Jane Goes Batty

by Michael Thomas Ford

  Jane moved her chair closer and peered at the screen. “Why, so they are,” she said. “How clever.”

  “And here’s the cat,” the man said, pressing a key. The blue ball appeared at the top of the screen and Jane saw that it was in fact a cartoon cat.

  “You drop the cat from anywhere up here,” said the man, demonstrating. “It falls between the gears or the balls or whatever and it eats the pieces of sushi. If you can get him to eat enough pieces, you go to the next level.”

  Jane watched as the cat ate piece after piece of sushi, growing fatter with every bite. She saw absolutely no point in the game, but she found herself fascinated. “Can I try it?” she asked the young man after he’d successfully finished a level.

  “You can play it on your laptop,” he answered. “Just do a search for Sushi Cat and you’ll find it. It’s a free game.”

  “Thank you,” Jane said, leaving him to his game. She opened the browser on her computer, found that she could connect to the Internet through the shop’s free Wi-Fi, and soon located the Sushi Cat website.

  An hour later, having made it to level nine, she paused to get another latte and a scone. She promised herself that once she cleared level ten she would begin writing.

  The completion of level thirteen saw her coffee cup empty and the scone reduced to crumbs, but not a word had been written. Jane glanced at the clock and discovered that she’d been sitting in the shop for more than two hours and had accomplished nothing. If you can call a score of 654,890 on Sushi Cat nothing, she argued.

  Annoyed with herself, she closed the game and opened her word-processing program. Locating the file for her novel, she clicked on it and prepared to read what she’d written so far.

  The koi pond was filled with the detritus of fall. Staring into it, Lydia searched in vain for the fish she had watched swim there in the summer. She had fed them from her hand, their whiskered lips breaking the water as they competed for her attentions. Now she prayed for the briefest flash of orange or gold, the merest flip of a tail to indicate that something still lived in the brown water.

  “Koi?” she said under her breath. “When did I write about koi? And why?”

  She had no memory of putting those words to paper, as it were. But there they were. She read more, but it was equally hideous. She thought hard and vaguely remembered a bottle of merlot. Possibly two. Had there also been some typing involved?

  “Apparently so,” she answered herself.

  It was all dreadful, every last word. Lydia (and she had not the foggiest idea who Lydia was or why she was looking anxiously into a koi pond) was dull and a bit of a whiner. There seemed to be no plot whatsoever, nor really any incentive to keep reading at all. Hoping to stumble across something she could use—some bit of prose that might be salvaged and used to build something better—Jane skimmed over several paragraphs about a pair of woolen mittens. When she arrived at some dialogue between Lydia and a child holding a balloon, she highlighted the entire document and deleted it.

  She closed the computer, shut her eyes, and wished she hadn’t eaten the scone. It was disagreeing with her. Also, she had a headache, and now the music from Sushi Cat was playing in her head.

  She got up and left, tossing her coffee cup in the trash and angrily pushing the door open. The afternoon sun was hot and the light hurt her eyes. Finally, to make things even worse, she walked two blocks in the wrong direction looking for her car before remembering that she was driving a loaner from the garage where her car was being repaired.

  She considered going to the bookstore and having a chat with Lucy, but decided to go home instead. Lucy would almost certainly still be giddy over her new relationship with Ben Cohen, and although Jane was sincerely happy for her, she didn’t want to be exposed to that much joy. She just wanted to go home, open a bottle of wine, and not think about anything.

  It wasn’t until her phone rang and she recognized Byron’s number on the caller ID that she remembered she was supposed to be watching Chloe. She’d promised to relieve Byron at four. It was now half past. For a moment she considered just not answering. You could always tell him you got busy writing and lost track of time, she thought.

  “Like he’d ever believe that,” she said as she answered the call. “I’ll be there in ten,” she told Byron, and turned the car around.

  “HOW NICE OF YOU TO COME,” SAID BYRON AS JANE ENTERED Chloe’s trailer. “I hope we aren’t inconveniencing you.”

  “Just a little,” Jane sniped.

  Chloe was seated in one of the chairs, a script open on her lap. Her eyes were closed and she was silently mouthing some words. She was dressed in a white poodle skirt and a pink angora sweater. Jane couldn’t bear to look at her.

