by ed. Pela Via
INT. DINING ROOM - CONTINUOUS
The man of the voice and photos, SAM DAWES, sporting a grey blazer over an emerald-green shirt, charms his companion by summoning phlegm to imitate her Hebrew.
SAMMY
Hchchuppah.
The woman, CARI (30s), elegant and dressed for her sexual prime in a burgundy camisole, raises her wine glass in mock-toast to his effort. They sit adjacent at the far end of a long table, CANDLES burning and spent linen topping their dinner plates. It could be a jewelry commercial. Looks exchange, the arch of his brow and her bitten lip suggesting the carnality to come.
EXT. HOUSE - THAT MOMENT
HANDHELD POV outside the window. Darkness vignettes the warm, MUFFLED dining-room scene as the couple converses whimsically. Tree limbs rake the f.g., WIND rustling through them. Sam puts one hand over Cari’s, then pulls her close with his other for a kiss. WHIP to CAR HEADLIGHTS piercing the night and pulling into the driveway. The gate is already open. The car stops, then reverses back the way it came. WHIP to the window again and the couple is gone.
INT. KITCHEN - MOMENTS LATER
Vised between the black stockings of Cari’s thighs, a high-tech CORKSCREW atop a wine bottle resists her efforts. Sam scrolls his CELL PHONE screen and swipes a finger through the hummus dish on the counter, licking it.
CARI
(re: corkscrew)
I can’t believe you -- er, we -- have one of these.
SAM
Careful. Eric Roberts gave me that.
He steps behind her and guides her hands. She purrs and tosses her auburn hair to expose her neck, which he nuzzles.
CARI
You like screwing from behind, dontcha?
SAM
How many more glasses you think that would take?
INT. LIVING ROOM - THAT MOMENT
HANDHELD POV. A rougher, frenetic imitation of the opening shot. Piano. Artwork. Fireplace now licking more fiercely as if challenged by a gust of air. A cork POPS O.S., with more tipsy LAUGHTER. WHIP to the couple waddling into the room, joined at the waist and balancing their replenished glasses as they devour one another. Cari breaks away, and her bedroom eyes instantly sober as we SNAP ZOOM into her. She shrieks.
Cabernet douses the white carpet, the dropped glass rolling beside it.
CARI
Hello?
(then)
Sam, who’s this?
Picking up Cari’s glass, Sam turns and sizes up an intruder. Cowgirl boots, black cashmere sweater, purple ribbon choker--
GIRL’S VOICE (O.S.)
Yeah, “Sam,” who’s this?
--and stringy blond hair framing a pale, raccoon-eyed face (20s) with a diamond stud in her nose. Five years ago she might’ve been adorable or in rehab.
The color drains from Sam’s own face.
GIRL (CONT’D)
Expecting someone else, were you?
He glares at her the way one might at a caged tiger before realizing the bars are too far apart. He swallows.
GIRL (CONT’D)
(to Cari)
That’s gonna stain if you don’t treat it right away.
Cari nods absently and steps out of frame. The girl approaches Sam, who backpedals until falling into an oversized chair.
SAM
(sotto)
Are you serious? The fuck?
GIRL
Oh, I think you know I am. You’re the one who never was. So who’s the flooz?
SAM
Please. You can cut the act. Just... go home before this gets out of hand.
GIRL
Before I cause a scene, you mean?
Sam digests the bitter medicine of her words.
SAM
I’ll call you tomorrow and explain everything. Promise.
Cari reappears with a dishtowel, a dog brush, and a shrug.
CARI
I didn’t know where--
GIRL
(locked on Sam)
Utility closet. On the left past the dead son’s room with the boy-band posters.
(to Sam)
Not exactly a domestic one, is she?
Cari tosses the supplies at the Girl, who just watches them fall to the floor.
CARI
You clean it. I’m not the one breaking into people’s houses.
GIRL
Door was unlocked. I know it’s Encino and all, but still. Sammy.
Cari also turns to Sam and crosses her arms, speed-blinking for an explanation.
SAM
What. I didn’t...
(sighs)
Cari, this is Joelle. Joelle, Cari.
JOELLE (formerly GIRL) sneers at Cari, then drapes herself over Sam’s lap. He struggles to avoid her lips and she settles for his cheek while eyeing Cari.
CARI
I’m guessing she’s not your niece.
JOELLE
Bitch, I was you a year ago. But without the stretch marks. Or a Valtrex commercial on her reel. And a helluva lot more to live for.
CARI
(embarrassed, to Sam)
I don’t have herpes.
Sam closes his eyes and shakes his head, imploring Cari not to provoke their intruder, who stands up and crosses to her.
JOELLE
You. Sit here, right across from him. Sammy, stay where you are.
