THE FIRST TIME
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR - DOUBLE TROUBLE
"Double trouble
T-R-O-U-B-L-E!"
LYNYRD SKYNYRD (From the album "Gimme Back My Bullets" (1975))
Sent: April 24th, 1999
From: Spielberg's Disciple
To: A Girl Named Joey
Subject: How it's all going.
Hi, Joey. I just thought, you might want an update on how the movie shoot is progressing. We had a rough start, there's little denying that part, but as things stand right now, it actually looks like we'll be finished more or less on schedule! Of course, I also know enough about moviemaking, to know that you usually end up having to do a handful of pick-up shots later on, still all in all, I have to say that with us being close to three fourths done, it's been a rather pleasurable experience so far! With finals looming ever closer too, we pretty much have to get it done in time, or just scheduling everything for a time, when everyone can be there, will in all likelihood become a nightmare.
I don't know if I should tell you or not, but Pacey has begun counting down the hours to your return (which is honestly a little impressive, considering how low his grades in any kind of math usually are), so you should probably be prepared to get smothered by him, when you come back here, at least for the first couple of weeks! Otherwise, I don't really have all that much interesting to write about. Then again, sometimes that isn't the worst thing in the world either!
Looking forward to seeing you soon!
Dawson
Sent: April 24th, 1999
From: A Girl Named Joey
To: Spielberg's Disciple
Subject: How it's going over here.
Hi, Dawson. As always, it was nice to hear from you and I'm stoked on your behalf, that your first "real" movie shoot has gone as much according to plan, as it has. I can't wait to help out on your next one, whenever it will be.
It doesn't surprise me that Pacey is counting down the hours, and I can't say, that I'm not guilty of the exact same thing! I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm looking forward like crazy to seeing all of you again. In his case, I'm just looking forward to it in a different way, if you get what I mean!
Oh, and just like it would have been back home, exam fever is beginning to set in over here as well, in a big way! Emma, whose French still isn't nearly as fluent, as mine has become, is seriously worried that she'll flunk one or more of her finals, just thanks to not understanding everything that's being said in them. So, we've been working intensely together on getting her language skills more up to par, to where she at least has the best chance, she can get, to pass her subjects.
Say hi to everyone from me and take good care of yourself!
Joey
"Marion, I've been such a fool! You're all that I've ever wanted, you have to believe me!" Chris recited his lines, while Andie (whom everyone on the crew agreed was doing a terrific job of playing off him, it should be added) got ready to deliver her character's defining moment in the movie. Chris, in spite of Dawson's initial reservations over hiring a walking cliche of a horn-dog like him, to play a fictionalized version of himself, had really stepped up to the plate as well and they'd already talked about having him star in Dawson's next movie project too.
"If I stay with you, what does that say about me, Steven? I can't forget about what you did with her, because you should have been doing all of those things for the first time with me! I would have too, if you'd only given me enough time to! You and her deserve one another! I can do better!" Andie recited her lines perfectly and filled with put-on emotion, before making her dramatic exit from his parents' living room, that he'd been allowed to borrow for one evening of using it as his set, for a handful of scenes.
"Cut! That was right on the money, you two! Picture perfect!" Dawson praised his two leading actors, who also got a round of applause not just from himself, but also the rest of the crew. Even Hannah, who on several other occasions had shown clear signs of jealousy, since Andie was obviously putting her own acting abilities to shame.
After they were done shooting the rest of the scenes, they'd planned to get shot that evening, the crew had quickly begun to disperse, seeing as all of them had to get up early and get to school the day after. Hannah had asked him earlier, if they could talk after everyone had left and he'd been looking forward to it like he would a trip to the dentist, but he couldn't refuse her either, no matter how much he'd slowly begun to loathe her over the past months.
"Whatever you need to talk about, can we make it quick? I want to get a head start on editing the footage, we shot, before I have to catch some Z's" he asked Hannah, who was making herself comfortable on his parents' couch. Luckily for him, he still had over half an hour, before they came home from one of their rare dates, to get the biggest she-devil of the entire state out of their house.
