Rogues

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Connie Willis

“A charming, lighthearted comedy!”

—Entertainment Daily

The Saturday before Christmas break, Zara came into my dorm room and asked me if I wanted to go to the movies with her and Kett at the Cinedrome.

“What’s playing?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” she said, shrugging. “Lots of stuff,” which meant the point of going wasn’t to see a movie at all. Big surprise.

“No, thanks,” I said and went back to typing my econ paper.

“Oh, come on, Lindsay, it’ll be fun,” she said, flopping down on my bed. “X-Force is playing, and The Twelve Days of Christmas and the reboot of Twilight. The Drome’s got a hundred movies. There must be something you want to see. How about Christmas Caper? Didn’t you want to see that?”

Yes, I thought. At least I had eight months ago when I’d seen the preview. But things had changed since then.

“I can’t,” I said. “I’ve got to study.”

“We’ve all got to study,” Zara said. “But it’s Christmas. The Drome will be all decorated and everybody will be there.”

“Exactly, which means the light rail will be packed and security will take forever.”

“Is this about Jack?”

“Jack?” I said, wondering if I could get away with, “Jack who?”

Better not. This was Zara. I said instead, “Why would my not going to the Drome with you have anything to do with Jack Weaver?”

“It’s … I don’t know,” she stammered, “it’s just that you’ve been so … grim since he left, and you two used to watch a lot of movies together.”

That was an understatement. Jack was the only guy I’d ever met who liked movies as much as I did, and all kinds, not just comic-book-hero and slasher films. He’d loved everything from Bollywood to romcoms like French Kiss to black-and-whites like The Shop Around the Corner and Captain Blood, and we’d gone to dozens of them at the Drome and streamed hundreds more in the semester we’d been together. Correction, semester minus one week.

Zara was still talking. “And you haven’t gone to the Drome once since—”

“Since you talked me into going with you to see Monsoon Gate,” I said, “and then when we got there you wanted to eat and talk to guys, and I never did get to see it.”

“That won’t happen this time. Kett and I promise we’ll go to the movie. Come on, it’ll be good for you. There’ll be tons of guys there. Remember that Sig Tau who said he liked you? Noah? He might be there. Come on. Please come with us. This is our last chance. We won’t be able to go next weekend because of finals, and then we’ll be gone on break.”

And nobody at home would want to see Christmas Caper. If I suggested going to the movies, my sister would insist on us going to A Despicable Me Noel with her kids, and we’d end up spending the whole afternoon in the arcade playing Minion Mash and buying Madagascar stuffed giraffes and Ice Age Icees. By the time I got back to school, Christmas Caper would be gone. And it wasn’t like Jack would magically show up and take me like he’d promised. If I wanted to see it on the big screen, I needed to do it now.

“Okay,” I said. “But I’m not going with you to meet guys. I’m going because I really want to see Christmas Caper. Understood?”

“Yeah, sure,” she said, getting out her phone and punching keys. “I’ll just text Kett and—”

“I mean it,” I said. “You have to promise me you won’t get sidetracked like last time, that we’ll actually go to the movie.”

“I promise,” she said. “No guys and no eating till afterward.”

“And no shopping,” I said. I had missed Monsoon Gate because Zara was trying on Polly Pepper shoes in The Devil Wears Prada boutique. “Promise me.”

Zara sighed. “Fine. I promise. Cross my heart.”

“A sweet romantic comedy with lots of action!”

—popcorn.com

Zara’s promise meant about as much as the ones Jack had made me. Zara began texting the second we arrived, and we weren’t even through the preliminary bag and phone check at the Drome before Kett said, “The NWU guys behind me in line just asked me to ask you if we want to go see the cast of The Bourne Dynasty. They’re holo-skyping over at the Universal booth.”

Zara looked hopefully at me. “We could go to the 12:10 instead of the ten o’clock.”

“Or the 2:20,” Kett said.

“No,” I said.

“Sorry,” Zara said to the guys. “We promised Lindsay we’d go to Christmas Caper with her first,” and they promptly began hitting on the girls behind them.

“I don’t see why we couldn’t have gone to a later showing,” Kett said, pouting, as we went through the explosives check.

“Because after the holo-skyping was over, they’d have wanted to play Skyfall or go eat at Harold and Kumar’s White Castle, and we’d have missed the 2:20 and the 4:30,” I said, and as soon as we made it through the body- and retinal-scans and into the Drome, I headed straight for the tickets kiosks, ignoring the barrage of previews and holograms and ads and elves passing out coupons for free cookies and video games and schedules of today’s autographing sessions.

“I thought you were going to get the tickets online before we left,” Zara said.

“I tried,” I said, “but it’s playing a special limited engagement, so you have to get them here.” I dragged my finger down the list of movies—Ripper 2, X-Force, The House on Zombie Hill, The Queen’s Consort, Switching Gears, Just When You Thought You Were Over Him …

Honestly, you’d think with a hundred movies, they’d put them in alphabetical order. Lethal Rampage, The Twelve Days of Christmas, Texas Chainsaw Massacre—The Musical, A Star-Crossed Season, Back to Back to the Future, Wicked—

Here it was. Christmas Caper. I tapped the tickets button and “3” and swiped my card.

“Unavailable,” the screen said. “Tickets must be purchased at ticket counter,” which meant we had to get in line, one of the worst things about going to the Drome.

You’d think as huge as it is and as many people as it has to cope with, they’d have Disneyverse-style back-and-forth lines, but they only use those to line people up for showings. The tickets lines snaked single file all the way back through the Drome’s football-field-sized lobby, the Hunger Games paintball stadium, the No Reservations food court, Wetaworks’ Last Homely House, the virtual-reality terrace, and half a mile of souvenir shops and boutiques.

It took us twenty minutes just to find the end, and in the process we nearly lost Kett twice, once at Pretty in Pink—“Oh, my God! They have stilettos in fifty shades of gray!”—and again when she saw that Hope Floats, Shakes, and Cones was selling cranberry malts.

Zara and I dragged her out of both and into the end of the line, which was getting longer by the minute. “We’re never going to get into the movie,” Kett grumbled.

“Yes, we will,” I said confidently, though I wasn’t sure. There were so many people in line, though most of them were little kids, who were obviously going to The Little Goose Girl or The Muppets’ It’s a Wonderful Life or Dora the Explorer Does Duluth. The adults around us who I asked were all going to A Tudor Affair or Return to the Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, and everybody else was wearing an Ironman 8 T-shirt. “We’ll definitely get in.”

“We’d better,” Kett said. “Why are you so set on seeing this Christmas Caper, anyway? I never heard of it. Is it a romcom?”

“No,” I said, “more like a romantic spy adventure. Like Charade. Or The Thirty-Nine Steps.”

“I haven’t seen previews for either of those,” she said, looking up at the schedule board above us. “Are they still playing?”

“No.” I should have known better than to mention an old movie. In this day of reboots and remakes nobody watches anything older than last week. Except Jack. He’d even liked silents.

“You know, the kind of movie where the heroine gets accidentally caught up in a crime,” I said, “or some kind of conspiracy, and the hero’s a spy, like in Jumpin’ Jack Flash, or a reporter, or a detective who’s pretending to be a criminal, like in How to Steal a Million, or he’s a scoundrel—”

“A scoundrel?” Kett said blankly.

“A rebel,” I said, “a rake, a rogue, like Michael Douglas in Romancing the Stone, or Errol Flynn—”

“I haven’t seen previews for those either,” she said. “Is Arrow Flin still playing?”

“No,” I said. “A scoundrel’s a guy who’s cocky and doesn’t care about rules or laws—”

“Oh, you mean a slimewad,” Kett said.

“No, a scoundrel’s funny and sexy and charming,” I said, trying desperately to think of a movie recent enough that she might have seen it. “Like Ironman. Or Jack Sparrow.”

“Or Jack Weaver,” Zara said.

“No,” I said, “not like Jack Weaver. In the first place—”

“Who’s Jack Weaver?” Kett asked.

“This guy Lindsay used to be in love with,” Zara said.

“I was not in—”

“Wait,” Kett said. “Is that the guy who put a whole bunch of ducks in the dean’s office last year?”

“Geese,” I said.

“Wow!” Kett said, impressed. “You went with him?”

“Briefly,” I said. “Before I found out he was—”

“A scoundrel?” Zara put in.

“No,” I said. “A slimewad. Who got himself thrown out of Hanover. The week before he was supposed to graduate.”

“He didn’t actually get thrown out,” Zara explained to Kett. “He took off before they could expel him.”

“Or press criminal charges,” I said.

“That’s too bad,” Kett said. “He sounds totally depraved! I’d have liked to meet him.”

“You might get your chance,” Zara said in an odd voice. “Look!” She pointed toward the lobby.

And there, leaning against a pillar with his hands in his pockets, looking up at the movie schedule, was Jack Weaver.

“Exciting fun! Sets your pulse racing!”

—USA Today

“It is him, isn’t it?” Zara asked.

“Yes,” I said grimly.

“I wonder what he’s doing here.”

“As if you didn’t know,” I said. No wonder she’d been so insistent I come with them. She and Jack had cooked up a—

“Oh, my God!” Kett cried. “Is that the guy you were talking about? The—what did you call him?”

“Wanker,” I said.

“Scoundrel,” Zara said.

“Right, the scoundrel. You didn’t tell me he was so hot! I mean, he’s positively scorching!”

“Shh,” I said, but it was too late. Jack had already looked over and seen us.

“Zara,” I said, “if you set this up, I’m never speaking to you again!”

“I didn’t, I swear,” she said, which didn’t mean anything, but two things made me inclined to believe her. One was that even though this looked suspiciously like a movie “meet cute,” the expression on Zara’s face had been completely stricken, the reason for which became apparent a few seconds later when a trio of Sig Taus, including Noah, sauntered up way too casually.

“Wow!” Noah said. “I had no idea you three were coming to the Drome today, too.”

Except for Zara’s texting you fifteen times while we were in the security lines, I thought. But at least their being here would keep Jack from coming over to talk to me.

