The Delphi Room (7 page)

INT. BRINKLEY’S HELL—MIRROR—
VELVET’S CHILDHOOD HOME—LIVING ROOM—LATER

Velvet sits at a decrepit piano. Her mother enters from the kitchen, drink in hand, wearing a short, silk bathrobe. She has wiped the blood from her swollen face.

MAE/MOTHER

Play for me, darling. Calms me down right away. Oh, wait! Candles, every performance needs candles.

She sets her drink down on a scarred table, spilling a little. As though seized by a sudden fit of amnesia—or merely a leading lady on pause—she is motionless for several moments, before touching her fingers to her brow to channel obscure knowledge through a manicure. Velvet watches her frown and shake her head, then startle as at the blast of a gun.

MAE/MOTHER

Matches . . . matches, matches, matches.

(fishes matches out of a bowl of potpourri)

Aha! Safe, safekeeping.

Several candles stud the room. Mae/Mother attempts to light a match, but her hands are shaking too much.

VELVET

Let me do it.

MAE/MOTHER

No, no, I’ve got it.

(strikes match)

There. There.

(lights candle, match goes out)

Well. One is all we need.

Retrieves her drink, holds the glass to her face. Looks long at her daughter. Lies down on the floor.

MAE/MOTHER

Okay, I’m ready, darling. Begin. Begin.

Velvet turns to the piano, takes a deep breath, and begins to pick out “Chopsticks.” As she plays, her mother cries, and the choking sobs cacophonize with the uncertain musical notes. The song ends and Mae/Mother clamps a hand over her mouth, removes it, breathes deeply and sits up.

MAE/MOTHER

It was an accident. It was an accident. I fell down. He didn’t mean . . . It was an accident. Little Vee. My little Vee . . .

Velvet turns and looks at her mother. They stare at one another across the room. The single candle flame unrolls its scarf of smoke, trails its black chiffon through the still air. Velvet nods.

MAE/MOTHER

Oh, you’re my little angel. You know that? My little angel. Where’s your halo? Your tinfoil halo. I’ll make you one tomorrow. I love you, I love only you. Do you know that? Oh, I feel so much better. I feel so much better.

(starts to cry)

So much better. Okay.

(lies down)

I’m just going to lie here for a while. I love it when you play. Calms me down right away. “Play it again, Sam . . .” You know I love
Casablanca.
What a romantic movie.

(laughs bitterly)

“Play it again, Sam . . .”

INT. BRINKLEY’S HELL—MIRROR—
DAVIE’S APARTMENT—BEDROOM—NIGHT

The bedroom walls are overwhelmed by black-and-white posters of Shakespearean stage productions, tiny movie stubs that have been tacked up, random squares of tinfoil, programs from concerts, takeout menus, handwritten lists with headings such as: Things To Do Today, People To Do Today, Things To Do Never, Favourite Words, Words I Hate, Best Hamlets of the Past 100 years, Best Hair in Hollywood, Astrological Combinations Most Often Resulting in True Love, Top Ten Reasons Why There’s No Such Thing as True Love, Most Gratifying Sexual Positions/Two Perspectives, Shakespeare’s Greatest Tragedies, World’s Greatest Poets According To Velvet, Top Seven Reasons Why the Ukulele is the Greatest Instrument on Earth. A bare bulb hangs from the ceiling, while two very phallic-looking lava lamps provide further light. The bed is a mattress on the floor, covered with threadbare and somewhat dirty bedding. The only other furniture in the room is an overturned wooden crate stamped with the words “Produce of Thailand.” It serves as a night table, and it is on this that several framed photographs of Velvet—outfitted in elaborate vintage fashion—sit, along with a camera.

Davie is sprawled naked on his bed, smoking a cigarette in an antique cigarette holder. Velvet, clad in hand-painted jeans and a top trimmed with sequins and pink feathers, sits on the bed with her back to a wall, knees drawn chinward, a pillow between her legs. She watches him smoke; her eyes never leave him.

DAVIE

Here.

He passes her the cigarette. She inhales and passes it back to him.

DAVIE

Did you buy me a birthday present?

VELVET

You don’t get to know that ’til tomorrow.

DAVIE

Christ got gifts on his birthday.

VELVET

You’re not Christ.

DAVIE

How do you know? I could be the Messiah reincarnated, with better hair. Anyway, I deserve a gift. A birthday is a sign of spiritual evolution.

VELVET

How is a birthday a sign of spiritual evolution? It’s a sign that you’re on a steady march to eventually qualifying for ten percent off the Early Bird Special. And how do you know that Christ got gifts? He wasn’t materialistic.

DAVIE

Birthdays create psychological torment. It’s the fight against psychological torment that creates spiritual evolution. And I happen to know that all the disciples loved to pool their resources and get JC something special.

VELVET

You’re weird. And when have you ever felt psychological torment?

DAVIE

In the lapses between fucking and eating I get a little cranky.

Velvet laughs and touches her feet to Davie’s side.

DAVIE

Aaahhh! Your feet are freezing.

VELVET

So pay your heating bills. Then I’d have warm feet.

DAVIE

Don’t need to. I’m warm-blooded.

VELVET

I’m not.

DAVIE

It’s ’cuz of the straitjacket. It’s bad for the circulation.

VELVET

Shut up. I wasn’t in a straitjacket—well, not after the first few days. I was in a Quiet Room. But he still came to torture me.

