The laughter swelled to an unbearable thunder and then stopped, as always. It had been twenty-six days when his watch broke and he stopped keeping count. The little notches in the table told him that. Lifetimes filled the void between then and now.

His mouth moved up and down as he said nothing. Lips parted and hands gestured throughout the room; smiles grew, eyebrows furrowed, heads nodded up and down, up and down. It was a silent exhibit of pantomimes.

Except for center-stage. The couch. Where the Main Cast was currently sitting, talking about their surface level, manufactured problems.

“That’s when he told me I was supposed to dust the keyboard, not wash it!” James said. The laughter rose again. Ben cringed against it, silently. Everything he did was without sound.

“Gosh, I’m such an idiot!”

“Well, it could be worse,” Allen quipped. He was the quipper. “He could have been your boss and not just the guy who pays you!”

Raucous laughter exploded, booming from the walls and the ceiling. Ben wanted to plug his ears, but never that. Never that. God no.

Instead he grabbed his empty coffee mug and raised it to his lips. He turned his wrist, tilting the mug further, as if enjoying a slow pull from his beverage. He waited what felt to him an appropriate amount of time for someone to hold a mug to their lips. He couldn’t remember anymore. The inside of the mug smelled like nothing. No essence of old coffee stains; not the sterile, warm smell of the dishwasher—not even the blank, cold smell of clean ceramic. Absolutely nothing.

It had been twenty-six days plus one infinite void of time unmeasured since he’d had a drink.

“At least you have someone who pays you,” Lisa added from her spot on the comfy yellow chair, next to the couch. “My boss hasn’t written a check that’s cleared her entire life.”

“Who’s your boss, Lisa?” Michelle asked.

“I am.”

The Cast smiled and laid their heads back as the laughter rose and rose. They looked at each other and shook their heads in amusement at their aloof friend.

Ben, at his spot above them, in the background, fought the urge to cry.

Later on, the lights dimmed, as always. Four of the six Main Cast members had exited through the front door, and oh! what a time that was. One had to be especially convincing if you were apt to be in frame. With the young, lively bodies that made up the Cast darting past them, rushing for the door—surely, always, pursued by the programmed laughter of the crowd—they had to make certain their faces were believable. I’m twenty minutes into a riveting conversation, his face said; my story is approaching crescendo said her gesticulations! Please, you can trust me, divulge; I listen without consternation, said the gently serious face of the man across the table.

The other two Cast members had simply disappeared. Dissolved into smiling nothingness as soon as the others were outside the store. And then the laughing faded, the lights dimmed, and the story continued elsewhere—perhaps Allen’s apartment, or the deli around the corner, or in Lisa’s car.

A communal sigh escaped the remaining mouths, those of the perpetually quiet. The girl in the corner stood and stretched. She had been by the window last time, now the corner. They didn’t move, they were moved. The man hunched over the counter shook with a sob. No noise escaped him and he did not turn, so there was no way to know if there were tears. Were they allowed tears? Ben was not sure. He decided he would make himself cry, then realized he didn’t remember how.

The older woman that sat alone at the high-top set her book down next to her empty tea cup and laced her fingers together, stretched them longingly toward the ceiling. There were no words on any of the pages, Ben saw. Just a prop with a pretty cover.

The young guy started to talk. Quietly. They were allowed that, usually. So long as they didn’t distract Him from the Main Cast and their doings. He, the young guy, was always the one to start conversation; he dipped his toes into the chill, unclear water of their environment, and always managed to coax someone into joining him. He was always wearing athletic clothes. A tank top and gym shorts, joggers and a thin hoodie, Nike sneakers, Adidas sneakers, Nike headbands, a Fitbit, a duffel bag with two tennis rackets—he was always sweaty, always just finished with some exertion, even if he never left the room.

Ben realized none of them had names. They were not allowed names. Even he was beginning to stop thinking of himself as Ben.

Across from Ben was the pretty girl. Sometimes they were sat at the same table, other times she was out of sight. Turning your head too far during scenes was not allowed. Too conspicuous. Too attention-drawing. They’d talked a few times—actually talked, with words—but he knew very little about her. But what was there to know about anyone, really? They didn’t have jobs, or friends, or families, or pets, or apartments. You couldn’t very well ask someone where they were from when they themselves hadn’t the slightest idea of where they were from or even where they were now or how they’d gotten there. Mostly they just mumbled to hear the sounds of their own voices.

“I like that,” Ben said, careful to keep his voice as low as the tide around them.

“Like what?” She asked. Her eyes were gray.

