Marcus arrived twenty minutes late.

  He walked through the side door with a greasy paper bag in one hand and his phone in the other, reading something that clearly put him in a foul mood. When he looked up and saw Kein in the side seats, his expression shifted.

  "I didn't know you were coming today."

  "I came without notice. I hope it's not a problem."

  Marcus dropped the bag onto a chair.

  "Actually, I wanted to talk to you."

  Ana watched from the stage, her notebook clutched to her chest. Dustin had stopped moving as well, though he pretended not to be listening.

  Marcus sat across from Kein. He pulled a half-eaten wrap from the bag and rested it on his thigh without eating it.

  "What did you want to talk about?" Kein asked.

  "You first."

  "I want to work here. As an actor."

  Marcus nodded slowly.

  "I can offer you something. But first, understand how this works."

  He pointed to the theater with a wide gesture.

  "The Silver has no fixed subsidy. We stay afloat through the box office and two private investors who have been betting on us for years. To survive, we put on a play every two months—sometimes every month and a half."

  "And the pay?"

  "Per performance. If the house is full, you get paid well."

  He paused.

  "Do you have something with Jackson Brooks?"

  "An audition. In two days."

  Marcus looked at him with an expression that was hard to read.

  "Are you going?"

  "Yes."

  "Good. This doesn't have to be one or the other, Kein. The Silver can be your foundation while you build everything else. Plenty of actors do independent theater and commercial auditions at the same time."

  "Agreed."

  Marcus extended his hand. Kein shook it.

  "Tomorrow at ten. With Dustin and Ana."

  Marcus returned to his wrap.

  "Be punctual."

  Dustin was sitting on the entrance step when Kein walked out. Ana was beside him, with Dustin's headphones hanging around his neck—not over his ears—staring at the street.

  He looked up.

  "Did he hire you?"

  "Yes."

  Ana's mouth fell open.

  "Great!"

  The shout came out louder than she intended. Color rushed to her cheeks, and she looked away as if the traffic light at the intersection had suddenly become fascinating.

  Dustin said nothing. He nodded as if the answer didn't particularly surprise him.

  "Tomorrow at ten," Kein said.

  "I know. I'll be there too."

  He stood up and brushed the dust off his jeans.

  Ana regained enough composure to speak.

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  "Since you're joining us... we were wondering if you wanted to head out for some food."

  Kein considered it for a second. 'Less money to spend on food.'

  "Alright. It's not that late anyway."

  ———//————————————//———

  The ramen shop was two blocks away. It was small, with eight tables and a sign at the entrance that mixed English and Japanese. It smelled good. They ordered at the counter and sat by the window.

  "Have you been in Los Angeles long?" Ana asked.

  "A while."

  "Where are you from?"

  Kein hesitated for a second.

  "From far away. Very far away."

  Ana waited for him to continue. Kein did not. He couldn't even tell the truth—not Kael's, and not Kein's. She accepted it with an ease that surprised him slightly and changed the subject.

  "Had you done theater before Hamlet?"

  "No."

  "Nothing? Not even in school, or—?"

  "Nothing."

  Ana rested her cheek on her hand.

  "Incredible. I mean, I've been at this for three years and my knees still shake before I go out. You did it like it was the most normal thing in the world, and you learned the lines in an hour."

  "It wasn't the most normal thing in the world."

  "Well, it didn't show."

  Dustin, who had been staring at the street, turned around.

  "It showed."

  Ana looked at him.

  "I didn't see it."

  "Because you didn't know what to look for."

  He said it while looking at Kein.

  "The acting. I don't know if it's a mistake. But it didn't look like acting. There was no technique, no vocalization, no grand movements. It worked because it was like seeing the character. Not an actor acting like a character."

  Kein didn't respond.

  "The rest worked," Dustin added, and went back to watching the street.

  The bowls were brought out. The ramen arrived with a poached egg on top and slices of pork sinking into the broth. Ana pulled out her phone to take a picture, thought better of it, and put it away.

