Storm of the Century (32 page)

29 INTERIOR: THE ISLAND BEAUTY SHOP.

It’s also full of snow. The hair dryers stand like frozen Martians. Written across the mirror is “GIVE ME

WHAT I WANT AND I’LL GO AWAY.”

30 EXTERIOR: THE TOWN HALL--LATE AFTERNOON.

We can barely see it, partially because of the SCREAMING BLIZZARD, but mostly because night is getting ready to fall.

31 INTERIOR: THE BASEMENT DAY-CARE AREA--LATE AFTERNOON.

The KIDS are sitting in a circle. In the middle is CAT WITHERS, reading a book called The Little Puppy (a great favorite of DANNY TORRANCE’S, once upon a time).

CAT

So the little puppy said, “I know where my ball must be. That mean little boy put it in his pocket and took it away. But I can find it, because my nose is--”

(sings)

“I’m a little teapot ...”

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CAT

Sally, honey, you shouldn’t be singing now. This is storytime.

CAT’S a little freaked, although she can’t quite remember what it is about that nonsense ditty that is so unpleasant. SALLY pays no attention to her in any case, goes right on singing. RALPHIE joins in. HEIDI adds her voice, then BUSTER and PIPPA, FRANK BRIGHT and HARRY ROBICHAUX do the same. Soon all the children are singing, even DON BEALS.

“. . . short and stout. . . .”

They stand up. They show their handles and spouts at the appropriate moments. CAT looks at them with growing unease. JOANNA STANHOPE, MOLLY, and MELINDA HATCHER join her.

What’s going on?

CAT

I don’t know ... I guess they want to sing.

“. . . Here is my handle, here is my spout. You can pick me up and pour me out. . . . I’m a little teapot, short and stout.”

MOLLY doesn’t like it. There’s a shelf with a few books on it to her right. Also on it is the chamois bag with the MARBLES in it. MOLLY glances at this, then goes quietly upstairs.

32 INTERIOR: THE TOWN MEETING HALL--AFTERNOON.

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ANGIE CARVER is sitting on one of the front benches. She has been bundled into a warm, quilted housecoat, and there’s a towel over her wet hair. JACK sits solicitously beside her, helping her with a cup of steaming broth. She can’t seem to manage it herself, because her hands are shaking badly.

Sitting on the edge of the stage, facing her, is MIKE ANDERSON. Behind them, on the other benches (and on the edge of their seats, you could say) are most of Little Tail’s storm refugees. HATCH weaves his way to the front among them, and sits down next to MIKE. HATCH looks pretty well exhausted.

(eyeing the onlookers)

You want me to move them out?

Think you could?

He’s got a point, and HATCH knows it. MOLLY comes in, slips through the crowd, goes to MIKE, and sits beside him on the stage, attempting to have a private moment in a very public place.

(low)

The kids’re acting funny.

(also low)

Funny how?

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Singing. Cat was reading them a story, and they just stood up and started singing. (sees MIKE’S puzzlement)

I know it doesn’t sound like much . . .

If you say it’s funny, it’s funny. I’ll come and take a look as soon as I finish here.

He tips his eyes in ANGIE’S direction. ANGIE speaks . . . but not to MIKE or JACK or anyone in particular.

Now I know how easy it is to just get. . . yanked out of the world. I wish I didn’t, but I do.

JACK offers her the cup of broth again, but when ANGIE puts her hands on it, they’re shaking so badly she spills it and CRIES OUT when the liquid scalds her. MOLLY takes a handkerchief from her pocket, sits down beside her, and wipes the hot broth from her fingers. ANGIE looks at her gratefully and takes MOLLY’S hand. She grips it hard. It’s comfort she needs, not a cleanup.

I was just standing there, you see, watching the lighthouse. And then ... I was his.

Shhh. It’s over.

I feel like I’ll never be warm again. I’ve burned my fingers . . . see, they’re red . . . but they’re still cold. I feel like he turned me to snow.