“That blue thing they have you in. The sweater-thing.” He tugged on his own sleeve, unconsciously pantomiming, acting with his hands as he’d been taught. Ben looked at his own arm as he did, realized he was wearing blue, also.

“Oh. Thanks, I guess.”

He smiled wanly. She looked at the table.

Laughter, fainter than before, echoed somewhere above them. So, they’re in one of the apartments, Ben thought. Probably talking about James’s failed relationships, or Michelle’s suspended license. Unpaid parking tickets. The silent killer.

The quiet babble in the coffee shop stopped dead at the sound. Everyone looked up. They

waited. Quietly, distantly, conversation continued. They untensed.

Ben tapped his fingers on the wood. The tips made a soft drumming sound which he relished. Sometimes all he wanted to do was just make noise, as much noise as he was capable. But never that. God no.

More laughter from above them, seeping through the floorboards. He wondered how much longer until they came back. They were always in the coffee shop, always on the couch. Even now it sat empty. None dared to get up and sit in it while they waited for their next scene. Because there was no warning. One moment they were sitting in the gray, lightless coffee shop, whispering among one another, stretching their necks or their backs or cracking the knuckles; the next they were moved—teleported, almost—to a new seat, somewhere else in the coffee shop, and the Cast was back. Sometimes they came in through the door, sometimes they materialized on the couch and surrounding chairs, there was no way to know when or how they’d come. But one had to be ready. Always.

He spoke, thinking it might be a while before he found himself seated with the pretty girl again.

“It goes really well with your eyes. They reflect the color. It’s nice.”

“Don’t.” She said.

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t do that. You know. Stop.” Her voice was bitter, biting. She stared directly into his eyes now.

“Why not?”

“Because what good can come of it? Just stop it. Don’t bother. You know we can’t.”

That was true. He did know, he just couldn’t help it. Even if she liked him too, where could they go? They weren’t allowed to leave unbidden. The Director moved the pieces, set the scenes, wrote the script. No one else got any influence. And even if He did set them up in a room together, alone, what then? Did he even have parts anymore, down there? He reached down to feel but the material of his pants was too hard and immovable. Did she? Ben couldn’t remember the last time he’d jerked off. He still had sexual thoughts sometimes, but not as many as he should. And he couldn’t remember a physical reaction to any of them. No movement, no growth.

When had he last used the bathroom? There was one in the coffee shop, he could see it now. But it was just a door. Behind it was a small, empty room—more like a closet. The Cast needed somewhere to go if they stood up to “use the bathroom.” So they’d wait in the empty room while their friends continued the dialogue. But did they ever actually go to the bathroom, either? They ate, they drank; surely they had to sometimes. Did they get to fuck? Ben felt angry, not for the first time.

“It’s bullshit.”

She ignored him.

He said it again, louder. “It’s bullshit.”

Heads lifted, stared at him. Their eyes were the frightened eyes of captive animals. A few of  

the Extras looked around, waiting to see if their peer’s words had escaped the safety of the vacant shop. In the air was a building tension, a waiting to see what might happen.

“Shh!” The pretty girl reached out and grabbed his arm. He could feel it. He wasn’t sure until that moment that he’d be able to.

“Be quiet! What’s wrong with you?”

“Me? What’s wrong with you?” He was feeling indignant, inspired. But still he lowered his voice back to its former conspiratorial whisper. “What the fuck are we even doing?”

“You know what we’re doing, now stop being a fucking idiot.” Her voice was low, but stern. She spoke through gritted teeth beneath wide, commanding eyes.

Ben crossed his arms, shook his head, leaned back. “Bullshit.”

Cars began to slowly track by the bay window with the words JAVA’S HUT stenciled along the outside. Traffic was slow, quiet, polite—nothing like real New York traffic. Just enough to be inconspicuous. The Extras all noticed the change in their environment; like hunted animals, they were very aware of their surroundings.

So, they’re outside now, walking down the street, Ben thought. He has them walking somewhere, or maybe in the park. Maybe they’re playing a game of pick-up basketball and making stupid wisecracks at each other. Really ripping into James for being so unathletic, I bet.

“You’re good, you know.” The pretty girl was looking at him again. Her face had softened, but not by much.

“Better than most of the others, that is. But that’s all that matters.”

“I don’t see how any of this matters,” he responded.

“And you’re good looking. Young. Ethnically ambiguous. That’s what He likes. You’re good for the camera. If you keep doing your job, you might get an opportunity one day.”

“Sure.”

“I’m serious. Don’t be an idiot.”

“An opportunity to be one of them? The Main Cast? You’re the one being an idiot.”

“It could happen.”

“Bullshit. Never has and never will. We’re the Extras. He has his playthings, we’re just here to fill in the background.”

