Two times two (the whole story)

“And now… it’s an honor for me to announce the winner of the 10^th Annual Short Film Festival — conducted in memory of one of the most tragic pages of our history. And the winner is…”

The man, in an impeccable black suit shining under the stage lights, was professionally dragging out an intriguing pause. He carefully tore, sticking his little finger out, a white envelope and extracted the name from within it. “And… the winner is… Alison Chance!”

The man beamed a radiant smile and inspected the auditorium in front of him packed with neatly-dressed people. He was enjoying the effect made by his words, “…and her ten-minute-long film Two Dollars which touched thousands and thousands of American hearts by its poignant story”.

Suddenly, she could not breathe as if someone just cut off the oxygen in the auditorium. It was improbable, unbelievable; she felt like being in a movie where dreams come true. Wearing this gorgeous dark cherry dress, she was sitting in the auditorium that before she saw only on TV. She was surrounded by the most famous people of American filmmaking industry, and the person on the stage was calling her name. All of this was too wonderful to be true.  

“… a film about love that never dies… a film about the warmth of human heart that saves the life…” The anchorman readjusted his tie and turned over a paper with his speech.

It is for her all of these people are cheering now; it is her they are smiling at so nicely; it is her they are looking at with such an admiration. She stood up from her velvet armchair, “… film about eternal…”

“What is he talking about?” flashed through her mind.

“… and now I invite you to enjoy this striking movie.”

Two high school students appear on the huge screen. They are riding a merry-go-round, holding hands and kissing every two minutes.  She is laughing contagiously; he is looking at her with eyes full of insane love.

Next shot. She is playing in a school theater and receiving a great ovation. He notices dozens of admiring looks at her and hears students’ parents discussing her acting talent. At the end of the show, she is officially named Prom Queen. They are escaping from the prom together to glide in a small boat across the lotus-covered surface of the night lake. He is reading her his poems about everything in the world being doubled: a boat has two oars, a day always has a night, a moon always has a sun, and he will always have her in his heart… She is smiling charmingly and saying that he is funny.

Next shot. They both are 19. They are sitting on the shore of the same lake, his arm round her waist, and discussing what to name their future son and daughter. She is telling him that she has just received an acceptance letter from Yale School of Drama. She is saying that her family is incredibly proud of her and that her mom is already packing warm clothes for her daughter. He inhales deeply and resolutely offers to get married and to go to Connecticut together. Lyrical music; camera is slowly zooming out.

Next shot. New Haven, winter night, a heavy snowfall. A tiny room packed with things. He is in the bed reading a book.  The phone rings. It’s her saying that she’ll be late because they have a dinner party with directors and actors after the show. She asks him not to wait for her and to go to bed. He turns off the lights, laying in the darkness with opened eyes for a long time.

They are 25. He comes home after work, takes off his suit and puts his bank employee ID on the table. She is dressing up for a theater play, looking for matching shoes and putting on her make-up. She says they have to discuss something. He is looking at her inquiringly. She tells him that she is going to Los Angeles for the whole summer to study in Hollywood Film School and that they probably should get divorced. She delivers an emotional speech about the very important places that theater and her career hold in her life. She is crying that it’s not his fault, that she just needs freedom, freedom to create, that anyway his rational accountant’s mind would never understand her soul.

Slow sorrowful music. A plastic cup appears on the screen with a blue toothbrush in it. Immediately, the next shot is an identical green toothbrush. At first sight, it seems to be the same cup with two toothbrushes in it but a viewer soon understands that they are already far away from each other.

Two bearded, famous directors in the first row approvingly exchanged glances.

Once, when Alison was six, she accidentally found an old toothbrush of the same blue color in a small cardboard box in her mother’s closet. She always asked herself why her mom would keep such trash at home.

Next shot. Eight years later. She is a decent actress living in Washington DC and performing in different theater productions. Right now, she is on tour in New York. After one of the shows, she suddenly meets him – he noticed her name on one of the posters and came to see her show. They are having dinner together in a restaurant and recalling their childhood and their hometown; they are telling each other with enthusiasm how they have spent these eight years. She retells how she gave up her youthful passion for cinema and decided to become a serious dramatic artist and how she never regretted this decision because it enabled her unique acting style; allowing her to choose to perform in any production she desires. He became the director of a big investment company, works on his own project and plans to set up his own firm in next few years. It’s clear in their eyes that they are still attracted to each other and there are some lingering feelings.

