TANATA:

a screenplay BASED ON A TRUE STORY
by Randall Carter Gray

FADE IN

INT. AN ETHIOPIAN HOME — DUSK

The sun is setting in Asmara, Ethiopia (Eritrea).

AN ETHIOPIAN WOMAN, 45, is spreading dried grasses and palm fronds on the tile floors of her modest contemporary home. On a wall is a framed photograph of Ethiopian Emperor Ras Taferi Haile Selassie, the last of a line of kings descended from King Solomon.

In a bedroom of the same home are two sets of clothes, an unbuckled somewhat battered leather satchel and a Bible written in Ge’ez (an ancient Ethiopian language) and English, open to the Gospel of Mark. On the wall over the bed is a framed photograph of Haile Selassie. An attractive American man ANDY WHITMAN, 22, and MARIAM, 20, a beautiful young Ethiopian woman, are making love, covered by sheets.

CUT TO:

EXT. ETHIOPIAN MEN AND BOYS OUTSIDE THE HOME — SAME

Just outside the window of the bedroom, ETHIOPIAN MEN of all ages and TEENAGE BOYS are gathering. A boy in tears leads a goat by a rope. Grasses and fronds have been spread on the driveway where the men have gathered. AN ETHIOPIAN MAN looks up at the window and produces a knife, which gleams in the dying sunlight.

CUE ETHIOPIAN FOLK DRUMS

CUT TO:

INT. AN ETHIOPIAN HOME — SAME

Beneath the sheets in the bedroom we see the passionate, perspiring faces of ANDY and MARIAM.

CUT TO:
Outside the bedroom door, the ETHIOPIAN WOMAN is listening to the lovers. She recoils in disgust and bangs on the door, shouting something in Tigrinya.

CUT TO:

EXT. ETHIOPIAN MEN AND BOYS OUTSIDE THE HOME — SAME

The ETHIOPIAN MAN looks up. We see the knife.

CUT TO
A man reaches into a clear cylinder filled with large red capsules.

CUT TO:

INT. AN ETHIOPIAN HOME — SAME

ANDY and MARIAM reach their climax.

CUT TO:

EXT. ETHIOPIAN MEN AND BOYS OUTSIDE THE HOME — SAME

The knife is pulled across the throat of the goat, and blood splatters on the ground. The men smile, the boys are appalled.

CUT TO:
We see the framed photograph of Haile Selassie in the bedroom.

We see the hand reach down into a deep glass cylinder filled with large red capsules. He hand selects one and draws it out.

BLEATING OF THE GOAT

CUT TO:

INT. AN ETHIOPIAN HOME — SAME

ANDY, startled by the sound of the bleating goat, blood gurgling in its throat, rises up his face covered by perspiration. The expression on ANDY’S face is one of fear, then deep sorrow, longing and remorse, with the framed photograph on the wall behind him.

CREDITS

DISSOLVE TO:

EXT. KAGNEW STATION, ASMARA, ETHIOPIA — DAWN

We see the front gate, manned by SHORE PATROLMAN. We see various huge satellite dishes and radio towers in early morning light. We see the rear gate as ANDY, highly inebriated, wheels unsteadily his motorcycle onto the base. ANDY manages a salute/wave at the SHORE PATROLMAN who recognizes him, smiles and waves him in.

CUT TO:

INT. A DARKENED ROOM IN A DORM BARRACKS — DAWN

We see a poster of John Lennon on the wall of the room, and a Puerto Rican man FRANK COSTELLO, 23, asleep beneath it when an alarm goes off. He startles and looks up.

CUE LENNON BLASTING ON A STEREO FROM ANOTHER ROOM: “GIMME SOME TRUTH”

CUT TO:
Mayhem in the hallway of the barracks. Men are standing outside their rooms, some getting dressed, some in pajamas and skivvies shouting, banging the walls and their doors as a CHIEF and two SHORE PATROLMAN are striding away. One SHORE PATROLMAN turns to the CHIEF:

PATROLMAN
Aren’t we going to do anything?

CHIEF
We just did.

The CHIEF reaches up, with a smirk on his face, and cuts off the alarm as he passes and mutters:

CHIEF
All clear.

