca's attention leaves a task, often a moment before Luca himself could say where it went. They travel together often, in the Chevy 2018 Camaro SS when the work gear has already been sent ahead. On a long drive, Ty will endure up to two accounts of the same traffic light.

Ty leaves at six

At their first joint practice Luca soaked up an audience at the fence while Ty packed up a loaned tool tray. They agreed to swap roles the following Sunday. Luca went from the end of his run to a conversation about an upcoming show, and made it back in time to see the gates being closed. By then Ty had spent his own slot looking for a socket Luca had left on the ledge along the windscreen. He found it when Luca opened the door to put a sweatshirt on the passenger seat.

On the next visit there were bright rings under every tool in the foam tray. Ty had used leftover scene paint. Luca made a joke about signage for people of declining eyesight and got a laugh out of somebody two bays over. Ty kept checking what was in his bag. At six he left, with two runs on the sheet and both of them under Luca's name.

Two short slots

Luca first came back early for a practice he'd agreed to share with Miller Laqour because both had evening calls. He wrote his name down for twenty minutes and drew a box around it. At the track, he likes the first obvious opening and puts the Camaro into it with a clean push. Sometimes the next marker gets big very quickly. Miller saw one such pass and asked where Luca wanted to be after it. They worked on that question until Miller's timer went. That was close to the first time Luca had wanted one more run and managed to clear the lane when he said he would.

Rafi left him a folding chair once after a test. Luca spent so long wondering whether it was a deliberate test of his follow-through that he could have packed it and made the evening bus with time to spare. He packed it anyway and ran.

Open on Sunday

Ty has accepted an afternoon slot Luca signed over to him. They're still debating who gets to keep the car for the second half. Luca would like to get through the back half of that turn cleanly enough to set a marker for a newcomer, and he would like Ty to be the one holding the marker. He took the new roster to a show last week and pinned it behind the lighting panel. In that space, where nobody sees it, he waits for the stage crew to plague him about how much he has underlined Ty's name.