Note: Foggy's Drive-in is registered with the WGA and is currently being shopped in Los Angeles and in Canada.
NOTES: SET IN 1964 HIGH RIVER, ALBERTA: THE LARSON FAMILY RUNS FOGGY’S DRIVE-IN. FOGGY, THE DAD - LEE, MOM - CARRIE 6 - TREVOR AND TREENA, 16 AND IRENE, FOGGY’S MOM, 68.
FADE IN:
EXT. FOGGY’S DRIVE-IN - SUNSET
Prairie highway at sunset. Rocky Mountains on horizon.
TITLE CARD: ‘High River, Alberta - 1964’
A HORN HONKS LONG AND LOUD: A LIME GREEN 1970 AMC GREMLIN careens off the highway into the ditch in front of Foggy’s Drive-in, dirt flying as it barrels toward US.
IT MOWS DOWN THE LARSON’S MAILBOX.
CARRIE, 6 (O.S.)
Whoa!
PULL BACK TO REVEAL we are inside -
INT. FOGGY’S HOUSE, CARRIE’S BEDROOM - SUNSET
Looking out the LARGE WINDOWS of the second story bedroom (which run the length of the LARGE room in the old house) we see the 1970 Gremlin regain control - drive out of the ditch.
But now we hear a FEMALE VOICE SCREAMING from a distance.
CARRIE LARSON, 6, leans out the window, around ‘BRUCE THE SPRUCE’ the large Blue Spruce which has some branches protruding into the open window. Carrie is small for her age.
CARRIE
WHO’S SCREAMING? HEY! HEY!
Screaming STOPS.
LEE (O.S.)
Carrie! Stop screaming.
Carrie looks down at her Mom but we don’t see her yet.
CARRIE
Somebody was screaming, Mom.
LEE (O.S.)
Nobody was making a racket but you. Again.
Carrie points toward the highway.
CARRIE
But a car knocked -
She looks over and sees -
THE MAIL BOX UPRIGHT AND UNDAMAGED.
CARRIE (CONT’D)
Never mind.
LEE (O.S.)
For God’s sakes.
Carrie’s face is hurt as she withdraws into her room, paces a few feet.
She paces back, looks out at the mail box again.
Wow. She is dazed. She looks at the tree.
CARRIE
Guess what, Bruce the Spruce?
She says these words with gravitas, her expression serious.
CARRIE (CONT’D)
I - am - just - like - Grandma.
And then a slow wide grin spreads across her face.
OPENING NOTES OF ‘Louie, Louie’ by the Kingsmen carry into credits.
END TEASER
From ACT I
EXT. FOGGY’S DRIVE-IN - NIGHT
The Beatles run from mobs of girls on Foggy’s DRIVE-IN SCREEN: ‘A Hard Day’s Night’ showing.
The fun frenetic opening in beautiful black and white.
TITLE CARD: ‘Incomprehensible At Any Speed’
Now we see Carrie running and jumping like The Beatles as she tears across the Drive-In in front of the screen.
Carrie keeps one eye on the screen and one eye on the ground ahead as she runs and jumps joyously.
She passes by: A Picnic Area with a sign, ‘Kiddie Corral’, with a ranch style fence around it.
KIDS in sleeping bags or having picnics with parents.
KIDS inside the Kiddie Corral ride little bouncy horses on springs attached to the ground.
Carrie passes them and then slams to a stop, staring at something straight ahead.
She looks around at the people nearby. Everyone is focused on the screen.
She turns back.
CARRIE’S P.O.V.: In the forest running alongside Foggy’s is a group of sad faced people, some crying.
They huddle in the night with candles and pictures of a guy with weird long hair and round wire glasses.
We recognize the photo as JOHN LENNON and the scene as the VIGIL outside the Dakota on the night of December 8, 1980.
But Carrie doesn’t know what she is seeing.
The image FADES AWAY.
Only the forest remains.
She grins.
CARRIE
Grandma.
She tears off running again.
FROM ACT I
INT. PROJECTION BOOTH - NIGHT
The giant REELS spin film through the big projector.
FOGGY LARSON, 38, a Beatnik looking guy in his classic Breton sailor cap, black turtleneck and jeans, sits beside the projector.
Carrie is sitting beside him. They look at each other periodically, smiling and laughing at the movie.
Carrie revels in this magical time with her Dad in the flickering light of the projector. He’s obviously her hero.
LATER:
CARRIE
I am like Grandma.
Foggy hesitates, this is not what he wants to hear.
FOGGY
You are not like Grandma.
CARRIE
I’m just like her. I like her stories and I’m just like her.
He laughs, joshing with her to cover his alarm.
FOGGY
Carrie. No, you’re not. Jeez. You just have an imagination.
CARRIE
What’s so bad about being like Grandma?
Foggy bumps shoulders with her, then puts his arm around her shoulder, gives her a little shake, effectively dismissing what she’s just said.
FOGGY
Heyyyyy...
He looks to the screen again, laughs too loud, trying to draw Carrie back into the movie.
He bumps her shoulder again, points at the screen.
FOGGY (CONT’D)
These guys are the real deal, eh?
He pretends to be lost in the screen again.
She makes no such pretense now, staring at the floor for a moment before stealing a glance at her Dad.
She knows he’s aware of her looking at him but he pretends to be lost in the movie.
She hopes he doesn’t notice the disappointment on her face.
From ACT I
TWINS TREVOR AND TREENA, 16, presented proudly with an old 56 VW Beetle from Foggy.
Trevor and Treena turn away from the car and stare at Foggy as though he’s lost his mind.
Foggy sighs,
FOGGY (CONT’D)
-a Beetle.
TREVOR
It’s old.
TREENA
And embarrassing.
Irene laughs to herself as her gaze turns inward.
IRENE, 10 (PRE-LAP)
Dad, this is embarrassing.
FLASHBACK EXT. LARSON FARM - DAY (1906)
Hoofs plod out the door of a barn as LOUIS LARSON, 40, an affable farmer, leads an old but still serviceable plow horse, BLUE, out to the corral.
IRENE’s 10 years old - and this is TRAGIC.
LOUIS
Blue’s a good horse.
IRENE
She’s a plow horse, Dad. She’s old. And embarrassing.
Irene gives her Dad her best pleading look.
FLASHBACK EXT. ALBERTA PRAIRIE ROAD - DAY (1906)
A beautiful fall morning. Irene riding old Blue to school at a leisurely walk - she’s riding with a flat exercise saddle under her, no saddle horn
-a group of kids pass on their trotting horses, laughing as they go by.
Irene leans forward, pats Blue’s neck.
IRENE
Never mind, Blue. Let’s be late so we miss ‘God Save The King’.
She leans down over the horse’s neck, snuggles into Blue’s mane, closes her eyes and revels in the sun on her face, the gentle rolling gait of the old horse.
She opens her eyes and sees...
IRENE’S P.O.V.: The dirt road slowly passing below Blue’s shoulder under her.
Blue’s front leg stepping; safely, steadily onward.
NORMAL P.O.V.
IRENE (CONT’D)
(whispers)
I didn’t mean what I said. You’re the best horse in the world.
She squeezes her arms around Blue’s neck.
The stillness of a prairie morning broken only by the squeaking leather of the saddle.
Irene’s eyes close as she falls asleep, still wrapped around Blue’s neck.
Blue carries her faithfully down the road.
The horse’s head turns toward something in a field-
- a coyote sits in tall wheat, watches them pass.
Blue continues on with her safe sleeping rider.
Excerpt...LATER...
Irene jumps at the SOUND OF A JET ENGINE.
Irene stops Blue. Looks around, twisting in the saddle.
Sees the coyote sitting in the crop field quietly.
Blue stands still.
IRENE (CONT’D)
Blue, didn’t you hear that?
She looks round some more then something above catches her eye.
She looks to the sky at the weird line of CONTRAIL THERE - the jet just barely visible in front of it.
She’s never seen a white line in the sky like that.
She closes her eyes - rubs them - opens them.
Only the blue sky remains.
And Blue under her.
___________
Foggy’s Drive-in is being shopped in Los Angeles and in Canada and I hope to return to High River to shoot it :).
Wednesday, 29 October 2014
Saturday, 13 September 2014
Vancouver Elevators Display Rider's Weight
The city that likes to call itself The Most Beautiful City In The World, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, is spending over $7 million to retro-fit the city's 25,000 plus elevators with sensors that will display each rider's weight in the floor at their feet."Vancouver is a beautiful city full of beautiful people and we want to keep it that way so really the weight display is only the beginning." says Trudy Spencer-Flint the city's 'Director of Beautification'.
 |
| Some may wish to use this when elevators in Vancouver display their weight! |
"Vancouver is also spear heading a major advance in lift technology by scanning each rider's face and scoring it for symmetry, lack of blemish, grooming, make-up application because after all you can be healthy and slim but have a face like Mr. Ed."
The city's willingness to spend money on something some might consider frivalous considering the tremendous issues Vancouver faces with homelessness, violence, disenfranchisement, transit, water quality and the dip in tourism doesn't wash with Spencer-Flint. "This is an important advancement for the health of Vancourverites. We want to see those elevator numbers drop year after year until our ridership is predominately in the double zero to zero size range. We will save millions in health care costs."
