unmoored

His brow furrows at the question. He sees them all the time. They’re part of his every-day life like a pair of handcuffs is to a prisoner. He talks to them because he’s commanded to, because he has to, because he needs to. But before he can answer her, the circuits in his brain connect the intended dots, reframe themselves away from the Winters and onto his own family lineage, not the one he’s diseased with. The Aldridges. Their family line. It’s been so long, he’s nearly forgotten them altogether, as if their existence was scoured from his DNA.

“No,” he begins, a dead type of thought, the kind of answer that lingers until it seeps into the atmosphere. Does he tell her what she probably already knows? That they wrote off any members of the family that took out his mother? That they knew from the beginning that all of it was a mistake, a con-job, a pointless loss? “No,” he simply decides to repeat with a shake of his head. Leave it at that. Take a sip of your drink.

“How’d it go when you told them you signed your contract?”

something like a laugh sticks in her chest at his answer, builds ask he continues talking. the aldridges often felt a far off, a kingdom who’s gates only opened when there was an event large enough to garner photography. they expressed no interest in her personal life, only her career seemed to matter. and for a time on broadway, it was. and now, it was something a little more wary. 

“that i was throwing my career away.” she recites the words that had been left in a voicemail, phone never being picked up in time. “the one with the singing and dancing, at least.” as though that could sum up the work she’d done in the past, a careless dismissal of what had once been hopes for a tony, if she’d ever been the awards type. “but they’ll be watching.” 

they always were. it was the kind of statement that didn’t even need to be paired with the listless shrug she’s given it. “but it’s not up them what i do.” or don’t do, as had often been the case it seemed. “my mother was the one who recommended los angeles, i don’t know what she expected.”

there is little solace to be found in remainders of the past, the reason to come to hollywood has been lost in translation. but one thing is clear, it is not new york city, she will not be stepping foot back on a broadway stage. there is only one thing that is clear, no matter what the city’s title, melancholy seeps through. the expression on her cousin’s face matches pitch with her own thoughts. time does not make things any better. at least they no longer wear matching christmas patterns.

“you don’t still talk to any of them do you?”

Little girl in her little uniform, waiting her turn on the swings. Tailored in sea-storm gray with a badge from Mercy Middle embroidered on her chest like the trustfund babies that littered the field. She was almost one of them. She blended in. She was one of them. As much a chameleon as her father. Nina Carnegie. You’re weird. You’re odd. You’re strange.

Humble young woman in her Bergdorf and Goodman turtleneck, waiting her turn on this new playground. Nina Morgan. She contorts her muscles in a way to smile. The body is a puppet with strings pulled by the new-self. The napkin in her lap stains from the edge of a cuticle being ripped off beneath the table.The new-self isn’t much better than the old.

“Who says you need to listen?” Wine flows into their glasses. Her peripheral vision tells her this. Her direct focus tells her that Carolina Papen wants nothing to do with these meetings. Her clean hand wraps around the stem of her glass, keeping it there. If she says yes, she’ll drink. If she says no, she won’t. “Those meetings are pro forma. I don’t mind going as your proxy.–Wouldn’t you like that?”

finally there is wine, though it does little to improve the conversation at hand. she hardly listens to anything these days, the veil that has dropped over her life only penetrated by those insistent, people with burning tempers and agendas that simply cannot be laid to rest. she takes a sip of her drink, she does not turn over the reasons why someone might want to go to one of those meetings, let alone endure it alone. would she like something, she tries to think it through, that she could avoid the truly excruciating parts of the job she’d now chosen.

“that sounds like paperwork.” and the man in charge of her contract seemed particularly keen to make sure that there were no loopholes in her account. that every question had been answered and accounted for in writing. it made for changes like these being near impossible, at least in her own hazed mind. “and i would like to avoid going further than what was already necessary.” the sigh to her voice makes it sound like a favor, the lilt of someone who hopes to save them hours and energy on what will be falling asleep with their eyes open. “i’m tired of reading fine print.”

DON’T TELL ME WHAT I WANT TO DO. “Not that,” she almost breathes, releases her words into the air like a string of menthol. There is no room for her to be a secretary. She will make her own observations, but it will not be for the sake of remembering inconsequential details. Even Lina is aligned with her view, even if it’s not framed in the same way. She knows what she wants. She has always known. She knows. She knows. “They need to be the ones taking notes.”

