Snow globes and projector reel.

Opening:

As I watch her on the old home movie, the kind that you ran on your wall through projector reel. Most kids today don't even remember it. It didn't have any sound, or at least not the one that I could afford at the time. Or any time. I see her looking over her shoulder at me. But I know it isn't her. She wasn't even born then. Neither was I.

I keep going back to places that we all hung out at. Not just her and I, but all of us. The group of us that decided we were kindred spirits, and spent almost all of our spare time together throughout college. I'll sit there, pretending like they'll just show up, like any other day, to sit down and talk with me. Tell me about their day, or something that annoyed them, or how hard an upcoming project was going to be. But they won't, and inside, I know that.

But these places. They hold memories. You can feel them echo in these places. And if we could walk backward, if we could retrace those steps, then we could live those memories again.

The hardest is at night. When I lay down to sleep. She once slept here with me, and I can feel her echoes in this room and hear them in my dreams. She's still here, I just can't touch her. It's maddening.

There's an aboriginal belief that the past actually lies before us and the future is behind us. It sounds absurd at first, mostly because of how we look at it. But it's because we can see the past. We can look at it and examine it. We can't see the future. We don't know what it looks like. Thus its behind us, and we are eternally backing into it.

But what if we stopped and turned around?

What if we stopped moving through time the way we have always been led to believe time is supposed to work. What if we pick a different direction, and go that way.

I did.

( Max has been walking down a long, dimly lit hallway. He is walking backward at first. Then he stops and walks forward. His movement should nearly imply that the exact steps are being retraced, or that its being played in reverse, but it isn't.

At the point of his realization, Max takes a step sideways, and disappears into the wall. He reappears in his bedroom. )

Here, she was here once.

(Max lies down in bed, looking desolate and alone. His arm lies out at his side, where some one else would be laying next to him.)

And I knew, if I could just change how I saw things, that it could all be right again.

(Max closes his eyes tightly, hoping desperately for a miracle. The screen goes black. When Max's eyes open, Samantha is laying next to him, asleep in bed clothes. Max is awestruck. He holds her close, in tears, just enjoying the touch of having her nearby again. Smelling her hair, caressing her back. She snuggles closer to him. Max smiles. Samantha wakes slightly, and looks at Max.)

Sam: Max, you alright honey?

Max: I couldn't be happier right now.

Sam: Aww... (kisses Max) you're so sweet. (Samantha drifts off to sleep. Max closes his eyes as well. When he opens them, he is sitting at a bare table in a stark white room. A grim looking man is sitting opposite him with a clipboard.)

Maddock: And how is it that you wound up here?

Max: It scared the hell out of me. It was what I wanted more than anything in the world. But I couldn't keep it up. At least not yet, not then, not right away.

Maddock: Why not?

Max: I don't know. I guess it takes some time to get used to playing God.

Maddock: But you created nothing artificial? It was exactly as it was.

Max: Exactly. I even walked through my crummy old apartment to make sure I was really back there. Believe me, I was.

Maddock: And yet you are now confined here.

Max: You realize that I could leave whenever I wanted?

Maddock: Whenever you are ready, you will leave.

Max: You're right.

Maddock: So do you know what it is that prevents you from leaving now?

Max: Doubt? Fear? But I can leave. Though you may not even know it. You may think I'm still here when I'm actually some where else entirely.

Maddock: And why would that be?

Max: I don't know, I'm just guessing really. In all actuality I don't really know what happens to you when I leave.

(Maddock stoically jots down a note and stands, placing his clipboard at his side.)

Maddock: We will speak again soon Max. (Maddock leaves)

Max: Yeah, I always love our little visits.

(Max is handled roughly, and tossed onto a cot in what appears to be his cell. He lays there wide eyed.)

Max: I could stay here. I could stay here where there is no danger. Where I wouldn't lose anything else, ever again. Life would be safe... and static. Nothing would change. Nothing ever changes here. The doctors are always the same, the pills always bring the same vague numbness. The guards are always indifferent. This is no where.

Curt: So how did you end up here?


Max: I left.

Curt: That it? You just left?

Max: So you can believe that I went back in time to sleep with Samantha one more time, and you can't buy that I just walked out of the looney bin?

Curt: Well, I wasn't there for the whole time/space fuck reunion thing. But I saw you get locked up, so I guess that's a little more real, or surreal for me right now.

Max: Well, what do you think?

Curt: Well, if it's true, and you can go back in time and just live the life you wanted, the life that you have spent the last 3 years agonizing over having lost, then I say fucking go for it.

Max: But I can't.

Curt: Why not?

Max: Because the problem hasn't changed.

Curt: What's the problem?

Max: It's me Curt.

Curt: Of course it's you, who else would it be?

Max: That's not what I meant. I meant that I am the problem. What drove us apart, I realized that it hasn't changed inside of me.

