The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane

Frank Hallet:
You know how to survive, don't you?

Rynn:
I thought I did.

Mario:
Yeah, but kids have to go to school.

Rynn:
Why?

Mario:
Okay, so your father taught you. Everybody doesn't have a father like yours. Everybody can't be like you.

Rynn:
If I'd listened to them, I'd be like them.

Mario:
Damn. You keep saying "them" like everyone's out to get you.

Rynn:
Maybe they are.

[repeated line]

Rynn:
This is *my* house. *My* house.

Mario:
Like your father said in that letter: Since when do they let kids do what they want?

Rynn:
How old do you have to be before people start treating you like a person?

Mario:
But what about school?

Rynn:
School is having people tell you what life is and never finding out by yourself.

Rynn:
Thirteen means I have no right, is that it?

Mrs. Hallet:
Thirteen means you should be in school.

Rynn:
[about her mom] My father had given me a small bottle containing some white powder. He said if she should arrive, I should put it in her tea. Calm her, make her less agressive.

Mario:
Well it sure did, but you didn't know what it was, eh?

Rynn:
Not until after. I looked it up based on it properties. Potassium cyanide.

Mario:
And that's what you put in her tea?

Rynn:
Father meant what he said about doing anything you have to to survive. [Mario looks at his tea]

Mario:
How come you're not drinking yours?

Rynn:
Mine's still too hot, I didn't put in any cold milk. I can still see her red nails holding up that cup. After a few sips she said that the tea tasted of almonds. It's the almond cookies, I told her.

Mario:
Rynn, don't bodies...

Rynn:
Decompose? Well, you can put stuff on them.

Mario:
How do you know how do to that stuff.

Rynn:
I looked it up in the library.

Mario:
I'll make a deal with you. You tell me about the car, I'll tell you why I'm crippled.

Rynn:
No.

Mario:
It was Polio shots. See, I have so many brothers and sisters that my mother forgot who did and who didn't

Mario:
Somebody's out there.

Miglioriti:
I don't believe what you've been telling me about your father.

Rynn:
I think I should warn you that the police are watching our house right this very minute, Mr. Hallet.

Rynn:
[answering the phone] Hello? [pause] Mr. Hallet, Mr. Hallet I know this is you because everyone else is at the football game this afternoon. I think I should warn you that the police are watching our house right this very minute, Mr. Hallet. [hangs up]

Miglioriti:
Rynn, I don't believe what you've been telling me about your father.

Rynn:
No?

Miglioriti:
No, no you're going to tell me that he's in there working, right?

Rynn:
He was this afternoon translating.

Miglioriti:
Then he was and now he isn't, that's it, eh?

Rynn:
No he's resting upstairs.

Miglioriti:
I've been here 3 times, and each time I notice how good you are with words, you're very careful, you're too God damned careful.

Rynn:
Maybe you don't understand about poets: Edgar Allen Poe was a drug addict, Dylan Thomas drank himself to death, Sylvia Plath took her own life.

Miglioriti:
Rynn, we're talking about your father.

Rynn:
Yeah well, sometimes my father goes into his room and locks the door, keeps something in a desk drawer, I don't know what it is. I know when he locks that door, he doesn't want me to see the way he becomes, you know?

Rynn:
[about her father] Through most all September he looked fine, if the pain was terrible he never said anything. Then one Sunday evening, we were sitting in this room and he whispered to me in a very soft voice that I wasn't like anybody else in the world; and people wouldn't understand me, they'd order me around, tell me what to do and try to turn me into the person they wanted me to be. Since I was only a kid, I couldn't say anything, I'd have to stay alone, keep out of trouble and make myself very small in the world.

Mario:
All alone?

Rynn:
We worked out every detail, we knew it wouldn't be easy. Here's a letter from my father: Don't give in and play their game, fight them any way you have to, survive. That's what he said. Then he kissed me and walked off into the trees and down the lane.

Rynn:
[after Mario returns Mrs. Hallet's car] Did you lock all the doors? [Mario palms the keys to Hallet's car] You should've put 'em through her office mailbox.

Mario:
No I shouldn't, let me tell you, I'm sitting there in her Bently, in the dark, right? In front of her God damned office, trying not to let anybody see me and ask me what I'm doing, I gotta be careful right? Now, I may not know why Mrs. Hallet didn't drive her own car back, but one thing I do know, why would Mrs. Hallet put her own keys through her own God damned office mailbox? She wouldn't, she'd keep her keys, they'd be wherever she is.

Rynn:
You got any pets?

Mario:
Nope, just my parents, which I water and feed regularly.

Mario:
What, are you gonna bust us for drinking here? I won't have it!

Miglioriti:
You're just lucky I don't smell any grass.

Mario:
You got any? I'll buy it cheap.

[last lines]

Frank Hallet:
You should see the way the fire lights up your hair. All yellow and gold. [coughing] Such lovely hair.

Mario:
Aw, hey Gordon...

[Rynn smacks Mario's hand when he touches the hamster]

Rynn:
Get away.

Mario:
Man, you won't even trust me with your rat!

Rynn:
He's a hamster.

Mario:
Yeah, well he looks like a rat.

Rynn:
You look like a rat.