A flurry of short shots. The whole month of her tour they spend together. He shows her “his” New York, his favorite museums and historic places; she takes him to the best New York theater productions. They talk and go out a lot.

Every time Alison closed her eyes, she could easily imagine these madly happy, shining eyes, hair fluffed up by warm spring wind, a serene smile and two hands – of a man and of a woman – with fingers intertwined. She used to peruse this photo album hundreds of times trying to catch a glimpse of what had changed in these brown pensive eyes, why they didn’t glow as they did in these sunny pictures.

Next shot. Last night before her return to Washington DC, he secretly takes her to one of the World Trade Center office buildings where he works. They are going up to the 110^th floor to admire distant lights of the city. He is asking her to become his wife again. She is incredibly happy and can’t find the words to respond, so she is just burying her glistening face on his breast. He is giving her a two-dollar bill. He places an identical bill in his pocket reminding her of his poems about a “doubled” world and saying that these two-dollar bills will bring a double portion of happiness in their second marriage. Beautiful lyrical music; camera pans away.

Approving whisper from the first row.

Next shot. She is in Washington DC settling her affairs before moving to New York. She is packing her suitcase and humming some melody. The TV is on in the background, broadcasting some musical. Suddenly, it is interrupted by a picture of a huge skyscraper collapsing like a house of cards in smoke, fire, and flying debris.

A tragic, heart-rending music and anxious voices of news reporters on the background.

Her phone is ringing; she rushes to pick it up. Among loud cries and noises she recognizes his voice, he is telling her that a plane has run into the North Tower, not the South one, so they are evacuating now. He is persuading her to not worry. He is telling her that everything will be all right…

Alison hated September. Every September, her mom took her to New York to visit these two huge granite squares in the center of the city. Alison usually ran around them following their glittering slabs with her fingers. She wished to grow up as soon as possible to look inside these squares to see what was hidden in their depth, where the swift streams were running. Deep inside, Alison knew her dad was within those black holes, but her mom could never follow which is why she was always upset when she came here. Once, Alison heard her mom saying to Alison’s grandmother in the kitchen: “Mom, you know what? I have never been late for anything, never – not for school, not for rehearsals! You know it, right? And now I’m late forever… I can’t catch up, I can’t return, I can’t change anything…” Alison had decided that one day her dad went to an enchanted kingdom somewhere underground where all these water streams in granite squares were running, but her mom was late and the gates were already closed.

There was a close-up shot of the woman’s face on the screen. She was still holding the receiver in her right hand listening to a sudden silence in it. In the interest of safety, all phone lines were blocked in New York. This shot was silent as if the world has become deaf; as if there were not any sounds left.

For Alison, even the bustling city that never sleeps outside the dusty windows of her yellow cab kept silent. She still remembered this silence in the room where little Alison woke up in the middle of every night and saw her mom’s silhouette against the sombre background of the window pressing her forehead to the glass.

A taxi driver was anxiously casting glances at the finely dressed-up girl at the back seat. Finally, he asked her with caution if she was all right. She nodded in silence…

At the dinner after the award ceremony, the two bearded directors, warmed up with wine, were having a heated discussion about the last shot of the winning film. “And this amazing story with his wallet and ID card found among the debris and her discovering this two-dollar note in his wallet! Such a fine reference to the title of the film! And such a sad irony, my friend…” This director kept telling his colleague about “irony of our life” while slapping him on the shoulder. His colleague was trying to escape these slaps and kept repeating with dwindling patience: “Oh no, that’s nothing! How about the shot where she is holding this two-dollar bill with one hand and blowing the dust off it while keeping her other hand on her rounded belly? It’s such an optim… optimistic point of view! It’s a promise for a better future, you know.”

Alison didn’t turn on the lights in her apartment. She came up to the bureau and carefully lifted the two small photos with thin black ribbons encircling one corner. A man and a woman. She smoothed a crumpled “lucky” two-dollar bill with her shaking hands.

“I’m so sorry, mom. I just wanted you to be proud of me.”