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"We have our own indoor set?" The whisper was urgent and curious, and right against my ear. "Fantastic!" I said into the phone. "Will there be beer there? And women?" Billy asked, hopping up on the balls of his feet and tugging the phone cord just to annoy me. I chuckled, punched his arm, and he fell back dramatically in a flourish of feigned injury while I tried to finish my conversation with the domestic affairs rep on the line. It had just been explained to me that, while Elijah and Sean Astin were filming some Frodo/Sam scenes on South Island, so would Billy and I be filming Merry/Pippin scenes in about the same location. Because of the unpredictable weather and the location being just a bit too far from Wellington, they had built an inside set for our respective pairs. We couldn't been flown or driven easily each morning, and since we might not even be able to work every day, the nice people down on South Island had a house set aside for me and Billy. A house. For me and Billy. These people didn't really know us, did they? "Alright. Yes, that's fine." I covered the mouthpiece of the phone, turning to Billy. "We'll need about six cases of—" Listened to the voice on the other line again. "Oh. Ah. Yes, right. No guests. A private residence, then? Of course." I tilted my head back at Billy, shaking my head. "Make that four cases." "Right then!" he shot back, already halfway dived into the closet and then a moment later dragging out huge armfuls of clothes which were dumped unceremoniously on the bed. After ringing off, I collapsed laughing. This was too much. I mean, if they could only know how funny it sound, all, "You and Mr. Boyd will have lodgings for a week in a pretty isolated coastal town called Milford Sound," and on and on, considering the madness the two of us would probably create when left to our own devices. "Coastal, my friend!" I sang-sung as I helped him sort out the tangled mess of silk, cotton, and wool on his bed. "Surfing," he chimed in, snagging some jeans and tossing them into what looked like a "take with me" pile. "What're we filming there, then?" "Does it matter?" I said, snickering and flopping over what seemed to be the "leave in Wellington" pile of clothes. "A bit, you lout. Get offa my clothes." I rolled to the left. "Fangorn." "Where're Lij and Sean going to be?" "Uh. The Misty Mountains?" He chucked a kilt at me, and it tented over my head, leaving me in navy-blue darkness. "Wasn't paying attention really. Ehm. Haast? Something like that." "We can visit them, then, yeah?" I took the kilt off my head, tossed it back at him, and raised an eyebrow. "Not really. Something like seven hundred kilometers difference." "Christ. When they say isolated—" "They mean isolated. But the beach, Bills. It's going to be wild." "Better search my car for the wetsuits." "Under the bodies of the people you forgot you left in there, and just to the right of the balls of twine—" Another article of clothing swatted me full in the face and I grinned, lying back against the pillows while flicking it off. "Certainly not anywhere near the air-fresheners, because, oh, bless me—there aren't any!" "Are you dishonoring my car, Dominic? Because that's a challenge." I waggled my eyebrows, grabbing up a pair of pants and swatting him with one pant leg. "Bring it on, sheep-shagger."
And then he flying tackled me off the bed, preparing to strangle me with a sweater's long, clinging arms, but all I saw was him, and all I thought of was the week ahead.
Okay. So, it was exciting beyond belief for about an hour. But now it's all set and we're packed and we've already said goodbye to the boys and the Wellington crew. And it's kind of just hitting me now, after more talks with the South Island folks over the phone, just how alone Billy and I are going to be. Itinerary's all set—surfing, snorkeling, and hiking. We've got enough CDs and DVDs to last us until Armageddon or until Australia slides into New Zealand because of some continental shift in the Earth's crust and mashes us to Hobbit hotcakes. Which sounds funny on paper, but man— Right. On topic. Of course I am. I ramble when I'm nervous, don't I, then? Billy breezed through round about an hour ago, glowing and red in the face because he managed to filch Orli's video-camera—and he plans to chart our manly outing on film with it so that one day our grandkids can watch us being stupid and I dunno, learn something about life, or what have you. I think he just really liked stealing Orli's camera. Sure hope the Elf doesn't notice it's gone, because we've still got twelve hours in Wellington, and man, that'd be one awesome showdown—probably not a good idea, though, since bruising and swelling does not a happy make-up crew make. Hm. Avoiding the issue again. But yeah. Billy, me. Alone. I mean, fucking, ALONE, for a week. And if it rains during an outdoor shoot? Alone through the whole day. Very. Alone. Think I'm worried because the funny thing that happens when me and Bill are alone for a long time is that I start to let down my outward persona, and kind of like, let the inner me just hang all out. Worried that, if that goes on for nights on end, that he might notice that I'm not all laughs and pranks and insanity. That something drippy and squishy for him keeps turning figure eights in my chest. Worried about acting TOO happy that I've got him to myself for a week. Worried about saying something bloody stupid when we get drunk. Worried that the ocean and the together time will go right to my dumb head.
