by Amanda Coe
‘You lot always know where your families come from,’ said Len. ‘Yanks, I mean.’
And then, some seconds after this had closed the conversation down, he unexpectedly revived it.
‘Sounds French, Montwhatsit.’
‘My mom’s family is French Canadian, originally,’ Quentin explained, despite her resentment at proving his point. ‘I took Mom’s name when my parents divorced.’
Len had no answer to this. After nearly an hour more of their sporadic couplets, he announced that they would soon be there. Quentin gratefully hunched closer to the window. She had imagined, since they were travelling north, that the countryside would be rather like that in which her grandmother had been born. But there was still freeway, mainly, and a notable flatness. She’d been expecting moors. Didn’t moors go up and down like Heathcliff’s moods, hills and dales, mountains and valleys, et cetera, et cetera?
‘Are these the moors?’ she asked Len, just in case.
‘Nah, have to go further north for that, love,’ he told her, and she could tell her ignorance slotted right into his prejudices. Yanks.
The schedule she’d been sent ordered her to go straight out to the location. Quentin suggested that once Len had dropped her off, he could take the luggage on to her hotel in case she was late checking in. But she could see he was looking worried. Challenged, he explained that she’d been booked into a hotel in Manchester, a city apparently another couple of hours’ drive away across something – mountains? – called the Pennines. Quentin could imagine the way some PA back in the production office in LA had checked out a map and figured that the apparent distance to Manchester would be nothing in this bonsai country. But of course, being so tiny, two hours was a big distance, and apparently the freeway didn’t go everywhere.
If Len had been an American driver, he’d have got on to finding somewhere else for her to stay during his downtime when she was visiting the set. But the lost look of his eyes behind his fishbowl lenses told Quentin that any further prodding would produce a more despairing version of his already contagious anxiety. She forced herself to quell the instinct to worry about Len. Incredibly, it wasn’t her job.
‘I’ll be fine,’ she told him. ‘Just wait here, or whatever.’
The location looked even more like Poland. It was a school, and although it was a modern building, it seemed entirely without modern amenities. The many large windows, presumably intended to give the place a sense of space and light, were cramped with childish artworks and dulled with dirt, and looked out on to a brutally circumscribed area of concrete. Quentin felt a surge of dread. Confinement, limitation, despair. Bullshit, she tried to convince herself. This is chemical. My body thinks it’s four in the morning. Everyone’s low point. This building is the architectural equivalent of four in the morning. For all I know, the whole frickin’ country might be. I’m just passing through.
‘B– bleak little place, isn’t it? We were pleased. Mike Keys.’
The man poked his hand forward for her to shake it. Weaselly little guy. The director.
‘I must say I was expecting someone much older and not nearly so attractive,’ he told her, automatically checking out the non-cleavage. Incredible, really, that a movie director would be insensitive to sight lines, but every guy in the universe thought he had secret X-ray vision when it came to staring at tits.
‘Of course, the art director’s had a bit of a go,’ Weasel-teeth continued, as oblivious to Quentin’s lack of response as he apparently was to her power. Power, goddamn you. ‘It’s actually all rather sweet inside.’
Of course. They were making a movie. They wanted the school to look like this.
‘Interesting,’ said Quentin briskly. ‘This wasn’t the original location, right? You changed it.’
‘G– gosh, yes we did.’ Good. She could see his surprise that she was up to speed. Did he really think she’d flown thousands of miles to provide him with frankly disappointing T & A? ‘That was early days. The other place was a bit gothic – bit too obvious. I just felt it’d be more interesting to use somewhere modern and, you know, try to subvert it, make it sinister. We did send you photos.’
‘Yeah, I saw them. It looks great. Suitably creepy and depressing.’
‘But modern!’
Quentin registered Mike’s little anxiety about the modern thing. Probably his age. He was what, in his mid-thirties? So maybe worried that he was losing touch with the youth market. Nobody at the studio has any hopes for this movie as regards the youth market, honey. Or maybe, she realized, as Mike continued to yabber away fanatically about the world of the movie as he led her into the school, it’s an artistic thing. Europe, Quentin. This is an art movie. Guy’s a fucking artist.