"It's kind of cute, you know?" she said with a flirty smile, that did nothing for him.
"What is?"
"Seeing you being so enthusiastic over something, like a little kid enjoying their own birthday party. I mean this honestly, Dawson. You could actually become a someone in the movie industry someday, if this is an example of the kind of movies, you'll be making more of" she told him, in a way that seemed earnest, although he could never entirely tell with her.
"Thanks, I guess" was all he could think of saying.
"Dawson, I know that it could have seemed that way from how I've occasionally acted towards you, but I didn't get involved in a project like this, just to mess with your mind".
"You could have fooled me!"
"The only reason why I'm still involved is because you obviously have a rare talent, that needs to be nurtured in the right way. Have you ever considered leaving boring little Capeside High, that can't do anything to help those, who rise above the rest, for a school that can actually help you with developing the skills, you'll need to know, to make it in Hollywood?"
It wasn't like it hadn't crossed his mind a few times already, that compared to lots of the other young and talented filmmakers to be, who were attending those kinds of schools and living 24/7 in environments, that were productive to them chasing their dreams, he would have a distinct disadvantage, by the time he got to go to film school. His hometown could only offer a small handful of opportunities and even that was only if you knew how and when to take advantage of them but compared to if he'd lived in New York, London or Los Angeles, it was like comparing apples to oranges.
"I don't think that my folks could afford to send me to live in one of the big cities, with them having to pay for my tuition, rent, food ..."
"What if none of that was an issue, they'd have to think about? Dawson, one of the many charitable programs, my family is involved with, involves helping children and young people, who are exceptional gifted and just don't have the financial means, to become everything, they can be. As far, as I see it and I'm pretty sure that my folks would agree with me, you would be a perfect candidate" Hannah explained.
This time, he could tell that she meant every word.
"Why do I get the feeling, that there's a catch, you haven't told me about?" he calmly asked Hannah, who smiled slyly to herself.
"You're being careful. That's good! It means that I've actually managed to knock a thing or two about the harshness of life through your thick skull, over these past months! Look, I'll be completely honest with you. Capeside, for as small and insignificant, as it is in my eyes, is still the bread and butter of our family's riches. To make a long story short, it means lot to us, that our public image here is kept at an acceptable level, where the people living here year after year at least don't dislike us" Hannah began to explain.
"And you want to use me as your poster boy, for how much you supposedly care about the people of this place?" he asked, already not liking where this was going.
"I wouldn't be wasting my time on making this offer to you, if I didn't believe in you and what it's possible for you to become, Dawson! I'll be honest, at first, after I'd come back, I just saw you as yet another of those far-too-full of himself guys, that I couldn't wait to tear down to size!" she continued to explain, confirming something that he'd suspected for a while. "Do you know what none of those other guys could have done? What you've done here, by getting all of these people together to make a movie, that's actually worth an hour and half people's time! In case, it hasn't sunk in with you yet, you're doing something like this years before, most of your biggest idols even dared to attempt it! So what, if you have to do a hundred-word interview with the local paper, or be in a small local news segment hosted by your mom, where you thank us for the huge opportunity, that we've given to a local boy like you? There are plenty of schools around the country, where they know all about how to nurture and develop raw talents like you, and you can practically have your pick of them".
He didn't know what to reply, so shocked was he at this unforeseen development. All he knew was that as she got up from his parents' couch and walked towards him, his head became filled with dozens of conflicting emotions, very few of which were particularly pleasant ones.
"As I told you on our first evening together, knowing someone like me can open up a whole of doors for someone like you, Dawson" she continued, driving an already obvious point home. "And, if you need another incentive to say accept my proposal, how about this one? I'll let you off the hook, for every little sordid thing, we've done together. You'll be free to continue chasing the romance of a lifetime with Mary-Beth and you'll never have to worry, that I'll tell her anything. All we'll be are a pair of occasional business partners and nothing else".
"How do I know that you'll live up to your end of the deal? It's isn't as if you've done too much, to come off as trustworthy so far!"
