Reaching Out

Robert Allen

January 7, 2024

                                The Embassy, San Antonio

                                                January 31, 2009

The theater emptied quickly while the end

credits rolled. In the dark I noticed another

person sitting alone, who also appeared to be

staying for the “whole thing,” and I moved

closer, asking “Why are we still here?”

She said she was on a mission to see all

the Oscar nominees this year. She did not

subscribe to the theory that there is already

enough sadness in the world and therefore

one should not add to it by watching

or making more sad movies. She said

she liked movies with depth and substance,

movies which depict characters whose

actions have consequences, and reveal

the consequences of those actions, because

that is the way life is. She liked movies

which are true to life, complicated the way

life is complicated. “Life has consequences.”

I like this person, I thought, and I asked her

about one specific scene in the final third

of the movie, where the two leads sit opposite

each other across a prison table and the woman

reaches out and touches the man’s hand:

“Did she want to resume their relationship?”

“No,” my new acquaintance said. “She

wanted him to go away, and she was making

sure of it.” When the woman in the movie

commits suicide, I had believed she was

distraught over his rejection of her, again,

after all those years. But the woman in the

theater had a different interpretation. “She

was planning to commit suicide, even before

he came to visit her.” When the credits came

to an end, this woman, once a stranger,

told me she enjoyed our talk. Then she rose

and walked out of my life, back into hers.

“It’s been six hours,” my wife said. “Where

have you been?” “I saw a movie, a downer.

You would not have liked it. But I met

another person who did.” “Oh?” she asked.

“Yes, I actually spoke to a stranger. One

who likes movies that make her sad.” “Get

her name?” “No.” “Was she pretty?” “It was

dark.” She looked me squarely in the eyes.

“Cold leftovers for you tonight, my friend.”

Robert Allen is retired and lives in San Antonio with his wife, two children, five antique clocks, and two cats. He has poems in Voices de la Luna, the discontinued Texas Poetry Calendar, and TPA. He loves cardio-boxing workouts, hates to throw things away, and facilitates Gemini Ink's in-person Open Writer's Lab.