“This Movie Theater Sits on a Leyline” by Maxine Sophia Wolff

I butter the popcorn. I clean the butter machine. The bag runs out, and so I stick my head into its metal belly to screw in a new one. It’s a wet mess of plastic tubes and blood vessels inside there. The stench of congealing dairy blooms as I clasp and unclasp the nozzles. Before I’m done, an old man throws his credit card at my back, angry that I am not at concessions. He tells me that the last time he was here the popcorn only cost four dollars. He tells me that now it is four ninety-nine. His wife calls me foul names under her breath as he continues, and she defecates a thin string of slime onto the carpeted floor through her dress. After I serve them both and steam the carpet, the man waddles to the water fountain and spits rivers down it, clogging the drain. I grab a wire brush and get to work.

“Hey, change out the Pepsi when you get the chance.” Michael tells me, catching my arm as I stride past him. “It’s running low.” 

“Yeah, sure.”

“And after that, take over for Zane in box.”

“Sure.”

“I’m going out to smoke. See you later.”

On the way to the soda closet, I pass Naomi stacking Buncha Crunch into a tower. Her creation climbs up towards the soft ceiling like a living stalagmite growing. But then, the errant hand of a customer sends it toppling, and Naomi howls. She tears off her tie and white-button-down before lunging at the man. Her claws rip through him right there by theater six. 

I butter the popcorn. I clean the butter machine. 

The soda closet has grown some kind of intelligent mold, so I have to hold my breath as I change the bags. The plastic caps unseal with a hiss, halfway alive, watching me. The whole business makes my guts turn.

Outside, Naomi has left the popcorn popping untended. Fountains of yellow spew from its metal mouth, rising up the floor like a tide. I try to wade through it, kernels sneaking down into my shoes, battling my toes for shelter. But the popcorn rises from my ankles to my waist, and then up my chest. So I take a deep breath and dive in. Butter soaks my hair and prunes my fingers, but I pull myself along the bottom until my hands find the floor grate. With a heave, I pry it open, and the ocean of corn funnels away. I shake the butter from my hair. I turn off the popcorn machine. I butter the popcorn. I clean the butter machine.

“My wife has vertigo.” An old man yells, sneaking behind concessions, terrifying me. Behind him, Naomi has finished her meal of the last customer. Blood runs down her chest like a bib. The man staring me down pays no mind to the carnage. Butter stains the corner of his lip. 

“She needs a bucket to throw up into.” 

I fetch the man a bucket and rush to theater five, but it is too late. Vomit stains the floor like a wax finish. It gets all over my shoes. The man’s wife, with her head held in her lap, chuckles amidst her moaning and points to the screen. On it, a beautiful actress is confessing her love to the male lead. Her breasts are visible through the thin fabric of her dress. The man is holding her like a fish. She is smiling like a fish. For a moment, they are both fish. 

Outside, Naomi has finished building a dollhouse out of the bones of the customer and some Buncha Crunch. She plays with little wax figurines inside the hollowed out carcass. A thousand years pass within the world she creates. I stumble, reeling a little, the stench of vomit still in my throat. Down the way, Michael comes back in from his smoke break, the door behind him disappearing as it closes. I try to tell him about the vomit in theater five, but he swipes me away. 

“I thought I told you to go in box. Zane has been in there all day.”

“Right. Of course. Sorry.”

Zane grins at me with five teeth as I relieve him, all ten of his fingers laughing too. There is a line out the door. All their eyes stay fixed on me, like a single organism split. 

 “We are going to be late to the movie.” The customer at the front of the line complains behind the glass screen. 

“I am sorry, sir.” I reply, “But the movie doesn’t start for another twenty minutes.”

“The one in theater two?”

“Yes. It doesn’t start for another twenty minutes. That’s what the schedule says.”
He spits a wad of phlegm onto the ground. “My wife has vertigo. She might need a bucket.”

I tell him to ask for one at concessions. Then, Michael bursts in and asks me why I’m not mopping up theater five. I follow him, the hollow in my head flooding. Some water leaks out from my ears. 

Naomi shoots me a grin as we pass. She has become a god within the confines of her dollhouse. Every moment is ruled by her magic, and she stands behind all of its strings. Under her stewardship, the dollhouse changes. It evolves from a plaything into the movie theater itself, a pocket universe inside a pocket universe. She has dolls for all of us too. Myself, Michael, Zane. They puppet themselves around, little marionettes brought to life. 

She makes Zane dance for her until his feet grind off and he’s screaming. Then she folds his spine back and pins his limbs in at ninety degrees. Zane is now a box. She opens him up and fills him with bloodroot flowers and beeswax and overstocked candy. Then she closes him, and he can’t scream anymore.

Her hands turn to me, and suddenly I am on a table. With a needle and thin strands of Nerds Rope, she sews two M16 assault rifles to my chest. When I breathe, the triggers compress, and I spray the back wall with bullets. Some of them hit a couple customers who have gathered around her, entranced. Butter drools from their gunshot wounds as they go down, and they vomit Buncha Crunch across the floor. I scream and it’s terrible, and even Naomi agrees, so she wipes it all away with a snap. 

But all actions have consequences. Somewhere so distant that the very concept of measuring seems insane, a terrible planet god notices Naomi’s magic. It sets a course for her, ten million hungry eyes lashing in the dark.

When I enter theater five, the same scene from before is on the screen. The woman, now naked, is pierced by a dozen swords. She is bleeding all over her lover. He has no skin. The lover brings his open, lipless mouth towards her, butter gurgling out of his throat. He is covered in Buncha Crunch.

“This night is eternal.” The woman whispers to him. “And the dawning sun will never rise.” They are now kissing. The men and their wives in the theater all smile at the screen. After they pull away from their kiss, all tongues and butter and blood, the woman on the screen turns her head towards the camera and looks at me. “You are happy here.” She says. “You are so happy.”

I shift my weight, my feet squelching into the wet soles of my shoes. The woman turns back to her lover and begins to kiss him again. The men and their wives in the theater all start clapping as the credits roll. 

Back in the lobby, the front doors have disappeared. There is nothing behind them but an empty void. It is deep and rolling, and for a moment I can make out a coiled shape shifting underneath the blackness. At concession, Zane screams the word box over and over again as he prepares the next batch of popcorn. I don’t know where Michael is. Half of the customers are gone. 

Silent, Naomi takes a seat beside me at the edge of nothing. She raises a finger, and points to a speck of light in the distance. It thrashes against the nothing, growing closer, eclipsing everything with its impossible size. Naomi calls it a planet god and I have no idea what she is talking about. It doesn’t matter anyways. I’ve already reached my conclusion. I turn around from her and walk away. 

“The popcorn used to be four dollars.” An old man complains. I tell him I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry. 

Behind me, Naomi battles against the tongue of the planet god, which has settled into orbit above us. Enshrined in its gravity, the movie theater spins, sending unbolted chairs and boxes of candy flying. But none of it really matters much to me because there is an old man telling me his wife is about to throw up and I need to get a bucket before it’s too late. 

I’m too late. I clean it all up anyways, diligent and uncomplaining, the defleshed woman on the screen crooning against her male lover. Blood and butter and bits of bone and Buncha Crunch flood the place. The vomit becomes the floor and the walls and my hands too. My throat closes, choking, and the husband slips me a twenty. Outside, the planet god turns Naomi into a wax doll. It builds her a toy box. And it all starts again. 

I push past what remains of her. I ignore the giant tongue. A customer, taking my lead, spits phlegm in the water fountain as I unclog it with a wire brush. 

I butter the popcorn. I clean the butter machine. The woman on the screen was right. I am happy here. I am so happy.

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