Quote:
INT: Meadowview High School Cafeteria
ANDREA sits at one of the long tables with his lunch and a sheet of paper in front of him. He holds a pencil in his right hand, and idly eats a carrot stick with his left. Beside him, also dipping into his baggie of carrots is his friend ROBIN, who is also working, if less attentively, on homework. Both are dressed in their spring school uniforms for Meadowview high school. Standing across the table from them is their third friend NORA; she is dressed differently, in a black skirt and white blouse, with a black top hat and a short cape lined with fabric decorated with silvery stars. She stands with her arms spread in a flourish, and is smiling cheerfully, but appears to be frozen in that position.
Robin grumbles suddenly, tossing her pencil and half of a carrot stick onto her homework paper.
ROBIN
Ugh, how many of these problems do we have to do? If you can't get it after the first 8, why keep going?
Andrea HUSHES her sharply, focusing intently on Nora ... or at least on her cape.
ANDREA
I'm only on number five. Quiet one sec so I don't lose count of these stars.
Robin rolls her eyes and puts her hands behind her head, leaning as far back on the lunch table stool as she can without falling to stretch her back. Andrea holds up his pencil, closing one eye as he uses the eraser to point to each star on Nora's cape as he counts it.
Though she has not moved, Nora's expression is now no longer cheerful, but concerned. When she speaks, her lips do not move.
NORA
Andrea, is everything alright?
ANDREA
Huh?
He looks startled for a moment, and writes a number on his homework paper quickly as he notices that his carrot sticks are gone.
ANDREA, cont.
What do you mean, Nora?
(confusedly)
ROBIN
Stupid math homework, the same thing over and over again.
Nora's arm finally moves, pointing across the table, over Andrea's shoulder, to something behind him, with a slender wand. Andrea turns and frowns. A TEACHER is walking towards him - Andrea remembers her from second or third grade, but does not appear to realize that the woman is out of place in his high school. Her features are indistinct and change periodically, as Andrea cannot remember what color her hair was exactly, but can remember ten or twelve of her favorite dresses that she wore often to class.
TEACHER
Andrea, I need you to come to the office with me.
(she sounds concerned)
Andrea stands, forgetting about his unfinished homework and lunch; the pencil in his hand is now a crayon.
ANDREA
What is it? What's going on?
NORA says something to him that he does not catch; ROBIN replies to her, but the sound of their voices fades and becomes less intelligble as Andrea crosses the room with the teacher to the far door.
TEACHER
Your mother is in the office waiting for you.
She opens the door with a CLANK of the metal bar-handle, and they walk out of the Meadowview cafeteria and into what resembles the office of Andrea's elementary school.
INT: Front Office of an Elementary School Not Unlike Andrea's
There are four desks arranged in a U shape around an empty section of floor; four identical female SECRETARIES, all grey-haired and wearing glasses, type, write, or file behind their respective desks. To the left, there is a short hallway that ends in a door with a frosted glass window. A person is visible just inside the frosted glass, but the texture makes it impossible to discern who it is.
The teacher walks Andrea to the center of the open space in the office, and fades as Andrea's attention is now focused on the door to the side.
After a moment, it opens; ANDREA'S MOTHER walks to him, embraces him.
ANDREA'S MOTHER
(tearfully, in Italian)
My dear... you have to come home now. We have to go back to your Grandpa Giampaolo's vinyard.
Subtitles appear as she speaks; presumably they are in English, but Andrea cannot read them easily from his vantage point. They remain, changing for each line of dialogue, until the end of the scene.
ANDREA'S MOTHER, cont.
(still in Italian)
I've signed you out of school for the week so we can go to the funeral. You Grandpa has died, Uncle Mariano just called to tell me....
She smiles sadly and wipes her eyes, then wipes tears from Andrea's cheeks with her thumb.
ANDREA
(also in Italian, if not as fluently as his mother)
But ... he was going to the ballet with us this summer. That's 3 more months. He ... He can't go with us. To see "The Firebird".
Andrea is not actually crying, but there are tears running down his face. He puts a hand to his chest, where a hole is appearing; he knows that this hurts, but for some reason, is numb to the actual pain.
ANDREA, cont.
(in Italian)
It was his favorite. He won't get to see it, and I can't tell him that I'll be dancing to it in a month when I am in high school.
ANDREA sits at one of the long tables with his lunch and a sheet of paper in front of him. He holds a pencil in his right hand, and idly eats a carrot stick with his left. Beside him, also dipping into his baggie of carrots is his friend ROBIN, who is also working, if less attentively, on homework. Both are dressed in their spring school uniforms for Meadowview high school. Standing across the table from them is their third friend NORA; she is dressed differently, in a black skirt and white blouse, with a black top hat and a short cape lined with fabric decorated with silvery stars. She stands with her arms spread in a flourish, and is smiling cheerfully, but appears to be frozen in that position.
Robin grumbles suddenly, tossing her pencil and half of a carrot stick onto her homework paper.
ROBIN
Ugh, how many of these problems do we have to do? If you can't get it after the first 8, why keep going?
Andrea HUSHES her sharply, focusing intently on Nora ... or at least on her cape.
ANDREA
I'm only on number five. Quiet one sec so I don't lose count of these stars.
Robin rolls her eyes and puts her hands behind her head, leaning as far back on the lunch table stool as she can without falling to stretch her back. Andrea holds up his pencil, closing one eye as he uses the eraser to point to each star on Nora's cape as he counts it.
Though she has not moved, Nora's expression is now no longer cheerful, but concerned. When she speaks, her lips do not move.
NORA
Andrea, is everything alright?
ANDREA
Huh?
He looks startled for a moment, and writes a number on his homework paper quickly as he notices that his carrot sticks are gone.
