Original subtitles

Thank you.

You have to trust your own cunt.

She wrote that on my birthday card.

Trust your own cunt.

I knew what would happen as soon as she met him. So did Minter.

She saw that movie Breathless when she was drunk, and she came to Paris,

She wanted to meet a gangster and become a writer.

Those were her dreams, and they all came true.

That can happen in Paris.

Trust your own cunt.

She believes that.

I don't know if that made her a great writer or just a bad girl.

Minter looked like he'd been marked by God. To me, anyway.

They were both absolutely desperate.

Not Minter and God. Minter and my girlfriend.

It's what made them irresistible to each other, and they would never know it.

Let me start again.

She wanted to be a writer, and she met the devil in Paris, France.

I'm not doing that reading.

I have to meet with those imbeciles tomorrow. I'm just going to tell them

can't do it.

You'll be fine. You'll always feel this way.

I feel like a reunion of Led Zeppelin. I just can't get up there and do Stairway

to Heaven one more time.

When is it, tomorrow?

Sunday.

I'll go with you.

Lucy?

Happy Easter.

You're an hour late.

Are you familiar with airport traffic?

Let me introduce to you the one, the only...

Billy Shears, fresh off a DC -10 from Vancouver.

I'm Michael.

This is my wife, Lucy Quick.

Lucy, this is Randall Sloan.

Call me Sloan.

I've wondered whether your career as a boxer contributed to the illegibility of

your handwriting.

I can't imagine Sloan with a computer somehow.

He's our thug with a vic.

You just think I'm a thug because so many sissies want to be writers.

I was saying the same thing to Michael only the other day.

You're right.

Why do I strike you as a sissy?

No, no, fuck no.

Publicers who are actually frustrated writers are playing up on the earth.

I like turning the private into the public.

Have you ever been to Europe?

Guys like me don't go to Europe.

Brown Derby is the first book I ever published.

William here, the eager young author, came in from Calgary to do some readings

and talk about it with me, just as you're doing.

Careful, Sloan.

Don't accept a job offer. No, thank you, Daryl. Under My Skin could be your last

book. I was in Calgary once.

We got in a fight on the bus.

A bullshit town. You from there?

I can't deny it.

Michael, on the other hand, hails from the much more illustrious Oshawa.

I was raised there. I'm not from there.

Michael's from Liverpool.

He's the fifth Beatle.

What do you do, Lucy?

I work for Michael.

So everyone either works for you, sleeps with you, or both.

What are you, Michael, the devil?

No, he's not the devil.

I'm quite sure I don't need you to sleep with me, Randall.

Call me Sloan.

Are you robbing us?

This is a great shot of you and Michael. It's our wedding photo. I like you in

this dress.

Who's this guy?

Minter. He was our best man.

Michael didn't like him, but it's the only picture we have from our wedding.

He died of cancer.

Did you like him?

What did you put in your pocket, Sloane? Nothing. I'm just happy to see you.

It's my underwear.

I was hoping it wasn't Michael's.

It's the next best thing to wearing your skin.

What's next, killing me?

Sloan! Rogue, what am I catching you at?

I was stealing your wife's underwear.

But she caught me.

We want to leave you can take care of business tomorrow at the office Saturday

Michael time is the enemy, right?

Thank you.

She had no models and no heroes.

She was not in Paris to write Ulysses.

She liked Notre Dame. She liked Versailles.

She liked the Champs -Élysées.

She says that if bombs had been dropped on Canada day and night for the entire

length of the war, not a single piece of history would have been lost.

History had already been destroyed there.

She wanted it back.

She's in Paris to create a history, not revive one.

She likes saying that.

Better go.

Bye.

Bye.

You don't look so well, Michael.

Do you know the difference between involvement and commitment?

It's like bacon and eggs.

The hen is involved, the pig is committed.

Lucy, why don't you give Sloane the tour?

I think I'll just go home taking that.

It's not much of a tour, really. The whole company is just

Michael and William and me.

Michael started it with his first wife, Elaine, in 1979.

I

suddenly

had the odd idea that your touch could heal me.

Is it the veins in my hands?

You have the hands of an artist.

Just when you think you've heard all the lines.

I was awfully drunk last night. What a coincidence. So was I.

Live dangerously.

Where is it? I took it off. I hate those fucking things anyway. For Christ's

sake. I don't have any diseases. I don't have any babies either.

Put the fucking thing on first.

Isn't there something else we can do?

on me.

What about you?

What can I do for you?

You gotta do it to me. We didn't come up here just so you could see what it was

like to stick it in me, did we?