  “What is she doing?” she asked Byron.

  “Learning her lines,” Byron explained. “She’s shooting a scene with Tucker Mack this afternoon. It’s the scene where Jonathan seduces Barbara after taking her for a ride in his new Chevy Bel Air convertible. Wait until you see the car they got. It’s a beauty. Red and white. I had one exactly like it in 1955.” A dreamy look appeared on his face. “I took Scotty Mulligan to see Rebel Without a Cause at the drive-in in that car. He was captain of the football team.”

  “How romantic,” Jane teased. “Did you go to the malt shop afterward?”

  “Of course not,” said Byron. “We went necking.” He clicked his fangs into place and gave Jane a lecherous leer. “I think I still have his class ring somewhere.”

  “Wait a minute,” Jane said, ignoring him. “There’s no scene in Constance where Jonathan seduces Barbara, let alone in a convertible.”

  “There is now,” said Byron, getting ready to leave. “What’s-her-name wrote it not an hour ago.”

  “Who?” Jane asked.

  “The Frost woman,” said Byron. “And I must say, she’s quite good. You could learn a thing or two from her.”

  “Out!” Jane ordered.

  Byron, laughing, went invisible and slipped out the door, leaving Jane alone with Chloe. The girl had said not a single word during Jane and Byron’s exchange and seemed almost to be in a trance as she continued to mouth her lines. Now, as Jane stared at her, her eyes opened.

  “Hey,” she said. “When did you get here?”

  “Ages ago,” said Jane, now in a foul mood. “Thank you for noticing.”

  “Run lines with me,” Chloe said, thrusting her script at Jane.

  “Excuse me?” said Jane.

  “Run lines,” Chloe repeated. “You read Tucker’s lines and I’ll say mine. It’s how we practice.”

  Jane took the script from the girl and plopped down in the trailer’s other chair. She looked at the script and found Tucker’s first line.

  “ ‘I hope you had a nice time,’ ” she read.

  “Don’t use your voice,” Chloe said. “I can’t do a romantic scene with a woman. Try to sound like a man.”

  Jane began to object, but Chloe said, “Please. It will really help.”

  “Fine,” Jane huffed. She cleared her throat and began again, this time making her voice lower and gruffer. “ ‘I hope you had a nice time,’ ” she said.

  “That’s better,” Chloe said. “Now me. ‘I had a swell time, Jonathan. Thank you for asking me. To tell the truth, I wasn’t sure you liked me.’ ”

  “Swell?” said Jane in her own voice. “Who says swell?”

  “Just read the lines,” Chloe said. “I didn’t write them, so don’t get mad at me.”

  Jane gritted her teeth. “ ‘Why would you think that?’ ” she read.

  Chloe shrugged. “ ‘I don’t know,’ ” she said in a breathy voice. “ ‘I guess because you’re always talking to Connie, and you gave her your letterman sweater.’ ”

  “Please tell me she didn’t rename Constance Connie,” Jane said, putting a hand to her forehead. “Please tell me that.”

  “You really suck at this,” Chloe replied, snatching the script from Jane’s hand. “Forget it. I’ll do it mysel
f.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Jane. “I can do it. It’s just that this is all very upsetting.”

  “I don’t know why,” Chloe said. “They’re making a movie out of your book. You should be happy about it.”

  “You wouldn’t understand,” said Jane. “You’ve never written a book.”

  “No,” Chloe agreed. “But I know if I did I’d be pretty excited if someone liked it enough to make a movie out of it.”

  Jane sighed. “I suppose you’re right,” she said. “Still, it’s not really my book anymore. It’s someone else’s story now.”

  “Oh, boo-hoo,” said Chloe, picking up a pack of cigarettes and tapping one into her hand. She began to light it, then suddenly stubbed it out. “Shit. I can’t smoke.”

  “Why not?” Jane asked.

  “Tucker has a thing about cigarettes,” Chloe explained. “If you’re going to kiss him, you can’t taste like cigarettes.”

  “That sounds like a reasonable request,” said Jane.

