The Verrick Theatre sits an hour past the last gas station, a black stone box with no sign out front. They gave Mara the lead after one phone call. The actress before her, Lenore, walked out mid-run, and nobody will say where she went. In her dressing room, taped to the mirror at eye level, is a single index card. The handwriting is Mara's own. It reads: "You will read this and not run. Good. We start at eight."

Mara peels the card off the mirror and flips it over. The back has more of her handwriting. "Check the costume rack. Lenore's old dress. Don't put it on." She turns. A dress hangs on the rack, deep red, exactly her size. A second card is pinned to the collar.

Mara searches the dressing room for a hidden camera, sure someone is feeding her these notes in real time. Instead she finds a stack of index cards in the drawer, hundreds of them, all in her writing. They describe the whole night ahead, scene by scene. The last card just says: "This is where you stop reading and start performing."