Inside, the hopeful array of kids’ pictures and projects, the world so trustingly and inaccurately represented in primary colours and cardboard and tissue paper, was enough to choke her up. Benign, not in the tumour sense, but like Santa. All love and optimism and related shit. Each painted coat peg was surmounted by a label with a child’s name (Judith, Darren, Rodney, Pauline) printed in clear black teacher’s script. As though this was the way life went, a place for everyone, and so clearly and democratically marked. Even the teacher’s writing on the name cards, striving for impersonal authority but betraying the compromised asymmetry of a human touch, raked at Quentin’s vitals. That falling short, the contamination of the real. Poor little kids. She couldn’t remember a time when sights like the wavering tail of the ‘y’ in Rodney didn’t give her a pain in the guts.
‘Let’s make a movie!’
She heard herself produce this exclamation as they reached a huddle of lights and cables in the corridor that was being set up for a shot. Her loud American voice aroused curiosity, which was presumably what she’d intended: to announce her arrival. Was this what the job was going to do to her? But she encountered a few friendly smiles among the response to her dumb-ass effusion, so maybe it was OK. Oh, God, she was tired. Check out the crew. That skinny guy adjusting a lamp had the promising look of a speed freak about him.
‘Bit of a nightmare with the lighting,’ Mike said, following her gaze but not her intention. He gestured to the lack of space. ‘But we can’t say you didn’t warn us.’
Quentin smiled professionally. Her predecessor, Danny Larson, had lobbied to build sets for the main interiors, including the school, but Mike and the English producer, Hugh, had insisted on shooting everything on location, with all the problems of cramping that entailed. As long as it looked OK and didn’t hold up the schedule, it wasn’t Quentin’s job to care. Danny had a thing about set-building because he’d majored in architecture – this was Quentin’s theory anyway – and he just loved fooling around with the models the designers sent him and arguing about dimensions and building methods to console himself for the loss of what he had concluded, age forty-two, would have been the nobler career choice. Asshole. She really, really wished she hadn’t fucked him. Even with thousands of miles between them, it made Quentin feel bad to think about it, befouling the nest of her new job. Everyone would be saying she got the job because she’d fucked Danny, or, to get the hierarchy straight, Danny had fucked her. When actually, she owed the gig to her dad. Calling Dr Freud …
‘So …’ Snapping herself to attention, Quentin could see that Mike was itching to get back to work, to tweak some lights and confer with that silvery-haired cinematographer of his and then shout ‘Action’, presuming that was the word they used over here.
‘Is Hugh busy?’ she prompted. Mike looked shifty. There was absolutely no way he’d know about her and Danny Larson, right?
‘He is, I’m afraid – meant to say – got a batch of rushes up from the processors which are looking a bit wonky.’
‘Wonky.’
Quentin could see he thought she was challenging him, when she was just unfamiliar with the word.
‘Nothing serious. Just a slight colour problem – he’s sorting it out now.’
‘So maybe th
ere’s someone who could take me to him …’
Mike hesitated. Right there, Quentin had had enough. With the journey and the lack of sleep, and maybe the craving for chemical alteration, she felt as though she’d already slipped into watching what they called rushes and she knew as dailies; repetitive, discontinuous interludes which needed an editor’s hand to splice them into the illusion of action with consequences that lead to another action. And so on, building to a climax. Instead of which she had the view of the shrunken English freeway, Len’s gnomic expressions of anti-American preju dice, the school, all spooling off into pointlessness like the black frames that ended a reel of film. Nothing. Nada.
‘Anything I can do, Mike?’
Gratefully, Quentin felt the arrival of organizing energy. It emanated from a small, wiry woman around her own age with bright eyes and too much make-up.
‘Oh, Katrina …’
She couldn’t readily place the woman in the crew, but Mike didn’t like her, that was for sure. Quentin offered her hand, just to yank his chain.
‘Quentin Montpellier.’
‘Ooh, American—’
‘That’s right!’