“Just because it hasn’t happened yet, doesn’t mean it never will.”

Ben listened to her and realized she was talking mostly to herself. Convincing herself that there might be a future that didn’t involve this eternal waiting around and hoping and pretending. Well, pretending would always be a part of it. That was the name of the game.

“Just look at Bradley.”

“Fucking Bradley? He’s basically one of us.”

Ben turned and looked at Bradley, standing behind the counter. He ran the coffee shop. Got to talk to the Main Cast sometimes, in a very limited role. Limited, yes, but still: he got to speak. And he had a name. And he got to drink coffee and eat pastries. Ben watched him now, standing in his usual spot, eating a blueberry muffin, sipping something warm that steamed.

I bet it smells delightful, he thought. Ben found he missed the smell of coffee more than the taste. And who the fuck could make someone sit in a coffee shop for the rest of time and not even get to smell the goddamned coffee?

“One of us? Have you ever had a line? Is your cup full of something besides air?”

“No—”

“You’d be lucky to be Bradley.”

“But would I? He doesn’t get to leave. He’s still stuck in here with us. If that’s all I have to look forward to then fuck it. I don’t care.”

“Don’t say that.”

“Why not?”

“Because you know what can happen. Even if you have no desire to be Bradley, or one of them, you can at least be happy to be one of us. There are worse things He can make you.” She leaned over the table, closer. Whispering now: “Like Darryl.” She flicked her eyes to the right, where the counter was, the glass display of muffins and bagels and pastries, the fish tank, the espresso machine, the rack of books and magazines.

“Darryl?”

That’s when the bell above the door rang loudly and the three male members of the Main Cast walked in, talking loudly, and sat on the couch. Once they were fully situated, and the background was out of view—always wait for a close-up, always—the Extras were dissolved and reanimated in their new seats. Ben was at the high-top, alone, with a different wordless book in his hand, and the pretty girl was sitting in the wrap-around section by the window with the athletic guy and an older man.

Ben held the book in front of his face, pretending to read. But behind it, his eyes scanned the counter and wondered, wondered…

Dark again. Movement outside of the shop had ceased. The friends of the Main Cast were elsewhere, not in the building. Ben heard no laughter above his head, no footsteps or refrigerator doors closing. Were they having fun, then? That rag-tag group of thirty-somethings, that sexually balanced pairing of friends that seemed to spend all their days prancing around the city or drinking coffee or crafting solutions for their puerile problems. Did He let them have fun?

A false book sat on his table. The cover made it out to be something hard-boiled and mysterious, something a man could read in public without shame. Ben watched as the goldfish paced its bowl on the counter restlessly. It swam back and forth, side to side, always with its bulging eye on him. He stood.

Across the room sat the pretty girl. She had her head bowed, her fingers at her temples,

massaging, nodding very minimally as the athletic guy rasped on in his low voice. Ben walked to them. The sound of his feet clacking against the wood echoed in the emptiness. Faces perked up to watch him, fear in their eyes. An older black woman sighed and muttered, shaking her head. To be caught moving in one’s own volition was to be punished.

He was above her before she’d opened her eyes or removed her probing fingers from the side of her head. The athletic guy stopped speaking and stared; the cessation of his endless rattling woke her.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Sitting down to talk with you. He’s not watching.”

“You don’t know that!” Her words were quiet but desperate. She scanned the room spastically, her eyes darting from one corner to the next.

“He’s busy with his favorites, why can’t I pass the time with you? I do my job when they’re here.”

“Please go away.”

“I bet He doesn’t even notice.”

“He notices everything. Stop being such a fool! You’re putting all of us at risk.”

“Yeah man,” athletic guy added. “You’re gonna get us in trouble.”

“Piss off.”

“Don’t be such an ass.”

“Trade seats with me then. Go on. Go sit by yourself and I’ll stay here.”

“Hell no!”

The Extras watched the confrontation from their spots, too scared to speak up and ask for it to stop. Best they could do was sit still and pretend not to notice.

“Why me then?” Ben asked. “Why should I be alone? I can’t just sit there and stare at the wall any longer! I’m losing my mind!” His voice was rising, getting dangerous now.

“Because He put you there, not him,” the girl said. “If He’d wanted him there, He’d have put him there. But He put you there. We all play our part when we’re sat at the high-top, now go back to your seat, please.” Something in her eyes told Ben she’d rather he be the one sitting next to her than Mr. Muscles. There was enough in her gaze to walk him off the ledge.

“Please.”

He conceded. The room breathed a collective sigh of relief when he sat back down. There’d be no punishment, no Games for them. Suddenly, they were quite happy to be bored.