Actually, yes.

Oh, yeah?

Listen to me.

I don't fuck around on Michael, so if we're gonna fuck around, then let's fuck

around. Whether or not I am your fantasy, you are gonna be mine.

You wanna give me a hint?

I wanna be on a minefield.

I'm the guy.

I am that man.

I'm Muhammad Ali.

condom situation.

I only brought the one. It's gonna take me a while to get it up again anyway.

God damn it!

What's the point of getting it up if we can't do anything with it anyway?

I think I expected too much.

I thought this would be a long overdue sensory plunge and instead I'm in the

middle of a substandard coupling in a cheap hotel room with the last man on

continent who prefers the missionary position.

Trying to impose will and imagination on a sordid mistake.

Somewhere north of London.

On the outside, it's all flesh and blood.

Violence and heat, a riot of color and passion.

Inside, it's all ice.

Ice covering time.

Every second it's frozen and dead and will never be heard from again.

We're dead inside, our skeletons dying to get out. That's the real us.

We've chosen our x -rays.

We're dying for our skeletons to get out.

They sit in doctor's outer offices, losing teeth, patiently waiting for the

that their time has finally arrived.

The two, two solid flesh will indeed melt.

Born dead, waiting for death.

A frozen sea that lies beneath the ticking clock containing us all.

Tell me about, um... Ed Gein.

It's Gein. Gein.

You spell it G -E -I -N.

But you say it Gein.

Ed Gein lived in one unbelievably filthy room in his house and boarded the rest

of it off.

After they caught him...

They found the other rooms were immaculate.

The shrine to his mother.

He drank soup from skulls.

He had a box full of vaginas.

He skinned corpses.

He made himself an outfit that he wore while cavorting in the moonlight.

You haven't read Under My Skin?

I wait till they're published.

Michael says it's brilliant.

It is fucking brilliant.

Eddie's probably been the inspiration for a dozen movies, two dozen, from

to Chainsaw Massacre.

My poems are about what we have in common, him and me.

I'll read it.

I'm going.

I brought a couple of other manuscripts with me. They're at Williams.

Actually, my Muhammad Ali thing is better than under my skin.

Is it about what you and Ali have in common?

Yes, it is.

I'd like to see you have sex in front of ten people.

There's no time, Sloan.

Look,

Sloan.

Sloan.

Take this in the right spirit, but you use your tongue like you're trying to

remove a spot.

When you do it, pretend you're licking honey off the wings of a butterfly.

You're so beautiful.

You want me to chastise you, don't you?

I want people to watch me, and you'd like to be my dog.

You want to crawl on your hands and knees and bark, don't you, Sloane?

Hey, look at me.

Have you done this before?

Yeah.

Was it... Was it with him in your apartment?

Are you hoping it was on the subway?

Was it with him at home?

Yeah. It was with him.

In Paris.

Christ, Lucy.

She wouldn't appear to be modest to the casual observer, but this kind of thing

only works if you are a modest person.

I don't know if she's doing it for herself or for him.

Rather just see.

Paul is a gangster.

She asked him what crimes he commits for money.

All of them, he said.

He watches her and eats a pear.

She tells me this story, and I'm not that fascinated.

I know all about sex and being embarrassed and having geeks look at me.

Paris, France.

Roman Polanski sitting in front of the Eiffel Tower.

I thought it was great. Franek was shit.

Breathless. Goddard. Who cares?

The way French movies drive me insane.

You gotta be careful when you ask someone to tell you a story, because it

might not be about you.

It's about you and Michael?

Just like the two of you own the world. You want to go to Paris, you just go.

Nobody stops you. You just feel like it.

Rome, Athens, Barcelona.

Like you deserve it. Like it belongs to you. Ed Gein never left the state of

Wisconsin.

I wasn't aware of the fact that Ed Gein had never been to Paris.

Is that what you and he have in common?

I know what he thought about.

I can just see Michael in Paris.

Taking about 500 boring fucking snapshots. The two of you out of focus

of Notre Dame.

Probably rained all the time.

Spent all your time watching movies.

I bet he was shocked when you masturbated.

Paris is a stupid city.

Well, maybe you fell in love there, huh?

You fell in love right in front of the opera house.

You probably hate Paris.

Michael doesn't have much of a body. Get the money together. Go get it out of

your system, Sloan.

What a boyfriend like you want, Sloane.

With him, it wasn't Paris.

It was book.

Why do you read all them foreign writers, loose Russians, Germans, South

Americans? You don't live there. What's so interesting?

What's the plot?

Jesus, he was a moron.