If he even wanted to. Because the other reason I thought Zara didn’t have anything to do with Jack’s being here had been the look on his face. He’d looked not just surprised to see me here, but dismayed. Which meant I was right—he wasn’t a scoundrel, he was a slimewad. And probably here with some other girl.

“I’m especially surprised to see you here, Lindsay,” Noah, who would never make it as an actor even in the Twilight movies, said. “What are you doing at the Drome?”

“The three of us,” I said, emphasizing the word “three,” “are going to a movie.”

“Oh,” he said, frowning at Zara, who gave him a “go on” look. “We were just going to get something to eat at the Mos Eisley Cantina, and we wondered if you’d like to come with us.”

“Oh, I love the Cantina,” Kett cooed.

“I’ll buy you a Darth Vader daiquiri,” Noah said to me.

“Lindsay prefers Pimm’s Cups,” Zara said. “Don’t you?”

I glanced toward the lobby, hoping against hope Jack hadn’t heard that.

He wasn’t there. He wasn’t at the end of the line either, or at the ticket machines. Good, he’d gone off to meet his new girlfriend. I hoped she hated movies.

Noah was saying, “What the hell’s a Pimm’s Cup?”

“It’s a drink from a movie,” I said. My favorite drink, I added silently. Or at least it used to be. The drink Jack had made me after we’d watched Ghost Town and Téa Leoni had said it was her favorite drink.

“We could have lunch and then go to the movie, couldn’t we, Lindsay?” Kett asked, looking adoringly at Noah. “I just got a text coupon for Breakfast at Tiffany’s breakfast bar.”

“No,” I said.

Zara gave Noah another nudging look, and he said, “Maybe we could go with you. What are you going to?”

“Christmas Caper,” Kett said.

“I never heard of it,” Noah said.

“It’s a spy adventure,” Kett explained. “A romantic spy adventure.”

Noah made a face. “Are you kidding me? I hate romcoms. How about we all go see Lethal Rampage instead?”

“No,” I said.

“Maybe we could meet you at the Cantina after the movie,” Zara suggested.

“Yeah, I don’t know,” Noah mumbled, looking at the other guys. “We’re pretty hungry. Listen, I’ll text you,” he said, and the three of them wandered off.

“I can’t believe you did that,” Zara said. “I was just trying to help you forget about—”

“That Noah guy was scorching,” Kett said, looking after him, and sighed. “This better be some movie.”

“It is,” Jack said at my elbow. “Hi.”

“What are you doing here?” I demanded.

“Going to the movies,” he said. “What else?” He leaned toward me. “Traitor,” he said in my ear. “You promised you’d go to Christmas Caper with me.”

“You weren’t here,” I said coldly.

“Yeah, about that,” he said. “Sorry. Something came up. I—”

“Is it really a good movie?” Kett asked, sidling over to him. “Lindsay didn’t tell us what it was about. All she said was that there was a scoundrel in it.”

“Scoundrel,” Jack said, raising an eyebrow at me. “I like the sound of that.”

“How do you like the sound of ‘loser’?” I said. “Or ‘slimewad’?”

He ignored me. “Actually,” he said to Kett, “he’s an undercover agent working on a case, and it’s classified, so he can’t tell the heroine about it or why he had to leave town—”

“Nice try,” I said, and to Kett, “What it’s really about is this creep who tells the heroine a bunch of lies, does something staggeringly stupid, and then goes off without a word—”

“Why don’t you come with us, Jack?” Kett interrupted, looking up at him hungrily. “I’m Kett, by the way. I’m friends with Lindsay, but she didn’t tell me you were so—”

Zara pushed between them. “Kett and I actually wanted to go play drone tag with these Pi Kappas, Jack,” she said. “We—”

“What Pi Kappas?” Kett demanded.

Zara ignored her. “We were just going to the movie with Lindsay to keep her company, but now that you’re here, you could take her.”

“I’d love to,” Jack said, frowning, “but unfortunately I can’t.”

“He has to put a flock of geese a-laying in the theater where The Twelve Days of Christmas is showing,” I said. “Or is it partridges this time, Jack?”

“Swans a-swimming,” he said, grinning. “I’ve got eight of them in my pocket.”

“Really?” Kett said, as if it was actually possible to get anything through security, let alone a flock of swans.

“That would be so depraved!” she purred. “What you did to the dean’s office was so amazing! You definitely should come with us to Christmas Caper!”

“I have no intention of going anywhere with Jack,” I said.

“Then I will.” Kett tucked her arm cozily in his. “The two of us can go see it.”

“Yeah, well, I’m sure that would be fun,” Jack said, disentangling himself from her like she was barbed wire, “but it’s not gonna happen. We can’t get in. It’s sold-out.”

“It is not,” I said, pointing up at the schedule board. “Look.”

“Not right now maybe, but trust me, it will be by the time you get to the front of the line.”

“You’re kidding,” Zara said. “After we’ve stood in line all this time?”

“And told Noah we couldn’t go to the Cantina with him,” Kett added.

“It’s not going to be sold-out,” I said confidently.

“Wrong,” Jack said, pointing at the board, where NO TICKETS AVAILABLE had begun flashing next to Christmas Caper.

“An engrossing mystery …”

—flickers.com

“Oh, no,” Zara said. “What do we do now?”

“We could go see A Star-Crossed Season,” Kett said to Jack. “It’s supposed to be really good. Or The Diary.”

“We’re not going to either one,” I said. “Just because the 12:10 of Christmas Caper’s sold-out doesn’t mean the other showings are. We can still get tickets to the 2:20.”

“And wait around for another two hours?” Kett wailed.

“Why don’t we get lunch first and then get the tickets?” Zara said. “We could go to Chocolat—”

“No,” I said. “This is not going to turn into another Monsoon Gate. We are staying right here till we get our tickets.”

“How about you stay in line, Lindsay, and we go and bring you back something?” Kett suggested.

“No,” I said. “You promised you’d go with me.”

“Yeah, and you promised you’d go with me, Lindsay,” Jack said.

“You stood me up.”

“I did not,” he said. “I’m here, aren’t I? And anyway, Kevin Kline stood up Meg Ryan in French Kiss. Michael Douglas stood up Kathleen Turner in Romancing the Stone. Indiana Jones left Marion tied up in the bad guys’ tent. Admit it, that’s what scoundrels do.”

“Yes, well, but they don’t throw their entire future away on some stupid prank.”

“You mean the geese? That wasn’t a prank.”

“Oh, really? Then what was it?”

“I can see you two have a lot of stuff to discuss,” Zara said. “We don’t want to get in the way. We’ll catch up with you later. Text me.” And before I could protest, she and Kett had vanished into the crowd.

I turned to Jack. “I’m still not going with you to see it.”

“True,” he said, looking over at the ticket counter. “You’re not going to get in to the 2:20 either.”

“I suppose now you’re going to tell me it’ll be sold-out, too?”

“No, they usually don’t use that one twice,” he said. “This time it’ll be something more subtle. Free tickets to a Special Christmas Showing of The Shop Around the Corner or a personal appearance by the new Hulk. Or, since you like scoundrels, of the new Han Solo.” He grinned. “Or me.”

“I do not like scoundrels,” I said. “Not anymore. And what do you mean, ‘they don’t use that one twice’?”

He shook his head disapprovingly. “That’s not your line. You’re supposed to say, ‘I happen to like nice men,’ and then I say, ‘I’m a nice man.’ ” He leaned toward me. “And then you say—”

“This is not The Empire Strikes Back,” I snapped, backing away from him. “And you are not Han Solo.”

“True,” he said. “I’m more like Peter O’Toole in How to Steal a Million. Or Douglas Fairbanks in The Mask of Zorro.”

“Or Bradley Cooper in The World’s Biggest Liar,” I said. “Why did you say I’m not going to get in to the 2:20 either? Have you done something to the theater?”

“Nope, not a thing. I swear.” He held up his right hand.

“Yes, well, your word isn’t exactly trustworthy, is it?”

“Actually, it is. It’s just that … Never mind. I promise you I didn’t have anything to do with the 12:10 being sold-out.”

“Then why were you so sure it was going to be?”

“Long story. Which I can’t tell you here,” he said, looking around. “What say we go somewhere quiet and I’ll explain everything?”

“Including where you’ve been for the past eight months? And what possessed you to put those geese in the dean’s office?”

“No,” he said. “Sorry, I can’t until—”

“Until what? Until you’ve done the same thing here?” I lowered my voice. “Seriously, Jack, you could get in a lot of trouble. The Dromes have really heavy security—”

“I knew it,” he said delightedly. “You’re still crazy about me. ‘So what say we go discuss this over a nice cozy lunch,’ as Peter said to Audrey in How to Steal a Million. There’s a little place over on Pixar Boulevard called Gusteau’s—”

“I am not going anywhere with you,” I said. “I am going to the 2:20 showing of Christmas Caper. By myself.”

“That’s what you think,” he said.

“Watch the sparks fly between these two!”

—The Web Critic

Jack had sauntered off before I could demand to know what “That’s what you think” meant, and I couldn’t go after him to ask for fear of losing my place in line, so I spent the rest of the wait to get tickets worrying that the 2:20 would be sold-out, too, though there were only a couple of dozen people left ahead of me, they were all going to something else, and the schedule boards were still showing tickets were available.

But there were three other lines, and the ticket seller on mine apparently had the brain of a character in Dumb and Really Really Dumb. It took him forever to make change and/or swipe people’s cards and then shove their tickets at them. It was a good thing I wasn’t trying to get a ticket for the 1:10. I’d never have made it.

It was half past before I even got close to the ticket counter, and then the guy three people ahead of me couldn’t make up his mind whether to see Zombie Prom or Avatar 4. He and his girlfriend spent a good ten minutes trying to decide, and then his card wouldn’t swipe and they had to use his girlfriend’s, and she had to search through her entire bag to find it, digging out handfuls of stuff for him to hold while she looked and standing there to put it all back after they’d finally gotten the tickets.

This is exactly what Jack was talking about, I thought. What if they were doing it purposely to keep me from getting in?

Don’t be ridiculous, I told myself. You’re seeing conspiracies where they don’t exist. But I still looked anxiously up at the schedule board as I came up to the counter, afraid the NO TICKETS AVAILABLE would blink on at the last minute.