The following scenes and proceeding intermissions had gone well. Knowing—or, at the very least, imagining—the pretty girl kept her eyes on him as much as he kept his on her was enough to make the silent show bearable. Ben found himself reinvigorated, splashed with the brush of enthusiasm.

His pretend conversations were lively as ever, his face a cartographer’s illustrations: mountains of emotion carved, valleys of empathy speckled with emotive ridges and low hills made of whispers.

Only once between his outburst and the party was he sat alone. Oh, how he hated to be alone; how much more the lonely man suffers when alone in a room filled with others. But even that hadn’t been so bad; he’d had faith that they’d return soon, the Main Cast, and after the scene was acted out, he’d be transferred to some new location, a table with people he could talk to, a nook where he might be sat with his girl. He’d started thinking of her as his. He filled the lonely moments between acts with daydreams of her.

On that single lonesome occasion he’d found himself back at the high-top, the goldfish had paced and paced, keeping its bulbous fisheye trained on him all the while. Ben found it hard to hold that gaze, so he didn’t.

And then it happened. Without word or warning he was dissolved, transported; he found himself outside of the coffee shop for the first time. He was in a room, a warm room, and he could feel its warmth. People filled the room and their body heat filled the spaces between them. It was an apartment, a big one, twenty-two stories up in New York City. Lights glimmered outside the window, and they were open! By God they were open! Cool autumn air rushed in, selfishly taking some of the room’s warmth outside in its place. And he could feel it. It was only then that he realized how long it had been since he’d felt.

Ben observed the spectacle. People stood in tight groups with cups in their hands. A small table set against the wall was covered with food, the most delicious smelling assortment of cheese and meats and crackers. The smell of food touched his nose and his mouth filled with saliva the way Pavlov’s dogs’ must’ve at the sound of the bell. He could smell again. There was food within reach and he could smell it.

How good it was to be sensitive.

He crossed the room, determined to lift the red, greasy slices of meat to his nose, to breathe them in, to huff them and get high from them, his own personal inhalants. And then he would lick them. He would taste again. He would lick the slice of meat until it shrunk and disappeared in his hand as if he were a big cat, a predator prepping its kill for consumption.

But then he saw his girl, and she saw him, and the table was forgotten. They locked eyes. They glided across the polished wood floor and into each other’s arms.

“You’re here,” she said. Thin strands of her hair tickled his nose. He could smell her, too. Light perfume, something floral, all part of the illusion. Underneath it was the human smell of skin and warmth, and he preferred that above all the scents in the room.

“You’re here,” he repeated back to her, holding her at arm’s length, looking hard into her gray eyes.

“I told you it could happen,” she said, smiling so wide her face was in danger of splitting. “This is why we play our parts. And you’ve been so good lately. I knew He’d want you. I’m just glad He wanted me too.”

“What is this?” Ben asked.

“A party.” She turned and he followed her gaze. The room was filled with Extras. Only the

best. From the coffee shop—there was one he recognized, another young girl, like them—and from all the other places He liked to set his friends, the Main Cast, for their lazy adventures. The best of the best of the Central Park joggers, the most believable office workers that meandered around by the copy machine or the water tank, the restaurant goers, the museum observers, the bar patrons, the anonymous faces on the sidewalk. Here they were, all allowed a brief reprieve in the light.

“When He needs a party scene for them, He picks his favorites from each setting to fill the background. I always heard that He populates the room before they get here, giving us a minute to enjoy ourselves and mingle while we wait for their arrival. Some say He does it out of kindness, as a reward, but I think it’s because we all look more believable if He actually lets us enjoy a bit of the party we’re supposed to be having, you know?”

Ben studied their faces. Their unknown faces. They smiled and laughed and flirted about. Their cups ran over, and there was drunkenness in the room. People drunk on food and drink and beer and wine and laughter and feelings.

“Can we stay here?” he asked.

“Of course not. This is just a scene. Then we go back.” And then, because his slackening face told her to continue, “But this is good! This means He likes us! We’ll get to do this again next time He needs a party crowd, so long as we keep up what we’re doing!

“Come! Let’s eat and drink. It’s been so long since I’ve tasted.” She took his hand and led him to the table. They filled their plates with chunks of cheese and slices of meat and crunchy crackers, filled their cups with spiked punch; they settled into a corner, just the two of them, by the open window, and ate and drank as they enjoyed the feeling of cool wind against their burning faces. The room was so loud. Ben closed his eyes as he chewed and lost himself in the din of the party.

