"Okay." "Jackson came over to play." "Superheroes" "I was black Power Ranger." "He was Batman." "Jake, you okay in there, buddy?" "I'm okay." "Can I ask you a question?" "Okay, time to hit the sack." "An important question." "Here we go, big guy." "Come on." "Can I wear bugs?" "Bug pajamas are all the way downstairs." "But the fire trucks are here." "They're okay for tonight, aren't they?" "Bugs." "Fire trucks." "Bugs." "Okay, bugs." "I'II be right back." "Does it hurt to be dead?" "animal." "What'd I do now?" "Can I tell him?" "If you wanna die." "well, your beer-addIed sperm still works." "Lisa!" "You impregnated my sister again." "Bitch !" "I thought you wanted me to." "Why, because I said, "Don't"?" "well, you're so afraid to say anything." "The kid could've been born before he noticed." "You're not pregnant." "I feel "congratulations" is the more appropriate response." "You told her before you told me." "She's a witch !" "She took one look at me and guessed." "Say something." "Bummer." "Something else." "So, she's six weekks pregnant." "It means the baby's due in april, May, June..." "Gemini, that's cool." "Einstein was a Gemini." "So's that Scottish gal from Garbage." "would you go upstairs and help Jake with his pajamas, please?" "If she's late, you're into Cancer, which is..." "Lisa, I swear to God, if you start with the Dionne Warwick stuff," "I'm gonna throw you right out a fucking window, all right?" "So, go upstairs please and help him with the pajamas." "Thank you." "Love you, too, Tom." "Hey, this is great." "I mean it." "I think it's about time we had another kid." "You know, I was gonna bring it up myself one of these days." "really?" "absolutely." "This time, you gotto take some time off, babe." "please." "We can't afford that." "Yes, we can, because I'm gonna hit the overtime again." "No, I do not want you to work those hours again." "You come home." "You're, Iike, in a trance." "You're completely useless to me." "I'm gonna be fine, okay?" "I'm just gonna tell Teddy to get somebody else for the thing." "Oh, God." "Oh, Tom." "What?" "I'm sorry, I completely forgot." "No wonder you're pissed off." "I'm not pissed off." "I just..." "No, I'm not." "I'm not." "I'm a grown man." "I shouldn't be screwing around with some shitty band anyway." "Hey, look, I gotto go change." "You know, put on something cool." "I Iove you." "I'm a happy guy." "I'm not gonna be a lineman forever, I promise you that." "What do you mean?" "I clip wire all day." "A monkey could do it." "Yeah, but they're gonna move you into the office soon, before the end of the year, at Ieast." "No, I meant when we first got together" "I said a Iot of stuff about where I was gonna go and what I was gonna be, and I just wanted you to know" "that I wasn't giving you some kind of line, you know, that I meant it." "I didn't marry you because I thought you were gonna be famous." "I just liked the way your ass looked in jeans." "I never wanted be famous." "I just..." "I didn't expect to be so..." "What?" "I don't know." "Ordinary." "You know, I hope it's a girl." "I'm kind of sick of all these balls around the house." "Except for yours, babe." "Hey, what are the odds of a reasonably educated single man being at this thing?" "And I don't mean a GED." "Does it matter if he's on the boner pill?" "Hey, I wouldn't look a gift boner in the mouth." "Nice." "That's very nice, Lisa." "Hey, how've you been?" "Hey, Tom-Tom-Tommy." "How you doing, huh?" "You would not believe the day I had." "You take this right here." "I'II get another one." "Come on." "Thanks." "Harry." "Tom." "Taking care of the place for me?" "No, actually we're drilling holes in all your floors." "Hope you don't mind." "Tom?" "You know my squaw, sheila?" "Bobby, Vanessa..." "Thanks for having me." "Drink up." "Drink up, take your medicine deep into your body." "That's it." "Tom, how're you liking the neighborhood?" "You know, I grew up just over in Bridgeport, back of the yard, so it's not Iike it's a foreign country." "Goddamn right, it's not a foreign country." "This is the best neighborhood in the city of Chicago." "That's 'cause we all look out for each other." "And that is saying a Iot as we approach the year of our Lord 2000." "You running for mayor?" "Hey, hey, did any of you guys see them crank dealers hanging out by the park again?" "What is Lenny doing at this party?" "Bobby, did you tell him you had a party?" "Vanessa made me, all right?" "We invited everybody." "I couId see if he heard the noise and wandered in, but you actually invite this jack-off into your home." "Oh yeah, laugh it up." "Laugh it up!" "You know, when you wake up dead with your throat cut, don't come cryng to me!" "Not attracted to." "Not drunk enough for." "Whoa!" "Frightened by!" "Don't touch me." "I'm fine." "Haven't you ever heard about people being operated on when they're under hypnosis?" "Yeah, but I don't believe in any of that." "I mean, people who say that they were hypnotized weren't really." "They were just, you know, playing along." "Right." "really?" "Yeah." "Then how could they have a scalpel stuck into their throat without even bleeding or without even making a sound?" "bullshit!" "I