Platoon Page #7

RHAH:

You lame Taylor?

CHRIS:

What?

RHAH:

You lame or something?

KING:

(smiling)

... go ahead on, smoke it man.

Chris understands, takes the bowl. Hesitates. Then smokes it.

The contact fumes are almost enough to knock him out. He starts

coughing. They're all laughing.

RHAH:

Your sh*t's in the wind troop. Baaaaah!

Lerner replies, his tongue hanging out in parody.

LERNER:

And Baaaaaaa! back on you.

RHAH:

(looking at Lerner with distaste)

If you're gonna do it man, 'least do it right.

Building up to it, his eyes shaking with conviction at the whole

insanity of the world, he neighs with all the venom he can

muster.

RHAH (CONT'D)

Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!

They all laugh and applaud. King smoking from the pipe passing

it back to Chris who takes another hit, doesn't cough this time,

looking around, wondering about these guys.

LERNER:

I didn't like it.

RHAH:

Bah, you're a child, Lerner. Rhah don't waste time

on you.

They go on ad-libbing with each other, teasing Doc, who's fairly

straight, saying he wants to go to med school in the fall. 'Be

what?''A gynecologist, man.''What dat?' Francis suggests, 'Dats a

p*ssy doctor, man - he's gonna be Doctor Feelgood, man!' They're

all cracking up, finding every joke funny. As Chris finishes his

hit on the pipe, looks up across the smoke, already dazed,

surprised to see ELIAS suddenly there - leaning out of his sling

in a far corner of the hooch. A Monkey is draped around his neck

with silver bracelets, rings, a necklace - like a sensual little

Egyptian whore, Elias playing with it, spaced out in a sleeveless

vest, tiger pants. Dancing eyes on Chris, he swings out the

hammock, comes over with the monkey.

Meanwhile Manny has broken into a high falsetto snatch of blues

directed at Chris, joined by Big Harold and Francis, all of them

clicking their hands.

MANNY & BIG HAROLD & DOC

Oooh Chris, you look like you is high oh yeah, he

looks like he is high Ooooh Chris, you know you gonna

be that way all night oh yeah I think that you are

... Yeah! up now and up to par oh yeah.

Elias pulls out a Remington 870 shotgun, jacks it to the rear,

points it at Chris.

ELIAS:

Put your mouth on that.

Chris does so slowly, a little worried. Elias takes a hit and

blows it down the bore - 'shotgunning' it into Chris' lungs.

Chris staggers back, coughing. Everybody laughes 'hey dude - you

done had your ass blown away' etc ...

Elias smiles his big white-tooth smile.

ELIAS (CONT'D)

First time?

CHRIS:

Yeah.

ELIAS:

Then the worm has definately turned for you man.

Chris puzzled by this expression.

ELIAS (CONT'D)

(smiles)

Feel good?

CHRIS:

(a sense of euphoria now)

Yeah. No pain in my neck now. Feels good.

ELIAS:

Feelin' good's good enough.

As he sucks in a huge mass of smoke off the bowl. His eyes

performing a funny little hop, skip and jump, as he holds it, his

face turning red.

The monkey jabbers and jumps around on his neck, worried. Elias

then blows the smoke out in its face, the monkey hating it.

The Group laughes.

ELIAS (CONT'D)

Hey Crutcher. I hear you got a Dear John from your

gal. Told you she wasn't getting 'nuff from you.

Lerner looks up, stoned out of his mind, wearing a ring in his

ear.

LERNER:

Sh*t. Sold me out for some lame dude with a 4-F.

ELIAS:

What'd you say her name was again?

LERNER:

(recalling her image)

Daisy Mae.

BIG HAROLD:

Hey look at Charlotte!

The monkey is sitting quietly stoned, its eyes blinking.

Laughter off.

ELIAS:

Daisy Mae! What Daisy Mae look like Crutcher?

MANNY:

She look huge and got freckles on her ass.

LERNER:

She look beautiful.

FRANCIS:

How much she weigh man?