The first bite was so full of flavor it made his mouth pucker. His cheeks wanted to suck in and clamp on every juicy drop. The crunch of salty crackers underneath his teeth was orgasmic. Slimy, chewed food slid down his gullet, filling him in a way he hadn’t been filled for longer than he could remember. The punch warmed him further, sparking a loose numbness in his head that was liberating. He set his empty plate down, but the pretty girl placed a few things from her plate back on it and placed it back in his hands. It was, after all, all about the illusion.

“I’m Ben,” he told her, feeling free. “What’s your name?”

She frowned. Her face contorted as she remembered, or tried to remember. Eventually she said, “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know your name?”

“I know I had a name,” she said. “At least I think I did. I must have.”

“Pick a new one,” he said. “Any one you want. You can be whomever you choose to be. Isn’t that what this is all about?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t think it’s a good idea. It’s easier this way. I think I’d rather not know who I am. Makes it easier to be whomever He needs me to be.”

“Fuck Him.”

“Shh!” She covered his mouth with her hand. It smelled of deli meat. Ben laughed, drunkenly stumbling backward into the cracked window.

“Relax,” he said.

“They’ll be here any minute! Don’t be such a fool! Why must you try to ruin a good thing?”

“Is it really such a good thing?” he asked. “To be here for just a moment? How empty will the coffee shop feel after this? I was finally beginning to forget what it feels like to…to…to feel! And He does this? You think this is a reward? This is part of the torture!”

Eyes were on him now, but in his inebriated state he did not notice.

“Be quiet, please, I’m begging you. Just be happy with what we have. We have tonight when so many others don’t. Please, Ben. Please.” Hearing his own name, spoken from the lips of another, silenced him. Together they waited for the show to start.

Minutes later the Main Cast materialized. First James and Michelle, brother and sister, front and center of course. Then Allen walked through the door with Lisa. An odd pairing. Rhonda couldn’t make it. She had some other lazily-written bullshit going on somewhere else. Jeff stumbled out of a bedroom; apparently they could fuck after all. At least The Director wanted them to believe so. The laugh-track ensued. Their entry was dictated by a jovial riff of guitar: sitcom transition music.

“Do you think she’s gonna come?” Michelle asked of her brother.

“Geeze, I really hope so,” James moped. “I can’t believe I told her I’d be happier without her. I’m so stupid! If only I could have another chance to tell her how I feel…”

Which meant, Ben knew, she’d show up at any moment. Whoever she was. Some quick fling, one of many, for one of His Main Characters. A pretty face to fill a recurring role. Three, maybe four episodes before He’d write her off in the easiest, most contrived way.

Right on cue the door opened, the party hushed, and in walked a pretty blonde girl, young, with big eyes and straight teeth.

“Hi.”

She walked to James who was staring, open-mouthed, like an idiot. Ben couldn’t stomach the melodrama. He turned to his girl—surely she was his girl now—and saw her staring, rapt, watching the scene unfold. She was dreaming of her chance, her moment to be in the spotlight. Here she was, at the party, believing that if she worked hard enough, if she was the best Extra there ever was, maybe, just maybe, she could get a recurring role, too. She could be the love interest, the fling—even the one-night stand would suffice.

The familiar rage returned, burning behind his cheeks, this time stoked by the rare taste of alcohol he’d been allowed. I’ll kill him, he thought. Before He can stop me. I’ll break my glass, walk to the front of the room, and stab him in the neck. With one of His Main Cast dead, He’ll have no choice but to replace him. Surely I’ll be the first choice. It is I who has risen up, who has taken the power in my own two hands and decided my own fate. He’ll reward me with a spot in the Main Cast, as one of the friends. I’ll get a job and an apartment and a sister and various plot lines and girlfriends and easily manufactured drama that is always neatly and tightly wrapped up within

twenty-two minutes—forty-four in the rare two-parter—and I’ll get to eat and drink and taste and cry and smile and celebrate, and I’ll get to make noise, I’ll get to speak! I’ll have so many lines! And He will give me things to do and places to see and I’ll never have to be alone again because the camera will revolve around me, the show will be mine, I’ll be a friend and a brother and a boyfriend and I won’t be alone.

“I’ll kill him,” he said, and there was a hand squeezing his arm, pulling him back.

“Don’t.” Her face was implacable. Her gray eyes devoid of emotion. He wanted to reason with her and knew he couldn’t.

“But I can do it.”

“You can’t.”

“I can and I will.”

“You’ll try,” she said, “but He’ll stop you. You’re not the first, you know. To forget your place. There have been others, like Darryl. You haven’t even been around long enough to remember the Games, have you?”

“Games?”

They could talk, in the background. It was a party, after all. Background noise was a requirement. In the coffee shop they merely pantomimed, moving their mouths mindlessly. She took advantage of the opportunity to teach him.