ANDY, still drunk, is climbing the stairs to his floor and passes the CHIEF and PATROLMEN. The alarm goes off again. The song is blaring.

ANDY
What the fuck?

ANDY bursts into his room, where FRANK is getting dressed in the dark.

ANDY
What the fuck is going on?

FRANK
Bust.

ANDY
Bust?! Good night, Miss Agnes! Where’s my shit?!

FRANK grins and retrieves two blocks of hashish from his hiding place.

ANDY
Put it back. (running) I had two lieutenant junior grades, a first class petty officer and an ensign trying to blow me shotguns two nights ago for crying out loud! I was fried when I got there! This shit’s worldwide!

ANDY throws down his helmet, and runs into the hallway. Through a window he sees a toilet falling from above and hears it explode on the parking lot. ANDY, still drunk, grins knowingly.

ANDY
Marcus.

CUT TO:

EXT. BARRACKS ROOFTOP — DAWN

ANDY runs down the hallway dodging fellow “landlubbers,” who are staging a small, fairly contained riot, and climbs the steps leading to the roof of the barracks. We see ANDY step onto the flat roof, where MARCUS, a tall, slender attractive guy wearing cut-off blue jeans and no shirt, with various white-shell necklaces, is picking up another porcelain toilet and flinging it off the roof, delirious with glee as the toilet explodes in the parking lot.

MARCUS
It’s even more beautiful than I imagined! … That was for Dick … Richard … excuse me.

ANDY cracks up

ANDY
As in King?

As ANDY grabs a toilet.

MARCUS
Family!

ANDY
Tricia!

MARCUS is puzzled at first, and then roars with laughter. ANDY flings the toilet with one arm. As it lands, MARCUS jumps up and down and claps his hands, still laughing. ANDY looks down. Beside MARCUS is a bottle of ZIBIB, an opium-based Ethiopian liqueur. ANDY smiles appreciatively as he grabs the bottle and takes a swig.

ANDY
Zaaabeeeeb!

MARCUS grabs another toilet.

MARCUS
Julie!

ANDY grabs another toilet.

ANDY
Henry Fucking Kissinger!

MARCUS
Kissing Fucky Henniger!

The toilet explodes.

CUT TO:

INT. BARRACKS HALLWAY — SUNRISE

ANDY and MARCUS enter the barracks hallway. ANDY is trying to run and drink out of the bottle at the same time.

MUSIC ON THE STEREOS AS THEY RUN BY: “I DON’T WANT TO BE A SOLDIER, “PURPLE HAZE, “A HARD RAIN’S GONNA FALL,” “PLEASE MR. SPACEMAN,” “YOU DON’T KNOW MY NAME.” And “NASHVILLE CATS” in MOOSHE’S room.

A can of black spray paint lies on the linoleum floor. MARCUS picks it up and sprays a long black line on the wall as he walks and drops it. ANDY picks it up and writes “Revolution” on the wall. He punctuates the word with an exclamation point and sprays the period until it runs down the wall.

CUT TO:

INT. THE BOW, CAPTAIN’S MAST — DAY

We see ANDY and MARCUS in uniform at attention standing before the the base COMMANDER, 58, who stands behind a podium. The COMMANDER looks up from ANDY’s records and looks at ANDY.

COMMANDER
And it says here WHITMAN, you’re very intelligent.

The COMMANDER waits for ANDY’s response, but gets none.

COMMANDER
Don’t you have anything to say?

ANDY
Back at you … sir.

COMMANDER
You got into a scrape downtown. How long did they have you?

CUT TO:
The hand opens the capsule and takes out the piece of paper inside. (Double exposed. Some film noir angles of windows and venetian blinds would be interesting here, I think.)

CUT TO:
In a violent flashback, ANDY is being pulled out of a room by members of Ethiopia’s Second Division Army, blindfolded and tied at the wrists. He is beaten and kicked. ANDY falls and hits the pavement floor, knocked cold. (Screen filtered red) ANDY is drug into a cell and the door is closed.

CUT TO:
Back at Captain’s Mast.

ANDY
Three or four days. Long enough.

COMMANDER
Did they feed you?

ANDY
Guinea rolls and tea.

COMMANDER
Are you okay?

