Reapers Creepers (Excerpt)

INT. PERSEPHONE'S HOUSE - NIGHT

Persephone putters around the kitchen making tea. You hear the police car start up and leave her driveway. Reggi sits at her kitchen table, elbows resting on the table. He watches her with the look of someone who knows his help wouldn't be appreciated. He rubs a hand over his face, trying to keep awake and alert. The radio continues to play.

REGGI

Look, Penny, you should get some sleep.

PERSEPHONE

If I don't keep my hands busy, sugar, I will stomp right back to that awful place and strangle the man myself.

Persephone slams the full kettle on the burner with a little too much force. Reggi startles at that but Persephone gives it no notice, setting the flame. She flinches when she opens the fridge and has to take a second to let her shivers pass but gets out the pie crust regardless.

REGGI

Jesus, Penny, a pie?

PERSEPHONE

I thought you loved my pies.

Persephone roughly rolls out her pre-made dough onto the cutting board and starts to cut it into strips.

REGGI

I don't mean to keep you from your creature comforts but, really? Now?

PERSEPHONE

Yes really and yes now! I just had a traumatic encounter and what I want, mor'n anythin' is. To. Bake.

Persephone accentuates each word with a hard cut with her knife. Silence reigns but only for a moment.

REGGI

I just mean-

Persephone slams down her knife, embedding it in the wooden cutting board so it stands up. She whips around to face him.

PERSEPHONE

I know what you damn well mean, Reggi Hallaway, and I don't like it one bit. If I want to bake a pie at three in the fuckin' mornin' after I escape from some- some fuckin' deviant then I damn well will! Until YOU put a ring on my finger you ain't got no authority in MY house, you hear me? And for fuck's sake, how many times I gotta remind y'all to call me Persephone?!

She goes to prod him in the chest with her left hand but her hand is missing, she just has a stub of wrist pointing in his direction. It isn't bleeding. She looks behind her at the cutting board. There, on the other side of the knife, is her neatly severed hand. Reggi faints. The radio plays on. Persephone stares at her stump wrist in vacant disbelief. She stumbles slightly over to a chair, sinks into it, rests her elbows on her knees and tries to sink her fingers into her hair, mirroring what she did in Warrens house but flinches violently away from her stump, slamming it onto the table beside her, as far away from herself as she can have it. She waits for someone to help, for Reggi to wake up.

INT. PERSEPHONE'S HOUSE - Day

Persephone wakes up, having slept in the crook of her arm on the kitchen table. The radio is now playing static. She wakes as doll-like as she did before. She stretches and tries to rub at her eyes but misses and pokes her cheek with her stub. She startles back so hard she falls out of her chair.

PERSEPHONE

FUCK! Wait. Reggi?

She crosses her legs and looks over to Reggi, who is still passed out on her kitchen floor, snuffling in his peaceful sleep.

PERSEPHONE

You're not gonna be much help are ya?

She spares him a fond, if desperate smile before examining her stub more closely. It is a clean cut, right through the joint. The veins are collapsed and pump no blood. She pokes at it, then runs her fingers over the cut looking bewildered but not in pain. She stands up, still shaky, and walks to the counter but the camera focuses on Reggi who is slowly waking. He stretches, arching his back like a cat and yawning wide. He gets up like someone not unused to sleeping on the floor.

REGGI

Dang Penny- sorry Persephone, you sleep on the floor too? Your hair's a-

Reggi freezes as he remembers why he slept on the floor. His eyes are wide. Persephone turns to Reggi, face carefully blank and nods to her stump and dismembered hand which she is carrying.

PERSEPHONE

(devoid of emotion)

Look't this.

Persephone slowly moves her hand towards her stump, touches the bone to bone, and lets go. The then moves her previously dismembered hand up and down, as if there's nothing wrong. There is still a large gash around her wrist and bone is visible through it. She turns it towards herself and clenches and un-clenches her hand. Reggi looks like he might faint again. Persephone looks up at him sharply.

PERSEPHONE

You betta not be coming down with another case of the vapors and leaving me to deal with this alone again.

Reggi runs a hand through his mussed hair, puts a fist in his mouth and screams around it slightly. Persephone waits impatiently, arms crossed and foot tapping, one hip cocked and with the expression of someone who had already gone through this emotional roller coaster and was waiting for him to get off.

REGGI

W-what're ya gonna do?

PERSEPHONE

I suppose I'll have to cover it with a nice bracelet.

Persephone experimentally tugs at her hand and it pops off again but reattaches easily again. Reggi resolutely and with great effort, does not faint again.