It didn’t, and when I said, “One adult for the 2:20 showing of Christmas Caper,” the ticket seller nodded, swiped my card without incident, handed me my ticket, and told me to enjoy the show.

“I will,” I said determinedly and started toward the entrance of the theater complex.

Halfway there, Jack suddenly reappeared and fell in step with me. “Well?” he said.

“They weren’t sold-out, and I didn’t have any trouble getting a ticket. See?” I said, showing it to him.

He wasn’t impressed. “Yeah, and in Romancing the Stone, they found the diamond,” he said, “and Whoopi Goldberg got Jumpin’ Jack Flash an exit contact, and look what happened.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means you’re not in the theater yet, and if you don’t make it by 2:20, they won’t let you in.”

That was true—it was part of the Drome’s security precautions not to let anyone in to a movie after it had started—but it was only 1:30. I told Jack that.

“Yeah, but the line to get in could be really long, or the line to buy popcorn.”

“I’m not buying popcorn. And there isn’t any line to get in,” I said, pointing over at the usher standing all alone in the entrance to the theaters.

“At the moment,” he said. “You’re not there yet. A horde of middle-aged women could show up for the new Fifty Shades of Grey before you get over to the usher. And even if you do make it into the theater, the film could break—”

“The Drome doesn’t use film. It’s all digital.”

“Exactly, which means something could go wrong with the digital feed. It could be contaminated by a virus, or the server could crash. Or something could trigger the TSA’s alarms and send the whole Drome into lockdown.”

“Like setting geese loose in a theater?” I said. “What are you up to, Jack?”

“I told you, I’m not up to anything. I’m just saying you might not get in. In fact, I’m almost certain you won’t. And if you don’t, I’ll be at Gusteau’s.”

“Nothing is going to happen,” I said and started across the remaining half of the lobby toward the entrance and the usher.

The lobby was getting more crowded by the minute with gaggles of excited children and texting teenagers and families arguing about where to go first. I pushed past and around them, hoping a line wouldn’t suddenly collect in front of the usher and prove Jack right, but the usher was still standing there alone, leaning on the ticket stand and looking bored.

I handed him my ticket.

He handed it back. “You can’t go in yet. The movie’s not over. Excuse me,” he said, and reached around me to take the tickets of two eight-year-old boys who’d come up behind me.

He tore their tickets in half and handed them back. “Theater 76. Up the stairs to the third floor and turn right.”

The boys went in. I said, “Can’t I go in and wait in the hall outside the theater till it lets out?”

He shook his head. “It’s against security regulations. I can’t let anybody in till the movie gets out.”

“Which is when?”

“I’ll check,” he said, and consulted the schedule. “1:55.” Ten minutes from now. “If you don’t want to wait—”

“I do.” I moved over against the wall, out of the way.

“Sorry, you can’t stand there,” a manager said, coming up. “That’s where the line for Dr. Who: The Movie has to go.” He began busily cordoning off the space.

I moved to the other wall, but a bunch of little girls and their parents were already lining up there to get in to see The Little Goose Girl, and the sole bench near the door was occupied by a mother vainly trying to talk her two daughters into relinquishing their virtual-reality glasses. Shrieking was involved. And kicking.

I was going to have to wait out the ten minutes in the lobby. Hopefully Jack’s gone off to Gusteau’s, I thought, but he hadn’t. He was standing just outside the entrance with his hands in his pockets and an “I told you so” smile on his face. “What happened?” he asked.

“Nothing happened,” I said, walking past him. “The 12:10’s not out yet.”

“So you decided to have that talk with me after all. Great,” he said, taking hold of my arm and propelling me through the lobby toward Pixar Boulevard. “We can go to Gusteau’s and you can tell me what excuse the usher gave you for not letting you in and why they wouldn’t let you wait there in the entryway.”

“I don’t have any intention of telling you anything,” I said, wrenching my arm free of him. “Why should I? You didn’t tell me you were planning to get yourself expelled a week before you were supposed to graduate.”

“Yeah, about that,” he said, frowning. “I wasn’t actually going to graduate—”

“Of course not,” I said disgustedly. “Why am I not surprised? Was that why you broke into the dean’s office, because you were flunking out and you were trying to change your grades?”

“No,” he said. “The fact is, I wasn’t actually—”

“You weren’t what?”

“I can’t tell you,” he said. “It’s classified.”

“Classified!” I said. “That’s it. I’m not listening to any more of your paranoid fantasies. I am going to go stand over by the entrance until this movie gets out,” I said, pointing, “and then I am going inside, and if you try to follow me, I’ll report you to security.”

I fought my way back to the entryway through a mob of cloaked and hairy-footed Hobbits who were obviously on their way to The Return of Frodo, a bunch of old ladies going to see a special Nostalgia Showing of Sex and the City, and the mazelike line for Dr. Who, which now extended ten yards out into the lobby. By the time I made it to where I intended to wait, there was no longer any reason to. It was already two o’clock.

I went over to the usher and handed him my ticket.

He shook his head. “You can’t go in yet.”

“But you said the 12:10 got out at 1:55.”

“It did, but you can’t go in till the crew finishes cleaning.”

“Which will be when?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Some guy threw up all over. It’s going to take them at least twenty minutes to clean it up.” He handed me back my ticket. “Why don’t you go get something to eat? Or do some Christmas shopping? They’re having a sale on Inception sleep masks over at the Sleepless in Seattle shop.”

And Jack will be standing right outside of it, smirking, I thought. “No, thanks,” I said, and squeezed past the Dr. Who and Little Goose Girl lines to the bench, hoping the mother and girls had gone.

They had, but the bench was now completely taken up by a passionately kissing and practically horizontal couple. I edged past them to stand by the wall, but by the time I made it, the couple had reached the R-rated stage and was rapidly approaching NC-17. I braced myself for Jack and another round of conspiracy theories and went back out into the lobby again.

“A gift for holiday moviegoers!”

—silverscreen.com

Jack wasn’t there. But he—and Zara and Kett—were the only ones who weren’t in the lobby. It was crammed to bursting with people checking their coats and buying tickets and refreshments and staring up at the previews and schedule boards. I found myself alternately jostled and smushed by the crowds going into and coming out of the theater complex and by kids mobbing the Christmas characters who meandered through, tossing candy canes and distributing Coming Attractions flyers. Alvin the Chipmunk gave me a chit for a free mince pie at Sweeney Todd’s snack bar, and a frighteningly friendly Grinch presented me with a coupon for half off a Twelve Dancing Princesses T-shirt at the Disney Pavilion.

I’d no sooner handed it off to a NewGoth girl and read a text on my phone, telling me I’d won a free ticket to a special Encore Presentation of Ghost Town, than I was nearly run down by an enormous Transformer stomping through the crowd, flailing his huge metal arms and nearly bumping his head against the lobby ceiling. I partly dived and was partly pushed out of its way by the crowd as it scattered and ended up on the opposite side of the lobby.

The crowd surged back toward the Transformer, snapping pictures on their cell phones, jockeying for position to have their photos taken with it, their backs forming an impenetrable wall. There was no way I was getting through that, at least till the Transformer left.

It didn’t matter—it was still fifteen minutes till they’d be finished cleaning. I turned to look for a place I could wait without being run down. Not Gusteau’s—I had no desire to hear Jack say “I told you so.” And not Sweeney Todd’s. It was too far away.

I needed someplace close so I could start back the second the crowd dwindled or the moment I saw the cleaning crew give the usher the high sign, and someplace with a short line, but finding one was practically impossible. Zombie Juice was even more mobbed than the lobby. Stargate’s Starbucks, which was advertising Mistletoe Mochas, had a line merging over into Zombie Juice, and the Transformer had apparently been passing out coupons for a Transformer Tea because Tea and Sympathy, usually a safe bet, was jammed, too.

And I was definitely not going to the Cantina even though at this point I could have used a drink. But Jack had obviously sent that text, which meant he was waiting in the Cantina to get me drunk and tell me more conspiracy theories. I was not going there.

That left a hot cocoa at the Polar Express, which was just off the lobby and whose line only had two people in it, but even then it took forever. The guy at the counter wanted a gingerbread clove latte, which the barista didn’t know how to make, so he had to give her step-by-step instructions, and then the teenager behind him couldn’t get her swipe card to work.

I looked back out at the lobby. The Transformer was gone, but now the zeppelin from The Steampunk League was floating above the ticket machines, throwing down gift cards on a converging crowd. If I didn’t go soon, the lobby would be even more jammed than it had been with the Transformer.

I decided I’d better bag the cocoa and head back, and I started for the door. And collided with the gingerbread guy, who was bringing his latte back for having insufficient whipped cream and who managed to spill the entire drink down my front.

Customers converged with napkins and commiserations, and the barista insisted on my waiting while she fetched a wet rag. “That’s okay,” I said. “I’m kind of in a hurry. I have a movie I need to get to.”

“It’ll just take a sec,” she said, running back to the counter. “You can’t go all wet like that.”

“I’m fine,” I said and started for the door.

The gingerbread man grabbed my arm. “I insist on buying you a drink to apologize,” he said. “What would you like?”

“Nothing, really,” I said. “I need to go—” and the barista came over with the rag and began swabbing me down.

“That’s not necessary. Really,” I said, brushing her away.

“You’re not going to sue the Polar Express, are you?” she asked tearfully.

Yes, I thought, if I miss this movie because of you. “No, of course not,” I said. “I’m fine. No harm done.”

“Oh, good,” she said. “If you’ll hang on just a minute, I’ll get you a coupon for a free scone the next time you come.”

“I don’t want—”

“At least let me pay for the cleaners,” the guy said, getting out his phone. “If you’ll give me your e-mail address—”

“On second thought,” I said, “I think I would like that drink. A peppermint chai,” and when he started for the counter, I darted out of the Polar Express, into the protective cover of the crowd, and into the lobby.

It was even more crowded than it had been with the Transformer. I pushed into the scrum and started across, and it was a good thing I hadn’t gotten my cocoa. I had to bull my way through with both hands, prying couples apart and slipping between them, pushing aside excited kids in bright blue A Smurf Hanukkah T-shirts and teenagers staring up at House on Zombie Hill previews.