Clear the boil on the nose.

Mocked me every chance he got.

Terrified, I was calling attention.

To his narrow little field of interest.

Paris Sloan, you're going to have to pick something else because I'm hanging

to Paris.

Simone de Beauvoir fell for Nelson Algren.

And he hadn't even been to Europe.

And only Jean -Paul sat in a cafe in Paris while Simone sat on Nelson.

I fucked you here today in this bed. A lot of good Paris, did you? You don't

have to go to Paris.

Yeah, but you do.

One way or another, you do.

John Lennon was an inspiration to me. Michael, it's getting late. I'm sure

is leading somewhere.

Are we publishing some forgotten manuscript of Lennon? Someone's memoir?

Lord, say it isn't so of the 60s.

But still.

Michael, I have to go. We'll talk later.

Did you just get back from the office?

No, I went out to the bookstore.

Oh.

Well, I hope you didn't buy... this.

The new translation of The Master and Margarita.

No, I didn't get it. That's very sweet, Lucy.

Apparently the same translators did Crime and Punishment and there's

else in the deck.

The Master and Margarita is a very long book. Might take weeks to read.

Are you serious?

Well, one week at the very least.

Well, I'll be happy to take it back and get you something shorter.

Magazine?

William?

I don't know if I fall in love and it makes me feel fucked up, or if I just

fucked up and it makes me think I'm in love.

None of us do, Randall.

Sorry. My father's name was Randall.

Put a gun in his mouth and lose fucking brains out

Sorry your

mother Bet You wanted

to go to Paris, how would you do it call the travel agency?

I'd like a ticket to Paris And so you don't have to you're not to fly to

and take a train

Put the married woman in a hotel today.

That's work for a man with jet lag.

You think sex can make you a better writer?

Wouldn't that it were true?

I would like you equals.

The movies have poisoned us with romance.

Movies. television, and stupid books.

If you get involved with a gangster, get the biggest shark in the ocean.

Paul is a minnow, afraid of anything bigger than a goldfish.

She's been fucking his friends.

They think Paul is a joke, a minnow.

He knows it and wants to kill her, but he can't admit it or he'll have to kill

her. She knows he knows.

He screams at her about the way she dresses, the way she walks, the way she

speaks.

He screams at her about everything except having sex with other men.

A guy pulled a gun on me once. I had on all my leather gear and I just finished

punishing him.

Maybe I wasn't very good at it.

I fell on my knees. I begged for my life until one of our security took the gun

away and knocked out his teeth with it.

But this isn't my story.

She wanted more than Paul could give her until he gave her Minter.

Are you talking to yourself?

Somebody has to.

Doing the deed is never going home.

That's from my book.

Great book, man.

Damn it, Sloan, you've actually read it?

It was, what, seven, eight years ago?

Did you stop writing?

Don't get me started.

How many more poems could I write about unrequited love, or sodomy, disease,

betrayal, cops, public washrooms, trains, the zoo, blood, death, and

Libraries of them.

I have a Niagara of poems beneath the scotch, the office of the one -nighters.

I have a contest.

We're a couple of writers.

Don't get me started.

I don't know what Paul's first mistake was, but his last mistake was bringing

Minter home at Easter.

Minter had killed a man.

He stood so close when he did it that he felt the dying breath on his face.

He killed him over a woman or money or both.

Maybe the guy backed out of a deal.

Minter isn't someone who forgives you.

Minter is a cold wind that blows into the room. He is a black shark near a

beach, all teeth and eyes.

I know him.

I saw Minter fall like lightning from the sky.

Can I talk to you?

Can we talk?

It's about me and Sloane.

She never saw Paul again.

Maybe Minter killed him close enough to feel his breath.

Paul had never covered her body in kisses. He'd never kissed her feet. He'd

never kissed her eyes. He'd never kissed her ass. He showered right after sex

and never referred to her, period.

Minter. He frolics in these things. He cavorts. He gives great head.

He must have done more than that, or he wouldn't have been her perfect lover.

He was.

Sloan.

Sloan.

No, please.

No!

No.

It's too early for me, William.

Trust you slept well.

You think I'm gay?

I think there's certain evidence to support the idea.

I've fucked way more women than men.

If cannibals ate a lot of turnips, it wouldn't make them vegetarians.

It's only been the last couple of years that I realized when a guy is staring at

me, he's not always looking for trouble. Sometimes it's sex.

I find that really bold.

I don't know if I could be bold enough to be gay.

Know what else?

Sometimes when I'm sizing a guy up and I think there might be a fight,

Really all I've got is the hots for him.

I just don't know.