Regarding the Face Scanner 4000 TLC, an advanced version of current law enforcement face scanning technologies, that will rate the attractiveness of a rider's face Spencer-Flint had this to say, "This is not to say that ugly people have no value in society, I mean if you didn't have someone to compare beautiful people to how would you know they were beautiful, so you need ugly people, they are like the night sky. You need the dark to see the stars."
 |
| Trudy Spencer Flint - Director of Beautification City of Vancouver |
Spencer-Flint then smiled at her own metaphor, "Perhaps the night could be given over to the ugly people in Vancouver."
Tourism Vancouver is expecting no drop in tourists visiting the city because of the new elevator system but they are expecting a 95% drop in elevator ridership.
Sunday, 8 September 2013
Friday, 6 September 2013
The Invisible Neighbourhood
On June 20 a catastrophic flood destroyed or damaged over 80% of High River, Alberta, where I live. My home was not badly damaged, but, as you'll see in the following post, it must be demolished due to the ineptitude of Emergency Operations Centre. They did a fantastic job in so many ways but even the Minister responsible for E.O.C., Rick Fraser, has admitted communications were terrible.
This is about Sunrise Place N.E., a lovely community, new and friendly and lovely, that will shortly no longer exist. Damn. We were just getting started.
This is about Sunrise Place N.E., a lovely community, new and friendly and lovely, that will shortly no longer exist. Damn. We were just getting started.
>
>
>
> SUNRISE PLACE N.E.
>
> OUR COMMUNITY
>
> Sunrise Place NE High River Alberta was a 32 unit condo in eight buildings situated in a circle off 21st NE directly north of Holy Spirit Academy. The complex was built by Classic Communities Ltd. (Classic Construction Ltd.) based in Medicine Hat, Alberta.
>
> These homes were Certified Greenbuilt villa style condos of 1100 square feet and featured quality finishing including:
>
> 1. Hardy Plank exterior siding.
> 2. In-floor heating.
> 3. Tankless hot water.
> 4. Double glaze windows.
> 5. R42 insulation in the roof.
> 6. SIPS (Sandwiched Insulated Panels) walls.
>
> The homes themselves were incredibly well built and energy efficient costing on average $40 per month each to heat in winter. They also featured as standard issue beachwood cabinets and granite counter tops in the kitchen and both washrooms. The cost to build these homes was $200 per square foot. They were purchased for approximately (depending on upgrades) $279,000.
>
> It was a cozy community of close-knit neighbours who gathered around the central community gardens for conversation. People watched out for each other's pets and for many of us it was the first place where we literally knew all of our neighbours.
>
> We were just getting started as a community. We had many plans for our lovely piece of the world.
>
> June 21st changed all of that.
>
> Worst of all, we lost our neighbour Jacquie Brocklebank in the flood waters that day. Jacquie perished checking on a friend downtown, something that did not surprise her family and friends for Jacquie was the kind of person who would make sure all she knew were okay.
>
> We nearly lost another resident. Derek Etherington was left alone in the complex. He is 84 years old. We believe the RCMP were at fault for this.
>
> They banged on the door of Mareea Maynes early Friday morning and told her to get out because the water was coming.
>
> She said, "There are 32 units here, I don't know who is still here!"
> The officer said, "I'm leaving, my car is going to get swamped."
>
> He LEFT HER ALONE to try to alert the other residents. In the dark, with water rising on the south side of the complex she ran door to door and was able to awaken many neighbours.
>
> By the time she got back around to the other side the water was too high for her to continue and so she did not make it to Derek's house. The water was also too high for her to get back to her house and her cat.
>
> She went out the back gate and found a woman in a jeep with a 5 year old. The woman was crying because she couldn't figure out how to get out of town on the roads behind us. Mareea jumped in her truck and said, "I'll show you because I'm coming with you."
>
> Meanwhile, Derek, who is EIGHTY FOUR YEARS OLD, was asleep in his home. He woke to water that was waist deep.
>
> He could not get the doors open. He was trapped in his home as the water kept rising.
>
> He made his peace with the fact he was going to die. He went to a window facing the street and got it open. He called out but all he saw was black water and moonlight.
>
> He stood in that freezing cold water for approximately six hours. He lost his glasses and could not see well. He was hypothermic.
>
> Unbelievably he saw a boat approaching, he yelled and screamed and miraculously they heard him. He doesn't know who his three rescuers were, he never got their name.
>
> The writer of this document happened to be at the E.O.C. at the Firehall when Derek was brought in. He was not in good shape. He was airlifted out to Calgary.
>
> Thankfully, Derek survived but he does not want to go back to High River. Can't say I blame him.
>
> Sunrise Place was special for many reasons. Many of us desperately want to return. Many of us do not! Some of us are conflicted.
>
> It is difficult having your fate in the hands of others when sometimes those 'others' do not seem to know you exist.
>
>
> THE INVISIBLE NEIGHBOURHOOD
>
> Sunrise Place did not appear on the Town of High River or the Alberta Disaster maps at the Emergency Operations Centre for many days.
>
> Several residents called to say that we were not even drawn on the maps for the Re-Entry. "Where are you?" "WHAT'S your place called?" "I don't see it." "Are you sure that's where you are?" Those were some of the responses to our calls.
>
> Can you imagine how disconcerting, how disheartening and despairing it was to realize your homes did not appear to exist to the people who were in charge of trying to save it?
>
> We finally did appear on a Google Earth map we saw at the E.O.C. but were still absent from other maps.
>
> Speaking to the E.O.C. was like banging your head against...
>
>
> A BRICK WALL
>
> Unfortunately for Sunrise Place our difficulty with E.O.C. was just beginning.
>
> Within a few days of the flood our two eastern buildings, comprising eight units, at a value of Two Million Dollars, were high and dry and easily accessible through the gate in the east retaining wall. You barely needed rubber boots to walk in.
>
> We have estimated that the E.O.C. received OVER ONE HUNDRED phone calls regarding these two buildings over the course of nearly two weeks.
>
> We were talking to a brick wall. No calls were ever returned. We told the same story again and again and again and again. Most of us called several times per day, explaining again and again and again that you could walk in off the street and then explaining again and again and again and again (if you think this sentence is annoying multiply that feeling by two million and you have an idea of our frustration as our homes sat rotting) to say we could not fall through to a basement because we had no basements.
>
> We finally went to the E.O.C. and insisted someone investigate. We spoke to David Sands who brought forward someone who was going to investigate.
>
> Then, we got a phone call saying we were still under water. Apparently all they did was take a canoe in the west side entrance and say, "Oh, they are still under water."
>
> We had photographs of our dry homes. We went to the E.O.C. AGAIN. This time Shane Schreiber came with us and saw for himself that we were high and dry.
>
> IT WAS TOO LATE TO SAVE OUR HOMES.
>
> The SIPS walls were already contaminated with mold and once contaminated they cannot be remediated easily, as is the case with standard construction.
>
> THE LOSS OF THESE EIGHT HOMES IS THE FAULT OF THE E.O.C. AND THEIR INCREDIBLY POOR COMMUNICATIONS.
>
> These homes only had five to six inches of sewer back-up in most of them and yet they must be demolished. What an incredible and unnecessary waste!
>
> We deserve compensation for this. Some of us work at jobs where communication is important. The writer of this document transcribes physician's orders on hospital units. If I do not communicate critical information, CRITICAL things will happen.
>
> CRITICAL THINGS HAPPENED WHEN THIS CRITICAL INFORMATION DISAPPEARED INTO THE VOID THAT WAS E.O.C. COMMUNICATIONS.
>
> The frustration of this situation has made many of us ill. Many of us are off work. Some of us have no sick leave left but cannot function at work.
>
> And for some of us, this was our...
>
>
> FIRST HOME
>
> There are special financing considerations that need to be taken into account when examining the situation in Sunrise Place.
>
> These are quality homes that were offered to people who can pay a mortgage payment but find the down payment a barrier to home ownership. Murray Prokosch, the President of Classic Construction has built several projects in Canmore, Strathmore, and Medicine Hat with an eye toward securing home ownership for people who would not be able to qualify for a conventional mortgage.
>
> These are not 'sub-prime' mortgages similar to those that contributed to the Wall Street crash of 2008. These are assistance plans offered to buyers with good jobs, paying rents equivalent to their mortgages, who needed assistance to own a home.
>
> Besides paying over half of the down payment, Classic Communities offers a sliding scale monthly subsidy that lasts nine years going from $495 per month to $120 and then $0. They also offered a direct $36,000 savings off the price of the home if an owner did not wish to participate in the monthly subsidy.
>
> For many in the complex it was their first home and if only offered a buyout they will not be able to purchase another home. For some it will be the end of the dream of home ownership and the security that provides.
>
> For many as well, Sunrise Place was to be...
>
>
> THE LAST HOME
>
> There are many people in Sunrise Place who thought they had purchased their last home. It was the place they would settle finally and enjoy their retirement years from a secure home base in a lovely and friendly place.
>
> And, like most, they realized they were buying far from flood areas of High River. In fact in the history of the town this area has NEVER flooded.
>
> There was a lot of security in that fact.
>
> Now all of us are left with the question...
>
>
> WHY DID WE FLOOD?
>
> The word 'sacrifice' has been in the news. Is this the truth? Are there other words that apply to the shocking fact of a flood in that area? Mistake? Accident? Mismanagement?
>
> We have heard of mismanagement of the 'dewatering' stage, an official at a town hall meeting stated that, "Sunrise Place was not forgotten, we just didn't notice the water wasn't going down there for a few days."
