Film

I have a friend who films the parts of her life that no one sees. She films her bus rides to work. She films her naps and her trips to the grocery store. When she has a cigarette on the fire escape, she films her slice of skyline and the moment’s particular light. The only exception: she doesn’t film herself on the toilet. She’s a modest girl, my friend.

She says it’s because when she meets the man she’s destined to meet, she’ll want to share her entire life.

So every day she watches her co-commuters in a four-inch digital display. She eats lunch on the fountain in the park, her bag and jacket to one side, camera on the other. Walking down the street, she has problems with depth perception, and stops short when she doesn’t need to.

I tell her look, nobody’s ever going to watch all that. It’s boring. Nothing happens.

But if he watches it, she says, I’ll know he really knows me.

One day she met a guy who films his own unseen life. I’ve called her a few times since then, but she never picks up. I heard she quit her job, and nobody I know has seen her. I imagine she’s at home, alone, taking notes on his subway rides, memorizing the seven ways he can walk to work.

It’s been a few months, but I know she’ll call. We’re old friends, and in my head I’ve got a hundred of pieces of her life that she won’t remember. We’ll go out, she’ll bring her new boyfriend and we’ll laugh over old stories, even though they’re boring, and nothing really happens.