Intro ⭐️ Script ⭐️ Featured Song ⭐️ Writer’s Notes
Intro: Everybody Run!
It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood, though not so sure of some neighbors. An unraveled friend tells her story while packing for short-term Sacramento refuge to determine post-winter relocation. It’s confirmed. I’m not alone. Agreed, new-normal chaos of San Francisco is quicksand to the remainder of functional population, who in unhinged circumstance is thrown under the bus anyway. My neighbor, unraveled, unable to focus on work, unable to cope, is far from first to trail exodus.
“He’s got a knife! - Run!!” Screeching roundabout, a car spin-stops as woman screams from its window “Run! - Run!!” My neighbor, standing on the corner, tauts a leash as her dog bush sniffs. “Aannh! - Aannh!...” Into focus against a blue sky, a raised machete beelines above an unfamiliar screaming face racing up a grassy median. “Aannh! - Aannh!” She just stepped out 10 feet to relieve her dog.
Perhaps desensitized to detrimental chaos, the 25lb pooch resists her pull. She lifts the dog, then pivots into an approaching mob of baseball bat wielding men, charging through like the onset of battle in 300. Behind chivalrous protection, traumatized, she recognizes a bat man then observes. Machete Man is cornered. Is this the intersection of battle?
“Put down the knife!” Machete Man sees no exit. “No!” Knife forward, He assesses the disposition of bats. “You stole our machete! Drop it!” The most involved mobster forwards. “That machete belongs to my grandmother! You need to give that back now. It’s our family machete!” Somber reverence tripped Machete Man’s conscious. “Oh ... I didn’t know it was your grandmother’s machete. I’m... I’m sorry. I - I didn’t mean to take her machete. I’ll... I’ll give it back - since it means something to you.”
To roll back madness, an hour preceding, the surrendering crazy maker roamed inner courtyards of townhouses rattling doorknobs for unlocked access. One neighbor toted groceries, a door cracked open. A garden entry found, along with the stored heirloom, transformed intrusion of Machete Man. Once inside, “Aannh!” He chased a family with grandma’s knife. “Aannh!” Yelling from room to room, out the front door he ran. “Aannh!” Next townhouse. - Machete Man terrified enough families, who happen to be baseball fans, to motivate a bat mob. “Let’s go Giants!” - “Aannh!” - Angry mothers grabbed steering wheels. “Rrrreettcchh!” Everyone meets.
San Francisco police siren a post de-escalation appearance, exquisitely groomed. - All are lucky for absence of tragedy. The stolen value isn’t high enough to consider theft. Machete Man entered unlocked doors and open windows, nothing broken. No one was physically attacked, households including young children were traumatized, and no crime determined. The grace of assessing presence ends.
What’s the value of circular file destined paperwork? Upstanding residents sort mental scars of disturbance, redefine beliefs, and grieve loss of sanctuary. I could not fit here the collected stories, many including baseball bats, from those loosing sleep and ability to manage work along with their children’s schedules. The functional minority sinks into the heavily salted nut bowl with dwindling status. Exhausted cries from the ship floating neighborhood safety fighters is numbing as the trauma frequency.
Confirmed. Neo San Francisco is an alternate Confederacy Of Dunces. Same ice cream, different flavor. Personally, I favor pistachio. We all likely become some variety of nut to defend ourselves. Everyone here, however, is going through something you might not understand. I wonder what was buzzing in the person play-chasing his kids with a live chainsaw. Like Marty Byrd, I walked through that day respectfully nodding, then called in the event to fill another relocation bingo card square. Once again, no crime determined.
Along with others , I seek the light switch for reasonable exit to something better than a nut bowl. As I wave and cheer departing rafts, at the least, I’d appreciate a grand night of escape to interrupt the stress and sadness. Oh how I do love a good party! Maybe if I attended till the end, luck would trip a flood light of answers leading where I could feel comfortable enough to venture out after dark. Vampire standard time, ultimately, is my lifestyle.
Script: We Have Our Roots
Angry eyes shift in all directions, focus locks. Into view, to the collar bone and shoulders, is the woman behind those eyes.
JULIETTE
I will kill you and ALL of your family!!!
Outside a window frame slid halfway open, a neighbor passes between townhouses toting shopping bags.
NEIGHBOR
Everything all right in there?
JULIETTE
Fruit fly.