Her muscles uncurl in her shoulders, smoothing down the blades while the corner of her napkin is twirled between her thumb and finger in her tracked thoughts. “They see you’re a contract. That’s all they see, now.” Her voice is gentle, but she is not sympathy; she is factual without arrogance; the harbinger of what is and what can be done about it. She is no rebel, but advocate. “It’s better that I’m there.–I don’t mind. It’s what I’m here for.” A small smile spreads from across the table. “Let me do this for you.”

she wondered if they really did think of her as just contract, she found it hard to think so. all her time in hollywood was predicated on the  idea that she could spend money. her last name was an investment that people could use. now, it was something else. a selling point maybe, but she wasn’t sure. who could be, and why bother trying. notes were irrelevant. 

“you’re strange.” she knew that nina was only saying that she would be there because she was paid to, through some nebulous tie she was going to have to endure whatever lina said she wanted, but wasn’t that always the issue. lina didn’t want anything. still, nina offered. “i’m bored listening to them.” and it was about her. but there were certain precautions that were supposed to be taken now. the irons warned, her own parents insisted, and she was left waiting for her glass of wine. the sigh that escapes her betrays an eternity of exhaustion, far more than it should be possible for a papen to have accrued. “just don’t say i didn’t warn you.”

Her eyes are reaching out for her image, not so much her as a complete being with thoughts and ideas of her own, but as the slender outline that floats down. Nina’s head turns slightly, shifts the angle minutely, lengthens her neck as if she’s caught her reflection somewhere. She is listening, but there are other notes being taken down than wine pairings.

“Of course.” She is humbled, lowers herself into the spot that she is exactly set out to fit into. “It seemed late for lunch…” she murmurs, lips dewed by her clear gloss before her head tips up to the approaching waiter. “Ms. Papen decided against the merlot. She would like a sauvignon blanc instead. I’m sorry for the confusion.” And the waiter turns away almost as soon as he’s come, leaving Nina to adjust the napkin on her lap by her fingertips. It winds up being in the exact spot as where it started before Carolina is brought back into her vision.

“I should be with you during the meetings in the future,” she brings up softly, even as pale blue irises are sitting atop the others in their gaze. “Don’t you think so?”

she is neither problem or solution. she simply is by virtue of being, the spark of life that might have possessed so many in her position has faded, leaving this shell which watches the wine be swapped without a flicker of emotion. she doubts it is the kind of detail that many people would notice, but it makes all of the difference when in suitable company. besides, any time she does not have to talk to the waiter, sommelier, bartender, or hostess, is considered a win. there is so much small talk in daily interactions, the thought of them presses on her heavily. she only has so much to say, the words seem to evaporate from her mind before she has the chance to grasp them. 

“to take notes?” it escapes as a sigh, as though the mere idea has already taken some toll on her. it wouldn’t be the worst idea to have someone along to deflect all the small talk, get to the point of all these long meetings and navigate the boundaries of her new contract. there seems to be something complicated about it that she cannot understand, and no one is able to elaborate. the department on her side, as everything else has so often tried to fall. “you don’t want to do that.”

she knows that nina’s title is something other than assistant, and that friend is far too broad a suggestion, but she’s never quite grasped what the official relationship should be. there were always so many other people trying to help guide her, all of them with a different label and none of them ending up sitting across from her at this table. “it’s not even production meetings— hardly worth remembering.”

@linapvpen​

She remembers rainy days. They cloud her already hazy memories of childhood. The selective recollections of a young girl are the scars of the human psyche. The Upper East Side was a messy string of scattered storms. The raindrops raced down her bedroom window. She picked a favorite, placed her bet. If that little droplet reached the bottom first, daddy would take her with him on his trip. The voices in the hallway distracted her. When she looked back, her game was over. She was not the winner. He never did go on his trip, not the one he was packing for.

That was almost fifteen years ago. The Carnegie name, so prized and revered, is now replaced by Morgan in homage. For it was Morgan who made Carnegie the richest person in his own time, and that’s exactly who Nina Morgan will become. She is billed as talent agent, exclusively devoted, staring up from her seat at who she represents. The droplets splash across the window next to her, awaiting the next bet. This is too important to risk. She ignores them. 1-2-3. 1-2-3. 1-2-3. She hates herself. She is Nina Morgan. She is Carolina Papen. She doesn’t need her droplets. She’s made it this far without them. She loves herself.

