“Thanks. I have some.” He patted his pants pocket. “I always keep ‘em on hand when there’s a love scene to do,” he said, raising his eyebrows and grinning. He got up from the chair and stretched. Waves of muscles rippled down his back. I staggered back.

“By the way Jackie, I have my own trailer now. If you care to drop by, it’s the really big one, right next to yours.”

DISSOLVE TO:

INT. HOSPITAL ICU

EVENING

DAY 46

It is hollow and cold behind the waterfall. Wavy shapes slide past, whispering. A plastic and steel wet nurse pumps life into my lungs. I am drowning in air; compressed and earthbound. I long to go back to heaven or wherever the hell that was. My body feels bound, mummified as if I’m buried in sand, struggling to break loose before the tide comes in to claim me.

A figure looms up and passes his hand over the ventilator as if casting a spell. “Jackie!” Brett calls but the sound is muffled. He twists and hurls his body out of the room.

Daddy bursts into my cubicle and pushes past the waterfall. I want to warn him about the slippery rocks, but I am too late. He collapses. Nurses rush in but Daddy pushes them back with one arm while fumbling to pull the sheets from my body. The nurses guide, push, pull him away from my bed. The tide washes over me. I am floating down at the ocean’s base. Above, my father swims past a shimmering kelp bed of helping hands and out the door.

A hot Santa Ana blows the door open bringing Anna in a pink warm-up suit with an alligator emblem. A nurse stands guard at each padded shoulder for support. Her body looks compressed as if the space between her bones and organs has been sucked out.

Anna motions the nurses to leave her. She comes to my bedside and bends over, arms extending like the branches of a desert willow. My body cools in her shade. From somewhere a bell sounds, and nurses scurry down the hall. Anna loosens my sheets, reaches under, and presses something cold into my palm. Her gold cross floods my senses, and I am looking up into those dark eyes, safe again, lying on her unmade bed in the little room over the garage. With everything in me, I will my hand to squeeze hers, to let her see I am receiving this gift, this proof of that precious time we shared. Anna entwines the chain around my fingers so that the necklace will not fall away.

“No te vayas, Jackie. Don’t leave us.” She kisses my forehead. “Quedarse, okay? Stick around.”

PARAMOUNT STUDIOS

INT. SPACESHIP - DAY AND NIGHT

1995