I can't tell the difference between fucking and fighting sometimes.

You know, Flona, it really was unforgivable me touching you in your

that. I'm sorry.

The night of my 26th birthday.

I stepped into an alley with a stranger and punched him twice in the face.

And then I made him quit by using a full nelson.

A couple of years later, a guy kicked me on a bus in Calgary.

And I hit him with probably a dozen right hands.

I never even threw a punch.

I should have pulled him off the bus and fucking hospitalized him.

See, when I am violent, I'm never violent enough.

When I should be violent, I'm not.

See, it's respect.

If I'm not getting any, I feel I should do something about it.

It keeps me awake at night. If I don't, it's been a problem with me ever since I

was a little kid.

It wears me fucking out.

You know something, William?

I don't want any self -respect.

Come on, darling.

What's the matter, Lucy?

You nervous?

Honey, anybody would be.

You know what?

I could not give a reading to save my life.

I'm not nervous.

I'm terrified.

I can't delight in fucking wine.

Hey, hey, hey. You're gonna be fine. Don't worry.

We'll be in, we'll be out.

Boom, boom, boom. Away we go.

You just read from this.

Who's there?

Michael.

Holy shit.

William's not here right now. I know.

He and Lucy are at a reading.

Are you a fan of Blue Reef?

No. Nirvana's more my style.

There was a man I met when Lucy and I were in Paris.

A poet.

Terrible writer, terrible person. Minter.

His name was Minter.

Aside from being a liar and a bore, one of his many affectations was that he

used no first name.

No offense.

Yeah, Lucy showed me the photo. Isn't he dead or something? Look, I really don't

like this book very much. Yeah, he did.

You would have killed him, Sloan, or at least punched him in the face.

He gave me an awful manuscript to publish. Of course I didn't. Did you

before you published this? I mean, did you help her write this?

No.

Every syllable was her own. Just between you and me, she was a sick little girl.

I took her to Paris. She thought she could write a novel there. That's how

she was.

Now she got it out of her system. Came back to the real world.

You read this thing. You liked it. You published it.

You and Lucy got involved.

You went away to... You went away somewhere together.

And she fell in love with you.

Lucy fell in love with you in Paris.

Feeling better?

I'm sorry, William.

I don't know what happened. I just couldn't do it. It's okay.

Hey, everything's okay.

You know, I'm not a writer. I can't get up there and pretend that I am. I got

one book I'm nauseated by, another one I can't finish. I mean, is that a writer?

No. Lucy, don't do this to yourself.

I had an affair.

Oh.

I'm not going to see the guy anymore.

Well, tell me about it.

Come on, tell me the story.

There isn't much to tell.

Have you ever felt like falling into sex like it was this vat of chocolate?

No, wait. Listen to me. Like picking up the first guy you meet, taking us to

some cheap hotel and just, you know, blowing his mind.

Yesterday.

Yesterday?

Well, I've met somebody, too.

Well, how's that for synchronicity, huh, handsome?

Oh, I'm sure that there is some kind of special connection between us, but, you

know, right now it's the effects for you.

And I don't want to pressure him, but I don't want it to stay casual either.

What would you do?

What would I do?

Well,

maybe I'd do it.

Wrap myself around him and we'd live happily ever after.

He'd be there in the middle of the night, and he'd be there when everything

trying to crush the life out of me, and I could be bad and crazy again.

You know how the relationship becomes a job, and then everything else you do is

just something on the side.

I'm married.

I have no idea what I'd do.

A book at one end and a guy at the other.

She said it was like being back at school.

You have to keep a grip on reality.

What's reality?

She said it depends on who's the guy and what's the book.

She wants everybody to think she's crazy and strange.

Fuck, man, if you're a woman, you can get away with murder. You don't even

to know how to fucking write.

It should have been published by Little Dyke Press.

It doesn't concern us, Sloan.

The only thing I know is what's on my mind. You know what that is?

You're a cock.

What are you thinking about?

Same thing.

I'm gonna have to call you back.

William, I'm 44 years old and I don't know anyone who's died.

The only person I ever knew as a healthy specimen than a sick one, than a corpse

with that wretched poet Minter.

You know my worst nightmare is about death.

That there's either hell or bleed.

I'm not sure which will be worse.

The idea that you can't run away from your problems is stupid.

If you run out of a burning building, no one criticizes you.

Just make sure you don't run too soon.

Make sure that everything is actually on fire.

There are ceremonies and rituals. There are deals to be made.

You don't marry the devil in church and make promises in front of a crucifix.

You do it the way he wants.

