Regretting You(108)

I’m relieved too.

This is good.

Miller goes to the laptop that’s hooked up to the TV. “Okay, I have one more video.”

I tilt my head, confused. “But we only made the one . . .”

Miller looks at me and grins. “This one’s a surprise.”

He pulls up a different file, and as soon as the television connects to his computer, Miller rushes to the lights and turns them off.

I don’t know what he’s up to.

I’m still standing in the back of the living room when Miller wraps his arms around me from behind. He rests his chin on my shoulder.

“What is this?”

“Shh,” he says. “Just watch.”

The film opens with Miller staring at the camera. He’s holding it himself, pointing it at his own face. He waves. “Hey, Clara.” He sets the camera down. He’s in his bedroom. He takes a seat on his bed and says, “Okay, so I know you said you don’t like anything elaborate, but . . . I kind of started this before you told me that. So . . . I hope you like it.”

The screen goes black and opens up to footage of the two of us. It’s all the B-roll he’s taken over the last several months. Clips of us sitting against the tree at the park. Clips of us working on our video submission. Clips of us at school, at his house, at my house.

The montage of clips ends, and in the next scene, it actually has sound. It’s Miller, fumbling with the camera. He’s at his truck, and he slams the door, pointing the camera at himself. “Hey, Clara. I think you should go to prom with me.” He whispers it when he says it, then sets the camera up on the tripod. He points it at me.

It was the first day he had set up the camera, when we were at the food truck. He walks away to go order our sandwiches, and the footage shows me making silly faces at the camera.

The next scene is the day we skipped school. He’s setting the camera up, pointing it at the tree. I’m leaning against the tree, staring out at the water. Miller isn’t in the shot at first, but then he sticks his face in front of the camera. “Hey, Clara,” he whispers in a hurry. “You should go to prom with me.” Then he backs away from the camera and slips between me and the tree, like nothing was amiss.

I had no idea he was doing any of this. I turn around to look at him, but he urges me to keep watching the television.

The next three scenes are all from while we’ve dated, with him sneaking in random promposals while we’re together and me having no idea he was doing it.

Then a scene opens up to him standing in line at Starbucks. He points his camera at me. I’m sitting alone in a corner, reading a book.

Oh my God. This is the first day we kissed.

Miller turns the camera back on himself as he’s standing in the Starbucks line. “You’re so cute, sitting over there reading your book,” he whispers. “I think you should go to prom with me.”

“Miller,” I whisper. I try to turn around and look at him again, but he doesn’t want me to take my eyes off the television. I’m just in shock. I wasn’t expecting any of the footage to be from before we were dating.

In the next scene, Miller is outside, leaning against a pole. I don’t recognize the location at first, but when he wipes away beads of sweat from his forehead and pulls the sucker from his mouth, I realize he’s standing in front of the city limit sign. He’s looking into his camera when he says, “So. Clara Grant. You just drove by, and I know you saw me standing out here on the side of the road. Here’s the deal. I have a girlfriend, but I stopped thinking about her when I go to bed at night, and Gramps says that’s a bad sign and that I should break up with her. I mean, I have had a thing for you for a long time now, and I feel like I’m running out of opportunity. So I’ll make you a deal. If you turn your car around at the bottom of that hill and come back, I’m gonna take that as a sign, finally listen to my gut, break up with my girlfriend, and eventually ask you out. I might even ask you to prom this year. But if you don’t turn your car around, then I’ll assume you and I just weren’t meant to—” His eyes flash up, and he catches sight of something. He grins and then looks back down at his phone. “Look at that. You came back.”

That portion of the video ends, and now I’m crying.

When the next scene begins, I don’t recognize it at all. The camera is pointed at the floor and then at Gramps.

Gramps looks a few years younger in this video. Healthier than he looks now. “Get that out of my face,” Gramps says.

Miller turns the camera on himself. He looks younger too. He’s skinny, probably about fifteen. “Gramps is excited for the show,” Miller says sarcastically into the camera. Then he points his camera toward the stage.

My heart is thundering in my chest when I recognize the set.

My mind also starts to race. Twice, Miller’s grandpa tried to tell me about something that happened when they were at the school when Miller was fifteen. And twice, Miller was so embarrassed by it he shut him up.

Miller kisses the side of my head because he knows I’ve been wanting to know this story since the first day I met Gramps.

The camera cuts off. When it cuts on again, it’s the same night, but it’s the end of the play. The camera is on me now. I’m fourteen, standing onstage by myself, delivering a monologue. The camera slowly pans away from me and onto Miller.