“I’ve been here a long time, Ben. I know what He’s capable of. When The Director is unhappy, he’ll make us play Games, you see. Sick games. His favorite is Transformation. That’s the one where he turns you into whatever he wants you to be. I’ve watched Extras be transformed into horrible crab-things—things like people, all bent out of shape, with hard shells and spikes and deformed heads with bulging eyes. He turned my first friend, Michaela, into a table. A table, Ben. The table in front of the couch. The one they put their feet on sometimes. Can you imagine what it would feel like to be a table?”

Ben could. All hard, unmoving wood. Bent into rigid corners and angles. A lifeless prop without words and without breath for all eternity. Trapped inside of immobile elements.

“Or Darryl. You probably know him as the goldfish, the one on Bradley’s counter. He swims back and forth in that tank, forever. Forever, Ben.”

Ben saw his horrible, insectile eye. The glossy one that watched him from inside its small tank. To be soundless forever. Alone forever.

“There was an Extra once that refused to play anymore. He couldn’t do it. Couldn’t make the faces and the gestures, couldn’t pretend to be in conversation. He turned him inside out. Removed his skin, put his organs outside, turned him into a red, screaming, bleeding thing. He screamed and screamed until he disappeared. No one knows where he went. We try not to think about it.

“And that’s just his favorite. He has others. He made us play Gladiator. All the tables and couches and chairs left the coffee shop. He filled it with weapons—broken pool sticks, broken bottles, brass knuckles with spikes, tasers, torches. That was just because he was bored. He wanted  

to see who would survive. He let us feel then, just for a moment. He let us feel everything.”

The skin on Ben’s arms was tightening, becoming rigid and bumpy. He could feel it.

“I know it looks like a sitcom, like something funny you might see on tv, but that can change, Ben. It can become a horror show, with torture, unending torture.”

Ben was suddenly sure he was going to vomit. He stepped away, out of frame, just in case he did. The last thing he wanted was to ruin the scene and become a strip of wallpaper.

Once outside of the shot, he opened the windowed, inhaled deep. I’ll jump, he thought. I can feel right now. That must mean I’m alive. Normally, no, but right now, I’m alive. And if I’m alive, I can die. But what if I don’t? What if I hit the ground with a painless thud and stand right back up? What will become of me?

He wiped stinging tears from his eyes and stared at the skyline. Flickering lights in skyscrapers, good old NYC. Except, not really. A few blocks beyond the window everything became blurry. It wasn’t rendered, he realized. Because it wasn’t relevant. The shot would only show the Main Cast, some of the Extras, a sliver of window. All that needed to be real was the top stories of the other buildings. Everything else down there was a façade. It wasn’t really there.

A boundary. An edge.

He walked back to his girl and took her hand.

“Will you please just stay with me?” she asked.

“No.”

Her hand clamped tighter on his.

“Neither of us are staying.”

When the party ended, they found themselves in the familiar cave of the coffee shop. They were seated together at a small table toward the back, a place where they could speak quietly and keep their words between them. The room was all shadows and silence. With the party so recent in their minds, the darkness seemed darker, the silence more claustrophobic, the sterility more lifeless than before. Ben felt a cloud of anguish threatening to absorb him and turn him into black rain.

And he knew she felt it too. It made him quick to share his plan, in hopes it would lift her spirits. He wanted to see her smile again, the way she had when they’d found each other in the apartment upstairs. Instead, it made her angry. She fought with him. Told him it was stupid. It would never work. Too dangerous, too much to lose.

“The party’s ended and He’s sat us together. We’re being rewarded! Why can’t you be happy that things are getting better?”

“Because,” he said, “what does it matter, us being together? What does it matter if we can’t feel each other?”

“There are worse things than not feeling. He can make it much worse to feel than not to.”

“I won’t wait forever,” he said.

They sat in silence until the next scene began.

A quick, jazzy riff of guitar and drums signaled their return. Outside of the coffee shop it was suddenly day. The lights came on. The bell above the door jingled and four of the Main Cast entered. Showtime.

Ben found himself lifted and reset, like always. His girl was still beside him. They were on the cushioned bench beneath the bay windows. Just the two of them. It was the third time in a row they’d been moved together. He was starting to think that maybe she had some sense; perhaps He was pleased with their performance, allowing them to be with each other as payment.

Or perhaps He was using the incentive of hope to string them along, to bring their best out. Perhaps it was a dead-end road. Or perhaps, even worse, it was meant to increase the suffering. She was near, yet he felt no warmth from her skin. When he was certain they were out of frame, he leaned close to her hair, inhaled. Nothing. Not even the sensation of air rushing through his nose. I’m cardboard, or pixels, he thought. I’m lifeless, inanimate. Nothing but a cage to house my thoughts, forever. I can’t continue this way.