Well, fuck all. Best get on with it.
The helicopter had been gone for about two hours. It took the crew and all vestiges of the outside world with it. I finished emptying the contents of my luggage, which was immense for such a short trip. The rent-a-car with the bigger things like surfboards would be driven up for us later that evening. The house was wonderful; all whites and greens and browns, split-level, lofty ceilings. But it was the outside that caught our attention before anything else; wide open space for miles, ringed fairly by rocky hills along the lip of the bowl that served as the three-hundred-and-sixty degree horizon. The grass was fair and light, hinting at slightly sandy soil. The beach itself was no more than a couple miles walk to the east; a well-beaten path connected the shore and the property. And we went mad going over the fields, messing around, and breaking in the camera. It became clear right from the off that Billy was the cameraman. He liked the thing, obviously, liked seeing our world through it. "It's like reality through a filter that just doesn't restrict anything around it," he commented oddly. I just snorted and stole it from him and dashed for the house like someone had lit a fire under my arse. We chased each other around the house, then, claiming this room and that, swiping the camera back and forth while filming, though we both knew full well that we'd end up sharing the same rooms at the same times. We stocked our private stash of liquor in the freshly scrubbed icebox. We put the telly and its accessories through a quick check, messed with the Playstation, and altogether approved the electronic accommodations. In the bedroom, I helped Billy unpack what had become our shared CD case; the CDs we agreed were necessary when traveling and quite cool besides. I tried to ignore how full and good it felt, doing this stupid domestic unpacking shit with him. Tried to ignore the feeling of mutuality; how all his stuff was sort of my stuff or at least I had borrowed and used most of it so much that it seemed like that. Just wanted to have a good time, was all. I was flipping through a book that fell to the bottom of my bag, muttering because the bookmark fell out and I'd lost my page. I felt the lens of the camera steady on me and I looked up to see Billy, just flatly filming me. "Can I help you?" "Do something interesting for the camera." I flipped the bird at the glaring lens. He snickered. "Come on!" "Like what?" "Dunno. Tell a story." "Once, there was a very, very annoying Scotsman, who would've been such a lovely friend if he wasn't bloody obnoxious, but his British friend was oh-so-patient and humble that—" "Your stories are crap." "I'm feeling the love, Pip." The camera lowered and he was grinning that mad, Billy grin of his, upper lip drawn up and eyes wildly at the ceiling, tossing. "You like that camera a bit too much, I think." He fell on the bed, setting the camera on the mattress next to him. "Which room do you want?" Fishing my bookmark out from between two CDs, I smiled triumphantly, popped it into the book, and then realized Billy had said something. "Mm?" "Asked which room you wanted." I hesitated, for some strange reason. It didn't seem to make sense for us to use two separate bedrooms when we were the only people in the house. Why even bother? Bed was big enough. Bed was…yeah. Yeah. Maybe best if we did have separate rooms. Still, none of my thinking made it to my mouth. "Don't we just share this room?" I muttered, so casual that I mentally high-fived myself. "Alright," he agreed, just as casually, eyes on the back of a CD case. "Guess it is kind of daft. It's just us two."
Just us two. Huh.