“I ordered ahead,” she says, watching her. “I didn’t know how long you’d take, but I asked for a bottle of Merlot to be chilled until you came. Is that all right?”

there is little change in her life it seems. the excitement that was promised in an acting career, all of those glittering lights and luxuries to spare that estelle had been so sucre of never did manifest. she is a valued name, a player on both teams who can no longer be trusted with secrets from either. and so she takes the roles that are given to her, and she walks through each and every art gallery in the city. and in between there is wine and nina. 

“of course.”  she set her purse on one free chair, dropping into the other in one fluid motion. dancer’s grace being used only for lunches now, audience dwindled but present. “meetings always run long.” for she who had no watch and hardly knew the day of the week, it was near impossible to ask for a schedule. perhaps a rigid production would do her some good. “i prefer white with lunch.” though there was no question she preferred reds, she was a creature of decorum, raised with polished silver and ivory handles. “a sauvignon blanc in the future.”

it falls somewhere between request, command, and advice. as though she is teaching etiquette in between her days of stretching nothingness. “pairs better with salads.”

She would never know more about her friend like he would never know more about his. Left behind to sift through rumors, through former possessions, through memories for hidden meanings you wished you could have seen in the moment as an indicator to act sooner, to do things differently. But they were not meant to be grouped together. Julian Santiago and Carolina Papen were not on the same page as far as he was concerned. His weakspot for contracts did not extend to her. She was not forced into it, she was not pressured, and she was not cornered into Los Angeles with only a pen and a piece of paper to sign. She had been given the resources to do something to change the circumstances of those that weren’t as fortunate, and she threw it all away, leaving him to watch the mess that was irreversible. And she asked if he was unhappy. She had no fucking idea.

“Que te den por culo,” his voice scraped against his lungs from the harsh breath, harsher eyes watching her. “You ask me that again? You act like you care? When you don’t?” She stayed in his sights, head a sharp gesture to the remnants of shattered whiskey. “That glass will go through your skull from your eyes.”

Unaffected. Empty. He was already staring at someone who was dead. And what was he in comparison? Someone who by all means should have been, left only with a will that refused to go so quietly, burning and burning, ready to explode. Souls like that never fit in graves, barely fit inside a human body without cracking it at the seams. Lina just happened to be an accelerant, a one-night only chemical reaction by simple happen-chance or misfortune.

“Was! Now? Nothing!” he continued in the correction, kerosene leaking out, splashing, some trickling subconscious hope something of her would finally catch on fire to make her feel /something/, too much for him to hold onto all alone. She pushed it back on him, spraying him in the face as he looked down at her, close enough for her to see the pinch at the corner of his eyes, the flaring of the nostrils, the jaw that threatened to unhinge.

“My points? Why?” The teeth exposed themselves as gritting, a firmness in every bone in his body as she was swallowed up in his sights. “My time is not enough of a waste on you?”

the threat of violence procured less than a flutter of an expression across her face. too accustomed to hearing it shouted across a set time and time and time again to ever let it sink in. usually she had a bottle of water and a comfortable seat but instead now she was standing uncomfortably and her glass was almost empty. she parsed through the scenery, trying to find the saving moment. where was his wife? the only time she’d ever seen his expression lift was when she’d walked on the set to talk to him. no such luck now as his tirade continued on. maybe that was the sore subject. wine swirled in the glass, topic left alone. 

she thought it’d been nice to give him the warning, in case he needed more funding than felix could have provided. but apparently her notion was misplaced. she was no closer than she’d ever been. at least she could say her change was not for the worse. it was as if nothing had happened at all. at least not yet, there would be the matter of it somewhere down the line. what a waste it all seemed to be. a year hidden away and here’s what it got her, one angry man trying his best to still intimidate her. but he wouldn’t kill her. 

“but never a waste of film” they’d never gotten along, not once. from the moment they met, her script stained and unopened. but still, he couldn’t pretend that it had all been for not. with his big sets, the extra hours filming in, the crew for the desert film. all of it, and he took it without a second thought. she didn’t care, not in any concrete way. but she was trying to avoid the delusion of it all. she was, for better or worse, coming to terms with her life. years late, but there all the same. “you’re welcome.” apply it to the first thing that came to mind, reject it entirely, she had almost moved on now that she’d said her part. “i thought you’d appreciate the notice. bad night for it.”

