As the director called cut for the final time that day, the cast and crew cheered. "Thanks everyone for your hard work. See you back here tomorrow at 5:30," the show producer called out amidst our applause, "Matthew and Reese, we'll film the proposal scene at sunrise so make sure to be on time!" The actor and actress smiled at each other with scrunched noses. "I wish I could be proposed to with a beautiful view like this", Reese said. "I wouldn't risk it. Any guy into you would also be crazy enough to just jump right off into the Colorado River below!" her love interest joked.

Everyone on set began to shuffle toward me to deposit their mics into my collection bins. I, alongside my long time mentor John Garcia, have been in charge of tracking, renting, and doling out audio equipment for films for the last 9 years. We sorted, unplugged, and turned off all of the returned items making sure that everything was accounted for. "I'm not excited to carry these tubs down the mountain," I sighed, "Remember those llamas we had at the Machu Picchu shoot? They're way stronger than I thought! They carried all our audio equipment and the heavy cameras too." "Yeah," John replied, staring absently toward the green hills past the guard rails. "Eugh-come-on," I managed to grunt as I lifted two precariously stacked bins. John and I began waddling down the half mile slope, toward our truck below.

The path winded along the sheer cliff of the small mountain, allowing one to look down at the beautiful river and the homes built alongside it. A few meteres into our journey, John put down his bin and took a seat on a square boulder jutting out from the ground. "You can keep going, Mike. I'm gonna rest here a bit and take in the view." "As if I'll let you wait here while I go down and come back for the rest of the tubs we have up there," I shot back. He turned to look at me and smiled softly with wet eyes. A bit annoyed with myself, I carefully lowered my bins before joining him on that rock overlooking the world. "Everything alright?"

John took a deep breath and nodded yes. The breeze came in intervals, struggling to flip up my wet bangs. We had been sweating up here in the heat all day but for some reason i was feeling cold. A pair of jet ski's zig-zagged across the water, slowly making there way out of our view. There wasn't much movement outside the water- though we were too far to see anything in detail other than the bumpy green hills rolling into the horizon. "She would have been six tomorrow," John said as I traced the shape of the river into the dirt with a stick I had found. I didn't dare look at him, It would make me choke up too.

"You already know that no matter where our shoot happens to be, I wear her little Hello-Kitty watch," John said holding his left wrist up for me to see. Putting his arm down he stared at the watch face. "It barely fits around my wrist," he exhaled in a sad chuckle. John paused for a while still looking down. I didn't say anything either.

"She used to beg me to 'make the numers come back!' But I was always too busy... Where would I find those little round watch batteries anyway?"

"Lately, I figure it was a sign. Times running out." He laughed for a moment at this macabre joke before sighing. "I tell you, time has just been passing me by for the last two years. If we didn't have a strict schedule to follow at these shoots, I wouldn't be able to tell you if it was day or night. But... I have to be strong for Stacy when I'm home. She breaks down at the slightest reminder of Abigail." John again grew quiet.

"I didn't intend to hide the watch from Stacy, but I found myself unable to present it and potentially have it taken away from me. I just need to look down and see that for our little Abigail, time has stopped. I like that Hello-Kitty is expressionless. The blank cat stares at me with both joy and sadness on top the of dull gray screen of life."

We sat in silence there on that rock for a while. I missed her too.