The laugh-track boomed. The jokes were never funny and they always laughed. Ben bit his teeth, grinded them. Of course it didn’t hurt. Didn’t even produce the satisfying grating sound he longed for. Even masochistic pleasures were denied in this torture-pit.

Then the scene was over. The friends dissipated. Lights dimmed; day became a gray mixture of twilight and dawn, a timeless transition. Extras folded hands across their laps, inhaled fully, let their eyes lower. Not that they’d sleep. They weren’t allowed sleep.

“Next chance then,” Ben said to her quietly.

“No, please. You’re not going to make it.”

“Come with me.”

“I won’t.”

“You’ll sit here forever then, in constant expectation of something you can’t have.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do know that. He’s not going to make you one of them. Not even a recurring character. Not even a love interest or a co-worker or estranged cousin. That’s not how it works. He likes that you believe it, though.”

Ben watched as her face contorted. She cried without tears; just big hitching breaths that racked her body.

“I’ve worked hard,” she said. “And things have gotten better, they have. He sits us together, He’ll take us again the next time He needs Extras for a gathering or party or celebration. Eventually we’ll get the chance to say something, I just know it. Where else does He find their neighbors and friends?”

“I think He just creates them. He can create anything he wants. You’ve seen it. He created those six to be his Main Cast, and when they need someone else to interact with, He creates those

people, too. And He created us to be in the background. That’s all we are. Space-fillers. We’re here to make sure the backdrop doesn’t look too lonely.”

Her pale hands covered her face. Ben resisted the urge to comfort her. If she felt hope, she would never leave.

From above came the sound of scene-transitioning music. The friends were walking around James’s apartment, the one that faced the same side of the building as the coffee shop. Pieces of conversation fell through the cracks. Ghost laughs from a machine echoed through the walls.

“Come on then,” he said, standing. “This is our best chance.”

“No, please.” She grabbed his hand, begged him to stay with her wide, pleading eyes. “He’ll catch you and He’ll hurt you, please, Ben, please, don’t. Don’t. Don’t.”

“I’m going.” He yanked his wrist free of her grip. “You can sit around and wait for a day that’s never going to come if you want, but I’m leaving. With or without you.”

They stood in silence for a moment, holding each other’s eyes, as well as the eyes of the other Extras. Then Ben turned and left. The bell above the door dinged as he opened it. Quickly he turned right, and as he walked past the bay windows, he looked at his girl for the last time.

Time was limited. Even if He hadn’t heard the sound of the bell, the scene was only apt to last two, maybe four minutes. Who knew where He’d put them after that. James’s apartment faced the same direction as the coffee shop, which meant Ben had to loop around the building and head the other way. He fought the temptation to cross the street and run full speed now that he was outside; that direction would be rendered, considering James’s window would face it, and no sitcom set in New York City would ever allow an apartment with a window that didn’t display the skyline.

The building was wide. The length of an entire city block. He’d gone right upon coming out the door, probably so he could see her through the window one last time, and now realized that was a mistake: he’d taken the longer route. Running; he was running, breathing hard. There was no feel to the air he sucked into his lungs, no burning stitch up his side. He felt nothing physical, only fear, deep in the base of his brain.

He rounded the corner. In front of him was half a city block, populated with shops and apartments and trash cans and stoops and parked cars and everything else needed to maintain the illusion. Beyond that, nothing. Ben sprinted to the boundary.

The noise above ended. There was silence for thirty seconds. In that time she thought of Ben, wondered if he’d succeeded. Then the bell above the door jingled and the friends walked in. Hot on their tail was the same four-second guitar riff she’d grown so accustomed to. They sat on their couch and began the usual conversation.

Even though it pained her, she went through the motions. At the start of the scene she’d been transferred; no longer was she sitting on the cushioned bench alone. She was now at a side table, right next to the couch. In frame! She was closer than she’d ever been. There was an older man sitting with her. Together they pretended to enjoy a conversation; they sipped from their empty cups; they nodded and smirked and moved their eyebrows. All in all, a splendid show.

She took this rare opportunity to study the Main Cast up close. Normally, from where she

sat, there was no way to see their faces. Her position allowed her to keep her eyes on them while maintaining the illusion that she was going about her business, enjoying her mid-day coffee break with whom? Her father, perhaps? Uncle? Former teacher? Did it matter?

“You know my uncle had a gambling problem,” said Michelle.

“Which uncle?” asked James.

