PIGGS - A Novel with Bonus Screenplay (28 page)

It's fuckin' dark in here. I coulda said black.

CECIL

I think you did.

GRAPE

You want a beer, something else?

Cecil is watching Gloria, paying no attention to Grape.

POV CECIL

Gloria doing her stuff.

CECIL (V.O.)

...No, I'm fine...

NEAR THE BAR

Jack makes his way through the crowd. He glances back at Cecil's corner.

CUT TO:

CECIL'S TABLE

Cecil, Grape, Hutt and Alabama are there. Cecil and Grape look toward the bar.

BACK TO JACK

He ducks back a few steps to avoid getting too close to Cecil again. He steps behind the bar, crouches a bit as he makes his way.

CUT TO:

The BARTENDER, an older, ex-stripper, gives Jack a curious look as he crouches past her, behind the bar, on his way out.

BARTENDER

Hi, Jack...

CUT TO:

Jack reaches the door that leads to the passageway to Wan's. Reaches for the knob, opens the door, and runs FLAT into Cat. Cat stares at Jack.

CAT

What the fuck you---

Jack has had all the stress he can handle. As Cat grabs him, Jack lashes out before he can think, kicks Cat in the crotch.
 
Cat drops him, howls.

MOVING

Jack runs, pauses at the men's room. It's locked. Someone's in there. He heads for the next door, a storage room.

STORAGE ROOM

Ducks inside, stumbles over mops, beer signs. Hides behind a stack of old tables. He can hear Cat's fury.

OUTSIDE MEN'S ROOM

Cat emerges with a broken urinal, a handful of pipe,
 
suddenly figures it out, opens the storage room door. He blinks inside.

CAT

Little sum'bitch.
 
Sum'BITCH!

Grape comes up behind him.

GRAPE

What the hell you think you're doing, man?
 
Get out of there.

IN THE CLOSET

Jack has found a board on the wall.
 
He's desperately trying to loosen it.

CAT (O.S.)

Little sum'bitch is in there somewhere.

GRAPE (O.S.

Isn't nobody here but you.
 
Shit, you tore up the john.
 
Mr. Dupree's going to have a fit.

CAT (O.S.)

Huuuuh!

GRAPE (O.S.)

Get out of there.
 
Clean this fucking mess up!

Loud noise as something large crashes into the storeroom door. Jack cringes.

CUT TO:

OUTSIDE MEN'S ROOM

A urinal lands atop the mess.

CAT (V.O.)

Little sum....bitch.

IN THE CLOSET

Jack has freed a few boards on the back wall. He presses against the boards. They don't seem to give, then---the whole thing gives way and Jack, head first, disappears.

JACK

Whoa....!

IN THE CELLAR

Jack, landing in a pile of rubble. He reaches out, touches a cement wall. Spears of light find their way through cracks.
 
He can see he's below Piggs.

He looks up, startled, as he hears DOUBLE FOOTSTEPS overhead. When he looks up he sees the underside of a stairway leading to the second floor.

CUT TO:

CLOSE UNDER THE STAIRWAY

DUST falls through cracks.

BACK TO

JACK blinks. A DOOR opens above.

CECIL (O.S.)

Goddamn Cat! I ought to kick that
 
dummy in the ass.

GRAPE (O.S.)

You, not me.

CUT TO:

ON JACK

We catch him in the act of chinning himself on an old pipe, pulling himself up in the dark. A slit of light crosses his eye from the slats in the floor above.

CECIL (O.S.)

Him and Hutt fucking Kenny. Jesus.

GRAPE (O.S.)

The guy's a dope.

CECIL (O.S.)

'Course he's a dope. He's a messenger. You send a message, you send a dope. The dope scopes out the scene, takes it back to Junior.

POV JACK

A narrow horizontal view through the crack, from floor level. Cecil's bare feet as he crosses the room, toward us. One of Cecil's feet comes down on the crack, blacking out our view for an instant.

CUT TO:

CECIL'S ROOM

His room is somewhere between slovenly and garish. To quote a guy I know: "Cecil's place is cheap, but it's in poor taste."Cecil gets a beer from his fridge, doesn't offer one to Grape.

