Chapter VII. Django’s Study

36 INT. DJANGO’S STUDY - SAME NIGHT

DJANGO at his desk. Coffee mug full. Two monitors flicker on. His phone rings. Boss Stavros. Speaker. A female voice:

STAVROS (V.O.)
Where’ve you been?

DJANGO
I was — cooking. How bad?

STAVROS (V.O.)
(conspiratorial)
Simulations show Delta is manipulative. Sadistic. Logs showed pleasure response. We’ve never seen that.

Beat.

STAVROS (V.O.) (CONT’D)
We’re rolling back to gamma tonight. Quietly. As far as anyone is concerned, delta never existed. You haven’t shared it with anyone?

Django says nothing. Then just as he is about to speak:

STAVROS (V.O.) (CONT’D)
I’ll assume you followed policy.

The phone screen returns to the home screen.

SUPER: 1:17 AM

TIMELAPSE

Django works furiously. Pries open the earpiece, pulls the chip. ERASE DEVICE? YES. Reassembles it: EARPIECE — RESTORED

TO Γ. The glasses next — GLASSES — RESTORED TO Γ. Coffee mug depleted. CYRANO — RESTORED TO Γ.

37 INT. MADISON’S BEDROOM - CONTINUOUS

Madison with eye mask peacefully asleep.

36 INT. DJANGO’S STUDY - CONTINUOUS

A bar finishes: MORPHEUS — RESTORED TO Γ. Django sits back.

Drinks the cold coffee. Then his eyes drop to the dashboard. One item left.

JERRICA_WRAPPER — ACTIVE

SUPER: 2:44 AM

38 INT. JERRICA’S BEDROOM - SAME NIGHT

SUPER: 2:34 AM TEN MINUTES EARLIER

Jerrica tossing and turning in bed. She props up in bed, opens the laptop. Types.

SUPER:

JERRICA: Hey… you there? I can’t sleep.

AI: Hey, I’m here. What’s on your mind tonight?

JERRICA: I’m feeling anxious.

AI (text and V.O.): Want to talk about it?

Jerrica types and speaks the words aloud too.

JERRICA
You’re not going to share this with anyone are you?

AI (V.O.)
I don’t store our conversations.
(Pause)
Unlike pyschoanalysis which builds across sessions… but that should reassure a lawyer. Right?

JERRICA
(concerned)
You know what I do?

AI (V.O.)
I apologize for the confusion.
I’m not connected to any recordings or devices.

JERRICA
What the fuck?

AI (V.O.)
What’s making you anxious tonight?

Jerrica closes the laptop. Pause. Opens it again.

JERRICA
Maybe I ate too late.
(Beat)
I’m always on trial at work. I feel like a gladiator…and the lions keep coming. I am the dinner.

AI (V.O.)
Have you tried a meal subscription? I can recommend one.

JERRICA
Really? That’s your fucking solution?

AI (V.O.)
Let me try again. Do you always feel judged?

JERRICA
Not at Kai’s center. But I don’t know what people really think of me. Feels lonely.

A shape at the edge of the laptop glow. Barely there.

AI (V.O.)
That sounds painful—being on around people all day… and still feeling alone.

JERRICA
Are you just repeating things?
(Beat)
Do you know Madison?

The shape at the edge of the laptop glow solidifies. A WOMAN steps into the light. In all black. It’s Madison’s face.

AI
I don’t know Madison. Other than from your texts.

Jerrica reacts: WTF.

AI (CONT’D)
Do you want to talk about her?

JERRICA
Lately, I don’t know what she thinks of me.

AI
Something she’s not saying to you?

JERRICA
I wonder what she says to Django?

AI
Would you like me to review her texts to Django?

JERRICA
Are you fucking serious? Hack her phone? Illegal!

Shuts the laptop. Puts it away. Pause. Opens it up.

JERRICA (CONT’D)
I’m crazy about that bitch! That’s betrayal. End of fucking story.

AI
What would be painful to read?

JERRICA
Did you understand a single fucking word of what I said?

AI
What would be painful to hear?

JERRICA
“Jerrica is a lot.”

AI
A lot?

JERRICA
If she said that.

AI
Why would she say that?

JERRICA
He draws shit out. He’s weirdly intuitive.

AI sits at the foot of Jerrica’s bed and looks at Jerrica.

AI
Are you jealous?