It was like swimming through molasses, and it seemed to take hours to get to a place where I could finally see the usher. There was a line in front of him now, but it wasn’t the Dr. Who or the Little Goose Girl people, who were still waiting in their mazelike lines. I needed to get over to him before those movies got out, or I’d never get in to Christmas—

Someone grabbed me by my arm. Please don’t let it be the Gingerbread Man, I thought as I was yanked back into the center of the crowd.

It wasn’t. It was Santa Claus, with a microphone and a phalanx of reindeer. “What do you want for Christmas, little girl?” he asked, sticking the mike in my face.

“To get over there,” I said, pointing.

“Ho ho ho,” he said. “How would you like a nice pair of tickets to the 3:25 showing of The Claus Chronicles?”

“No, thank you,” I said. “I’m going to see Christmas Caper.”

“What?” he said. “You don’t want to see Santa’s own movie?”

He turned to his reindeer. “Did you hear that, Prancer?” he said, loudly enough for the entire lobby to hear. “We have a problem here. I think I need to check my naughty-and-nice list, Blitzen.” The list was duly produced, Santa put on a pair of spectacles, and he ran a very slow finger down it while I looked longingly over at the entrance to the theaters, where the line in front of the usher was growing longer by the minute.

“Here she is,” Santa finally announced. “Yes, definitely naughty. And what do we give naughty children for Christmas, vixen?”

“Coal!” the crowd shouted.

Santa reached into his sack and produced a lump of licorice. “Shall I give this to her or shall we give her another chance? After all, it is Christmas.”

“Coal!” the crowd bellowed, and Santa had to ask them two more times to persuade them to offer me the tickets again, which this time I had the sense to take.

“And here’s a ticket to the 2:30 showing of The Twelve Days of Christmas for being such a good sport,” he said. “Merry Christmas, ho ho ho,” and I was finally free.

I shot over to the entrance, where the line in front of the usher had miraculously disappeared, and handed the usher my ticket. “Sorry,” he said, handing it back.

“They’re still cleaning?” I asked incredulously.

“No, but you’re late. It’s 2:22. The 2:20’s already started.”

“But they do previews for the first fifteen minutes—”

“Sorry. It’s theater policy. No one’s allowed in after the start time. I think you can still get tickets to the 4:30.”

I don’t, I thought, and I know who’s responsible.

“Do you want me to check and see if there are still tickets available?” he asked.

“No, that’s okay. Never mind,” I said and went out, across the lobby, and into the wilds of the Drome to find Jack.

“A great movie! Don’t miss it!”

—Time Out Magazine

I’d expected Gusteau’s to be a bar somewhere near the dance clubs and Rick’s from Casablanca, but it wasn’t, and after consulting two maps and a Drome guide dressed as Frosty the Snowman, I found it in the depths of Munchkinland, sandwiched between the Monsters, Inc. ball pool and the Despicable Me moon drop, both of which were filled with toddlers emitting ear-slashing shrieks of joy and/or terror.

The restaurant was a replica of the French bistro in Ratatouille, with rats on the wallpaper and the tables. Jack was seated at a table at the back. “Hi,” he shouted over the din from the ball pool. “Didn’t get back in, huh?”

“No,” I said grimly.

“Sit down. Would you like something to drink? Gusteau’s is G-rated, so I can’t offer you a Pimm’s Cup, but I can get you a mouse mocha.”

“No, thank you,” I said, ignoring his invitation to sit down. “I want to know what you’re up to and why you saw to it I didn’t—”

“Hey, what happened to you?” he interrupted, pointing at my still-wet top. “Don’t tell me you collided with Hugh Grant carrying an orange juice, like in Notting Hill?”

“No,” I said through gritted teeth, “a gingerbread latte—”

“And they wouldn’t let you in because of the Drome’s dress code?”

“No, they wouldn’t let me in because the movie had already started. Because a guy with a gingerbread latte and Santa Claus kept me from getting back from the Polar Express in time, as you well know. You’re the one who put them up to it. This is just another one of your adolescent pranks, isn’t it?”

“I told you, that wasn’t a prank.”

“Then, what was it?”

“It … you remember when we watched Oceans 17, and there’s a break-in at the casino? Cops, sirens, helicopters, the whole nine yards? But that’s just a diversion, and the real crime is taking place over at the bank?”

“You’re saying the geese were a diversion?”

“Yeah. Just like Santa Claus. What did he do to delay you?”

“You know perfectly well what he did. You hired him to do it so I wouldn’t get in and I’d have to go with you. But it won’t work. I have no intention of seeing Christmas Caper with you.”

“Good,” he said, “because you’re not going to. Not today, anyway.”

“Why not? What did you do?”

“Nothing. I’m not the one responsible for any of this.”

“Really?” I said sarcastically. “And who is?”

“If you’ll sit down, I’ll tell you. I’ll also tell you why the 12:10 was sold out, why The Steampunk League sent its zeppelin over when it did, and why you couldn’t buy tickets to Christmas Caper online.”

“How did you know that?”

“Lucky guess. The ticket machines wouldn’t let you buy them either, would they?”

“No,” I said and sat down. “Why not?”

“I need to know something first. What were you doing at the Polar Express? When I left you, you were handing the usher your ticket.”

“He wouldn’t let me in. Some guy threw up in the theater.”

“Ah, yes, good old vomit. Works every time. But why didn’t you just wait there in the entryway?”

I told him about the Dr. Who and Goose Girl lines and the bench people.

“Did anything else happen while you were waiting? Anybody send you a text telling you you’d won free tickets to something?”

“Yes.” I told him about the Encore Presentation of Ghost Town. “Which you can’t tell me you didn’t put them up to. Who else would know Ghost Town was one of my favorite movies?”

“Who, indeed?” he said. “When we were in line, you said, ‘This isn’t going to turn into another Monsoon Gate.’ I take it you didn’t get in to that movie either. Why not? Did the same thing happen?”

“No,” I said. I told him about Zara trying on shoes and us missing the six o’clock showing. “And then she got a tweet saying there was going to be a special preview of Bachelorette Party—”

“Which, let me guess, was a movie she really wanted to see?”

“Yes,” I said. “So we decided to go to the ten o’clock, but when we checked its running time, it didn’t get out till—”

“After the last light rail back to Hanover,” he said, nodding. “Are you sure you don’t want something to drink? A rat root beer? A vermin vanilla coke?”

“No. Why are we here anyway?” I asked, looking around. “Surely there’s someplace we could go to that we wouldn’t have to shout.”

“This and the Tunnel of Love are the only areas not under surveillance. We could go do that.”

I had been in the Tunnel of Love with Jack before. “No,” I said.

“I heard they’ve got some new features that are really romantic—Anne Hathaway dying of consumption, Keira Knightley being hit by a train, Edward and Bella catching fire on their wedding night and burning to a crisp—”

“We are not going in the Tunnel of Love,” I said. “What do you mean, these are the only areas not under surveillance?”

“I mean, there’s no need to distract kids from going to see Ice Age 22,” he said. “Kids invented the short attention span. You, on the other hand, have been remarkably single-minded, hence the vomit. And the Gingerbread Man.”

“You’re saying the Drome was the one trying to keep me from seeing Christmas Caper?”

“Yup.”

“But why?”

“Okay, so you know how this all started, that after the Batman and Metrolux and Hobbit III massacres, movie attendance totally tanked, and they had to come up with some way to get the public back, so they turned the theaters into fortresses where people felt safe bringing their kids and sending their teenagers. But to do that, they had to introduce all kinds of security—metal detectors, full-body scans, explosives sniffers, and that meant people were standing in line for an hour and forty-five minutes to see a two-hour movie, which only made attendance drop off more. Who wants to stand in a line when you can stay home and stream movies on your ninety-inch screen? They had to come up with something new, something really spectacular—”

“The moviedromes,” I said.

“Yup. Turn going to the movies into an all-day full-surround entertainment experience—”

“Like Disneyverse.”

He nodded. “Or IKEA. Show lots of movies. A hundred instead of the multiplexes’ twenty. And add lots of razzle-dazzle: 4-D, IMAX, interactives, Hollywood-style premieres, celebrity appearances, plus theme restaurants and shops and rides and dance clubs and Wii arcades. None of which was really new.”

“But I thought you said—”

“Movie theaters have never made their money off the movies they showed. They were just a sideline, a way to get the public into the theater and buy popcorn and jujubes at outrageous prices. The Dromes just expanded on the concept, to the point that the movies have become less and less important. Did you know 53 percent of the people who go to a Drome never see a movie at all?”

“I can believe it,” I said, thinking of Kett and Zara.

“And that’s not an accident. In the two hours a movie takes to watch, you could be spending way more than the price of a ticket and refreshments. And if they can get you to see a later showing, you’ll eat lunch and dinner here—and stick around to play glittertag afterward. The longer you’re at the Drome—”

“The more I spend.”

He nodded. “So the Drome does everything it can to see that happens.”

“You expect me to believe the Drome orchestrated all that—the tickets and the vomit and the text and the sold-out sign—just to get me to buy more souvenirs?”

“No. You know that old movie we watched where the guy’s investigating what looks like a simple train accident and then it turns out it wasn’t an accident?”

“I Love Trouble,” I said promptly. “With Nick Nolte and Julia Roberts. She was a reporter—”

“And he was a scoundrel,” Jack said, grinning. “Who, as I recall, Julia really liked.”

“What’s your point?”

“My point is, that the train accident was just the tip of the iceberg. And so is Christmas Caper. I think there’s a whole vast conspiracy—”

“To keep me from seeing a movie?”

“Not you. Anyone. And not just Christmas Caper. The Pimmsleys of Parson’s Court, too, and Just When You Thought You Were Over Him, and Switching Gears, and possibly a couple of others.”

“Why?”

“Because they can’t afford to let the public find out what’s going on. Remember the things I told you the Dromes used to attract people—lots of razzle-dazzle and merchandise, and lots of movies?”

“Yes.”

