Rayne & Delilah's Midnite Matinee Page 3

  It’s a very niche crowd.

  Most of all, I think it’s people who love to be reminded that sometimes you do your best and you come up short, but there’s still a place in the world for people like that. People like them. It might be 11:00 on a Saturday night on a public access station in Topeka, Kansas, but it’s a place. It’s comforting to know that you don’t have to be excellent to not be completely forgotten. Maybe it’s people who feel like the world is leaving them behind.

  Maybe it’s people who simply want to remember a time when they were happier and their lives were easier. That’s why I would watch.

  We do the best we can. I figure because TV is what I want to do with my life, I might as well do it right. Also, Arliss gives us exactly two takes before he deems it “good enough for access” (short for “public access”) and then it airs in all of its broken glory. We hear this phrase a lot.

  We discovered this the hard way one night when both Delia and I were loopy from lack of sleep and hopped up on sugar and caffeine, and I accidentally said “grost” instead of “ghost” during the second take on a segment. We tried to keep it together. Delia shuddered with silent laughter, turning red, her hand over her mouth and nose, tears streaming from her eyes. I tried to keep talking, but my voice started to wobble and tip like a drunk tightrope walker, and we both lost it completely. For a solid minute, we laughed so hard we couldn’t breathe, making a “cut” motion across our necks while Arliss glowered at us, shaking his head grimly, mouthing Good enough for access. This only made us laugh harder. The segment ended with both of us in fetal position on the floor, racked with laughter. It aired like that. Good enough for public access, indeed. Yeah, we got letters.

  Delia removes her septum piercing. We fit our vampire fangs over our canines, perform last-minute touch-ups on each other’s makeup, and take our seats.

  Arliss gets the lighting right and stands behind the camera, counting down on his raised fingers. “And we’re rolling in five…four…three…two…one.”

  “Gooooo­ooooo­d evening, boys and ghouls, zombies and zombettes, witches and warlocks, this is Midnite Matinee, and we are your hosts, Rayne Ravenscroft…”

  “And Delilah Darkwood,” Delia says.

  “How are you doing tonight, sister?”

  “Well, sis, I’m feeling pretty great considering I’m two hundred years old.”

  “You don’t look a day over a hundred and eighty.” We pause. Arliss will insert a rim-shot sound effect here. “So, Delilah, what do we have for our viewers this week?”

  We both pause. This is where Arliss will insert a peal of thunder sound effect.

  The twins and Lawson stand behind Arliss as he works the camera. The twins look deathly bored. Or merely vacant. Hard to tell with them. Lawson, however, wears a childlike expression of wonder, as though he’s watching the filming of a show about people getting punched in the nuts or whatever MMA guys enjoy watching. I guess if you’ve never seen a TV show being filmed, even ours is impressive.

  I get it. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t get a rush every time I was on this side of a camera. Ever since I was old enough to remember, I’ve been fascinated by strangers on TV. How they’re beamed out to the world and become part of people’s lives. How they connect with millions. I knew I wanted that. Aside from a hot two weeks when I was nine and I wanted to be a marine biologist, I’ve never wanted to be anything else.

  It’s nice to know your thing.

  “Folks, tonight’s movie is the 1972 classic Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things, directed by none other than Bob Clark, who you may remember from a little film called A Christmas Story,” I say.

  “You’ll shoot your eye out, kid!” Josie says.

  “That’s the one, Rayne! Boy, you’ve seen a lot of Christmas movies for a two-hundred-year-old vampire.”

  “I’m a Christian vampire, Delilah.” (We’ll get letters for that one.)

  “Anyway, folks, this movie is a little different, as you’ll soon see. No leg lamps, Red Ryder BB guns, or Ovaltine here. Instead, we have a motley crew of actors wearing some pretty amazing seventies garb, who go to an island off the coast of Florida, where they perform a ritual to raise the dead. And it goes…well…watch and see.” We pause for Arliss to insert a boing sound or a descending slide whistle.

