LATERAL

1.MAY MORNING

A blue bicycle lies in the sand of a small beach town, New York City. Ten feet away, a glass bottle of whisky glistens in the early morning sun. Next to it, lies Sarah, sleeping in the sand, her head lightly throbbing from a nocturnal tumble down a short concrete staircase.

Sarah opens her hazel green eyes and sees the ocean, the calm winds gently guide her fully awake. The beach, vast and empty, offers the tired girl a modicum of relief; no judgmental eyes. Surprisingly, not that injured from her exploits, she arises. The young lady picks up the bottle and eradicates the last swig. Her eyes glow with moisture and widen, as if awakened by the taste. She picks up her bike, left to Sarah by her father, and walks it up the stairs.

Lost in the chasm of depression, a black hole that has swallowed Sarah most of her life, she rides her ten-speed bike downtown, to teach a piano lesson.

Sarah sits in a modern home, as she listens to her eight-year-old student play Beethoven's ‘Moonlight Sonata.’ Sarah is struck by the domesticated nature of her pupil’s house. She is reminded of a faint memory – Sarah’s dad at a piano, on a warm morning of some June day, playing some sad tune, just months before his death. Sarah’s little hands gripping a plastic rocket-ship toy. The image of her father’s face was never clear and fades everyday.

The lesson ends, Sarah leaves through the front door, her student follows. Sarah turns around and squats in front of the doorway. She tickles the little girl on the belly. Laughing, the tiny protege hands Sarah a folded piece of blue construction paper. Sarah opens it and somberly smiles. She speaks softly and genuinely to the little girl,

“I am so proud of you, little monkey.”

Giggling, rubbing her own belly, little monkey shyly responds,

“I know.”

Sarah sits atop a moderately paced ferry, as it escorts her and other residents of this small beach town to the island of Manhattan.

She rests on the top deck, reading ‘SIDARTHA’ smoking a cigarette, with an unintentional licentiousness. Her light brown hair playing songs in the wind of the bay. Sarah’s head vibrates, as it is time for her fix.

Consoling the catastrophe of her chaotically incantatory mind, Sarah ruminates the complexities of the city. She walks a long distance to the west village, pondering the machine of Manhattan. The brokers and bartenders, the actors and poets, the little city children, sheltered from the suburbs, exposed to fast cabs and slow methadone nodders. She settles at a sidewalk cafe, enjoys a glass of red wine, and a slice of flourless chocolate cake.

Dusk blows winds of cool air on her smooth, fair skin, as Sarah lays on the top deck, high on the exhaust fumes of the last ferry.

As she lays, the boat glides under the bridge of her childhood beach town, cars drive over the transparent steel grating, creating a hum, a tonality of her youth. She looks up at the cars through the grating, presumably filled with happy families, on their way home, kids tucked safe in the back seat, as mom and dad enjoy the elegance of the sunset.

She looks back at the bridge and notices the sounds of the cars driving on the steel grating, the tonality of her youth, fading in the distance.

After Sarah’s long day of metropolitan exploits, she finds herself sitting at a lonely table of the ‘Tiki Bar’, a sad, drunk look in her eyes.

The local bar, not far from her house, sports many of the typical decorum of a Hawaiian-style saloon. Dimly lit, tiki hut awnings, hang above totem pole wall mounts.

Having only eaten cake, all day, Sarah’s drinks have a strong effect. She sits visibly intoxicated. A cigarette burns in the ashtray on Sarah’s solitary table. She abandons it, slowly stumbling out of the low lights and judgmental eyes of the ‘Tiki Bar.’

One man, reading a newspaper, observes her without judgment, but instead, concern – an innocent, cautious look in his young eyes. The lean man, sporting a modest white tee-shirt, puts down his newspaper and follows Sarah out of the bar.

Sarah stands, unbalanced, as she attempts to unlock her car. The man intervenes . . .

“Hey, it’s none of my business, but I don't think you should drive.”

The man’s voice is kind, Sarah’s response is not.

“Fuck off.”

The man stands confused as car keys come hurtling towards his feet, thrown by the frustrated young drunk, admitting she is unable to drive.

Guided by stuttered directions, the man drives Sarah home. She takes the keys out of the ignition and makes her way into her ranch-style house.

The man sits in the car and waits to see her make it in safe. A small piece of blue construction paper delicately sits on the bench seat, he opens it . . .

‘Happy Birthday Sarah,

- love little monkey’

The man’s heart aches. The idea of this stranger, alone on her birthday, strikes his soul, he gets out of the car, and walks off into the night.

