Death in Love

Eldest Son:
[voice-over] When you're young, and the woman in your hands is young, you're provoked by the life in her skin, in the muscles under her skin. You can smell life in the sweet perfume of her sweat and her breath, sweet perfume that can make you dizzy. You can sense life in the jittery convulsions of her reactions to every new touch and sensation. And you feel young and alive and jolted by excitement every time you come near her. But the older you get, the older the woman in your hands gets, you grow lulled by the lazy response of her flesh to your touch. Lulled by the numb response of your own nerves to her flesh. By the sluggish torpor of her muscles. The souring perfume of her sweat, of her tears. The souring smell of her old guts belching out air. And it's a curse. Because getting older doesn't make you like being with an old woman any more than you did when you were young. It's worse really, because it lacks even the thrill of novelty of the forbidden. She's just old and she reminds you that you're old, and that your old shell is still taking up space, but that it's life is almost gone. But nothing is worse than being old and holding youth in your hands, even youth that's thrilled by the novelty of you, because you can still smell youth's sweetness, feel the spring of muscles under taut skin, but you know isn't yours. You're not sharing in it, but are feeding off it like some kind of vampire. And you wonder what the point is - what the point of going on living, the point of loving, the point of touching. And all your instincts, your training, have made you too afraid to pull the trigger and end it yourself. To take responsibility that nature's abdicated into your own trembling weakening hands. You stare at those hands, studying them, wondering what they are, why you can't make them do what you want them to do. You stare down at your hands and you realize that even your own hands aren't really yours any more.

Beautiful Woman:
You're 40. God could reverse your age back 20 years and you'd still feel old.

Eldest Son:
I am old.

Beautiful Woman:
No, you're depressed. Being old has got nothing to do with it.

Eldest Son:
I'll tell you the worst part about getting old.

Beautiful Woman:
You said you weren't.

Eldest Son:
The worst part is getting lectured by kids who think they know everything. It's getting lectured by kids who think all the sh*t they're going through right now will lead to good sometime later. That for everything you lose, you'll gain something. Well, you won't. I'm doing you a f***in' favor. You want to hang out with an old guy like me so you can feel relaxed? Well, allow him to do you this favor to tell you that you will lose everything and gain nothing. Not a single f***in' thing. Except the knowledge that you've lost everything and gain nothing.

Beautiful Woman:
Nothing? You say you want to do me a favor but you give me nothing? How is that doing me a favor?

Eldest Son:
By helping you lower your expectations. Lower your expectations... and the pain of realizing how empty life is might be a lesson learned.

Beautiful Woman:
So, you want to ruin my happiness now so I can feel pain later? I'll take my happiness. I'll take my pain. The only thing I don't want is your goddamn favors! You should feel guilty about hanging out with younger girls like me. Although if I were you, I'd feel guilty about hanging out with the older ones because I imagine they have enough sh*t to deal with without being invaded by your misanthropic bullshit about nothing! I would feel guilty about hanging out with my friends if I were you! I would go into a room and crawl into a closet and lock the door!

Eldest Son:
What are you doing? Where are you going?

Beautiful Woman:
I'm leaving. Goodbye.

Eldest Son:
No, don't. Please, don't leave. I'm sorry.

Beautiful Woman:
For what?

Eldest Son:
It... just... I'm sorry.

Beautiful Woman:
No, you're not.

Eldest Son:
What the hell is that supposed to mean? I'm telling you I'm sorry, and you're telling me that I'm not for nothing will change that. I'm sorry.

Beautiful Woman:
No. You can say whatever you want to say, and you cannot take it back. You're not sorry. From that impassive tone of voice and those empty eyes, you're not sorry.

Eldest Son:
Please don't go. You're hurt about what I said. I'm sorry.

Beautiful Woman:
No... you're not.

Eldest Son:
It's not like I did something terrible to you.

Beautiful Woman:
[walks out] I thought you were the one handing out favors.

[to his girlfriend]

Eldest Son:
And you look up from your hands into the mirror, and you see a face that you recognize, a face you've been staring at your entire life, for eternity. And you remember that the face is yours, but you have no idea who you are any more. And the person you once were, who had any kind of cohesiveness or connection to himself, feels a million miles away. Like the native of some alien planet you visited long ago, in another lifetime.