Ben’s facial expression was almost comically solemn. “I promise.”
Like a lot of actors he knew, Jason never watched his own movies once they were finished. The prevailing wisdom of people outside the business—people who didn’t know a damn thing about acting or filmmaking—was that the only way to get better was to analyze your own work. What they didn’t seem to realize was that acting wasn’t about planning out each sigh or bat of the eye. It wasn’t about stepping outside yourself and viewing your body as an outsider, wondering if your hair was a mess or whether there was snot coming out of your nose as you cried. It was about occupying the character completely, one moment at a time, and trusting that everybody else involved, from the gaffers to the hairdressers to the editors, would take all the fragmented pieces of art and make them work.
But once the scenes were filmed, why watch them again? There were the exceptions of course—the actors and actresses who were anxious to see their footage and analyze what they’d done, but in Jason’s experience, they were the minority. Most actors he knew shuddered at the thought. After all, it was over. Nothing could be changed or revised or reshot. Why watch a movie afterward only to find out the scene you’d torn your heart out for had landed on the editing room floor, or that in the sequence you’d done your best work in, you’d actually been halfway out of focus, just part of the background of another actor’s shot?
In the end, it didn’t matter. The success of the film had very little to do with acting. It had a lot more to do with the total vibe of the project. There were a hundred different things that went into making a movie work.
Or not work, in certain cases.
And for better or worse, about two-thirds of the way through a production, most of the cast and crew knew how things would shake out. They knew in their gut whether the film would rock, or whether it was a dud. When that happened, the only thing anyone could do was try to laugh it off. Hold their heads up and walk back on set every day until it was done. And Jason had done that. No matter how shitty the role or the film, he’d given it his best. But in nearly every case, he’d walked away feeling like it had all been for nothing.
Alley of Blood had been like that.
Jason took a deep breath and prepared for a hundred and three minutes of hell. He knew watching the film would be tough, but he realized immediately he hadn’t thought things through. The opening scene was all Andrew, so bright and young and full of life, it took Jason’s breath away.
“That’s him,” Jason said, his throat tight. He felt Ben’s concerned gaze on him. “That’s the boy I was telling you about. Andrew. The one who died.”
Ben frowned. “We don’t have to watch it if it’s upsetting for you.”
And it was. There was no denying the gentle ache in Jason’s heart, but it also seemed wrong to turn away. As if stopping the movie now somehow diminished what Andrew had meant to him. “No, it’s fine.”
He settled in, mentally steeling himself for the onslaught of bad memories, and they came. He remembered fighting with the director over a certain scene, and a key grip being fired in the middle of another, and the debilitating off-screen drama surrounding the director and his affair with the actress. It had made the entire project seem unbearable at the time.
And yes, seeing Andrew was hard. God, he’d forgotten so much, like the way Andrew ducked his head when he laughed, as if he was embarrassed at his own amusement. He’d forgotten how Andrew flexed his arms whenever he was on camera, as if trying to take up more space. But he’d also forgotten the shadows under his eyes, and the twitchiness and unpredictable bouts of surliness. They hadn’t been lovers yet—that hadn’t happened until after the movie had wrapped—and so he hadn’t understood at the time, but hindsight was twenty-twenty: Andrew had been strung out, using God-knew-what kind of drugs, even back then.
It was a startling realization.
Ben sat next to him, rapt. As the tension built through the first act, he leaned forward on the couch, his hands clutched tight in front of his chest. When the first coed died an appropriately violent death, it startled him so much he popped right out of existence.
Jason paused the movie and wound the globe while he waited for Ben to reappear.
“What happened?” he asked, once Ben was next to him on the couch again.
Ben’s spectral skin seemed paler than before, his eyes wide. “That was horrifying!” He gestured at the screen, which was frozen on a shot of fake blood splattered across a battered No Exit sign. “I wasn’t expecting it to be so graphic. Is the whole movie like that?”
“It is. That’s why people watch. It’s a trademark of the genre.” He glanced over at Ben. “Are you sure you want to watch it? We can turn it off if you want. I won’t be offended.”
“No, I still want to see it.” He rubbed his chest lightly. “I suppose I’ll get used to it, right?”
“Probably.” Jason tapped the remote on his thigh, remembering. “The funny thing is, this entire sequence was cobbled together after the fact. The shots of the killer while he’s chasing her, and the shots of her as she’s running away weren’t shot on the same day. They weren’t even shot in the same location. If you watch carefully, you can see that the building behind her is red brick, but when they flash to him, it’s a cinderblock wall. That’s because her death was originally scripted for later in the movie, and the killer looks different by then. They changed it about halfway through production, moving her death to the end of the first act, but we were already overbudget, and the director figured we may as well use the footage we’d already shot rather than wasting time and money doing it right.”
“I didn’t even notice.”
“Well, that’s what they were counting on. You’ll also see that her shirt is buttoned when she’s running, but when they show her on the ground afterward, it isn’t. That’s just slop. It happens. Here. Watch. I’ll rewind it a bit.”
“You can do that?”
“Of course.”
“Is it one of those VSH things?” he asked.