>
> That sounds 'forgotten' to most of us. Added to the invisibility of not being on the maps and the fact we were ignored when we pleaded to get into those two eastern buildings...you get an impression of how most of us are feeling.
>
> Forgotten. Ignored. Invisible.
>
> The fact we are not on the flood plain or the flood fringe seems to have left us 'out of the loop'.
>
> We have not heard any answers from the province about what they will do to help us. There is only confusion about our ability to rebuild.
>
> There is also confusion about whether we SHOULD rebuild because...
>
>
> WHAT ABOUT OUR AIR, OUR WATER, OUR SOIL?
>
> What is Tervita's role in the remediation of the soil? How far down are they going? As far as we understand they are only scraping the surface debris away.
>
> Who is going to monitor our soil in the years, perhaps decade to come?
>
> We had community gardens. Is it safe to grow anything there?
>
> What about the ground water?
>
> What about the saturated state of the ground? Are all of the pipes under us, water, sewer, gas, going to be ruptured by frost heaves in the soaking ground?
>
> What about the air quality?
>
> What is our next step?
>
> WHEN DO WE GET TO TAKE A FIRST STEP?
>
> The writer of this document was at the complex on August 15. I went into the back gate of the complex and took video. It looks exactly the same as it did the last day we were there a month ago.
>
> Sunrise Place is frozen in time. Sunrise Place is frozen in the worst time of our lives.
>
> These are people's lives you are dealing with.
We have been told because we have insurance we will get NO HELP from the government. But, our insurance coverage CANNOT cope with the costs of remediation and rebuilding.
WE ARE LOSING OUR HOMES.
The insurance payout is going to $225,000 per unit. I still owe $266,000 on my mortgage. There are many of us in this situation.
What are we to do?
>
> We need answers.
>
> We need help.
Now.
>
>
Wednesday, 2 January 2013
Subtext or How To Stay Off That Damned Nose!
Subtext is something I relate to screenplay writing. But it's also a great tool for the novelist and something I consider essential. Subtext adds layers of emotional complexity to a scene by intimating what characters are really thinking when what they are saying seems obviously about something else.
For instance, a couple has a fight, he stomps to the kitchen, they sulk for a few minutes, then he peeks around the corner and says: "I'm sorry, honey."
Bore. Bore. Bore.
What if he peeked around the corner and said her three favorite words (we know they are her favorite words because they have joked about it previously in the story) : "Want grilled cheese?"
See that? There's some character there. There's a relationship there. There are PEOPLE living in this scene. And if you don't think of your characters as living breathing people you are probably already in trouble. But that's another blog for another time.
In the first example above, the "I'm sorry, honey." is the generic, one size fits all characters, absolutely ON THE NOSE writing that should be punishable by going to your room and being banned from using the alphabet ever again.
To stay OFF THE NOSE we use subtext and bring our work to life!
One of my favorite examples of subtext is from the great film, 'The Apartment', with Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine and Fred McMurray (Edie Adams also does a wonderful turn as MacMurray's bitchy leopard print clad secretary).
In the film Jack Lemmon is C.C. Baxter, a cog in the wheel of a giant insurance corporation. Now, keep in mind this was 1960 and in those days couples could not check into a hotel unless they could prove they were married. Yup. Imagine that.
So. C.C. has an apartment that is used by upper management types as a convenient place for illicit trysts. One of those involved in an affair is Fran (Shirley MacLaine), the elevator operator in his building that he has a crush on. Fran is having an affair with, and sadly is in love with, Sheldrake (MacMurray), who keeps promising to leave his wife.
The writing, by I.A.L. Diamond (great name!) and Billy Wilder is stellar throughout: funny and fast and poignant and multi-layered. My example of subtext comes from the scene in a Chinese restaurant, the old favorite haunt of Fran and Sheldrake. At this point it has been several weeks since Fran has told Sheldrake to bug off, finally tiring of his promises to leave his wife. Sheldrake has talked her into meeting him at the restaurant to try to win her back, while still making excuses...
In the hands of lesser writers the scene might have gone like this...
...as we focus on them in the booth the piano player is playing what he always plays, the same food is on the table that is always on the table...
Sheldrake: How long has it been - about a month?
Fran: It's been exactly six weeks.
Sheldrake: I've missed you.
Fran: You always say that.
Sheldrake: It's been hell.
Fran: Does that mean you love me?
Sheldrake: You know I do.
Fran: So you say. Again.
ZZZZZZZZZZZZ...right?
This is how it was handled in 'The Apartment.'
-----
For instance, a couple has a fight, he stomps to the kitchen, they sulk for a few minutes, then he peeks around the corner and says: "I'm sorry, honey."
Bore. Bore. Bore.
What if he peeked around the corner and said her three favorite words (we know they are her favorite words because they have joked about it previously in the story) : "Want grilled cheese?"
See that? There's some character there. There's a relationship there. There are PEOPLE living in this scene. And if you don't think of your characters as living breathing people you are probably already in trouble. But that's another blog for another time.
In the first example above, the "I'm sorry, honey." is the generic, one size fits all characters, absolutely ON THE NOSE writing that should be punishable by going to your room and being banned from using the alphabet ever again.
To stay OFF THE NOSE we use subtext and bring our work to life!
One of my favorite examples of subtext is from the great film, 'The Apartment', with Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine and Fred McMurray (Edie Adams also does a wonderful turn as MacMurray's bitchy leopard print clad secretary).
In the film Jack Lemmon is C.C. Baxter, a cog in the wheel of a giant insurance corporation. Now, keep in mind this was 1960 and in those days couples could not check into a hotel unless they could prove they were married. Yup. Imagine that.
So. C.C. has an apartment that is used by upper management types as a convenient place for illicit trysts. One of those involved in an affair is Fran (Shirley MacLaine), the elevator operator in his building that he has a crush on. Fran is having an affair with, and sadly is in love with, Sheldrake (MacMurray), who keeps promising to leave his wife.
The writing, by I.A.L. Diamond (great name!) and Billy Wilder is stellar throughout: funny and fast and poignant and multi-layered. My example of subtext comes from the scene in a Chinese restaurant, the old favorite haunt of Fran and Sheldrake. At this point it has been several weeks since Fran has told Sheldrake to bug off, finally tiring of his promises to leave his wife. Sheldrake has talked her into meeting him at the restaurant to try to win her back, while still making excuses...
In the hands of lesser writers the scene might have gone like this...
...as we focus on them in the booth the piano player is playing what he always plays, the same food is on the table that is always on the table...
Sheldrake: How long has it been - about a month?
Fran: It's been exactly six weeks.
Sheldrake: I've missed you.
Fran: You always say that.
Sheldrake: It's been hell.
Fran: Does that mean you love me?
Sheldrake: You know I do.
Fran: So you say. Again.
ZZZZZZZZZZZZ...right?
This is how it was handled in 'The Apartment.'
SHELDRAKE
How long has it been -- a month?
FRAN
Six weeks. But who's counting?
SHELDRAKE
I missed you, Fran.
FRAN
Like old times. Same booth, same
song --
SHELDRAKE
It's been hell.
FRAN
(dipping shrimp)
-- same sauce -- sweet and sour.
Sweet...right? They've said the same things, but in a much more intriguing way.
So, let's break it down:
SHELDRAKE
How long has it been -- a month?
He's more cavalier about the relationship - he's not sure exactly how long it's been since he's seen her.
FRAN
Six weeks. But who's counting?
Fran is in love with him. She knows exactly how long it's been since she's seen him. She says how long it's been then adds a defensive bit of casualness of her own with 'But who's counting?' She's hurting and trying to protect herself by appearing as uncaring as he.
SHELDRAKE
I missed you, Fran.
Well, he's missed the sex. And maybe he's missed somebody to bitch to about the ball and chain at home but it sounds like a hollow effort.
FRAN
Like old times. Same booth, same
song --
Well, she's heard this about a hundred times. He's said it all a hundred times. But nothing ever changes. It's lovely in the film, she glances at the piano player as she delivers the line.
SHELDRAKE
It's been hell.
It has been hell for Sheldrake. This is a man who is used to getting what he wants. Now he's not getting what he wants and that is his narcissist's version of 'hell'.
FRAN
(dipping shrimp)
-- same sauce -- sweet and sour.
My favorite line in the whole scene. He's trying to wear her down with talk about how broken he's been, how tough it's all been for him being without her, meaning, somewhere in there, he must really love her. The sweet part of the sauce, the sour is the emptiness of his words, the same old words.
You can't get that kind of emotional context with on the nose writing. It's a beautifully written scene.
If you haven't seen 'The Apartment' I urge you to do so. It won many Oscars including 'Best Picture'.
Adding subtext to your work is not that difficult, sometimes it will come naturally from the situation. But if it doesn't simply go over your scene and look for different ways characters can express what they want to say without saying it directly and hitting that damned nose!
And now...a scene from 'The Apartment'...wherein C.C. learns the unfortunate truth about Fran.
Enjoy and happy writing!
Saturday, 15 December 2012
Sample Sunday Excerpt
Thanks for reading! Here's the e-book link: Amazon
Here's the paperback link: Lulu
Spectral Witness
for Mom and Dad
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Here's the paperback link: Lulu
Spectral Witness
by
Diane L. Randle
A Granite Diamond Production
Copyright 2012 by Diane L. Randle
All rights reserved. Except
as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication
may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or
stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission
of the author.
