The small, kind-hearted, goddess of the silver screen pressed ever so gently on the right hand door of the entrance to the theatre. She wanted to get inside before she was spotted by someone emerging from the foyer. At the same time, she did not want to make so much noise as to cause the boy to turn around and recognise her.
I do not want to scare this little creature, she thought, fondly, smiling to herself. I want to delight him. But I just want to take a peek at him first.
The door responded easily and quietly to the gentlest pressure by her. Her body flowed noiselessly through the doorway and she had the feeling of being at home in a special place, as if this were in fact really her domain, but also the domain of people’s dreams and today, of the little boy’s dreams, in particular. She felt, like never before, that she was meant to be here, in this place where hope gathered, sometimes.
Almost as if it were a church, she thought, where people pray or hope for a better life.
She turned, made sure the door closed noiselessly after her and then turned back to face the screen.
She recognised the scene from the movie, the one with John and Sheridan (playing his hoodlum) and she knew she was about to have her biggest moment in the movie (apart from her song): the talk with Scott, which finished with her kissing him on the forehead.
She had very little time now, but had to move quietly. Straight ahead of her: the screen, but not the boy. He was seated, she knew from Robert, on the left. Her view was restricted in the short hallway. So she stayed to the right and began to inch forward towards the screen, on her high heels. Then she saw him, seated alone, in the empty theatre. She stopped. To look at him. This boy who was in love with her.
She could just about make him out. He seemed very small and immediately, she felt relief at this.
What was I so frightened of? she thought to herself, amused by her own cowardice now. She shook her head and almost laughed. He’s going to be so happy. He’ll be overwhelmed.
She smiled to herself, confidently, continuing to look at him, with no fear left inside her at all now, just pleasure and that new sense that this was part of her special, very fortunate lot in life: this gift that was both a power and an obligation to give, to enchant.
She studied him. He was blond. But nowhere near platinum, she thought. [The manager had exaggerated.]
She could also make out, after a moment or two, that he was wearing a mainly red, very inauthentic-looking tartan shirt. C & A? Probably, she thought. It was visible above the top of his seat; he was somewhat slumped down into it.
Her eyes flicked between him and the screen for a few moments. The preceding scene came to an end. This would be interesting. She continued watching it as she appeared on it with the other girls and wonderfully, to her delight, the infatuated boy sat up immediately, in response to her presence and leaned forward to gaze at the beautiful actress he could never realistically hope to meet.
She waited while the scene with Scott progressed, watching him, to be sure he didn’t turn (sometimes, she knew, one feels one is being watched). But he didn’t move a muscle in response to her real, actual presence. She began to move away from the hall to his right, side-stepping quickly but quietly along the back of the seating, watching him all the while as she moved, in case he turned, which would necessitate her turning. She paused at the corner of the seating, at the last row. But she wanted to see a bit more of his face. This was special. A special day, for both of them. There was a risk he might get up and leave, but she could risk that, she felt. Usually, he did stay for the song, she had heard, though not always. I’ll risk it. I’m feeling lucky now.
She took a few steps more, enough to see the expression of love and wonder on the side of his face, then stopped, almost parallel with him now, waiting to see what happened to it when she kissed Scott. Jodie Foster did so. The boy smiled and looked as if he were enveloped by something; something better than what he had, or could ever have. Then, to her surprise and enormous satisfaction, the boy actually leaned a little further forward and closed his eyes, imagining he was being kissed. By her.
Involuntarily, the line of the Yeats poem her Mom liked so much came back to her:
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
But she imagined it spoken to her, by the enchanted boy. She added in her own mind, with inner joy, the words: movie star to the end of the line. And she almost cried as she watched him.
Then, disaster!
She’d gotten it wrong. The boy got up, but to walk to his right, awkwardly , the long way, along the row of seating he was in with the intention of exiting out of the right-hand side exit door, which was about two thirds down the walkway to the right of the seating. He saw her immediately and looked straight at her, straight into her face and at her clothes. The face and clothing he had just been looking at and which, he must, by now, she thought, know every inch of.
She turned too late, but turned anyway and she rummaged in her handbag and began walking back towards the hallway, but ridiculously facing the back wall as she did so, not sure what to do. She turned back a little and out of the corner of her eyes, she noticed the boy sit down promptly, almost like a sack of potatoes she thought, and face front, looking at the screen. He had moved a handful of seats along his row, towards the exit he had been planning on using. He was looking forward at the screen again she noticed, glancing at him, as she got to the hallway. He had moved just to get a better view for the song, maybe? Maybe he hadn’t recognised her? It was dark. Her presence was somewhat unlikely.
Robert to her surprise met her, startling her, at the start of the short hallway but had somehow clearly seen what had happened and stepping behind her, he shielded her from the possibility of being seen again as they hurried wordlessly out of the auditorium, leaving the boy to his dreams, once more.
Jodie Foster and the Super 8 