New York, New York #10
One attempt at child’s pose revealed a stash of Eudora’s final Home Shopping Network purchases beneath her majestic canopy bed. By the looks of it, she’d gone in big on Snuggies and the collected works of Kenny G.
Then, one day, as AJ began the final build of the screenplay, she found herself looking directly at a file box labeled Summer 2000. It had been there the whole time, as if waiting for her to spot it among Eudora’s papers. Startled, AJ roused herself from the chaise and lifted the lid.
Her breath caught as she took in the CD case for NOW 4, the Gelly Roll pen with the fake flower attached, and the clipboard. She extracted these treasures from the box to reveal a loose collection of notes below, meticulously dated beginning in June 2000.
AJ bit her lip. Eudora had left these papers to her and Noah. Heart pounding, she began to read.
June 8, 2000
Ezell—
Today something remarkable happened. A girl came to the house—with Noah. The moment they walked in, I could tell there was a bond between them. Noah’s been like a caged animal for weeks, snarling and irascible, but in her presence he is soothed.
I don’t know what possessed me. All right, fine, I’m a twisted old thing. But I had them read.
Ezell, it was extraordinary. Watching them together…it was like seeing two people switched on from the inside. Noah’s been resisting his birthright for years, but with this girl he just…gave in. He trusts no one but himself, but he seems to trust her.
From what I can discern she is totally untested, a complete tabula rasa. But she’s responsive and open and bright, and she’s a fellow twin…so, primed for higher levels of psychic connectivity. I think she might just have the makings of a born actress.
If they agree to work with me, this may be the opportunity I’ve been hoping for, to push our work on phasing beyond Laughter & Death. What a grand experiment that would be.
It was unreal to have this unfiltered look into Eudora’s brain—and to that end, Eudora’s unvarnished perspective on her own younger self. Later, as Noah unloaded the dishwasher, AJ asked if he’d read the papers.
“No. I have my own memories of that time,” he said irritably. “I don’t want Eudora in my head overwriting them. You shouldn’t either.” He closed the dishwasher a little too hard.
With one day to spare, AJ turned in the screenplay, and as June gave way to July, her grip on time started to slide.
It was all the same sets as it had been thirteen years ago, and many of the same players, albeit some in altered states: as AJ perused Eudora’s papers, the distance between the summers of 2000 and 2013 began to collapse.
One surreal Friday, AJ and Noah went to retrieve Eudora’s ashes from the crematorium and spent a pleasant if macabre afternoon selecting an urn they felt would be up to her standards.
“I wonder if they have anything in cashmere,” said AJ.
Noah snorted and picked up a sleek blue-and-white number marked down for Fourth of July. “Classic adult urn. This weekend only, twenty-five percent off,” he read from the label. “I think this works. She loved a limited-time offer.”
From there, they went directly to a cookout at AJ’s parents’ house.
AJ tried not to think about cremation as she watched Noah and her dad fervently agree that ceramic briquettes were superior to lava rocks a foot from a flaming meat cooker.
As her dad clapped Noah on the shoulder, he tipped back a Diet Coke, and AJ’s heart swelled. In the year since Patrick’s accident, he had made a concerted effort to cut back. So far, it seemed to be sticking. It made AJ feel almost…hopeful.
She heard a crunch and looked up to find Mike chomping on a pickle beside her. “This is unexpected,” he said, nodding to Noah. “But also not.”
AJ blushed. It was the first time anyone in her family had directly addressed Noah’s presence. News of Libby’s split from Lucas earlier this month had eclipsed even Noah’s celebrity. In fact, Libby was holding forth on her divorce right now, Noah listening attentively.
“I mean, he’s no Brian,” said Mike, with his shy smile. “But he’s a good guy, too.”
Too good, an unpleasant voice interjected. All of this is too good to be true.
That voice seemed prescient when, around four, the group realized that no one had seen Emily in two hours. When she wasn’t inside the house, the Graveses began to panic.
“I’ll try Mrs. Chin,” said AJ’s mom, hands shaking. “Maybe she wandered off to see Agnes.”
AJ disagreed. “She’s here,” she whispered to Noah as Libby tried to establish a timeline.
Noah nodded, and the two of them began to hunt around the yard. AJ was convinced on a marrow level that Emily was nearby. When they arrived at the garage, AJ stopped walking.
Without a word, Noah bent down and hauled up the door. And there, passed out in the front seat of Katie Graves’s Toyota Camry, was Emily.
