365: Day 4-Nomenclature
Jun. 27th, 2008 06:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kitewithfishDay 4.
There were reasons why people had started calling Eva “Boss,” all of which came before her taking over as the musical director of the Nosferatu. All of them were now on display as she addressed the assembled gaggle of singers.
“Ladies, first I want to thank y’all so much for all the work you’ve done that’s gotten us here tonight.” Eva was tall, even for a Chinese women, and as a trained singer her voice carried without strain. As usual, her pre-show nerves had dissolved once the task lay before her. Veteran captains under fire on the high seas had something of the same psychotic poise about them. “I am incredibly proud of this group and what we’ve done this year, and y’all have been a pleasure to work with. This is out last performance for this semester and for some of us, including myself, Bruiser, Killer and Sax, this is our last performance with the Nosferatu ever. Let’s make this worth it. We are ready for this. I want you to go out there and sing the house down, because you are that good, and because this, of all audiences, is going to appreciate what you can do. You ladies rock like nobody’s fucking business when you put your minds to it, so I want to see everyone telling all the competition to fuck off and get in line, because this. Is. Our. Year. Now let’s go!”
***
“That was amazing- really great performance.” Jamilla did not notice when the guy in the tux had snuck up next to her until he started to talk to her. He didn’t bother to introduce himself, and combined with his nigglingly familiar good looks, this seemed to suggest that she should already know him from somewhere. Thanking him seemed safe enough.
“They called you Bill Shakespeare?”
“Jill Shakespeare. I do some theater on the side and I’m always the MC at shows. It’s kind of a thing.”
“Ah, that would explain it. Do all the nicknames have a point? I mean, I can understand one or two people, but you all seem to have one. Some kind of initiation thing?”
“It’s kind of a thing in general at the college… Some of us joined already using one, and other people just kind of picked them up after they joined. Einstein gave out a lot of them. But not everyone has a nickname. Er.” Jamilla caught herself. “Well, last year Jessie didn’t have one.”
“Do they all have a story?”
“Eh, more or less. Evageline is Boss because she’s just… a boss. She’s always got a plan, ya know? She used to clash with the last president a lot because of it, but once she got voted President herself she’s been really good and fair about it. Lesse… Well, Genevive is Legs for obvious reasons. The three Sarah’s got their nicknames first, cause we just needed to tell them apart. Einstein (that’s the Latina Sara-with-no-H) got hers cause she’s majoring in physics and she’s just kind of brilliant. Sarah M, the shorter black girl over… there! we called ‘the Lady’-"
“Lemme guess,” he broke in, “Lady Sings the Blues?”
“Nah, she ran the Renaissance Fair at the college in the fall three years running. Everyone in that group called her Lady Sarah, so we just sort of picked it up.
“Now, the last Sarah, the tall black girl, didn’t actually have a real nickname until she started dating Bruiser. Er, that’s Gina. She was kind of screwed up when she got into college- her mom had just died that summer and she’s from California so she couldn’t go home… she ended up getting into a lot of fights. She had a black eye when she auditioned for the group. So we called her Bruiser, and when Sarah S started to date her, she needed some kind of badass nickname. So, Killer. Aw, look, she’s getting Bruiser a Shirley Temple. They’re so cute. Killer really helped straighten Bruiser out. Er. So to speak.”
“They just got married?”
“Yup. They’ve been engaged a while, actually. They couldn’t get married in Massachusetts cause Bruiser isn’t a resident, so they got married here. We were all at the wedding. Ruski was the maid of honor.”
“Wait, which one is the Russian?”
“Oh, um… There! She’s over at the bar too- see the girl with the short little dreads? That’s her. She’s a Russian area studies major, not actually Russian. Her real name’s Margaritte.”
“And who’s the girl next to her?”
“That’s Rocky. I have no idea why she’s called that. Her real name’s Kevina, she really hates it, so she just always introduced herself as Rocky. I wouldn’t even know her real name if it wasn’t part of her school email address.”
“Ok, I think that just leaves ‘Spider-man’ and ‘the Boy’ to explain. Presuming that ‘Sax’ is called that for playing sax?”
“Almost. You ever see Some Like It Hot? Tony Curtis has to cross dress as girl named Josephine who plays sax in an all girl band? Well, our Sax’s real name is Josephine. Now, Spider-Man is really Latifah. She pulled this stunt her freshman year where she hung a giant net filled with water balloons between a couple of buildings on campus. But to get the net up there, she had to climb up and down the outside of both buildings with the net in one hand and a roll of duct tape in her mouth, and then carry up the water balloons in buckets. It was amazing. They still tell the newbies about it every year. So, anyway, good climber, Spider-Man. She tried to get them to change it to Spider-Girl, cause she liked that comic better, but it never stuck.
“Oh, and Lolita is not actually a Lolita. She’s Jane, really, but she always ends up dating these really old and sketchy guys. And she’s so tiny, you know? It’s a little… Nabokov.”
“Okaaay.” He stared across the room at Courtney and looked to be filing that information away. Jamilla began looking for an escape. “But what about ‘The Boy’?”
“She’s tiny and her last name is Mann. I think that explains itself. Oh, look, Boss is waving to me, I’ll just go say hi, real nice meeting you, thank you so much for coming to see the show, have a nice evening.” She made her escape, leaving the familiar looking name to puzzle out her sudden disappearance. She looked back to see him sauntering over to Lolita.