ANDY
I … dunno.

COMMANDER
Are the men here who pulled you outta there?

ANDY
Yes sir, they are.

COMMANDER
Back there, we’ll get to you two. Righto.

DANNY
Okay, yes sir … you bet.

HACKY
Yo.

COMMANDER
I’m sorry you have to wait through all of this. But …

DANNY
No, we’re just hanging out, your L… Sir.

HACKY
No, that’s cool, sir.

COMMANDER
So that we can give your efforts the attention and appreciation they deserve … but this station and the men of it salute you for your vigilance and effort. All of us feel safer when our people do their jobs. And no one is here to die. I’m sure Mr. Whitman concurs.

ANDY
Yes, I sure do. (hesitatingly) Um, we were, uh, thinkin’ we’d throw ‘em a party at the club. And y’all are welcome if you wanna come … if we do that.

COMMANDER
Thanks Whitman. But I’m not an opium man … and you shouldn’t be one either. Zibib will knock you on your ass. You can’t be of any help here, Whitman, if you’re knocked on your ass. We all want to get home in one piece, and we will.

ANDY
Yes sir.

The COMMANDER turns to MARCUS. We see more men awaiting their turn and standing at attention behind ANDY and MARCUS.

COMMANDER
And you’re the one who got this little soiree off the ground, is that right? You got anything against toilets?

MARCUS
Yes sir … and no sir. You asked two questions, so, I said yes and … no. You know, sir? So, yes I got it started … stupid, I know … and no toilets are good. I use them all the time.

COMMANDER
Well, for God’s sake, man … You are a man, aren’t you?

MARCUS
Fuck, yeah! … Sir. Hey, I’m sorry man, sir. But you guys brought me over here where they drink opium, and, well, seeing as I was about to enter college and become an architect, I thought I’d drink some so that I’d get better ideas on what to draw when I get back.

COMMANDER
Well, you’d have a week alone or longer to dream up some sketches … if I had a brig.

CUT TO:
ZECKO, a black sailor in uniform mishears the COMMANDER, thinking the COMMANDER said “brick” instead of “brig.” A BUDDY corrects ZECKO.

ZECKO
I do, too. ‘Cause I’d hit you with it.

BUDDY
He said “brig.”

ZECKO
Oh. … Sorry. … No I’m not.

COMMANDER
Get him out of here. … Whitman, busted to Seaman. Five-hundred dollars.

Two SHORE PATROLMEN grab ZECKO roughly and take him out.

ZECKO
Fuck you, you cunt! … My mama’s dyin’!

The COMMANDER turns to MARCUS.

COMMANDER
Mr. Remmick, busted to Seaman, thousand dollars.

MARCUS
Thank you, sir. My mother died two months ago.

COMMANDER
I’m sorry.

ANDY and MARCUS whirl and stride out. The COMMANDER turns to an OFFICER standing nearby.

COMMANDER
Rough crowd. Thank God this is the tail end of them. What’s a bottle of that Zibib shit selling for these days?

CUT TO:

EXT. PRIMITIVE AIRPORT, ASMARA, ETHIOPIA — EARLY MORNING

We see Ethiopian men, women and children, in white linen wraps and modern dress. Crude, box-like structures which serve as homes, shops and stores. Dirt devils. Poverty.
ANDY and some Navy colleagues, with some stealth, make for their plane from a simple terminal building.

GUNSHOTS FIRED INTO THE AIR

When ANDY and his colleagues hear gunshots, his colleagues run toward the plane. ANDY stops and begins to walk slowly, to the dismay of his colleagues who are boarding.

RANDOM GUNSHOTS CONTINUE

V.O.
I never saw Marcus again. And he and his girlfriend rode all the way from California to Tennessee on his motorcycle to see me. But I hadn’t been home. But I wasn’t home when I got home. A piece of me, I don’t know which part, is still over in Ethiopia, Asmara, which is now the capital of independent Eritrea.

CUT TO:

EXT. BAR, ASMARA, ETHIOPIA — NIGHT

ANDY in a bar, drinking up. We see a framed photograph of Haile Selassie on the wall. ANDY kisses MARIAM and walks out the door. MARIAM stands up and is weeping, consoled by friends. ANDY is stone-faced.

