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happening. I drove over to Bree’s feeling romantic and wild.
    It was an old art deco place, all white. I parked the car across the street and walked up. There were sculpted bushes all around and a black-and-white check pattern on the ground in front of the main door. Her unit was five stories up. The lights were off up there, so I climbed the fire escape ladder onto the roof. It was about midnight.
    At the top, I leaned over the side and saw her window. I knew which one it was from when we had rehearsed there. I tried to hit it, but the angle was bad. I missed a bunch of times, and the coins fell onto a dumpster in the parking lot below. I tried all my coins, quarters too, but she didn’t wake up. I sat on the roof, holding the rose, looking at the sky. The moon was bright, and I could see the dark part, not reflecting anything back.
    I sat for twenty minutes feeling something like sadness and also feeling very romantic, like a poet. I was getting cold; I only had a T-shirt on. I got up and walked around on the roof quietly. It was steeply pitched, and I could have fallen off. There were apartmentbuildings across the street, and if someone looked they could see me being a prowler. I scooted on my butt to the edge of the roof on the side of her apartment opposite her bedroom.
    I gripped the rain drain on the side of the roof and went for it—I swung through the void onto her balcony. Once I landed, I felt like I had accomplished something. My blood circulated fast; everything else was quiet. I wraith-floated across the balcony to the door, and, like a wish granted, it was unlocked.
    Inside, the place was in shadow, and I made my way across the wood floor toward the back rooms. Bree had a roommate who slept across the hall from her. I was about to see Bree, my love, and I was going to make something happen. I pushed open her door, and there she was on the bed beneath a thick white comforter. Her eyes flickered, and then she jerked up into a sitting position. That’s when I knew that something was off.
    “Hey, it’s me,” I whispered.
    “Jerry, what are you doing here?”
    “Um, I brought you this.” I handed her the rose.
    She didn’t say anything. She was hunched up against the headboard beneath her comforter.
    “I miss you,” I said.
    She said nothing.
    “You must be tired,” I said.
    “Jerry, how did you get in here?”
    “I climbed onto your roof and then swung down onto your balcony.” It was all different when I said it out loud.
    “I’m sorry I didn’t show up for coffee,” she said. “I have to get up at five-thirty.”
    “Oh, that’s okay,” I said, talking as if I was very calm and nothing was wrong. “I just wanted to see you.”
    “Jerry, you can’t just break into my apartment.”
    “I didn’t break in. I love you.”
    She said “Jesus,” but it was quiet.
    “Have you ever loved anyone?” I said.
    “Jerry, stop.”
    “No, I wonder if you have ever really loved someone so that you feel like you want to be a better person because of that person? You are so amazing, so amazing, that I just want to be the best person I can be when I am around you.”
    “Jerry, if you’re in love you don’t break into someone’s house.”
    “I didn’t
break
in. And Romeo did.”
    “
What?
”
    “Broke into Juliet’s place. Nothing, never mind, I just want to be with you. I want to be the best actor I can be, and you make me a better actor and a better person when I’m around you. I am sorry that your stupid agent didn’t like me, but I know that I’m good;
you
know that I’m good. I’m like Sean Penn. I’m really good, right? Isn’t that what you told me?”
    “Jerry, you have to go.”
    “What, you don’t think I’m good now? The fucking gay guy said that I am going to be bigger than Brad Pitt. I know it was because he wanted to kiss me, but still, everyone can see—can’t you see? Everyone can see that I’m going to be great!” I was talking loudly and getting closer to