never saw that happen." "That is bullshit." "Can you learn another word?" "Yeah, what about "narrow-minded"?" "You know, I saw a guy in my class get a 2-inch needle stuck into the thick of his arm by my instructor when he was under hypnosis." "Horseshit." "Is that better, honey?" "You're making that up." "It's disgusting." "I saw a picture of it the next day." "It left a mark." "What I don't understand is how a person that spent most of her adult life in college can believe all that superstitious crap." "It isn't superstition !" "Come on." "I'm practically a licensed hypnotherapist." "Oh, "practically" licensed?" "Isn't that like saying, "I don't have a license"?" "Why you squeezing my arm?" "This may come as a surprise to you, Tom, but just because you kicked around the same six blocks for your whole life doesn't mean that there isn't a whole larger world out there." "You know what I mean?" "Doorways you haven't even opened." "Things you wouldn't have the faintest understanding of." "Doorways?" "Okay, okay." "all right, Kreskin, prove it." "Why don't you hypnotize somebody." "Yeah, do me." "No." "Why not?" "For one, you're hostile." "I'm not hostile." "Do I seem hostile to anybody?" "Yeah." "Thanks for having us." "It was a great party." "No, no." "This is just getting good." "Come on, Lisa, hypnotize me." "Come on." "No, you're drunk." "I'm not drunk!" "You're not supposed to mesmerize somebody who's been drinking." "Mesmerize." "No, stop." "Oh, please, come on, I'm begging you." "Educate the savages." "Yeah, and it won't work with that kind of uncooperative attitude." "I swear to you, I'II follow every instruction to the letter." "still won't work." "Come on." "What's the worst that can happen?" "Somebody turn out the lights." "Oh, yeah." "Oh, yeah !" "all right, just relax." "Put your arm down." "Just rest it comfortably." "Just lean back." "Just be very comfortable and relaxed." "Trust me." "Okay?" "close your eyes." "Certainly, Lisa." "Now, just listen for a moment." "Listen to the sounds of the room around you." "I don't know why, but I don't see her." "Now I want you to pretend you're in a theater, a movie theater." "You're the only one there." "It's one of those great old movie palaces." "And you look around." "It's a huge, empty theater." "You notice that the walls of the theater are painted in black." "The seats, covered in black." "And in the whole pitch-black theater there's only one thing you can see, and that's the white screen." "You'll notice there are letters on the screen." "TaII, thick, black letters, but they're out of focus, so you begin to drift closer to them in your chair trying to read them." "And you're very comfortable nnow." "It's your favorite chair." "You're drifting closer and closer staring at the letters." "Very relaxed nnow." "Your legs are relaxed." "Your arms are limp and heavy." "You're almost close enough to read the letters now." "They start to come into focus." "The letters spell "sleep."" "Sleep." "What the hell was that?" "Jesus, Tom." "What?" "What?" "What?" "Are you okay?" "You were faking it." "You had to be." "That was the weirdky goddamn thing I've seen in my Iife!" "He was faking it." "congratulations, Tom, you're one of the lucky 8%." "You still have tears on your cheeks." "What the hell did she do to me?" "Christ, I'm thirsty." "What do you mean?" "What 8%?" "well, I mean, there's only 8% of the population that's, Iike, highly hypnotizable." "I mean, almost anybody can go under a Iittle, but not way under." "Oh, no, slow down." "Not freaky under, Iike he did." "How's your hand?" "What do you mean?" "Dude, I stuck a safety pin in your hand and asked you to bleed on one side but not the other." "Which I can't believe you did." "Yeah, you were very cooperative." "It was a side of you I hadn't seen before." "That happened?" "You said it didn't hurt." "The hell with the pin." "I wanna know more about" "Joey Luca." "Yeah, right." "Who?" "Joey Luca is a kid who used to pound the shit out of you when you were 1 2." "You told us all about it." "You were cryng and moaning." "It was hysterical." "Shut up." "It was very moving, Tom." "Joey Luca?" "Jesus Christ, I haven't thought about him." "Hey." "Can we go home?" "I feel kind of strange." "Yeah." "Yeah, sure." "Close your eyes." "What's the matter?" "Nothing." "Don't stop." "Don't stop." "Oh, Jesus Christ!" "What?" "Oh, my God." "What?" "I don't know." "I'm seeing things." "What do you mean?" "Whoa, no, no, no." "Wait, wait, no." "I can't right now." "Then you were faking it extremely well." "Wait, stop, stop, stop." "It's too weird." "Baby, that wasn't weird." "I couId show you weird." "I was..." "Like I was being attacked." "Thanks." "No, sorry, I didn't..." "I'II be right back." "What the fuck?" "You can hear me, can't you?" "Hey, Jake." "You're awake now, Daddy." "Are you okay?" "Yeah." "Yeah, I guess." "I just don't feel so good right now." "Don't be afraid of it, Daddy." "well, what was it, then?" "An hallucination?" "Yeah, yeah, a bunch of them." "It's hard to explain." "It's like all these thoughts just kept coming." "Can you believe this?" "I got seven calls before lunch." "well, if it