MAN: [watching them drive away] I’m tired in a way that will go unresolved for at least another week.
WOMAN: [staring through the windshield] Me too.
The wind picks up and pushes a shopping cart a little bit. The shopping cart hits a small patch of snow, stops. They both laugh and find they are holding hands.
WOMAN: You are thinking about saying “tag” but you don’t want to ruin anything. You don’t want to make me chase you [pause] Tag [kisses his cheek] Thank you for being here. Do you still want to walk home?
MAN: [ignores her] Whenever I go outside, I hope to get picked up and blown away. But it never happens. I just stand there. The wind moves around me. Yesterday I figured out that I am a small, human-shaped negative and the world is a giant space with a small human-shaped negative removed from it. And we’re good for each other [sniffs] We’re good food for each other.
WOMAN: Right.
There is loud wind. The woman wipes some snow off her cheek.
WOMAN: We will be in love until the earth grabs its chest and shrinks. Over and over again. There has to be a loser.
MAN: [turns to the woman] Never.
WOMAN: Oh [reaches towards backseat] I forgot. This is for you [produces a package] Happy Birthday, Arnold.
MAN: It’s not my birthday.
WOMAN: Sure it is, Arnold.
MAN: [confused] It’s not my birthday, and my name’s not Arnold.
WOMAN: [ignores] Open it up, Arnold.
The man takes the package and undoes the wrapping paper. Inside there’s a calculator.
MAN: [looking at calculator] Thanks.
The woman touches his arm.
WOMAN: Happy birthday, Arnold [pointing out the window at someone crossing the parking lot] Who’s that, Arnold?
MAN: I don’t know [confused] My name isn’t Arnold [pause] I’m not Arnold. [looking off to where she’s pointing]
WOMAN: [arching her head] Oh I think it’s just a policeman [smiling] What do you think, Arnold?
MAN: I’m confused and scared [holding up the gift] Thanks for the calculator though [reads front of the package] “With both addition and subtraction features.”
WOMAN: Look how happy that boy on the front is, doing his homework.
MAN: I see. Thank you.
WOMAN: [toneless] You’re welcome, Arnold. You’re welcome. Do you want to come home with me and play a board game or some cards with me? We don’t have to go to bed. There’s a wonderful board game where you get to be a little mouse. Sometimes I get angry playing the games but sometimes they make me smile and cry but I only cry once I get back to my room. Everything is leaving you once you are born. There’s a wonderful board game where you get to be a little mouse. But you’re lost. Will you help the little mouse out, Arnold? We can do it together and help the little mouse out. He’s nice I’m sure. Do I look pretty today, Arnold? — do I? Do you want to sleep in my bed with me [coughs] You know, only a certain amount of people get into Heaven. They do. Every time you do something, you have to ask, ‘Will this get me into Heaven? Will it?’ There has to be a loser.
MAN: [smiling] There is too much garbage in Heaven for God to want more. There’s too much garbage [types some numbers on the calculator] Twelve multiplied by eight is ninety-six.
More wind. Metal sounds of shopping carts drifting.
WOMAN: Can I have a hug?
MAN: [still typing on calculator] Can I just let you hug me or do I have to put my arms around you too?
The hug happens. The man, arms down.
MAN: That was one of my finer, more emotionally-convincing hugs I think [looking out window] I don’t know why I got in here with you [to himself] This will never stop. This happens all the time.
He watches the shopping cart through his window. He is staring. The woman reaches into her pocket and takes out a switchblade. She grabs his hair with one hand and with the other hand she cuts his neck open, sawing deep.
MAN: [bleeding into lap, where both his hands are palms up] Why did I get in the car?
He looks at the clock.
WOMAN: [wiping knife off on her shirt] You are calculating the hours remaining before you will get tired and go to bed.
The man turns from the clock to her.
WOMAN: [puts knife up to his face] And you regret even calculating because you know any answer will upset you. Tag.
They wait to be buried in snow.
THE BASTARDS [THEY MAKE PEACE WITH MOTHER EARTH]
Daytime. Three men drive down a road that threads a forest preserve. The man in the passenger’s seat is loading a shotgun. His neck is cut deep, bleeding pumps he sighs out in slow intervals onto his lap. He is very weak. The windows are all open.
THE DRIVER: [scratching sideburn] I am thinking something.
THE MAN FROM THE BACKSEAT: [rocking back and forth] Hold on, stop talking. I can’t remember what my mom looks like [panicked] It’s difficult to do for some reason and I’m getting scared [stops rocking] I keep trying to remember. I can’t do it. It’s impossible [then louder] It’s impossible.
The man with the slit-throat pumps a cartridge into place. He looks at his hands. They are pale. He wheezes something that he thinks probably isn’t a word but should be.
THE MAN WITH THE SLIT-THROAT: [sitting up weakly, keeping chin down] God bless America. I really mean that.
THE MAN FROM THE BACKSEAT: [composed] Ok, I remembered what she looks like [to the driver] I believe you were thinking something. Sorry I interrupted like that. It helped though. Fuck, that was weird. What were you thinking? Come on. Tell us.
THE MAN WITH THE SLIT-THROAT: [quietly] Yeah. Tell us.
THE DRIVER: Yeah, can I say it now? After I think things, I have to say them.
The man with the slit-throat positions the gun in his mouth. He secures it with his legs. Then he flicks fuzz off his pants.
THE DRIVER: [looking at the man with the slit-throat] Hey, you’ll ruin your appetite for dinner mister [stops] I don’t know why I said that [looking into the rearview mirror] Anyway, what I was thinking before was that Santa Claus is probably the invention of a pedophile [looking forward again] Think about it. It’s a perfect way to keep a kid quiet about breaking into his or her room and then assaulting them. Also, the whole milk and cookies thing is genius right — I’m always hungry after a sexual assault [pauses] and for one.
They all laugh.
THE MAN FROM THE BACKSEAT: [rubs chin] This explains why I always got bruised wrists for Christmas.
The man with the slit-throat mumbles something. The gun in his mouth holds him up, neck open in wet flaps. Blood pumps onto his limp hands, both lapped.
THE DRIVER: Hey [pauses] Quit being rude [laughing]
They all laugh. The man with the slit-throat takes the gun out of his mouth. He wipes his mouth. Then he looks out the window, chin down to clamp the slit-throat together. He is weak.
THE MAN WITH THE SLIT-THROAT: [quietly] Sorry. I was saying that that explains why I always got a face scraped up by beard hair and a neck covered in bite marks.
THE DRIVER: Yes, and that explains why I always got nothing because I was an unattractive child.
THE MAN FROM THE BACKSEAT: I got my mom a sore neck for Christmas last year but it was the wrong size. I don’t respect anyone else’s life. That is my main problem. That and never really knowing whether or not other people like me, or if I like them. I am very angry. Believe that I am very angry [looks out window] There is no one thing that is important. And I am very angry.
They drive. Climbing a slight hill, the sun blinks in rapid clips, trees blacking out strobes. All three squint against the machine-gunning of the sun.
THE DRIVER: [squinting through the window] I was also thinking something else, you know, before you interrupted me [bites nails] I was thinking the sky is the big breath that everyone ever made has breathed. Does that make sense to anyone else right now?