BIG HAROLD:

She braid her hair under her armpits, Crutcher.

FRANCIS:

(sarcastic)

Daisy Mae what?

KING:

Daisy Mae Highway, that's what.

(laughing)

Well whatcha want, Lerner, your dick been limp for a

year, 'cept when you're bopping your buddy Tony up

there.

LERNER:

F*** that.

ELIAS:

I f***ed this chick in Hawaii man. Couple weeks ago

... Oooooh! Wow - outasight. Gracie Slick man, she

looked like Gracie man, I sh*t you not.

(remembering)

The look on his face ensnares all of them, except perhaps Rhah.

MANNY:

What happened man. What whorehouse you go to?

ELIAS:

No whorehouse man. On the beach.

FRANCIS:

Sure.

ELIAS:

Yeah, sure. She walked right by me. Long black

hair, tits swinging. Ass like French bread. Legs

don't end right.

LERNER:

(skeptical)

You can plant that sh*t in Tennessee man, but it

won't come up in Texas.

CRAWFORD:

So what she got, hair on her tits.

ELIAS:

I just stopped man. My heart's beating like a hardon

right I got a hardon sticking through my pants, my

bathing suit looks like a hutch ...

BIG HAROLD:

I know dat feeling ...

ELIAS:

So I'm thinking to myself - Elias you walk away from

this, you gonna regret this the rest of your natural

life. So I go after her, follow her down the beach.

You know find out if she is what she is.

They're all hooked into this now.

KING:

And?

ELIAS:

Well she was picking up her kids.

MANNY:

Dat's dat.

ELIAS:

No, dat ain't dat.

FRANCIS:

Get outta here, she married ...

ELIAS:

Like two hogs in heat. Boy.

Their throats knotting ...

CHRIS:

(joining in)

... But what'd she do?

ELIAS:

What didn't she do. She f***ed the living sh*t outta

me, that's what she did!

CRAWFORD:

(sucking in air)

Jesus!

ELIAS:

Couldn't get enuff ...

CHRIS:

But what'd she actually do?

ELIAS:

She was a crossbreed, Chinese and Polish.

BIG HAROLD:

What dat?

RHAH:

(finally hooked in)

And living in Hawaii man?

ELIAS:

Yeah - and has blonde hair and almond-shaped eyes.

FRANCIS:

Hey man didn't you say she had black hair?

ELIAS:

She had blonde hair man. And long tan legs, in those

leather sandals you know, with those thongs up to her

knees, this musky oil on it ... mmmm smelled good

when they were wrapped around my face ...

They groan, dreaming of Hawaii.

DOC:

Yeah!

CHRIS:

God!

BIG HAROLD:

Please, somebody hold my dick!

ELIAS:

(in afterthought)

... and a broken nose.

DOC:

Broken man?

ELIAS:

Yeah, otherwise she would've been too perfect, y'know

what I mean ... some woman. Her name was ...

He forgets it. A grass blackout. Lerner urging him on.

LERNER:

Susan?

MANNY:

Tamara?

CHRIS:

Elizabeth?

Elias shaking his head, trying to remember.

KING:

Merle?

RHAH:

Merle? Jesus! ... Patty?

BIG HAROLD:

Inga?

CHRIS:

Jennifer?

HOYT:

Connie?

Elias snapping his fingers.

ELIAS:

Dawn! That was it!

CHRIS:

(repeating it)

Dawn ...

King listening to the sound of it.

KING:

Dawn?

The others nodding, musing over it.

BIG HAROLD:

Yeah, Dawn ...

INT. THE BARRACKS - NIGHT

In comparison to the darkness of the hooch, a highly lit

atmosphere, attracting bugs ... dusty gear lying around a

disordered hooch, loud and finger-snapping COUNTRY WESTERN MUSIC

playing from a tape deck, a well-known tune, circa 1967.

BUNNY, the 18 year-old angel face, totters drunk with a Colt-45

beer in hand, over to JUNIOR, the badass black kid with the zits,

who just lies there on his cot sweating, doing nothing.

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