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Mike’s got to ask you some questions, but it doesn’t have to be here--do you want to go somewhere more private? Because you can, if you want to.

She looks to MIKE for confirmation, and MIKE nods. ANGIE, meanwhile, gathers herself with an effort.

No . . . this is for everyone. Everyone should hear.

Fascinated and frightened at the same time, the ISLANDERS move in closer.

REV. BOB RIGGINS

What happened to you, Angie Carver?

During what follows, THE CAMERA PUSHES SLOWLY IN ON ANGIE, moving to CLOSE-UP. Intercut with this, let us see as many ISLANDER FACES as possible. On each we see the horror, the terror, and the growing belief in what she’s saying, strange as it is. There are supposedly no atheists in the foxholes, and maybe no disbelievers when the Storm of the Century is huffing and puffing and threatening to blow the house down. This is a quasi-religious experience, and by the end we see one solidified idea that really doesn’t need verbal expression: when LINOGE shows up, they’ll give it to him. Whatever it is he wants, they will give it to him. “Ayuh, deah--shoah!” as the ISLANDERS themselves might say.

We were watching the lighthouse fall down, and then I went flying backward into the snow. At first I thought it was somebody’s idea of a joke, but then I turned around and what had me ... it wasn’t a man. It wore a man’s clothes and had a man’s face, but there was just blackness where its eyes should have been--blackness and little red twisting things, like snakes on fire. And when it smiled at me and I saw its teeth ... I fainted. First time in my life. I fainted.

She sips from the cup. The room is completely silent. MOLLY and JACK sit with their arms around her. ANGIE is still clutching MOLLY’S hand.

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When I came to, I was flying. I know that sounds crazy, but it’s true. Me and George Kirby, we were both flying. It was like Peter Pan, with me as Wendy and old George as John. That . . . that thing had us, one under each arm. And right ahead of us, as if it was leading us or holding us up, there was a cane. A black cane with a silver wolfs head. As fast as we flew, that cane always stayed ahead of us.

MIKE and HATCH lock eyes.

(continues)

It was the island we saw. The storm was over and the sun was out, but there were cops on snowmobiles everywhere. Mainland cops, state cops, even game wardens. News people, too, from the local stations and the networks. They were all looking for us. Only we were gone . . . gone where nobody could ever find us ...

Like in the dreams . . .

Yes, like that. Then it got dark again. At first I thought it was night, but it wasn’t. It was the storm clouds. They were back and the sunshine was gone. Pretty soon it started snowing again, and I understood what was happening. I said, “You showed us the future, didn’t you? Like the last ghost showed Mr. Scrooge the future in A Christmas Carol.” And he said, “Yessum, that’s very smart of you. Now you best hang on tight.” We started to go up, and the snow got thicker, and old George started to cry and talk about how he couldn’t stand it because of his arthritis, he had to get down . . . although it wasn’t cold a bit; at least it didn’t seem that way to me. And then the man laughed and said that was fine, George could go down right away if he wanted to, and by the express route, too . . . because he only needed one of us, really, to come back and tell. We were just going into the clouds by then-

It was a dream, Angie; it must have been.

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I tell you it wasn’t. I could feel the clouds, not cold the way you’d think snow clouds would be, but damp, like wet cotton. And George saw what it meant to do, and he screamed, but the thing that had us opened its right arm ... it had me in its left . . . and . . .

33 EXTERIOR: OLD GEORGE KIRBY--NIGHT.

He FALLS AWAY FROM THE CAMERA, SCREAMING and waving his arms. He disappears into the dark and the snow.

34 EXTERIOR: RESUME ANGIE AND THE GATHERED ISLANDERS--LATE

AFTERNOON.

Then what happened?

He told me he was bringing me back. Back through time, and back through the storm. He was letting me live to tell you--to tell everyone--that we have to give him what he wants when he comes tonight.

If we have something this man Linoge wants, why doesn’t he just take it?