ISBN: 978-1-300-20697-2
for Mom and Dad
for limitless
horizons
The
author wishes to thank Terri-Lee Randle for her unwavering counsel in the
editing process. She made this a better book, though sometimes having to drag
the author through the changes kicking and screaming.
The
author also wishes to thank Ravven for the cover of this book. Please see her
work and portfolio at
www.ravven.com/blog.
Please
note: This book is written in Canadian English, so expect to see 'chequing
accounts' instead of 'checking accounts' along with 'humour', 'centre' and
other full fat 'favourites' like 'poutine'.
Chapter One
"God's hand
painted Glass Lake." Arthur Black, London, England.
'I could drown her.'
"Glass Lake is the most beautiful place
on Earth." Millie Augustine, New York, New York.
'It would be easy.'
"I've never seen
the mountains before. The Grey Lady looks alive." Angel Sanchez, 12,
Mexico City, Mexico.
'She's weak.'
August 9, 1985 would turn out to be the hottest
day of the year, the day a young mind on fire would try to put out the flames
using the waters of Glass Lake.
The high mountain lake in the Alberta Rockies east
of Banff was renowned as a pristine and perfect arrangement of nature that no
architect or painter or designer could have imagined: arms of grey granite
encircled the lake and the great north peak was tilted over the shoulder of the
mountain, like a mother looking down on the babe in her arms, giving rise to
the name The Grey Lady. The Grey Lady held Glass Lake. The name the Hallstrom
family gave to the lake they owned caused consternation among some of the early
settlers in Mountainview, the town on the plateau below Glass Lake. The name
had nothing to do with a Grey Lady, they said. They were looking for a name
like Grey's Daughter or something, to which old man Hallstrom laughed. "It
looks like green glass. It is Glass Lake. That is all."
Old man Hallstrom's own great granddaughter sat on
one of the flat boulders at the edge of Glass Lake now, on this hottest day of
1985.
'I COULD drown her.' The thought lit up Helga's
ten year-old brain and sent a warm rush through her body. 'I could drown her OR
I could go write stupid stuff in the guest book.' She weighed the options in
her mind, 'Drown. Write. Drown. Write....DROWN!' She tossed her head, sending a
blonde strand out of her eyes and pushed her hands down onto the boulder. It
was warm. She dug her nails into the granite slab, as she watched her cousin
Nate and that Alexandria, a janitor's daughter no less (!), playing and
laughing. The warm rush boiled over.
Her hands turned white as the pressure on her
fingernails increased until she imagined them ripping off the ends of her
fingers. Little pink pieces of flesh would stick to the undersides of the nails
as the blood poured out and dripped down the sides of the boulder to boil
through the lake in red clouds.
'It will be easy. She's little.'
Eight-year-old Alex was little and cute and squealed with delight when Nate splashed
her with water that left her red curls sprinkled with diamonds. Nate took her
hand. "Do not go too far into the water," he warned. He sounded much
older than his eleven years and his voice carried the formal authority of his
family's aristocratic Scandinavian background. Alex turned and laughed at him,
squinting as the sun cracked open on the edge of The Grey Lady, breaking into
brilliant shards that stabbed at her eyes.
Helga turned to check for grown ups in the area; Sheila,
her sixteen year-old babysitter, was on the veranda with Walker, her boyfriend.
Helga smiled at the sight of the family home. Hallstrom House was an impressive
gleaming white three-story Bavarian castle, with turreted corners and leaded
glass. It was a designated historical building with a plaque and everything. Open
to the public most summers, they were lucky this year; there were renovations
that closed it for the whole month of August, a whole month with no idiots
bumbling about with cameras slung around their necks. A whole month with no
boring scribbling in the guest book: 'oooh, it's so pretty here', 'oooh, I've
never seen anything like it', 'oooh, look at the colour of the water', 'oooh', 'ooooh'.
Helga felt a thrill of superiority whenever she
looked at Hallstrom House. She knew they were better than the others who lived
below them in Mountainview, especially the coal miners, whose eyes and
fingernails were always ringed with black. Like Alex's family.
That girl did not belong up here with them.
Helga stood up on the boulder. "Nate! Come
with me! I want to pick some Labrador tea before dark!"
Nate knelt to rinse a stone in the water. He didn't
bother to look back at Helga. "I have company." He smiled at Alex who
turned to look at Helga.
Alex felt her stomach tighten when her eyes met
Helga's. She didn't understand it, but Helga scared her. "I can go."
"Never mind. Helga is just my cousin. You are
company."
Helga curled her fingers into her palms. Her fingernails
bit into the flesh there. She wondered if she could make them bleed. That would
fix Nate. She wanted to fix them all, especially that one, that janitor's
daughter.
Alex watched Helga for a moment more, stomach still
churning, and then turned back toward the water.
Nate said, "Do not go too far into the water!"
She clenched her fists. "I won't!"
Nate was not satisfied, "I am serious Alex!"
"I heard you Naaatte!" Alex marched down
the shoreline to get away from him. She stopped and turned to see if Nate was
watching her but he'd picked up another rock and was rinsing it in the water. She
smiled and turned back to the lake. She loved the way the sun cast liquid bands
of snaking gold light onto the surface. She stared at them and her eyes went a
little out of focus in the glinting shifting light. She heard the birds
singing, the chatter of ravens in the evergreens, the droning of dragonflies.
She looked down the shoreline for Nate. He was
farther off now.
She stepped into the water and gasped. It was
freezing! But she wanted to go a little farther. She liked the feeling of the
currents touching her legs; it felt like her cat, Fonz, like his tail brushing
her legs.
She took another step. Up to her knees now, her
body swayed in the current. Another step?
One more. She bent her knees a little now. The
current felt stronger and made her want to laugh. But she felt like her teeth
might start chattering any second. She tilted her face toward the sun and
closed her eyes and did not see Helga turn back to Hallstrom House and see the
empty veranda.
Through Alex's eyelids the sun's light turned
crimson. Her smile widened at the cherry red colour and then-
-the sun was gone and she was no longer in the
world.
'What? What?' Alex's mind could not comprehend
what was happening.
Her body was swaying and rocking through brown
churning cold. She couldn't breath. She couldn't see.
There was something pushing on her back. Gurgling
noises, rushing sounds. Her fingertips clawed at the mud below her, scraped
across rocks as her body was pushed forward.
The thing on her back was gone now. But her body
was skidding along the bottom, pulled as though something had a rope around
her. She tried to stand up, could not. She tried to keep her eyes open but it
hurt too much. She couldn't hear anything but the weird bubbling noises.
She couldn't hear Nate calling out to her,
panicked. Nate saw Helga, stretching at the shore's edge, "Helga, did Alex
go back to the house?!"
Helga shrugged. She moved her eyes ever so
slightly to the spot where she had shoved Alex down into the water, planted her
foot on her back and sent her into the undertow she knew so well.
Glass Lake was only calm on the surface. Below it
was a churning mess of currents, cross currents and 'keepers', vertical
whirlpools created by the rush of glacial water from Marra's pass down into the
lake.
If you went into a keeper, you didn't come out.
Helga hoped that she had put Alex far enough into
the water to be taken by one of the keepers. A keeper would pull her in and
Helga would never have to see her again. She imagined Alex's body rolling in
there for eternity, decomposing, bloating, falling apart and then she imagined
the bones of Alex, clattering in the freezing water forever.
She was startled out of her delicious fantasy by
Nate's screams, "WALKER! SHEILA! HELP! HELP!"
Damn. Helga turned. Sure as hell, Sheila and
Walker were on the run from the house. Helga watched, annoyed, as Walker and
Sheila crashed into the water close to where she had shoved Alex in and, yes,
dammit, now Walker was pulling her body out of the water. At least it looked
like a body. Alex was slung over Walker's arm like a pile of wet clothes from a
washing machine. Nate fell to his knees, praying, "Please, please,
please..."
Walker stumbled onto the rocky shore and threw
Alex on her side. He squeezed his big hands around her ribs and pushed and
pushed and Alex threw up buckets of foaming brown water while Sheila wailed, "No!
No! NO! I should have been here! I should have been here!"
Walker put his fingers in Alex's mouth, dug out
twigs, mud, then turned her over his knee and slapped her back. Alex gasped and
coughed and coughed. Helga watched for a moment, then turned and walked back to
Hallstrom House, hearing the disappointing sounds of life behind her.
She would have to kill something else today,
otherwise, she knew, this ucky feeling would not go away. There was a robin's
nest not far from the house.
Walker sat Alex up. The coughing subsided. Walker
pulled away the hair stuck to her face. Alex looked at him like she'd never
seen a person before. Nate grabbed her shoulders, "Alex! Say something!"
Sheila, still sobbing, knelt beside Alex and
hugged her, "I'm so sorry honey, I'm so sorry! I should have been here!"
Walker put his arm around Sheila, but his eyes
were focused on Alex, his strong handsome face sunburnt and serious under his
blonde hair, "Oh, holy hell, kid! Will you puh-leeze say somethin'!"
Alex looked from Sheila to Walker to Nate. Her
eyes held Nate's as she said, "Don't be mad at me."
Nate's jaw dropped. "For what?!"
She swallowed, precipitating another cough.
"I went too far."
Chapter Two
"You haven't gone far enough, Alex!"
"Alexandria has more potential than any child
in this class but she doesn't speak up, even when I know she knows the answer."
"Again you stand on the edge! Jump for
Chrissakes!"
"Alexandria is lagging behind the class
average."