Jason laughed. “VHS? No. Those have gone the way of the dinosaur, but this works the same way.” He rewound the globe first, so Ben wouldn’t lose his voice, then the movie, glancing sideways at Ben as he did. “Can I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
“Why do you disappear the way you do?”
“Oh.” Ben put his hand over his chest, as if trying to steady his breathing. “It takes concentration to stay here, and if something surprises me or upsets me, I lose the connection. It’s worse when I’m tired.”
Jason thought back to the first time he’d seen Ben, and how when he’d sought him out a second time, Ben was gone. “So that first night, when you saw Dylan and me on the balcony, you were upset or—”
“I was surprised! You looked over, and you saw me. I was sure of it.”
“You scared the hell out of me!”
“I felt the same way. I’ve spent a hundred and fifty years spying on people, but that’s the first time I’ve ever been caught at it.”
Jason laughed self-consciously, wondering if Ben would ask about Dylan. He turned back to the movie, deciding it was better to nip that one in the bud. He didn't want to talk about Dylan. “Here, I’ll start it when she comes out of the bar.”
The second time through the coed’s death, Ben managed to stay present on the couch.
After that, it was one spectacularly gruesome Hollywood death after another. Jason tensed as Andrew’s cinematic demise drew near. He feared watching it would bring back memories of his lover’s actual death, but it didn’t. Instead, he found himself smiling at the scene, remembering how they’d flirted between takes, even though Andrew was covered in fake gore. He remembered hoping Andrew would kiss him. He recalled with stunning clarity the butterflies in his stomach, wondering what might happen between them once the movie had wrapped.
They’d had good times. Not only he and Andrew, but all of them. After all, at the heart of it, they’d been nothin
g more than a group of teenagers, hanging out and goofing off. They’d learned to roll their eyes when the director wasn’t looking and to bolster each other when things got rough. They’d eaten lunch together and played video games in their downtime and dreamed about the future.
They’d had fun. That was what he’d forgotten. It seemed odd, but it was true. He’d forgotten that acting had once been fun.
“That was fantastic,” Ben said when it was over. “You died better than anybody.”
“If you say so.” Jason had been lost in thought during the last half hour of the movie. Now that he focused on Ben again, he realized the boy looked drained. His image on the couch was fainter than before, his translucent cheeks somehow paler than Jason remembered. “Are you all right?”
“I’m tired,” Ben admitted. “This has worn me out more than I expected. I’m used to lingering, but I’ve never interacted before. It’s harder, although I’m not really sure why.”
Jason felt guilty and a bit disappointed. “I’m sorry.”
“No. Please don’t be. This has been wonderful. I know I should go rest, but . . . I’m so afraid this is all some kind of dream. I’m afraid if I leave you now, that’ll be the end of it.”
“Well, I can’t make any promises since I’ve never dealt with a magical snow globe before, but I swear to you I’m not going anywhere. And first thing tomorrow morning, I’ll get Stalker in the Woods queued up and ready to go, just for you.”
“Thank you.” Ben smiled sweetly, his image flickering. “In case for some reason I don’t see you, I want you to know this has been wonderful. Truly, my best day ever. I’ll never forget it.”
In the blink of an eye, he was gone, leaving Jason alone with his parting words.
Sitting on the couch watching soap operas and bad horror movies with a man he didn’t know was the best day ever?
It sort of put Jason’s worst days into perspective.
When Jason wandered downstairs shortly after nine the next morning, he found Ben in the living room, waiting for him. He practically glowed when he spotted Jason. He clapped his hands and bounced on the balls of his feet. Jason wasn’t sure he was ready for conversation, but it would be cruel to deny Ben a chance to speak, so he dutifully wound the music box.
“You’re here!” Ben gushed, as soon as he was able.
“Seems that way.”
“I think I’d hug you if I could.”
“Let’s not get carried away.” Still, it felt good to be wanted, even if it was by a man nobody else could see.
“Can we watch another one of your movies now?”
“Coffee first.”
Twenty minutes later, they settled on the couch—or in Ben’s case, in the couch—and Jason hit Play. Ben asked a lot of questions, and Jason told him all about the cast and how the various scenes had been shot. In the end, it took them a little over three hours to finish watching a ninety-minute movie.
“That was wonderful!” Ben said when it was over. “Even better than the last one.”
“It doesn’t take much to beat Alley of Blood.”
“Bummer that you had to die so early.”
Jason laughed. “‘Bummer’? You have a pretty modern vocabulary for somebody who hasn’t had a single conversation since the start of the Civil War.”
“It’s not like I haven’t been around people. Just because they couldn’t hear me didn’t mean I wasn’t listening to them.”
“Or to the TV?”
“Exactly.”
“I bet that made your predicament a lot easier.”
“It really did. Of all the inventions I’ve seen over the years, the TV is definitely my favorite. I mean, the radio seemed like a miracle, but television . . .” He shook his head, smiling. “It’s amazing.”
“But you said you hadn’t seen one since about 1990?”
“I think that’s when it was.”
“Okay.” Jason took a moment to wind the globe. “Back up. You talked about being stuck in the curio cabinet. How does that fit in?”