‘From the studio,’ Mike muttered grudgingly. Katrina’s eyes widened. See, asshole, Quentin mentally addressed Mike. She can see it. Power.
‘And you are …’
‘Katrina. Lallie’s mummy.’
Ah. Lallie’s ambitious mommy. So Mike was pissed with her for muscling in, and who could blame him?
‘She’d love to meet you, hasn’t stopped talking about it – she’s mad about America, terrible—’
‘Well, I’d love to meet her too,’ Quentin reassured her, professionally. ‘Maybe Katrina could take me to see Hugh, Mike?’ she suggested. ‘I wouldn’t want to hold things up.’
And so she was borne off by Katrina, who enlisted Len to transport them to the hotel where Hugh was staying. This was presentable enough by Polish standards. Despite everyone in the cast and crew who wasn’t local being billeted there, they still had rooms for Quentin and Len, and Len was even galvanized by this happy outcome into dealing with the luggage without being asked. Katrina, calling the receptionist by name (no one wore name badges, Quentin noted, although they did have odd militaristic burgundy uniforms), eased their passage. She had talked a lot in the car, and Quentin was struggling to understand her, not just because of the accent, but also because Katrina seemed to assume a lot of prior knowledge on Quentin’s part, particularly of Lallie.
‘… course, we’ve been keeping our heads down with Mike, but he’s got a lot on his plate, hasn’t he? I wouldn’t like it, everyone “Mike Mike Mike” all the time, poor man doesn’t get a minute, but Hugh’s lovely – Uncle Hugh, Lallie calls him, which is funny because she’s got a real Uncle Hugh back home – a friend of Graham’s nan’s actually, I mean, not a proper uncle as such, but she calls him Uncle Hugh, and he’s nothing like this Hugh, but she says to me, “I’ve got two Uncle Hughs now, mam” …’
Katrina had unselfconsciously followed Quentin into her cramped room. It was really dusty, although since most of the people she’d seen since she arrived also appeared dusty, she was beginning to think this was a British thing. The receptionist had mentioned a shower, but Quentin, remembering her previous European trip, held no illusions about its prospects. This didn’t prevent her using it as her excuse to hustle Katrina out without causing offence.
‘Twelve hours on the plane … need to freshen up …’
Katrina obligingly made for the door. ‘Just give me a knock when you’re ready. Two two five. Then I’ll run you along to Hugh.’
‘That’s OK, Katrina – I’m sure I can find him myself.’
Quentin caught the fall of the woman’s face as she pulled the door after her. Thwarted ambition? Being the mother of a kid actor was all about that. Get close to the rep from the studio. Or was she hoping to buddy up with Quentin so that she could bitch some more about Mike? The garrison mentality of location shoots guaranteed relationships were as overcharged as they were overdiscussed. Or maybe, Quentin realized, the woman was just plain lonely. She was a mom. She spent her day hanging around a place where everyone else was incredibly busy and focused. That was it; the poor bitch probably just needed a friend. With that thought she felt guilty. And the guilt led to the other thoughts about what she might procure to bring about a more insulated state of mind. She took herself to the shower.
The unit uncertainly grouted to the tiling above the bath waited a couple of seconds before drooling lukewarm water from its rectangular head, tickling unsatisfactory pathways over parts of Quentin’s skin. Even so, when she got out, she had to admit she felt better.
Without swabbing herself with the thin hotel towel, Quentin lay on the bed. She goose-pimpled and cooled, bobbing in and out of consciousness the way, as a kid, she used to tread along the shallow end of their pool with her head almost submerged, alternating between the heat and chatter above the water and the soundless, cool isolation of the world beneath. At some point she must have drifted under completely because suddenly she jolted back into the room. A man was staring at her. She yelled. Instinctive pervert-response.
‘Good God – I’m so sorry.’
He erased himself with the closing door, and it wasn’t until she met him down in the lobby, twenty minutes later, that Quentin was entirely convinced that he didn’t belong to her dream.
‘Well, it’s one way to break the ice,’ said Hugh.