never happened before, it had to be the hypnosis." "Your brain was agitated or something." "I had this headache like you wouldn't believe." "I was thirsty as hell." "Jake!" "I know you're not watching that monster tape again." "Who was the woman?" "I don't know." "I don't know." "Maybe somebody I met once, and I was just remembering her." "She didn't look familiar, though." "Did you fuck her?" "You gotto be kidding." "well, I mean, was she someone you used to go out with?" "You're jealous of my hallucination?" "Hmm, you are pregnant." "You should call Lisa." "Oh, Lisa, please." "She's the one who fucked up my brain in the first place." "Then she has to un-fuck it." "Fuck!" "Fuck!" "Don't swear so much." "Hang on, hang on." "Let me get my bearings, here." "I haven't..." "I haveabsolutely no caffeine in my system, you know." "Okay." "You're asking me if I gave you a post..." "Post-hypnotic suggestion." "Yeah, I know what it's called." "Did you leave anything else behind when you were kicking your clumsy-ass feet around inside my brain?" "Nothing." "tell the truth, Lisa." "Tom, please, this is insulting." "You know, I have done this before." "Okay, good." "I was just making sure." "And it was just a harmless one, anyway." "What?" "Did it actually work?" "What did you say?" "I don't wanna tell you." "You're grouchy." "Lisa, I swear to God !" "Well, you know I've always said I think you need to be a little more open-minded, right?" "Yeah?" "Right, so, I just said that after you wake up, your mind will be completely open, like an open door." "Open to receive everything around you, or words to that effect." "And what's that supposed to do?" "well, fuck if I know." "I never said it before." "Why, did something happen?" "Jesus Christ!" "Relax, okay?" "I opened a door that's all." "You know, therapists do it all the time." "It releases repressed memories and latent abilities, whatever you got back there." "In your case, it was probably old Mannix reruns." "I gotto get back to work." "Okay, well, all righty, then." "No." "No more calls for Lisa." "Hey, Lise, it's me." "call me when you wake up." "Is there any way you could babysit for us on Friday night?" "I did." "I told him." "I hate to hit you up for double duty, but I can't just go to somebody new with Jake again." "What's your name?" "Okay." "... andTomandIwannagotothis game and I'd ask Grandma, but then I gotto hear about it for a month." "I called everyone who could possibly do it, and no one's free." "call Vanessa." "Huh?" "I said call Vanessa and ask her about Debbie." "Anyway, call me back." "Bye." "Debbie?" "That's the girl who babysits for them?" "Yep." "Great idea." "Pray she's free." "How'd you know about Debbie?" "Samantha told me." "Hey, Vanessa." "Are you guys going out Friday night?" "Hi, I'm Debbie." "Kozak?" "Tom Witzky." "Hi, Debbie, I'm Maggie." "Hi." "Thanks for coming." "Jake's asleep already, and he hardly ever wakes up." "A band could play in his room and he wouldn't hear it, so you shouldn't have any trouble with him at all." "His room's upstairs at the end of the hall." "Kitchen's back there." "Just help yourself if you want anything." "Here, have a seat." "This is the baby monitor." "It's on B in his room, so you should hear everything." "You wanna watch a movie?" "I got a book." "well, it shouldn't be any later than midnight, if that's all right with you." "Perfect." "Great." "I'II just grab my coat, and we're out of here." "hello?" "Ready?" "Yeah, just about." "Okay." "Hey." "Where'd you find that girl Debbie?" "Vanessa gave me her number." "Everybody uses her." "It's cool." "Another headache?" "Too much caffeine." "Oh." "Okay, Iet's go." "Bye." "Don't get me wrong," "I think that Damon kid is doing a great job and everything, and, you know, the other kid's got a decent arm, but high school football is about power." "It's about running a goddamn football." "It always has been." "It was when I was in high school." "What did you play in high school?" "Piano, mostly." "Oh, Jesus, sorry." "Here, you want some?" "Anyway, Adam, and I admit that I'm biased, but my kid is having a hell of a season, and it's like nobody even notices." "If they just give him the ball, he could break 1 ,000 yards." "And that's in an eight-game season." "Jesus Christ." "Why don't you just lick them when they walk by?" "Frank says the average guy carries around a hard-on two-and-a-haIf hours out of every day." "Three-and-a-haIf for him." "I wish you hadn't told me that." "See, now I gotto picture that." "One of these days, she's gonna find one of my .38s and pop a cap in my ass." "He'II stick it in a bowl of soup if it's still warm." "Go, go!" "You okay?" "Yeah." "Yeah, I'm fine." "If he goes over 1 ,000 yards, we're talking major college scholarship." "Here, come on." "No, thanks." "The kid can write his own ticket, and that's good for everybody." "It's good for the whole goddamn neighborhood." "I mean, he's gonna go a hell of a Iot further than I ever did." "Look at the quality of tall he's already getting." "I mean, he passed me in that department when he was 1 4." "Come on !" "while we're young, huh?" "You scared me." "She's downstairs, I think." "I don't