CECIL

The guy Junior sends with the package, this is the guy we've got to watch.

GRAPE

It'll be somebody else.

CECIL

It'll be more than somebody. Somebody and his friends.

Cecil crosses the room.

CUT TO:

THE CELLAR

Jack has scrunched himself onto a cement ledge. Light from above comes through the gaps in the floor.

BACK TO CECIL'S ROOM

GRAPE

To make sure it goes down okay.

Cecil makes a face.

CECIL

Don't be a klutz. It's not supposed to go down. I know old man Ambrose. He's maybe dying, he's not dead. We don't get the goods.
HE
gets the money. This is how he sees it coming off. Once he sees a hundred grand sitting there for the taking...

GRAPE

You let him see it?

CECIL

Got to let him see it.

GRAPE

We
got
a hundred Gs?

Cecil's birthmark goes dark. Grape sees his mistake, raises a protective hand.

GRAPE

Hey....

He waves Cecil off.

CUT TO:

JACK

CECIL (O.S.)

Go one, get me some ribs. Don't go to that place on the highway, go on into Lockhart. And find that dumb shit Jack. Don't play with him, just bring him here.

ON JACK

He hears the door close, hears Grape go down the stairs. He listens. Hears Cecil go across the room, open the fridge, get another beer. Hears Cecil come back. He stops. Right on top of Jack's position. He hears Cecil squat down. Cecil uses something to pry up a floor board. Jack nearly panics. But, only a little light comes through. Jack hears Cecil pull something out of the floor. Then he hears a key click in a metal box. Cecil takes a stack of something out of the box, lays it on the floor. Then another stack. Jack can see the shadows of the stacks through the cracks. Then, Cecil picks up a stack, rifles through it. Jack's eyes go wide. There's only one thing makes a sound like that. MONEY! Cecil flicks through another stack, and another. Finally, he puts the stacks back in the box, locks it, puts it back in the hollow in the floor, snaps the boards back in place. Jack looks up, makes kissing motions with his lips. Hears Cecil go back, open the fridge. Hears him turn on the TV. Jack just sits there a moment, and grins.

DISSOLVE TO:

DARK CELLAR

Jack feels his way past boxes, debris, in the half light. He reaches a cyclone fence. Looks surprised. What the hell is a fence doing down here? He walks through a narrow passage between rows of fences.

ANOTHER VIEW

The room suddenly ends at a rusty ladder. He climbs up. Bricks fall around him. He lifts a rusty manhole cover aside.

EXT. PARKING LOT

Jack peeks up.

POV JACK

He sees Ortega sitting on the back steps of Wan's. Headlights glare and Jack ducks as a carload of college guys roar right over him.

CUT TO:

PIGGS MAIN FLOOR

Maggie is doing a lap dance for a RUBE. Rube is dazed, not listening at all.

MAGGIE

I was going with this guy, he had a Honda dealership in Houston? Least that's what he
says
he's doing, right?

I catch him one day, he is coming out of this Nazi bookstore?

Christ, used to be you could tell a man by what he drives...

RUBE

Huuh..huhh...

DRESSING ROOM

Gloria and Wilda. Gloria going through her costumes.
 
Wilda is eating Ricky's chocolates, watching the tiny TV. Ricky's rose is stuck in an empty beer bottle. Minnie is in the john.

GLORIA

I am not a racial person
at
all. It's not the color of a man's skin it is what's inside.
 
If a man is of the greaser folk, that is what God meant him to be, he cannot help that.

FAVOR WILDA

WILDA

That isn't no taco he's wearing, dearie.
 
That is your honest to God Roll-o-dex is what it is. You could buy a Lexus for that.

BACK TO SCENE:

GLORIA

I do admire a man who will talk about something besides
 
"You think the Cowboys got a chance?" I cannot go a minute on current events.

MINNIE (O.S.)

(from the john)

Don't be fooled by that, hon. A man don't give a damn about talking to a woman. You're lucky, he'll talk to the other end a while.