He didn’t know her on a personal level. He knew a part of her life that branched off from her own even less. It failed to stop him. She gave her response to him, and it only went against the grain, the grain of the natural order of things, the grain of common sense, shown in his jaw chiseling itself from the inside out in its pressure. “This is what she would have wanted? What friend wants this? You wanted it for her? You’re happy?”

Steam pooled in his ears, rush of blood that wanted to be released desperately at bare knuckles, deaf to the exact words she muttered, lack of care for them keeping him from making her repeat it. What did it matter what was mumbled under breath when what was said at surface level alone was enough for the temper to wrap itself around. The air cracked his lungs, shot up like fire through the nose, like the emptiest laugh. Dark eyes on her even as the head turned, a broken shake of the head that didn’t deserve even to be completed on her behalf. “The credits! Why else would you know a name? Your cast! A person! What else are they there for but to fill the time after a film?! Mierda!”

His hand had raised, caught by its own muscles, clenching fingers that balled together, thumbnail digging into the palm, nipping its way through without restraint. Glass shards already decorated the side of where he stood. There was little else that was in his way that could find itself in the same way. Choices limited when the only thing left in his path was the very one tipping him one breath at a time.

There was numbness prickling his veins, starting from his wrist, working its way down across him, as if her answer had been delivered to him via intravenous. She wanted to do this? What does that tell you about the state she’s in? He didn’t pause, more so the moment kidnapped him, kept him frozen in its capsule of time while he stared at her, the flicker of understanding snuffed out before it could it even smolder. Numbness turned into electric pulses, wavelengths turning into short-circuiting, turning into unplanned fire that reached around his neck and squeezed.

“The money.”

Calm. A chill, the kind that siphons off all warmth.

“You think that’s it? The fucking money?”

Calmness teetering, a tone razor-thin at its edges, fragments of crystal below him soft and approachable in comparison as his foot crushed one in a step towards her.

“That’s all you’re good for? That’s it?! That was all you could do? Write a check?!” he questioned from teeth barely separating, air from his chest eviscerating the night against her own bubble, busting it in one disemboweling slice. “Then? Jump. Go! That is something you can do!”

she only had the obvious on her side. “i’ll never know.” there was no emotion to her words, it was clear from the path of questioning that he was headed down that he was never going to understand what might have been the last straw to force estelle to sign the contract. for her to make the same decision in the end. she wasn’t happy. but when in the past year had her happiness be the thing to take into account. it wasn’t, and it didn’t need to be now. “why? are you unhappy?” not that he was a friend, or that he could answer the question with any clarity when he seemed on the verge of exploding completely. she knew it wasn’t her, not in any particular answer she gave. but just that it was her. 

“i thought he was a fine choice.” good would have implied that she’d done anything more than hold minor conversations with any of the members of the cast while waiting for time to fade between their takes. he hadn’t offended anyone, and she remembered his name. it was more than most people she encountered in the past year could have said. but before she might have scrounged up another half reply to bore him into closing the conversation, he seemed to latch onto her statement. and it was enough to turn him inside out.

she always wondered what it would be like to hear the thoughts that rattled around her head spoken out loud, confirmed by another voice. but there was nothing to it, no placement for it to find, no hold left. if he was right, it would happen soon enough either way. “all i was good for.” that had been the point of the conversation anyways. the possibility that she couldn’t be a producer anymore, that someone else would have to fund his mysteries and love stories the like. “if you want me gone any quicker,” she sighed as if the threat hadn’t really made its way anywhere close to the target. and really people’s words hadnt’ started to sink in just yet. she knew she’d have to start taking opinions back into consideration, feel the sting and pinch of the agenda of others. but not just yet, not from him after all this time. “you’ll have to use your own points.”

A hollowed out breath scraped across his lungs, the edges sharp and jagged, sliced out across his tongue in ruby-coated words. “Then? Why did you come here? To Prometheus? You’re an actress!” he threw her own words back at her, spearing them with hands that abused their freedom, questioning loops fueled by misshapen anger that flared across his face. “You want to act? Act! You should have stayed in New York!” His shoulders fell back heavily after being raised, a mocking shrug while his eyes bore holes into her, the stare that made her the embodiment of all his failures.