I don’t think he can. I think we have to give it to him. (pause) He told me to tell you that he’ll only ask once. He asked me if I’d remember Roanoke, and Croaton, and that he’ll only ask once. And I said yes. Because I knew if I said no, or even asked him to explain anything, he’d drop me the way he dropped George. He didn’t have to tell me. I just knew. Then we stopped going up. We did a rollover in the air, and my stomach went way up in my throat, like it was a county fair carnival ride we were on instead of being way up in the air . . . and I fainted again, I guess. Or maybe he did something to me. I don’t know.
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The next thing I was sure of, I was stumbling around in the snow . . . the whiteout . . . and I could hear a horn ... I thought, “The lighthouse must not have blown down after all, because I can hear the foghorn ...”

I tried to go toward it ... and I saw someone coming out of the snow . . . and I thought it was him . . . him again, meaning to take me back into the air again . . . only this time he’d drop me . . . and I tried to run . .

. but it was you, Jack. It was you.

She puts her head against his shoulder, exhausted by the effort this has taken. There is a beat of silence. Then:

(shrill)

Why us? Why us?

Several beats of silence. Then:

Maybe because he knows we can keep a secret.

35 INTERIOR: THE BASEMENT DAY-CARE AREA--LATE AFTERNOON.

(sing)

“I’m a little teapot, short and stout--”

CAT WITHERS is still standing in the middle of the circle, holding her place in The Little Puppy. We can see that she’s freaked but is trying to hide this from the KIDS. MELINDA and JOANNA are still on the stairs. Now, joining them, is KIRK FREEMAN, still dressed for outdoors and with a pile of the toys and puzzles he and MIKE picked up at Wee Folks.

CAT

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If you want to sing, kids, maybe we could sing something else for a change? “London Bridge” or “The Farmer in the Dell” or ...

She gives up. They’re not listening. They hardly seem there. Once normal, happy preschool children, they have become spookily distant.

(sing)

“--Here is my handle, here is my spout. You can pick--”

They stop on the word “pick,” and they do it all at the same time, as neat as a lock of hair snipped by a barber’s shears. Now they just stand in a circle around CAT.

I brought these games and--What? What’s going on?

36 INTERIOR: CAT AND THE CHILDREN, CLOSER--LATE AFTERNOON.

Oh, this is freaky. She looks from one to the next, and the normal vivacity of young children has left their faces; they are Cult City. Eyes like big zeros. Just standing there.

CAT

Buster?

(no answer)

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Heidi?

(no answer)

Pippa?

(no answer)

Ralphie? Are you all right?

(no answer)

MELINDA HATCHER hurries into the circle, almost knocking SALLY GODSOE and HARRY

ROBICHAUX over. She kneels by PIPPA and grabs her arms.

Pippa, what’s wrong, honey?

CAT bursts out of the circle. She’s had enough.

37 INTERIOR: ON THE STAIRS, WITH CAT, JOANNA, AND KIRK FREEMAN.

What is it? What’s wrong with them?

CAT

(starting to cry)

I don’t know . . . but their eyes . . . oh, God, there’s nothing there.

38 INTERIOR: MELINDA AND PIPPA, CLOSE-UP.

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CAT is right--PIPPA’S eyes are scary in their emptiness, and although her mother shakes her harder and harder--this is panic, not anger--there is no result.

Pippa, wake up! Wake up!

She tries chafing PIPPA’S hands. No result. She looks around wildly.

All of you, wake up!

39 INTERIOR: RALPHIE, CLOSE-UP.

His head turns a little, and the life comes back into his eyes. He smiles. It’s almost as if he’s heard her and is responding . . . except he’s not even looking in MELINDA’S direction.

Look!

He points toward the shelf with the bag of marbles on it.

40 INTERIOR: THE BASEMENT DAY-CARE CENTER--LATE AFTERNOON.

Everyone looks. The KIDS light up, just as RALPHIE did. What are they looking at that pleases them so? The marbles? No, that doesn’t seem to be it. Their eyes are fixed a little lower . . . but there’s nothing there.