Slippage: Previously Uncollected, Precariously Poised Stories

by Harlan Ellison

  "Carole told me about it. Carole was smart to leave you."

  Eddie stepped back, felt his hand touch the wall. He was reeling. He understood, suddenly, that he was actually reeling. This couldn't be happening.

  "I never..." His voice was small. He knew the truth...he just wasn't a hitter. Had never hit a woman. Had, in fact, only raised his fists in anger once, thirty or more years ago, to defend himself against a pair of schoolyard bullies. He was just, simply, not a hitter. Why had Carole told this guy such things? Why had she left without speaking to him? Why had she taken his sons away? Why had she confided in this total stranger? Why had she—and had she?—written letters of permission, letters of accusation? What the hell was happening here?

  "We haven't been having any trouble," Eddie said.

  "Carole says it's terrible living with you. She says to tell you it's all over, and she's getting a divorce."

  "You said that!"

  "Carole told me to say it to you."

  What was with this gazoonie? Was he fucking retarded, or what? It was like having a conversation with Rain Man, or Forrest Gump, or Lenny from the Steinbeck novel. It wasn't any kind of conversation he'd ever had with anybody, even his grandfather, when the old gentleman had gone simple, and Eddie as a kid had been taken to visit Grampa in the Home. Not even those soft, aimless, frustrating conversations had been like this.

  There had been no menace when talking to Grampa.

  "I'm calling the cops." He moved again toward the end-table. The guy on the sofa didn't move. Eddie strained to see some tiniest reflection of moonlight in the shrouded eyes, but they were back in darkness. It was like trying to see a road sign through heavy fog. You could strain all you liked, but you were going to overshoot your turnoff, no matter how hard you craned your neck forward. Where there is no light, there is no sight. He picked up the receiver and put it to his ear.

  "Carole had the phone turned off. Electricity and water, too. Until you leave. I made sure that was done."

  Eddie held the dead thing to his ear. Not even the sound of the sea. Slowly, he set the implement back on its stand. The guy pointed to the duffel bag.

  "I'm not going anywhere!" Eddie yelled.

  Then he remembered the revolver in the hall closet. Up on the shelf, near the front door in case anyone ever tried to force a way in. He turned quickly, stumbled through the entrance, back into the front hall, and got to the closet. He automatically reached for the light switch to illuminate the closet, and flipped it. And nothing happened. Electricity and water, too. Until you leave.

  He fumbled in the closet, found the shelf, found the cardboard box under the moth-proof plastic bag of mufflers and scarves, and jammed his hand inside. It was empty.

  From the living room he heard the guy's voice. "Carole told me about the gun. I got it out of there."

  Eddie felt his knees lock. He couldn't move. His spine was frozen. The guy could be behind him right now, the revolver aimed at his back. Not even kill him, just leave him a cripple for the rest of his life. Unable to walk. Unable to pee. Unable to work with his hands, draw, paint, do the work he so much wanted to do. All the work he'd put off for fifteen years to raise two kids, to make a stable marriage, to have a career in business. He'd put it all to one side and now he was going to be shot by a stranger in his own house.

  He turned, slowly.

  But the guy wasn't there. The hall was empty. Eddie closed the closet door, and walked back through the entranceway into the living room. The guy hadn't moved. The duffel bag lay where it had rolled. The moonlight still came through like watery soup, enough to enfeeble, but insufficient to restore or bring back to health.

  "What the hell do you want with me?" Eddie said.

  "I'm just a friend. Of Carole's. I said that before. She asked me to come and make sure you left."

  Eddie felt pressure in his chest, like an attack of heavy anvil angina. "Where's the gun?"

  "Over there on the television set. I put it there after I took out the bullets and threw them in the trash."

  "And you're just going to sit there till I leave you here, all alone in the house I've been paying mortgage payments on for fifteen years? You think that's going to happen?"

  "Well, this is Carole's house now. She owns it. You just have to leave, and everything will be fine."

  "I'm not leaving some guy I never heard of, all alone in my house. And where the hell's all my stuff? My drawing table, my art supplies, my paints, my reference books? How am I going to make a living? You think I'm just going to take my clothes in an old duffel bag and vanish? This is damned crazy, it's obscene, for chrissakes!"