"This is a fine art class, if you want to
paint these, these things – these lakes that look like ten million other lakes
I suggest selling them to Walmart! This is hotel art! Disposable! Forgettable!
Garbage!"
"Alexandria is not going to get into
university with these marks. You better hope she marries well because she will
never amount to anything without an education."
"THIS is all just SURFACE. LITERALLY! THIS
work says, 'I am a boring thirty something single Mom waitress living in
Winnipeg and my hobbies are bingo, bowling and baking!" Derek ran his
hands through his shaggy Warhol hair. Derek was no Warhol, but he did know a
thing or two about art.
Alex felt her hand go numb around the paintbrush.
She felt the eyes of everyone on her. Again. She put the brush down on the edge
of her easel, hating the way her hand shook. Derek rolled his eyes at her, "You
have the technical capability but you need more than technique! You have to be
willing to expose yourself in your work! There is NOTHING here!" Alex
looked at her painting of Glass Lake. It was, and she knew it, damn it, exactly
what he said it was.
Nothing.
Lee's Diner, with its red vinyl booths and black
and white linoleum floor, had occupied the same space in Osborne's Village near
Winnipeg's downtown for almost 50 years, well before the neighbourhood became
the trendy home of half million dollar houses. Alex had bussed into the newly
upscale neighbourhood for almost ten years now, Rose was a toddler when she'd
started at Lee's. She liked the place. She liked her boss. She liked the
customers. Especially the regulars like Rob Roy and English Larry and Froggy.
She missed Rotten Johnny, still expected to see
him sauntering in every time the bell above the door chimed. She missed his
mischievous pranks, which were always funny and never mean, like the time the
clock fell off the wall and the arms popped off and were lying on the bottom of
the face. He took the clock, saying he could fix it, and asked Alan Lee
(grandson of Andy, founder of Lee's Diner) to let him in early the next day so
he could hang it. The waitresses came in that morning to the still broken clock
hanging on the wall, below it a large framed sign, printed in beautiful
calligraphy: Waitresses will only take their breaks at the times indicated.
Alex glanced at the clock now, smiled. 'God, I
miss that guy.' Old Johnny had bought four of her paintings. He'd bought them
for Christmas presents and she knew that he knew that their sale, and his
insisting on over-paying for them, had bought her and Rose their Christmas.
Things had been so tight in those years. She
sighed as she dumped the used coffee filter in the garbage. She thought she'd
be a real artist by now. She thought she'd have a studio, she'd be selling work
in galleries, she'd have that cute little Victorian grey house just down on the
corner from here, the cute little house with the gingerbread white veranda
where she'd read in the afternoon, the cute little house with the lilac bushes
and weeping willows, the cute little house that was now on the market for
$439,000.
A successful artist could have afforded that
house. But she was a successful waitress.
Alan let Alex hang her artwork in the diner. It
was nice of him. It didn't suit his place, her landscapes; they were mostly of
Glass Lake. She herself wasn't sure why she did so many of the lake. Rose
teased her unmercifully about it. She did do a few paintings more suited to Lee's:
Elvis, a cherry red 57 Chevy convertible, Lucy. They were technically
proficient and, as Derek said, entirely forgettable disposable garbage,
expressing nothing of their creator.
Except, Alex thought darkly and often, that
somewhere she believed they DID express their creator, and they, and she, were
ordinary, mediocre, and entirely forgettable.
Alex poured the water into the top of the big old
coffee maker, placed the carafe on the burner, flipped the switch and sighed, 'Snap
out of it!' she thought, 'Stop whining!' When did you turn into such a wimpy
whiner? You're not a wimpy whiner! Christ!'
"Alex. Here you go. Thanks, you're such a
doll!" Julie took Alex's hand and
folded a wad of bills into it. "You don't know how that saved me."
She walked away while the words 'saved me' echoed in Alex's mind as she looked
at the back booth.
"I don't need you to save me, Nate."
Alex picks up the creamer and pours a quarter cup of it into her coffee.
"I did not say that." Nate looks exactly
as she thought he would at twenty-six. He's beautiful: tan, fit, blonde, a damn
crooked smile and that heart shine all around him. People naturally like Nate.
People know they'll be safe with Nate. Alex knows she'll be safe with Nate.
But she doesn't believe his heart will be safe
with her.
So, what can she tell him? She comes up with a
reason she thinks is...reasonable. "I'll make my own way. I'm not going to
end up like my Mom."
"You won't end up like her."
"She died penniless Nate. The government had
to pay for her burial. She deserved better. But she - she just didn't know my
Dad was going to - and she put all her faith in him and he let her down."
Nate reaches his hand across the table, "I
won't let you down." He takes her hand in his and Alex wavers. His hand is
warm. She does trust him but she
knows that he is wrong about her.
"You don't even know me."
"Are you kidding?"
"You don't me Nate. You really don't."
"I know you. Alex, you're kind and -"
She pulls her hand out of his, shakes her head. "You are! You see people
all around you and you step in and help when you can, you're kind to total
strangers and I know you do these little things for people you know that you
keep quiet."
"If I keep them quiet how do you know about
them?"
He laughed, "Because the people you do them
for sometimes are not so quiet. Sometimes they are quite amazed at your
thoughtfulness."
"You're a kid. I'm a kid."
"Exactly! You need support. And I'm a kid
with money."
"It's my choice."
"That is not fair. I should have some choice,
too. And I choose you. I will always choose you. Forever. Alex, please. It is
our future you are determining here."
She bites down to stop the tears that threaten and
looks him in the eye. She leans forward, "Nate. You do not know me,"
presses her hands to the table and gets up. She doesn't say goodbye but walks
to the counter and puts on her apron. She does not turn to watch him leave but
hears the bell of the door.
It sounds like a death knell to her.
"Hey, Gorgeous George!" Alan called out,
laughing, as the door opened. Alex's heart stuttered as she turned to look at
the door. Yup, there he was, Gorgeous George. HER Gorgeous George. In all his
twenty-eight year old, black leather clad, tall, dark and handsome brown eyed
glory.
He leaned across the counter to kiss Alex. She
leaned back out of range. "Three years! Three years I say 'don't kiss me
at work'!"
"Hey, Al, you kiss me at my work."
"You work in a dark room full of drunk people
and why are you up so early?"
She held up the coffee pot. He shook his head,
held out his hand.
"Need your bank card." She gave him a
look. "Mine's somewhere in my, uhm, 'office'." Another look. "Hey
it's there! I just didn't want to waste time looking for it!"
She grabbed her purse from under the counter,
pulled out her card and handed it to him. He grinned. Damn. Daniel Craig wished
he had that grin.
"Have fun in class tonight!" He blew her
a kiss and headed for the door.
Class. Damn class. Damn unit clerk class. She
wanted to be an artist. But, she also wanted to be able to feed and clothe her
daughter. Keeping a roof over their heads would be a good thing. Sure as hell
George's band wasn't going to do it – they wouldn't be giving U2 any
competition any time soon.
Gorgeous George paused at the door, reading the
look on her face. He shrugged. "Hey, one of us has to keep their feet on
the ground!"
'My dogs are barking!' Alexandria smiled, trudging
up the stairs to the apartment. Where did she pick up that old chestnut about
sore feet? And then, 'Old chestnut?' She giggled. She got giddy when she was
exhausted. Eight hours on her feet at Lee's, then four hours at class (at least
she got to sit for that), then grocery shopping. At least Rose was at Tabitha's
tonight and George was working. Peace and quiet and some vegetative time
squandered watching 'So You Think You Can Dance' sounded like...maybe not. It
sometimes depressed her to watch others going after their dreams. All the
contestants on those shows, 'American Idol' et al, were so young and shiny. "Whiner!"
she sighed, as she schlepped, no other word for it, down the hall to 304.
The apartment block wasn't bad, a three story with
a brick façade and cinderblock walls in the narrow hallways. The apartment
itself was big enough for the three of them, except for that damn galley
kitchen, and only one bathroom and not much closet space and nowhere for her to
paint but the corner of her and George's bedroom and there was no – okay, the
apartment sucked.
But, it was cheap. She was squirreling away money.
She had plans for her little family.
She opened the door, barely able to hang onto her
groceries and her textbooks. Didn't much matter because when she turned on the
light, she dropped everything in shock.
"The
balance in your savings account is one hundred dollars and fifty cents."
Alex's eyes went from the cell phone and the mechanical bank voice crackling
out of it to the empty right side of their bedroom closet. 'I should do
a painting of this closet. Derek would love it.'
She picked up the phone, selected number six and
the bank's female voice then told her sweetly that, "The balance in your chequing account is seventeen
dollars and thirty-four cents."
'Or I could paint the empty living room. We, I
mean 'I', still owe for the sofa that's not here anymore and - who the hell
came up with the term 'love seat'.'
"The current balance on your VISA account
is six thousand, seven hundred and ninety dollars. You are over limit by two
hundred and ninety dollars."
'I could paint a painting of all my paintings
lined up against the wall. Or the toothbrush holder missing his toothbrush. Or
the shoe rack missing his shoes. Or the kitchen cupboard missing his precious
effing fricking fracking flaxseed!'