CUT TO:
In the bar inside the Airport terminal, which is empty, we see a brilliantly sunlit wall, which has been faded by the sunlight. From the darker rectangular space on the wall it is apparent that a picture of some kind once hung there.

CUT TO:
ANDY continues to walk toward his plane at a slow pace, stone-faced. His buddies board the plane and shrug their shoulders as to why ANDY is not running for the plane.

GUNSHOTS CONTINUE TO RING OUT

V.O.
I witnessed history while I was in Ethiopia, but I didn’t realize it at the time. When Haile Selassie and his imperial government was overthrown by Marxists, Islamic radicals, in September of ’74, it ended a 45-year reign. But more than that, it brought to an end almost 3,000 years of a line of Ethiopian kings, which was supposed to have ended with a Messiah. a Lion of Judah, but did not. The royal line supposedly began with the birth of a son, Menelik I, the product, or so we’ve been told, of the sexual union between King Solomon … and the Queen of Sheba. But I don’t think she ever existed. And I don’t think Mary of Magdala, which was once the name of a village, a mountain fortress several hundred miles south of Asmara in the Ethiopian Highlands, ever existed either. And both didn’t exist for the same reason … the same reason that so many people here were stunned when the Lion of Judah, so-called, ended up dead and buried beneath a toilet. The prophecy was wrong, and people fled the country by the millions. I know subterfuge when I see it … it just took me a while.

The English and Scots still hold as many as 500 pieces of what are called the Magdala Treasures, which represent the national treasures and national archive of the nation of Ethiopia. These items were looted from Magdala in the punitive British Expedition of 1868. I think they’re afraid to give these things back, because then Ethiopia and the world will know just what Ethiopia is, in addition to being the source of the Nile.

A shot, fired in ANDY’s direction, ricochets nearby. ANDY turns and holds his arms out with a smile on his face, but we see no one firing, no one but the terrified Ethiopian people running for cover. ANDY drops the battered leather satchel he is carrying and bends to pick it up, as another shot just misses.

CUT TO:

INT. A COPTIC (ETHIOPIAN ORTHODOX) CHRISTIAN CHURCH — DAY

In a flashback, we see the aged hand of an elderly ETHIOPIAN COPTIC PRIEST stuff the satchel with papers, buckle it, and hand it to ANDY.

ANDY
You went to a lot of trouble.

PRIEST
Don’t forget us.

CUT TO:

EXT. ASMARA AIRPORT — SAME

We see ANDY’s plane take off. And then the satchel in his lap. ANDY wears a stone face.

DISSOLVE TO:

INT. BASE HOSPITAL — DAY

ANDY is in a hospital bed following his rescue, when a priest dressed in white linen walks by. ANDY’S head is bandaged. He wears a wrist cast on his left arm.

ANDY
Sir? Hello? Can … I get … some information. You work here, right?

WALDU
No, I’m not affiliated with the clinic … but … you’ve heard of the Coptic church?

ANDY
Yes.

WALDU
Well, I’m just a priest. They let me wander around and pray when people request it. If you need some water, I can get it.

ANDY
Thank you. So, what’s special … about your church?

WALDU
What’s special about the Coptic church? (chuckling)

ANDY
Is that stupid? I’m sorry.

WALDU
I’m not laughing at you, my friend. No, it is not stupid to ask that question. I’m flattered that you detect speciality.

ANDY
Well … I mean, my mother mentioned the Coptic church, before I left, like it was important. She reads a lot. She said it would be here.

WALDU
Your mother is a wise woman. … To answer you as directly as I can, as helpfully as I can, I would say that we are the paradox … of Christianity. The orthodox paradox, which is an indication, at least it is to me, that evil exists and that it has been effective. Little is thought of us. And that which is … is often hated.

ANDY
I’m sorry, you lost me.

WALDU
You read very little to nothing about the Egyptian Christians, the African Christians in your Bible, but we are there. One of ours wrote two of the gospels … and the book of Revelation. It’s just that we have been hidden. There are roughly twelve, maybe thirteen million Copts in the world, nearly the same number as there are Jews in the world.

