Kisses and Other Necessities

《 kisses and drunk texts 》

Flora Morgan never knew the dingy movie theater existed.

She pulled her tweed jacket tighter around her body. The theater was a mystical creature, hidden deep into the night and buried through layers of cigarette smoke. There was also only one movie showing at the moment. The poster hanging outside was grotesque, to say the least, with a drawing of a face outlined and marred by blood.

Not her usual idea of a romantic date night, but she liked it. It felt very New York.

"A Short Film About Killing," she read. "Krzysztof...how do you pronounce it again?"

"Krzysztof Kieslowski."

"Hmmm. Is Ryan Gosling in it?"

"No, this is a movie by Kieslowski."

The way he said it, indignant and matter-of-fact, reminded her of the way she often corrected people on the pronunciation of Hermès (the h should be silent!). She hitched her Garden Party bag higher on her shoulder. "Forget about Ryan Gosling. Ryan Reynolds, then."

"I'm afraid the only Ryan you're gonna see tonight is Ryan Faulkner."

Flora tilted her face upward and winked. "That's the best kind."

His lips twitched a little. That was the way Ryan smiled, always reluctant, like it would disrupt the artsy airflow around him if he dared to have a sense of humor.

Flora was surprised she didn't mind it much. He was something different and he was of everything she used to regard as pretentious (he even had the surname Faulkner, which he was apparently proud of and would never think of introducing himself without using his full name), but ever since her new life started at NYU, she was even more willing than before to try and explore—classes, movies, lifestyle, and boys.

Not that she was looking for anything more than good company, but when Ryan bumped into her the third time at the school cafeteria, Flora thought it was okay to agree to a date. A single girl like her was allowed to make as many diverse friends as she wanted, and gradually, a casual movie night turned into movie nights with potential.

The film he chose tonight was nothing she had ever seen before and she was pleasantly shocked. 84 agonizing minutes felt unbearable to get through at some points. It was ruthless, raw, and brutally honest. It was the kind of violence that shook her to the core.

"Did you enjoy it?" Ryan asked with the very kind of light in his eyes that indicated that he adored it.

"It's so real, more like a documentary than a movie," she said, "which makes it really hard to watch."

He nodded, just once. Like she passed a small test.

"There's no plot or reason at all," she said. "It was literally a short film about killing. You can't accuse them of false advertising."

"It wasn't made to entertain. There's a message...a statement Kieslowski was trying to make."

"What kind of statement? That they are out of budget?"

Ryan frowned. "It's an attack on capital punishment. Look at how it was explicitly portrayed when that guy killed a person. You see every detail, how much effort it actually took to get through it, how messy it was...Kieslowski deliberately used a handheld camera and filtered lens to get it to look as ugly as possible. But with the second part, you can see that the execution was just as brutal and senseless as the killing itself."

She knew, but she widened her eyes anyway. "Oh. I'm copying your answer from now on."

"That's just my opinion, and it goes without saying that you can interpret the movie any way you want." Ryan squared his shoulders. "I especially enjoy the cello in the background toward the end. I've seen it five times already."