knnow. I haven't seen her yet." "Jake?" "What's the matter?" "Something's wrong." "What?" "I have a secret to tell you." "Promise, promise, promise." "Samantha says it's always dark where she is." "Who did you say?" "Samantha." "You talk to Samantha?" "Yeah." "When?" "all the time." "Where?" "Here in my house." "That's not true." "Move!" "That's cruel !" "It isn't true." "I don't tell lies." "Samantha was here?" "She was here in your house?" "You're hurting my arm." "Was she here?" "Let go of me." "Come on, you're coming with me." "Let's go." "She's taking him away." "Excuse me!" "Put me down !" "Put me down !" "Tom !" "Jake!" "Jake!" "Jake!" "What the hell?" "She took him !" "She took him !" "What?" "The fucking babysitter, she took him." "Oh, my God !" "He's not in there." "Where are you going?" "I don't know!" "He's in there." "Jake!" "Daddy!" "That's him !" "Wait!" "Where do you think you're going?" "Whoa, whoa, slow down." "all right, all right, take it easy." "Stop, stop, stop!" "Take it easy." "Take it easy." "Give me my kid." "Give me my kid." "tell me where she is!" "You tell me where she is!" "You tell me where she is!" "Keep your hands off her!" "tell me where she is!" "Hey, hey, hey!" "Everybody shut up!" "Are you okay?" "That girl kidnapped our son." "Did she hurt you?" "Is that your child?" "You ask them about Samantha." "I'm asking about that boy, who sure as hell doesn't look like he belongs to you." "Wait, I can explain this, all right?" "I'm not talking to you." "I'm talking to her." "Is that boy your child?" "No." "She was babysitting for us." "We never used her before, but..." "Do you know what you've done is a felony, young lady?" "You can go to jail for this!" "Where were you taking him?" "I wasn't taking him anywhere." "Then why the hell did you bring him to a train station?" "Look, I want to press charges." "Look, she came here because of me, all right?" "I work here." "I'm her mother." "Her mother?" "When are you gonna ask them some questions?" "When are you gonna ask them about Samantha?" "Who?" "Samantha is my oIdky daughter." "She ran away about six months ago." "No, she didn't run away." "She was kidnapped or something, and the little boy said he saw her!" "We haven't heard from her in a Iong time." "We filed a police report." "There's this open investigation, but nobody wants to return any of our phone calls." "He talked to her." "He said he saw her all the time in his house." "He said Samantha is in their house." "Is that her?" "Stay away from him, you crazy little bitch." "Look at the picture!" "You let go of me!" "will you just look at the picture?" "This is ridiculous!" "Do you actually think..." "will you look at the picture, please?" "I have never seen her before in my Iife." "What about you?" "No, sorry." "Never seen her." "No, no, no, they're lying !" "They're lying !" "Debbie." "Debbie, come on." "You wanna file charges?" "Yes." "No." "What?" "Come on, Iet's just forget about it." "Let's go home." "Are you nuts?" "What about the next people she babysits for?" "How could you do that?" "It was her." "Who?" "Samantha." "That girl in the picture." "She's the same girl I saw on our couch." "Why did you ask that girl Debbie to babysit for us?" "Why her?" "I couldn't find anybody else." "I was on the phone, and Jake said..." "Jake?" "Do you remember the other day when we were talking in the kitchen?" "I was looking for a babysitter, remember?" "And you said Samantha told you about Debbie." "Do you remember that?" "Mommy's asking you a question, bud." "Is Samantha someone who talks to you sometimes, Jake?" "Can you remember any of the things that..." "Don't ask the boy any more questions." "Talk to me." "What did you say?" "Huh?" "Jake, what did you say just now?" "Nothing." "That voice." "Let me hear that voice again." "Come on, come on, say it again." "Say it again." "Do that again." "Tom." "Use that voice again." "Come on, Jake." "Come on, come on, use the voice again." "Tom !" "Come on, make the voice again, Jake." "I know you can do it, come on !" "I want to hear it again." "Tom, don't do that!" "How do you make it come back like that?" "Tom, please!" "Wait, it's all right." "Come on, Jake, I know you can do it." "Let's go see if Beetle Board is on now." "please?" "What are you doing?" "Hey, hey, I'm talking to him !" "Hey, what's the matter with you?" "What do you think?" "I'm just trying to have a conversation with my kid." "Yeah, a perfectly normal everyday conversation for a five-year-oId." "Don't be afraid of it." "Why the hell shouIdn't I?" "I don't know." "That's what he told me." "This is where it happened." "This is where I saw her, you know." "I was sitting, Iike, right here." "You're different." "I reached up for the remote." "You feel different." "You look different." "Kind of 1 8, right?" "Longish kind of hair?" "I wish you could see yourself right now." "Is that what you saw?" "Maggie, please!" "God !" "Or maybe you don't see her?" "You just hear her?" "Is that what it is?" "You just hear her but you don't see her?" "Tom, stop it." "You're freaking him out." "I've been sitting here trying to figure out a way that I couId make her come back." "I'm