Thursday, March 10, 2011

The Homestretch

                    SCENE I

EXT. THE STREET – A LITTLE LATER THAT EVENING

GARY AND HERB ARE WALKING DOWN THE STREET. GARY IS WHISTLING, STROLLING JAUNTILY.

                   HERB
       How can you be happy at a time
       like this?
            
                   GARY
       Oh relax, Herb. Someday you’ll look
       back on this and laugh.

                   HERB
       Great. The way my life has gone, I’ll
       have to live to two hundred to get
       in all the laughing.

                   GARY
       And that’ll only cover the high
       school years.

                   HERB
       At my funeral, instead of a eulogy,
       they’ll just play a laugh track.
       Would it offend the gods so much to
       make me a winner just once?  Even
       Charlie Brown won a baseball game
       last year.  

                   GARY
       Maybe that’s your problem, Herb.
       All your role models seem to be
       cartoon characters. Robin, Jughead,
       Charlie Brown. You’re comparing
       yourself to ink!

                   HERB
       (WITH RESIGNATION) You’re right. I’m
       I’m aiming too high. Hey, what the hell’s
       going on here?

GARY AND HERB HAVE ARRIVED AT THE MILK BAR. THERE IS A CROWD OF PEOPLE MILLING ABOUT. POLICE TAPE IS BARRING THE ENTRANCE.

                   TERRI (OC)
       The whole place is infested with vermin.

GARY AND HERB WALK OVER TO ELAINE.

                   HERB
       Great – I’ve lost my girls, and now
       I’m not even gonna get ice cream.

                    TERRI
       Lost the girls? Where’s Jana and Jill?

                    GARY
       Listen to this! Jana, my girlfriend,
       tells me that she likes Herb better
       than me.

TERRI PUSHES GARY.

                   TERRI
       Get out! She liked Robin better than you?

                   HERB
       You haven’t heard the best. They both
       liked me so much, they dumped me.
      
                   GARY
       Rather than fight over Herb, they
       thought it’s be best to break it off.
       Pulaski, this charm of yours...it’s
       a curse.

                   HERB
       You are so right, my friend. Why is
       it that with women, I’m either Valentino
       Charlie Brown? They either become totally
       obsessed with me, to the point of
       suicide, or I turn them into nuns?

                   GARY
       You're godly, Herb.

HERB STOPS TO THINK FOR A BEAT.

                   HERB
       Godly, yes. A new angle!

END OF ACT TWO.

END OF STORY.

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