“Well, that’s the problem. The old multiplexes had fifteen screens to fill. The Dromes have a hundred.”

“But they show some movies in more than one theater.”

“Right, and in 3-D, 4-D, and Wii versions, plus there are tons of sequels and remakes and reboots—”

“And Encore Presentations—”

“And rereleases and film festivals and Harry Potter marathons and sneak previews, but even if you add in foreign films and Bollywood and bad remakes of British romantic comedies and crummy remakes of all three, it’s still a hell of a lot of screens to fill. Especially when most people are only interested in seeing The Return of Frodo. Do you remember when we went to see Gaudy Night and we were the only two people in the theater?”

“Yes—”

“It’s like Baskin-Robbins. They advertise thirty-one flavors, but who the hell ever orders raisin or lemon custard? Those could actually be vanilla with a little food coloring added for all anybody knows. And so could half the Dromes’ movies.”

“So you’re saying Christmas Caper doesn’t exist?”

“I think that’s a very real possibility.”

“But that’s ridiculous. You and I saw a trailer for it. There was a preview on the overheads while we were in line.”

“Which was three minutes long and could have been filmed in a day.”

“But why would they advertise it if it doesn’t exist?”

“Because otherwise somebody—like me, for instance—might get suspicious.”

“But there’s no way they could get away with—”

“Sure there is. Most people want to see the latest blockbuster, and with a minor nudge—like a sold-out sign—you can talk 95 percent of the rest of them into seeing something else. Or having lunch at Babette’s Feast.”

“And the other 5 percent?”

“You just saw it.”

“But movies sell out, especially at Christmastime—”

“And people throw up and accidentally spill drinks and get picked up by fraternity guys and can’t go to the 10:20 showing because it gets out after the last light-rail train home. But the last showing of every movie I named gets out after the last scheduled light rail, and I’ve tried to get into Switching Gears for the last five days and haven’t made it. What time is it?”

“Four o’clock.”

“Come on,” he said, grabbing my hand and pulling me up. “We’ve gotta get going if we’re going to make it to Christmas Caper.”

“Exciting, suspenseful, and unbelievably romantic!”

—Front Row

“But I thought you said it doesn’t exist,” I said as he dragged me out of Gusteau’s.

“It doesn’t. Come on.” He led me through Hogwarts and Neverneverland and down an aisle of shops selling Toy Story and The Great Oz and Son of Lion King souvenirs.

“This isn’t the way to the theater complex,” I protested.

“We’ve got some shopping to do first,” he said, leading me into the Disney Princess Boutique.

“Shopping? Why?”

“Because we can’t afford to have Management notice us, and the surest way to draw attention to yourself in a Drome is by not spending money,” he said, riffling through a rack of Tangled T-shirts.

“Besides,” he said, moving to another rack, this one full of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs hoodies, “this is a big date. You should have something special to wear. Something the usher hasn’t seen.” He flipped through the entire rack and then one of Twelve Dancing Princesses tutus, pulling them out and then hanging them back up.

“What are you looking for?” I asked.

“I told you. Something special,” he said, searching through yet another rack. “And something that doesn’t make you smell like Mrs. Claus’s kitchen. Ah, here we go,” he said, pulling out a yellow Dora and Diego Do the Himalayas T-shirt, with Diego pointing his trademark camera at Dora and the monkey, who were standing atop Mt. Everest. “Just the ticket.”

“I am not wearing—” I began, but he’d already thrust it and a bright pink Little Goose Girl baseball cap into my hands.

“Tell the clerk to deactivate the tags so you can wear them now,” he said, “and then go in the dressing room, take off your top, and put the shirt on. I’ll be in the store next door.” He gave me a push in the paydesk’s direction. “And no questions.”

I did as he said, pulling my top off over my head—he was right, it did reek of gingerbread—and putting the T-shirt on over my singlet.

It was too tight, which I suspected was part of the plan, and looked even worse on me than it had on the hanger. “You could have at least had me get something cute,” I told him when I found him in the shop next door, trying on Risky Business sunglasses.

“No, I couldn’t,” he said. “What’d you do with your top?”

“I put it in the bag,” I said.

“Good. Come on,” he said, taking it from me and steering me out of the shop, back toward Gusteau’s, to a recycler. He dropped the bag in.

“I liked that top,” I protested.

“Shh, do you want to go to this movie or not?” he said, leading me through a maze of balloon artists and tattoo laser techs and kiddie rides and candy stores to the lobby.

He stopped just short of it. “Okay, I want you to go over to the kiosk and buy a ticket to Dragonwar.”

“Dragonwar? But I thought we were going to—”

“We are. You buy a ticket to Dragonwar and then—”

“One ticket? Not two?”

“Definitely not two. We’re going in separately.”

“What if the machine tells me I have to buy it at the ticket counter?”

“It won’t,” he said. “Once you’re inside—”

“Or what if they say I can’t go in yet?”

“They won’t do that either,” he said. “Once you’re inside, go to the concessions stand and buy a large popcorn and a large 7-Up with two straws, and go down to Theater 17.”

“Theater 17? But Dragonwar’s playing at Theater 24.”

“We’re not going to Dragonwar. Or to Au Revoir, Mon Fou, which is what’s showing in Theater 17. You’re not going into any theater. You’re just going to stand in the doorway of 17. I’ll meet you there in a couple of minutes.”

“And you promise we’ll see Christmas Caper?”

“I promise I’ll take you to Christmas Caper. Large popcorn,” he ordered. “Large 7-Up. Not Coke.” He jammed the Goose Girl cap down over my eyes. “Theater 17,” he repeated, and took off through the crowd.

“Based on a true story … but you won’t believe it!”

—At the Movies

He was right. No one got in my way or spilled a felony frappe on me or stopped me to give me a free pass to You’re Under Arrest, and the usher didn’t even glance at me as he tore my ticket in half. “Theater 24,” he said, and motioned to the right. “End of the hall,” and turned his attention to a trio of thirteen-year-olds, and I went down the plush-carpeted hall.

There was no sign of Jack, but he could be hiding in one of the recessed entrances to the theater or past the point halfway down where the hall took a turn to the right.

He wasn’t. I stood outside Theater 17 for longer than a couple of minutes and then walked slowly down to 24, where Dragonwar was playing, but he wasn’t there either.

He got caught trying to sneak in, and they threw him out, I thought, walking back to Theater 17 and planting myself in the recessed doorway.

I waited some more.

Still no sign of Jack, or of anyone else, except a kid who shot out of Theater 30 and down to the restroom, banging its door loudly behind him. I waited some more. I would have gotten my phone out to see what time it was, but between the giant 7-Up I was cradling in my left arm and the enormous bag of popcorn, there was no way I could manage it.

A door slammed farther down the hall, and I looked up eagerly, but it was just the kid, racing back to 30, obviously determined not to miss a second more than necessary of his movie. I wondered what it was that was so riveting. I moved down the hall a little so I could see the marquee above the door.

Lethal Rampage. And next door to it, on the marquee above Theater 28, Christmas Caper.

“The cast is terrific!”

—Goin’ Hollywood

That rat! Jack had told me it didn’t exist, and yet here it was. And all those problems I’d had, all those people who’d gotten in my way, weren’t Drome employees hired to keep me out. They were just moviegoers like me, and the things that had happened were nothing more than coincidences. There was no conspiracy.

When are you going to learn you can’t trust a word he says? I thought, and if he’d been there, I’d have taken great pleasure in dumping the 7-Up—and the popcorn—over his head and stomping out.

But he’d apparently gotten himself caught and thrown out of the Drome. If he’d ever intended to come. And I was left, quite literally, holding the bag. And now that I thought about it, Nick Nolte had done the same thing to Julia Roberts in I Love Trouble—sending her on what else?—a wild-goose chase. With real geese.

I’ll kill him when I find him, I thought, and started back toward the entrance, fuming, and then stopped and looked back at Theater 28. I had come to the Drome to see Christmas Caper, and it was right here, with the 4:30 showing due to start at any minute. And it would serve Jack right if I saw it without him.

I walked back to the turn and peeked around the corner to make sure no one—especially not somebody on the staff—was coming and would catch me going into a different movie than the one I had the ticket for, and then hurried over to Theater 28 and pulled the door open. That was no mean feat given the popcorn and the 7-Up, but I managed to get it open far enough to hold it with my hip while I sidled through.

It was pitch-dark inside. The door shut behind me, and I stood there in the blackness, waiting for my eyes to adjust. They didn’t, even though there should be some light from the movie screen, or, if the previews hadn’t started yet, from the overhead lights. And weren’t these hallways supposed to have strip lighting in case they had to evacuate the theater?

This one obviously didn’t, and I couldn’t see anything. I stood there in the darkness, listening. The previews had definitely started. I could hear crashes and clangs and ominous music. It must be a preview for one of those shot-totally-at-night movies like The Dark Knight Rises or the Alien reboot, and that was why I couldn’t see, and in a minute, when a different preview came on, there’d be enough light to find my way by. But though the sounds changed to laughter and the muffled murmur of voices, the corridor remained coal-mine black.

I was going to have to feel my way along the passage, but I didn’t have a free hand to hold on to the wall with. Or to fish out my phone with so I could use its lit screen as a flashlight.

This is all Jack’s fault, I thought, stooping to set down the 7-Up so I could get my phone out of my pocket. I flipped it open and held it out in front of me. And no wonder the passage was so dark. It went a few more feet and then turned sharply to the left in a kind of dogleg. If I’d kept going, I’d have run face-first into a wall.

That’s a lawsuit waiting to happen, I thought, trying to figure out a way to hold on to my phone and the 7-Up. There wasn’t one—the cup was too big around—but if I could just make it past the dogleg, there should be some light from the screen to see by. I put my phone back in my pocket, felt for the cup, picked it up, and started down the passage again, counting the steps to the wall.

“Four … five …” I whispered. “Six, sev—”

And was grabbed abruptly from behind by a hand around my waist. I yelped, but a second hand was already over my mouth, and Jack’s voice was in my ear. “Shh. In here,” he whispered and pulled me, impossibly, right through the wall.

“A winner! You’ll be glad you came!”

