Chapter 47: Behind The Camera
The flan had been eaten, the pleasantries exhausted. An uneasy truce settled over the condo, more uncomfortable than any outright argument. Ava’s silence was a vacuum, sucking the warmth from the room. It was Mark’s father, Robert, who finally stood, placing his empty dessert plate on the counter with a soft clink.
“Well, we should let you all get settled,” he said, his voice a calm anchor in the stiff atmosphere. “Cynthia, we’ve got that thing.”
Cynthia, taking the cue, rose gracefully. She hugged Alexis again, this whisper a secret in her ear. “She’s just scared for you, mija. It’s her job. Be gentle.” Then, louder: “You call me if you need anything. Anything at all.” She turned to Ava and Aaron with a genuine smile. “It was so lovely to meet you both. Welcome to Texas.”
Mark saw them out, the door closing on a pocket of normalcy. The silence that rushed back in was heavier, loaded with everything unsaid.
Aaron cleared his throat. “It’s a impressive space, Mark. You’ve built something special here.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“I’d love to see where the magic happens,” Aaron continued, glancing at his wife. “Your studio. If you have time to show us.”
Ava’s expression remained neutral, but her eyes sharpened. Due diligence. Assessing the viability of the enterprise supporting her daughter and future grandchild.
Mark looked to Alexis. She gave a tiny, almost imperceptible nod. An escape from the condo’s battlefield. “Yeah, of course. It’s not far.”
The drive to the RDCWORLD studio was a quiet fifteen minutes. Alexis sat in the back with her mother, the space between them humming with tension. She watched the Austin scenery blur by, a mix of hipster cafes and sprawling tech campuses, so different from the historic, tree-lined streets of D.C. or the steady suburbia of St. Louis.
They pulled into a lot behind a modern, low-slung building clad in dark metal and glass. No flashy sign, just a discrete, stylized ‘RDC’ etched on the door.
“We keep it low-key out front,” Mark explained, leading them to a keypad. He punched a code. “Otherwise, we’d have fans camping out. Which is cool, but not always conducive to getting work done.”
The door hissed open, and the sound hit them first.
A wall of energy—a bass line thumping through the floors, layered with explosive bursts of laughter, the rapid-fire clack of mechanical keyboards, and a half-dozen voices talking over each other in a harmony of chaos. The air was cool and smelled of synthetic grape from vape pens, buttery popcorn, and the sharp, sweet tang of several different energy drinks.
Aaron’s eyes widened. Ava’s lips pursed.
The entry opened into a wide, open-concept space bathed in the glow of neon tube lights—pinks, blues, greens—that ran along the ceiling joists. One entire wall was glass, looking into a soundproofed recording booth where a guy with massive headphones was gesturing wildly. Another glass wall revealed an editing suite, three monitors glowing with video timelines. Holographic projectors in the corners cast shimmering, life-sized animations of characters from Jujutsu Kaisen and Chainsaw Man against the concrete walls, their forms flickering like digital ghosts.
Everywhere, there were young Black creatives in motion. A woman with locs pulled into a bun was adjusting a camera on a tripod. Two guys were wrestling with a green screen, laughing as it tried to roll back up. Another was doing a handstand against a mural of the RDC logo.
And there was the core crew. Desmond, tall and lean, practicing a dribble move with an invisible basketball. Leland and Ben were in a heated debate over a laptop, their voices rising.
“The timing is off on the sting! It has to hit on the third step, not the fourth!”
“You’re out of your mind, the comedic beat is the delay!”
Dylan glanced up from a script, saw Mark, and grinned. “Look what the cat dragged in! And he brought company!” His voice carried, and the room’s energy shifted, zooming in on them.
Mark’s posture changed instantly. It was subtle, but Alexis saw it. His shoulders went back, his casual slouch replaced by a buoyant readiness. A smile, different from the careful one he’d worn for her parents, broke across his face—wider, more open, charged with a performative joy.
“Y’all behaving?” Mark called out, his voice louder, richer, riding over the room’s noise. “Or do I need to start firing people?”
“You can’t afford to fire us, bro!” Desmond called back, abandoning his mime dribble to strut over. He nodded respectfully to Aaron and Ava. “Sir. Ma’am. Welcome to the circus.”