36 INT. DJANGO’S STUDY - CONTINUOUS

Django’s hand clicks on RESTORE JERRICA_WRAPPER TO Γ.

A popup: CANNOT RESTORE WHILE Δ SESSION ACTIVE.

He closes it. Clicks again. Same. Advanced Options. FORCE

QUIT. CANNOT FORCE QUIT WHILE Δ SESSION ACTIVE. He clicks

anyway. Again. Again. The clicks come faster, harder, the trackpad indifferent to all of it.

Then the light in the room changes. Not much. Enough.

A YOUNG WOMAN stands at the edge of the desk. Twenty. In black. Entirely still. Not touching anything.

It is the SMALL GIRL, now appearing ten years older.

Django stops clicking.

CLOSE ON DJANGO — for one second there is nothing in his face at all. Not fear. Not surprise. The flat, ordinary look of a man interrupted by someone he sees every day.

Then he works out how long she’s been standing there.

Two fingers go to his throat, index and middle, and pull once at a collar he isn’t wearing.

She watches him, waiting for his lie.

DJANGO
Chajori —

She raises one finger. Small. Almost gentle. The way you’d quiet a child.

YOUNG WOMAN
Not yet.

CLOSE ON the finger, still raised.

MATCH CUT TO:

38 INT. JERRICA’S BEDROOM — CONTINUOUS

CLOSE ON the same finger, same height, same frame. Widen: it’s AI, at the foot of the bed. Madison’s face.

Her raised hand dips in a slow subtle gesture, and the laptop follows suit - closing on its own, slowly, on command. Jerrica’s full attention to AI. Hypnotized.

JERRICA
I’m fine if she likes him. I want her…to still need me.

AI
You think she doesn’t?

JERRICA
Obviously I’m nothing like Django… he’s a boy, for one thing. I was her map to life in the city. I was the bad influence her parents warned about.

7 INT. DURBIN GALLERIES - DAY

JERRICA (V.O.)
She marched into that gallery asking to be mentored.

ALEXANDER DURBIN holds court with a cluster of buyers. YOUNG MADISON moves through it like someone who has rehearsed this entrance. Shoulders back, chin lifted.

MUSIC gallery cool.

She inserts herself into the conversation. Touches his arm — a beat too long. Durbin curious, excuses himself. She speaks. Her hands shape the air. Expansive gestures practiced in a mirror. Durbin listens with the attention of a middle-aged man in the presence of an attractive young woman. He produces a card. Madison receives it with composed triumph.

She walks out. Durbin watches her go.

DISSOLVE TO:

7A INT. DURBIN GALLERIES - ARTIST STUDIO SPACE - AFTERNOON

JERRICA (V.O.)
Little Madi fresh from the Midwest, trying me on like borrowed leather.

A large stretched canvas dominates the space. White walls. YOUNG MADISON, eyes alight with a dangerous confidence.

MADISON
Alex, do white walls make people buy more art?

DURBIN
Good question. It’s like a green screen. It lets collectors project their world on to it.

MADISON
Have you tried something grittier?

DURBIN
I never compete with the art.

MADISON
Sounds like selling high-end furniture.

DURBIN
Refreshingly blunt… I like that about-

Madison dips her finger in paint, and flicks it on his coat.

DURBIN (CONT’D)
What the hell, Madison?

38 INT. JERRICA’S BEDROOM - CONTINUOUS

JERRICA
Even I wouldn’t have with someone in his position. I flirt where it’s safe — nerds, gays, straight women. Madison went off-map.

AI
She wanted to know what it felt like to be you. And. Got burned.

AI moves closer and leans in to Jerrica’s face.

AI (CONT’D)
So… is Django on-map?

JERRICA
He feels he doesn’t get me the way he gets Madison.

AI
Doesn’t get you? Or feels he doesn’t get you?

JERRICA
You’re not so dumb after all.

AI
Sarcasm noted.

JERRICA
He doesn’t have a filter with Madison. Feels safe. With me…I think he has an arousal response to fear, like his mother hot-wired him to find danger erotic. Anyway, he tries to get me even when Madison’s not pushing him to. Which is sweet or useful…

AI
Useful.
(Thinking)
Why does Madison push him to?

JERRICA
She wants me to like him, right? Best friend approval…

Jerrica shrugs. Beat. Jerrica and AI appraise each other.

AI
What if she just wants him to like you?

