Midnight Movie

Wide shot of a throne room. The king and the princess are seated next to each other at the end of the hall. Gilded tapestries depicting the noble deeds of knights line the walls at an even interval. Their bodies are mostly obscured by large shields branded with their families’ coats of arms.

A crimson carpet ends at the feet of the king and starts at the doors, which suddenly swing open, thundering against the stone. The nobleman enters, accompanied by a ray of sunshine that makes his luscious blonde locks seem radiant. The sunlight extends about halfway into the room. The king’s face remains in darkness. The nobleman bows and greets the princess with a poem that is short but sufficiently specific.

Framed by a medium shot, he begins walking towards the thrones, careful to maintain a posture both befitting his high standing and accentuating his humility and submission before the king. Despite his best efforts, he appears to shrink with every step. Just as his illustrious coat disappears below the frame, the perspective returns to a wide shot. We now see that rather than shrink, the nobleman has been steadily sinking into the carpet.

He continues trying to wade towards the princess, but struggles to even lift his legs. Dark red mud spills over the sides of the carpet. The sunbeam fades away. A sudden gust of wind blows into the hall. The nobleman stumbles. He tries to get back up, but his arms are stuck. A medium close-up allows us to see his chest shivering as it heaves and falls, his dull hair covering his downturned face. It has begun to rain. The king rises.

His body has been swallowed by layers of cashmere and velvet. Encumbered by enumerable jewels and golden trinkets, he is an amorphous cone of power peaking in the needlepoint of his uncrowned head. As he extends his leg backwards, lightning strikes outside and illuminates his face for a split-second close-up shot, revealing empty eye sockets and a dangling jaw kept attached only by a thin string of decomposing skin. Then, his leg juts forward.

The king kicks the end of the carpet. It begins to roll itself up like the tongue of a frog. The nobleman is overrun and wrapped up by the fabric. His screams attain a curious vibrato effect as he is spun towards the door. The princess jumps up and waves after her adored hero with a white handkerchief, but her encouraging well-wishes are drowned out by the rolling thunder of the lightning strike from before, which has only now reached the throne room. The nobleman is thrown out into the storm, and the doors snap shut behind him.

***

The window front was being used as a film screen. Tonight's showing was some bizarre medieval drama, a foreign movie that looked like it had been made ages ago on a budget in the triple digits. The voices on the phone provided what they assured me was an accurate simultaneous translation as part of the 'deluxe entertainment package' I had never ordered. It seemed more like ad-libbing to me:

"Nyeah! I am the king! Look at my fancy clothes! He he he..."

"I own many hotels. My hotels provide the best service. I am the king of service. Hihi."

...and so on. I had zoned out long ago. The fear that had earlier held me in a chokehold had given way to resignation. With nothing better to do, I let my gaze wander through the room. Despite the circumstances, there was something nostalgic about it. Mimiko and I had spent our honeymoon lazing about in a room just like this, in a hotel in one of the few remaining quiet corners of Hawaii. The owner was an uncle of hers who had emigrated after the war. He cut us an amazing deal. We couldn't have afforded anything else, anyway...

Our fellow guests were a regularly exchanged roster of travelling businessmen. We'd take our sweet time with breakfast while watching them run into the dining hall, scarf down some eggs, burn their lips on the terrible coffee and rush back out, their ties flapping in the breeze. I pitied them back then. Nowadays...

What did it feel like, lying next to her on that bed...? Her long black hair fanned out beneath her, a few strands loosely coiled around my arm, our hands... 

The sensation refused to return. It had been too long.

"Hey!"

The second voice screamed into my ear and ripped me out of my sweet memories. I realised that the movie had already ended. Credits rolled over the window front.

"Aren't you going to eat? What are you waiting for, huh!? This wasn't easy to get up here, you know..."

The voice ended its tirade with an indignant pop. I sighed.

"What...?"

A crackle.

"As part of your deluxe package, you have been provided with refreshments. Please turn to your right to partake of our house chef's finest."

So now there was a chef involved...? I did as I was told and found that a food trolley had somehow been parked right next to the bed. Of course. Looking at it brought up memories of the hospice where my father had spent the last two weeks of his life. All those meds he was taking had finally stopped being enough for him to keep working through the pain. He complained about everything, but the food was a particular sore spot. Somehow, I had a premonition that I'd soon know how he'd felt. I lifted the lid with some hesitation.

Beneath it was a beautifully plated stack of dry instant ramen bricks.

"What."

The second voice was laughing wholeheartedly.

"That's right, boy. We went all out for you. Now, eat! Eat, won't you...?"

The phone cord around my neck tightened once again, suggesting what might happen if I didn't heed their command. I reluctantly picked up the chopsticks and split them.

"Go ahead..."

I began poking at the brick on top. It was easily made to crumble. Pieces of uncooked noodle landed on the carpet, looking like curled-up maggot corpses. I took a deep breath and tried to consider the situation rationally. I estimated that my best shot at getting any of the noodles down my throat would be to break off a larger slice and cram it in whole. It took some finagling. As soon as my mouth had closed behind the chunk, I knew I had made a mistake.

The noodles felt awful in my mouth, a tasteless, uneven slab scratching against its roof and sucking up all the fluids it could provide. There was no way for me to swallow them in this state. Sweat leaked out of every pore on my body. I felt a strong impulse to reach into my mouth and pull out the chunks, which I barely managed to keep in check by repeatedly hammering my leg against the bedframe. After a gruelling couple of minutes, my saliva had softened the noodles enough for me to get them down. I swallowed multiple times and felt a lump in my throat. Another horrible, wet popping noise came through the receiver.

"Goooood, good... You've taken the first step towards recovery... Keep eating, and you will grow big and strong!"

'Recovery'?  I still had a chance at recovery...? My father certainly didn't have one, back then. He knew he was done after his frist step beyond the hospice doors. Still, every day, the nurses would roll up to him with their carts and try their hardest to get him to eat. It was like getting a dog to swallow medicine. His gown was always covered in stains that retold his thrashing battles against the hands that fed him. Litres and litres of petrol to keep a broken-down car up and stuttering...

He died cursing us out.

His boss showed up at the funeral. With tears in his eyes, he called my father a 'paragon of diligence and commitment to the company'. I believed him and his tears. Even though my father would have never discussed such a thing with me, I was pretty sure that he would have wanted to die at his desk. But, deep down... 

Deep down, I liked to believe that there was a time when he would have wanted to die next to his wife.

A chance at recovery... 

I sniffled. The second voice popped in, clearly growing impatient.

"What's the damn holdup? Eat already!"

The ramen brick was struck by a single drop of warm water.

"N... No..."

"What!?"

What had started as a steady drip of tears quickly escalated into an outright waterfall. The faucet had been cranked up. Nothing was holding back the flood anymore.

"No! NO!! I refuse to eat this! I don't care anymore!! Take your beloved chef by the hand and jump off the roof together, all three of you! Just... Just leave me alone already!!"

The line went silent. No crackle, no pop, for the first time in what felt like hours. Just when I thought they might have finally given up, the second voice returned, louder than ever:

"WHAT AN ENTITLED, UNGRATEFUL LITTLE... WHY, YOU...! YOU JUST WAIT..."

Suddenly, the receiver unwound itself from my neck and leapt towards the armchair. It landed on the collar of my shirt, where my tie usually sat. The suit began to peel itself off the chairback. The sight was so confounding that the sobs got caught in my throat: Right in front of my bespectacled eyes, my clothes got up and began lumbering towards me.