"Diana, oh Diana, you who nevertheless feel the same feelings as me, why do you push me away?"
"I am sorry, Sir Eliot, but I have taken a vow of chastity, and to deny it would be an affront to our Lord"
Frey, in the role of Eliot, embraced the actress.
"So for you, our love has no value that a simple affront is enough to prevent it?"
"So you don't understand? An affront to a man is only an affront, but an affront to God is blasphemy"
The actress pretended to plunge a knife into his back, and Frey pretended to fall lifeless to the ground. The actress who played Diana leaned over him:
"Farewell, my dear and tender Eliot"
The curtain fell on the stage as the audience began to applaud fervently.
.
Backstage, the theater owner himself came to congratulate Frey on his performance.
"It's been years since I felt this much emotion", the owner said. "You are truly an exemplary actor Jeffrey, no wonder the audience is going so wild".
"It's true that Jeff is a great actor but we mustn't forget the other reason why people love him so much", Chloé interjected, the young woman who played Diana a little earlier.
"Which is?" the guy working at lighting, Mike, asked.
"Because he's super handsome, of course!" Chloé replied, laughing. "I mean look at him and tell me, eye in the eye, that he couldn't star in a superhero movie?"
And the whole show crew started laughing out loud, even Frey who chuckled a bit for a moment too, although he was slightly embarrassed to be the center of attention. He waited for the laughter to end before speaking:
"Thank you so much everyone, you're all really great too", Frey said. "But I don't think I deserve all these compliments"
Everyone started to argue again at his modesty, but he cut them off before it got too big.
"Also, I wish you would call me Frey, and not Jeff or Jeffrey. I'm sorry, but it makes me really uncomfortable when someone calls me something else."
Indeed, he had always hated being called anything other than Frey. Was it because of this murderer who was also called Jeffrey? Even Frey himself had no idea, and it had become a sensitive subject for him.
"No problem, sorry again about that" Chloé apologized.
They all chatted for a while, talking about the upcoming performance or just about their hobbies and things that had happened to them recently. After that, they all started going out and going home, by subway, by bus or by their cars. But that evening, Frey's gym was closed, so he decided he was going to walk home and get a little workout in instead.
.
On his way home, he accidentally slipped on a puddle and fell to the ground, catching himself just in time on his elbows. In this position, his eyes were turned towards the sky, and his heart almost gave out when he saw the silhouette of a dragon, which blocked the light of the sun because its size was so immense.
"Eh ? W-what… a dragon?!" he shouted, getting up quickly, paying no attention to the pain in his elbows.
But when he looked into the sky again, all he saw were pigeons flying in a V pattern to a building near him.
'Was I daydreaming?' he wondered.
As he asked himself this question, he realized that he had just shouted in the street. Luckily, there was no one there at that hour, but that didn't stop Jeffrey from feeling stupid. To forget his embarrassment and put aside all the strange things that had happened to him today, he tried to think about something else: his career.
He was often told that he should become an actor: he had graduated from drama school and everyone agreed that he acted well.
On top of that, as Chloé had earlier pointed out, he was handsome enough to get the leading role in most films: 1m86, more than athletic with broad shoulders, and black hair, medium short, swept back in front, a small budding beard and azure eyes. And it's not as if he wasn't interested in cinema, which was better paid and more watched, so why did he continue to do theater?
Like many children born after 1985, he often watched movies with his father. However, when he was little, he didn't have many friends and movies weren't enough to fill his schedule. So, to keep him from being sad, his mother often took him to the theater. He loved watching actors perform on stage, with his own eyes, he felt that it created a kind of bond that was not found in cinema films.
That was why he had preferred to start with the theater, for the connection with the public, but now he felt that the time to reconvert to an actor was approaching.
He thought about the other members of the team: they were probably going to have a hard time finding a replacement for him, but he wasn't going to change his mind just because of that: Frey had never been too social even growing up, and he wasn't attached to them enough to consider delaying his departure any longer.
Suddenly he felt something cold and wet on his foot, and saw that he had stepped in a puddle.
"Oh crap… wait, what's that?!" he exclaimed.
He looked up at the sky, but everything was perfectly normal: an infinity of blue-black where we could see a large white point, the moon. Yet he was sure he saw a green and pink sky in the puddle?
"Ah, I think I really need some sleep", he thought aloud.
Frey finally arrived home and barely took the time to undress before going to bed...
Opening his eyes, he realized that he was on some kind of giant boat, which was sailing on an ocean of a color that his brain could not comprehend.
"What the hell is happening!" he shouted, panicked.
"Hello, buddy, it's rare to see a newcomer around here" said a voice behind him.
Frey turned around and saw a woman behind him who looked to be the same age as him, wearing a sweatshirt with shorts. It wasn't really a conventional clothing choice, but what shocked him the most was something else: she had little wings on her back, similar to those that fairies had.
'Okay, it has to be a dream' he thought.
"But uh sir… why are you walking around in your underwear?" she asked.
He then realized that he was still in his underwear and blushed, letting out a cry of astonishment. Due to the wind blowing across the boat , without his clothes, he was starting to feel cold. Was it normal for a dream to be so realistic?