Introductions were a whirlwind. John emerged from a closet holding a bundle of cables. Affiong, the other founding member, paused a mixing board to wave. The warmth was immediate, genuine, and slightly overwhelming. They were a unit, a tribe. Alexis watched her parents navigate it. Her father relaxed, asking Ben about the specs of the camera setup. Her mother offered tight, polite smiles, her analytical eyes cataloging the lack of cubicles, the casual dress, the sheer, unadulterated fun of the place.
“We’re blocking a short for the channel,” Mark said, his hand finding the small of Alexis’s back again, but the gesture felt different here—more proprietary, a part of the show. “You wanna watch?”
Before she could answer, he was steering her toward a raised production booth behind another pane of glass. It overlooked the main studio floor, a control panel with soundboards and monitors lining the window. “Best seat in the house,” he said, ushering her parents in. “You can see everything, hear everything through these.” He handed them headsets.
Alexis put hers on. The world narrowed and amplified. She could hear the rustle of Desmond’s jacket, the faint hum of the projector, the pre-recorded track of a ridiculous superhero theme song.
Down on the floor, Mark was transformed.
He clapped his hands. “Okay, let’s lock in. Places for ‘Anime Fan vs. Normal Fan’ Take one!” His voice was a director’s now, clear, commanding, laced with an eager energy that was contagious. The crew snapped into position.
And then, the performance.
Leland, holding a basketball, became the ‘Normal Fan.’ Mark stood opposite him, and as someone called “Action!” his entire physicality shifted. He slumped his shoulders, his eyes went wide and unnervingly intense, his voice climbed into a reedy, passionately nerdy register.
“Bro, you can’t just dribble,” Mark-as-Anime-Fan whined, flapping his hands. “Where’s your chakra control? Where’s the flash step? You’re moving in, like, real-time! It’s boring!”
Leland dribbled, unimpressed. “I’m just hitting a crossover, man.”
“A crossover?” Mark screeched, his face a mask of utter contempt. “That’s a Tier-C move at best! Where’s the Hawk’s Eye targeting? The Zone? You haven’t even unlocked your Potential!”
He launched into a frenzied, sputtering monologue mixing Naruto terminology with streetball, his body jerking with awkward, exaggerated gestures. It was hilarious. It was absurd. It was a version of Mark she had only seen in clips online, amplified and hyper-real under the lights.
Alexis laughed into her headset, a genuine burst of amusement. She saw her father chuckling, shaking his head. Her mother’s expression was unreadable behind the glass.
They did three takes. Each time, Mark found a new angle, a funnier inflection. He directed the others with sharp, collaborative grace. “Des, maybe you enter frame here, like you’re judging his weak chakra flow.” “Ben, can we get a close-up on my eyes when I say ‘Potential’? I’m gonna try to make one twitch.”
Between takes, he was Mark—laughing, swigging from a water bottle, checking his phone. But the second the camera was live, he was someone else. A conduit for a specific, manufactured energy.
The last sketch was a parody of a popular reality show. Mark played a contestant desperately trying to explain the plot of Evangelion to a baffled judge. It was physically demanding, all flop sweat and frantic hand gestures, his voice cracking with faux desperation.
“You don’t understand! The angels aren’t angels, they’re alien life forms! And the Evas aren’t robots, they’re clones of the angels, which are also his mom! SEE?”
He collapsed to his knees, a picture of despair. The crew lost it. The director, from the booth, cackled in Alexis’s ear. “Cut! That’s the one! Gold, Mark, gold!”
Mark stayed on the floor for a beat, his chest heaving, then popped up, the despair vanishing as he broke into a grin. “Cool, cool. Let’s reset for the reaction shot.”
Alexis took the headset off. The real-world sounds became muted again. She felt a cold knot in her stomach, separate from the laughter of a moment before. The shift was so seamless. The on-off switch. Which was the performance? The careful, attentive man trying to impress her parents in the condo? Or this electric, king-of-his-domain showman? Or were they both acts, layers of a persona built for an audience, and she was just the newest viewer?
He looked up at the booth, caught her eye, and winked. It was a Mark wink, confident, warm. But it felt like it belonged to the guy on the floor.
They wrapped. The crew descended into post-shoot chatter. Mark extricated himself and bounded up the steps to the booth, sweat glistening at his temples, his energy still buzzing around him like a force field.