Urbane. Quentin had never before met a man to whom this word truly applied. Although appropriately and convincingly apologetic about their encounter (Katrina had told him where to find her, he’d knocked and, getting no answer, tried the door), he was also utterly unembarrassed. Not even a token peek down her cleavage, either, although let’s face it the sight of her from soup to nuts should have been recent enough.
‘Maybe some sort of producer’s prerogative? Droit de seigneur? Could try to convince you it was some quaint custom we have …’
Already, Quentin could tell that Hugh was the real deal. If she could have popped, snorted or smoked him, he could hardly have permeated her so instantly and so blissfully. He’s the man. He’s in charge. He can handle it all. He led her through the dingy hotel corridors like an astringent washcloth cutting through years of accumulated grime; she felt cleansed in his wake. Everything about him looked extraordinarily alert, even his skin. Although it was poreless and fresh, perfect, in fact, the perfection it emanated was the accomplishment of maturity rather than any residue of childishness. Still, it made him look wholesome, despite the urbanity, incorrupt. He was of that indeterminate middle age that turned women invisible but made men look as though they were wearing a good suit. Which, in fact, he was. She didn’t want to fuck him, exactly. She sort of wanted to swim in him.
‘Sorry about the hike – but the lift’s due to be condemned,’ he told her as they took a flight of stairs at a light run, weightless in his case. ‘Except of course no one will bother to do it until there’s actually a disaster of some kind.’ He dipped back towards her, making some gesture. ‘So glad.’
Probably gay, she realized with pang. Although it was harder to tell with English guys. Already she was worrying about how she’d feel when they parted. She’d come down, she knew. She wanted to live in Hughland. For ever. She was even in love with his watch, an assertive Rolex which suggested that time would be kept, really kept, accurately and reliably. He’s chosen that. That’s the kind of man he is. Jesus, Quentin, get a grip.
They were on their way to watch dailies, as per the schedule, because this was her job. One of the larger rooms – the hotel didn’t run to a suite, as Hugh explained – had been cleared of its bed to make a viewing room. There was a projector on a chest of drawers and a decent-sized screen at the far end of the room, slightly askew on its tripod. The curtains were drawn. Another man, youngish, with a corpse pallor suggestive of the hours he spent in these shaded rooms, was threading film into the projector as they
arrived. Hugh introduced him as Bri. He nodded, paying no attention to Quentin. She totally knew the type. Nothing personal, because a guy like him just didn’t do personal.
‘Do …’
Having tweaked the screen straight, Hugh waved to one of the armchairs placed in front of it, economically adapting the end of his gesture into an indication for Bri that he should start up the film. They both sat. The dry-leaf skittering of the reel feeding through the sprockets began, calming to an automatic whirr as the countdown flashed up on the screen, the numbers huge in the middle of their target-shaped cipher. 4, 3, 2, 1. There was no sound, of course. Hugh jabbed a cigarette into his mouth and lit up, first proffering Quentin the packet, which she declined. His chair was at a slight angle to hers, so that the definite edge of his profile teased her line of vision to the left. He inhaled as though the smoke was essential to the continuation of breathing.
‘Sorted out some of the earlier stuff for you to see …’
The screen flashed an apocalyptic white, then it began. A clapperboard, mutely snapping. This dipped from view, revealing muddled activity which dissipated into a suddenly empty frame. Now there was just an expanse of parched dun grass, surmounted by a flat grey stripe of sky. The shot held, second upon second, waiting in thick light like the view through a dirty window. A smudge appeared on the line of the horizon.
‘Lawrence of Arabia,’ remarked Quentin.
‘I think we’re calling it an hommage,’ Hugh told her.
The smudge grew, and resolved itself into the figure of a child. The kid. Lallie. Our heroine. She came erratically closer, running, then walking. Her distress was immediately readable, as was the fact that she was a child unwilling to accommodate her distress.
‘Titles here. Plenty of room.’ Hugh gestured to the space to the right of the approaching figure.
‘What about the fight with the mother?’
Hugh shot her an appreciative grin. See, Hugh, I’m on the ball, Hugh.