“Your friend. She was cancelled,” he reminded, tightness in his entire being, a coil of frigid bone, sprung by scalding blood. “For what? For this?! You could have made a difference! Now? What is there left? Nothing.” Breath streamed into his lungs, the large inhale that went unplanned into an empty chest, all used up in one shot, the kind of breath that Luis or Rick would never be able to make.

Around him, the night crumbled. It came apart in uneven clumps, each heavier than the one before. The stars might as well have crashed to the surface of the earth, showering down in hellfire, an addition to emerging ruins. Blackness was concaving, him in the center of its pressing shape, squeezing around him to the point of explosion, a last ditch effort to fight against it all and tear the universe apart. If it hadn’t been Lina, it would have been any other unfortunate visitor with the slightest push to his world dangling by the cliff-side. Even news of the points could not sway the orbit of destruction.

He heard Damion Killgrave’s name, only to picture Claudia on the dunes with him, the smile of familiarity and safety flashing. Where was it now? Where was her safety? Her sense of familiarity when she looked at him? In the present sense, his eyes tightened, focus forced back to the actress. She earned no merits; the fact clear from the chisel-cut jawline of clenched teeth before his head shook to himself. “You know the name? For once?” Unlike with Norah. She was dead then, and now? What was she now? One step away from being dust beneath her own star. Lips pursed at the thought, fingers rubbing against each other in the shape of a tempted fist until the vision flickered back to her.

“What do you want? From this?”

she wondered if she stayed in new york what would have happened. she couldn’t step back on stage. it had been crushing, a fragmented version of what she had been. she stood on a stage, in the spotlight that estelle had wanted so badly it was worth her life. how was she supposed to live with herself after that. how was that a role that she could have completed, held onto like it was honorable to do so. as if there was a right thing to do. she froze. if she had stayed in new york she would have withered and died in front of all of the people who knew here. she supposed the only difference was that here, they could plead anonymity. 

“she would have preferred it this way.” what did he know about the fierce competition that had kept her striving for lead after lead on stage, spurred on by each other alone. it was a strange sinking, a resettling of what she’d done. why must it have been an inevitable death. like she was already a walking corpse, with no hope left. whatever lightness she’d gained in finally accepting the inevitable was pulled right back. “one goes, the other follows.” barely a whisper of words. the spurring on of some childhood game where the one player had already gone home for the night. she wished she was holding a wine glass, for nothing more than the itch of familiarity in the anger that the announcement brought down upon her. 

“sure. i read the credits.” pinched lips, she’d had to be told his name when she was filling out the transfer. making sure it went to the right person— the lead in true grit. he seemed nice enough. why shouldn’t he get the boost. why shouldn’t they just vanish into thin air. it was the least of her worries. which of course made it the most important of his. two people who could never even attempt to see eye to eye. she didn’t know why she still felt the need to try. 

“i just want to.” how could she describe it, the shifting uncertainty that had only one clear guiding light. that she should act again. that she should finally do what estelle could not. what had gotten her friend cancelled was it the acting or something more. would she be more of the same. her companion certainly thought so but there was still the whispered thought, the returning voice. what if she did better. what if in the last she finally found what she had lost the moment an assistant had whispered the words to her in the middle of rehearsal. she’d laughed then. it had been the last time she could remember. “you’re upset about the money.”

What night was this for surprises? Pockets weighed down by keys and wallet in one, lighter and switchblade in the other, amiss one crucial object that would be the concept’s savior, to not cause the scales to teeter between a drowner’s vision and purgatory’s prisoner. What setting was it good for when looked through a cracked lens of potential? Off-black sheet in the sky, winking stars dotted across obscured, overthrown by the sickness of the city, from its polluted lights and heavy air that not even the rooftop could escape from. What fucking company did he have to spend both with?

Different blonde than that of a decade ago, joining him like a phantom, some imitation of a ghost of the past, heralding news of things to come. Flesh and bone instead, a mouth transcribing thought that went through him, permeating straight to the bone. The last touch of the railing was let go of, body straightening up further at the first sentence, cold metal replaced with hot blood rushing beneath his fingertips. Rapid firing within the mind, each a violent flash of thought. The addition. She said it, not him. Too much for her. Too risky for her. Too much of a statement. All about the money. All about being hidden. To lay low, to sink into the shadows, to blind yourself to everything that is happening!

