Forced to walk the rest of the way, Charlie eventually gets to the bridge in front of the waterfall. The chunk of railing she’d taken out with the Volvo is now covered with police tape—clearly a symbolic gesture and not an adequate replacement.

The Volvo itself still sits in the grass beside the ravine. Although Robbie’s body had been removed and carried away hours earlier, Charlie gets a chill when she sees the car. It reminds her not only about how close she had come to death but about how little she knew Robbie.

And how, when pushed, she was capable of anything.

As she crosses the bridge, Charlie wonders if there had been warning signs that she missed. She assumes there were. She also assumes it’ll take years of therapy to figure out what they were.

That and maybe some little orange pills.

Charlie knows that the movies in her mind need to stop. She can’t spend parts of her life in a dream state. She suspects that’s one of the reasons she had so spectacularly misjudged Robbie. He was too handsome, too smart, too perfect for real life. The flaws were there, but she had overlooked them in favor of preserving the movie-version boyfriend she wanted instead of looking for the real-life one she needed.

That’s the tricky thing about movies. They can be wonderful and beautiful and amazing. But they’re not like life, which is wonderful, beautiful, and amazing in a different way.

Not to mention messy.

And complicated.

And sad and scary and joyful and frustrating and, very often, boring. Charlie knows the night she’s just had is the exception rather than the rule.

She reaches the Grand Am, which had been left unlocked. Sliding behind the wheel, Charlie grabs the keys Josh gave her and starts the car. She then grabs a cassette and pops it into the stereo. She presses play and a familiar song starts to blast through the speakers.

“Come as You Are.”

Charlie bobs her head in time to the music. She can’t help herself. It’s a great song.

As the music plays and the Grand Am’s engine hums and the sun rises over the mountains, Charlie shifts into gear.

Then she drives like hell.

Fade out.

Screening room.

The middle of the afternoon.

The middle of somewhere.

The lights come up on the audience of movers and shakers scattered throughout the theater. Charlie doesn’t know who half of them are or why they’re here or what they think of the movie they just watched. But she knows the important ones.

The director, a Tarantino wannabe wearing a thrift-store bowling shirt and a ten-thousand-dollar watch. He kept his tinted eyeglasses on the entire screening.

The actress, a few years older than Charlie was at the time but far prettier. So pretty that it was impossible to hide. Throughout the movie, she was radiant in her sadness, radiant in her madness, radiant in her rage. Rather than feeling jealous about that, Charlie’s delighted that a better, more beautiful version of herself now exists. The world will see it and, hopefully, think that’s what she was really like back then.

The leading men are the opposite. They just can’t compare to their real-life counterparts, even though both are bona fide teen idols. The bad boy on that hit WB show leaning into type as Josh and the good boy from that other hit WB show playing against it as Robbie. Having seen the real deals, Charlie can’t help but be unimpressed.

After a smattering of applause, the director stands and turns to her, rubbing his hands together and giving her a smile that’s meant to be warm but comes across as predatory. Charlie knows the score. He thinks exploiting her ordeal is going to solidify his career. Maybe it will. Charlie’s long given up on trying to understand modern moviegoers.

Her main focus now is preserving the past, which is part of her job duties as an archivist at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. She loves what she does. Getting to be a gatekeeper of honest-to-God film history is her dream job. She even gets to attend the Oscars every year, although way back in the cheap seats. And when she goes home at night, she leaves it all behind. No more movies in the mind for her. Those ended the night depicted in the real movie she just watched.

“What do you think?” the director says.

He wants her to say she loves it. Charlie can see it in his eyes, which blaze bright even behind those tinted lenses.

But here’s the rub: she doesn’t know how she feels.

Charlie’s issue with what she just watched is that it ironically does everything she normally likes about the movies. It’s life, made bigger, if not better. The trouble lies in the fact that it’s her own life that’s been enlarged. This isn’t the story of that night. Not the true one. And she has a hard time seeing past the liberties that were taken.

For one, it was spring. There was no chill, no picturesque snowfall, no red coat, although that Charlie can forgive because the color pops beautifully on-screen. Most of the locations were also invented or altered. There is no Olyphant University—that was changed because the real college wanted nothing to do with the production. The Skyline Grille was less of a diner and more of a truck stop, its Formica tables colored a sad brown, its booths worn dull by the backs of slumped patrons.

As for the Mountain Oasis Lodge, Charlie almost burst out laughing when it appeared on-screen. It was so over-the-top as to be absurd. The work of a production designer with a lot of money and a penchant for exposed timbers. The real lodge was a glorified motel—one central building with a smattering of cottages forming a horseshoe shape around the swimming pool.

But some of the embellishments she likes very much. The fire—which didn’t happen—added some much-needed punch to the third act. The waterfall—which didn’t exist—added a great backdrop to the scene of the sinking Volvo.

That, by the way, did happen. Right down to the satisfying click of the handcuffs around the steering wheel.

Yet Charlie’s favorite part of the movie was the denouement, mostly because it showed what could have been. Marge died at the Mountain Oasis Lodge. According to police, she climbed into the pool, fished out the gun, and pulled the trigger.

There was no hospital room conversation.

No unspoken truce between them.

No triumphant moment with a tooth.

Watching all of that on-screen made her wish it was true. In this instance, she doesn’t mind the Hollywood ending. In fact, she cherishes it.

Movie magic. It’s a palpable thing.

And Maddy would have loved it.

Which is why Charlie smiles back at the director and says, “I adore it.”

After that, she’s free to go.

The screening room is located in a downtown building and not a studio lot. A shame, really. Charlie loves it when she gets to visit them for her work. They’re magical and mundane at the same time. Factories where dreams get made.

The upside about her current location is that a Lincoln Town Car is waiting for her outside. Rather than climb into the back, she slides into the front passenger seat.

“Hey,” she says.

The driver flashes her a killer smile. “Hey yourself.”

That part of the movie, as improbable as it may seem, is true. Josh did let her borrow his car. Charlie drove it straight to Ohio and Nana Norma. When she returned the car two weeks later, Josh did indeed ask if she’d like to go to the movies.

Her answer was simple: “I never say no to a movie.”

They went. Josh paid for the tickets.

They went the next night. Charlie returned the favor.

By their third movie, Josh had learned that she preferred to sit in the middle of the sixth row. By the fourth, Charlie had learned that Josh liked to put Raisinets in his popcorn. By their fifth, she finally learned to start calling him Jake.

That was six years ago.

“How was your day?” she asks.

“Good,” he replies. “I got to take Sharon Stone to the airport.”

“How’d she look?”

“Like a Hitchcock blonde.”

“Exactly what I wanted to hear.”

He waits a beat before asking the question she knows is at the forefront of his thoughts. “And how was the movie?”

“Not bad. Not great, but certainly not terrible. It was a typical movie. But real life—” Charlie exhales a sigh of contentment as she reaches for her husband’s hand. “Real life is so much better.”

END CREDITS

While it would be appropriate to compare writing a novel to a long, lonely drive through darkness, it’s not quite the truth. Getting a book published is a team effort, and I have many people to thank for helping me reach my destination.

To Maya Ziv, for being a fantastic editor and, even more, all-around joy.

To Emily Canders, Katie Taylor, Christine Ball, and literally everyone at Dutton, for helping me do what I do. I’m so lucky to have found such an amazing creative home, and I’m astounded daily by all your enthusiasm and support.

To Michelle Brower, for being an incredible agent, a fierce advocate, and a wonderful human being.

To everyone at Aevitas Creative Management, for keeping the business side of things running like clockwork and letting me focus on the writing.

To Mike Livio, for, well, everything.