just thinking maybe if I hang out here long enough..." "I'm talking to you !" "... maybeshe'IIjustcomeback , or maybe you could talk to her." "It's like I'm not even sitting here!" "help me out here, please?" "Hey, come on." "Hey!" "What's the problem here?" "Knock it off!" "I don't wanna talk about this, because it scares Mommy." "Turn it up, man." "What?" "Turn it up." "Louder." "Tom is looking especially together today." "Grunted a very pleasant greeting at me, actually." "Becoming sort of monosyllabic." "Nothing wrong with that guy." "Nothing at all." "Nothing a Iittle lithium couldn't cure." "I'm a jerk." "I'm sorry." "Are you okay?" "You live on the base." "Room and board's covered." "I mean, you got your service pay on top of that." "You still gotto get up real early." "By the time I retire, I got enough for a couple of down payments, some improvements." "When I take off the uniform," "I'm a landlord already." "Five years later, I got three houses in this neighborhood." "Hey." "Hey, Harry." "How you doing?" "What do you know about that girl Samantha Kozak?" "Samantha Kozak, that sounds familiar." "Why do I know that name?" "Brownish hair, 1 6 or 1 7 years old." "Used to live around here." "Yeah, yeah, yeah." "I remember her, I think." "Hey, hey, Kurt?" "Come here for a second." "Like he ever tells me anything, right?" "Get over here." "Say, you know that Kozak girl?" "Debbie." "No, no, no, the other one, Samantha." "Oh, you mean the retard." "Yeah, she ran away." "Yeah, that's right." "I remember that." "So what about her?" "I just been thinking about her a Iot." "Why?" "Her sister babysat for us." "Oh." "This is the first time he's been out of the house in a weekk." "He hasn't gone to work." "He sleeps, Iike, 1 2 hours a night." "He's used up all his sick days." "If he doesn't show up on Monday, they're gonna start to dock him, and I can't..." "I can't get him more than six feet from the couch." "Why?" "That's where she appeared to him." "I'm not shocked that there's another woman." "Of course, the fact that she's dead gives one pause." "We are talking about a ghost, here, aren't we, Maggie?" "She took off last March." "With a black guy, I think." "Hey, Harry, did she ever live in our house?" "No, no, no, I just bought that one." "You're the first tenants." "Tom and Jake, it's like they have this private club or something." "They sit in the living room and whisper." "As soon as I walk in the room, they both shut up right away." "You know what you need to do?" "Find one of those young priests with smoldering good looks who can sort of guide you through this." "I'm kidding, but I'm not." "Look, I give Tom a Iot of shit, but the truth is you guys are, Iike, the best couple on earth." "This is on you now, Maggie." "Get some help." "Find out why this is happening." "There is a reason." "You won't be the first woman who's had to hold an insane family together." "Tom's not crazy." "Oh, yes, he is." "But at Ieast he's getting interesting." "Sports flash, sports flash." "21 1 yards rushing on Friday night." "That's a total of 894 yards with two games to go." "The kid needs 1 06 yards." "That's 53 a game." "He could walk through the next two games and still break 1 ,000!" "Frank, Frank, Frank, what about you?" "Do you know her?" "Who?" "Tom was asking about that Kozak girl from over by baldwin." "You remember the one who ran away?" "The retard." "Shut up, Lenny." "Don't use that word." "She was just kind of slow." "What?" "Retard?" "God damn it, Lenny, why don't you just shut your fucking pie hole" "before I shut it for you, will you?" "I didn't mean anything." "Hey, hey, hey!" "Stop him !" "What are you doing?" "Somebody's always gotto ruin it." "Why can't everyone just be nice?" "Frank?" "What are you doing here?" "They're gonna kill you, Tommy." "You and Maggie, both." "Why would you say something like that, Frank?" "This is a decent neighborhood." "Hey, are you okay?" "Where's SheiIa?" "She at home?" "Say, I'm gonna go see if SheiIa's at home." "Okay?" "Come in." "Hi." "Hi." "Is your mom at home?" "'Cause your dad's acting..." "Hey, you wanna see what I've got?" "Sure." "That's great." "Is that one of your dad's?" "Not today." "Come here." "Why don't you just put the gun away, Adam?" "Come on, man." "Come here." "I don't know." "Those things make me kind of nervous." "Then this'II make you really nervous." "Whoa, whoa, whoa!" "Don't do that!" "Don't do that!" "please don't be under there." "Oh, boy." "Frank?" "Adam !" "Adam, open the door!" "Oh, God." "Oh, God !" "help!" "Am I awake or asleep?" "help!" "Oh, my God." "Oh, my God, my baby!" "Adam !" "hold on." "hold on." "Oh, my God, please." "Adam !" "Oh, God !" "Adam !" "Is he alive?" "Is he alive?" "Oh, my God, Adam !" "Oh, my God." "Oh, my God !" "What did you do?" "What did you do, Adam?" "Adam !" "I'm gonna take him for a walk or something." "Come on, sweetie pie, Iet's go get your jacket." "Where're we going?" "well, hello, there." "Listen, music!" "It's beautiful !" "Hey, Jake, wait up!" "I don't think we're supposed to be here, sweetie." "Come on, Iet's go." "This way." "Whoa!" "This place is cool !" "Come on, honey, Iet's go get some