Prose Potlatch Challenge-Describe a Person
Scripts
:
Witnesses
by michaelcahill
Scene I
Fade in:
In a dark alley two figures encounter one another. It is unclear if they engage in mortal combat or rather in a sensuous dance. Shadows fly about in the night and whispers fill the air. Bursts of light shine for but a moment on faces, some grotesque and twisted in anger, some screwed in abject terror, others whose expression is extreme but difficult to discern. Sounds pierce the night like animals in the deepest jungle, howls of pain, shrieks of attack and ravaging until a cloud drifts slowly by and the light of the moon reveals an empty alley and silence reigns save for the soft dripping of dew condensed on the eaves of old high rise tenements. All are asleep.
Fade out:
Scene II
Fade in:
A crowd fills an alley Officials, detectives, police officers and their superiors conduct an investigation. Behind bright yellow tape glistening in the glaring sun, witnesses, lookers-on and reporters gawk, comment or await their turn to reveal their insights respectively. A clown dressed in black makes unrecognizable balloon animals. Vendors hawk their wares, but only the frozen carrot on a stick concern is making sales. Almost everyone has a frozen carrot on a stick, but no one attempts to consume it.
A spotlight shines on two detectives examining clothing on the pavement. Detective Joe Leap Year
There are fluids all over these clothes. There are traces of blood dried on the pavement as well as gum of an unknown origin. Be sure and collect a sample, I'm suspecting Big Red ... I don't know, just a hunch. Bodies would help. They were either carried away to some hideous fate or they skipped to m'lou my darlin' ... uh, with all due respect, Detective Ballerina.
Detective Ballerina
That's Bawwwl, Joe, Bawwwlerina. I swear you get that wrong just to tickle me and make me titter. Bawwwwl as in basketball. You give the impression sometimes that I'm on the verge of skipping off with the Lord of the Dance to go antiquing, not that I don't enjoy a nice antique. Anyway, who's to say that these two didn't just knock boots like two rabid tit mice, and get spooked by Officer Flannigan, drunk and on horseback, forgetting he's twenty-years retired, trotting by naked singing selections from Candide. It's a terrible score. I'd run.
Detective Joe Leap Year
Terrible? Who died and made you the judge of musicals. I think it's an underrated score myself. Besides, that's an Old Navy blouse there, twinkle toes. You tryin' to tell me, that someone is so damn out of their tree they leave top of the line Old Navy apparel in a heap on the ground? Officer Flannigan is so drunk he don't see it and scoop it up. He's a veteran cop. Use your head, OLD NAVY, get it? OLD NAVY.
They start dancing around the scene arm in arm singing, "Next question, deep though it be, there's none too deep for me ..." From 'The Best of All Possible Worlds' from Candide. Cut to:
A young girl with two long braids is licking a huge lollipop and questioning a wide-eyed white skinned older woman. Detective Audrey Lick
Now, Miss Oldenmayden, you claim you witnessed the whole thing?
Miss Oldenmayden
You can call me Frigeeed, dear. Yes, it was a terrorist, no doubt about it. He was dark and wore one of those towels piled up on his head like an ice cream cone from the Dairy Queen. He kept calling him Fido, like he was a dog. That's what they call all of us, don't ya know, Fido's, dogs that should be killed. It's what their God tells them to do. He's a mean old cuss.
Detective Lick
It was pretty dark, Miss Oldenmay ...
Miss Oldenmayden
Frigeed, dear.
Detective Lick
It was quite dark, Frigeeeeed, how could you see all this so clearly?
Frigeeeeeeed
Well, I could see clear enough and, well, ya know, once you've seen one ... the camel smell, you can't get around that. Who calls another human being "Fido"?
Detective Lick
You heard that, then?
Frigeeeeeeeed
Well, they all say it. We're Fido's and we should be drowned in a gunny sack and all that. Anyway, she fought him with all her might and called out to the true God over and over. I think it helped, because when I came out of hiding they were both gone. I guess God vaporized him and took her straight up to Heaven since there's no bodies.
Detective Lick
Ahhh ... okay then, Frigeeeeeeeeed. I'll let you know if I have any further questions. You've been an astonishing witness.
Cut to:
A talking Emu wearing an Easter bonnet with a cracked egg sitting in the brim. A chicken peers out through a sizable hole in the egg. Emu
You about to eat cereal, mate? Stick that in your pocket so I can ask you some questions.
Prickford Bucksalot Junior
Very well, but I've got meetings ... deals ... money to be ... hold on ... PBJ, what's the good word? ... Uh huh ... Okay, slit, crush, sell all shares, Call CIRQZZZREDKVVEEE or whatever her name is, the RED dress tonight. Yeah, and no pickles. Okay, ask away.
Emu
You say you got a good look?
PBJ
K-Mart all the way. Welfare, trailer park, fourth grade tops, probably ethnic, criminal record, sketcher tennis shoes, throw away the key, should be the death penalty, never happen to me, hard work, smarts, started with nothing but a small loan from Mumsy. I'm guessing a tall black man, gang member, armed, assault, white women, no business out this late, crack addicted, fourteen kids. Good luck.
A helicopter swoops in and hovers over them. A ladder drops down and PBJ starts to climb. He reaches out and grabs the chicken. The chicken flips the Emu off and says, "buck, buck, begock!" Cut to A detective standing in a light drizzle smokes a cigar. His face is shadowed by his hat and only his lips show. Smoke pours out of his mouth as he speaks. The smoke is in beautiful pastel colours and paints abstract images that float in the air around him. A little girl, four-years-old stands before him looking up and smiling.
Gumshoe Johnny Johnny
Ya got a gander I hear. Them baby blue peepers caught the creepers as it were. The crud danced in the mud like a scud hitting Bagdad on a weekend pass. Spill it Jezebel, I ain't buyin' that innocent kid routine.
Cute little girl
You talk funny.
The little girl giggles and Johnny takes a deep draw on his cigar and blows out a picture of an atomic bomb fizzling out and dropping gum drops over a meadow. Johnny
What did you see, kid?
Cute little girl
Two people were dancing and then they kissed and walked away. I was in my bedroom and had to pee pee so I heard the music and looked out the winder.
Johnny
Now we're getting' somewhere. Black, white, brown? Gang bangers? Are you sure they were dancin'? Maybe one was tryin' to pound the other, a robbery, a shakedown, a rootin' tootin' shootin' or maybe a booty hootin'. Cough it up kid.
Cute little girl
Your silly. I don't know what your talkin' about. They just danced and went away.
Johnny walks over to the Emu. Johnny
Sorry to fly you in for this. She don't know what she saw. Another vicious hate crime ... unsolved.
The End
Author Notes
I took a "little" liberty. Kind of describing someone or two someones from the perspective of several witnesses. :))
Let's describe a person phsyical and mental and the such for this weeks potlatch prose. It can be someone you know or don't know, but help us to know them. Have fun!~DEbbie