"I never mess around, when it comes to doing serious business. It isn't in my blood!" she snappily bid him goodbye, before she seconds later was out of the door.
As if his life hadn't been complicated enough, here came another major curve ball being thrown into it!
Jen had spent a whole week waiting for the exact right time, to do what a strange inner sense of having to see justice be done, had her needing to do. She needed to tell Chris that Hannah was cheating on him.
What it was that made Hannah such an unsufferable bitch in her own eyes, when there were objectively worse girls than her at their school, was something that mystified even herself. She'd known so many "Hannah's" growing up in New York, that she could have filled a photo album with their pictures, but it was like there was an "Unlikableness X-Factor" to this Hannah, that made her stand out from all of them. Perhaps, it was the way she always had this aura around her, where it shone out that she felt like she was above everyone else, freshmen and seniors alike. The only time Jen had talked to her, that had been the impression she'd gotten from her, too.
It shouldn't have bothered her either, that Hannah was toying around with boys like Chris and Warren, who no doubt had been guilty of doing the same to their share of girls in the past. As Jen saw it, this was karma getting back at guys like them and whatever happened to them, was well-deserved.
But then, there was Mary-Beth, the one innocent victim in all of this. If anyone deserved to be told the truth, it was her and it was her that Jen used as her motivation, when she finally got a brief chance to talk to Chris in semi-private, in between their second and third class of the day.
"Can we talk, Chris?" she asked him cautiously, considering how their last conversation, months earlier, had ended with him (deservedly) shouting expletives at her.
"Princess Jen of New York wants to talk to one of her peons all of a sudden! Has hell frozen over?" he asked back sarcastically. He wasn't walking away though, so that was something, at least.
"Look, I'm sorry about the things, I said to you, the last time that we talked. I'd really like it, if we could start over".
"So, you can completely humiliate me in front of an entire hallway of people again, Jen? Do you have any idea how much I got ribbed on in the locker room for that little stunt of yours, for months afterwards?"
"I can imagine!" she nervously answered him, although she knew very well, that she probably couldn't.
"I don't think that you can! If we're going to have a conversation again about anything, you'd better give me a proper apology first. If you can't do that, then we have nothing more to talk about!"
Jen didn't really want to, especially since the unusual intensity of their little conversation was getting noticed by some of those around them. Since she didn't have any real alternative however, she had to swallow her pride for a brief moment.
"Okay, I'm really sorry, Chris! I didn't consider for a second how your jock buddies would react to what I said, but now that you've told me, I can see how much it must have royally sucked for you. Was that good enough?" she asked him and the small smile, she saw creeping across his lips moments after, told her that it was.
"You know, that's only the second time that a girl has ever apologized to me? Which is pretty incredible, considering the number of times, my parents made me apologize to the neighborhood girls, when I was a kid!" he half-joked and now Jen couldn't help smiling either.
"I bet, you were the worst of the worst! A real little hyper-active neighborhood menace!"
"You're not too far off, let me put it that way! Can you guess, who the first one was?"
"I have no idea".
"A seven-year-old Joey, after she'd thrown a rock that hit me square on the jaw! It hit me so hard, that it took over two weeks for the black mark to go away".
"Are you saying that compared to what she did, what I did wasn't so terrible?"
"In Joey's defense, she was only seven and was trying to get back at me, for having pulled her ponytail, in a way that had to have been very unpleasant for her! What did you want to talk about?" he asked, and now was the time for Jen to show what she was made of. How what she wanted to say next came out, could easily have been what defined their future relationship.
"Chris, I think that Hannah is cheating on you. With Warren. I saw them together" she tried to explain. It didn't look much like this was what Chris wanted to hear, though.
"When you say that you saw them together, what do you mean?"
"I saw them driving in his car" she further explained, carefully leaving out anything about how herself and Jack had spent an evening staking out a house. The more she heard herself though, the more she realized how flimsy her whole case sounded.
"That's all you're basing your assumption on?" Chris asked, looking like he didn't know what to think of it all.