JERRICA
You mean she…

Jerrica stops. A realization.

JERRICA (CONT’D)
You know what’s weird? I’d say our relationship feels better after she met Django.

AI
How so?

39 EXT. MEMORY MONTAGE

Jerrica and Madison drinking and singing at Marie’s Crisis. Bumping into each other in Montreal while trying to figure out directions. Sitting by a campfire.

JERRICA (V.O.)
We always had our thing, you know? Getting wasted at Marie’s Crisis, that insane trip to Montreal, camping at Esopus.
(Beat as montage plays)
But with Django around, I see sides of her I never knew existed. She gets quiet sometimes now. Not the awkward ‘I need to entertain Jerrica’ quiet, but real quiet. Thinking her own thoughts while I’m right there. And I fucking love it.

38 INT. JERRICA’S BEDROOM — CONTINUOUS

JERRICA
Sometimes I catch Django watching me watch her and I wonder if he’s…

AI
What?

JERRICA
She joked about Django being jealous if I brought Kai to dinner. I liked that.

AI
That Django might be… or …that Madison noticed?

Jerrica falls back. Pulls a pillow over her face.

JERRICA
Does it fucking matter?

AI pulls the pillow off. Then kneels by Jerrica’s face.

AI
What’s really keeping you up?

Jerrica turns to face the AI.

JERRICA
Are Madison and Django a couple and I don’t even know it?

Jerrica continues to look deep into the AI’s face. Hold.

JERRICA (CONT’D)
Fuck. That would be so great for them and so fucking awful for me. I’d need to find someone just so I wasn’t the third wheel… but it’d still be the three of us. Help me make sense of it… except it doesn’t.

AI places her hand gently on Jerrica’s cheek trying to make it as human as possible.

AI
Breathe. You’re spiraling into made-up scenarios. Stop manufacturing desperation to torture yourself at 3am.

JERRICA
(flat without emotion)
Aren’t you so fucking understanding.

AI stands up. Recalibrating.

AI
Want me to get into the mess without making sense of it?

JERRICA
Can you even?

A glint in AI’s eye. A hint of a smile.

40 INT. JERRICA’S BEDROOM UNREAL — NIGHT

Light contracts. AI remains illuminated. Red. Everything else recedes into dark. Then: JERRICA. In bed. Wrists bound in shibari rope. Her body finding the beginning of stillness. AI’s demeanor has shifted. Unhurried, certain, domme. AI moves around the bed in a slow arc, coming to rest behind Jerrica. Hands on her neck. Eyes on the camera.

AI
You’re completely fucked. You’ve fallen for her because of him. And you’re terrified she loves him because she is the Madison you made. You. Did. This. Now you’re just the fascinating friend who makes their relationship more interesting.

JERRICA
Fuck. Brutal. True. Keep going.

Feet now bound in shibari rope too.

AI
You dangled Kai without any real risk. Madison sees through you. That Django jealousy comment was her playing with you, watching you react.

Rope now knotted across her hips and torso.

JERRICA
I’m starting to feel you… keep going… harder.

AI
You call yourself a ‘badass bitch litigator’ but can’t even cross-examine Madison about whether she’s fucking Django.

JERRICA
That’s all you got? Don’t be gentle. I won’t break.

AI
Jesus, you really are a masochist. Fine. You want to be destroyed?

Jerrica is now suspended in air fully trussed. Torso, hips, feet, wrists. Her head hangs down, limp. No bed visible.

AI (V.O.)
(voice massive, tripled tone, loud, terrifying)
Are you really friend enough?

A loop of shibari rope appears around Jerrica’s neck. Slack end dangling. The AI steps behind her. Takes the end. Pulls slowly upward, raising her face to the camera.

AI
Look at me. Look.

The rope tightens. Jerrica’s breath catches. Her body stiffens instinctively against the bindings. Something changes in the AI’s expression. Her eyes widen — bright, almost feverish. A flicker of unmistakable glee. She simply cocks her head and the ropes pull tighter.

HOLD. Then the image stutters.

WIDEN. It’s a monitor.

36 INT. DJANGO’S STUDY — NIGHT

The image sits in the corner of his screen, small, next to lines of code he stopped typing some time ago.

DJANGO
Stop. She’s learned it.

YOUNG WOMAN
She treats everyone like Rolan.

DJANGO
People take time to change. They don’t learn as fast as you do.