Curt: So get past it man.

Max: I've tried. Oh god I've tried. I've tried meditation, and ginkgo biloba, and prayer, and more sunshine. But I just can't make it all go away. I want to be better Curt, I want it so bad.

Curt: Couldn't you two find it together?

Max: I have no right to put that on her. And if it was suicide...

Curt: Nobody knows that for sure Max.

Max: Where she was? What she had with her? What else could it have been?

Curt: I- I don't know man. I'm just saying, it could have been something else.

Max: Like what?

Curt: Like a brain aneurysm. They happen all the time.

Max: Yeah, maybe it was that. In any case, if she did do it, I don't want to end up being what pushes her over the edge, or just hurts her more.

Curt: Then it sounds like you have some work to do my friend.

Max: Yeah...

Curt: By the way, I knew what that meant.

Max: Oh. Well then you're an asshole.

Curt: Don't mention it. (Max sits down, lost in thought.) Hey, for what it's worth, I'm proud of you.

Max: Huh?

Curt: Well, ever since you two broke up... honestly you've done nothing but feel sorry for yourself. Mope around thinking about how unfair your life is. And now you're talking about being Dr. Who and having the power to change it... but you're thinking more of her than of yourself. Its improvement is all I'm saying.

Max: Thanks.

(Max walks into a Buddhist temple. He bows at the altar. He is sitting on a pillow with a monk.)

Max: If a man had forever to search for enlightenment, would he be sure to have the chance of finding it?

Monk: Enlightenment is a spiritual journey. It is within oneself, and in itself is timeless. But there are no assurances. The troubled mind and caged spirit, even with all eternity, will still not discover enlightenment.

Max: That was totally not what I was hoping to hear.

(Max is praying at a church, trying to find some peace there. He eventually leaves.

Walking through the French Quarter, he seems disheartened, looking around. He stops to listen to some music and smiles, enjoying some of the local performers.

As he is walking past a shop, he sees a snow globe in the window. His eyes light up and he heads inside.)

Max: Excuse me.

Shopkeeper: Yes?

Max: Um... I wanted to look at that snow globe in the window.

Shopkeeper: Oh, I'm afraid that particular globe is not for sale.

Max: (Crestfallen) Can, can I look at it?

Shopkeeper: Sure, don't see any harm in that. (Shopkeeper gets globe and returns to counter with it.)

Max: Its beautiful.

Shopkeeper: One of a kind too.

Max: My girl friend used to love snow globes.

Shopkeeper: She doesn't anymore?

Max: No, it's just that she-

Shopkeeper: Ah, you aren't together anymore. Hoping to get her a make up gift?

Max: Yeah, well, no. I mean- we're not together anymore, that's true. And, well, but it's not because. You see... she's dead. And, uh, yeah, I am kind of hoping that a nice snow globe would kind of... be a make up gift.

Shopkeeper: (The Shopkeeper stares at Max for a long moment, her face impassive. She studies him, while he looks at the globe, lost in thought. Finally, she says) Seven dollars.

Max: Huh?

Shopkeeper: The globe, it's seven dollars, if you still want it.

Max: Hu-yeah. Yes. Thank you! (Grabs wallet and counts out from what little money he has.) Seven dollars. (Which ends up being all of his money. He hands her the seven dollars.)

Shopkeeper: Then that completes our transaction.

Max: Uh, yeah. It-thank you again. This means a lot to me.

Shopkeeper: Just take it to her. I am sure she will love it. (Max nods)

Max: Thanks again. (Max hurries out of the shop with the globe. An older man walks out from the back of the store, looking curiously out towards Max.)

Man: So it was him.

Shopkeeper: Apparently so. (The older man puts his arm around her and they both smile, leaning into one another.)

(Max winds up the snow globe and watches it.)

Max: Samantha had said once that she had wanted to either be a ballerina or an ice skater when she was a little girl. They both reminded her of faeries, and because of that they seem to be magical creatures, something beyond the normal or the real. She had wanted to be a magical creature.

(Max is standing inside Samantha's kitchen. She is crying as she irons her work clothes.)

Max: And that's what broke. When she realized there was no magic in the world.

(Samantha is trying to focus on her ironing. Finally she drops the iron and pushes over the ironing board. She crumples to the ground sobbing.)

Max: When the last of the magic in her died, so did she.

(Samantha looks up and sees the picture of her father. Her overwhelming sadness turns to anger. She stands up and picks it up, screaming at it. She grabs her keys and storms out of the house without her work clothes, right past Max.)

Max: And it's too late. I can't save her here.

(Scene of Max and Samantha together at Christmas. They are opening presents, cuddling on the couch, hanging ornaments on the tree.)

I want to go back to a moment where she still loved me. Where I hadn't already ruined it. When I could still make her smile. God it was all so effortless in the beginning. Where did it all go wrong?