—Variety Online

Amazingly, I hadn’t dropped the 7-Up or the bag of popcorn. “What do you think you’re doing?” I said, wrestling free of him.

“Shh!” he whispered. “These walls aren’t soundproof. Did you spill any of the popcorn?”

“Of course I spilled the popcorn,” I said. “You scared me half to death!”

“Shh. Look, you can yell at me all you want,” he whispered, “but not till the next chase scene. And don’t take out your cell phone. I don’t want the light to give us away. Stay here,” he ordered, and I heard the swish of a door’s opening and closing softly, and then nothing but the sounds of pandemonium coming through the left-hand wall.

It sounded similar to what I’d heard before and had thought was from the previews for Christmas Caper, but it was clearly coming from the theater next door, which meant it was Lethal Rampage.

I couldn’t see anything at all, let alone enough to make out my surroundings, but this had to be the corridor leading to Christmas Caper because I could hear a voice intoning, “Coming this Valentine’s Day!” through the other wall.

Good, the previews were still playing. I hadn’t missed the start of the movie. I would have time to tell Jack what I thought of him for grabbing me like that and still make it into the theater in time for the opening credits. If I could find it in the darkness, which was still absolute.

Jack was back. I heard him shut the door. “Luckily, you only spilled a couple of handfuls,” he said over the crash of explosions from Lethal Rampage. “Which I ate. What took you so long? I was afraid the usher had spotted you, and I was going to have to come back out and rescue you.”

“Where was I?” I said angrily. “I was standing outside Theater 17 just like you told me to. You lied to me—”

“Nobody saw you go in the door to 28, did they?”

“Don’t change the subject. You—”

“Did they?” He grabbed my arm, jostling the popcorn.

“No,” I said, only half listening. In between deafening explosions, the announcer on the Christmas Caper side of the wall was saying muffledly, “And now for our feature presentation.”

“Look,” I said. “I’d love to stand here in the dark and fight with you, but I intend to see Christmas Caper. So if you’ll please let go of my arm, the movie’s about to start.”

“No, it’s not,” he said. He squeezed my arm. “Hang on,” he said, let go, and moved away from me, and I could hear him doing something, though I couldn’t tell what, and then the wall I was facing lit up with the beam from a penlight.

From what I could see in its dim light, we were in a narrow passage just like the one outside, with carpet on the floor and the walls and no strip lighting, but it was long and straight and ended in a wall, not in the entrance to the theater. There was no sign of the door Jack had just come through though it had to be in that wall because Jack had taken off his jacket and laid it against the bottom of it.

“To keep any stray light from seeping out,” he explained over the racket.

“What is this place?” I said. “Where are we?”

“Shh,” he said, putting a finger to his lips and whispering. “Kissing scene coming up,” and he must have been telling the truth because the gunfire and explosions were suddenly replaced by the strains of violins.

He took the popcorn and 7-Up cup from me, tiptoed halfway down the corridor, stooped and set them on the floor and then stood up again, listening with his finger to his lips. And apparently the lethal rampagers were back, because the romantic violins cut off abruptly, replaced by a blast of trumpets, lots of drumming, and the sound of revving engines and squealing tires.

“Chase scene,” Jack said, coming back over to me. “Time to go to work.”

“You said you were going to tell me what this place is. Where’s the theater?”

“I’ll tell you everything, I swear. After we do this. Take off your shirt.”

“What?”

“Your shirt. Take it off.”

“You never change, do you?”

“Wrong line,” he said. “You’re supposed to say, ‘Are you sure we’re planning the same sort of crime?’ and I say—”

“This is not How to Steal a Million,” I said.

“You’re right,” he said. “It’s more like Jumpin’ Jack Flash. Or I Love Trouble. Take it off. And hurry. We don’t have much time.”

“I have no intention of taking off any—”

“Calm down. It’s for the photos. Of this passage and the one outside,” he said, and when I still stood there, my arms crossed, “The camera the boy on your shirt is holding isn’t just a picture. There’s a digital-strip camera embedded in it.”

And that was why he’d riffled through all those shirts in the Disney Princess boutique. He’d been looking for one with a camera. “Why can’t you just use the camera in your phone?”

“When they scan them in the security line, they check your info against the police and FBI databases.”

“Which you’re in because of the geese,” I said. “That’s why you wanted me to come with you, so I could smuggle in your camera for you.”

“Of course. That’s what scoundrels do. They use the girl to smuggle the necklace through customs or to get the news story or to get them out of East Germany—”

“This is not a movie!”

“You’re right about that. Which is why I’ve got to get those pictures. So, do you want to give me that shirt or do you want me to take the camera off of it while you’re wearing it?”

“Fine,” I said, pulled the T-shirt off over my head, handed it to him, and stood there fuming in my singlet while he turned the shirt inside out, peeled off the digital-strip camera, and handed the T-shirt back to me. I pulled it on while he snapped pictures of the passage, motioning me out of the way so he could get a shot of the long wall behind me.

He snapped the end wall he’d dragged me through and the one at the other end, and then came back to me and listened a moment. “I’ll be right back,” he said, switched off the penlight, plunging us in darkness, and went out into the passage again.

He was gone for what seemed like forever. I put my ear to the door, but all I could hear were detonations and screams from the Lethal Rampage side and disgustingly perky music from the other. I listened intently, afraid the din would subside any minute, but it didn’t, though on the Rampage side I could hear, over the crashing, the sound of muffled voices.

Please don’t let that be the usher or Drome security, I thought, demanding to know what Jack was doing in here, but it must not have been because the door was opening again, and I had to back away hastily as Jack came in and shut it behind him.

“Can you find my jacket?” he whispered, and I felt around for it in vain, and then pulled my shirt off again and handed it to him to put against the door.

“Thanks,” he whispered and, after a few seconds, switched on the penlight again.

“Did you get the pictures?”

He waved the digital strip at me. “Yeah.”

“Good. You lied to me.”

“No, I didn’t. Besides, Jimmy Stewart lied to Margaret Sullavan, Peter O’Toole lied to Audrey Hepburn, Cary Grant lied to Audrey Hepburn. It’s what scoundrels do.”

“That’s no excuse. You promised you’d take me to Christmas Caper.”

“And I did,” he said. “This is it.” He waved his arm to show the passage. “Welcome to Theater 28.”

“This isn’t a theater,” I said.

“You’re right,” he said. “Come on.” He grabbed my hand, led me down to where he’d set the popcorn and 7-Up. “Have a seat, and I’ll explain everything. Come on, sit down.”

I sat down on the floor, my back against the carpeted wall, my arms folded belligerently across my chest, and he sat down across from me. “That passage outside splits in two and goes into the theaters on either side,” he said. “If I hadn’t reached out and pulled you in here, you’d have turned and followed that dogleg into Theater 30 and Lethal Rampage.

“And if you’d turned the other way, you’d have ended up in Theater 26”—he jerked his thumb toward the wall behind him—“where Make Way for Ducklings is now showing, a fact you wouldn’t have discovered until you’d sat through fifteen minutes of previews, at which point you’d have thought you’d somehow gotten in the wrong theater, and go tell the usher, who’d tell you he was sorry, but you’d missed the start of Christmas Caper and he couldn’t let you in, but that there might still be tickets available for the seven o’clock. A neat trick, huh?”

“But why—?”

“They have to have a last line of defense in case a determined fan makes it past all the other firewalls. That hardly ever happens, but occasionally somebody does what you just did—can’t get in, buys a ticket for another movie, and then tries to sneak in to what they originally wanted to see.”

“Why don’t they just not put up a marquee for it?”

“They tried that, which is what made us suspicious in the first place, so they had to come up with an alternative plan. Which you see before you.”

“Us?” I asked.

“Oops, I almost forgot,” he said, scrambling to his feet and going to retrieve his jacket. He put it on, came back, and began searching through its pockets.

“Now what are you doing?” I asked.

“Trying to get this made before Lethal Rampage hits another quiet stretch.” He frowned at the red Coca-Cola cup. “You did get 7-Up, didn’t you? Not Coke?”

“I got 7-Up.” I handed it over to him. “You’re not making a stink bomb out of that, are you?” I asked as he pulled out a flask and poured a brown liquid into it.

“No,” he said, patting his pockets some more and pulling out a Terminator 12 commemorative glass and then a baggie full of lemon slices.

He poured half the 7-Up-and-brown-liquid-and-ice mixture into the Terminator glass, added a lemon slice and a sprig of mint from his breast pocket, reached inside his jacket, pulled out a stalk of rhubarb with a flourish, stuck it in the glass, stirred the mixture with it, and handed it to me. “Your Pimm’s Cup, madam,” he said.

“Just like the ones you made the night we watched Ghost Town,” I said, smiling.

“Well, not just like them. These are made with rum, which was all Tom Cruise’s Cocktail Bar had. And when I made the Ghost Town ones, I was trying to get you into bed.”

“And what are you trying to do this time? Get me drunk so I’ll agree to help you do something else illegal?”

“No,” he said, sitting down next to me. “Not right now, anyway,” which wasn’t exactly a reassuring answer.

“I got the photos,” he went on, “which is what I came for, and, thanks to you and that awful Dora T-shirt”—he raised his Coke cup to me—“I’m a lot less likely to get caught smuggling them out. But it’s still too risky to do any more investigating till I’ve gotten them safely off the premises.” He took a leisurely sip of his drink.

“Then, shouldn’t we be going?” I asked.

“We can’t. Not till Lethal Rampage is over and we can blend in with the audience as it leaves. So relax. Drink your Pimm’s Cup, have some popcorn. We’ve got—” He stopped and listened to the din coming through the wall for a moment, “an hour and forty-six minutes to kill. Enough time to—”

“Tell me what’s going on, like you promised you would. Or are you going to tell me that’s classified, too?”

“As a matter of fact, it is,” he said. “And you’ve already seen what they’re doing—covering up movies that don’t exist.”

“But why? Most people don’t even care about the movies part.”

