Only Child

“Jews!” a harsh, off-camera whisper. “Fucking Jews.”

Figures running across an expanse of lawn.

Heavy breathing.

Swastikas springing from spray cans.

“Heil Hitler!”

“The white man is coming, kike bastards!” A different voice.

Fade to black, deeper than darkness.

In the silence, I said, “How did you know they’d be—”

“What you’ve just seen,” he interrupted, “is a very early example of what I call noir verite.”

“I love that name!” Michelle.

He bowed slightly, taking his due, but not finished opening our eyes. “With cinema verite, I had realism but not control,” he said. “With faux verite, I had control but not realism. But with noir verite, I finally had both.”

“How is that...I mean, how is what we just saw...both?” I asked him, my tone a study in confused admiration.

“How many actors did you see?”

“Uh...four, I think, right?”

“No,” he said. Waited a beat. “You saw one. One of them knew this was a movie. The other three, they thought they were going on an ‘action.’”

“You mean they were set up to...?”

“Not set up! They wanted to do exactly what they did. It was the actor’s assignment to get them to do it when they did it, and where they did it, that’s all. For the actor, this was a role. But for the others...”

“I think I under—”

“That was just the beginning,” he said. “The first step.”

“Now, who was acting in that one?” he asked, eyes on Rejji, who he’d spotted sneaking peeks at the screen.

“It can’t have been the one doing the paddling,” I said. “Why would the others have just gone along and—?”

“This is the final stage,” he said. “Or nearly it, anyway. Because they were all acting. But only one of them knew the script.”

“I don’t...”

“Okay, look,” he said, leaning forward, intense. “They all thought they were acting. In a movie. The script was this sorority thing...like you saw for yourself. But the girl doing the paddling, she was told that this was a different movie. And the plot of that movie was a girl who wants to get even with another girl, so she makes up this whole ‘movie’ thing.”

“Unreal!” I said.

“Completely real,” he corrected. “The concept is that everyone knows they’re on camera, but only some of them know that the script isn’t really the script. But even the ones who think they know, they don’t understand that their role is another role. One that only the director knows. And when it all comes together, at that perfect moment, it’s totally real. And totally under my direction.”

“Oh my God!” Michelle said.

“Noir verite,” he said proudly. “That’s why it’s always done with a single camera. The last thing I want is a Rashomon effect. Here, each of the actors has his or her own reality, but the only truth is what goes into the camera. And there can be only one truth. That,” he said, pausing, the way he’d rehearsed this moment before his mirror so many times, “was my vision.”

“That’s...amazing,” I said. “So, in each movie you make, the star—”

“The catalyst,” he said. “Not the star. In noir verite, there are no stars. Because there are no limits, do you see?”

“Not...really.”

“The ultimate control is the director’s. In noir verite, the director directs. Not just the lines, or the sets. He directs reality. The catalyst—there can be more than one—their job is to create the opportunity for conduct. But the conduct itself is real.”

“So if you let the...person think they’re the catalyst, but they’re really playing the role of catalyst...?”

“Exactly,” he said.

“Everything I heard about you was gospel,” I told him, admiringly. “This is a new concept. Nobody’s got this one. And it truly has no limits. You could do...anything with it.”

“No limits,” he agreed.

“Couldn’t it ever get...I don’t know, out of hand?”

“Even if it did,” he said, shrugging his shoulders, “whatever happened, it wouldn’t be real. It would be something else entirely. My creation. Noir verite.”

Before he left, he inked the deal memo Michelle handed him.

“I’ll just sign it ‘Vision,’ if that’s all right,” he said. “It’s the name I’ll be known by.”

“Oh, you already are,” I promised him. “We just need your Social Security number for the accounting department. You know, the tax boys. You better get used to a lot of attention from them, Vision.”

He put his copy of the contract into his briefcase, as Michelle tapped a single digit on her cellular.

“Please bring the car around,” she said. “You are to take our guest wherever he directs.”

“Better ring Fong, too,” I told her. “A little security wouldn’t hurt, considering...”

“Considering what?” The Vision asked me.

“Considering your signing bonus isn’t a check,” I told him. “Alana...”

Michelle handed me a Gucci bag of soft blue leather. I unzipped it, so Vision could see the banded stacks of bills. Then handed the bag to him.

He took it in both hands, torn. Then he made his decision and zipped it closed without counting. All class. Or maybe he wanted to keep the bag.

I’d expected a man so driven, he’d be almost vibrating with barely contained power. A psychopath, radiating evil ki. Not this. Not this lethal little cliche.

We shook hands.

Michelle took him downstairs, to the waiting limo.

“What if he—?”

“There’s no way,” I said to Rejji. “Not now.”

“Burke...”

“They heard it all?” I asked Cyn.

“Every word. I was right there.”

“I stationed Max behind Giovanni, just in case.”

“He didn’t move, Burke. Not a muscle. I don’t see how he did it. I wanted to...just...”

“How do you think I felt?” Rejji said to her. “And I was close enough to do it.”

“Why isn’t Michelle with you?” Cyn asked.