The Notebook in the Theater

Jeez. What a fucking mess. More than usual. I was looking to get out early. That’s not happening. I haven’t seen this movie yet, though I have observed the crowds leaving each showing. Very strange.They seem angry, confused. Never seen anything like it before. And it is packed. Show after show is full. The mess they make is more than all the other movie showings in our theater.  I guess that this movie makes people want to throw things, maybe at the screen, maybe just to express their angst at what is being shown. I heard some people, halfway through their popcorn, simply dump it on the floor so they have an excuse to leave their seats. A few minutes reprieve. They can get free refills from the concession stand in the lobby. We offer free refills on the bigger buckets of popcorn. So bigger messes. 

The credits are still rolling; there is no music track playing. Just an odd humming sound. I don’t think it is the subwoofers powering down. Actually, maybe that is the music track or more like a soundtrack of people moaning.   This was a late showing and so it is the last auditorium to be cleaned.  And it is only me. Some of my co-workers who have seen the movie refuse to help clean it.I do not ask why. They do not want to tell me anything since I have not seen the movie. It is part of our code. No hints whatsoever about a movie beyond the usual marketing with the famous statement, based on a true story. Even a single innocuous statement could reveal more than it should about a movie plot or ending. Though, in this case, sometimes I hear them mutter “Never again”.

I have a game plan for each cleaning, after a quick review of the mess pattern in the auditorium.Tonight is different. I could not figure out if it mattered where I started or how I started. So, I simply started in the front row, the simplest strategy when confronted with complexity. The front row oddly had the least amount of trash strewn around. Maybe the proximity to the screen has a paralyzing effect on the movie goers. If I could clean the first few front rows quickly, then I would use that momentum to clean the reminder of the rows. It is disheartening sometimes if after half an hour, I have only cleaned one row. I start cleaning. 

As disheartening as the mess is, it is even more fascinating the things that people drop aside from the food, candy and drinks. Sometimes, we will collect the items and place them in the lost and found bin.Sometimes, we keep them. The items we find could be wedding rings, maybe the popcorn grease makes their fingers slippery, to unused burner phones to IDs and, for this movie, single sneakers. Single sneakers. Ha.Can you imagine people walking out with one shoe and not noticing it? Go figure.

I was nearly finished with the first three rows when under seat C13 I noticed a notebook. It was a small notebook, hardcover. The cover was deep purple, all leather, smooth surface, with a built-in book marker. Don’t remember ever finding a notebook. So, I opened it. 

The handwriting was not too hard to read, a combination of cursive and regular lettering. Each page started with a time and date. 9:30 pm Saturday. 7:15 pm Sunday. The entries covered the last 10 days. At first glance, each entry was longer than that of the previous day. The entry for the first day, Saturday 9:30 pm, was simply “I can never unsee this”. I had a lot of cleaning to do and yet this phrase primed me to want to see more. What’s 10 more minutes of reading, I thought.Not like I was getting out of this godforsaken theater when I wanted. Anyway, I was curious see if this daily journal was just some random thoughts or was the author going to let me know what she meant on this first day of her, I assume it was a woman, a young women’s, journal. Maybe it was the handwriting. Or maybe just that guys rarely write down anything, especially a movie experience. So looking at the first entry, for the Sunday 7:15 pm time slot, the entry read “why am I back? The movie is about to start“.  Wait a minute!Did she say movie is about to start?My gosh, is this a diary of this woman’s viewing of a movie over 10 straight days? This particular movie? Unbelievable if it is. What’s even stranger than wanting to see this particular movie again, and again, is that she decided to come armed with a notebook. 

Now I am sitting down.Not sure I was ready to read on, not having seen the movie, did not want any spoilers. I sensed trouble coming and felt a deep compulsion to know. Maybe a sense of duty as an employee of the theater. Nah, that’s bullshit. But I was oddly worried. About what I did could not tell. So I read on.

Next page, the entry for Monday 9:30 pm: “Looking around, I have a sense that some of the people here are seeing the movie again, like me. Why?” Ok.That is weird if true. Rarely have I seen someone come to see a movie more than once in a short time. Usually, they have seen the movie with some friends and then some days or weeks later feel forced to watch it with their spouse or significant other. The next entry was for Tuesday 2:00 pm. Wonder if she skipped work to see the movie for a third time? Or maybe she did not want to come out of the theater when it was dark outside. The entry for this date read “Here I am again and though I have full memory of the movie, can’t say that my understanding of what I saw was clarified. I have not slept well since the first night.” It seems she brought the notebook only to record what she is thinking before the movie starts. So maybe I will not learn anything specific about the movie. A bit disappointing. 

Next entry is for Wednesday 7:15 pm: “The scene on the island is very disturbing. I can understand the realism that the director wanted the movie to have, but sometimes, some things are better shown indirectly. Or maybe in this case, it had to be shown in its raw form. How are the actors not traumatized? “ Now she is writing during the movie. 

Next entry is for Thursday 4:45 pm: “So much cruelty.So many lives destroyed. All by a few people. Why is that acceptable?” 

Entry for Friday 7:15 pm: “I am fucking pissed. I am angry. And yet, I also feel responsible. My sleep is getting worse. The dreams are sometimes of me on the island, experiencing some of the worst things. And then I am suddenly changing perspective, like I am floating in the upper corner of this room, watching what is going on.I am voiceless and invisible.  It is awful. Why do these things happen on our planet?” 

The entry for Thursday 7:15 pm: “I just noticed that my eyes are mostly closed during some of the more horrific scenes. I also brought ear plugs this time, they help muffle the screaming. Briefly looking around, I can tell who the other repeat viewers are. Their eyes are also closed. They know what is going to happen. Yet we are all here. Why? I was thinking that maybe we come thinking, hoping that the outcome will be different. That maybe we can stop it this time.  The lady next to me is subbing.” 

The entry for Friday 4:45 pm: “I just noticed something. I do not think that it is the first time it is happening, but it is my first time noticing it.  People are throwing stuff, mostly their popcorn and candy, during certain scenes. Though I saw a few unfamiliar objects flying through the air, too. Oddly, no one is yelling or screaming, no booing, but I can feel the tension, a building anger, in the auditorium. Though I am starting to notice things in the movie I did not before.Aside from the perpetuators, there a lot of people standing around, observing and not doing anything about what is going around them. Clearly, they are complicit, and yet they stand there watching, almost like us, spectators of this gruesome show.” 

The entry for Saturday 9:30 pm read: “Now I know why I kept coming. I am complicit. Somehow, I feel like those people in the movie just standing around.What am I supposed to do with this feeling? It’s odd that I know many people who have seen this movie. I see one person I know now sitting two rows ahead. Yet, I have not heard any discussions. We are all silent both within the theater and on the outside. I want to yell now in the middle of this full auditorium during the same horrific scenes that have been shown over and over in this auditorium and many other auditoriums over the weeks. Obviously I am not the only one disturbed. Yet, I cannot blame others since what am I doing about it? Trying to assuage my guilt by subjecting myself over and over to this movie. I cannot live the same life I did before seeing this movie.  If I cannot do anything about it, then maybe that leaves me no other choice.” 

That was the last entry. Wow. I am paralyzed in this theater seat. My mind quickly starts to think about the last sentence. I jump up and head out to find my manager.