  “I bet it’s called Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things for a reason. So, Delilah, if children aren’t supposed to play with dead things, can they play with us?”

  “What do you mean, Rayne?”

  “Well, we’re technically undead.”

  “Good point! The movie’s title specifically says dead things, not undead things.”

  “So I guess children can play with us!”

  “Sure,” I say. “Of course, we’ll suck their blood if we get the chance, so it still might not be the best idea.”

  We leave space for Arliss to insert more comical sound effects. We know our show is goofy. We’re working within a tradition here. Elvira. Tales from the Crypt. Vampira. Svengoolie. Zacherle. Dr. Gangrene. Your humor has to be a mirror of the movies you show: it can’t be too good. It can’t be too mean-spirited. You can poke fun at the films, but you have to fundamentally respect them and honor that your show might be the first and last time people see that movie—something that someone poured their heart and soul into.

  Arliss keeps track of the time, and he gives me the signal to wrap up the intro.

  “All right, wolf men and wolf ladies. Without further ado…Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things.”

  We let several seconds of silence pass so there’s time to fade out on us and fade into the movie. I spend these seconds doing what I always do: praying that he sees. Somehow. Some way. Somewhere. Topeka, Macon, Greenville, Des Moines, Spokane, Fargo, Little Rock. Wherever he is. I can’t tell you what I hope he does if he sees. I don’t know if I want him to regret leaving. If I want him to come back. If I want him to be proud.

  All I know is that I want him to see.

  Arliss claps. “What’s next?”

  I nod at the twins and Lawson. “Doggy wedding, and then dance party so these guys can leave.”

  Tater the beagle looks decidedly unhappy to be wearing a skirt and blouse. Behind me, Buford whimpers as Delia pulls his suit on him. We also make him wear a bat costume sometimes. He hates it.

  “Is Tater okay with us taking him for this segment?” I ask.

  “He’s pretty chill.” Lawson kneels beside us and scratches Tater’s tummy. Lawson smells like bodywash from neon orange bottles that are all AXE XXXXXXTREME ATOMIC FRESHBLAST MOUNTAIN ICE ODORPUNCH and also menthol-y kicked-in-the-face bruise medicine, with top notes of WD-40. It’s not an appealing-sounding combination, and yet it works, strangely.

  I lead Tater by the collar over to the set. Delia has the container of chicken livers in one hand and Buford’s collar in the other. Buford whines at the suit he’s wearing and tries to get at the chicken livers. His normally sad eyes always convey utter despair at these times. Kill me, they plead. Even if it’s painful.

  Delia and I get set up on the floor, and Arliss takes his place behind the camera.

  “This segment goes after a part in the movie where the acting troupe digs up a corpse in a suit and takes it back to this cabin on the island, and then they stage a wedding between the corpse and the leader of the troupe,” Delia says.

  Arliss stares and blinks.

  “Oh, and we’ll need you to perform the dog wedding,” I say.

  His face grows stonier.

  “I know,” Delia says. “Your life is very hard.”

  “Tight shot on the dogs,” I say.

  Arliss fiddles with the camera. “Not my first rodeo, sweet pea. Rolling in…five…four…three…two…one.”

  I grip Buford behind his front legs and make him gesture (I hope PETA never see
s this). I speak in a deep, comically broad Southern accent. “Why, I say, aren’t you the most lovely creature? My name is Colonel Buford T. Rutherford B. Hayes. What’s yours?”

  Delia holds Tater by his front legs and makes him cover his mouth with a paw coyly. She giggles and speaks in a high-pitched, equally horrific Sookie–from–True Blood Southern accent. “Why, sir! How you do flatter! My name is…” Delia looks to be racking her brain. “What name did we decide on for her?” she whispers in her normal voice.

  Delia can never keep our character names straight in skits. “Magnolia P. Sugarbottom,” I mutter back, trying not to move my lips, like a ventriloquist.

  “Magnolia P. Sugarbottom,” Delia says, returning to Sookie voice.