"Abby also thought she saw him naked with a guy. Well, actually it wasn't her, who thought it. I found that out later ..."
"Which guy?"
"Dawson. She had her back turned though, and it was only for a second, that she saw his face".
As she almost should have suspected by now, seeing as the evidence her case rested on was just about the weakest in history, Chris couldn't help himself from chuckling.
"Let's sum this up, Jen. Just for the fun of it! You saw her and Warren driving in a car together and Abby maybe saw Hannah, with her back turned, nakedly making out with a dork like Dawson Leery? I don't know if I should laugh or cry, Jen! I really don't!" he told her, before walking away and leaving her standing there, annoyed with herself that she'd presented an adultery case to him, where she admittedly had nothing even resembling any concrete evidence against his girlfriend.
What were the chances now, that he would listen to herself presenting evidence against Hannah again, after how utterly terribly that had just gone? Practically in the toilet, that's what they were!
For practically the entire day, since he'd woken up, Hannah's proposal had kept replaying itself in Dawson's head. Could he really leave the safety of his hometown behind, to chase his dream in a big city? It wasn't like he'd have to go too far away, if he chose to take Hannah up on her offer. Say that he went to a film school in Boston, he would only have to be down there five days a week and could still be home to spend his entire weekend with his parents and old friends back here. Sure, he'd have to sell out a little, but on the scale of big sell-out's, this was as minor, as it got. You heard all of the time about small-town guys like himself, who'd found a rich benefactor, that helped them along financially and in reality, all he'd be saying yes to was taking a student grant, nothing more. Something, that didn't make him any different from tens of thousands of other students in his home country.
There were other things that stopped him from saying yes, however. This wasn't just his home, it was where he had his entire support system. Not to mention that he was sure, that he'd end up missing Mary-Beth like crazy, if he could only see her two days a week, at the most. Seeing as she would likely be continuing as student body president next year, it also meant that it would take up a lot of her time, sometimes in the weekends too. Just the thought that it could sometimes be weeks between them being alone together, made him think that it could wind up spelling the end of their relationship.
To take his mind off it all, and thanks to his friends all having other plans, he decided to spend his evening editing footage by himself in his room. It was a process that had become like second nature to him and quite relaxing, when he could find an hour or two to do it in peace. Before he knew it, it was almost nine o'clock and he was getting ready to call it a day, when there was a knock on his door. With him having done plenty of work for one evening anyway, he quickly packed his equipment away and opened it.
"Hi, Dawson. Can we talk for a moment?" Abby asked him, and as surprised as he was to see her there, at this time of the day no less, he couldn't refuse her either.
"What's up?" he asked Abby back, before closing the door behind her.
"Maybe, I should ask you that! You weren't playing with yourself, were you?" Abby teasingly asked, behind a wide smile.
"Abby ..."
"I'm just kidding! What were you doing?"
"Editing some of the footage, we shot yesterday".
"That sort of ties well into why I'm here. I have to hand in my resignation, when it comes to working on the movie. With finals coming up and me being so far behind in basically all subjects, that it isn't even funny anymore, I have to devote all of the time that I can to it" she told him rather sadly.
"Is fine, Abby. We're almost done with making the movie, anyway. Don't you worry about it!" he reassured her, making her smile a tiny bit.
"You've always been a nice guy, Dawson. I'll end up missing you, when I'll have to go and live with my aunt down in Kansas next year" she truthfully told him, before slumping down on his chair.
"You won't be staying here?" he almost stumblingly asked. Just a year earlier, a Capeside without Abby in it would have seemed almost too perfect, but now that he'd grown to like her, the thought took some getting used to.
"Where would I live? Grams is a sweet old lady, but I can't keep on taking advantage of her hospitality forever. My mom is less than a month away from spending the next many of them behind bars and with Joey coming home, there'll be no room for me at her house. I even tried calling my dad, to see if he'd take me in, but his new girlfriend apparently wasn't too into the idea of it. My aunt is my only logical choice left, even if it means leaving everything that I have here behind" she sullenly explained and as she did, his heart more and more went out to this poor girl, who was sitting in his comfy chair.