  "Everything here is Carole's now. It's all like an egg, it's all one thing. She owns it, shell and everything inside it."

  "What are you babbling about? You act like she's the goddam Queen of Spain, some fucking nobility, droit du seigneur, everything belongs to her! Not bloody likely! I worked for every stick in this place, and I'll fight her every step in the court before I let her screw me over!"

  "No, you have to go away now. Carole asked me to tell you that."

  "I want to see her. I want her to tell me. We never had any trouble, this is all nuts, this hitting and the kids and all the rest of it. It's nuts! No eggs, just nuts!"

  "You can't see her. Carole's gone away. But Carole can see you."

  "What are you talking about? Where is she? If she's at her mother's house, she can't see me. Is this some crazy bad joke, is she here?" He turned and yelled into the empty house, "Carole! Hey, honey! Carole, you here?"

  But there wasn't any answer. He stood there for a long time, staring at the unmoving shape seated comfortably on his sofa, in his living room, tapping a workbooted foot that had kicked his duffel bag that contained all he was going to be permitted to carry away of his life.

  His life till now.

  He said it to himself again. My life till now.

  In the darkness—a darkness he now understood hid his face from the guy on the sofa—a guy who was the last aspect of my life till now—he smiled. She had left, had taken his life till now with her, and she was free. No. Not so. She was still tied to my life till now. In darkness, he was drenched in light. Now he could smile, because now he was free.

  Take care of the kids? Well, that would've been his job, but now it was part of my life till now, and that wasn't his responsibility any longer. Support, money, phone calls, courts, screaming attorneys, letters, eyeless guys on sofas...all part of what she had decided to tie herself to, forever. He was free.

  Never again to go across the river and into the Universe of Happiness. Fifteen years ago he had tied himself to my life till now, and he had been a good husband and loving father and a doomed wage-slave, and he would have stayed at it forever. But now he could be anywhere but here, with anyone but the jailer of his prison. He was out. In the darkness, he smiled; he turned, and walked through the front hallway, past the defenseless closet, and out the front door. He hoped Carole could see him, because as soon as he got in the car and drove away, he would cease to be Eddie Canonerro. Anywhere but here, with anybody but you.

  Squatting near the porch glider, was that scabrous cat. Eddie moved very fast. He kicked the little fucker in the head and, squealing, it jumped for its life, and ran away.

  Squinting through her telescope, the Queen of Spain frowned. Then the picture went dark, and not even the sound of clockwork ravens made the future any brighter.

  Crazy As a Soup Sandwich

  ACT ONE

  FADE IN:

  1 - EXT. INDUSTRIAL ALLEYWAY - DUSK (SHOOT DAY FOR NIGHT) - FULL SHOT

  OPEN BLACK & WHITE on a rain-soaked passage between warehouses. Crates and huge cargo containers stored along the walls of the buildings. Dumpsters overflowing here and there. Piles of trash of a strictly industrial nature waiting to be collected. High, metal loading bay doors (tambour doors) front the alley.

  A large truck (cab and trailer), parked and sealed, blocks one loading bay at the right in midd
le-b.g. Puddles of water shine down the entire length of the alley. It has just been raining hard, and the dumpster lids are soaked, the cartons wet. Ominous clouds scud across the lowering sky; no moon; shoot almost FILM NOIR, gritty and shadowy, à la 1930s B films.

  SHOOT FROM LOW-ANGLE down the length of the alley, giving a sense of enormous distance. The alley should be at least 50-60 feet wide, giving sharp perspective. ANGLE OF CAMERA should give us warehouse tops, fire escapes if possible, and the sky.

  HOLD ALLEY for several beats as INTENSE CHASE MUSIC RISES and we HEAR the sharp sound of RUNNING FOOTSTEPS OFF-CAMERA. (This in black & white) as exciting pursuit music reaches a crescendo and ARKY LOCHNER jumps OVER CAMERA and INTO FRAME, landing right in front of us so we see his legs. He runs from CAMERA POV into FULL FRAME, splashing through puddles in frantic flight.

  Arky runs fifteen feet from CAMERA and, as he leaps over a puddle, he looks back over his shoulder in terror and we:

  FREEZE FRAME.