  Chloe snorted. “Yeah, except that he always tastes like garlic.” She looked at Jane with a worried expression. “Do I have to worry about that?” she asked. “You know, the whole garlic thing?”

  Jane shook her head. “Probably not,” she said. “That’s pretty much a myth, although some vampires do have an allergic reaction to it. But you should be fine.”

  “How will I know if I’m allergic?” Chloe said.

  “Well, you’ll probably break out in hives,” Jane explained.

  “Hives?” said Chloe. “Like beehives?”

  Jane wondered if the girl was joking, realized she wasn’t, and said, “Not like beehives, no. Like welts.” Chloe looked at her blankly, so Jane added, “Small red spots that itch.”

  “Right,” Chloe said. “I get those when I’m around cats.”

  “So you’re allergic to cats?” said Jane. “Then you know.”

  “Oh, I’m not allergic,” Chloe said. “I just get all itchy and sneeze and stuff.”

  Jane decided against further discussion of the subject and said simply, “I’m sure you’ll be fine.”

  A knock at the door interrupted them. “Come in,” Chloe shouted.

  A young woman holding a clipboard and looking very anxious poked her head in and said, “They’re ready for you on set, Chloe.”

  Chloe stood up. “You coming?” she asked Jane.

  “I don’t know,” said Jane. “I might be in the way.”

  “Oh, come on,” Chloe prodded. “It’ll be fun.”

  Jane hesitated a moment, then stood up. “Maybe it will,” she said.

  The two of them left the trailer and walked over to where a camera had been set up near a convertible parked in front of the house that in the movie belonged to the Wexley family. In reality it belonged to Agatha Martin, the town librarian. In a stroke of good fortune, Agatha had maintained the house exactly as it had looked in 1955, when she’d been a sixteen-year-old sophomore at Brakeston High and lived there with her family. As a result, the set decorator had only to remove the satellite dish from Agatha’s roof and add a few more garden gnomes to those already occupying the petunia beds.

  Julia Baxter was peering at a monitor when Jane and Chloe approached. Seeing them, she straightened up. “All right, people!” she called out. “Let’s make a movie!”

  All around them crew members scrambled to do their various jobs. Jane watched in amazement as what had moments ago seemed like total chaos turned into an operation of military precision with Julia Baxter as the commander.

  “I should have eaten something,” Chloe said to Jane as lights were adjusted and someone polished the convertible’s hood. “My stomach is growling.”

  Jane stiffened. “Your stomach is growling?” she asked.

  Chloe nodded. “I should have had a muffin or some toast or something.”

  “No,” said Jane. “That wouldn’t help.”

  What Chloe needed was blood. It hadn’t occurred to Jane that the girl might be hungry. She’d assumed Byron had taken care of that. But perhaps Chloe hadn’t realized what was happening to her. It was difficult the first few times it happened to differentiate the need for blood from normal human hunger.

  Before Jane could do anything, Tucker Mack appeared. Like Chloe, he was dressed like a 1950s student, wearing jeans, a striped polo shirt, and a varsity jacket with PEARSON HIGH SCHOOL written on the back in white letters. His dark hair was slicked back.

  “Pearson High School,” Jane said, distracted by the jacket. “There’s no Pearson High School in Constance. There’s no high school at all.”

  “I had to write it in,” said a voice.

  Jane turned to her right and saw Shirley standing there. She was holding a script on which were numerous cross-outs and arrows and words scribbled in the margins.

  “Pearson is the name of one of the producers,” Shirley continued. “He wanted to be in the movie somehow, and this was an easy way to do it. Just be glad Elena Wawrzyniak-Kobayashi settled for an extra half a percent of the gross. We’d never have gotten that on a jacket.”

  “Chloe, get in the car,” Jane heard Julia Baxter say.

  “Wait a moment,” Jane said, grabbing the girl’s wrist. “You need to eat something,” she whispered in Chloe’s ear. “And I don’t mean a muffin. You need blood.”

  “Chloe!” Julia called.

  Chloe pulled away from Jane. “There’s no time,” she said. “Besides, I’ll be fine. This won’t take long.”

  Jane watched, tension rising in her belly, as Chloe got into the convertible. Tucker Mack was already seated behind the steering wheel, one arm on the edge of the door and the other stretched along the back of the seat.

