Game 6 Page #17

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She decides she will trust him. They kiss softly.

LAUREL:

You have to tell me what you

thought of the play.

STEVEN:

First you tell me.

LAUREL:

Brilliantly moving.

She begins to remove his jacket.

STEVEN:

What else?

LAUREL:

Packs an emotional wallop.

STEVEN:

What else?

LAUREL:

A flat-out hit.

Together they get his jacket off.

STEVEN:

Are you majoring in theater

criticism.

Laurel sees the shoulder holster and gun.

LAUREL:

Criminology.

They kiss passionately.

STEVEN:

If you're wondering about the

firearm.

LAUREL:

Yes.

STEVEN:

This building is not secure.

They are all over the sofa, working on the removal of

Steven's shirt.

INT. THE ENTRANCEWAY

Nicky makes his way past the debris. The front door is gone,

the inner door smashed and battered -- door knobs gone and

locking mechanism ripped out.

He starts up the stairs past a dead or sleeping body.

INT. THE LOFT

On the sofa, Laurel is straddling Steven, whose shirt is

almost completely off, exposing his bulletproof vest. Laurel

is blouseless and barefoot, with her unzipped skirt still on

and her bra dangling from one shoulder.

LAUREL:

I have this thing where I have to

know a person is being honest with

me before, you know, I can feel

completely free to be myself.

STEVEN:

We're strangers in the night. The

last thing we want is honesty.

LAUREL:

What do we want?

STEVEN:

Mystery. Deception.

LAUREL:

Deception isn't something I

personally consider sexy.

STEVEN:

What's sexy?

LAUREL:

Knowing who a person is. Down deep.

STEVEN:

Even if the truth about a person is

sad or depressing or shocking?

LAUREL:

You won't even tell me your name.

What's shocking about a name?

Steven maneuvers himself into a sitting position so that he

and Laurel face each other at equal height and at close

quarters.

STEVEN:

Even if the truth requires a

certain adjustment?

Steven begins removing the cosmetic putty around his

naturally shallow chin. He uses Laurel's hair clip to scrape

his jaw clean. Then he peels off his fake mustache. And

borrows Laurel's dangling bra cup to wipe the bronzing agent

off his face.

INT. THE LANDING

Nicky stands with his back to Steven's door. His gun is out.

He holds it up near his face, muzzle pointed up.

He looks at the gun as if it had feelings and personality,

and he speaks to it as to a sympathetic friend.

NICKY:

I used to go to the movies all the time

I saw a hundred situations like

this. A man and a gun -- and a

locked door. Lee Marvin or Steve

McQueen. And I used to say to

Lillian because we went to a

hundred movies that we saw together

or that I saw because she had seen

them, and I'd say, `Watch him kick

in the door with one kick,' And it

might be Steve McQueen or Jeff

Chandler, holding the gun up like

this, and he would turn and kick

the door and it would fly open at

once, and I would say to Lillian,

`How completely phony. Whoever made

this movie has no idea how hard it

is to kick in an actual door in

real life.' I still love Lillian.

But it's not easy to kick in a

door. I knew they would lose and

they lost, so what are we so upset

about? They lost tonight, they'll

lose tomorrow. It's written on the

wind.

INT. THE LOFT

Laurel is on her feet, backing away slightly. Steven removed

his shoes and stands in his stocking feet, noticeably shorter

than he'd been earlier.

He begins to unstrap the bulletproof vest, causing Laurel to

retreat further.

INT. THE LANDING

NICKY:

These wives named Lillian. I used

to say to her, `You don't kick a

door once or twice and expect it to

open. It's only in the movies a man

can kick in a door with such

amazing ease. Because a real door

requires a tremendous and prolonged

pounding before it finally gives

way.' He's a great player...how

could that ball go through his

legs?

Nicky turns, steps back and kicks the door. It opens at once.

INT. THE LOFT

Steven and Laurel are briefly immobilized by shock as the

door comes flying open.

Nicky moves toward the candle-lit couple.

Laurel realizes who he is and stands by the sofa. She zips

her skirt.

Nicky is trying to understand what he sees, then he gets it.

NICKY:

(quiet)

Laurel.

Nicky holds his gun hand aloft, repeating the image of Bill

Buckner with the baseball in his glove -- Nicky's

hallucination.

Then Nicky issues a cry, a sound from the time before humans

acquired language. It is the audible anguish of his life,

from the fetus onward.

We hear what he is saying in overlapping echoes and we

realize he is crying out a name. We recognize the look on his

face and the formation of syllables on his lips as elements

we'd seen earlier -- on Buckner's face when he shouted

something as he made N

the "third out" of the tenth inning.

NICKY:

Ste-vennnn Schwim-merrrr!

Laurel reacts with horror to the revelation of Steven's

identity. She rearranges her bra.

Nicky stumbles, drops his gun. It goes off.

Steven flees toward the shadows at the back of the loft, his

hand moving toward the gun in his shoulder holster.

Nicky picks up his gun and begins to stalk him.

Steven fires twice striking a nearby lamp. The room is dark

now. Lit only by the blue glow of the TV.

The TV sports roundup, which has been showing football

highlights, has switched to baseball -- highlights of the Red

Sox-Mets.

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