ANDREA, cont.
What do you mean, Nora?
(confusedly)
ROBIN
Stupid math homework, the same thing over and over again.
Nora's arm finally moves, pointing across the table, over Andrea's shoulder, to something behind him, with a slender wand. Andrea turns and frowns. A TEACHER is walking towards him - Andrea remembers her from second or third grade, but does not appear to realize that the woman is out of place in his high school. Her features are indistinct and change periodically, as Andrea cannot remember what color her hair was exactly, but can remember ten or twelve of her favorite dresses that she wore often to class.
TEACHER
Andrea, I need you to come to the office with me.
(she sounds concerned)
Andrea stands, forgetting about his unfinished homework and lunch; the pencil in his hand is now a crayon.
ANDREA
What is it? What's going on?
NORA says something to him that he does not catch; ROBIN replies to her, but the sound of their voices fades and becomes less intelligble as Andrea crosses the room with the teacher to the far door.
TEACHER
Your mother is in the office waiting for you.
She opens the door with a CLANK of the metal bar-handle, and they walk out of the Meadowview cafeteria and into what resembles the office of Andrea's elementary school.
INT: Front Office of an Elementary School Not Unlike Andrea's
There are four desks arranged in a U shape around an empty section of floor; four identical female SECRETARIES, all grey-haired and wearing glasses, type, write, or file behind their respective desks. To the left, there is a short hallway that ends in a door with a frosted glass window. A person is visible just inside the frosted glass, but the texture makes it impossible to discern who it is.
The teacher walks Andrea to the center of the open space in the office, and fades as Andrea's attention is now focused on the door to the side.
After a moment, it opens; ANDREA'S MOTHER walks to him, embraces him.
ANDREA'S MOTHER
(tearfully, in Italian)
My dear... you have to come home now. We have to go back to your Grandpa Giampaolo's vinyard.
Subtitles appear as she speaks; presumably they are in English, but Andrea cannot read them easily from his vantage point. They remain, changing for each line of dialogue, until the end of the scene.
ANDREA'S MOTHER, cont.
(still in Italian)
I've signed you out of school for the week so we can go to the funeral. You Grandpa has died, Uncle Mariano just called to tell me....
She smiles sadly and wipes her eyes, then wipes tears from Andrea's cheeks with her thumb.
ANDREA
(also in Italian, if not as fluently as his mother)
But ... he was going to the ballet with us this summer. That's 3 more months. He ... He can't go with us. To see "The Firebird".
Andrea is not actually crying, but there are tears running down his face. He puts a hand to his chest, where a hole is appearing; he knows that this hurts, but for some reason, is numb to the actual pain.
ANDREA, cont.
(in Italian)
It was his favorite. He won't get to see it, and I can't tell him that I'll be dancing to it in a month when I am in high school.
Andrea looked up from the page at his dance instructor, a feeling of sick dread settling into the pit of his stomach.
"That's ... exactly how it happened, suddenly while I was at school," he murmurs, folding the script in half. It is difficult, as the full script contains about fifty or sixty pages. "I was just in elementary school, not in high school. I was little at the time."
Miss Regina stood before him, hands on hips, dressed in her leotard for lessons. Both were standing on an expanse of varnished wood parquet floor; the grain of the wood seemed exceedingly intricate today, and Andrea could see every flaw, knot, and mark in it from standing height as clearly as if he was on hands and knees scrutinizing it with a magnifying glass.
"You're still going to do it, though, right?" Miss Regina inquired, causing the wood grain to fade to a more normal level of detail.
"Of course," Andrea told her, tossing the stack of papers aside. They fanned out as they contacted the floor, spreading out over about three feet. The boy realized abruptly that he was dressed in his costume for "The Firebird" performance next month. Or perhaps it was this month. Either way, the garments were indistinct, as he was not sure they were made yet; he was not naked, but he wore only the concept sketches and fabric swatches he had seen of the royal dress for Prince Ivan.
"He just ... never got to see me play Ivan." Regret gripped him, and his arms and legs felt leaden as a result.
The dance instructor raised her arms into an elegant circle over her head, then started to dance, her slippered feet nearly silent on the polished wood floor.
Andrea was meant to dance with her, but he could not remember the moves, could not make his body move. His hands fell limply to his sides; the pages of the script were suddenly slipping from his fingers, falling into a pile beside his feet. He watched them a moment, and then the door behind him opened and he turned towards it.
"Andrea," called the boy from the doorway. He was either Ladon or Lucas - both were nearly the same height, but the former had darker hair. "Andrea, we have to go." The boy crossed the room towards him, took both of his hands, and urged him into a swing step.
"Wait, I have to...." Andrea attempted, but could not complete the sentence. He had to do something for Miss Regina behind him, who was still dancing ballet steps. He was letting her down. And, more importantly, his grandfather. He loved "The Firebird". He would never see Andrea dance as Prince Ivan, and for this reason, he could not leave now with the boy who was now dancing with him. Their simple steps did not actually take them anywhere, but Andrea realized he would have to break free of his partner's grip, or he would be letting everyone down....
---
When he woke up, it was not suddenly. Andrea rolled over and peered at his clock, not comprehending the digital display until the time changed from 4:13am to 4:14am with a simple shift in electronic signals. Imagined things swam in strange patterns in the darkness around the glowing numbers, leaving the groggy boy to wonder if he was still dreaming. After all, the depth of pain and feeling that he was letting people down was slow to let go of his heart and mind.
Maybe that was the worst kind of nightmare. It was easy to dismiss many of the things that woke you with a start as figments of your imagination, or blame them on whatever you were watching or reading before bed. But some of those regrets, those feelings of emptiness, no matter how unreasonable in the waking world, came from Andrea's own memories.
