Free Project 17 by Laurie Faria Stolarz Page A

initials C. B., knowing somehow that it's the same
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    person. The eeriness of it---of the coincidence, maybe-- sends a chill right through the center of my skull. If it's possible to even feel a chill there.
    Liza turns away and waits by the door, like the possibility of the graffiti being true upsets her. Meanwhile, my focus shifts to the ground. The floor is littered with broken beer bottles, cigarette butts, and dirty old underwear.
    "I need a break," I tell Derik, suddenly feeling weighted down by all my loot.
    "You?" he asks, raising an eyebrow, like the idea of me needing a break surprises him.
    "Ditto," Chet chimes in. "I need to take a leak."
    "Break time!" Greta declares.
    "Fine," Derik says, still working his camera. "Let's go."
    Using the map, we move through several more wards and wings, up and down a couple more flights of stairs, through a couple rec rooms. We somehow make it to the reception room of the administration building, where we finally dump our bags.
    "Okay," Tony says. "A short break, then how about we get serious? Film something really dramatic." He pulls what appear to be a stack of scripts and a director's megaphone from his bag.
    "Are you kidding me?" I ask him. "This isn't The Young and the Restless."
    "More like The Young and the Sexless," Derik says, motioning to Chet.
    "Hey, what's that supposed to mean?" Chet asks,
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    standing so close to Liza that he might as well be humping her leg.
    "It means stop molesting my cast." Derik takes a portable dolly out of his backpack and sets it up so that his camera rests on top.
    "Wait." Greta throws her hand up as though to stop traffic. "Don't you want a high-concept, no-filler film? I mean, you don't want to bore people to death only ten minutes in, do you?"
    Derik swivels the dolly to aim the camera at her.
    "She's got that right," Tony says, using the megaphone, his voice echoing even more. "People will be asking for their money back before they even make a dent in their popcorn."
    "Right," Greta says, striking a pose for the camera-- hands on hips, back arched, stomach sucked in. "Which is why I was thinking we could have me act like I'm trapped in a room or something. I could be struggling to get out."
    "Or maybe we could just have you trapped in a room," I suggest, faking a smile. "No acting required."
    Greta lets out a huff, still overacting. "If I'm going to be involved in this project, I need it to have purpose ... to have edge ... to have spice."
    "Spice?" Chet perks up.
    Tony hands a script to each of us, but Derik totally ignores it, instead filming Greta's every bossy move.
    "I thought we were supposed to be taking a break," I say, unzipping my coat to unload the tonnage of file
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    folders I've squirreled inside, as well as the wax paper-covered notebook and the watercolor picture. I pile them on the floor, out of the way, and then pull a bunch of candles from my bag and set them up in a circle to establish a cozy area--if the word cozy could even apply here.
    "Séance time?" Chet asks, rubbing his hands together.
    "Yeah, I thought we could summon an evil spirit to take over your body and make you perform sadistic rituals."
    "Sounds cool," he says.
    I roll my eyes, noticing how Liza is sitting off by herself, eyeing my pile of stuff, probably wondering what my deal is. And so I listen to Chet ramble on about some candlelit picnic he attempted with a girl--how he accidentally burned his butt in the process--for exactly the length of time that it takes me to light all the candles. Then I join Liza, scooting in between her and my stack of file folders.
    "Still feeling like this place doesn't want us here?" I ask.
    "Make fun if you want."
    "I'm not making fun. I'm just curious. What did you mean by all that?"
    She shrugs instead of answering.
    "You don't want to be here, do you?"
    "Do you?" she asks. "Can you honestly say that this is fun for you?"
    I shrug, wondering what she was thinking by coming
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    here in the first place--Of if she