Illusion

[first lines]

Narrator:
The story doesn't end when you get here, like you think it might. All the mortal pieces have scattered, but the impressions remain. Every last one of them.

Stan:
Listen, I know it's a little startling, that's why I sat here for awhile while you were sleeping. I didn't want to scare you, then I figured, "How the heck could you be scared of a guy that's got a cup of coffee?"

Stan:
Can I ask you something? What are they putting in coffee nowadays? It's like a flavor, or something.

Donal Baines:
Donna, she likes hazelnut.

Stan:
Hazelnut? In coffee? Hm. Well, the first couple of sips it was good -

Donal Baines:
It gets worse.

Stan:
Yeah.

Stan:
When people live their lives, it's recorded. Now, most of it never quite makes it into the can, so to speak, but the deeper things, the significant things, burn an impression and it becomes an actual record.

Donal Baines:
What's it look like?

Stan:
Like a film negative, for the most part. Just like a movie.

Donal Baines:
[about teenage Christopher] He's too sappy, too sentimental.

Stan:
Shh, shh, shh. Teenager.

Isabelle:
I told you, I'm not interested.

Christopher:
Well, you wouldn't be talking to me if you weren't a *little* interested.

Sara:
You shouldn't sit on that wall. It's dirty and there's germs and you could get sick.

Christopher:
Yeah, well, I wish I would get sick. I wish I would catch some horrible disease and *die*. My chest hurts. My heart feels like it's shrinking into a little raisin. A little raisinette.

Sara:
Well, you *may* have a chance with Isabelle.

Christopher:
What are you talking about? She dropped the flowers and then she said she wasn't interested...

Sara:
Don't be a dummy. When a girl says she's *not* interested, it means she really *is* interested.

Christopher:
Well, I mean, what should I do? I'll do anything. I mean I'll, I'll come to the school until I'm too old to walk. I'll, like, buy her a million flowers -

Sara:
Woahhh, flowers are good, but there's a little issue with the boyfriend.

Christopher:
[shrugs] I'll kill him.

Christopher:
This is stupid. Who am I kiddin'?

Sara:
What happened to coming to school every day until you were too old to walk?

Christopher:
Sara, when I'm too old to walk, she'll have graduated. DUH!

Sara:
You had passion! You followed your heart!

Christopher:
Well, I'm using my head now.

Stan:
If we don't write our own lines, someone else ends up writing them for us.

Stan:
He's just into this, what do they call it? Not punk, but... oh, Goth.

Donal Baines:
What?

Stan:
Goth. Christopher's a Goth.

Donal Baines:
What's that?

Stan:
Like a beatnik, only more depressed.

Isabelle:
Hello, Christopher

Christopher:
Oh, so now it's alright to know each other?

Stan:
People end up in movies they never expected to be in.

Stan:
You know what else I've seen? Patterns. No matter what direction someone's life takes, no matter what sort of film they're in, people tend to follow the same storyline, same plot. And that means, sometimes, the film just has to end tragically.

Stan:
All that's ever left of a person is what's recorded on paper, or on film. A few lines, a few scenes. Then you're in the can. Deep down, everyone knows that all we are is a brief flicker on the screen in the dark, an illusion.