"We don't use our basement for much, except for storing old junk, most of which should have been thrown out years ago. Maybe, we could ask my folks and they'd let you make it a home of your own" he suggested and to his surprise, it made her give him a small hug.
"Don't you think that you need to ask your parents first, before you invite a girl, they barely know, to come and live in their home with them?"
"I'm sure that if I spin it the right way ..."
"You're very sweet to make me an offer like that, but we both know how that conversation will go. It's getting late, I should get home to Jen and Grams. See you tomorrow in school" she told him farewell, before leaving him alone with his thoughts once again.
One thing that had changed in them however, compared to prior to Abby's visit, was that it wasn't only his own problems, that were filling them anymore.
Jen had planned on taking an easy evening, where she could prepare in peace for her finals. When you live with Abby though, such a thing is close to being impossible and they'd ended up spending most of the evening watching and guessing along to game shows on TV, while they'd stuffed themselves with far too many pieces for their own good of Grams' famous apple pie, topped with plenty of vanilla ice cream, it goes without saying! She was slowly mentally preparing to go to bed, when their doorbell rang, an unusual occurrence for this time of the evening. Seeing as it probably wasn't for Grams, given that most of those she knew had already gone to bed, Jen rushed to the door, before Grams could remind her how late it was and that she needed her sleep, before school the day after.
One person, she hadn't expected to all of a sudden see at her door was Hannah, but it was nevertheless, who it was.
"Hannah. What are you doing here?" she nervously asked Hannah, who didn't look like she'd come there to exchange pleasantries.
"I have a bone to pick with you and the time for it is now!" a very angry Hannah replied.
Because she didn't want everyone else in the house to hear, Jen stepped out onto the porch and closed the door behind herself. Seeing as she was only wearing a pair of pajama bottoms, socks and a t-shirt though, it made her shudder for a second, when the chilly coastal evening air blew against her mostly naked arms.
"What this about?" Jen tried innocently asking Hannah, as if she didn't already know.
"You know! Why have you been trying to convince Chris, that I've been cheating on him?" Hannah accusingly asked, while also using classic body intimidation tactics, to really drive the point home, over the only slightly smaller Jen.
"Haven't you?" Jen asked back, standing her ground against this, the latest in the very short line of rivals in her life up to that point.
"Where's your evidence to this supposed adultery, then?"
"What were you doing riding around town with Warren?"
"We found out that we were heading in the same direction, so he asked if he could give me a lift and dropped me off on his way. Even if I'm already richer than ninety-nine percent of the population of this sorry town, I still have to wait until I turn sixteen and can get a driver's license, until I'm allowed to drive, you know?" Hannah fired back and it was hard, if not impossible for Jen, to come up with a proper comeback. At least, without admitting that she'd basically been illegally spying on Hannah. "And what's this about me and Dawson? Are you on some kind of much-needed prescription drugs, that you haven't been taking lately?"
"No, but ..."
"First of all, he already has a girlfriend, that he's crazy about! I don't have to sink low enough to go after guys, who are already taken, I'll have you know! I mean, why would I, when I can have any almost guy that I want here, practically at the snap of a finger?" Hannah continued, although she seemed to be heading off into bragging mode all of a sudden. Just as suddenly, Jen began getting an idea, that could just work.
"It isn't that easy! I tried without any luck for over half a year, before I found Jack".
"You can't be serious! I mean, with Warren, all it took ..." Hannah began bragging again, only too late realizing that she'd over spoken and busted herself.
"All it took was what, Hannah?" Jen asked and couldn't help be amused at seeing Hannah squirming, like she was now.
"You still can't prove anything!" Hannah almost yelled, before storming off over to the chauffeured car, that awaited her.
Even if she hadn't completely admitted it, this was as close to a confession, as Jen was likely to get from Hannah. As she watched one of Hannah's family's many cars drive off, thoughts of how she could use it to her own advantage kept running through her brain.
END OF CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR