On Screen & Off Again

Now Daxon

Now DAXON

“C an you say Jell-O dress?” I whisper to Wil about Katrina as we wait in our seats, the darkened screen ahead of us about to light up any second now.

She snorts. “Having flashbacks?”

“Uh, yes. Yes, I am. Hours of scrubbing my hands clean, thank you.”

“Think she got it out of the leather?”

I grin, picturing it. “Chase, I like to imagine that, to this day, that car is still Jell-O red inside, top to bottom.”

“She drives around with the top down and people pass by, going that is such a unique leather, what a fun color , and she waves and smiles and then drives away furiously screaming.”

“All the way to the salon,” I add and we both stifle ugly laughter.

Of the thousands of things about Wil that I’d consider a favorite, this kind of stuff is near the top of the list. Truly, we’re gremlins together. I don’t know which sane person let us meet, let alone get to know each other and become friends.

I hope one day, thirty years from now, she’s still next to me, cackling. And I realize for the hundredth time just how much I missed our friendship while it was broken. I won’t let it get to that place again.

The lights dim, people settle into their seats, the talking dies to whispers and the screen ahead of us blazes to life.

Here we go.

This is it.

From this second onwards, everything will be different.

I clap, everyone in the place erupts into applause, but Wil is still and quiet beside me. It’s like I can feel the air paused in her lungs. My eyes slide to my left where she sits and I can see her hands are holding on to either side of her chair for dear life. Like at any second it’s going to catapult her into the ceiling.

The music, scored by an incredible composer we were lucky enough to get, is sweet but sweeping. Already, before a single line, you know what time period we’re in. You know the stakes; you know there’s no way in hell you’re walking out of here with dry eyes.

Gently, slowly, I reach for Wil’s hand. Not in that sly, seventeen-year-old way I would’ve done back then, but in a confident gesture of reassurance. My fingers brush the top of her hand, trying to pry it from the seat, but she isn’t budging.

Her voice fills the room with Lila’s first line: For a girl from a family with more money than God , that summer cost me everything; but I’d live it over again a thousand times, given the chance . Wil’s fingers wrap around mine and hold fast and tight.

On-screen, we get a close-up of her face in an old, fancy car from the thirties, as the Patterson family pulls up to their new home.

I only filmed outside this place on location once or twice, and I’d forgotten how beautiful it was. Long-leafed, romantic willows drenched in sunshine guard that sloping front drive. The vibrancy of the greens and yellows mix with the endless blue summer sky against the glass like they’re colors on a palette. And just behind them is Wil.

Her eyes on-screen are fiery, intelligent, guarded, gorgeous.

I squeeze her hand and she squeezes back. All the tension in her body slowly starts to ease and Wil turns to me from her seat. She’s beaming in the dark. I grin back at her and flash a thumbs-up with my free hand.

By the time I have my entrance out on the pier, I’m so sucked into Lila’s wealthy world and its rules and expectations that seeing myself looking like I slept the whole night outside is jarring.

But man, fucking Greg. He doesn’t miss anything.

Every little movement I’ve worked into my face, every twitch of my lips or raise of an eyebrow, he’s captured and highlighted so that when you step back, he’s rendered this charming, golden kid who you’d follow into the sea if he asked.

Wil squeezes my hand twice in a row when Lila and Nick meet. And then she’s still for a while, our hands still clasped in the cool darkness, watching months of hard work pay off. Across a summer of first love and bitter goodbyes with a war on the horizon, Nick and Lila are so unbelievably watchable. Greg’s made sure of it.

They’re bright, like shooting stars passing across the sky.

The big, epic kiss is a particular stand-out moment. Lila running across the pier for Nick, the sunset all sleepy oranges and wispy pinks. She’s going to college. He’s staying here. The breakup is inevitable, and comes after a bitter fight. But she’s sorry and so is he.

She runs for him full-out, desperate for one last goodbye, then throws herself up into his arms. Her legs lock around his waist. His arms support her. Their lips crash together in a kiss Greg frames with the dying sun.

Holy shit . The chemistry between us in this movie is its own third character.

I wonder if it’s like that in real life, too.

Wil turns to me, excitement and shock registering all over her face. “Remember how messy that was?” she whispers gleefully. “Literal hours. So much lipstick.”

“It was the sweatiest, most choreographed anything ever,” I whisper back, nodding.

“We killed it.”

“Oh, there’s no question. We crushed it.”

She bounces our hands excitedly, and if it were possible for me to love her more, like if I had any real estate left in my heart or soul or kidney, maybe, this would be the moment that would’ve done it.

Instead, I force myself to look back at the screen, so I don’t puke up the surge of butterflies rushing out of my stomach towards my esophagus.

You know what, I hate to admit it, given the shitshow parade she’s been grand-marshaling lately, but Katrina is undeniably fantastic. She’s so mean in this movie, so cruel and bitter and committed, which isn’t exactly a stretch, but on camera, it’s captivating. You love to hate her. It creates this feeling of adrenaline each time she pops up on-screen, and unfortunately, all that serves to do is make her iconic.

By the end, though, there’s no doubting that this is Wil’s movie.

Lila is alive and nuanced, even if her circumstances aren’t particularly unique. During the last scene of the movie, as Nick’s life fades away, around us we hear the sound of noses sniffling, of people digging in pockets and purses for tissues.

Even I feel a tight twisting in my throat watching Wil act her face off as Nick and Lila marry each other knowing they only have minutes left together.

I had it easy. I was half-dead.

And while I can see a lot of doors opening for me after this—romantic comedies, maybe some more serious dramas—I know for certain that it’s airplane hangars that are going to open for Wil. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.