Rage propelled Alex through the apartment. She
stormed through the place, wishing there was something of his she could kick
around. Wishing HE were there to kick around. Instead her foot sent her
textbook flying. It landed ten feet away; she went after it, sent it airborne
again. "One of us has to keep their feet on the ground! But, not you,
George! Not you and your crappy band! Not with my twenty grand!" She broke
the spine of the big text with her next kick. "And that book cost a
hundred damn dollars!" She sent the destroyed book on another flight. "THAT'S
MY LIFE SAVINGS NOW!" She balled up her fists and screamed, her voice
echoing from the middle of the empty room, "AGAIN! I DID IT AGAIN!"
'Alexandria you did it again!' Her mind recoiled
at the distant sound of Mrs. Tremblay's voice. Why the Grade Eleven Home
Economics teacher had delighted in humiliating her in class, Alex never knew. Now, Mrs. Tremblay
stood at the front of Alex's brain writing out all of her screw-ups with
squeaky chalk. The classroom full of children howled with laughter with every
mistake Mrs. Tremblay tallied on the chalkboard of Alex's life. 'We will study Alex's failures
alphabetically, GIMMIE AN 'A''!
'A!' the children shouted with glee:
Alan: surfer boy, stoner, cute, slob, borrowed
$350 from her, disappeared.
Art School: was flunking out so tried harder to be
an 'ARTIST' with new edgy work like the crushed Coke can glued to a cardboard
representing society by depicting the repression of the masses to mass produced
product (Coke) and the flimsy construct that was civilization (the thin
cardboard and easily mushed can) and the uplifting notion of how easily the
masses could overcome repression if only they weren't blinded to their strength
like those poor adult elephants who thought they couldn't break their chains
because they'd been chained as babies and didn't know the chains were too weak
to hold them now and other assorted artistic flimeroo and bullshit which is
expressed in a breathless run on sentence which ends with the words: 'flunked
out.'
Accounting Night School: Flunked out.
Brian: 'Entrepreneur', crook, jail, bye bye Brian.
Film School: scraped through, no work, wrote some
scripts, sucked, defaulted student loan, bankruptcy.
George: Moving on!
MLM'S: Tupperware and Bitron Oil and Amway and yes
she made some money and yes it put some food on the table for her and Rose, but she really mostly sucked at it and
it took her away from her art which also mostly sucked.
"Enough!" Alex yelled, picking up her
broken textbook.
Mrs. Tremblay blinked at her. 'We will give her a 'T'
for 'Trying', because Alex keeps trying and trying and trying and try- '
"Shut up, Mrs. Tremblay!"
'- ing and trying. Except for-'
"Shut up!"
'Nate.'
"NO!"
Alex wrung her hands as she paced the room, "Shut
up, Mrs. Tremblay!"
Nate was not a mistake, could never be a mistake.
Wait. What did Mrs. Trembley mean? Did... did she mean because Alex left or
because she wouldn't let him help with Rose or because she couldn't lov- no.
Nope! No no!
"I am not going to think about this!"
She heard the satisfying clank that signified the
sending up of the heavy metal reinforced walls that kept all of the bad stuff
out. Mrs. Tremblay now had tape across her mouth and Alex could relax, which
meant, in this case, collapse.
'He collapsed.' Jason Sharpe lay awake staring at
the vaulted ceiling of his mountaintop mansion and remembered hearing those
words spoken about him ten years back. He felt an echo of that decade old
devastation make his muscles shake now. He rolled over with effort and looked
at the clock radio: 4:12.
The tears came then. He'd thought the sleeping
pills would help him sleep through 4:12. It wasn't the same clock radio. This
one had blue LED numbers. The one on that morning ten years ago had had red
letters. He hadn't seen a red 4:12 in ten years. But he'd seen plenty of blue
ones.
He hit a key on the open laptop on the night
table. He'd watch another episode of 'Mad About You', her favorite show and
then his, back when there was still hope in the world: hope for a future, hope
for new life, hope for memories created that would bring comfort in the
twilight years.
Now hope, always a forward entity, was a backward
looking thing to Jason. He hoped one day to join her and -
He reached forward and stopped the episode that
had started. It was Season Seven. He could not watch Season Seven or Season Six
but Netflix had played most of the night and moved him here to where he could
not be. Season Five was safe. Season Five was before Jamie and Paul had their
baby. Season Five was pre-disaster. Season Five was the only safe place for Jason.
Later, when the electrical fire inside Alex fizzled,
when her body felt like a puddle of lukewarm water, she lay on the floor
sketching. She fell asleep that way, pencil poised in the middle of a sketch of
Glass Lake with a canoe out in the middle. A canoe with a lone silhouetted male
figure in it.
She couldn't know it for sure, though with her
track record she may have guessed, but on the lake, right at that moment, under
a cobalt blue sky, with a crescent moon resting on the shoulder of The Grey Lady,
Jason Sharpe rowed alone to the middle of Glass Lake.
An outsider looking in at Jason's life might think
he had the world by the tail: owner of Sharpe Homes Enterprises building
exclusive mountain retreats for the rich and famous, the company logo, a
gleaming metal sword pointing to the sky was emblazoned on his company fleet of
Lincoln Navigators, he was owner of his own mountain mansion, a world
traveller, a handsome bachelor pursued by many women.
Only a stranger to Mountainview would have thought
that of Jason Sharpe. The people in town were intimate with the tragedy that
had twisted his life's path…
"Oh, my God! It's
too sad! She was so sweet and pretty and just adorable – just so sad!"
'They will find her
too late.'
"He's
lost everything now."
'She will be gone.
Walker can forget her.'
"Dr. Hallstrom
tried her best. Poor Dr. Hallstrom!"
'I will cry very
hard at the funeral for my poor pregnant patient.'
…and brought him out onto Glass Lake on this
night.
Jason pulled in the oars and looked toward shore
at Hallstrom House. He was surprised he felt nothing looking at the place. He
was surprised at how numb he was. That place wasn't worth his time anymore. He
looked across the lake to the promontory jutting into the water like the prow
of an ocean liner cutting a swath across the Atlantic.
He felt something then, a warm bloom in his chest
that spread through his body and made him glad and sad at the same time. The
first place they'd kissed had been The Snog, as the promontory was called, the
name snatched from Coronation Street in the sixties. Snogging is what you did
up there. He smiled at the silly name. They'd giggled like teenagers, though
that time was long past them, then laughed uncontrollably, a combination of
excitement, sleepiness, alcohol and a warm summer night, that first night up
there, "We're snogging!"
"We're too old to snog!"
"Like hell! Come here!"
A cold wind skidded across the water to him then;
its fingers trailed across his face in cool lines that he imagined might have
painted it ice blue. It was time to get off the water. Time to get out of here.
Time...
It was just time.
He picked up the Hudson Bay blanket at his feet,
unwrapped it. He stared at the white gauzy fabric there, looked at the folds
and swirls of it. He hadn't seen it for ten years. He opened it, and saw them
then, the little blue satin flower buds. 'Sheila really was a flower child. She
was Mother Nature.'
He took a breath and touched shaking fingers to
the other item there.
Pinned to the front of Sheila's nightgown, resting
on the belly, was the tiny pink sweater with her name already stitched into it
by her mother's hand: Eve. It was the jacket she would have worn home from the
hospital.
His cheeks were wet now as he brought the fabric
to his face and sobbed into it. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" The sounds of
his choking cries on the still Glass Lake echoed off the face of The Grey Lady.
He snuffed the sounds of his grief, pulled the fabric away and looked up at The
Grey Lady where the rain had done what it always did; sent streams of 'tears'
down her grey granite face. Appropriate, he thought, that she should look so
sad on this night.
A sound behind him, the faint light of car
headlights, then they went out and he knew someone was up on The Snog and it
was time to go.
He set the nightgown in the water. His fingers
went cold. He held on for a moment and the material seemed to come alive under
his hands, as she had. He held it for a long while and then took a breath,
another, then finally opened his hands and let it go.
He watched it twist and turn, dancing away from
him - a flash in his brain of her whirling in front of him, golden hair flying
- and he felt so lonely he thought of slipping into the water and letting it
take him too. And then he heard her voice giving him hell in that tone she had,
'Jason, Jason, Jason…'
And in his mind he answered her, 'I know. I'll be
okay.'
He watched the fabric flow away from him and then
in one second he couldn't see it anymore. He had an almost irresistible urge to go after
it, to pull it back into the boat, to take it back, to take it all back.
Instead, he took the oars in his hands and pulled
for home.
Chapter Three
At Alexandria's apartment in Winnipeg she was
jolted awake by the voice of Gorgeous George: "Hey, sucks to be you cause
we're not home right now but if you leave a message for George, Al or The Rose,
that would be cool!" George's voice was not what she wanted to hear right
now. She sat up, pulled the sketch off her face and wiped at the crusted drool
that had glued it there.
Then she heard what she did need to hear: "Alexandria,
are you there?"
She grabbed at the phone, "Nate...Nate!"
She laughed. "I just drew you! In a canoe on the lake!"
He laughed, "Are you in the canoe, too?"
She snorted, "Me on the lake? Who'd believe
it?" She looked around the empty apartment, sighed. "Who'd believe it?"
"I don't believe this!" Rose, twelve
years old, tossed her red hair off her face. "Are you kidding me?" Her
fingers tapped away at her i-Phone.
The left side of Alexandria's closet was now as
empty as the right. She closed a suitcase, zipped it, "No, you're the
kidder, remember?"
"George dumps you and now we're going to live
with your old boyfriend and I have to move to-" Alex snatched the cell out
of Rose's hand. "Sorry, Mom."