Contract.

The word snatched the mind. Stopped him. Cut him off before his voice could have been heard. His lips had separated, a grimacing shape formed, a snarling form of the muscles without sound until the explosion detonated.

The crash was quick, glass shattering against the side of the balcony, rainfall of it pouring to the concrete stories below. Whiskey splashed out, flowed out, trickle reaching out to the foot that twisted in the body’s movement.

Failed. Failed again. Failed again.

“Joder!” boiled over, finally uncorked, fuming. Instinct trigger-happy, unstable, acidic. Muscles tightening in his hands, going from clasping above the hips as he turned to flying in the air, swinging as if hoping to land through anything solid enough to burst them at the seams. “Why would you do that?! You signed? For what?! You could not stand to be a producer? You could not find a way to be one?”

A breath was released, punched out, another one taken in and expelled just as quickly, a mutter beneath the breath that went unrestrained. “Me cago en Dios.” The head shook, lips pursing, jaw shifting, stubble littering the cheeks hollowing in the ebbing motions until Lina came back into focus, sharp, pinpointed gaze harpooned straight to her eyes. “Your points. Where are they? You gave them out? Before you signed? Or? You threw them in the fucking trash with you?”

the glass shattered against the balcony and she twisted just the half step so that it couldn’t catch her face. she was used to the outbursts from him now, they were just a part of their relationship. she’d gotten used to these ideas. that no matter what she might or might not say in a given situation, he would raise his voice another octave and none of it would matter given the next hour mark. his grudge against her was a vague and ever present thing that could not be changed. if there had been a flicker of surprise in her expression, it was smoothed over by the time he finally launched his questions at her. 

“i didn’t want to be one.” she repeated his words with just the minute change. they could both agree to it even if there was fury forever on his side. she could not stand to be a producer. she couldn’t find a way to be one. it was slowly draining whatever there was left to her. there was no input from her on the creative side of the work, even if she had, her strengths did not lie in the topics that she might have been allowed to address. was she just supposed to spend another six months laying in her bed and letting each phone call go to voicemail while the world continued on around her. worse, what if that was again not enough to kill her completely. 

“i’m an actress.” that was all there could be to it. the long journey back to the same spot she’d started. and it wasn’t good to say, it didn’t feel enlightening or powerful, it didn’t fill any voids in her. it certainly did not do anything to comfort the memory of estelle that was still an injury after all this time. it was going to get the same reaction she’d come to expect. she said it anyways. she had never lied to him before. 

“my points? i gave them away.” only a few hundred sitting and gathering dust after all this time, with nowhere to go and no one who seemed to want them from her. she would have given them to miguel had it been a few months prior, but she was clean. no other substances to cloud her judgement even as he might treat her as thought she had finally gone off to the unreachable. “i gave them to the cowboy. the lead.” she would have forgotten they existed completely if the liaison hadn’t brought them up. she never could figure out his insistence on every detail being understood. “damion killgrave.”

coldness, hands connected by a glass of whiskey that was mostly intact since the moment it had been poured out. First drink of the night, and it had gone nearly untouched, minus one initial sip when he had been watched when he got it. A facade of normalcy that he could construct for only one before disappearing to his own corner of the world, where the view of Mulholland drive and all the twinkling lights beyond its bending shape were blurred by the obscurity of the mind.

Curvatures of the pavement paralleled to the winding path inside the head, thoughts mirroring its serpentine nature, rife with venom, paralyzing from memory.

Pain is too lonely to live only in your mind, Julian.

She had joined him, all those years ago, an entire lifetime ago, the very same balcony he was standing at now, the same theater Inception had premiered from. The breeze brushed at the already wispy blonde hair, the voice disconnected from reality even then. Now, it was like a record drifting across a needle, scratching back to life, clawing to the forefront. There is an ocean of pain that surrounds you, and you’re on the shoreline pretending not to see. She was standing beside him, ice eyes with a glimmer of blue in them, the faintest smile as he finally looked at her. One day, the tide will come in, and you will drown in its solitude.

How undaunted he was when he told her no after snuffing out his cigarette, twisting it into Prometheus’ property so blatantly with disregard, how full of spite his pride was when he told her that he knew how to swim. How much a part of him, hiding in the back of his skull, wished to still have that cigarette now upon knowing how much water could burn the lungs, much worse than the first hit of nicotine ever was.

