Slices by Michael Montoure Read Free Book Online

brilliant
lighting designer I’ve ever worked with. But I was still their
star. They never considered anyone else.
    And
it worked, it all worked, audiences screamed and laughed and wept. It
did better box office than any of their releases ever had, but it
simply wasn’t enough to justify what they spent, but still —
still. We’d done something to be proud of, made a nightmare
that would last for generations.
    Of
course you know all this. I’m sure you do. If you’ve done
any research at all, or just turned on your TV around Halloween, you
know it.
    I
just have to be sure. I want to know that you understand just what it
is you’re fucking with.
    Pray
for Dawn is
mine. It’s what I was going to be remembered for. My face,
flickering twenty-four times a second in the dark, forever. Can you
understand that?
    I
know it wasn’t your idea. I know that. I can’t imagine
you even have ideas. I’ve seen your movies, the entire Jeff Meyer oeuvre. Popcorn romances, Mister Meyer. I saw A
Walk in the Park. I saw that cheap little Breakfast
at Tiffany’s knockoff, whatever it was called. And I’ve seen you try to do
Jane Austen and frankly, Mister Meyer, I’m not particularly
impressed with any of it.
    Oh,
you can act — I’m sure you can, whether you normally
bother to or not, you have the spark for it, I can tell. I have a
sense for these things.
    But
your oh-look-at-me, I’m-a-bad-boy act isn’t — it’s
not dangerous. Not the way I was dangerous. It’s safe and commodified and
pre-packaged.
    It
honestly hadn’t occurred to me — can you believe it? That
after decades in this town, I still had one bit of naivety left?
Never occurred to me that anyone would ever think to remake Pray
for Dawn. I should have known it — there are no ideas left, and this city
dines on nothing but its own flesh.
    But
even if I had known, it would never in a million years have crossed
my mind to imagine that you would be cast in my most famous role.
Frankly? It’s insulting.
    I’ve
been trying to imagine, what could they be thinking? I’ve been
looking through all the trades, staring at every picture of you I
could find, trying to see it. What were they thinking when they
looked at this man and thought, yes, he could be the next Franz
August? Pardon me. I have to sit down. I can’t let myself get
this worked up, not with so little time left.
    The
thing of it is, you see, I could almost see it. The jawline was close but not perfect, there was a certain
set to the cheekbones, you have a particular dark smile that’s
close to mine. I could almost understand. I spent days, not sleeping,
trying to figure it out.
    Then
I finally slept, and woke up to a moment of absolute clarity. I woke
up, looked at your pictures, and had the same thought I always had
when looking through a new script:
    There’ll
have to be some changes.
    Calm
down. Calm down. There’s nothing you can do. It’s already
done. I already told you, I know the best plastic surgeon in this
tired old city. He’s already done his work.
    You
have to consider it from my perspective. Either you’d fail or
you’d succeed. Either your remake would be a disaster or,
somehow, surpass the original. Either my film would be tainted by
association, or overshadowed. One way or another, forgotten.
    And
when people remembered my most famous character, it would be your
face they remembered, not mine. So much for my immortality.
    I
had to do something. Surely you appreciate that. My surgeon friend
was harder to convince. I don’t think I could have talked him
into it. That is, not without the Devil’s Breath.
    I’ll
admit, I am a little concerned. About the quality of his work under
the influence of such a drug. But I supervised. I watched every step
and believe me, this man is an artist, just as much an artist as I
am, as much as you have the potential to be. I have every faith in
him.
    So
we’re nearly there, you and I. We’re halfway done.
    I’m
sorry — where was I? Oh, yes.