The Jaybird Flies Free | MH Rewrite

Chapter 3

     The two week wait for the meeting with Tim went by agonizingly slow for Jay's taste. With no tapes to look through, there was nothing to do for the first time in weeks. So, Jay waited. It was awfully boring, but in between, he and Tim would talk. They never really said much, just the occasional 'how are you doing?' Jay wanted to say more but what was there to talk about? The two were just some college kids who happened to work on the same student film a couple years ago. Even then, they weren't friends. They rarely talked to each other on set, let alone off set. It bothered Jay but maybe it was for the best that he kept his distance. Chances were they would go their separate ways after the meeting.

The day of the meeting came around and Jay was left with no more time to think about what could go wrong. Grabbing his camcorder, which was fully charged and had a brand new tape, Jay put on his coat, stuffed his car keys in his pocket, double checked he had his phone, and left. He was supposed to meet up with Tim soon. It's a bit of a drive but soon he parks, gets out and heads toward the meeting. Jay opens the door and Tim is there, holding a notebook and taking a drink from the water fountain. Jay walks towards the man.

"Hey Tim." He greets.

"Hey, Jay right?" Tim responds. Jay nods and they both head into the room.

"So, ready for your screen test?" Jay asks.

" Yeah, I guess." They both go into the room and sit down, Jay setting up the camera as he does. "I mean you'll have to get me up to speed, since it's been a while." Tim fiddles with the paper as Jay makes sure the camera is focused.

"Yeah, I can do that. Here's the script for your screen test," Jay hands Tim a script.

"Alright, cool. Am I allowed to write on this or....?" Tim trails off.

"Yes, that's fine, it's yours to keep," Jay says,

pulling out a notebook and pen. "So, before we start the screen test, I wanted to ask you a little bit about the production before."

"You mean, before now?" Tim asks.

"Yeah."

"Like, locations or something, because I remember there were a few around here," Tim states.

"Well, more specifically about the director, Alex, Alex Kralie." Jay specifies.

"I don't really know much, I mean, he was a friend of Brian's so I didn't really talk to him that much. He just asked me to be apart of the cast for the sake of convenience."

"Oh, alright. Did you live near him? Relatively speaking,"

"Yeah, well I live next to Brian so he was kinda off," Tim answers.

"In terms of his directing, at the time, how was he?"

"He was a decent director, at first but it got to a point where it seemed he'd be yelling at us more than he actually was filming the movie. He'd just be really paranoid, waving his camera around all the time,"

"His camera, other than the camera he was using to film?" Jay questions further.

"Yeah, he had a handheld that he was carrying around with him all the time and a ton of tapes too, like bags in the back of his car," Tim explains.

"Okay," Jay coughs roughly. "How many tapes would you say?"

"Oh, way more than needed to film a project like this."

"Okay, well speaking of Alex, I don't know if you know this but he did actually move away after he ended production," Jay reveals. "Do you know what might have caused this or where he might have gone to?"