Volcano 2

ROGER, HOLLY, and MICHELLE are gathered around the volcano.

ROGER [handing a box to MICHELLE]: Plain old baking soda.

MICHELLE: Just a little spoonful, and then . . .

MICHELLE puts a little into the top of the volcano.

ROGER [handing her a bottle]: Plain old vinegar.

MICHELLE: Keep pouring it down until . . . [A foam rises from the volcano.]

ROGER and HOLLY: Lava! Ah, me! The girl’s a genius!

They hear a car horn.

HOLLY: Ah, Mrs. Reeves. Go, go, go! No, no, no! I’ll bring this. You’ve got to go get changed and go out to dinner with Ed, remember? Hurry!

MICHELLE [as she leaves]: Bye, Holly. Thanks!

HOLLY: Have a good time!

ROGER laughs at them.

HOLLY: Oh, she is great!

ROGER: And you’re a greater mother than you give yourself credit for.

HOLLY: Hmmph!

ROGER: Hmmph! I’m serious!

HOLLY: Oh, please! The last thing I need is “serious” right now.

ROGER: The only question is “Who needs who more?”

HOLLY: Who?

ROGER: Who? You or Michelle?

HOLLY: Oh.

For a split-second, HOLLY looks the tiniest bit forlorn. The second passes, however. ROGER doesn’t see it.

HOLLY: Oh, when it all first happened, and Maureen died, and she was [HOLLY shudders]. . . I watched Ed trying to get her to talk, say something, feel anything, and she’d just look out with this vacant stare. It really worried me, but she’s pulled through.

ROGER: Thanks to you.

HOLLY: I dunno. I think she did it herself, but I was glad to be there, because watching her cope with real tragedy, it, well, it made me look to myself and say, “Why can’t I be brave, too?” you know?—stop blaming everybody for letting me down and just see what I was doing to myself.

ROGER: You . . . have been let down, Holly.

HOLLY: Well, it’s all how you handle the cards, right? I mean, you can be dealt the worst hand in the world, and still . . . stay in the game.

ROGER [quietly; he smiles]: Boy, Michelle’s been really good for you!

HOLLY: I like her company better than most adults.

ROGER: Still, though, your life can’t revolve around science projects.

HOLLY: Oh, I don’t know. If science projects bring you joy, then I say, “Bring on the Archimedes’ Principle.”

ROGER: You can’t live your life through Michelle, you know? You need something for yourself. If you’re not ready to come back to work at WSPR, I can understand that, but surely there’s something else that you want to do with your life.

HOLLY appears surprisingly vulnerable as the scene closes.

Later in the conversation . . .

HOLLY: You always had it easier with Chrissy than I did.

ROGER: How do you figure that?

HOLLY: Because you had no history, you had a clean slate. I had history—a lot of history, and all of it was bad.

ROGER: That’s not true!

HOLLY: You don’t know. You weren’t there.

ROGER: Okay, look. Now you’ve got problems, not then.

HOLLY: When she was a child, it was great, but then she grew up, and ... [HOLLY sneers.]

ROGER: Holly, Holly, you can’t dwell on the past.

HOLLY: I have nothing else to dwell on with her!

ROGER: Then I will give you something, this great water fight I just witnessed. I immediately started flashing on you and Chrissy in the backyard. Remember our first house?

HOLLY: Uh-uh! You’re dwelling on the past!

ROGER: We had this wading pool, and you and Chrissy were supposed to be filling it up, and instead you got into this wonderful water fight and she was chasing you all around the pool?

HOLLY has listened carefully, but is puzzled.

HOLLY: I don’t remember a wading pool.

ROGER: Sure you do! It was blue, and she got ahold of the hose and was just soaking you? And you kept screaming for me to save you—you don’t remember that?

HOLLY: There was no wading pool.

ROGER: Yes, there was!

HOLLY: It was a sprinkler.

ROGER: Now, I could have sworn . . .

ROGER stops short. Suddenly, he flashes to a memory of CHRISSY playing under a lawn sprinkler. HOLLY comes and picks her up off the ground and swings her around, saying, “Oh, Look at you! Look at you! I’ve got you! I’ve got you! I won’t let go!”

ROGER: You’re right.

HOLLY: It was a sprinkler.

ROGER [really puzzled]: Why did I think it was a pool?

HOLLY: Why think of it at all?

ROGER: It’s a fond memory, Holly. that's all.

HOLLY: It’s a mistaken memory.

ROGER: Okay, all right . . .

HOLLY: You want to fantasize a past. You want to make it idyllic, make it perfect.

ROGER: No, not perfect, just normal.

HOLLY [laughs]: Forget it.

ROGER: No, I won’t forget it! I may be sketchy on the details, all right—pool, sprinkler, whatever—but for the rest of it I am dead on, and that’s the feelings we had for each other, the joy we had being together, just . . . just the joy of being.

HOLLY: Overly romanticized fiction. It just wasn’t that way.

ROGER: If you say so.

ROGER [lets his eyes linger on HOLLY’S face for a moment; as he goes, he adds]: It sure was great to hear your laugh again.

HOLLY grins. As she walks across her living room, she picks up a copy of the Journal.

Later that evening, HOLLY has changed into a black dress, and appears to be headed out. She picks up the telephone.

HOLLY: Yes, I’d like the number of The Springfield Journal, please. Thank you. [She dials it.] Yes, hello. This is Holly Lindsey. I’d like to speak to the editor-in-chief—Fletcher Reade, that’s right.

ROGER goes back to the SPAULDING MANSION, where JENNA and BUZZ have had an emotional conversation. When ROGER returns, JENNA asks him, with pain in her voice, “Where have you been?” ROGER replies, “Well, I’ve been with Holly. WSPR business. Absolutely nothing for you to worry about.” ROGER doesn’t see JENNA’S annoyance.

Next Episode:
Laurel Falls