But there was no tobacco, only a secondary vice, another burning liquid pooled in a crystal cave, waiting for those other sips to take its life. It was the only thing expected, only thing planned that had actually come to fruition, and yet life was not done taking and replacing, sharp fangs snapping to the cortex at the familiar voice entering into the picture.

A small miracle that the thumbs didn’t crack the glass in its grasp, that the teeth were still able to live without fractures, that the jawbone didn’t slice through the cheeks in its clasp.

“You care? Now?” he hit back, fighting the tide, facing it dead on as he turned. Some timing. “Your congratulations? For what? The film you were not a part of? Keep it. Don’t bullshit me. What are you doing? You want something? Say it.”

his question pushed at something in her. not in tone— she was used to the dismissive anger that her voice always seemed to procure. and shouldn’t that be the case, what had she ever done to prove otherwise. she wasn’t even particularly agitated by it, no step back, no arch of surprise in her expression. but there was that question. what do you want. as though she had ever demanded anything from him. she’d always thought of their relationship to be particularly one sided in nature, he asked things of her. the small sorts of monetary gains she could have provided without thought. never did she turn around and ask him to do anything for her. what did she want? nothing still.

but they were both always particularly lost in their own thoughts. two paths that ran parallel but could never get to cross. was it better that way, that they continue along as some kind of structure, never to cross in understanding. she didn’t really care. she didn’t know what she was supposed to be looking for. the cinematographer didn’t look particularly happy about the surprise. or maybe she had missed the moment in which there had been emotion to exchange. she wouldn’t have been surprised. 

“i just wanted to tell you i don’t know if i’ll be able to produce your next picture.” which was perhaps the boldest sentence she had ever made when their work was concerned. still working out the details, trying to decide what were the most important parts of her autonomy. what could the papens still do that lina couldn’t, perhaps they could stand in for her. but there were no guarantees. what bother giving hope. “they’re still ironing out the details of my contract.”

there it was. out in the open. no more takes back. if there was anything to be severed here, then that was that. she didn’t think there was anything to be gained, she wasn’t seeking out any words of comfort. only acknowledgement. “i thought you should hear it from me.” standing straight and all. clear eyed and sober. the first direct statement she’d made in months. the first action that had been taken of her own volition. “that’s all.”

she didn’t know who she should tell. it didn’t feel like an achievement. it was some last death throe, the final move left on the board. to sit and rot, the wasting away until there was nothing left. tangled in stark white sheets, feeling the heave of her chest. and then she’d washed her face, gone down to the contract liaison offices and started the paperwork. her parents seemed some far flung notion. even if they disagreed, it would be too late now— but they wouldn’t. there were the irons, the hearts, the winters. everyone agreed having a contract in the family was a show of faith. and was there some part of her that missed it. some part of her that missed estelle so much she found the only door left to open.

she didn’t think he would care. not in a substantial way. three projects together had amounted to nothing. he sent her scripts she never read, she wrote him blank checks. she would have to read them now— funny how that worked. he probably wouldn’t care. but he did deserve to know. the responsibility therein. get yelled at long enough and there would eventually have to be some fire left, some aching clawing itching thing that said what if you stopped this. what if you could be better. what if you could be someone. what if it all happened again?

waiting until the movie was done, everything was over, a new cycle to start afresh. the announcement to be made only when the time was right, maybe the winter season. maybe the next. it depended on exactly how well true grit did, how much fame could be afforded to her name as talent and production. as if she’d done anything to contribute to it’s particular hoped success. the premiere night. who could she tell that would listen and not breath a word. she’d told felix while still sitting in dust covered folding chairs, watching two people fire off ideas back and forth until greatness stuck. maybe she would have said something then, but no one’s gaze ever slid over to her on that set. what reason did anyone have to pay attention then.

so he was alone on the balcony, and there was probably a next project in his head. there was always a next project, blank script on her night stand. but could she produce it, could she even be there to watch. some expectation of indifference, maybe that’s what it had been. maybe that’s all she wanted to speak to. that she could not be relied on in any whole way. “congratulations.” tripped off the tongue, the insincere greeting of nights like these. she meant it in some way, that it was a good film. but of course it was, there was no expectation for anything else. “did she like the addition.”