lunch." "Mom, what's this thing?" "I don't know." "Let me take a look." "Looks like some kind of stone." "Either that, or it's a medal." "Yeah, I think it is." ""... servedinthe..."" "Look, a flag." "Everything okay?" "It's fine, just fine." "We're not supposed to be here or something?" "Oh, no." "It's fine." "really." "Okay." "See you later." "Boy's got the eyes on him, doesn't he?" "X-ray." "Not you, though." "Possibly daddy?" "They're not the only ones." "tell Daddy to come by and see me a Iittle later tonight." "Might learn a few things." "Bye, Jake." "Bye, neil." "His name is neil." "Try that, Daddy." "Why do I know that song?" "I'II be home right after the movie." "I know it." "I know it." "I said I won't be late." "Okay." "Bye, Mom." "Bye, Maggie." "Oh, hello." "I don't know if I'm in the right place." "I'm looking for this big guy named neil." "Excuse me..." "I'm sorry..." "Shit." "Shit, shit, shit, shit." "I wanna see neil." "Wait here." "I don't know her." "What are you doing?" "I said the boy's father." "I said tell him to come." "He'd never do it." "He'd kill me if he knew I was talking to you about this." "He's so paranoid." "What's the story, man?" "close the fucking door." "So are they." "I can't let you in." "Who are they?" "Look, man, this ain't no freak show in here." "close the damn door!" "Look, you just gotto get out of here." "My husband is losing his mind." "I don't know why, but I think you do." "You can tell me what you know, but you can't tell me to go away, because I'm not moving." "How long has he had it?" "Just a few days." "What happened?" "Car wreck?" "No." "child die?" "No." "Did he kill someone?" "He was hypnotized." "Is that what started it?" "It comes and it goes." "Some people have it for five seconds." "Some their whole lives." "He's a receiver now." "Everything's coming in." "He can't stop it." "He can't slow it down." "He can't even figure it out." "It's like he's in a tunnel with a flashlight, but the light only comes on every once in a while." "He gets a glimpse of something, but not enough to know what it is." "Just enough to know it's there." "Jake, too?" "Your son?" "Much better flashlight." "Does he know what it wants yet?" "What who wants?" "He saw a ghost, didn't he?" "What did it ask him to do?" "She didn't ask anything." "Maybe he wasn't listening." "She's asked for something, and now she's waiting, getting more and more pissed off that he's not doing it." "If he doesn't do her thing, she'II never go away." "Kill her!" "Kill her!" "Kill her!" "Fuck." "Hey!" "absolutely not." "Oh, please, please, please?" "Five more minutes?" "Five more minutes?" "No, zero minutes." "This is cool." "You know The Mummy gives you nightmares if you watch it before bed." "No fair." "I know, I'm horrible." "I'm gonna take a bath." "You okay for 1 0 minutes?" "Whatever." "Oh, fuck." "How do I know this song?" "I know I know this song." "I know it." "I know it." "It's freezing." "Round up your weapons, folks!" "Charge!" "I don't wanna talk right now." "Hey!" "No, not that one." "Tom," "I think the pilot blew out on the water heater again." "Can you go light it for me?" "hello?" "Or I couId go light it." "Thanks, Colonel." "Thanks all of you." "I said no!" "Bummer." "Hey, that is the most amazing..." "Holy!" "Tom?" "Tom, breathe!" "What happened?" "Did you see her?" "What?" "She's here." "What?" "I want you to hypnotize me again." "all this shit, I want it out, I want it gone." "I want it all to stop right now!" "Yeah, come right in, Tom I want you to meet CIarita." "Oh, hi." "Sorry." "Sorry, I..." "Look, do you think that you could..." "could she..." "Yeah." "I know." "I know." "Okay, you got to slow down." "Okay?" "Just..." "Yougotto be a Iittle patient with me here, 'cause I got a confession to make." "You see, we..." "I just..." "We just smoked this great big fatty a few minutes before you walked in, so this is just blowing my mind just a Iittle bit extra right now." "Listen to me." "Listen to me." "Listen to me!" "If you can understand." "Yeah?" "Whatever door you opened in my brain," "I want you to shut it." "Now!" "Okay, I'II do it." "Okay, I can do that." "close your eyes." "Okay, just like last time," "I want you to just focus and concentrate." "Listen to the sounds of the room." "Listen to the sounds of your breathing." "Look at the back of your eyelids." "Do you see anything there?" "could you just get to it, please?" "all right, all right." "I want you to pretend you're back in the movie theater." "It's very dark, and in the whole pitch-bIack theater, there's only one thing you can see, and that's the white screen." "And as you focus on the screen, you begin to drift closer to it in your chair." "You'II notice that there are letters on the screen." "TaII, thick, black letters, but they're out of focus so you begin to drift closer to them." "Someone's here." "No, it's empty." "No, there's someone else in here." "No, you're alone in the theater Tom." "Oh, no." "No, no, I'm not." "All right, your feet and your ankles are relaxed." "Hard to breathe." "Your hands are limp and heavy." "Your arms..." "No air no air." "Tom, I want you to look at the screen." "Look at the