But even if you marry the devil, you still wind up married.

She said he wanted obedience.

He wanted fidelity.

He wanted her.

I said it sounded the same to me as my father marrying my mother. And I asked

her the same question I asked my mother.

What's in it for you?

Michael?

You ready to live dangerously, Sloan?

You've been looking at pictures of naked men, naughty boy.

And you've been reading my book.

What a busy morning you've had, Sloan. Look, William left these out. I don't

understand your stories, but you... You call your stuff postmodern?

You might be gay.

If you're gay and you're talking about postmodernism, you're not a writer,

you're a critic.

Do you need to do anything I tell you, Sloan? Fuck no. Do you want to do what I

tell you?

Wipe me out in five minutes?

That's all I took Dempsey out for, boom.

Sonny Liston.

Mike Tyson.

All right, then when I say break, you step back and break clean.

Tell me what you'll do.

Anything.

You strip for me like you did in those bars.

Who told you that?

You did in your fucking book.

If this was a massage parlor, tell me what you'd do.

What are you in hot oil?

Suck your cock.

Did you do that?

Lots of times.

What was the biggest cock you ever sucked?

This big.

How big is Michael's cock? Bigger than mine?

Uh -huh.

Well, his is longer.

Yours is thicker.

It's hard to tell without holding them both in my hands.

What does he like you to do in bed?

He likes me to talk about other guys, too.

I can't reason with him.

Call someone. Invite her over. Nobody I know does that, Sloan.

Call Michael.

Talk about... No, I don't hate him.

Come

on,

Sloan. Be fair.

Take me somewhere I've never been before.

I'm having sex with Helen of Troy.

A movie star.

I'll dance.

I'd fuck you in front of those dancers.

I'd fuck you on stage in front of everybody.

Do you want someone to watch?

Yeah. Ten people.

A hundred.

Call someone.

Call my parents.

No, I just called to say happy Easter. Is Mom there?

Yeah. No,

I think I just got out of the shower and I'm all wet. I don't have any clothes

on.

No, I'll wait this way.

Okay.

You were supposed to stay on the phone until you came.

I can't believe you told your father you were naked. You call someone.

I'll call Mick.

He's my best friend.

I want you to suck me off while I'm talking to him.

I'm going to tell him what you're doing, how it makes me feel, and then I want

you to get on the phone and tell him yourself. Will you do that? Of course I

will. Tell him I'd do the same to him if he were here.

Do it.

It's hard to get down with somebody who's so beautiful.

I'm not beautiful, Sloan. I love you.

You're in love with Ed.

Put your back to me.

Over the fireplace.

Up your bed.

Now just... stand there.

And don't say anything.

If Mick was here, I'd do it. I really would.

What would you do if I was your slave? Don't turn around.

Get up. Get up.

Get up, Terrence.

It's your birthday.

Kiss your ass and bark like a fucking dog.

You will, Sloane.

You will.

Am I on this planet hearing these words?

And what the hell are you looking for?

Meenter's manuscript.

He wrote 97 poems about death.

He wanted me to publish them.

But I didn't.

And he died.

Only they weren't poems.

They were songs.

It's elitist. It's the whole idea that there's something better somewhere else.

You're being a transparent asshole, Sloan.

There is something better somewhere else. I've been there.

And you're taking me back.

I think people who go to Europe are fucking pathetic, man.

There's a mileage out of it at cocktail parties, like having an endless.

Hey, I was just saying, you know, I don't mean it's any big deal.

Hey, Buzz.

He used to belong to Tommy Burns.

He was a heavyweight champion of the world.

Oh, my God, I've forgotten.

Michael!

Mentor's little cardboard coffin.

Give it.

How long was he in the hospital? Cancer of the liver is swift, isn't it?

Death, death, death, death.

Death of art, death of truth, death of God.

Death of Van Gogh, death of the Beatles.

The unthinkable.

And his own death.

Death of John Lennon.

John, we met in the park.

Now you're dead.

Are you feeding worms, or did they burn you?

Something, wasn't it?

I want to read that book.

The one you never finished writing.

How am I doing, Sloan?

Okay. Left foot in front of the right, okay?

You lead with your left.

Save the big one for the right.

See, your right is stronger, so you're going to want to lead with that.

But if you want to throw it, You're going to have to reverse your feet.

I'm in love with you.

I love Lucy.

I want to shave off your pubic hair.

I want to shave it all off with a straight razor like they use in street

Put these on.

My grandmother is a horrible, rotting pile of bones.

She used to be a horrible, rotting pile of grandmother.

She used to be a horrible, rotting pile of grandmother.