ANDY
Hmm. Well, that’s good, because I like Jewish people. I grew up around a number of Jewish families. One man in particular, he was a giant of a man. He worked with my father in the retail business. He always had a cigar in his mouth and these little clear blue mint candies in his pocket. When I was small, his hand was so big and mine was so small … that I could put my hand in his hand, and he could squeeze it as hard as he could, and it didn’t hurt. … I was very impressed with myself, because I knew he was trying … until I grew and my hand grew, and he nearly crushed my hand.

WALDU
That’s a nice story. Our problems get bigger as we do. … Is that not true in your case?

ANDY
I suppose. I’m not very old. But I feel old.

V.O.
I had been on the verge of saying something, but I couldn’t articulate it. I wanted to connect my present to my past … somehow. My childhood. It’s funny how that moment has stayed with me. Like the moment when it was apparent to me … that Haile Selassie was not any sort of messiah figure after all, which I recall thinking reflected poorly on Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. It is quite a dominant thought, too. I was looking off of the balcony of my apartment … at the straggled trees and the red desert in the distance. It was more dominant than the realization I had that I was probably witnessing something historic. I’d been raised in church. I knew the story of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. I had always thought it was strange that David seduced a woman named Bathsheba, which I found out means daughter of Sheba. Which, if they were related, would mean that Solomon was sleeping with his grandmother. There was a gap, there, someone had been wrong, all the rigamarole about Selassie being a Lion of Judah, a version of Jesus, a messianic figure just sort of went poof.

DISSOLVE TO:

INT. A PSYCHOLOGIST’S OFFICE — DAY

ANDY and DR. BILL GOLDSTEIN, 62, are engaged in a counseling session.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
What’s to say that Selassie will not return as Jesus said he would return?

ANDY
Selassie didn’t resurrect. His body was found buried beneath a toilet in the palace … and was there for ten years, I think. He was finally properly interred in 2000.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
Perhaps he did resurrect. We just weren’t privileged to see his resurrected form.

ANDY
We’d have known.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
Would we?

ANDY
I don’t see Rastafarianism spreading like wildfire … in the way that Christianity did. There are no written accounts. But the Rastafarian, Jamaica, Ethiopian people are awesome people, most of them. They’ve just been deluded … although Ethiopia is still largely Christian, with Judaism sprinkled in.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
Really? Hmm. That’s … very interesting. Well, I’m not interested in arguing with you … about it. I was playing devil’s advocate. It’s the unfulfilled attorney in me.

ANDY
No, I understand. I think people of faith should be hit with hard questions, and they should be able to answer them. But most of us, I think, are just fortunate enough to collapse with a full stomach at the end of a day, if that.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
You have a grim outlook … which is your privilege.

ANDY
I have compassion. I’m aware of the profound suffering in the world. My tender feelings, my broken heart … is what tells me that there is a God and that he is pleased with me. It’s a bittersweet feeling. It’s a hopeful feeling.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
One would like to think that such feelings are universal.

ANDY
I think they are, don’t you?

DR. GOLDSTEIN
I don’t know.

ANDY
There’s good and bad in every segment of society. There are Hindus who despise the poor, believing that God has cursed them, or forsaken them. But then there are Hindus I know of who are genuinely people of compassion.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
Will that get them into heaven?

ANDY
Who would keep them out? And if what the priest suggested to me was true, that one day people would recognize the lowliest for being the greatest, then Ethiopia certainly comes to mind. Ethiopia would come to be known as Eden, again, and Isaiah 60 would be fulfilled, and we’d know, maybe that Jesus possessed within him as Adam did all of the DNA of all races … except he said blood types, I believe, then all races are in, who are good … even those who have been raised in cultures where it would not have been at all socially appropriate to renounce the family’s faith and call oneself a Christian.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
So, you don’t think that belief in Jesus is absolutely mandatory for salvation?

ANDY
If he’s got your blood … and you’ve got his heart … I’d say that says you’re in.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
Without belief or faith?

ANDY
Belief is an act of the will, you know? If you act a certain way, you’re expressing your belief in a certain way of living, whether you might believe you are or not. God looks on the heart. Jesus tells a parable about the worker who brown-noses his boss and says he will do a job required of him, but doesn’t … while another worker gripes and says he won’t, but has a work ethic that won’t let him do otherwise.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
He was a very wise teacher.