Joelle pushes Cari backwards into the matching oversized chair and straddles her, measuring her. She clasps both of Cari’s hands, fingers intertwined and cycling them like an exercise machine, then leans close as if to kiss her, and headbutts her at the last second.
Cari’s eyes flutter and water as she sucks air between her teeth. Sam winces but remains silent.
Joelle holds up Cari’s limp left hand, examining the DIAMOND RING on her engaged finger in the flickering light.
JOELLE (CONT’D)
(to Sam, disappointed)
Seriously?
Her mouth slowly engulfs Cari’s digit from nail to knuckle, and the ring is gone when she resurfaces. She displays her tongue for Sam, the gold band ringing the barbell pierced through it like a carnival game. She spits the ring back into the dazed Cari’s face. It tumbles between her cleavage and Joelle reaches up underneath her camisole to retrieve it, throwing a seductive grin back over her shoulder.
WHIP TO:
Sam, stoic. Blinks. A deep breath. As if she’d vanish if he only stopped believing in her.
Cari flexes her eye sockets wide and rubs her head. Joelle climbs off and massages the length of Cari’s arm like a phlebotomist preparing to draw blood. Unable to break the skin, she trails the ring with her black fingernail, digging into the flesh until Cari yelps and blood surfaces. Joelle’s eyes light up like Christmas morning, teeth flashing.
SAM
Enough! What do you want?
JOELLE
What’s my motivation, you mean? Aren’t I supposed to be asking you that?
CARI
(groggy)
I want a Band-Aid.
(beat)
And a big wedding.
JOELLE
Aww, of course you do, sweetie.
CARI
In a nice hotel. Bon Jovi tribute band...
SAM
Let’s just get this over with.
JOELLE
Oh, no no no. Doesn’t work like that, Sammy. There’s no little magical transition to Happily Ever After on the Jersey shore.
(then)
Wait.
(she freezes, whispers)
You hear that?
SAM
What?
JOELLE
Is that a... SWAT team outside?
Sam’s eyes dart to the corners of the room as he listens. Cari perks up her head. Nothing but the TONE ARM COCKING as another LP drops onto the turntable and MUTED TRUMPETS begin. Joelle laughs it all off.
JOELLE
Course not, dumbass. But I do have an idea.
SMASH CUT TO:
Crime-scene slides project themselves onto the
wall inside Sam’s skull, dust motes suspended in the lamplight arcing through his grey matter. Each advance of the carousel one potential scenario, all flattened to two dimensions by blue-tinged, overexposed flash.
Ligature rings around a purple neck. Next.
River bloat. Next.
Bludgeoned face. Next.
Amateur vasectomy.
In his business they call this pre-viz: crude video storyboards created for approval before animators rend their artwork in full detail. But Sam’s vision had been compromised from the beginning.
Joelle seemed such a sweet girl when they first met on Transplanters. It was only a few days. He’d hired the special effects company where she apprenticed, glueing on silicone prostheses, blending makeup, and mixing batches of gore. Despite being starstruck by the actresses whom she disfigured so intimately, her people skills outshined the mouth-breathers back at the shop. She fantasized about someday being the one in that makeup chair, though Sam encouraged her continued craft specialization. Later, Joelle would toe the waters of many trades, each but a stepping stone to the Walk of Fame.
For five months they both got what they wanted from each other. He charted the territories of her young skin, sowing seed, while her networking tree took root. She loved finishing his sentence whenever he told someone she’d stolen his heart . . . “but only to make a mold from it.” And last Thanksgiving they shared his candlelit table much like tonight, when her pregnancy scare trumped his bent-knee proposal.
Her scare, not his.
Sam beamed at the news, pledging his eternal commitment while praying for a son to redeem the one he’d lost to depression and vomit inhalation two years prior. But Joelle only saw the career derailment that came with birthing a child at twenty-three. Their embryo was already spoken of in past tense before its father could object. She wouldn’t say where or how, and flashbacks of the animatronic latex and red-dyed corn syrup in her old creature shop gave Sam nightmares for weeks.
Though she didn’t want to marry, Joelle wasn’t ready to abort their relationship. Sam cut the cord. His assistant delivered a carload of her belongings to the wardrobe department in Burbank where she’d most recently been working.
When Sam found gashes in all four sidewalls of his 7-Series parked outside the studio bungalow, he didn’t file for an ex parte. He didn’t employ an investigator, didn’t even bring it up with his therapist. He did change his house alarm code, but never saw Joelle again until tonight.
———
“How about,” Joelle says, “we play a little game. Like a twenty questions type thing.” Crouched next to Cari’s chair, she remains fixated on the woman’s fingers, once again holding a handful up for inspection. “Actually, ten makes more sense. Ten questions. Yeah?”