  “All right,” Julia said. “Chloe, I want you to lean into him as he says his lines. But look a little bit afraid, as if you don’t know what he’s going to do.”

  Julia put a pair of headphones over her ears and took a seat behind the camera. A boom was lowered over the car so that the microphone was only a few feet above the heads of the actors.

  “And action!” Julia called out.

  “ ‘I hope you had a nice time,’ ” Tucker said.

  “ ‘I had a swell time, Jonathan,’ ” Chloe said. “ ‘Thank you for asking me. To tell the truth, I wasn’t sure you liked me.’ ”

  Despite her worries about Chloe’s hunger, Jane found herself entranced by what was happening. The lines that only minutes ago had been just words on paper were now coming to life. It still wasn’t the story Jane had written, but it was exciting nevertheless.

  “ ‘Of course I like you, Barbara,’ ” Tucker was saying. “ ‘I like you just fine. Connie doesn’t matter to me.’ ”

  Chloe ducked her head. “ ‘You’re just saying that,’ ” she said.

  Tucker put his arm around her. “ ‘That’s not so,’ ” he said. “ ‘Honest I’m not. Would I do this if I didn’t really like you?’ ”

  He pulled Chloe to him and kissed her. Chloe’s hand went to his neck as their lips met. Tucker put his other arm on her waist. Then, all of a sudden, Chloe pulled away.

  “Shit!” she said, no longer sounding like demure little Barbara. She looked at her face in the convertible’s mirror. “You’ve been eating garlic,” she said to Tucker.

  “Yeah,” he answered. “But I used mouthwash.”

  “That’s not the problem,” Chloe said, getting out of the car. She ran over to Jane. “Are these hives?” she asked, thrusting her face into Jane’s. “They itch like hell.”

  Jane looked closely at the girl’s face. Where Tucker had kissed her lips and cheek there were now red blotches. Chloe reached up and scratched at them. Jane pulled her hand away. “That will just make it worse,” she said.

  Julia Baxter walked over to them. “What’s the problem?” she asked, sounding annoyed.

  “She has allergies,” said Jane. “To garlic, apparently.”

  “Fantastic,” the director said. “Makeup!” she yelled.

  A man cam
e running carrying a small case.

  “Cover the spots,” Julia told him, pointing to Chloe.

  “No,” Jane said. When Julia and the man looked at her she added, “You can’t just cover them up. They’ll still itch.”

  “Then she’ll have to not scratch them,” Julia said. “Not until we’ve got the scene shot. Then she can scratch all she wants.”

  Chloe, who at that very moment was scratching at her cheek, stopped when Julia glared at her. “It’s not that bad,” she said.

  “Ansel, fix her face,” said Julia.

  The man opened the case and removed a tube of foundation. “This should do it,” he said as he dabbed some on each of Chloe’s hives and smoothed it out. “Just don’t touch it,” he told her as he dusted powder over the makeup.

  “Chloe, I really don’t think this is a good idea,” said Jane.

  “I’ll be fine,” Chloe hissed, trying not to move her mouth as Ansel applied a fresh coat of lipstick.

  “Jane, why don’t you stand over there,” Julia suggested. Her voice was friendly but firm, and Jane decided now was not the time to argue. Maybe Chloe could get through the scene without further incident. Then they could take care of both her hives and her hunger.

  “Is everything okay?” Posey asked when Jane came over to her.

  “Fine,” Jane said. “Everything is going well.”

  “I want to tell you again how sorry I am that I have to make changes to your book,” Shirley said. “If it’s any consolation, when the first Vivienne Minx book was made into a movie they decided that instead of being a black girl from Alabama whose ancestors were slaves who used their monster-hunting skills to fight the Klan she should be a white girl from California who got her skills from a magic amulet she found while scuba diving in the Bahamas.”

  “You’re joking,” said Jane.

  “I’m not,” Shirley said. “The good news is that the books weren’t hugely popular then and the movie only made it to cable. When we did the first real Vivienne Minx movie I had enough clout that I could insist they stick to the book. Well, more or less.”

  “How did you explain the first movie?” Jane asked.