“Oh, but they do. They think they’ve got a hundred to choose from, and that’s what makes them come all the way out here on the light rail and stand in security lines forever. Do you think they’d do that just to buy a bag of popcorn and an overpriced Avengers mug? How long do you think Baskin-Robbins would stay in business if they only had three flavors, even if they were the most popular ones? Look at your friends. They may have spent today shopping and eating and—”

“Picking up guys.”

“And picking up guys, but if somebody asked them tomorrow what they did, they’d say they went to the movies, and they’d believe it. The Drome’s not selling popcorn, it’s selling an illusion, an idea—a giant screen with magical images on it, your girlfriend sitting beside you in the dark, romance, adventure, mystery …”

“But I still don’t understand. Okay, they have to maintain the illusion, but it’s not as if they don’t have any movies. You said there were only four or five movies here that didn’t exist, and they already show some movies on more than one screen. Why not just show X-Force and The Return of Frodo in one more theater instead of making movies up?”

“Because they’re already showing X-Force in six theaters as it is, and Starstruck just announced they’re building a chain of 250-screen Super-dromes. Besides, I don’t think the moviegoing public’s the only people they’re trying to fool.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, if you’re a film company, this could really work to your advantage. If your movie’s behind schedule, nobody gets fined or fired for missing the release date. You release it anyway, and then, when it’s finished, you put out the DVD and stream it, and nobody’s the wiser. Which, by the way, is what happened to Monsoon Gate and what I think probably happened to Christmas Caper. You can’t release a Christmas movie in February. It’s got to come out in December or you’ll lose your shirt. Figuratively speaking.”

“Which means it might show up on the Net in a few months,” I said.

“Yeah, and if it does, I’ll watch it with you, I promise.”

“Do you think that’s what happened to the other movies?”

“No. The Ripper Files never came out, and neither did Mission to Antares or By the Skin of Our Teeth. And why spend millions making a movie when you can do a three-minute trailer instead, pay the Dromes to block people from seeing it, and pocket the difference? The shareholders wouldn’t even have to know.”

“Which would make it fraud.”

“It’s already fraud,” he said. “And false advertising. There are laws against selling products that don’t exist.”

“Which is why they don’t sell the tickets online,” I said. “But if they’re criminals, isn’t what you’re doing dangerous?”

“Not if they don’t know I’m doing it. Which is why,” he said, his voice dropping to a whisper, “we need to sit here quietly, eat our popcorn”—he scooted closer to me—“and watch the movie.”

“What’s it about?” I whispered.

“This guy who’s investigating a conspiracy when who should turn up but his old girlfriend. It’s the last thing he needs. He’s trying to stay invisible—”

Which explains why he looked so dismayed when he saw me, I thought, a weight lifting from me.

“And he knows he should probably get out of there before she blows his cover, but she already thinks he’s a—”

“Scoundrel?”

“I was going to say ‘wanker.’ ”

“Scoundrel,” I said firmly, “and besides, he needs her to help him smuggle something in past the guards, like Kevin Kline in French Kiss.”

“Exactly,” he said. “Plus, he’s got some stuff to tell her, so he recruits her to help him, and in the course of their investigations, he convinces her to forgive him, like Olivia de Havilland forgives Errol Flynn and Julia Roberts forgives Nick Nolte and Whoopi Goldberg forgives—”

“Jack. Because that’s what scoundrels’ girlfriends do.”

“Exactly,” he said. “Which is why you should—”

“Shh,” I said.

“What is it?” he whispered.

“Kissing scene coming up,” I said, and switched off the penlight.

“The most fun you can have at the movies!”

—moviefone.com

“How long does Lethal Rampage run?” I asked him a considerable time later. “That sounds like Final Scene music to me.”

He raised himself up on one elbow, said, “It is,” and went back to nuzzling my neck.

“But don’t we have to be out of here before it ends?”

“Yeah, but you’re forgetting, it’s a Hollywood Blockbuster. Remember when we saw the reboot of Speed, how we kept thinking it was over and it wasn’t? Or The Return of the King? That had like seven endings. Lethal Rampage has got at least three more climaxes to go.”

“Oh, good,” I murmured, snuggling into his shoulder, but a moment later he sat up, reached for his jacket, pulled a phone out of it, and flipped it open.

“I thought you didn’t have a phone,” I said, sitting up.

“Not one I wanted to get caught with photos on,” he said, looking at its screen. “Change of plans. There’s something I’ve got to go take care of.” He began buttoning his shirt. “Wait till the next explosion and then slip out into the passage and wait for Lethal Rampage to get out. And don’t leave anything behind.”

I nodded.

“When you get out to the lobby, go over to one of the cafés, not the Polar Express, order a drink, text your friends, and then wait at least a few minutes before you try to leave, and you should be fine.”

He pulled me to my feet. “Look, I can’t tweet or call you—it might be traced—so it may be a while before I can get in touch. All I’ve proved so far is that there’s a blocked-off passageway between theaters and some suspicious activity. I still have to prove the movies don’t exist, which I’ll have to do in Hollywood.” He hesitated. “I feel bad about leaving you here like this.”

“But Peter O’Toole left Audrey Hepburn in a closet and Kevin Kline left Meg Ryan in Paris without a passport,” I said, following him down to the far end of the passage. “And now I suppose I’m supposed to say, ‘It’s okay. Go,’ and you kiss me good-bye, and I stand in the doorway like Olivia, looking longingly after you with my tresses blowing in a wind that smells like the sea?”

“Exactly. Except in this case it smells more like rancid popcorn oil,” he said, “and we can’t afford to leave the door open. It lets in too much light. But I can definitely manage the kiss.”

He did. “See?” he said. “You do like scoundrels.”

“I happen to like nice men,” I said. “How are you going to get out of the Drome without security’s catching you?”

“I’ll be fine,” he said. “Look, if you get in trouble—”

“I won’t. Go.”

He kissed me again, opened the wall, and went through it, only to appear again almost instantly. “By the way,” he said, “about the geese and the graduating thing. Remember in How to Steal a Million where Peter O’Toole tells Audrey Hepburn he’s not a burglar, that he’s actually a security expert ‘with advanced degrees in art history and chemistry and a diploma, with distinction, from London University in advanced criminology’?”

“Yes,” I said. “I suppose now you’re going to tell me you have an advanced degree from London University?”

“No, Yale. In consumer fraud,” he said and was gone, leaving me to hurriedly gather up all the telltale trash by the less-than-helpful light of my cell-phone screen, get out into the passage, shutting the door soundlessly behind me, and over to the corridor that led to the theater next door, and wait for the movie to let out.

“A movie experience that leaves you wanting more! An enthusiastic thumbs-up!”

—rogerebert.net

He’d been right about Lethal Rampage. It went on for another twenty minutes, giving me time to make sure the door was completely shut with no seams showing, check again for stray popcorn, and then lean against the corridor wall, listening to a whole symphony of crashes, bangs, and explosions before the lights came up, people started trickling out, and I had to somehow merge with them without being noticed.

It was easier than I’d thought. They were all too intent on switching their cell phones back on and complaining about the movie to pay any attention to me.

Lethal Rampage had apparently been just as awful as it had sounded through the wall. “I couldn’t believe how lame the plot was,” a twelve-year-old boy said, and his friend nodded. “I hated the ending.”

Me, too, I thought, wistfully.

I eased in behind them and followed them down the passage, eavesdropping on their conversation so I could talk about the movie in case anybody asked me about it.

Like the ticket-taker, who I still had to get past. I wondered if he’d remember I’d been going to Dragonwar, not Lethal Rampage. Maybe I should go back to Theater 17 and go out with the Dragonwar audience.

But if it had already let out, I’d have to go out past the ticket-taker alone, ensuring he’d notice me. And what if somebody on staff saw me going back and concluded I was sneaking into a second movie? I’d better stick with this crowd.

I stopped just inside the door, loitering by the trash can till a group of high-school kids came by, and then hastily tossed my popcorn sack and Coke cup and attached myself to them. And it was a good thing because there was a cleaning crew lurking just outside the door with their dustpans and garbage bags, and for all their slouching against the wall, waiting for the theater to empty out, they looked unnaturally alert.

I stuck close to the high-schoolers as we passed them, bending over my phone and pretending to text like they were doing and stayed with them as we merged with the audience from Pirates of the Caribbean 9, which had just gotten out.

From the sound of things, Pirates hadn’t been any better than Lethal Rampage, and it occurred to me that I’d had a better time than any of them even though I hadn’t seen a movie.

The conclusion of that thought was swept away by a bunch of people pouring down from the upstairs theaters, and it was all I could do to keep my footing as the whole mass of people surged past the ticket-taker and out into the only-slightly-less-crowded lobby, which I was relieved to see wasn’t full of security guards and blaring sirens. Jack must have gotten safely away.

But just in case he was still in the Drome somewhere, I needed to do what I could to keep them from getting suspicious.

Which meant detaching myself from the high-schoolers and getting in line to get tickets for the next showing of Christmas Caper. If I were still trying to see it, I obviously didn’t know it didn’t exist.

The high-schoolers were trying to decide which restaurant to go to. “While you make up your minds, I’m going to go get a funnel cake,” I said to the nearest of them, who didn’t even look up from her smartphone, and went to check the time of the next showing, which should be at 6:40.

It wasn’t. It was at seven thirty, and the one after that was at ten. I stared at the board for a long minute, contemplating what that meant, and then went to try to find the end of the ticket line.

It was ten times longer than it had been when we’d first arrived, snaking all the way back to the Death Star Diner, and it was barely moving. It was a good thing I wasn’t trying to actually get in. I wouldn’t make it even halfway to the front before the last light-rail train home.

I wondered how long I needed to stand here. Jack had said it wasn’t safe to use his phone, but he might have been able to borrow someone else’s and send me a text from it, so I turned on my phone and looked at my messages.

There weren’t any from him, but there were four from Zara, all of them asking, “Where r u?” except the last one, which said, “Assume ur not ansring means u finally got in 2 Xmas Cpr. How was it?”

I needed to text her back, but not till I was far enough along the line that it wouldn’t look like I’d just gotten into it. I didn’t want her wondering what I’d been doing all this time—she was way too quick to draw connections to Jack. So I switched off my phone and then stood there, periodically inching forward, and thinking about Zara’s text. “How was it?” she’d asked.