“Oh my God, guys,” said Emily as AJ and Noah returned her to the cookout. “Why so serious?”
On the ride back to Drew House, Noah was contemplative. “How did you know she was there?”
AJ shrugged. “Coincidence.” Noah glanced over at her. “What?”
He deliberated, then said, “You are twins.”
AJ laughed. “I don’t believe in that stuff.”
“Why not? You two have been bonded since birth,” he said forcefully. His tone made AJ look up. He was squinting down the road, his face like stone. “I have to believe that if two people are that close, some part of it can survive, no matter what.”
He was thinking about them.
A long moment passed as AJ struggled for words. “We will always be close,” she said at last.
They brought Eudora home a week later. Noah set her up on the table in the front hall beside a vase of fresh flowers from the garden. He was starting to say his goodbyes.
AJ, meanwhile, felt as though she was meeting Eudora all over again through her papers. She would sit in the drawing room for hours poring over her director’s notes.
Noah did not approve. Often, he would come read nearby to register his displeasure through a series of heavy sighs and askance looks. Once, AJ actually heard him tsk.
“Yes?” she said without looking up.
“Oh, don’t mind me,” he said, nose in his biography of Jane Quinn. Then, “Learning anything?”
“Your love…shaped me.”
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him suppress a smile.
To be fair, Noah’s wariness was not unfounded. Eudora had been scheming that whole summer.
“Phasing” was the term she and Ezell had used for that near-telepathic state of play they’d once achieved. Ezell had passed before they had figured out how to replicate it—work Eudora would then attempt with AJ and Noah, in hopes of publishing a follow-up to Laughter & Death.
July 13, 2000
E—
Morning: Much Ado About Nothing
10 minutes repetitions
10 minutes hair dryers
2 hrs. three-line scenes
Notes: Music seems to be the key. This is our second week on NOW 4—it’s so god-awful it might drive me crazy, but it’s bringing them closer to phasing than ever before.
The more time they spend in a nonverbal capacity, the more in tune they get with each other.
Each day, they surrender a little of the awkwardness a little sooner.
Which is no small feat for two adolescents.
They’re both clearly taken with each other but are sublimating it into their scene work.
Noah in particular is showing great restraint.
He knows something of women by his age, but she is entirely unspoiled—I can tell by how she walks.
She has no idea the effect she’s having on him, and he is doing everything he can to keep her from realizing.
In return, AJ is showing remarkable trust in Noah—it’s almost like she’s imprinted on him, using him as her safety net as she begins to test her abilities.
It’s a very tender phase in her development as a performer.
If all goes well, she should be able to replicate this trust with other players.
At this point, though, she only has it with Noah.
AJ heard a jingle and looked up as the dog trotted in.
“Hey, Hortense,” she said without thinking.
Noah’s gaze lifted from his book.
AJ blushed. “I don’t know why I just said that.”
“I believe it’s called ‘revertigo,’ ” he said, eyes crinkling.
“I’m sorry, Bud,” said AJ, as the dog wagged up at her cluelessly. “I didn’t mean it. You absolutely do not look like you’ve had twelve children.” Then to Noah, “She hasn’t, has she?”
Noah shook his head. “She is fixed, like her dad,” he said, then turned back to his book. AJ felt a queasy jolt in her sternum as she realized he was referring to himself.
In the wake of their reunion, they hadn’t discussed Huntington’s disease once. If it came up, Noah referred to it obliquely. “As I get older” was a favorite euphemism of his, as in, “I’ll have to give that up as I get older.”
AJ knew it was on his mind significantly more than he let on. She continually tried to gauge his emotional landscape, but their channel was far from clear.
Noah had been right that sex did come with some transparency, but the kind of sex they were having mostly gave vent to intense bursts of excitement: highly erotic, but not all that informative. Outside the bedroom, AJ’s read on him was crude—at most, she could sense the temperature of his moods.
But AJ didn’t need to phase with him to understand that for the past thirteen years, he had dealt with his prognosis by scripting his life in tight increments, and that what they were doing now was strictly off book. AJ also understood that despite this, Noah was sticking with her.
Still, there was a part of him that was desperate to shut this down. As these sultry weeks stretched on, open-ended, AJ could sense it growing restless—a shadow in conversation, a pall encroaching on their felicity.
One cool night in mid-July, they cuddled together in Errol’s office watching Center Stage, which, to AJ’s supreme delight, Noah had never seen. As AJ explained the finer points, Noah wrapped his arm around her, and Bud rested her soft head on his lap.