My So-Called Bollywood Life(19)

Winnie whirled to face the voice. “Dev?”

“The one and only,” he said. “What are you doing here? First you’re stalking your ex, now me?”

“What? No! Never. I mean, why would I stalk you?”

He grinned. “I don’t know. Maybe it’s because you finally realized we’re meant to be?”

    “Sorry, Romeo,” Winnie said with a laugh. “Destiny and I are not getting along right now.”

“Damn. Okay, then what brings you to the Rose?”

“Forget me—what are you doing here?”

“I work here.”

“Really? Since when?”

“Since the beginning of summer. What, is that really so hard to believe?”

“No, it’s just that I didn’t expect Mr. Tall, Dark, and…uh, you to get a job at the Rose. My father knows the owner, Eric, so I was able to get an interview.”

“Yeah? Eric mentioned that he had one or two spots open. Henry and I thought they’d go to college students.”

“I know Henry is the tech guy. He’s always the tech guy. But what do you do here?”

“I run the ticket booth most of the time, but I also order new films. It’s a pretty cool gig. This job funds my camera collection. Come on, I’ll introduce you to Eric. Hopefully, you can join the crew. It wouldn’t be such a bad thing seeing you around, Winnie Mehta. You’re the only other person I know who has an encyclopedic brain when it comes to movies.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

He grinned. “No. It’s a great thing.”

Keep it together, Mehta, she chanted even as she felt a shiver rush up her spine. It was a sensation she had never experienced with Raj, which she realized both alarmed and thrilled her at the same time.

    Dev led her down a narrow hall and knocked on the open door at the end. “Eric? Your new recruit is here. I can vouch for her. She runs the film festival at school.”

A burly, balding man sat behind a metal desk piled with stacks of paper. “Winnie? Welcome! Come in, come in. Oh my goodness, you look just like your father.”

“Hi,” she said as she shook his hand. “I’ve heard that one before.”

She turned, ignored Dev’s curious expression, shut the office door in his face, and slipped into one of the metal chairs. It took only a moment for Eric to start firing questions, first about her interest in movies, and then about her understanding of film.

Yes, she had a blog where she reviewed movies. Yes, she knew Hollywood, foreign, and Bollywood, but Bollywood was her favorite. Yes, she’d learned 35-mm film at film camp.

“I’m a purist,” Eric said, pressing a hand to his wide chest. “We keep thirty-five-millimeter film projectors to play the classics and art-house movies. I’m the only one who knows how to splice film, but it’s taking up too much of my time. I need a projectionist who can stay up in the room with the machines, and splice and thread the film to prep the projectors a few times a week.”

“I can definitely be your projection-room tech,” Winnie said. “I love working with film. I learned how to do it this summer, and I can splice and build a movie faster than it takes Scorsese to kill a character.”

    Eric laughed. “I trust your father, so I’m sure you’ll be fine, but why don’t you show me what you’ve got? I want to see for myself that I can trust you with my film.”

“Sure. Works for me.”

In the lobby, Dev was unboxing candy.

“Where are you going?”

“Winnie’s going to show me her film-splicing ability. Want to see?”

Dev pocketed the knife and followed them to the second floor.

In the cool, dim room, Winnie walked over to the makeup table and switched it on. “Ready?” she said.

“I’m not going to time you,” Eric said with a smile.

“Right,” she said. She waited for the table to warm up before she started to put the strips of film together. She was careful with the old Casablanca practice reel he passed her and quickly built the movie lead. She then threaded the lead onto the platters and soundhead assembly. She ran a hand over the framing knob and film shoe, positioning the film into the machine. She deftly formed a proper loop with the film.

Eric stood next to her, arms crossed. “Not bad. Not bad at all. It takes someone who really appreciates film to do this. Even people who host flash screenings claim to appreciate movies, but they don’t get it.”

“Flash screenings? You guys get requests for them here? I thought that was only big in the city.”

    “Yeah, the college crowd likes it,” Dev said. “Art-house film screenings with only twenty-four hours’ notice to the public create a lot of buzz. The spontaneity brings people in the door. We’ve actually had to turn some business down because of all the requests recently.” He kicked the base of one of the platters.

“That’s a shame,” Winnie said. “But I splice pretty quickly, so maybe you can show more movies with two people putting film together.” After cutting the lights, she listened to the telltale hum of the shifting strips.

Dev leaned forward as the images played across the screen. “You’re definitely surprising, Winnie Mehta,” he said.