screen." "Hey." "You can read the letters now." "You're right up next to them." "Tom, look at the screen!" "Wow." "What happened?" "Are you okay?" "I think you need to sit down, Tom, because what was happening there was very next level." "You should have seen your face." "Do you want a beer?" "Are you feeling better?" "What happened?" "I'm supposed to dig." "Hi !" "hello?" "Anybody home?" "Wow, look what I'm not cleaning up." "Interesting." "Okay." "Hi, honey." "What you doing?" "Dad said I'm supposed to dig." "Oh." "Nice." "Tom." "Tom !" "Oh !" "You scared me." "I scared you?" "What are you doing?" "I'm supposed to dig." "What do you mean?" "I'm supposed to dig." "Who says?" "I see." "And what's Jake doing?" "Jake is helping." "Why are you doing this?" "Water softens up the dirt." "No, I mean..." "could you just stop for a second?" "Tom, can you turn around and look at me while I'm talking to you?" "What exactly don't you understand?" "I'm supposed to dig." "Why are you digging?" "I'm searching." "What are you searching for?" "The question is not what." "I think we both know very well what, even if we don't want to admit it." "The question, Maggie, which you can plainly see I am very busy trying to answer, the question is "where?"" "Don't worry, he's okay." "It's not over there." "We're calling the police." "And tell them what, exactly?" "Practice it." "Run it by me once." "I wanna see how it sounds out loud." "Anything else?" "Tom, why don't you come inside with me?" "I wanna talk to you." "You're not yourself right now." "This is just fucking typical !" "What do you want me to do, Maggie?" "You want me to go inside and just sit down on the couch in front of the TV and drink eight or nine beers until I faII asleep, then maybe just repeat the whole thing again tomorrow and the day after?" "Be quiet!" "And the day after, and the day after..." "Tom, just stop." "... andthedayafter, until I grab my chky and die?" "I mean, this is the most important thing that's ever happened to me." "I mean, this is the most important thing that I have ever done in my whole life, in my whole stupid life!" "And you want me to just stop?" "No!" "No, I won't stop." "I won't stop!" "I won't stop!" "Eight years I've known you." "Not once have you talked to me like this." "Not once." "And if you do it again, I swear to God..." "And you know what else?" "When you talk about how ordinary you are and your stupid life, you know what you're really saying?" "You're saying our stupid life, which I don't think is particularly stupid." "So, how the fuck am I supposed to feel about that?" "You gonna drink that?" "I'm sorry." "Okay, I'm not sorry." "Who's that from?" "My brother, Steve." "My grandma's going back in the hospital." "No, she..." "What?" "Nothing." "What is it?" "hello?" "Oh, Steve." "I'm sorry, we've been so busy." "I was just about..." "What?" "She did?" "How am I doing, Dad?" "You're doing great, kid." "You're doing great." "I'm so sorry, baby." "You knew." "You knew, didn't you?" "When is the funeral?" "Sunday." "We should leave as soon as we can." "Oh." "You want me to go with you?" "I meant, I just thought with your family and everything..." "Do I want you to go with me?" "To my grandmother's funeral?" "She practically raised me." "Of course I want you to come." "Why wouldn't you?" "It's just I'm kind of in the middle of something here." "$800 a month." "Can't get any fucking water!" "Fuck it!" "tools." "Damn it." "Piece of shit." "This is a rented house." "Hello?" "It's me." "Hey." "Hey, baby, how you doing?" "I'm okay." "How's your family?" "You know, drunk." "Fighting with each other." "Listen, Maggie, I'm so sorry." "I mean, I should be there with you." "l'm an asshole." "Yeah, well, you have your good points." "How do you feel?" "Oh, fine." "Fine, you know." "Much, much, much better." "Everything's fine here, really good." "No..." "No more digging?" "No." "No." "It's back to normal." "I'm sorry, too. I wish I hadn't just stormed out of there like that." "I shouldn't have left you alone." "I deserved it." "Why don't you come up here with us?" "This time of night, you could make it in an hour." "No, no. I can't really do that." "Why not?" "Well, you know, I'm not supposed to use the truck for personal trips." "all right, then, I'II pick you up." "I'II leave right away." "Oh, no, no, baby, don't do that." "No, no." "That's crazy." "Don't come down here." "Look, I gotto go." "I'II just pull up front and honk." "Bye." "No, no, no." "Okay, bub, you ready to go?" "I'm scared to go home." "I wanna stay at Uncle Steve's house." "Why are you scared?" "Because of the feathers." "What feathers?" "I don't know, just the feathers." "It's okay, I'II watch him." "Okay." "You be good." "Mom, wait!" "You forgot this." "Hi !" "Hi." "Come here a sec." "What?" "Come closer, I can't hear you." "Are you talking to me?" "I wanna show you something." "You wanna show me something?" "Yeah." "I don't see anybody else around." "What is it?" "It's a surprise." "It's really great." "Come on, you won't believe it." "Come on, it's freezing." "Hey, happy Saint Patrick's Day." "What's the surprise?" "Don't you have it?" "Oh, yeah, the surprise." "The