NEIGHBOR
(Releasing an empathetic sigh, nodding, she whispers)
yeah
(she carries on)
JULIETTE
Power nap.
(Nodding in exasperated self-agreement of a brilliant idea)
A flyzapper is hung inside a kitchen utility closet (1 second)
She swiftly glides through the living room to scoop two resting Chihuahuas under each arm, continues into the bedroom, fluidly plops her dogs onto the bed, then rolls into the covers.
Her head on the pillow, she adjusts a purple satin sleep mask.
JULIETTE
(speaking inner dialogue to the ceiling)
Wake me into an enchanted soirée where all binding crumbles too distant to dust me… Even if for a few party hours tonight.
Swirling, dark and light-plum smoke spirals around her eyes into sleep. She shifts her head on the pillow as clouding smoke spreads. An alarm tone sounds loudly, clearing. (“Yeet-Skrt” from a 2020 SNL sketch with Timothée Chalamet and Pete Davidson)
JULIETTE
(feeling under her pillow to silence the phone)
- Everybody up!
(Fluffing a snow leopard blanket, Chihuahuas jump to their feet. Dogs in arms, she lunges to her feet.)
cold water face splash (1 second)
Crown hair in three large Velcro rollers and feet dangling in toe separators, she curls face framing hair with a hot tool (1 second)
Hair and makeup ready, She situates a thigh-high fishnet stocking as a gold charmeuse gown hangs behind her (1 second)
Masked and dressed, she kisses each dog on the head (2 seconds)
posh ready and gazing outward from a doorstep, A horn beeps twice. the view zooms out as she raises the edge of her gown, rushing forward.
A happy driver, in a cream fedora with a pink plume tucked in its ribbon, holds open the door of a semi-metallic orange sports car of glowing cream interior, gesturing to get inside.
A high heeled shoe in gold raises into the door as it is closed behind her, then opens again, zooming back as a high heeled shoe in silver touches ground on a night sky colored carpet.
The back view of high-low translucent layered moonloght-iridescent silk chiffon dress ascends middle in a series of steps. She inhales deep, turning head to curiously take in surroundings.
Undersides of wide-branching tree limbs, lightly dressed in fairy lights, reflect glittery pinwheels hanging throughout a gated garden bordered by Doric columns. Partygoer chatter And music drift the air.
Juliette gauges the open floor of dance and chatter. all are vibrantly masked. sparse table seating lines the walls. - A tray of champagne catching the light flares a beam of glare, passing to reveal a masked man fourteen feet away starring directly at her. He smiles. A woman in a plumed crown passes, blocking her view. He is gone beyond clearing feathers.
MINDY
Juliette! - You’re here.
(reaches extended arms around for a hug and kisses each cheek)
JULIETTE
Mindy! Such a glossing you’ve done. I recognize this house from the old drawings now. Have we stepped back in time?
MINDY
Jarah and I spent every waking minute restoring since auction. Every crack, he filled, to appease history, and lingering ghosts. If you find a haunter do take a Polaroid, for me.
JULIETTE
Of course.
(turns side by side with Mindy and raises a camera - removing the Polaroid output)
Before the glitter settles, I will bring all into focus.
(pointing into the Polaroid, she hands it to Mindy)
Your favorite ghost already developed.
MINDY
Absence is wearisome, it is. Between us in this new home, and you and …
(searching for a thoughtful answer)
JULIETTE
My reclusion outlives a spider, no ‘and.’ This apparition is isolated …until, my coupled friends cabin fever draws them into the dark.
MINDY
You look as I last saw you.
JULIETTE
It’s the vampire lifestyle, and my granny’s bloodline.
MINDY
One of your kind is in this room, my dear. When I bring him to you please don’t run away like I’m selling a used car.
JULIETTE
The residue on a previously owned vehicle is no more alluring to me than a bus ride. No frog kissed unzipped a prince yet, so I travel the dance floor without linger for tadpole birth. Oh, but I do dance.
MINDY
(Laughing)
Get my party swimming! I’ll find you, love. And we’ll keep you.
JULIETTE
(patting her on the shoulder, laughing)
I’m off to haunt a ghost.
(shares a brief hug)
Juliette chassés forward, camera in hand, engulfed by a crowd of festivity
Above the party, spiraling, everyone in the room is seen reveling
A masked man’s shifting grin appears, placing a piece of hard candy in his mouth. Tasting the sensation, his side glance is caught to step forward.
