I dreamed of you last night. We were in the Beechwood
backyard, and it was somewhere else at the same time too. Does that make sense to you? Kublai was there, draped across the windowsill, asleep, dreaming of small flightless birds prolly. You wore a curious expression, mouth bunched up to one corner and eyes in a level gaze. Stoical surprise would be how I'd describe it. Had your turquoise shoes too, the strappy ones I like. Ah. I thought you liked those. You stood hipshot, tapping one foot on the ground. I felt you were drawing my attention to something. I turned and there was a mountain of suitcases stretching above me, vast and black and brown and red, I couldn't even see the uppermost point. Then the mountain tottered and collapsed on me. Symbolic eh. I felt disappointed when I woke: I thought we might have talked, if even for a few sentences. It feels good to hear your voice now I can tell you. Most times, speaking to a disembodied voice gives me the creeps, I feel like I'm speaking to a ghost. Perhaps that's why I sometimes behave differently than I would if I were actually face-to-face with the person. It's difficult to put it into words. Sometimes the conversation takes a curious left turn, that's all. Not with you though. With you it feels like all of you is squeezing down through the cables and racing thousands of miles and flooding out this end into my ear, and I feel a bit more whole for it.

This may sound somewhat crazy but have you ever felt like you existed to a lesser degree? During my last year of school, the bigger part of it I wore this knackered pair of tennis shoes, I had no money for an upgrade. There was a hole in the left and a hole in the right and I was constantly skipping back and forth to avoid puddles and gradually, I began to feel of less substance. The wind might have been blowing right through me. Now is similar. The morning I crawled out of bed to come here, a miserable morning, one of those misting rains that seems to soak you more thoroughly than fat raindrops. I was still so tired I dropped off before the wheels left the runway. I remember my ears popping in my sleep. What I'm getting at is, a part of me feels as if I never left. As though another me is still living out my everyday at home: lying in on Sundays, having my hair cut, shooing Kublai off the table, thinking about sex, that sort of thing, while at the same time I am here. Like there's an eastern me and a western me. Best I can put it is I feel strung out across the globe. Um? Fine, I'm fine. Just missing you. How much? Let's see… I miss you so much I feel like turning myself inside out. Trust me, it's a compliment. Actually, it's how I feel about this whole thing. Really tough shoot. According to schedule, I was home two days ago. Walked about all that day with a fuckoff smile, feeling a little bit sorry for second unit, who've got another month and guess what? I get back to my suite at th- no. Tent. No, it's a tent, Mona. Really. Excuse me. Sarcasm only gets one so far into the evening. Anyhoo, there was a note waiting for me:
ADJUSTMENTS TO SCENE. WILL NOTIFY. I could have
screamed. I think I did. It creeps to fortyfive degrees in
the afternoon. Fortyfive, and the only thing between a
million square miles of sand and a colossal ball of flaming
gases is yours truly. Luncheon vouchers at the Vic are
looking pretty good right now.

Start of the shoot and you should have seen us. Our guide, Tariq, this tubby chainsmoker with a mole on his cheek, told us this was the area they shot the Tatooine scenes of the Star Wars series. That's right, Star Wars. You sound unthrilled. Tell you the truth, to me one sandbar looks quite like another, but still. Star Wars. Boy were we allsinging alldancing. Now I'm lying on a rushmat with a wet towel over my head. That's Nick Drake on the cassette player, Art was kind enough to lend me his on account of mine melted. My boots also, but that goes for the entire British contingent. Or should I say Briddish. He he. No, no, sterling crew. The whole genteel thesp shtick tickles them no end. Definitely. They really respond to it. Less so when I'm teetering under sixty kilos of combat gear, feeling like a newborn calf on skinny legs. So the whole weedy Brit thesp shtick they find wearying - more and more so, I'm sure. Things have changed here. The mood feels oppressive. Last week, the dee-oh-pee stalked off after a volcanic spat with Herr Direktor and nobody's heard from him since. Net result was we had to fly in Borumhil Rozsa special. Yep. That Borumhil Rozsa. It's that kind of project. Writers are another matter entirely: they come and go in a pinch, we're handed new pages two-three times a day. Scene was Cortado and I and two others discover an upturned jeep, still smoking, and we fall under ambushed. Simple enough. I play the conflicted embed who's nearly won the favour of the others and Cortado the steely grunt. The raghead groundtroop corpses play raghead groundtroop corpses. Then Herr Direktor strides over making throatslit gestures. Needs something, he says. Stakes are high at this point, we're well into act two.

