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		COSMO 
See.  I told you what she was like.

RITA turns around

		RITA
What?

		COSMO
I wonder what I'm supposed to do
now...

		RITA
It'll be OK.

		COSMO
You think I did the right thing?

		RITA
I don't know....

		COSMO
I think I did.  That's what
matters.  That's so easy to forget. 

RITA finishes clearing the table

COSMO reaches out and touches her

		COSMO
I mean, I've never done this
before.  I've never left someone.


EXTERIOR * THE REFLECTING POOL * NIGHT

JACK wanders down past the pool -
carrying a torch

		JACK
Arlie?  ARLIE!

he moves past the pool into a field

		JACK
Arlie!

He moves across the field into the woods


INTERIOR * THE DINING ROOM * NIGHT

		COSMO 
When I met you and Jack I was
feeling... I don't know, kind of
dead - and it was funny but I
didn't know it.  After I started
coming over I suddenly found myself
not sleeping as much - I had been
sleeping alot for a long time and
then this thing started happening. 
I started... this is going to sound
so juvenile but I found myself
looking at girls - you know in that
way - differently - it was even
that the looking was a new thing in
itself - and it was all the time.
	But when I look at her and I
sink - how did I get here - what
was I thinking?  This just isn't
right for me.  I made a mistake. 
Sometimes I get up at night and
look at her sleeping next to me - I
go downstairs and lay on the floor
in the livingroom and listen to
music - music from long ago and I
float away.  To the place I should
have gone.  You are an inspiration
to me, Rita, you've done what you
wanted.  I never did what I wanted
to do.  I don't want to wake up
someday and be dead - have my life
over.  I couldn't do that.  This is
my last chance.  She wants to have
a kid now.  If that happens I'll be
lost forever - stuck forever. 
There'd be two of them following me
around the house all day...  	Don't
you see - you've listened to her
talk - you could imagine what it
would be like.  I mean she's great
for herself but not for me.  I mean
there's something in me that has 
been asleep too long.  I want
everyone to get out of my way -
JUST GET OUT OF MY WAY.
	Sometimes I get these great
feelings - feelings of expansion -
limitlessness - and then she puts a
pin in me. When I look at her I see
myself - the self I've become - I
cannot have become that.... I mean
she was so amazing when I met her -
so alive and I was this... this
thing and she loved me but in some
way I think it was just a delayed
teenage thing working itself out -
if I had been honest about it I
would have seen it for what it was 
- a thing about lust - a person to
have around.  You know sometimes
you just have to have somebody
around.  It's in our nature.
	But I've outgrown that.  I'm
stronger now.  I have more to give - 
much more.
	It's like how you feel at a
party - you've had a few drinks and
you dance for the first time in
months and some woman you've never
seen before smiles at you - you
feel yourself at the moment -
really feel yourself and then you
go to use the toilet so you get in
this strange bathroom and you turn
around and there's a full length
mirror and you see yourself and you
think - yuck! - that's me - that's
not me.  It's like a kick in the
stomach seeing yourself like that
and I feel like that everyday with
her.  When I see you, Rita, I feel
like myself.  It is so freeing.  I
must stay with that.  I must - I
mean I'll be dead soon and I don't
want to be lying there dying
thinking I didn't do what I should
have done for myself.  You know
what I mean.  Right?
	There's something I've never 
done - things that I felt as a kid 
- as a teenager that got lost in
the shuffle that are still
glimmering - holding on by a
thread.  I live in fear that the
thread will break and I'll never
remember again.  I want to
remember.
	I owe it to myself.  Help me,
please.  I mean I trust myself,
that's so important - isn't it?  I
mean ultimately - not in some spur
of the moment way but in the
forever ultimate sense - that is
the way that I feel that I trust
myself.  I mean it's true what they
say about how you die alone - you
do - you do die alone.  How else
could it go - I mean you're born
and you die alone.
	See I read this book and it
was saying how you have to go by
your own heart and listen to your
heart - and so I decided I would do
that - I really sat there and
listened and the crazy thing is I
didn't hear anything - and I've
come to realize that you have to be
listening all the time - it's like
a kid - you can't just be a parent
part of the time - a kid needs you
all the time - or else it just
shrivels up - it's that attitude
that counts - it's that feeling
that your heart is where it all
starts - I mean you can't be doing
all this other shit - these things
for everybody else and getting sick
and old inside and then you decide
when you read a book to then decide
to listen to your heart - I mean
that's ludicrous - don't you think? 
I want to live.  This isn't living 
- I mean can't I make a mistake. 
Can't I change my mind?  I mean
everybody's out there killing and
robbing and looting and screwing 
around and doing anything they want
and I have to sit here and live
with my mistake - and the crazy
thing is, who's it doing any good. 
Not her.  I mean how can it help
her to be with someone you really
don't want to be with.

RITA stands looking out the window

		COSMO
I mean the other night I was
watching the tube, thinking and she
called out to me and you know what
I said?  You won't believe this. 
Before I realized what I was saying
I said: What mom?  Can you believe
that?  Mom?  It scared me.  It
really scared...  I mean it was
frightening.  Like there was a
thing in me that I didn't know was
there that was coming out - like
one of those science fiction
futuristic things where I was being
taken over or there was something
planted in me when I was a baby and
now the aliens are returning to
earth to harvest their crop.  It
was so creepy.

RITA turns and looks at him

		COSMO
I find myself looking at other
women...  ALOT.

She exits up the stairs

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