ANDY
Yeah, and he said that salvation was of the Jews.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
That’s good to know.

ANDY
Yeah, I thought you’d get a kick out of the encouragement.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
So, tell me, God knows who is who, every little nuance about us, all of the aspects which comprise a person’s heart and mind and essence? He knows us to that degree of detail?

ANDY
You ever hear of people who have had their lives flash before them, really fast, so that you know that was everybody, but it went so fast, like how you have dealt with each person in your life matters, and you’re just having that information uploaded?” I don’t think he could be God if he were not constantly present in all situations, you know, what makes the electrons and protons in all atoms and molecules run perfectly?

DR. GOLDSTEIN
So, your answer is yes?

ANDY
Well, of course, otherwise we’re all doomed. How we act as people toward other people means something. It’s why I believe that we will all be held accountable for how we’ve treated other people.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
How do you know we aren’t doomed?

ANDY
Because life has too much beauty and joy in it for everything just to fall off the end of the table, you know?

DR. GOLDSTEIN
Beauty and joy for everyone?

ANDY
Enough to get by. I’ve seen it in the faces of the poorest of the poor who live across the border in Mexico, who live in cardboard boxes on a landfill. The city dump. And I saw it in Ethiopia in the faces of children who had nothing, really, but they were just happy to be alive. And I’ve seen the town’s wealthiest man try to kick an entire set of golf clubs across a fairway into the street … once.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
But beauty and joy for everyone? What about the miserable soul who just can’t get a break … and it makes a disagreeable old curmudgeon out of him?

ANDY
Suffering doesn’t turn you into a curmudgeon … does it?

DR. GOLDSTEIN
I’ve known some sad luck cases … whose picture would be in the dictionary next to curmudgeon.

ANDY
I didn’t meet one curmudgeon in Ethiopia or Eritrea in the entire time I was there.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
Not one?

ANDY
Not a one. Plenty of ugly Americans, however. Suffering breaks your heart, when it reaches the point of mental anguish.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
There’s a certain level you think? You hit the mark … and you graduate from ever having to go through your curmudgeon phase?

ANDY
Yeah … I think so. That’s one way of looking at it. I’m too tired to be a jerk, and I know how bad it hurts to be on the receiving end, convinced that you won’t get up the next time. It was bad what Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger did to people. Their policies helped to make me who I am … they broke me, callously, thoughtlessly, like I and all of my comrades in arms were expendable, trash, a number. But now I’m back, you see, and it is a privilege for me to be to those in power now who are just like them … who orchestrated the Yom Kippur War, which killed tens of thousands of people needlessly, because Kissinger green-lighted it … it’s an honor for me to be their worst nightmare. And do you know why I know that he green-lighted that war?

DR. GOLDSTEIN
Why?

ANDY
I read it in a book. By Abraham … I can’t remember. Ich at the end. The Yom Kippur War. I was in it to the extent that I handled some of Mr. Kissinger’s satellite transmission back to Washington. But I couldn’t tell you what was in those messages, or I’d have to commit hiri-kiri with a blunt object.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
I understand.

ANDY
Evil loses. Beauty, joy and love … win. A person I’m sure they never expected. Someone who knew the truth, which they did not know, who would be someone who wouldn’t stop … and won’t stop … until he pulls it all down. And I’m going to ask as many people as I can to help me do it.

DR. GOLDSTEIN
Pulls all what down?

ANDY
Heh, you know, there’s nothing there. It’s all about time … and matter, and lightspeed cubed … and a little faster than that. Time is what the Anunnaki taught us, in increments of sixty. They taught us time. If it weren’t for time … no one would die.

CUT TO:

INT. AIRPORT TERMINAL, JIDDA, SAUDI ARABIA — DAY

ANDY has become preoccupied and is writing in a notebook, oblivious the rest of the world, including the time. MOOSHE and HACKY stir ANDY to life just as he is being surrounded by armed Saudis with swords drawn. Presumably they are about to arrest ANDY.

HACKY
Look lively, peckerwood, rag heads at ten o’ clock.