You know what this is?

Spell menopause.

You're trying to recapture your rock and roll youth.

But you never were a rocker.

Lucy didn't have an affair with Minter, if that's what this is about. She would

have told me.

Tell me something.

I mean, apart from a taste for art and music and leaving aside a sense of style

and refined sensibility, doesn't being gay really come down to fellatio?

Well,

there is some truth to your observation.

Well, you see, I can't imagine doing that.

Or having it done to you.

Sure.

By Lucy, I mean.

I've forgotten more about giving blowjobs than Lucy will ever know.

Did you read my story about Lot's wife?

No, you didn't.

I mean, what was her crime?

She looked back. She looked back and she got turned into a pillar of salt.

Be still.

She didn't even have a name.

She was just Lot's wife.

Lot offered his daughter's virginity.

Ah.

To the people of Sodom.

Then...

He slept with his daughters.

In the desert.

He had a name.

I know why she looked back.

Michael knows about us.

You never said anything to me, are you sure?

Ow.

Are you scared of Michael?

Who's going to help me finish my book?

You?

I'm timing you, Lucy. Let me read it.

Paris, France.

There were ceremonies and rituals.

There were games.

There is a kind of game you play and all you have to do is believe in it.

Your dolls will suddenly come to life or a monster will crawl out from under

your bed.

All you have to do is believe.

This is what was in it for her. Now she trusts her own cunt.

She isn't ashamed.

She can do anything.

She wants her life turned black and blue.

Spank her in front of the Eiffel Tower. Smack her on the ass while she bends

over his knee and his friends sit in a circle and watch.

Spank me with something harder than your big rough hand.

She wants to be flogged in a public square.

Undress me and lead me through the streets to the Place Vendôme and beat me

front of the whole city of Paris.

I am gone.

Rip off my clothes and let me out of here.

Let it out.

Minter opens her and words come crawling out like bugs.

Words fall off her hands or skin off a snake.

She bends over a chair and words run down her face like tears.

You should touch the dog.

Cock. Mouth.

Masturbation. Fuck.

Sensuality. Crime.

Canadian.

She isn't convinced that in the beginning was the word. She thinks the

probably comes at the end.

Maybe she's right, but I've got a couple of questions.

First of all, the end of what? And second, which word? A funny word or a

word? Is it the first word of a joke or the start of an autopsy? Is it a good

word or an evil word?

She says, fuck evil.

If it's the first word of a joke, then that word is evil.

Evil is a joke.

She sings to herself every song she's ever known. Love songs.

All the good songs are love songs.

She is blind and hot, and bugs have crawled out of her and covered the

peels off her flesh like her body was a long, perfect love song, and her blood

splashes over the room and writes her name. He makes her bleed, and he makes

sing. he makes her sing.

Out of her mouth comes a long, perfect song for one voice, her voice, a solo

that sounds like a scream if you haven't heard it from the beginning, like a

scream, not singing, but what else can it be but a single voice with perfect

pitch, never reaching the end because the whole point is just to go on

I got one foot on the brake and one foot on the accelerator.

If I took my foot off the brake, I'd burn rubber halfway across the country.

Don't believe all that romance about writer's block.

Everybody has it.

Butchers, bakers, writers.

Just means you got one foot on the brake.

There.

In a socially acceptable manner, would you then observe my cock?

Your turn. I don't have to go.

Of course you have to go. We've been drinking all afternoon.

It's not as big as it was, especially when I'm nervous.

I showed you mine.

Well, back up a bit.

Uncircumcised. All these years and I never knew. It's because I was born in

England.

Oh. No!

We were just going to look.

Don't be so childish. We both know why we're looking. I'm not going to rape

I've always felt as though I was living my life in a slow -moving car, just

watching it all pass by through the window.

The only thing I think I ever really wanted was just not to make any

but you may as well fuck up all you want.

You'd die anyway.

Do you want to take this opportunity to fuck up?

William, I don't want to say anything negative about your penis, but I just

can't imagine putting it in my mouth.

Happy Easter, sweetheart.

Minter told her to stay at home and wait for him. He likes to be obeyed and he

isn't the kind of man who forgives you.

He gets dressed and goes out.

It's dark and cold and she doesn't wear any underwear.

It's a long way to the Bois de Boulogne and by the time she gets there, her

hands are numb.

She walks through the trees to a clearing.

She approaches a stranger and touches him. He turns.

It's Minter.

She doesn't try to run. It makes him angrier and he's furious to begin with.

He hits her so hard in the face it makes her knees dip.