“I saw a lot of TV in the seventies and eighties, up until the curio cabinet. That only lasted a year or two, thank goodness. And then somehow—I never really knew how, because I was inside the globe when it happened—but I ended up with this little old lady in a nursing home. Her name was Edith. She was alone a lot, and she watched TV all the time, which I loved, but then she died. After that, I spent a few years in the spare bedroom at her niece’s house. That was pretty boring. Then I ended up in an antique shop. That wasn’t bad, really. No TV, but there were lots of people in and out all the time. I’d follow the employees around and listen to them talk about their families and their trouble with their husbands. There were affairs and arguments and all kinds of drama.” He laughed. “It was a lot like a soap opera, actually. That was one of the better periods, I guess. Then one day, a new lady came in and bought the globe and stuck it in that room you found me in.”
“Did anything interesting ever happen there?”
Ben shook his head. “Never.”
“So that was a bad time?”
“No. That wasn’t too bad. The worst . . .” He winced, hesitating, and Jason wound the globe again while Ben contemplated his words. “For a while, the globe . . . well, I don’t really know for sure, but in hindsight, it must have been in a box, packed away in an attic or something.”
“So you were stuck in the attic?”
“No. I was stuck in the box.” He shuddered. “I’d try to come out, like this—” he indicated his spectral form, on the couch “—but it was all wrong. Like I could just barely project, but I couldn’t move at all. It was pitch-black, every time, and not a single sound. If I listened hard, sometimes I thought I heard birds or footsteps, but I wasn’t really sure at that point. It felt like a grave.” He shook his head, his eyes focused on some distant point as he remembered. “I imagined so many things. I thought maybe the world had ended, and I was the only one left, stuck forever in that place. And then I thought maybe the globe had been thrown away. Maybe it had been buried in a dump somewhere, and I’d picture piles of earth all around me, and I’d suddenly feel like I couldn’t breathe.” He clutched his chest with one pale hand. “I thought maybe I was in hell. That I’d died, and damnation was going to be an eternity of silence.”
“That sounds horrifying. How in the world did you handle it without . . . well . . .”
“Without going crazy?”
Jason hadn’t wanted to say it out loud, but he nodded.
“I’m not sure I did, to be honest. I think I lost it for a while.”
“You seem perfectly sane to me, especially given the circumstances.”
“I’ve learned through all of this that sanity isn’t something you have, and then you lose it and it’s gone forever. It’s something you can pass in and out of, you know? It’s there and gone, there and gone again. It’s like walking through shadows on a sunny day.”
Jason shivered at the thought. “But you obviously got out of there eventually.”
“Yes, thank goodness. One day, it started snowing, so I knew somebody had moved the globe. And when I projected to the outside, I was in a living room. The curtains were open and the sun was shining—it was August, although I didn’t know that yet—and there was music playing, and kids laughing in the other room. Oh my God, I can’t tell you how relieved I was. It was like I’d been reborn.” His glanced over at Jason, a broad smile brightening his face. “That was the happiest day I’ve ever had in the globe. Until yesterday, that is. Until you.”
Jason squirmed at the frankness of the statement. “I’m sorry I ran away after our first meeting.”
“I don’t care. You came back. That’s the only thing that matters. That room over the garage was okay, but this is definitely better.”
“I’m glad I’m more entertaining than an empty room.”
Ben laughed. “Much more entertaining. And you have a TV.” Ben’s smile faded. He stood and went to the window to gaze across
the lawn to the garage. “But you see what I mean now, that being there wasn’t too bad. Boring maybe, but at least I knew the world was still turning, and that the globe was safe. I even had a window. There’s nothing worse than not being able to see outside.”
If seeing outside meant that much to him . . .
“Do you want to go out there?”
Ben spun toward him. “What?”
“I could take the globe outside if—”
“Oh my God, yes! I hadn’t even thought of that, but yes! Would you really do that for me?”
“Sure. Why not?”
Ben grew so excited, he popped out of sight for a moment. By the time he appeared again, Jason had donned his shoes and jacket. He tucked a pair of gloves into his pockets.
“You ready?” he asked Ben.
Ben nodded, his face bright and eager, and Jason picked up the globe. Ben vanished again as he passed out of the living room, flickering back into view briefly in the hallway, and then again on the veranda. His face broke into a dazzling smile as they descended the steps to the yard. The sunlight washed through him, making it much harder to see him than it had been inside. He closed his eyes and tilted his head back, soaking it in. His lips moved, and Jason realized he hadn’t yet rewound the globe. His fingers were starting to get sore from turning the tiny key so many times.
“You’ll have to repeat that,” he said, after he’d wound it as far as it would go.
“I said, ‘It’s perfect.’” Ben watched as Jason pulled on his gloves, the globe held tight between his knees. “Is it cold?”
“Can’t you feel it?”
Ben shook his head, but his smile didn’t fade. “I wish I could.”
“It’s brisk, that’s for sure, but it could be worse.”
“What month is it?”
“November.”
“Oh, if only it were October! That’s my favorite month. But November isn’t bad. Is it early in the month?”
“It’s the eleventh.”
“On a mild year, they might still be harvesting. Does it smell like apples?”
“What?”