In her stare, she takes in a breath.
The plumed crown passes crowd view, and he disappears
Uncertain of her perception, she reaches for her camera, takes a photo into the crowd, then another, and another
Gently spinning in place, she scans the dance area, 1.25 rotation
The masked man appears, for a flash in passing, with a hand half reaching on the wall he moves along it, eyes focused on the center of spin. An ejecting Polaroid is heard.
The crowd spin of the Dance area continues, .75 rotation
He appears again, a few feet closer, socializing among others chatting, though with eyes focused on the center spin. Another ejecting Polaroid sounds.
The crowd spin of the dance area continues, .25 rotation
The masked man appears standing within arms distance, smiling in a gaze angled to her height.
She gasps, for he is gone as the crowd spins behind her, she looks down (toward her hand of photos)
Out of the crowd, gripping a thick stack of Polaroids, she seeks exit for fresh air.
Above an arched doorway, she is observed passing through onto a semicircle terrace. The concrete floor painted in moonlight-silver reaches a watery view, full moon illuminating all.
Juliette’s hands sort Polaroids. Each one is absent of the the masked man and the woman’s plumed crown, as they were where she photographed. - she hears footsteps and turns
One hand covered in a dinner napkin holds the bottom of a guest plate piled with deeply saturated glossy fruit. the masked man approaches, delighted in himself, attentively smiling, dressed in a black dinner jacket refined by a deep teal velvet lapel with a pink & orange rose secured by an arrow pin of gold and sparkling citrine. As he approaches, the brass wallet chain swings against his black and deep teal harlequin print pants.
At Juliette’s side, he turns to face her, leaning his back against sculptural concrete railing
BOWEN
Ambrosia?
(he spikes into the fruit pile with a metal skewer topped with a small natural seashell, and offers it forward)
JULIETTE
Tell me who you are.
BOWEN
I’m Bowen … from the neighborhood.
JULIETTE
Lovely. You appear in the crowd through the night, though I didn’t capture you in single photo.
BOWEN
You must know something… a trickster spiked the punch bowl. And probability tells me you had some… so I’ll look after you.
(delighted, places the fruit upon his tongue, closes his mouth into a smile)
JULIETTE
And did you have some, Bowen?
BOWEN
Absolutely.
JULIETTE
Well, lovely.
Bowen turns, now shoulder to shoulder with Juliette, facing the water. camera zooms out and upward, as the shadow of an elephant leaves the room they begin talking, adjacently, in growing delight while a full moon ripples and reflects.
BOWEN
(Glances behind)
All house lights are dark. - Come with me… let’s tour the garden. It’s the only way out tonight.
Juliette turns to Bowen and smiles. He pauses, then reaches for her hand, leading down side steps.
Descending away together, Bowen extends the guest plate to his side,held from the bottom with a napkin covered hand.
BOWEN
(while descending the stairs, camera behind them)
Hm, it seems my mother made exit on her own.
JULIETTE
The lady in a feathered crown - Mom is your party date?
On the last descending step, Bowen skips ahead of her, turns toward her and slightly raises the held hand to escort her onto the lush grass.
BOWEN
She insisted, to assure I uphold appropriate social grace as this is Mindy and Jarah’s first soirée. - Is our masked resemblance so barefaced?
JULIETTE
(her mind shifts to the Polaroids)
A similarity exudes.
Bowen turns, hip to her side, with a muffled sound of Altered amusement as he tirelessly holds the guest plate with poise. stepping forward into the garden, glittering pinwheels hang at various heights from the under branches of trees, dispersing light. Each tree trunk hosts a ring of hanging flower baskets, roughly eye level. Serene instrumental music quietly plays through garden speakers, slipped from household attention. The garden feels alive, saturated, and glossy.
Bowen stops in front of a silvery painted iron bench cast in a design of intricate roses, then turns gracefully to face Juliette.
BOWEN
Soft, extravagant, masked moonlight, dance and ascend into ever night.
She smiles. still gripping her hand, he pulls her in closer guiding into a spin, while balancing the guest plate
BOWEN (CONT’D)
All night you dance alone, though now with me.
JULIETTE
Escape is mine from me. Night is all I see, till day falls in harmony. But no prisoner shall I keep, or be.
BOWEN
Yet we’re here, under the same tree with no rush for home. … Is it sun you seek?