A pair of headlights flash on and cover them in light. Then another. Then

another. She walks towards the light.

The engine rumbled beneath her as she climbed onto the hood of the car.

She raised her skirt above her waist and knelt on all fours. She moved her

perfect ass against the windshield.

Minter used to kiss her ass.

A circle of cars watched her. The drivers and their passengers had sex and

watched her.

Minter steps back into the shadows.

She looked for Minter, but he was gone.

She was there. She looked for Minter, but he was gone.

She was there, and he was gone.

What happened next?

Nothing.

She never saw him again.

He died.

You never saw him again, you mean.

Guy's name was Minter?

You showed me his photographs. You're talking about a real guy.

Must be tiring being you, Sloane.

Must be exhausting.

It's not a novel. It's a fucking diary.

A diary of your vacation.

A tourist getting laid in Paris.

A diary.

Let me start again.

She was there, and he was gone, and she didn't see him again for five years.

She got married and had children, and she returned to Paris for a second

honeymoon. It was Easter, and she found herself remembering Minter and going

across town to visit their old place.

When she looked up, he was staring at her from the window.

She immediately opened the front door and went in.

Why not?

Nothing had changed.

Minter couldn't keep up with her the first time, and he wasn't going to keep

with her now.

She had something for him they hadn't tried before.

Whether or not she was his fantasy, he was going to be hers.

If she could just take her foot off

the brake, she'd burn rubber halfway across the country.

The engine's tuned up and the tank is full, but you have to take your foot off

the fucking brake.

It's everybody's problem.

Maybe not.

Maybe it's just her problem.

And mine.

All revved up and standing still.

Take... your foot off the fucking brake.

Hello?

I'm home.

Sloan? Hope you're hungry.

Where the hell are you?

Are you having a nap, or are you just waiting for me?

I was just thinking I could take a shower.

Not on my account.

Listen, um...

I wondered how you felt about what happened this morning.

Can we go out and eat? I'm starving.

I'll cook for us.

No, just go grab a burger. I gotta eat right away.

Oh, yeah.

That's you, isn't it? It's gotta be right away.

Lucy, it's me. It's Michael.

You know what we should do?

Fly to Paris right now.

Or in the morning. What do you think?

Jesus Christ, I'm scared.

What?

What?

They locked the door?

Lucy?

Are you crazy?

Marriage isn't what it's cracked up to be. Honey, I love you dearly, but have

you gone mad?

What, have you been walking the streets? There's a trouble with sex and it

doesn't get you anywhere.

Depends where you want to go. Don't even mention sex under these circumstances.

William, want to watch us do it?

I don't want to fuck. It just makes trouble.

Want to watch William and me? Oh, get a grip, Sloan. I just want to go somewhere

that's safe where I can look all around me and not be scared.

Well, honey, this isn't that place.

Tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to make us a nice cup of tea and you

can tell me what's on your mind.

Minter.

Minter?

What, are you and Michael doing the same drug?

There was a fighter named Minter. Alan Minter. He was a middleweight. That's my

weight. He lost the title to Marvin Hagler. Where?

Where did this happen? London. London, England.

Yes, I think a nice cup of tea and some tranquilizers are in order.

Excuse me.

Oh, I like fucking you, Sloane, but you're not him.

You're really not.

I die.

You die.

P .C.

It's time.

We die.

Let me take you home. Let me take you home. All

right. Minister, I'm leaving.

If you don't get up right now and come with me, I'm going to get William and

Sloane to come over here and drag you out of here. Do you understand me?

Help me pack up my stuff.

Good boy.

I reserved a room for you in a hotel. It

isn't far from here.

Come on, William. How am I going to pay for it?

Put it on my card and get reimbursed from the company.

Be paid for your readings next week.

You'll have no one to talk to, right?

You could have showered at the hotel.

You know, I know what goes through your mind.

We may or we may not sleep together again, but if we do, it won't be

You're not sleeping here.

Parading around naked is not going to change my mind.

Do you mind if I finish my fucking drink?

Drink your fucking drink.

You know, I just want to go on record here. I did it with her before it even

happened with you.

Yes, I gathered that.

You spent yesterday in bed with her. You even told me about it. But, you know, I

didn't believe you.

Well, Sloan, I believe you now.

Having sex with Lucy or anyone else you wish to have sex with is your own

business.

It happened, as you point out, previous to our little tryst in any case.

Even if you spent a day in some King Street dive while I was at the office

exhausted the possibilities of the Kama Sutra, I have no complaint.

However, when you bring her into my apartment and you lay down with her on

my bed, The bed where you and I have shared our intimacies, then you are

showing... Showing!