  Still in black & white, CAMERA MOVES IN on Arky frozen in mid-leap. HOLD at MEDIUM CU as we HEAR NARRATION OVER:

  NARRATOR

  (Over)

  As certain as death and taxes, we are told, "the meek will definitely inherit the Earth."

  (beat)

  Perhaps.

  (beat)

  But not always. Consider, if you will, frozen in terror, Mr. Arky Lochner, (pronounced Locic-ner) a well-known petty crook, sidebar six-for-fiver shylock, registered coward, and owner of a yellow streak so vivid it could be slathered on a hot dog.

  (beat).

  Mr. Lochner was written out of the will when the meek were guaranteed their inheritance. And just now he's trying to avoid another kind of payoff; a soulful payoff in that off-track betting parlor where the viggerish is a matter of life and death.

  Arky Lochner is in his late thirties, early forties. He has the beady little eyes of a marmoset, the twitchy thin face of a weasel, and the slim build of a street purse-snatcher. He wears a suit that looks as if he's been sleeping in it since they locked him out of his hotel room; a cheap, paper-thin yellow plastic rain slicker (the kind you can buy in a turnpike gas station's men's room, folded into a tiny square, for a dollar); a dirty Borsalino now jammed at a cockeyed angle on his head; and he seems to have lost a shoe while running. As VO NARRATION ENDS we segué FROM BLACK & WHITE to COLOR and

  UNFREEZE FRAME:

  As Arky's feet hit the filthy wet blacktop and he dashes away from CAMERA, still looking over his shoulder in panic.

  2 - REVERSE ANGLE - THE ALLEY - SHOOT UP-ANGLE FROM GROUND

  TO ARKY as he rushes toward us. Above and behind him, at mid-b.g, we see an ominous cloud hanging in the air at the second storey level. The cloud is boiling. It is rushing after him (suggest SFX time-lapse photography of clouds a la Louis Shwartsburg at Energy Prods.) and crackles of lightning dance through and around the cloud like a Van de Graaff Generator run amuck. As it rolls down the alley after him, Arky stops, spins, pulls a .45 from his belt and fires four shots into the cloud. It has no effect, but from the cloud comes a thunderclap and the roar of a demon voice that fills the alley like a SWAT-team bullhorn:

  VOLKERPS OVER

  (filter FX)

  Cease your flight, you four-flushing pismire!

  Arky does not hesitate. The demon voice only serves to panic him more. He turns back INTO CAMERA and takes two running steps toward us, his foot-without-a-shoe slips in the water, he flies forward INTO CAMERA and lands on his stomach, sliding in the filthy passageway. CAMERA HOLDS as he scrabbles to a crouching position, staring up at the cloud hanging over him now, as the demon VOLKERPS emerges from the top of the cloud. As he materializes, Arky falls backward, staring.

  Volkerps is huge, immense, enormous. A massively-muscled upper torso that makes Schwarzenegger look anorexic, surmounted by a bestial head with three blazing green eyes, a wide mouth filled with double-rows of fangs like a shark, and claws and spikes and hooked talons at the elbows.

  VOLKERPS

  (filter FX, raging)

  This is the second most ill-advised action you have ever taken, Arky Lochner, you miserable gobbet of human meat!

  A thunderclap and lightning punctuate his words. He smiles. The smile could rot poison ivy. Arky . trembles, drops the .45.

  VOLKERPS (CONT'D.)

  The first was trying to make a bargain that would outwit me. I'm thirty-two thousand years old, you human virus! Even among my peers in the 4th Canonic Order of Demons I'm considered a truly ghastly dinner companion.

  (beat, smiles)

  Did I mention I enjoy sucking the marrow from the living bones of idiots like you?

  (beat)

  Whatever made you think you could outwit the magnificence of Volkerps?

  The speaking of his name produces reverberations, thunder, lightning, greater trembling on Arky's part.

  3 - ANOTHER ANGLE - FAVORING ARKY

  As he demonstrates a kind of pluck we would not have expected from such a weasly guy. Arky gets to his feet and points a trembling finger at the demon, his voice squeaking but almost brave. Give him a mock Broadway-Bronx accent, high and fast.

  ARKY

  (terrified but plucky)

  I still got a week! The contract ain't up for a week! Why it is you're tormentin' me?

  A bit more electrical display from the cloud.

