“There's enough food here for a hundred starving people," Jane said in wonder. Her stomach growled.

“That's about what we've got today," Maisie said. "Dig in. You can't make a dent."

“Is this normal?" Shelley asked. "All this food?”

Maisie nodded. "It's one of the best things about the job. The food. You should have seen breakfast."

“You mean this isn't breakfast?" Jane asked, biting into a sweet roll.

“No, the caterers' truck just left. Breakfast was a hot meal for everybody a couple hours ago. I'd weigh three hundred pounds if I worked very often.”

They chatted with Maisie about her job and discovered that she was a military wife and an actor's daughter. She had combined the two with her nursing degree and had worked on many movie sets over the years as she followed her husband's postings. "Fortunately he was assigned to desk workin L.A. several times back when nearly everything was done in the studio. I worked a lot then," she said. "And now that so much work is being done on location, the number of jobs elsewhere in the country is increasing."

“You mean you live here in Chicago?" Jane asked. "Is anybody else local?"

“Oh, yes. Quite a few. Transportation, extras casting, all the extras, catering, craft services," she said, rattling off individuals by their jobs instead of names. "All local. Even Jake there is local now."

“Who's Jake?”

Maisie popped a donut into her mouth to free a hand and pointed to a tall man in his early forties who was leaning against a piece of fake building, obscuring their view of the set.