He's cooking something downstairs in the kitchen and I've just showered, so I figured I'd sit down and write. South Island is…well. There's something about it that makes me feel like I'm in a country within a country. Hell, I know it's an entirely different place than the North Island, but this isolation is just weird. For the few hours it took us to settle in, I almost forgot why we were here. It took a split-second of thought to remind myself that we were here to film Fangorn scenes. That I had dialogue to remember. That we weren't just on some mad all-fees paid holiday. The truth of that slid off me, especially when Billy changed into a decent pair of linen pants and a nice shirt, and popped some of our good stuff and filled the glasses and then wandered the perimeter of the house with me on his left-hand side and the camera in his right hand. He suggested walking to the beach, but I felt like sticking to the house. So we went back inside, finished off the bottle, got warm and fuzzy enough for everything to be funny, and sorted through our DVDs. One movie later, hunger set in, and he offered to look through the groceries that had been stocked for us. So I said I'd go wash off the clinging salty-dirt that seemed to lace the ground as well as the air here. It's funny, how it gets, when we're alone. There are these quiet moments, these long stretched shadowy spaces, like putty between two grubby pairs of fingers. And in those silences, all is right with the world, and the breezes coming off the water pet you in a welcoming sort of way and you close your eyes.
And a heartbeat turns the moment over, cooks it on its other side, and eventually he or I start talking again. It cycles like that, conscious and unconscious moments flipping and flopping gracefully. Sharing space. Making room. Changing things? Well, maybe. Maybe for me. But for him? That's just another shadowy space, right there. One that I don't have a grip on at all.
"Give it an hour. When I'm positive food poisoning hasn't set it, I'll sprinkle you generously with compliments," I announced, leaning back in my chair, our table full of empty plates. He smirked, threw a wadded up napkin at me, and took a swig from his beer bottle. "Of course," he drawled, dragging his accent out in a way that made my cheeks warm. "Can you bake, d'you think?" He laughed, folded his hands behind his head, and the kitchen light played with the shades of black on his shirt. "Much better than you, my friend." "Wasn't my fault the oven broke and I was left with a bowl of cake batter!" "Oh, but it was your fault that you then ate the batter, and came moaning over to my place like a wee boy with a very bad tummy-ache." I grinned, recalling the afternoon, and how I had whined and flopped on his lap and he had pet my hair playfully for a few seconds before searching out some nasty something or other for me to swallow down. We lapsed into comfortable silence; the clink of beer bottles on the tabletop the only thing that broke up the minutes. After a time, I got up and started taking the plates into the kitchen. Filled the sink with them, too lazy to put them in the dishwasher and then figure out how it worked. Billy showered while I puttered around my remaining bags and unpacked what I thought I'd need for tomorrow. I put my set of the Lord of the Rings books out, along with some comfortable clothes to change into at the make-up trailer, and snagged a few CDs in case we had time to kill on set. He was showered and changed by the time I ventured back towards the bedroom. Misty warmth from the bathroom filled the place, and the light warmth from outside was almost similar. It sort of made me dizzy for a moment. In shorts and an undershirt, he flopped on the bed. I lay down on the other side of the bed, putting the requisite distance between us, and grabbed my copy of The Two Towers. I tried to read, but the words became one long string of unreadable drivel in front of my eyes. I was a little tired, but didn't want the day to be over at the same time. And Billy's presence just a couple feet away nagged at me. Sure, we'd shared a bed plenty, but never like this. Never planned. Never previously agreed upon bed sharing. "What part're you looking at?" "Oh. Um, trying to find the description of Fangorn Forest again," I lied. "Not a bad idea," he replied absently, his own eyes skimming the contents of a book. "Just let me know when you want to sleep, mmm?" he added, laying the book on his chest and looking over at me. It was frighteningly intimate, the way he looked like a man playing husband with the blankets around his waist, the light coming sideways through over his profile, and the easy smile on his lips. And I thought to myself: This is no different than how his wife will one day see him. And then I cringed and tried not to think about the cringing.
I nodded, closed the book, and sank deeper into the blankets. He flicked the light off a minute later. The bed squeaked and shifted for twenty minutes before I lost my battle to stay awake, my eyes slipping shut in spite of the tension in my limbs.
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