JULIETTE
I’d ash, or grow old too distant from my nature. In the quiet of night, when psychic chatter rests, I am my best.
BOWEN
Grow as you will, with me - tend blooms we choose to keep. For I know
(pulls her close to him, as their dance travels nearest a tree trunk)
Where the heart bleeds.
(staring into her heart )
JULIETTE
(notices a flower basket, overflowing a bleeding heart plant)
You know this garden well.
BOWEN
As it is my own.
(holding stare, he skewers into the plate of fruit, picking up two cherries )
Ambrosia?
(he raises his eyes to hers)
JULIETTE
Yes, please.
With a slight smile, attentively, Bowen slowly places a cherry past her lips and onto her tongue as her teeth grip it from the skewer. The second cherry, he places into his mouth, smiling as his teeth crush into the fruit. The garden saturates.
The skewer drops onto the fruit plate. Reaching behind his head, eyes focused on Juliette, he plucks a bleeding heart flower from the basket situated just over his shoulder.
Placing the flower over her heart, the edge of plunging neckline in her dress slightly begins to absorb the flower color. The flower glows slightly brighter.
BOWEN
To see what resides, I could dig inside to find what feeds your bloom, clearing weeds from the ground, I could pull their roots from your light, and resituate the soil with my own in hand.
JULIETTE
(Speaking through a frozen faced moment)
I’m… uh… You want to resituate my soil?
BOWEN
Words. - What I’m saying is - (sigh)… let’s start this right.
Smiling Bowen, takes a breath, delightedly reaching his free hand to the guest plate edge and swiftly pulls away the plate and the napkin.
JULIETTE
(in a shrill moment of panic)
Aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh!!!
(she slow motion turns, dress picking up the wind, the bright pink of the flower bled further into the neckline edge)
Her depart reveals Bowen, holding a machete, above his wrist dangling pink & orange fuzzy handcuffs, one end open. He drops the plate and napkin from the other hand, and begins to run after her.
BOWEN
It’s my mother’s!!! and it’s been in our family for millennia!!!
JULIETTE
(Running, she begins to slightly stagger)
Aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh!!!
(the pink color bleeding into her dress takes and orange blended shift as it spreads)
She sees a second-story window light up and ducks behind the nearest tree across, leaning just enough to peer up, shaking with adrenaline.
Mindy calmly approaches the window to locate disturbance, Jarah walks up behind, placing one hand on her shoulder and the other at the hip.
Juliette leans out from behind the tree, just enough, wildly waving her hands above her head to signal Mindy, then ducks her arms back to keep hidden.
Jarah points as Mindy’s gaze follows.
Waving wild hands again, Juliette mouths “Help”
Mindy raises a hand, fingers up and down, she waves back smiling. Jarah gently pulls on Mindy’s shoulder. As she turns her head toward him, Jarah leans in with a kiss then brushes his fingers through Mindy’s hair. They turn away and the lit window darkens.
Juliette, Mouthes “No” shaking her head, having as quiet a panic attack possible. - The garden lights shut down. Hanging pinwheels emanate a glittery scatter of their own. Juliette’s nerves edge further, interrupted by a thud against the tree.
Startled, she abruptly turns to see the machete landed in on the opposite edge of the tree at heart level. She tries to pull the machete from the tree, though it’s set deep. She sees Bowen running toward her in a fixed gaze. She pulls the machete frantically, though it does not budge.
BOWEN
(Running to close for comfort with the other open handcuff in grip)
I’m after your heart!
Juliette turns and runs, color bled from the flower seeps deeper into her dress -pink-orange-pink, while it glows brighter over her heart.
JULIETTE
Aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh!!!
Bowen stops at the tree and violently yanks the machete twice. It releases. Raising it in the air, he resumes the hunt.
BOWEN
(Yelling and running)
I’d offer a bouquet of flowers!!! (Catches a breath)
but you‘d run anyway!!!
JULIETTE
I love flowers, but this one is killing me.
She reaches to rip it from over her heart, though it burns the touch, and flares a brighter glow and her footing grows clumsy and breath heavier. Into a tunneling grove of trees, sparkling pinwheels hang everywhere. The watery edge is heard.
Bowen reaches the grove. She’s not on the tunneling path. Into the weave of branches and tree trunks is the only possible direction. He follows her footsteps along the path to find where she disappeared.
BOWEN
Your reaction appears socially appropriate for the machete. I don’t want to chase you all night.- I’d like a peach.