surprise." "Take it." "You need another drink." "No, man, I got the spins already." "Drink, motherfucker, drink." "Drink." "I don't think there is a surprise." "Oh, yeah, there is." "Yeah, there is." "The surprise is we decided we wanna be your friends." "You do?" "Yeah." "Why do you wanna be my friends now?" "Are you kidding?" "Look at yourself." "Look." "You can take your coat off, you know." "Want a drink?" "I'm not supposed to." "Don't you do anything you're not supposed to?" "I do." "Mama, you are hot." "Come on, Iet's be friends, huh?" "well..." "You can kiss me, if you want to." "Yeah." "Not like that, okay?" "Okay, okay." "Okay." "I wanna go home." "No, no, no." "Come on, sweetie, I'II be your friend." "I swear I will." "Just be nice to me." "I want to, but..." "Be a good girl." "You are a good girl, aren't you?" "I have to go home." "Come on, baby, how about a Iittle helmet wash?" "I have to go home." "I have to go home!" "Stop!" "Shut up!" "Shut up!" "Stop!" "Shut up!" "Stop, man !" "Make her stop screaming !" "Shut her up, man !" "Use your jacket or something." "Put it over her face." "Shut up!" "Oh, my God." "What the fuck did you do that for?" "Is she dead?" "No shit she's dead." "Oh, my God." "Look at her tongue, man." "I'm not here." "I've never seen nobody dead before." "I can't be here." "It's fucking gross." "This isn't happening." "Fucking plastic over her face!" "Good thinking, Adam." "well, what do we do now?" "How's he doing?" "He might make it." "He might not." "sheila's over at the hospital." "I'm gonna head over." "Frank, I'm sorry." "I'm sorry, because" "I think I know why Adam shot himself." "And" "I gotto call the police about it." "And I don't want you to hear it from them, and I don't want SheiIa to read about it in the paper." "I think you have a right to know before anybody else." "What are you talking about, Tom?" "Come with me." "Wait here for a second." "Better be important." "Come on, come on, come on." "How the hell did you find this?" "Does it matter?" "You don't know if it was Kurt and Adam." "Yeah, I do." "But you don't have anything to..." "Come on, Tom." "You're talking like a goddamn Iunatic." "That's what people are gonna say." "It's just a body." "It doesn't prove anything." "She's got somebody's hair in her hand." "They're gonna be able to tell whose it is." "Hey, Frank," "we gotto call the cops." "What were we supposed to do?" "It was an accident." "The kids come to us." "She's already dead." "The damage is done." "There's nothing anybody can do to bring her back." "But these kids got everything ahead of them." "So what were we supposed to do, Tom?" "Send our sons to jail for the rest of their lives because of her?" "Who you planning to shoot with that?" "Get the hell out of here, Tom." "Hey, Frank, come on upstairs." "We can talk about this." "I been living with this for six months." "Six fucking months!" "Do you think anything you have to say is gonna make one bit of difference to me?" "Get the hell out of here!" "I'm not leaving until..." "Get out!" "Hi." "Hi." "Hi." "Boy, it's really pouring, huh?" "Yeah, looks like it." "Hey, you got a minute?" "No, I'm kind of busy right now." "It's important." "I don't really have time to talk right now, Harry." "Jesus!" "This rain, huh?" "Harry, Iike I said, you know, I'm really kind of busy right now." "Kurt, I know you weren't raised in a barn." "close that door." "Maybe I couId call you later or something?" "Tom, we got ourselves a serious problem here." "What do you mean?" "What the hell you think you're doing to my house?" "I heard all this pounding going on up here." "I thought I'd better come up, check it out." "I didn't think in a million years you'd be wrecking the place." "What's the matter with you?" "Don't worry." "I'm gonna take care of that." "I was trying to fix your water main, you know." "It was leaking like a son of a bitch, and I couldn't get to it from underneath the house." "I mean," "I couldn't get under the house to get to it." "Is that right?" "Damn." "A Iot of water damage?" "Some." "Can I Iook around?" "Yeah." "Yeah, sure." "Sure." "help yourself." "Maybe you better show me where it's at." "You guys'II be able to see it." "I gotto take off right now." "I'm almost afraid to look." "Drink it." "Hurry up." "The water main doesn't run under the house." "well, I know that now." "Shit, Tom." "Get him on the rug." "Don't look at him." "roll him over." "Yeah." "Let's go!" "all right, get out of the way." "Tom?" "Are you here?" "Shit." "Out of the way, Kurt!" "They were gonna kill you, Tommy." "You and Maggie, both." "Are you okay?" "Yeah." "CoId-bIooded murder." "Can't let something like that happen." "Not here." "This is a decent neighborhood." "If I ever feel the light again" "Shining down on me" "I don't have to tell you" "How welcome it would be" "I felt the light before" "But I let it slip away" "And I just keep on believing" "That it'll come back someday" "It's not the spotlight" "It's not the candlelight" "It's not the streetlights" "But some old street of dreams" "It ain't the moonlight" "Not even the sunlight" "But I've seen it shining in your eyes" "And you know what I mean"