But it's not fair. Not to her. She doesn't get to go back and make these choices. I shouldn't be allowed to make them for her. I've wanted the ability to do this for so long. But I'd been so selfish, thinking about how alone I was or how much I hurt.

(Max is sitting next to Samantha as she is driving. She looks determined but crumbling.)

But how much did she hurt? How alone did she feel in the end?

(Samantha keeps driving and we hear a train coming. Max looks and sees the train. Then a bright light floods the vehicle. Samantha flinches, Max turns away.

In the next instance, Max is standing alone at the railroad tracks.)

This is what I really want to prevent. This is what I can't let come to pass.

It took me weeks, or maybe months, I really can't tell, to find the right place and time.

(Max walks up to see Samantha sitting at a park bench.)

It was here. Apparently she sat here, staring out into the ocean, thinking about her dead father, and everyone else that had ever failed her. He had said that he would always be there for her, and that she would never have to be afraid of anything because daddy would be around to take care of it. He had said this when she was nine. But she took him at his word and held it deep in her heart. She took comfort in knowing that he would do anything for her, that he would protect her from harm and catch her if she fell.

And then he overdosed. I didn't know the how's or why's. I never found the appropriate moment to ask. It's funny the things we'll put off for the sake of being polite. But he died, and she blamed him for it.

Then I came along. And I let her down too. And two years later, she'd be dead.

(He walks up next to her.)

Max: Samantha!

Samantha: Max? What the hell are you doing here? (Wiping her eyes)

Max: Uh, I wanted to talk.

Samantha: What about this time? We've been over this.

Max: I know. Uh, it's not about that. Honest. It's, well I did want to say that I am sorry.

Samantha: You've said that already. Several times.

Max: Well I-

But I couldn't think of what to say. I mean what are the words you use to make it alright that you broke some one's heart? How do you wipe away whatever turmoil they are facing in that moment that you look in their eyes, some of it you guess at and so much more you can never know, but you see it there, and you know it's there. So I sat there, and just looked at her. The cold air and the dim morning light made her beautiful. Like the ice skater. Like the ballerina.

Samantha: So that's it? (nods) Nothing more to say? Can we finally be done with this? (She stands to leave.)

Max: Nothing I say can fix this, and I realize that. I actually just came here to give you something.

Samantha: I don't want any-

Max: It was given to me. They didn't want it, and I only even took it because I knew you'd like it. So it's not be sentimental or sweet. I just figured better to let you have it then just throwing it away, alright?

(He pulls out the snow globe and sets it on the bench in front of her. She stops, staring at it. Speechless.)

Samantha: (stunned) Oh my god. Where did you get this?

Max: No where. Some lady gave it to me.

Samantha: It's beautiful.

Max: You know, I get it now.

Samantha: What?

Max: The ice skater, or the ballerina in the snow. Its because their beauty seems timeless and that nothing can hurt them. Barely wearing anything and surrounded by frost, yet dancing across the ice like it's nothing. They seem impervious to the world. And then that moment, frozen, of beauty and grace, can last forever in our minds, and remind us of everything it represented to us in the first place.

(Samantha looks at him, speechless. He mistakes the look and excuses himself.)

But uh, I should be going. I just wanted to drop that off. Uh, take care alright?

Samantha: You too...

(Mark nods, and turns, walking away. He is lost in his own thoughts)

Samantha: Mark.

Mark: Huh?

Samantha: You look awful.

Mark: Uh, thanks?

Samantha: No, I mean. You look like hell warmed over. Like you haven't slept in days or something. Are you alright?

Mark: Its- just been rough.

Samantha: I guess it has.

Mark: You look pretty beaten up yourself. What's been going on?

Samantha: Just realizing how lonely the world can be.

Mark: (nods) Yeah... (Both are silent, not sure what to say. After a long uncomfortable pause Mark moves to leave.) Well I-

Samantha: What, you're not going to try to ask me to go somewhere?

Mark: No, I, sorry, I know. You've made it clear you don't want that, and you don't have to worry about me pushing anymore, ok?

Samantha: Well that's good. (Samantha smiles, Mark turns to leave.) Then, uh- would you like to come over later? (Mark pauses, in shock) Grilled cheese and hot cocoa? (Mark looks at Samantha, speechless. After a few moments, she feels that Mark does not want to.) I mean, nevermind, that was stu-

Mark: Sure. I'd love to. When?

Samantha: Come over around 2. Give me some time to sleep. You go rest to. Get some good sleep.

Mark: Will do. I will see you at 2?

Samantha: You better.

And that was it really. No tricks. No carefully maneuvering myself into the upper hand. I was just... honest. I couldn't ever tell her about what had happened. Curt wouldn't even remember our conversation. But we were back, arm in arm. And I made it my duty, never to let her down, never to leave her waiting. Just to be there, like I should have been from the beginning.