“So? What’d you think?” he asked, breathless, aiming the question at everyone, but his eyes were on Alexis.
“It’s very… energetic,” Ava said, removing her headset with delicate precision.
“You’re a natural performer, son,” Aaron said, clapping Mark on the shoulder. “I see the appeal.”
“Thanks, Mr. Moore.” Mark’s gaze flicked back to Alexis. “Lex?”
She swallowed. “It’s… a lot. In a good way. You’re really good at it.” The words tasted flat.
He seemed to sense the distance in her tone. His vibrant energy dimmed, just a fraction. The performer receded, and the man she’d woken up beside reappeared, searching her face. “You okay?”
“Just tired,” she said, forcing a smile. “It’s been a long day.”
On the drive back, her father asked more questions about the business model, the ad revenue, the long-term plans. Mark answered smoothly, confidently. The CEO. Another role.
Back at the condo, the goodbyes were less strained but still formal. Promises to meet for a proper dinner were made. Her parents’ Uber arrived. At the door, Aaron hugged her tight. “He’s a good man, Lexi. A bit of a whirlwind, but his heart’s in the right place.”
Ava’s hug was stiff. She held Alexis for a second longer than usual, her voice low and fierce in her ear. “Just make sure you don’t get lost in the show.”
Then they were gone.
The condo was silent, truly silent for the first time all day. Mark leaned against the closed door, letting out a long, slow breath, all the performed vitality draining from him. He looked exhausted.
“Your dad’s cool,” he said.
“Your mom’s a saint.”
He pushed off the door and came to her, his hands cupping her face. His palms were warm. “You’re upset.”
“I’m not.” She was.
“Talk to me.”
She looked up at him, at the familiar brown eyes that could hold so many different lights. “Who was that today?” she whispered.
“What do you mean?”
“In there. At the studio. That guy… he’s amazing. He’s magnetic. But when you turned it on, it was like you… left. Where did you go?”
He didn’t let go. His thumbs stroked her cheeks. “Nowhere. I was right there.”
“Were you?” The question hung between them, fragile and dangerous.
He understood then. He closed his eyes for a second, then pulled her into him, his chin resting on her head. She could hear his heart thudding, a steady, real rhythm against her ear.
“It’s a tool, Lex,” he murmured into her hair. “The voice, the faces, the energy. It’s a tool I use to do the job. To make the thing that pays for all this.” He took a deep breath. “The guy who kissed you in the kitchen last night? The one who’s scared shitless of being a good dad? The one who loves your stupid Totoro because it smells like you? That’s me. That’s the only me there is. The rest is just… a really loud drill. Useful. But not the heart of the house.”
She clung to him, to the solidity of his body, to the metaphor that was clumsy and perfect. The performance was the noise. This, the quiet, desperate hug in the darkening condo, was the structure. She wanted to believe him.
“Don’t let me get lost in the show,” she said, her voice muffled against his chest.
His arms tightened. “Never.” He pulled back, looked down at her. “And don’t you let me get lost in it either. You’re my anchor. You and this little dude.” He placed a hand gently on her still-flat stomach.
He kissed her then, slow and deep, a kiss meant to reassure, to ground, to erase the distance she’d felt through the glass. It tasted like the cheap grape soda he’d been drinking on set, and underneath, like him. Like home.
Later, in the dark of his room, she lay awake. The holograms from the studio seemed burned into her vision, flickering against the ceiling. She could still hear the echo of his stage laugh, so different from the soft chuckle he let out when she traced patterns on his back.
He slept deeply, an arm thrown over her, possessive and peaceful. She carefully extracted herself, slid out of bed, and padded barefoot into the living room. The city lights were a muted diorama. She went to the shelf.
Her hand bypassed the law book, and found the worn felt of Totoro. She picked it up, held it to her nose. It did smell like her old dorm, like her past life. She looked at the mug, the book, the plush. Her artifacts. His artifacts. Side by side.
It wasn't a merger yet. It was a juxtaposition. Two different collections, on the same shelf. The performance and the anchor. The drill and the house. The future was the terrifying, hopeful work of building something from all these mismatched pieces, and praying the foundation, somewhere beneath the noise, would hold.