  I put the container of chicken livers on the floor and use Buford’s paw to slide it over to Tater. “Ms. Sugarbottom, I own the largest chain of chicken liver restaurants in the world, and I offer you some of my finest chicken livers in exchange for your paw in holy matrimony.”

  Tater whines and licks at the container. “Colonel, I would be honored to be Mrs. Magnolia P. Rutherford B. Hayes. Do you promise that you can handle me at my worst, so that you deserve me at my best, which is also quite, quite bad?”

  “Ms. Sugarbottom, I promise.”

  “So you know, Colonel, I’m super hard to deal with almost always. I’m really a giant pain in the rear.”

  “I will love and cherish you anyway and apply a healing salve to my buttocks.”

  “Then I shall wed you this very moment, Colonel, before you can change your mind.”

  I make Buford wave to the camera. “Wonderful! Simply wonderful! Oh, Professor? Professor Von Heineken?”

  One guess how Arliss picked the name Professor Von Heineken. He put exactly as much work and thought into it as he puts into every aspect of the show.

  Arliss pulls his goggles down over his eyes and ambles onto the set, looking exactly as happy as you’d expect a grown man forced to perform a dog marriage on public access television would look. He’ll cut in some wedding music that Jesmyn recorded for us.

  Arliss clears his throat. He’s supposed to do a German accent, but he always forgets. (We get letters; he doesn’t care.) “Okay, uh, do you, Buford, take…”

  “Magnolia,” Delia says. Arliss is even worse at remembering character names than Delia is.

  “Yep. Her. To be your lawfully wedded wife, so help you God?”

  “For as long as you both shall live,” Delia says.

  “For as long as you both shall live, so help you God?”

  “Professor! You gotta get the words right or it’s not legally binding,” I say.

  “Oh no,” Arliss says. “Anyway, I now pronounce you…dog and dog wife, I guess. You may sniff the bride’s butt or really whatever you’re into. Just go nuts. Who cares?”

  Delia and I clap and push Buford and Tater at each other. They whimper and turn their heads. We let them go. Tater runs off set. Buford sort of melts to the floor like a scoop of ice cream licked off the cone onto hot asphalt. Arliss slinks back to the camera. We clap until we see Arliss signal that he’s not focused on just the dogs anymore.

  I make a great show of wiping my eyes and sigh. “I always cry at weddings, Delilah.”

  “Me too, Rayne. I love happy endings. But, viewers at home, to see if our friends—the children who play with dead things—have a happy ending, stay tuned!”

  “And cut!” Arliss walks from behind the camera, grabs the container of chicken livers, opens it, pops two in his mouth, drops a couple on the ground for Buford, who looks the most excited he’s looked all day, and takes a couple to Tater, who eats them out of his hand.

  “I’ve never attended a dog wedding before,” Lawson says to me as I come off set, leading Tater by the collar.

  “And?”

  “It was very romantic. I always hoped Tater would find the right someone.”

  This guy is a massive goofball, but a good sport. “You ready for your big dance scene?” I ask.

  “I have no idea what I’m doing.”

  “Dude, none of us do.”

  “Come on. You’re amazing.” He nods at Delia, who’s handing a CD to a decidedly glum Arliss. “Y’all are both great. But you especially.”

  I start to respond, but Arliss cuts me off. “Dance party. Let’s go.”

  I wave for the twins and Lawson to come. The twins whoop and pull their skeleton masks into position and run on set, shoving our chairs and end table aside to make room. They jump in place, slapping the sides of their heads, psyching themselves up.

  Lawson does a couple of quick stretches followed by a few high kicks. Nothing else about him is that impressive, but he moves well—quick and strong. “That’s good,” I say. “Incorporate some of the karate moves.”

  Delia and I take our positions; the twins and Lawson are just off set, out of the shot.

  Arliss goes over to the light switch and cues up the music on the laptop and speakers we’ve set up. “This music is royalty free, right?”