DAVIE

Your friend the Shadowman? Is he still a shape-shifter?

VELVET

He’s not my friend. I’ve never told anyone else about him, you know. Except for the doctors and they don’t believe me, I can tell. They’re very condescending.

DAVIE

I believe you, my darling Velcro Chenille. But then, I’m a very deep and sensitive person. If you want my advice, stop telling the doctors that there’s a monster-man stalking you, and then you won’t have to go to the hospital anymore. I’ll keep your secret.

VELVET

But what about when he maims me? He’s nice to me sometimes. Sometimes he’s fun and creative. He loves movies, all the ones I love. And he’s helping me write my book. The meds make me too tired. So I’ve sort of been forgetting to take them. They make me feel like I’m walking through Jell-O all the time, in slow motion.

DAVIE

Wow, I’ve never walked through Jell-O in fast motion. That might be a cool feeling.

VELVET

You’re not listening. I’m tired of being tired. Everything feels hard. Getting dressed feels hard. And you know what else? I’m afraid he might not come back. Isn’t that warped?

DAVIE

No, it’s not warped. After all, he knows you so well. But I have a feeling the Shadowman’ll be back. Call me psychic. And you know what the Irish say: “The devil you know is better than the devil you don’t know.” You just happen to have a particularly colourful devil.

VELVET

That’s sick.

DAVIE

(shrugs)

You’re
sick.

Velvet looks wounded.

DAVIE

Relax. I love sick. Sick is beautiful. Sick is interesting.

VELVET

Will you come visit me in the Quiet Room?

DAVIE

I always come visit you. Since when would I ever pass up the opportunity to give my two cents’ worth of advice to the medical establishment?

VELVET

I wish I were more like you.

DAVIE

Charming and devilishly handsome? My darling, there is only so much charisma to go around.

Davie balances the cigarette holder on an empty tuna can on the crate-cum-night table. He holds out his arms to Velvet.

DAVIE

Princess Velcro Chenille!

Velvet tosses the pillow she held between her legs and dives on top of Davie, giggling.

VELVET

Squeeze me. Who do you love most in the world?

DAVIE

Velcro Chenille.

VELVET

How do I know for sure?

DAVIE

Have I fucked you lately?

VELVET

No.

DAVIE

There you go. I don’t fuck people I love.

VELVET

So that leaves how many?

DAVIE

You and . . . you.

(laughs)

Love is highly overrated.

VELVET

It’s natural. Part of life.

DAVIE

Ah yes, but life is the most unnatural of states. It offends the very core of being!

VELVET

What dead Germanic philosopher are you channelling?

DAVIE

I only speak the truth—the cosmic truth. So if life is unnatural then love, as a part of life, must also be deemed unnatural, or, rather, severely out of place.

VELVET

But you love me.

DAVIE

Did I say that? Yeah, well. A performance, darling, it’s all a performance. God’s a recidivist. He likes to watch reruns.

(screams at the ceiling)

Time for a hiatus! I’m fucking sick of this! I want a new trailer!

Several moments of silence.

DAVIE

(to Velvet)

He’s in a production meeting.

(yells at the ceiling)

I know how this movie ends!

Again, silence.

VELVET

I thought you were an atheist.

DAVIE

Depends on my mood. Which depends on my blood sugar. So really my entire spiritual ethos is based around insulin.

Velvet rolls off the bed and begins perusing the selection of takeout menus pinned to the walls.

VELVET

So are we ordering in? Agnostic pizza, reincarnated Pad Thai, Godless sashimi?

DAVIE

You can if you want. I’m going out. Save some for me.

VELVET

Where’re you going?

DAVIE

The witching hour nears. I’m off to get myself a little warlock for my birthday.

He moves to get off the bed. Velvet sets a new land-speed record charging from a menu to Davie’s feet. She grabs his arm.

VELVET

Stay. Stay. Stay. Stay. Stay.

DAVIE

Five stays. Not enough for a corset, my dear, though you’re starting to need one.

VELVET

Cruel.

DAVIE

Yeah.

VELVET

Stay.

DAVIE

No.

Velvet continues to cling to his arm. He tries to shake her off. They end up wrestling on the floor.

VELVET

(crying)

You promised! You promised! Don’t go!

DAVIE

Fuck off! Fuck you! Get off me!

He manages to pin her to the floor.

DAVIE

(screams into her face)

Stop it! Stop! Stop!

Velvet’s struggles chameleon into limp surrender, and a moment ices over in stillness between them.

DAVIE

(speaks slowly)

I will be back late. If you’re here, you better not be alone. You better be in the company of cold egg rolls. Nod if you understand me.

She nods. He slips his tongue into her mouth, a silky probe that mines deep. Her body buckles and shakes.

INT. BRINKLEY’S HELL—MIRROR—
DAVIE’S APARTMENT—BATHROOM—LATER

Velvet stands before the toothpaste-speckled mirror. Shy, uncertain fingers discover the skin of her face. She does not see her reflection.

INT. BRINKLEY’S HELL—MIRROR—
DAVIE’S BATHROOM—MIRROR—CONTINUOUS

The Shadowman appears. He is styled as a Gene Kelly look-alike, a lá
Singin’ in the Rain
, and his yellow raincoat is painfully shiny. A smile, like the ripples from a plunged stone, radiates across his face. He opens a bright yellow umbrella.