“You know, uncle Jack.”

“We have an uncle Jack?”

Cue laugh-track.

“I do.”

More laughs. Because they were brother and sister. How silly.

“You guys, I don’t have a gambling problem,” Allen said. “I’m up three-hundred bucks. I have a gambling solution.” Booming laughter from nowhere.

She watched the scene play out from where she sat, off to the side. What she noticed made her heart sink into her stomach. Their faces. Their pained faces. They were unhappy, too. Even the friends, the Main Cast. As soon as they’d deliver a line, they’d look forward, towards where the camera would presumably be (there was nothing there except more coffee shop, but that’s the direction everything faced), and grimace, nervousness in their eyes. They were always on, she realized. Even when the Extras were allowed a break, some momentary boredom, He was always watching the Main Cast. They had to act out His silly little dramas endlessly, without break, forever. 

And what if one of them had an off day? Were they forced to play Games?

She watched as they acted and sweated, grinned and grimaced, delivered their lines with fake enthusiasm. Their camaraderie was entirely manufactured. They didn’t care for each other. They were just as stuck as anyone else, except they had to pretend to care. Every silly plot line, every self-inflicted problem: they had to be a participant. Their suffering was in front of camera one. Their pain was overlaid with jovial sitcom music and laugh-tracks.

The pretty girl in the background no longer wanted to be on camera.

All that remained was the waiting. She was very good at waiting. As soon as she heard their steps above, she would follow his path, make a break for it. There was always the chance he hadn’t escaped, that The Director had turned him into a rat or a toilet somewhere, but how much worse could that be? There was also the chance that he’d been successful. She now found it was worth the risk.

Laughter, from somewhere beyond the ceiling. Footsteps. She heard James’s mopey voice, Michelle’s upbeat one. She crossed the room and pushed through the doors, mindless of the bell that marked her departure. Like Ben, she made the mistake of going right. Perhaps because that was the direction the Cast always seemed to go. The sidewalk was empty; she passed mailboxes and storefronts as she ran the length of the block. She turned right at the corner and saw Ben.

All at once, a number of realizations revealed themselves to her. She’d known The Director could be cruel, that he preferred his sitcoms, but also enjoyed horrific displays of pain and suffering. What she hadn’t known was that he liked to flick from one to the next, to have all channels available to his whim. She also hadn’t understood his appreciation for complexity; his desire to enjoy plot development.

He’d sat them next to each other for a reason after all, and the reason had nothing to do with rewarding their efforts. He’d enjoyed watching them plot, watching them plan, watching them grow closer.

She felt herself being lifted and placed into a chair and strapped down. In front of her was Ben. His head had been twisted around so that he could now see his own back. His face told her that he’d been granted the ability to feel before this adjustment had been made, that he’d gotten to experience the twisting crush of his windpipe as it collapsed in on itself as a corkscrew. His feet and hands had been swapped. His eyes plucked out. And now that she was here, he was taken off mute. His screams echoed loudly in the empty city streets.

The road beneath him was no longer asphalt, but instead a collection of pieces of broken metal and glass. Each step tore open his palms, cut his wrists, severed his fingers. He fell and was impaled. The Director let him lay for a moment, sinking further onto the sharp points underneath the pressing gravity of his own weight. Then he let him die.

Now it was Ben who sat across the road, strapped to a chair. He was reanimated, reset, the way he always was in the coffee shop. The moment he reappeared he was screaming, as if still stuck dying on the glass road. When he saw his girl across the way he stopped. But not for long.

It was her turn to be the spectacle, her opportunity to be in front of camera one. She was taken from the chair, set down in the middle of the road which was simply a road again. Her clothes were gone. She was covered with something sticky and foul-smelling, like rotten juices from old meat. That’s when she heard the growling, saw the dogs approaching from both ends of the road. Pitbulls the size of tigers, hyenas that laughed as they closed in on her, a rottweiler with two heads. They were on her in a fury, pulling her apart, limb by limb, taking pieces of her flesh in their oversized, ravenous mouths.

He kept her alive long after they’d separated her into pieces. Her head screamed from where it lay in the gutter, sitting atop long ropy things that hung from her open neck.

And then she was in the chair again, whole again, and Ben was back in the street. He was hairless, without clothes. The street had become a giant cheese-grater. It rocked up and down, as if shook by an earthquake. Each time he fell, he slid along the shaved metal of the road, losing skin, being peeled like a potato.

Somewhere in the background, people laughed. An upbeat guitar-drum duo marked the transition from one scene to the next. And when The Director grew tired of torturing Ben and the pretty girl, He simply muted them and let it play in the background while He watched something else.