It definitely did not help that Jules et Jim turned out to be about a love triangle where both of the main guys were obsessed with a woman named Catherine, who basically had the market cornered on Manic Pixie Dream Girls before anyone had invented them. She drew on a mustache just for kicks and fell into rivers and was sad and gorgeous and batshit and whimsical. But it was obvious it wasn’t going to end well: anyone could see it coming. (OK, so I guess I was paying a little bit of attention, when I wasn’t watching your right arm out of the corner of my left eye, trying to predict when your hand was about to dig into Ethan’s popcorn so that I could put mine in, too. If I had put half as much effort into my calculus homework, I could probably have worked for NASA. But you never ate the popcorn, anyway. You just kept drumming your fingers on your jiggling knees. I thought it meant you were bored.)
But halfway through the movie, we’d never touched, not even “accidentally,” and I was swiftly spiraling into a dark and fragmented place that felt less New Wave and more Fifth Wheel. Loneliness was bad enough when I was actually, physically alone, staring up at Pop-Pop’s presidential memorabilia covering the walls of my makeshift bedroom, passing time like treading water and praying for someone (you) to send a hopeful ping into the void with a text . . . but being lonely in a group made me feel even worse. Luckily I had also drained a large soda and was about to piss myself if I didn’t get to a bathroom soon, so I got up and edged my way out of the row, causing a chorus of groans from about half the theater. As I tripped over the clogs of the woman sitting in the aisle seat, who had refused to stand or even tuck her knees up, I glanced back to see Ethan wrapping his arm around your shoulders. And then, just like any good girlfriend would do, you leaned into him and whispered something in his ear.
You both laughed.
? ? ?
“You’ve reached the voicemail of Allison Anders, formerly Allison Anders Roth, of AAR Artists. Please leave me a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can, or you can reach one of my assistants . . .” I held the phone away from my ear as my mother’s disembodied voice read out a series of names and numbers. I thought about hanging up. I’d decided to call her mostly out of boredom, anyway, since I’d been sitting in the lobby for an hour, unable to face the Molotov cocktail of lust and angst that awaited me back in the theater. I’d played four chess games already and was down to 5 percent battery on my phone, which was an even more compelling argument for hanging up on Mom’s voicemail. But then I realized that she would see the missed call even if I didn’t leave a message and would probably start concern-texting me a series of standalone question marks. So I waited, as instructed, for the beep.
“Hey Mom,” I said, getting up and pacing across the geometric lobby carpet. “It’s your most important client. Haha, just kidding, it’s your son.” Just then, the double doors to the theater opened; the movie was letting out. “I guess I . . . um, just wanted to say hi,” I said, stepping back against the wall by the men’s room, keeping one eye on the stream of people moving toward me. “And that it’s like the Arctic Circle here, and that—” I felt someone watching me and noticed a girl a few feet away, zipping up her coat with a don’t-I-know-you? look. I cleared my throat and lowered my voice.
“I, uh . . . miss you,” I said, trying to sound nonchalant. “But I’m actually at a movie right now with some friends, so I guess that’s a good sign. Except for the fact that I’m outside calling my mom, so . . .” I laughed gently, shaking my head. I definitely should have hung up when I got her voicemail. I hadn’t wanted to leave her a dumb, rambling message. I hadn’t wanted to leave her any message at all. I’d just wanted to hear her voice.
“Anyway, I know you’re really busy,” I said, “so you don’t have to call me back. I’ll talk to you later.”
I ended the call and slipped my phone into my back pocket just as Ethan came out of the theater and spotted me.
“What the hell, dude?” he cried, tossing me the coat I’d left crumpled on my seat when I made my escape. “You missed half the movie!” You, Diego, and Joy followed a few steps behind him, looking restless, confused, and puffy-eyed, respectively.
“Sorry,” I said. “I had to—”
“Take an epic dump?” Ethan asked, loud enough that a few strangers laughed.
“Um, no. I had to make a phone call.” That was true. “To my agent.” That was not true.
“Oh,” he said begrudgingly, looking annoyed he couldn’t be more annoyed.
“Consider yourself lucky,” Joy said, wiping her eyes. “That was so sad.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“Don’t tell him!” Ethan said. “This is the kind of film you have to see from start to—”
“She drives her car off a bridge,” you cut in. “With Jim in it.”
“Babe!” Ethan said sharply, and you shook your head at him like someone training a dog. I felt my shoulders relax.
“And she makes Jules watch,” Joy whimpered. She looked up at Diego, her lower lip quivering. “Did I get snot on your arm at the end?”
“It’s OK,” he said, smiling down at her. “This shirt is so old, it’s basically Kleenex.”
“I mean, who would do that?” Joy asked, her eyes wide and watery.
“A crazy person,” Diego said.
“See, that’s what I take issue with,” you said, pulling on your coat while simultaneously dodging Ethan’s attempts to help. “Why does the woman have to be some unhinged sociopath?” You rooted around in your purse and fished out a container of Tic Tacs. “That’s just straight-up misogyny.”
“Truffaut is not a misogynist,” Ethan said, rolling his eyes. “He’s a genius. Have you seen The 400 Blows?”