So we're all in position stood hemming and hawing, looking like we're expecting the something Herr Direktor wants to fall out of the sky. Me, I found it difficult to think of anything. The air wrinkled and warped in the heat and I had a head full of white noise. So I pinched the bridge of my nose with index and thumb to feign deep thought, though at the time I felt like a shallow stream. The heat factored. If it was skindeep I could stand to weather it, but this heat boils a person from the inside out, invades my peace of mind like a crying child on a train. Some didn't seem fazed much by it. Cordado busied himself with warm-ups. Rifle wedged stockfirst in the sand, he stood tiptoed with legs bowed outwards and hands in a high steeple above his head, intoning, Mememememememememememememememomomomom ... Slocum hunkered on the sand, dashed the last of his water over his head. Lipgloss was passed around. Palacios had drifted asleep and was snoring gently, still standing. Beats the life out of me how she does that. Only the extras stood to attention, possibly thinking this sort of behaviour was par for course. Herr Direktor rocked on his heels and twiddled a finger in his ear, tasted it. His expression crinkled sour and he began to growl. The growl blended in the air with the drone from Cortado's chest. Then I saw Palacios' eyes snap open, and a pearltoned lightbulb blinked over her head. She whispered the Big Idea into Herr Direktor's ear. He was not displeased: his face creased into a warface of a smile and he levitated. Only a few inches mind you, but signs of approval come few and far between from him. Herr Direktor was a new man after that. Moneyshot of this act completed, cut to falling statue, this war was brought to you by D'oritos… We started blocking straight away. Hop to it, he said, clapping. Cortado, I want you in a crouch over here and you lot, you lot move here…Perfect. I love you. More sprightly than we'd seen him in days, and as he gave me mine I caught a whitehot glow from one pupil. It hung in the air between us. I breathed in the colour, breathed it deep into my chest and for the first time here felt comfortable. We got most of it in the bag today. Only hitch was Slocum objected to playing a prisoner. Nope, he said, swiping a hand flat across the air, Somebody else on sandmonkey detail. Herr Direktor spun on his heels and snapped, Whatwhat? and Slocum tossed his native headdress to the ground and said, Not wearing this. My agent told me there'd be exposure. And there's nothing I can do to change your mind, sez Herr Direktor, eyes changing from green to red. No, sez Slocum, and Herr Direktor whips out a sidearm. There's a crack and a halo of pink mist around Slocum's head and Slocum crumples to the ground, and a horde of extras swarm all over him scrabbling for his union card. Silly bastard…Who's that? Who is that? Don't give me that, Mona. It is not the radio. Take me for a damnfool. Who is it? Steve. Steve Management Steve? What on earth is he doing there? No, I do not want to talk to him. I plain refu…Steve! How are you? Good. Good. Oh, can't complain. Boardtreading. Yep. Keeps the wolf from the door. Uh huh. Huh. Hahahahahahaha! Okay. Sounds good. We must. Bye Steve. Hi. What on earth is he doing there? Maximising data interface? Effecting a core dump I suppose. Don't be like what? I'm just being me. Whatever that might be. Mona. Mona. I'm sorry. I do want to talk. Highstrung, that's all. This place smells as if it might burst into flames any second. Anyhoo, no more shoptalk. What are you wearing?


^