  “Yep,” I say. “And you better believe it sounds like it.”

  Delia and I stand there for a moment to give Arliss a space to fade us in.

  “Wow, Delilah, this movie sure is a spooky romp!” I say with exaggerated cheer.

  “Yes, it is, Rayne. I think—”

  Arliss begins flicking the lights on and off. Delia and I look around wildly. Arliss will insert a spooky cackle sound effect.

  “Delilah?” I say, voice quavering theatrically.

  “Rayne?”

  “I think we’re about to take a trip…to the bone zone!” We say the last part in unison. We pull our capes around ourselves and retreat off separate sides of the set. Arliss begins flickering the lights to simulate dance floor lights and starts the music. Imagine the most low-rent, dollar-store dance music you can. Nope, worse. It’s filled with weird air-horn sounds and sped-up chipmunk voices and this flatulent bass that sounds like stomping your bare foot in a bucket of dead fish. Given the choice, I would prefer to listen to the screaming of the damned.

  Lawson hesitates. The twins shove him onto the set, where he stands frozen for a second while the twins take formation behind him. The twins begin dancing wildly. Pelvic thrusts. Pantomiming drawing revolvers from invisible holsters, shooting them, and blowing away the smoke. They jump at each other and chest-bump. Lawson finally gets into the groove a little bit, but then all at once he starts this series of alternating high, strong kicks. The twins whoop and holler encouragement. We make (what I assume is) eye contact, because he kicks harder and higher, jumping and spinning, when I give him a thumbs-up. He’s doing great, especially considering he’s wearing a black robe and a mask.

  He’s clearly an inspiration because behind him, one of the twins cups his hands for the other twin to step on to try the backflip again. The flipping twin over-rotates, lands on his heels, falls, and rolls backward off camera. Someday one of them is going to crack open his head and flood the studio with whatever noxious gas is inside.

  Lawson looks back, motions for the remaining twin to move, and then executes a textbook backflip, landing perfectly and doing a jumping spin kick. We cheer silently.

  There’s no reason Dad shouldn’t love our show the way he loved the Dr. Gangrene, Zacherle, and Svengoolie episodes he watched while I was growing up. I mean, we have people doing karate moves and backflips. We’re not terrific, but we’re unterrific in the ways he always loved.

  Lawson comes off set flushed and glowing. He nods quickly to me, and then looks to Josie for approval. She gives him a thumbs-up, and he beams.

  Another dude who loves Josie. Color me shocked. I’d comfortably estimate that of guys who meet Josie and me simultaneously—and who are in the mood for love—approximately one hundred percent go for Josie. Almost all have been guys I didn’t care about
at all, like Lawson. But I choose Josie over any dumb boy, and plus, I’m used to rejection. Maybe that’s what they see in me. Even more than Josie’s flawless teeth and Scarlett Johansson voice and long, curly hair that’s the color of a jar of dark honey in front of a candle and the couple of inches of height she has on me, I think it’s that they can see there’s nothing with her they need to fix. No baggage. Whereas with me? Mechanic’s special. No one wants the sad girl. Whatever.

  “All right, next segment,” Arliss says. He turns to the twins and Lawson and motions with his thumb toward the door. “Leave.”

  They drop their costumes in the tub.

  “Can I stay and watch?” Lawson asks. He keeps glancing in Josie’s direction. “I’ve never seen a TV show filming.”

  “Nope. Too distracting. This job requires tremendous concentration and care,” Arliss says, his voice dead.

  “But we were here during—”

  “Too. Distracting.”

  “Okay. Sorry.”

  The twins scurry for the door. They’ve never once been interested in staying a minute longer than necessary.

  Lawson waves. “It was nice to meet y’all. Good luck with the show. When’s it on?”

  “Saturday nights at eleven,” I say.

  “Cool. Bye, Delia. Bye, Josie,” he says. “I guess we’re in-laws or something now that our dogs are married, right?” He blushes and laughs awkwardly.