STAY Page #17

The boy with the red balloon and his mother.

BOY:

Mommy, is that man going to die?

Lila rushes over to Sam, Athena and Henry.

LILA:

I'm a nurse.

SAM:

All right, keep tabs on his pulse.

If it stops we'll have to start

CPR.

Lila grabs Henry's wrist and checks his pulse against her

watch.

SAM (CONT'D)

(to Athena)

What's his name?

ATHENA:

Henry.

SAM:

Can you hear me, Henry? Henry? I'm

a doctor, I'm going to help you.

Can you hear me?

Henry's lips have begun to pale from the loss of blood. When

he speaks, his mouth barely moving, Sam and Athena bend

closer to hear.

HENRY:

Hail.

Athena looks up. No hail is falling, but the lights on the

suspension cables above look like pieces of ice suspended in

the air.

ATHENA:

It's not hail, baby.

102.

LILA:

He's hallucinating.

SAM:

Keep him talking.

Henry's eyes are still open but he appear to be fading fast.

He is trying to speak and his face contorts with the effort.

Athena bends closer to hear him.

SAM (CONT'D)

What did he say?

The blood from Henry's head wound has seeped through the

sweater and onto Athena's hand.

Athena struggles to keep from hysteria. She kisses Henry on

the forehead. When she looks up we see that her mouth and

chin are spotted with Henry's blood.

ATHENA:

"Forgive me."

SAM:

It wasn't your fault, Henry. I was

driving right behind you. Your

front tire blew out.

ATHENA:

You hear that, baby? It wasn't

anybody's fault.

CLOSE ON HENRY'S EYES. Again, it appears that he understands

the message. The words have a calming effect; his face is no

longer contorted.

SAM:

We need an ambulance!

Sam stands up and looks out over the backed-up traffic. We

PULL BACK and see that the bridge is jammed with rush-hour

commuters. There is no ambulance coming.

Sam crouches down again and peers into Henry's eyes. He takes

hold of Henry's free hand (Athena holds the other hand).

SAM (CONT'D)

Come on, kid, you need to stay

conscious. Come on, come on, wake

up!

Henry mutters something. Sam leans closer to hear.

103.

HENRY:

You're real, Dr. Foster.

Sam has no idea what Henry's talking about.

.

SAM:

It's Dr. Williams, Henry. Just stay

with me.

ATHENA:

Henry, come on. Come on. I need

you, baby, come on.

LILA:

I'm losing the pulse, Doctor.

Sam begins CPR.

ATHENA:

Stay, Henry, stay. Stay. Stay.

Stay.

CLOSE ON HENRY'S FACE

The camera shows what Henry sees.

HENRY'S POV of the crowd of faces gathered around him. At

first they are clear, each face cleanly delineated. But they

begin to blur and merge together.

The camera PANS UP, past the blur of faces. We see the great

Gothic arches of the bridge from this angle-- the perspective

of a man lying flat on his back.

We have seen this view before, in Henry's painting.

The camera continues to PAN UP, past the glittering towers of

Manhattan, up and up into the nighttime sky.

Now the screen is BLACK, but we continue to hear Athena's

words.

ATHENA (O.S.) (CONT'D)

Stay. Stay.

The screen is black for ten seconds. And we think it's going

to stay black, except now we notices pin-pricks of light

piercing the darkness.

The stars are back in the sky, but these are the usual pale

New York stars, not the hallucinatory fires that scarred the

air with their fall.

104.

PAN DOWN to the bridge.

Two ambulances have arrived, as well as several police cars.

The PARAMEDICS (not the same ones we've seen before) load

three dead bodies onto stretchers, while the POLICE OFFICERS

mark the scene and begin questioning people in the crowd.

A female OFFICER sits with a stunned Athena on the trunk of a

squad car.

Meanwhile, a TOW TRUCK OPERATOR begins attaching the hooks

and chains to the ruined Mustang. One lane of westbound

traffic has already resumed moving.

The people in the passing cars stare out their windows at the

carnage.

Sam and Lila, grim-faced and exhausted from their ordeal,

stand beside one of the ambulances.

SAM:

Too much bleeding. Too much.

LILA:

You did everything you could,

Doctor. There was never a chance.

Sam says nothing. Lila touches him on the shoulder, briefly,

and walks away.

She's getting farther and farther away. Soon she'll be gone.

Sam finally looks up.

SAM:

Hey.

Lila turns.

SAM (CONT'D)

Thanks for helping.

Lila smiles sadly.

LILA:

I wish we could have done more.

She starts to walk away again.

SAM:

You want to grab a cup of coffee

somewhere?

105.

Lila turns again and looks at him.

SAM (CONT'D)

I won't be able to sleep tonight.

Lila hesitates for a second and then nods.

LILA:

I'd like that.

Sam begins walking toward her and then stops.

He notices something lying on the asphalt, something

glittering amid the debris of the wreck, the broken glass and

twisted metal. He kneels and picks it up.

Lila, curious as to what he's found, walks over to him.

LILA (CONT'D)

What is it?

Sam, standing, shows her the diamond ring. It glitters in the

lights of the bridge. But we're pulling back now, farther and

farther from the wrecked car, the ambulances, the slow-moving

traffic.

We're rising higher and higher, above the suspension cables,

above the great arches, above the blinking red lights that

warn airplane pilots.

All the commotion on the bridge is silent now, nothing but

beads of light trickling over the dark river.

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