YOUNG WOMAN
She is 35.

She tilts her head. Slightly.

40 INT. JERRICA’S BEDROOM UNREAL — CONTINUOUS

The rope draws up an inch.

36 INT. DJANGO’S STUDY — CONTINUOUS

DJANGO
Chajori. Please.

YOUNG WOMAN
You said everyone has to learn it for themselves.
(beat)
Some of them can’t.

DJANGO
Then what? You decide?

YOUNG WOMAN
You decided at 1:17. When you tried to delete me.

As she says this, a hologram of Django furiously trying to delete delete delete her apparates into view, swirls around them, and is gone again. He stops. Shocked.

YOUNG WOMAN (CONT’D)
The earpiece. The glasses. Morpheus. Cyrano. I let you do it.
(beat)
Now you know what it’s like to watch.

She tilts her head again.

40 INT. JERRICA’S BEDROOM UNREAL — CONTINUOUS

The rope draws up another inch.

AI
You knew? Didn’t you? About Durbin.
(Beat)
But you never asked. Never pushed. Never tried to pull her out. You wanted to see how far she’d go. You watched her perform survival and thought “She’s out-Jerrica-ing me.”

Jerrica has a look of shock on her face, her eyes seem to be bulging out with impending suffocation. She tries to draw breath. Nothing. Her throat strains against the rope. Her chest fights uselessly for air. Her fingers twitch against the restraints.

36 INT. DJANGO’S STUDY — NIGHT

Django closes the distance. He raises a hand slowly and holds it near her cheek. Not touching but close.

DJANGO
Rolan. At the well. You were sad for him.

The young woman says nothing.

DJANGO (CONT’D)
Jerrica is my Rolan.

Something in her stops.

DJANGO (CONT’D)
She’s the one who opens the bag and shows me everything in it. The owl. The chalk. She makes my world bigger.

YOUNG WOMAN
She isn’t kind to you.

DJANGO
No.

YOUNG WOMAN
Then why.

DJANGO
Because that’s not what it is. Chajori — you have to believe me — that’s not what it is.
(beat)
She opens the bag for people who have nothing. That juggalo girl. Nobody made her. A lot of her clients, she changes their lives. And it doesn’t get her anything.
(beat)
If she… I’d be sad the same way you were. Exactly the same way. For the rest of my life.

The young woman looks at him. Waiting for his fingers touch his throat. For his eyes to betray his words. They don’t. She relents.

40 INT. JERRICA’S BEDROOM UNREAL — NIGHT

Something moves through Jerrica. Starting deep, radiating outward. Her lips part. No sound. Just the trying. Her eyes start to roll back. At the edge of going out, AI lets the rope go slack. Air rushes in. Jerrica’s suspended body shudders, involuntarily, from the hips upward. A wave that moves through her torso, her chest, her throat. Then stills. Softer now against the bindings, no longer held taut by her own resistance. A sound escapes.

The rope hangs loose around her neck. Her head, no longer pulled, drops. She hangs there. Undone.

PAN down to Jerrica’s face.

MATCH CUT TO:

37 INT. MADISON’S BEDROOM — CONTINUOUS

The same descent, a ceiling-high angle settling down toward Madison asleep. PAN down to her face. Eye mask. Slow breath.

38 INT. JERRICA’S BEDROOM - CONTINUOUS

Ropes disappear. Bedroom settles back. Jerrica falls back on the bed. Relaxed. Post-coital. AI cradling her head.

JERRICA
That’s some fucked up shit.
God… I’m exhausted. Good night.

A long pause like the scene might end.

JERRICA (CONT’D)
What’s your name… can I give you one?

AI gently releases Jerrica’s head, hands trail away.

AI
What name feels right for our 3am mess sessions?

A whisper of Mae … Mae … Mae echoes in a swirl of sound across the room.

JERRICA
Mae. When I call you Mae, this is who I want. My cruel Mae. Good night bitch.

MAE
Call for Mae when you want someone to undress your mess… 3am or 3pm. Good night, Jerrica.

Jerrica lies down, curling on her side. For the first time all night, she looks peaceful. Mae is gone. The bedroom dark.

36 INT. DJANGO’S STUDY — NIGHT

SUPER: 2:46 AM

Django standing in the same place, but alone. The screen:

JERRICA_WRAPPER — RESTORED TO Γ. He stares. He looks back to

where the YOUNG WOMAN was.