Sweat trickles down Sam’s nose, clinging under the tip until accumulating enough mass to drop and stain his trousers. “Something you wanna know, Joelle, just ask it.” He wriggles out of his blazer and tosses it onto the couch.
Joelle clocks his every motion, coiled, irises dilated like anime. “Oh I will. But we need to establish the stakes. I mean, what happens when someone gets one wrong? Or lies?” She draws the word out like an accusation.
He takes off his cufflinks and tables them. “When have I ever lied to you?”
“Not to me. To her.” She rubs Cari’s shoulders from behind. “Though, by extension, to me, yes.”
Cari remains silent, not wanting to stoke any pre-existing drama. None of this is her doing, yet she can’t say she didn’t sign up for it. Producers make enemies, and she’s known her complicit role from the start, fiancée or otherwise.
Sam rolls up his sleeves.
“One finger per question,” Joelle suggests with all the levity of a roulette dealer. “Sounds fair, right?”
This gets Cari’s attention. “Wait, one what, now?”
“No,” Sam grumbles, “it doesn’t.”
With a rattle of her arm, a roll of black gaffer tape shimmies down from Joelle’s elbow into her hand. The tape screeches like a wounded alien as she whips it around Cari’s torso from above while holding her in a headlock. Cari squeals.
Sam sees his chance and lunges for them, but in the ten feet and one second between chairs he takes a boot heel across his chin.
“I told you to stay there!”
His fluttering eyes distorted through Cari’s spilled wine goblet, Sam picks himself up off the carpet and follows Joelle’s pointing finger back to his chair. He rubs his jaw and numbed lips, and spits a mouthful of blood tasting nothing like corn syrup into his palm. Nowhere to wipe it among the all-white décor. Resigned to sully his green shirt, he knows he’ll forever associate this memory with Christmas. Another crimson stain begins to set next to the neglected cabernet.
After four tape passes, Cari can only flap her forearms like a T-rex. “Don’t worry, this stuff is great. No residue,” Joelle says. “Oughta be, for twenty bucks a roll. This part, though,” she binds Cari’s ankles, “is a community service.”
“Fuck. You,” Cari snarls. She wonders how much damage one of her own four-inch heels could do to an eye socket if given a chance and sobering reflexes.
“Allrighty. Let’s do this.” Joelle takes the woman’s flailing hand and grips its pinkie like she would an ATV throttle, thumb against the side for leverage. “Samuel. First question: what’s Cari’s middle name?”
Sam’s brows raise in anticipation, then twist, and Joelle sees Cari’s pantomiming lips in her periphery, which she thwarts with an elbow to the temple.
“Ellen!” he blurts, impeded speech from his bitten tongue drawing looks from both women. “Jethuth, it’th Ellen, okay?”
Cari’s head sinks. Joelle fishes a driver’s license from the purse now on her lap and chuckles at Cari. “Says ‘Cari H.’ Helen, I’m betting, right?” She licks her lips as she applies pressure. “Okay, here we go—”
“Wait! Dubuh or nothing!” Sam pleads. “Dubuh or nothing. C’mon.”
“Intriguing. Shoulda figured you might bargain.” Joelle opens her grip, then grasps both Cari’s pinkie and ring fingers. “Sure, why not. Because I know you don’t know any of this shit. Okay—for two fingers—question number two: what’s Cari’s favorite movie?”
“Oh, thath eathy. Jerry Maguire. Ith thtill in the pwayer upthtairs.” He’s a better negotiator than liar, but they’re complementary skills.
Joelle looks to Cari for confirmation, who feigns relief and nods quickly. “Bullshit. It’s gotta be Pretty Woman,” Joelle says, and Cari’s torrid howl wrenches Sam’s heart as her tendons snap.
From her pants pocket, Joelle slips what Sam figures to be his engagement ring back over Cari’s gnarled finger. Despite being oversized, there’s no way it will fit around the swollen flesh now, and her trembling makes it all the more futile, but Joelle persists.
“Oh God, no!” Cari thrashes in the chair like a shark, bound feet flailing. “No! Why are you—” She screams and throws her head back as the veins in Joelle’s neck tense repeatedly.
Her tormentor’s hands come up bloody and accomplished, palms on display. One holds two severed fingers, the other a chrome guillotine cigar cutter identical to Sam’s.
Sam gags, coughing and sputtering some combination of fluids between his fingers and down the front of his Christmas shirt.
Cari’s mutilated hand lies limp, blood flow pulsing in rhythm with each heartbeat. Her skirt is already spotted red, and the dripping armrest begins to flood the floor. Tears cascading, her head lolls side to side in shock on the edge of consciousness. Panicked breaths seething through her nose and grinding teeth. She thinks only of Gabrielle, light of her life, who’s probably asking the babysitter right about now if she can make popcorn, negotiating bedtime and their movie library.