"Now, get this straight: Nate's a friend. And
we're not living WITH him. He's employing me to house sit for the winter."
Rose sighed, looking at a painting. "You've
always wanted to go back to that place." She pushed her voice down, trying
to mimic her mother, "'Rose, honey,
I had the best summers of my life there!'"
"Cut me a break! It wasn't my idea." She
pulled open a dresser drawer. "That's why I know it's a good one."
Rose, in a room full of drawings and paintings of
Glass Lake, threw the back of her hand to her forehead, feigning an
old-fashioned swoon as she fell back on the bed and declaimed dramatically, "The
artist obsessed is pulled ever deeper, deeper, DEEPER, into the depths of Glass
Lake!"
Alexandria put a pillow over Rose's face, pressed down
for a few seconds, then lifted it.
Rose was deadpan. "Nice. Does this backwater
at least have internet?"
"We're not going to Mars! We're only going up
to seventy seven hundred feet. People use the Internet on Everest. That's
twenty-nine thousand and twenty-eight fee-"
Rose, suddenly energized, jumped up and down on
the bed. "Jeopardy, Mom! You have got to get on Jeopardy! Seriously! You
could marry Alex Trebek! You could be Alex and Alex Trebek! You could be Alex
SQUARED! You could be-"
"Feeding my daughter to bears!"
Rose stopped jumping and stuck out her lip in a
mock pout. They exchanged a little grin and somewhere inside her Alex knew
everything was going to be okay.
The feeling lasted almost ten minutes: a new
record.
"Mom, it's going to be okay." Rose said,
watching her Mom gnaw on a fingernail. "And I think that might be
distracted driving right there."
Alex pulled her hand away from her mouth, studying
the wide-open horizon ahead. They were in a sea of yellow sunflowers. It was
one of the things she loved about Manitoba. And now she was leaving Manitoba.
Leaving her friends. Okay, she only really had one friend. And she hadn't
really talked to her much in the last few weeks. And actually she was kind of
annoying. Irritating, even.
And she was leaving her job. Okay, she was a waitress,
but she loved it at Lee's. Except for having to serve people. That was kind of
annoying. Irritating, even.
And she really wanted to be an artist and she
could spend all winter painting now! Except, she didn't know what she was going
to paint. She didn't want to think about that now. It was annoying. And, yes,
irritating.
It occurred to Alex that perhaps she had spent
most of the last ten years annoyed and irritated. She'd just been too busy to
notice. Well, then. Perhaps this was the right move after all. But she wasn't
the only person involved. She had pulled Rose away from her friends. Rose could
use the plural with that word: 'friend'. Part of Alex knew that Rose would have
no problem making new friends. She was gregarious and social in a way in which
her mother had never gotten the knack. Her daughter had said not a word about
leaving her friends. Alex didn't want to bring it up but how could Rose not
have complained about that? What about Ashley and Tanya and Nicole? What about
Alicia, for god's sakes, those girls had known each other since kindergarten! What
had she done!
She started chewing on her lip. "Mom!"
Alex stopped chewing her lip. Her hands tightened
around the steering wheel of the little red 84 Chevette and her jaw clenched as
the tension built in her.
Rose eyed her surreptitiously from the passenger
seat, noting Alex's white knuckles and then–
-Alex did a whole body seizure, quaking and
screaming.
It lasted about five seconds. When it was over she
let out a long slow easy breath.
Rose raised an eyebrow at her, "Feel better?"
Alex nodded. "No."
Rose laughed as they passed the sign: Now Leaving
Manitoba.
Rose sighed, 'So long, Manitoba.'
Alexandria joined in with, "Hello, Alberta."
Rose smirked, "Mom, maybe Jeopardy isn't such
a great idea. You forgot Saskatchewan."
"Hardy har!"
"Does Nate know he hired someone with no
basic geography?"
Nate Hallstrom traversed the topography of the
Rockies, tree root and rock and running water, as effortlessly as others moved
about their living rooms. For, this was HIS home: living room, kitchen, bedroom
and bath. He had bathed in the icy Cougar Canyon Creek, he had cooked trout
over fire and he had rested and slept in beds of pine boughs.
Nate, thirty-eight, was a stereotypical Nordic
blonde, as fit and lithe as a 20 year-old Canadian. His good looks were only
slightly diminished by a thin puckering burn scar running down the right side
of his face and disappearing under his collar. But the scar on his face told
only a fragment of the whole story. Second-degree burns over forty percent of
his body had left him with a plastic like skin patching his right side from his
head to his feet. That plastic had no feeling. He was used to it now. And used
to how it looked. Okay, that was a lie, he knew. If he'd been okay with how it
looked he would have been with a woman again by now. Some of the women of
Mountainview thought the scar on Nate's face gave him a swashbuckling look.
Some other women thought those women were stupid and shallow considering how he
got that scar. Still, he had about him that cachet of someone surviving
unimaginable tragedy.
Nate stopped abruptly, noticing something on the
ground.
His dog, Powderface, a brown mutt mix of Blue
Heeler and Chocolate Labrador, with a fine speckled white face, stopped by his
side, sniffing at the thing that had stopped Nate. Though she stayed close to
him she never tripped him up. She was, Nate thought, the perfect dog.
He knelt, picked up a mud covered G.P.S. unit. He
scraped the mud off the thing, turned it over. On the back a sticker with the
initials: S.H.E.
"Damn it, Jason." He sighed.
The sun was melting into the wheat fields
surrounding them and casting everything in gold; even the hood of the old
Chevette glowed with that special summer evening light. Alexandria yawned as
she swung the car into a highway motel lot. She parked, peering up through the
windshield at the proud sign: 'Clean Rooms. Friendly Staff.' She grinned at
Rose. "Think there's a discount for a dirty room with surly staff?"
Sargent Walker Stevens, the forty-seven year-old
Commander of the Mountainview RCMP detachment, turned the G.P.S. over in his
hands. He looked up at Nate from his desk, "Sit down."
Nate smiled, "I'm good." Powderface
stood beside him.
Walker looked at the label on the unit, "S.H.E.?
Never heard of it."
"S.H.E.: Sharpe Home Enterprises?" Nate
prodded.
Walker shrugged, leaned back in the chair behind
his desk and, trying to entice Powderface over, patted his knee. Powderface turned
her face away and sat down. "That dog hates me." Nate laughed as Walker
gestured to the coffee maker. "Coffee?" Nate shook his head. Walker
laughed, "You have no vices do you, you inhumanely fit bastard."
Nate laughed. "I guess all my vices are
healthy."
"Such as?"
Nate grinned, "Never mind." He picked up
the G.P.S. "So, what about this? I think it is Jason's."
Walker leaned forward again, shrugged. "Maybe.
But it's not their logo. What's the big deal anyway?"
"Jason Sharpe and I are not partners anymore.
He should not be up there."
Walker sighed. "Look, Nate, I know it's
private land, but you know…" Walker cleared his throat, "…it is
coming up on the tenth anniversary…anniversary of…"
"Of what?"
Walker shifted in his chair, looked out the window
at the peaks of The Grey Lady towering over Mountainview. He thought of all the
times that she had gone with him up there, to Glass Lake, on cool and quiet
autumn afternoons, after the tourists had gone. 'Christ, we were so young!' They
had planned their lives, lying in the wild flowers up there. She would be the
town vet. He would be the town cop. They would have a couple of kids. He would
play hockey in the winter and they'd cross country ski through the woods around
their log house. They'd grow old together secure in the arms of The Grey Lady,
and send their children out into the world, and on holidays their grown,
confident, and happy children would come home and tell them of their adventures
out there beyond the granite walls of this mountain plateau. He felt his eyes
sting and shut down his fantasizing about what might have, what should have
been.
The bitter taste in his mouth was made more acidic
with the knowledge it was his fault she left. He swallowed before he was able
to say, "Sheila."
Nate's face fell, "Oh, yes. I am so sorry."
Nate felt a shudder run through him remembering
the awful sight the Search and Rescue Team came upon on that cold blue winter
morning, ten years gone now.
Rose gave her Mom a sideways look as the Chevette
struggled up the steep mountain road. Rose thought she could hear the little
engine chugging, 'I think I can! I think I can! I think I can!' She began
whispering herself, "I think I can! I think I can! I think I can!"
Alex joined her chant as the car gamely took the
next curve hugging the granite face and continued to climb, dropping down into
a lower gear and jumping with the effort. Rose's face dropped when the car
jumped. She frowned. "Will we be there before dark?"
She was not happy when Alex shook her head.
The dark in the mountains was worse than Rose had
feared. It had started raining, there was no moon, it was black as, well she
couldn't think of anything it was as black as but something she'd read in
Stephen King's book, 'On Writing', when he had quoted one of his favorite authors.
Rose thought it might be Elmore Leonard, or maybe Ross MacDonald. All she knew
was that it was too good not to share with her mother, so she took a big breath
and in a clear voice announced that, "The night was darker than a carload
of assholes."
Rose wasn't sure what she expected: a laugh, a
reprimand, a scowl. She sure as hell didn't expect her mother to slam on the
brakes. "Mom!"
"Rose!"
"Mom!" Rose turned in her seat, looking
fearfully back. "We could slide backwards, this little car can't, can't –
just go please!"
"No more language like that."
Rose, still wide-eyed and looking into the dark
behind the car, nodded, "No more language like that."