You heartless bastard!

You self -centered cretin! I hope the hotel burns to the ground and turns you

into bacon!

You're upset.

I understand that.

But no man calls me names to my face. I want you to shut up, William.

Whore.

Swine.

Vermin. I'm not kidding. You better stop.

Ruthless, lying, little cocksucker.

I'm gonna count to three. You fuck.

Push me too far!

No dead people can't use the phone One word you

can't tell anything from one word

What's

wrong

alone. To tell me JFK, Charles and Anne,

Brian Jones, my parents,

won't live way longer.

Victor Hugo died in Paris. I'll be right back, lover.

This isn't right.

This isn't right at all. This isn't like leaving my body. It's like falling

inside myself.

Where's the fucking turn on the lights?

Not now.

Not like this.

I didn't think it through.

We all wanted that.

Not here.

Not now.

That must be what everyone says about death.

Play with me, all right?

I need to stay. I really do.

It isn't fair to Lucy. She'll think it's her fault.

If I can't have a day, give me an hour, 15 minutes.

This is a scary business.

What the fuck does it all mean?

Why is my goddamn father still alive and my mother?

Some of the most miserable people on earth.

John, all I want to do is be happy.

Michael, there's no disgrace to not being shot to death in the street.

the wrong line of work for that. What writer, what artist of any kind has ever

died that way?

idea of the time, Sloane? Ed Gein wasn't gay.

Oh, Lord knows he had his faults.

I'm not either.

You're drunk.

Sloane?

What the hell are you doing here?

William made a pass at me. Oh, you pig.

Well, you can't stay here. It just isn't possible tonight. I got no place to go,

Michael. Is that our fault? To get you a hotel?

I don't want to stay in any goddamn hotel. Jesus Christ, what is with you

and hotels? I don't owe you anything, Sloan.

Go to a hotel or go to hell.

Hotel or hell?

This is how you treat your author?

No, this is how I treat you.

Thank you very much.

Your Christian hospitality.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Good Lord, it's the middle of the night. I can't

throw you out into the street.

Michael.

It's a very difficult time for us. She's not herself.

I'm really very sorry about all this, Michael. I'll just, I'll curl up on the

couch and keep out of your hair. Yeah, no bother. Believe me, Sloan.

I had to come over to Lucy and Michael's to spend the night. You see what you've

made me do?

I just thought I'd call to say fuck you.

So fuck you, William.

I

think

Sloane is gay.

I think he and William are having an affair.

Is it exciting when there's someone in the next room?

Tell me a story.

About you and Sloane.

Oh, Michael.

I can't imagine having sex with Sloane.

Pretend you want to fucking please.

Tell me what you do.

Michael, pick somebody else. Anybody else. Talk about Sloane. He's right

He's back. I'll be in the room.

All right.

P .C.

It was meant to.

It is a gift.

Shoulder to shoulder with you.

Should I go and get him? I could stand across the room and watch. I could tell

you what to do.

Should I get him? If that's what you want.

You want him in the bed right now?

No, you do.

There is an old belief that if you take out the victim's eyes, you'll find the

image of the killer on the retina.

A frozen picture of death and violence caught forever and carried into the

grave, the last look saved for all time.

She wonders what you'd find if you took out the killer's eyes.

I am here, and he is gone.

Minter liked to say that you could always find your way back. Whatever

might take you, wherever you went, you could always come back.

Nobody finds their way back. There is no route back.

You would have to be bigger than Jesus.

This is the main event, Tiger.

Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain

We're

gonna watch you put it on

Excites you, Baywatch, doesn't it, Sloane?

Hello, everyone.

It's me.

Here's a few words from the Easter Bunny.

Do it.

in the vacuum.

It shouldn't stand there waiting to be claimed by the first innocent bystander.

Lucy, you carry guilt like a 50 -pound bag of rotting potatoes.

Guilt and shame are the hallmarks of the great fuck.

And a naughty girl, you don't let your knickers down.

I'm a pompous horse's ass.

Even the expression horse's ass is an indication of pomposity.

I love you, Michael.

I love you, Louie.

I love Paris in the springtime.

A slave is someone who waits to be freed.

A fascist said that, but so what?

Minter wasn't the word made flesh.

He was the perfect lover, and he could make you feel like his only angel. He

the flesh -made word.

Yes, I'd go that far. Fuck, I've gone farther than that.

He might come again, but it won't be to save me.

I'll start again.

She is the perfect lover.

She gives herself to it like she does to nothing else.

She gives herself to it, body and soul.

And so.