There were reasons why people had started calling Eva “Boss,” all of which came before her taking over as the musical director of the Nosferatu. All of them were now on display as she addressed the assembled gaggle of singers.
“Ladies, first I want to thank y’all so much for all the work you’ve done that’s gotten us here tonight.” Eva was tall, even for a Chinese women, and as a trained singer her voice carried without strain. As usual, her pre-show nerves had dissolved once the task lay before her. Veteran captains under fire on the high seas had something of the same psychotic poise about them. “I am incredibly proud of this group and what we’ve done this year, and y’all have been a pleasure to work with. This is out last performance for this semester and for some of us, including myself, Bruiser, Killer and Sax, this is our last performance with the Nosferatu ever. Let’s make this worth it. We are ready for this. I want you to go out there and sing the house down, because you are that good, and because this, of all audiences, is going to appreciate what you can do. You ladies rock like nobody’s fucking business when you put your minds to it, so I want to see everyone telling all the competition to fuck off and get in line, because this. Is. Our. Year. Now let’s go!”
***
“That was amazing- really great performance.” Jamilla did not notice when the guy in the tux had snuck up next to her until he started to talk to her. He didn’t bother to introduce himself, and combined with his nigglingly familiar good looks, this seemed to suggest that she should already know him from somewhere. Thanking him seemed safe enough.
“They called you Bill Shakespeare?”
“Jill Shakespeare. I do some theater on the side and I’m always the MC at shows. It’s kind of a thing.”
“Ah, that would explain it. Do all the nicknames have a point? I mean, I can understand one or two people, but you all seem to have one. Some kind of initiation thing?”
“It’s kind of a thing in general at the college… Some of us joined already using one, and other people just kind of picked them up after they joined. Einstein gave out a lot of them. But not everyone has a nickname. Er.” Jamilla caught herself. “Well, last year Jessie didn’t have one.”
“Do they all have a story?”
“Eh, more or less. Evageline is Boss because she’s just… a boss. She’s always got a plan, ya know? She used to clash with the last president a lot because of it, but once she got voted President herself she’s been really good and fair about it. Lesse… Well, Genevive is Legs for obvious reasons. The three Sarah’s got their nicknames first, cause we just needed to tell them apart. Einstein (that’s the Latina Sara-with-no-H) got hers cause she’s majoring in physics and she’s just kind of brilliant. Sarah M, the shorter black girl over… there! we called ‘the Lady’-"
“Lemme guess,” he broke in, “Lady Sings the Blues?”
“Nah, she ran the Renaissance Fair at the college in the fall three years running. Everyone in that group called her Lady Sarah, so we just sort of picked it up.
“Now, the last Sarah, the tall black girl, didn’t actually have a real nickname until she started dating Bruiser. Er, that’s Gina. She was kind of screwed up when she got into college- her mom had just died that summer and she’s from California so she couldn’t go home… she ended up getting into a lot of fights. She had a black eye when she auditioned for the group. So we called her Bruiser, and when Sarah S started to date her, she needed some kind of badass nickname. So, Killer. Aw, look, she’s getting Bruiser a Shirley Temple. They’re so cute. Killer really helped straighten Bruiser out. Er. So to speak.”
“They just got married?”
“Yup. They’ve been engaged a while, actually. They couldn’t get married in Massachusetts cause Bruiser isn’t a resident, so they got married here. We were all at the wedding. Ruski was the maid of honor.”
“Wait, which one is the Russian?”
“Oh, um… There! She’s over at the bar too- see the girl with the short little dreads? That’s her. She’s a Russian area studies major, not actually Russian. Her real name’s Margaritte.”
“And who’s the girl next to her?”
“That’s Rocky. I have no idea why she’s called that. Her real name’s Kevina, she really hates it, so she just always introduced herself as Rocky. I wouldn’t even know her real name if it wasn’t part of her school email address.”
“Ok, I think that just leaves ‘Spider-man’ and ‘the Boy’ to explain. Presuming that ‘Sax’ is called that for playing sax?”
“Almost. You ever see Some Like It Hot? Tony Curtis has to cross dress as girl named Josephine who plays sax in an all girl band? Well, our Sax’s real name is Josephine. Now, Spider-Man is really Latifah. She pulled this stunt her freshman year where she hung a giant net filled with water balloons between a couple of buildings on campus. But to get the net up there, she had to climb up and down the outside of both buildings with the net in one hand and a roll of duct tape in her mouth, and then carry up the water balloons in buckets. It was amazing. They still tell the newbies about it every year. So, anyway, good climber, Spider-Man. She tried to get them to change it to Spider-Girl, cause she liked that comic better, but it never stuck.
“Oh, and Lolita is not actually a Lolita. She’s Jane, really, but she always ends up dating these really old and sketchy guys. And she’s so tiny, you know? It’s a little… Nabokov.”
“Okaaay.” He stared across the room at Courtney and looked to be filing that information away. Jamilla began looking for an escape. “But what about ‘The Boy’?”
“She’s tiny and her last name is Mann. I think that explains itself. Oh, look, Boss is waving to me, I’ll just go say hi, real nice meeting you, thank you so much for coming to see the show, have a nice evening.” She made her escape, leaving the familiar looking name to puzzle out her sudden disappearance. She looked back to see him sauntering over to Lolita.
