Filming the Doomsday Clock

We were told that the cloud cover was a blanket about to settle into the shape of the present which, if we wanted to imagine it as a person, would undoubtedly look startled— as after a verbal berating or in advance of a light pistol-whipping. The camera came and went, came and went, like a masked man trying to light a too-damp fuse. The crew was acting like a litter of mimics trying to make a killing. Anything to fill the vacuum of time. The wind whirred and tracked the clouds. The credits, we were told, would take the form of a semi-scrawl, urban-sprawl, graffiti-style typography. The soundtrack would include instrumental versions of "Try a Little Tenderness." Our handler, who was walking backward in order to maintain constant eye contact with us, nearly stumbled over a girl in a sheath and pearls who was misting a shelf of hothouse flowers. While the two apologized to each other, we stood and watched the fine spray settle over the leaves and drip onto the floor. On the way out, we passed a door with a small window reinforced with wired glass through which we could see a nurse positioning a patient on a table. We swore afterward we'd heard her say, "Lie perfectly still and look only inward." A clock chimed and as the others were audibly counting backwards from five to zero, I thought I heard someone say, "Now let go of this morbid attachment to things."