"Okay." Alex stepped on the gas. And the
little car spun on the gravel. Alex gulped. Oops. Maybe she'd made another of
her classic mistakes. She cleared her throat, determined not to look at Rose
who was now staring at her in recrimination.
Alex put the car down into L and stepped on the
gas gently. The engine whined but the tires bit into the road and the car
started inching up the mountain again. It picked up a little speed, the engine
screaming now, and Alex slipped it into second gear, a little more speed, okay,
now we're getting somewhere, and into third, yup, they were going to make it
which made Alex happy because Rose would never have let her live it down if she'd
had to back down the mountain and start up again. Okay, onward and upward…
They reached the plateau below Glass Lake forty
minutes later. The night was still black outside but Rose's face was now lit by
her i-Phone, still hooking her up with the world outside. Alex thought she was
surfing the net or texting an abandoned friend so she was surprised when Rose
read, "Hallstrom House is a favorite for Halloween parties because of the
numerous tragedies and-" Rose looked over at Alex. "Tragedies, Mom?"
Alex laughed, "That's for the tourists."
Rose read on. "Uh, blah blah blah...oh, the
most famous was the case, during the Great Depression-" Rose glanced at
Alex. "- which I'm about to go through by the way - the case of a
carpenter who fell from a scaffold on the house and was pronounced dead at the
scene." Rose screwed up her face, "Exactly how many people have died
in this house?" Alex laughed. Rose's mouth fell open. "She laughs!
She laughs!" She continued reading, "The carpenter claimed he left
his body - left his body?"
Rose looked at Alex again, but Alex didn't react
and so she continued reading, "Okay, so he, quote left his body unquote,
and flew across the valley to his home, oh brother, where he saw his wife in a
compromising position with his business partner…uh huh... Upon awakening inside
the morgue, where his wife had come to identify him - ick- he told her what he
had seen and the hysterical adulteress confessed all, ran back to Hallstrom House
and jumped from the promontory into the lake where she drowned…WITH HER POODLE,
DOROTHY PARKER! Aaaghhh! The stupid cow took her dog with her? What a-"
"Rose!"
"-stupid dumb selfish idiot stupid stupid
woman! Jeez! Poor little doggie. That woman was the skank in that house, no,
the bitch-"
"Rose!"
"I mean as in female dog." Alex looked
at her. "Okay, sorry! But Jeez! Don't take the poor dog with you because
you're a-" She looked sideways at her Mom, "-really stupid woman."
Rose shook her head, "And 'left his body and travelled across the valley'?"
Alex shrugged, "I've read a few stories about
people being pronounced dead and then waking up knowing everything that
happened while they were...uhm...'gone'''.
Rose rolled her eyes, "Onward…tragedy struck
again when a young skater fell through the ice-"
Rose dropped her phone, "That's enough of
that!" She looked out the window at the black forest; shivered.
Alex was surprised, "You read all those
vampire stories and THAT bothered you?"
Rose laughed, "Those vampire stories are just
stories and anyway what's a little blood between friends?"
Blood drained into a large jar from clear plastic
tubing.
'It is Hallstrom blood.' Helga thought. 'Alas, not
as pure or perfect as it once was and that is my fault.' Her gaze followed the
red flow up the tube from the jar into Nate's arm and then on to his face as he
smiled at her.
"Thanks, Helga."
She smiled back at him. She was beautiful still,
now in her late 30's, a striking blonde, tall and lithe and elegant. Though the
fates had been unkind to her in many ways she was thankful that the Hallstrom
genes would carry her with dignity and grace into her middle age and beyond. She
winked at Nate. "Each time you thank me and each time I tell you there is
no need. We are blood."
'And I caused your hemochromatosis', she thought. 'I
am sorry, Nate. I say this to you silently every time I have to do this and you
will never hear my confession. All those transfusions after you were burned
caused this and this is my fault.'
"Well, if I went to the hospital for this, my
Thor-like image would be destroyed by news of my infirmity."
Helga laughed, "If everyone were so infirm I
would be out of business." She checked his arm again and then sat back and
looked at the painting over the stone fireplace; a derivative landscape,
surprisingly in this log cabin in the mountains, a painting of a field of
sunflowers. Hideously relentlessly happy. She was surprised it lacked a unicorn
and rainbow. She wondered at his complete lack of taste. He was a Hallstrom.
She kept her tone neutral as she said, "That is new."
He sighed, "I know. It's not 'art art', but
it makes me happy and it was painted by a friend."
Helga didn't ask whom; she didn't want to hear
that disgusting name spoken aloud, especially not by him. "The yellow does
brighten the place."
He grinned, "That must have hurt you."
She smiled at him, but it was a lemon-sucking
construct with which he was intimately familiar. He smiled to himself. Helga
hated everything about his lifestyle. Especially his home, which she insisted
on calling a 'cabin', though it certainly a house: twelve hundred square feet,
two bedrooms, two bath, master ensuite with Jacuzzi, decks front and back,
vaulted open beam ceilings, massive Rundle Rock fireplace…damn fireplace, something
was in the chimney. He'd have to get up there and get it out. Last time he'd
tried to use it he'd smoked the place out. It was already August; he'd really
need it soon.
He felt a buzz of fatigue behind his eyes and gave
into it, letting his lids fall shut. He knew he'd spend the afternoon napping
in his big feather bed. His big empty feather bed. 'Not now.' He thought, 'Think
about it later, when she's here…' A small grin crinkled the scar on his face
and neck.
Helga smiled, watching him smile. He was drifting
off, as he often did during his phlebotomies. It was when she felt most
responsible for him. 'His life is in my hands right now.' She thought. 'I could
let all his blood run out.' She checked the level in the jar at their feet, 'Of
course, I don't have enough jars.'
He looked so innocent like this, so vulnerable. So
loveable. She reached to touch his face, the terrible scar there. Her fingers
were close enough to feel the warmth of skin when he opened his eyes, startled.
Then she could see it in his face. That most awful thing of all: pity.
"Helga."
His voice was so kind, so concerned, it made her
want to retch. She turned away from him. "I'm sorry." Her voice was
ragged, betraying her. She would have to work on that.
"I thought it was…" He reached for her
hand; it was limp and cold in his. "You have Walker."
She turned to him then, pulling her hand out of
his. Her voice under her command again, she said with the authority of a
physician giving a diagnosis, "I am competing with a dead woman: forever
young, forever beautiful, forever perfect."
"Perfect!" Rose, tired and cranky, had
held her tongue as long as she could, "You're lost!"
"I am not lost!" The Chevette's lights
lit up a sign: HALLSTROM HOUSE. Alex turned to Rose and grinned, "And neither
are you."
The lights of the car sent crazy shadows walking
through the stands of pine and spruce on either side of the twisting gravel
drive.
The back of Hallstrom House was dark and in Roses'
opinion, creepy. "Where's The Adamms Family?"
Alexandria shut off the car lights - total
black - Rose screamed. Alex laughed as she turned on the lights again.
"Mom! Not funny!"
Alexandria turned them off.
"Still not funny!"
What was funny was their run for the house, arms
loaded with only the essentials, Alex trying to hang onto the flashlight, as its
jiggling beam lit their way. "You should have parked on the lawn!"
Rose yelled.
But they both laughed all the way from the garage
to the rock Nate had hidden the key under. Rose was running on the spot waiting
for her Mom to "Hurry up!" She glanced at the black moving forest
around them, the trees waved like weird robed dancers angry to be rooted to
their spots and hissing at the interlopers. Rose knew you couldn't hear the man
eating grizzly certainly hiding in there, waiting to roar out of the black and
rip into this easy buffet.
Then they were on the run again, Alex laughing
again, until they were finally safe at the back door. Alexandria handed the
flashlight off to Rose and dropped the key."MOM!"
"Rose!"
Rose shined the light on the ground as Alex
searched and the wind wound up again and now the trees seemed to be screaming
at them. Rose was wide-eyed.
"MOM!"
"Rose!"
"MOM!"
Alexandria spied the key, grabbed it, stood and
inserted it. The door fell open and they crashed inside, Alex laughing. But
Rose was still scared. "CLOSE THE DOOR!"
"Okay, okay!"
Alex kicked their tote bags out of the way and
shoved the door shut.
"Lock it!"
Alex locked it and then noticed another lock up
high on the door. Rose eyed it, "Did they lock people IN here?"
"Uhm..."
"Mom?"
"Sort of."
"Excuse me!"
"It was for her protection."
"What does that mean?"
"Someone who used to live here; she walked in
her sleep."
"Out the door?"
Alex's "Yes," came out in a croak. She
cleared her throat, trying not to think about what the lock represented. She
cleared her throat, tried again, "Yes."
"Well, what hap-"
Alex feigned a huge yawn, "I'm done in!"
"But, what-"
She took Rose by her shoulders and turned her away
from the door, "We're both done in! Come on, chop, chop! Time to hit the
hay! Sandman's coming! Grab some shut-eye!"
She shoved Rose down the hall, "What about a
tour?"
"In the morning. In the bright, fresh, Alpine
morning."
Hallstrom House was quiet the next morning. A
hiker passing by would have thought it still abandoned for the season, until
that blood-curdling scream.
Alex leapt off the sofa where she was still
sleeping, "Rose!" She noticed the open doors to the veranda, ran
through them.
Rose stood on the edge of the deck, slack-jawed.
Alex ran to her, "What's the matter?
Rose pointed to the living post card surrounding
them. She turned to her mother, dazed.
"Is this where we are?"
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