ANDY
When’s the flight leave?

HACKY
One’s about to fly straight up your ass if you don’t stand up and start walking like you know where you’re going. Let’s go. … What the fuck are you writing … a suicide note? You haven’t spoken at all on the flight … and we’re goin’ home, man!

ANDY
(flatly) Fuck you.

HACKY
(greatly exasperated) Man! What the freakin’ fuck … damn it!

ANDY
What?

HACKY
I thought you were my friend, Andy, man! Why are you cuttin’ into my heart, brother? Damn, I get all settled … I’m nervous, too, Andy. Shit. I don’t know how fucked up I’m gonna be when I get home. It’s changed me. I’m different. Not Mooshe, he signed up. But I got drafted, man. And I was about to get married. But the way I look at it, I’m still alive, we’re alive … and I can get outta this shit in six months, and then I’m gonna stay zoned out … on the beaches of Santa Barbara. And try to forget that I’ve lost four years of my life, fucking whores and trying to drink myself to death.

ANDY
Don’t say anything more … about suicide notes. Okay. That’s … all.

HACKY
I wasn’t serious about suicide. … Are you? I’ve thought about it. If I go home, and Angela has dumped me for some dildo Alpha male at college … I’m a dead man. That’ll do it! So write one for me, pal. Write two. … Are you?

ANDY
No, you dickwad.

HACKY
That’s good. That’s good.

ANDY
But part of me wants to. I’m a fucking wreck, Hack. I’ve lost a part of my brain. I can’t go deep any more. You know? My thoughts only go so far and they stop … and I get disoriented … and I’m nervous as hell that I’ll never get back.

MOOSHE
Go deep? I can still go deep, baby … with little Mooshe here … and these football magnets for hands. If it was near me … I mean touchable, baby, it was as good as caught.

ANDY
Deep.

MOOSHE
Real deep.

ANDY
We’re not talking about football, Knute. Go get something to eat. What’s it been, fifteen minutes?

MOOSHE
Hey, don’t rain on my parade, Andy-Poo. I’m outta this mother-fucker … and the women are linin’ up now. I can just feel it.

HACKY
That may because you have a big wet spot on your ass. You sat in something. Or maybe you prematurely ejaculated.

MOOSHE
Yeah, back there? Why didn’t you tell me, man. It looks like I had an accident. I’m gonna have to find a way to stick my butt up on that freaking little dryer.

ANDY
Just take your pants off.

MOOSHE
Hey, that works. Don’t leave me.

ANDY
God, it’s Marcus. I wonder if he is on the same flight outta here.

MARCUS
Hey, Captain Z’s … remember me?

ANDY
You on our flight?

MARCUS
Maybe. You guys wanna get laid … right here? Now?

HACKY
Mark, I told you, you have to be discrete about these things … nobody’s gonna go out with you anymore, if you just blurt it out. You have to woo your … victim.

MARCUS
I did more Italian girls in Asmara than you did. Eighteen, pal.

ANDY
God, you keep score? You’re a fucking romantic.

MARCUS
Whatever. But, no, I’m serious, man. There’s a bunch of Japanese girls over there with that giggly-let’s-fuck-now-anywhere thing goin’. Hi, sweetie. And I’m just dyin’ to find out what a slant eye is like. You don’t think … ?

HACKY
They bombed Pearl Harbor.

MARCUS
Pay back was hell, though, was it not? You know what the S stood for in Harry Truman, don’t you?

HACKY
What’s the matter, Andy.

ANDY
I’m not going to be able to do this. I’m fucking impotent. I can’t get an erection. I can’t focus my mind to get horny anymore. I won’t be able … to be happy to see my family. I’ll never see my girlfriend again … because why would I?

HACKY
Fuck, man. You’re gonna wanna work on that. … Mr. Happy has never let me down … that would suck. Smack it around. Get the blood flowing.

ANDY
Is it always about sex?

MARCUS
No, it’s about gettin’ loaded … and then gettin’ sex. And I am so ready. You’ll get back in the saddle. My old man bounced back. Mid-life crises, or whatever.

ANDY
I’m fucking 22 years old. And I’m a wreck. I’m a wreck. I don’t wanna go home. I wanna go back.

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