He spots Juliette hiding behind a low dipping branch reaching across to the nearest tree.
BOWEN (CONT’D)
You’ve run out of landscape.
Juliette begins pulling up from the lower branches, nestling in between thick intersecting limbs, appearing disoriented. The flower over her heart glows bright and the pink-orange-pink-orange color bands bled halfway down her dress.
Bowen looking upward, smiling, places the machete blade between his teeth, and climbs forward up the tree.
His head below Juliette’s feet, opposite tree limbs she grips. Bowen removes the machete from his mouth. Climbing to her eye level, securing leverage within branches. He reaches through an opening of entangled limbs and points the machete under the bottom of the flower where it intersects with her heart. Her face is pale, and the flower color has bled down to mid calf of the dress.
BOWEN (CONT’D)
My, how you squirm under the point to your chest. I’ll watch until you stop fighting and dodging. … when I pierce into the light of ecstasy unwavering, I flare your glowing heart not to burn you, but to find your truth and walk into it.
JULIETTE
(weak, tired, and unusually awake)
Could you be less terrifying?
Bowen presses the point of the machete into the intersection of the bleeding heart flower and her heart. Juliette gasps as a stream of blood drips fast. Bowen slices the flower from her heart, flinging in behind his shoulder. The machete point returns to rest against her.
BOWEN
What if your life isn’t perceived as a prison?
Juliette begins breathing faster and color appears returning to her skin.
JULIETTE
Have you seen what’s on my dining table?
BOWEN
There’s nothing a cricket pop can’t prevent. Pink or orange?
JULIETTE
Last clearing, I climbed it to take video and slept there.
BOWEN
What if on this road under the same tree, in passing …
A distant series of four music notes begin to play, each a bit louder.
BOWEN
What in Mykonos?!?
(said as he turns to look down behind him, one hand around a tree limb and the other holding a poised machete)
“Yeet-Skrt” (from a 2020 sNL sketch with Timothée Chalamet and Pete Davidson) kicks in loudly. Juliette recognizes her ring tone, becomes alert, knocking the machete from Bowen’s grip. As it falls, he leans to go after it, though Juliette grabs the open ended handcuff and slaps it closed onto her wrist. The music fades as quickly as it started.
JULIETTE
Eros?!? … Bowen?!? … Really???
BOWEN ( EROS)
Yes, winged and now up a tree with you, love, doing my job. -
(he observes the twisted tree limbs with too narrow of an opening for either of their bodies. He pulls at the handcuffs a little)
That was my family machete!
JULIETTE
Well, unlock us.
BOWEN ( EROS)
Handcuffs are also my mothers. I took them from her nightstand. … We have more time to now to get to know one another.
(smiles in finding the bright side)
JULIETTE
Well, lovely. You’re excellent company.
BOWEN ( EROS)
Without turning your feet to roots, if I sent an arrow into someone for you, where do you think he would be right now?
JULIETTE
Under a warm blanket, awake in sleep, with a celling stare for a lover unknown. … Though my repetition for this thought is unclear as days flipped on a calendar.
BOWEN ( EROS)
Yes, but what if I could turn all that boggles into birds and honeybees?
The same four music notes begin to play, much louder into (“Yeet-Skrt” from a 2020 sNL sketch with Timothée Chalamet and Pete Davidson).
Juliette suddenly wakes on her pillow, brushing the sleep mask to her forehead.
JULIETTE
(feeling under her pillow to silence the phone)
- Everybody up!
She sits up in bed, and looks across to her dressing area where the gold gown hangs, shakes her head awake, relieved.
From opposite the front door a knock is heard. She opens it, to see a smiling driver wearing a cream hat and a pink feather tucked in its ribbon.
DRIVER
Courtesy of Mindy and Jarah.
(bows slightly, tipping his hat)
Are you ready for the festivities?
JULIETTE
Let’s go!
The driver turns to her side and offers his arm, as she lifts the edge of a her dress and they walk over to a sparkling orange sports car.
A high heeled shoe in gold raises into the door as it is closed behind her, then opens again, zooming back as a high heeled shoe in silver touches ground on a night sky colored carpet.
Featured Song
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"We all likely become some variety of nut to defend ourselves." This is beautiful, Juliette. You've deftly and poetically captured all the craziness and its nuance. Feeling nostalgic for SF Christmas among friends!