  "Do you plan on staying at the Silver? Long term."

  "For now, yes."

  "Marcus is a good person. Sometimes he's a bit chaotic with organization, and some weeks the theater feels like it's falling apart, but he truly cares about what he does."

  "How long have you been there?"

  "Two years. I started as a production assistant. Marcus saw me in an internal audition and offered me a small role."

  She shrugged.

  "I haven't left since. I guess I haven't had many other offers, either."

  She said it with a slightly awkward smile.

  "Do you want to leave the Silver?"

  Ana took a second.

  "I want to do more things. It's not the same. I like the Silver. But sometimes I think that if I only do independent theater my whole life, I'll reach a point where I'll wonder if this was what I wanted or simply what was easiest to stay in."

  Dustin said nothing. He kept eating.

  "Don't you think about that?" Ana asked him.

  "No."

  "Why not?"

  "Because I already know what I want to do. Do theater."

  He said it without arrogance. With the same neutrality he would use to give a weather forecast.

  Ana looked at him with an expression caught between admiration and irritation.

  "I'm so jealous."

  "It's not something you either have or don't have. It's a decision."

  "Easy to say when you've already made it."

  Dustin raised an eyebrow slightly, as if conceding the point, and continued eating.

  "Have you been doing theater long?" Kein asked.

  "Since I was 16."

  "How did you start?"

  "I saw a play."

  He paused.

  "It felt like the only thing that made sense to do."

  Ana looked up from her bowl.

  "I started because my mother signed me up for an after-school program. Nothing so poetic."

  "And did you keep liking it?" Kein asked.

  "Yes. There are days I hate it. When something doesn't come out right and you repeat it forty times and it still won't work. But then there's a moment where something clicks, and it's like..."

  She searched for the word.

  "Like when you finally understand a joke you didn't catch the first time."

  "Delayed," Dustin said.

  "Hey!"

  "The metaphor. Not you."

  Ana threw a napkin at him. Dustin dodged it without looking at her.

  Kein took a spoonful of the broth. It was good. Better than he expected from a place with that sign.

  "What do you do when something doesn't come out right?" he asked Dustin.

  "Depends on what it is."

  "In general."

  Dustin thought for a moment.

  "I repeat it until I understand why it's not working. Usually, it's something physical. A gesture that doesn't fit, a breath out of place. Most mistakes on stage have a concrete cause. It's not magic."

  "And if you don't find the cause?"

  "Then I sleep and try again the next day. I haven't found a problem that isn't solved with time and repetition."

  "You make everything sound so simple."

  That was Ana.

  "It is simple. It's not easy. Those are different things."

  Kein put down his chopsticks for a moment.

  Simple. Not easy.

  He had spent 117 years applying exactly that logic to a different trade.

  "I'll be there before ten tomorrow," Dustin said. "If you want to take advantage of it."

  "For what?"

  "To start learning your basics. The things that aren't seen but without which nothing works. I don't know what you have, exactly. Talent, let's say. You can't teach that. But the rest, you can."

  Kein looked at him for a moment.

  "Nine-thirty."

  Dustin nodded.

  Ana looked at them both with the expression of someone who had just missed the exact moment two people reached an agreement.

  "Can I come too?"

  "It's Marcus's theater," Dustin said. "You can come whenever you want."

  "That wasn't a no."

  "It wasn't a no."

  Ana smiled and went back to her ramen. Kein finished his slowly, watching the street through the glass. A bus passed. A child on a bicycle. A woman with two grocery bags who stopped to check her phone in the middle of the sidewalk.

  He didn't analyze any of it.

  He just watched it pass.

  Dustin paid for everything without asking or announcing it, and they left when it was nearly 5 PM. Ana headed north. Dustin vanished without saying where. Kein walked toward the bus.

  The flicker appeared twice more on the way back: a line that half-formed, a number that didn't quite become readable.

  He climbed the stairs, went inside, and hung his hoodie on the door hook.

  'Tomorrow at nine-thirty.'

  He lay down and closed his eyes.