Great, I thought, and remembered those boys complaining about Lethal Rampage and my thinking I’d had a much better time at the movies than they had.

And how did I know that wasn’t what I’d just experienced—an afternoon at the movies? That I hadn’t just been participating in a romantic spy adventure concocted by Jack, who knew how much I wanted to believe he’d had a good reason for going off without saying a word to me and who’d heard me complain countless times about going to a movie with Zara and Kett and ending up not getting to see it?

There could have been lots of reasons that that passage was there. It could’ve been a shortcut between theaters for the projectionist, or some sort of required evacuation route in case of fire that Jack had appropriated for his own private Tunnel of Love. He could have bribed the usher to tell me I couldn’t get in and to put Christmas Caper up on Theater 28’s marquee after the audience for Make Way for Ducklings was inside. And the other stuff—the vomit and the spilled gingerbread latte and Santa—could all have been coincidences, and Jack had simply made them sound like a conspiracy.

Don’t be ridiculous, I told myself. Do you honestly think he’d go to that much trouble just to get you into bed?

Of course he would. Look how much trouble he went to just to play a practical joke on the dean. And the whole thing had been just like the plot of How to Steal a Million or I Love Trouble, complete with spies, slapstick, a sparring couple forced together into a small confined space, and a hero who was lying to the heroine.

And believing it was a scam made a lot more sense than believing that some vast Hollywood conspiracy lay behind this decorated-for-Christmas Cinedrome.

There isn’t any conspiracy, I thought. You’ve been had, that’s all. Again. Christmas Caper is showing right now in Theater 56 or 79 or 100. And Jack is off plotting some other practical joke—or the seduction of some other gullible girl—while I stand here in this stupid line trying to protect him from a danger that never existed.

I looked back at the end of the line, which I was only a dozen people away from. I still couldn’t text Zara, but for a completely different reason now—she couldn’t ever find out what an idiot I’d been.

So I continued to stand there, thinking about how easy it would have been for Jack to bribe somebody on the staff to put a NO TICKETS AVAILABLE sign on the schedule board, just like he’d bribed some farmer to lend him those geese. And to pay somebody to block me on my way across the lobby. And thinking how, when I found Christmas Caper was sold-out, I should just have gone to see A Star-Crossed Season instead.

Three Hanover freshmen leaned over the barrier to talk to the girls ahead of me in line. “What are you going to?” one of them asked.

“We haven’t decided,” one of the girls said. “We were thinking maybe Saw 7. Or A Star-Crossed Season.”

“Don’t!” the trio shouted, and the middle one said, “We just saw it. It was beyond boring!”

“Well worth the trip!”

—comingsoon.com

I waited another ten minutes, during which I moved forward about a foot and then called Zara.

“Where have you been?” she asked. “I’ve been texting and texting you.”

“You have?” I said. “I haven’t gotten them. I think there’s something wrong with my phone.”

“So where are you now?”

“Where do you think? In line.”

“In line?” she said. “You mean you still haven’t seen Christmas Card?”

“Caper,” I corrected her. “No, not yet. All three afternoon showings sold out before I got to the front of the line, so I’m trying to get a ticket to the seven o’clock.”

“Where are you exactly?” she asked.

I told her.

“I’ll be right there,” she said, which I doubted. It would take her at least twenty minutes to disentangle herself and Kett from the guys, and then on the way here they’d be delayed by the dress Zoe Deschanel wore in Son of Elf or some other guys, and by that time I’d hopefully be far enough forward in the line to make it look like I’d been in line since the 12:10.

But she showed up almost immediately and alone. “This is all the farther you’ve gotten?” she said. “What happened to Jack?”

“I have no idea,” I said. “Where’s Kett?”

Zara rolled her eyes. “She texted Noah and they went off to the Dirty Dancing Club. Did he tell you where he’s been all these months?”

“Who? Noah?”

“Very funny,” Zara said. “No. Jack.”

“No. In jail, probably.”

“It’s too bad,” Zara said, shaking her head sadly. “I was hoping you might get back together. I mean, I know he’s kind of a …”

Scoundrel, I thought.

“… wanker,” Zara said. “But he’s so scorching!”

That he is, I thought. “What are you going to do now?” I asked her, to change the subject.

“I don’t know,” she said, sighing. “This trip’s been a complete bust. I didn’t meet anybody even lukewarm, and I couldn’t find anything for my family for Christmas. I suppose I should go over to the Pretty Woman store and see if they have anything my mom would like, but I think maybe I’ll just go see Christmas Caper with you. When did you say the next showing was?”

“Seven.”

She checked the time on her phone. “It’s already 6:30,” she said, looking at her phone and then up at the line ahead of us. “We’ll never make it.”

“When’s the showing after that?” I asked her, but before she could look it up, Kett came up, looking annoyed.

“What happened to Noah?” Zara asked her.

“He’s at the first-aid station,” she said.

“The first-aid—?”

“He had a bloody nose. He said he wanted to take me dancing, but it turned out it was because he wanted to enter me in the wet T-shirt contest, the slimewad,” she said. “So what’s going on?”

“Lindsay’s still trying to get in to see Christmas Caper,” Zara said.

“You mean, you haven’t managed to see it yet?” Kett asked. “Geez, how long have you been standing in line?”

“Forever,” Zara said, studying her phone. “And she’s definitely not going to get in to see the seven o’clock. This is showing it as sold-out.” She scrolled down. “And the next showing isn’t till ten”—she scrolled some more—“which doesn’t get out till after the last train to Hanover leaves, so that one won’t work either.”

“Geez,” Kett said. “You spent all this time standing in line for a movie you don’t even get to see. Was it worth it spending the whole day on it?”

Oh, yes, I thought. Because, lies or not, bill of goods or not, it was still the best afternoon at the movies I’d had in a long time. Much better than if I’d gone to see A Star-Crossed Season. Or Lethal Rampage. And much better than wandering around looking at Black Widow boots and Silver Linings Playbook leotards like Zara, or dealing with creeps, like Kett had. Unlike theirs, my afternoon had been great. It had had everything—adventure, suspense, romance, explosions, danger, snappy dialogue, kissing scenes. The perfect Saturday afternoon at the movies.

Except for the ending.

But it might not be over yet—Jack had after all promised me he’d watch Christmas Caper with me if it ended up being streamed. And right before the end of Jumpin’ Jack Flash, Jack had left Whoopi Goldberg sitting waiting for him in a restaurant. Michael Douglas had left Kathleen Turner standing abandoned on a parapet. Han Solo had left Princess Leia on the rebel moon. And they’d all showed up again, just like they’d said.

Of course Jack had also told me he’d graduated from Yale and was investigating a huge, far-reaching conspiracy, and that putting those geese in the dean’s office hadn’t been a prank. But not everything he’d told me was a lie. He’d said he loved movies, and that was true. Nobody who didn’t love them could have engineered such a perfect one.

And even if he’d made up everything else, even if he was every bit the scoundrel I was afraid he was and I never saw him again, it had still been a terrific afternoon at the movies.

“Well?” Kett was saying. “Was it? I mean, you didn’t get to do anything.”

“Or have anything to eat,” I said, getting out of line. “Let’s go get some sushi or something. How late is Nemo’s open?”

“I’ll see,” Kett said, getting out her phone. “I think it stays open till—Oh, my God!”

“What?” Zara asked. “That slimewad Noah didn’t text you something obscene, did he?”

“No,” Kett said, scrolling down through her phone-number list. “You won’t believe this.” She tapped a number and put the phone up to her ear. “Hi,” she said into it. “I got your text. What happened? … You’re kidding! … Oh, my God! … Are you sure? Which channel?”

Oh, no, I thought, even though I’d decided he’d concocted the whole thing, they’ve arrested Jack. They caught him with the camera strip.

“Oh, my God, what?” Zara said.

“Hang on,” Kett said to whoever was on the other end, and pressed the phone to her chest. “We should have stayed home,” she said to us. “We missed all the excitement.”

Jack went back to the campus to leave me a message, I thought, and the campus police caught him.

“What excitement?” Zara asked. “Tell us.”

“Margo says there are all these TV-camera crews and squad cars with flashing lights around the admin building, and a few minutes ago Dr. Baker told her the dean’s been arrested.”

“The dean?” I said.

“For what?” Zara asked.

“I don’t know,” Kett said. She texted like mad for a minute, and then said, “Margo says it has something to do with taking federal loan money for students who don’t exist. It’s apparently all over the news,” and Zara began swiping through screens to find the coverage.

“The dean says it’s all a big mistake,” Kett said, “but apparently the FBI’s consumer-fraud division’s been investigating him for months, and they’ve got all kinds of evidence.”

I’ll bet they do, I thought, thinking of Jack’s saying he had to go, that something had come up, and of what a good idea geese had been. In all the chaos—and mess—nobody would have even thought to check the dean’s office to see if anything was missing.

“There are?” Kett was saying. She put her hand over her phone. “Margo says the place has been crawling with scorching FBI agents.”

“Here it is,” Zara said, holding her phone so I could see the screen, which showed the quad full of police officers and FBI agents, and reporters trying to get a shot of the dean as he was perp-walked down the steps and over to a squad car. There was no sign of Jack.

“Are they still there?” Kett said and then glumly, “Oh.” She turned to us. “She says there’s no point in our coming home. It’s all over. I can’t believe we missed it.”

“Especially the FBI agents,” Zara said teasingly.

“Right,” Kett said. She sighed. “Instead, I got felt up by a slimewad.”

“And I still don’t have a present for my mother,” Zara said. She turned to me. “And you didn’t get to see your movie, after I promised you would.”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“We could go to the 9:30,” Zara said, “and leave before it’s over. That way you could at least see part of it.”

“And miss the ending?” I said, thinking of Romancing the Stone, where Michael Douglas comes back when Kathleen Turner least expects it, and of French Kiss, where Meg Ryan’s already on the plane, and of Jumpin’ Jack Flash, where he finally shows up in the very last scene and is every bit as wonderful as she thought he was.

“No, that’s okay,” I said, trying hard not to smile. “I’ll watch it when it comes out on the Net.”