Life During Wartime
by Keith Reddin
Synopsis: Tommy, a young security systems salesman, made his first sale to Gale, a divorced mother of a teenage son. Gales is older than he is, but that doesn’t keep them from falling deeply in love and planning to marry. After Tommy makes a few good sales, his boss tells him about the company’s sideline: robbing the homes in which they’ve installed security systems. The boss offers Tommy a piece of the action and he replies that he needs some time to think about it. A short while later, Tommy learns that Gale and her son have been murdered as they walked in on a burglary in their home. In the next scene, Tommy is in a bar talking to Richie, a total stranger.
TOMMY: This one time, I brought over this bottle of champagne, we were celebrating … I don’t know, I’d made two or three sales in a row and I was feeling hot, like I could do anything and we sat at the kitchen table, in her kitchen and we drank this champagne and … we drank it pretty fast it was so cold and it was good champagne, it was a bottle of really good champagne and we drank it fast and we got drunk and we were laughing, laughing at anything either of us said, and I was sort of sliding out of my chair and then I said the floor looks really good, why don’t I just lie on the floor and I did, I was lying on the kitchen tiles and they were cold and I said Gale join me on the kitchen floor and she did and we were both so drunk and laughing and the floor was sort of spinning as we lay on it, like we were lying in this boat on the waves and we lay on the floor and looked up at the ceiling of the kitchen and we held each other and I loved her so much and I said that, I said I love you so much and I wanted to say on the kitchen floor for the rest of my life, holding her, holding this beautiful woman that I loved, but of course you can’t. You can’t lie on the tile for too long, because … I’m sorry I forgot your name…
Timed to 50 seconds:
TOMMY: We were sitting at her kitchen table and we drank this champagne and … we drank it pretty fast and we got drunk and we were laughing at anything either of us said, and I was sort of sliding out of my chair and then I said the floor looks really good, why don’t I just lie on the floor and I did, I was lying on the kitchen tiles and they were cold and I said Gale join me and she did and we were both so drunk and laughing and the floor was sort of spinning as we lay on it, like we were lying in this boat on the waves and we looked up at the ceiling of the kitchen and we held each other and I loved her so much and I said I love you so much and I wanted to say on the kitchen floor for the rest of my life holding this beautiful woman that I loved, but of course you can’t. You can’t lie on the tile for too long, because … I’m sorry I forgot your name…