  VOLKERPS

  (filter FX)

  Because I'm a demon, you imbecile! I don't send singing telegrams, I torment! It's what I do! That's why I'm called a demon, instead of The Easter Bunny...

  Arky snaps off two more shots, sort of lackadaisically. The demon looks disgusted at this behavior:

  VOLKERPS (CONT'D.)

  (filter FX, wearily)

  Fine, just fine: this one is the slowest learner in the entire human race.

  (yells)

  Dummy! Moron! Bullets can't hurt me, you worm, you stone, you less than living thing!

  ARKY

  A week! You made the deal...you can't bug me for a week!

  Volkerps begins to shrink slowly back into the cloud, and the cloud begins to grow smaller, fade from sharpness.

  VOLKERPS

  (filter FX, chuckling)

  Bug you? Bug you? A week from now I'll remember you mentioned bugs.

  His talons clack and clatter like castanets, making a lunatic cricket sound against his scaly hide.

  VOLKERPS (CONT'D.)

  Perhaps I'll turn you into one. A small, black, crawling bug ...not unlike the kind I spear with a claw, crack like a nutshell, and feed to my serpent mate, Diptha. She loves to be bugged!

  The lightning flashes, the thunder rolls, the cloud sucks in on itself with a roaring typhoon sound as of air being vacuumed into a black hole. And in an instant he's gone!

  4 - CLOSE ON ARKY - HAND-HELD

  As he stares up into the now-empty alleyway for a moment. He stands there with one shoe missing, his Borsalino filthy, the yellow plastic rain slicker barely hiding the tackiness of his suit...and suddenly he howls in delayed terror, a high keening whine, as he jams the useless .45 into his raincoat pocket and, as HAND-HELD CAMERA GOES WITH, he turns back down the alley and runs. He runs for his life. He runs like a mad thing, arms pinwheeling, eyes wild, he runs full-out. CAMERA WITH Arky as he runs and runs down the alley, past the truck, and suddenly turns left and runs straight THROUGH A WOODEN DOOR in a warehouse. He is doing eighty-five miles an hour, and when he hits that warehouse door he splinters it, going right through!

  5 - INT. WAREHOUSE - OVERHEAD FULL SHOT - ESTABLISHING

  As Arky comes through the wooden barrier. He suddenly erupts into the building, sending planks and chunks and slivers of wood in all directions.

  The warehouse is a freight-forwarding operation. Filled with crates and cartons and boxes and containers. A couple of small forklifts. We are SHOOTING STRAIGHT DOWN from the metal beams overhead as Arky bursts into the scene. All through scenes 4 and 5 we HEAR that air-raid siren scream of Arky's, like a
Doppler effect rushing toward us, then away. He bursts through the door below us, and keeps running straight ahead across the warehouse floor as we:

  CUT TO:

  6 - SERIES OF INTERCUTS - MEDIUM SHOTS

  thru

  12 - FOLLOWING ARKY. MEDIUM CLOSE behind him as he

  rushes away from the shattered door. We get a

  distorted perspective of the crates, et al, rising

  toward the ceiling in rows and aisles and profusion

  all around him. He's moving fast (undercranked?)

  as CAMERA GOES WITH.

  INT. OFFICE - ANGLE PAST NINO & OTHERS - THRU GLASSED-IN WALLS & DOOR toward Arky running like a gazelle toward the office.

  Arky rushing faster and faster toward office cubicle at rear of warehouse. A light is on in that office and we can see a nattily-dressed man rising with alarm from behind a desk, as the two other men and a totally gorgeous woman shrink back from the oncoming juggernaut. SOUND of a freight train in B.G. It's Arky, but he's coming1 on like the super-express.

  CLOSEUP on the faces of the men and woman as Arky thunders toward them. CLOSEUP on Arky's strained, howling face, CLOSEUP on the men and woman, CUT BACK AND FORTH and:

  13 - INT. OFFICE - TOWARD DOOR

  As Arky bursts through the glass-paneled door, several of the cubicle's windows shattering outward as he booms into the small space. He hits the desk with his thighs and falls across the desk. He stares up at the man who was sitting there a moment ago. The nearly-transparent, sickly-yellow rain slicker has billowed out to cover him like a blanket.