2. WEEKS LATER

Sarah comfortably lays on her white couch, in an afterglow of new friendship. She had bumped into the man, a few nights after his chivalry. Seamus; the black-haired man she recognized from a drunken memory is kind to her. The two new friends of around the same age, fell into a quick platonic bond, he didn't judge her, he didn't want her, he only experienced her, a feeling she had longed for her entire life; the unconditional feeling of friendship. They shared subjects of pristine privacy, including the loss of their parents – Sarah’s father went down flying a small airplane, his body was never found.

It’s 9:00 PM. The white walls of Sarah’s living room reverberate the sound from her late 1980’s television set; inherited from her late mother, a car accident claimed her life when Sarah was eight-years-old.

Carl Sagan’s “Cosmos” glows the room with light. His mellifluous voice fills her home . . .

“The most bizarre aspect of traveling near the speed of light is that time slows down. All clocks mechanical and biological tick more slowly near the speed of light, but stationary clocks tick at their usual rate, if we travel close to light speed, we age more slowly than those we’ve left behind.”

Sarah, having seen this clip before, remains enchanted by the concept of ‘time dilation’. The idea stimulates her and reminds her of the beautiful finite nature of life. Comforted by the sounds of the TV, the young lady falls asleep peacefully.

3.THE METEORITE

Yellow yolk sizzles in a pan, as Seamus hand squeezes oranges into a bright blue bowl. Sarah sits stoically, playing a sophisticated Sonata, in her well-organized home. It starts slow, with heart-aching melodies and syncopated chords, played fortissimo. The young lady plays with the skill of a musical savant, muddled by the all-consuming experience of severe alcoholism.

Seamus drinks a refreshing glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. Sarah drinks a glass of ice water, accompanied by two aspirin.

“You know, sometimes I can still hear my father at his piano. I wish I got to play for him, I’m sure he’d be proud of my playing, he was quite good as well. I don’t even have any photos of him.”

Sarah grabs a newspaper, sitting on her coffee table. The date on the front page - ‘May 1st.’ She hands it to Seamus. He reads the front page . . .

‘METEORITE HITS SMALL BEACH TOWN’


Seamus says,


“Oh, you have it, that’s awesome ! On your birthday, no less.”

Sarah has a flashback from about a week ago . . .

Sarah and Seamus explore an abandoned tuberculosis hospital, located in the suburban section of their little beach town. They sneak through the backyard of a large beach house, hop a small chain-link fence with bright green artificial hedge slats and sneak into the old hospital.

Sarah had spent her teenage years sneaking around the old hospital with friends, long before the drink had intruded on her. Back when the feeling of friendship mattered the most, the time in life when friends feel like family, before everyone grew up and became workers of the village, soldiers of the senate. Sarah mourns her childhood friends, who had chosen a different life path to hers.

Sarah and Seamus reach the roof. The view of the shoreline astounds them – a quiet summer morning, with very few beach goers.

Sarah points west,

“You know, that’s where the meteorite hit us ?”



She giggles, “It was on my birthday.”

Seamus responds, 
“Yeah, I saw the photos in the paper.”

Sarah feels blessed. She was profoundly stimulated by the mysteriousness of the universe and astronomy.

The two friends climb a sheltered hallway on the roof and sit on top, soaking in the view of the shoreline.

They sit close.

Due to the heat, and the influence of some mid-morning drinks, Sarah becomes smitten with Seamus. She flirtatiously brushes on his leg, with her delicately feminine hand. He slowly removes it and speaks softly . . .

“I don't want that with you. We have something stronger than romance.”

Seamus takes a moment. With a quiet confidence, he looks Sarah in the eyes . . .

“We’re friends.”

Sarah’s lasciviousness quickly fades. She looks at Seamus; dark hair and light eyes. She looks further in, his kind heart, his bright soul, his friendship. Sarah realizes he had become her true friend, here on this roof of an abandoned hospital, overlooking the ocean.

The new platonic bond hoists Sarah out of the cavern of depression. A hole that had trapped her so many times before. Moments of happiness brighten her again, like when she was a little girl, gazing at her mother speak on the phone, drawing little pictures with a blue pen on clean white paper, awe-inspired by the simplicity and sophistication of life and art.

Sarah snaps back from her flashback, staring at her empty plate, glazed with egg yolk. Her headache is gone.

4.LATE AUGUST

Its 7:00 PM. Sarah walks over to Seamus’s house. She sees kids playing in sunlit mist, emitting from a fire hydrant. The unblemished joy of pure youth strikes her heart. She feels sweet pain, like a knife, slowly slipping into her soul; a contrast of vicarious joy and mourning for her childhood. She craves a stiff drink, like medicine for her soul.

She hasn't drank in a week. An experiment.

As Sarah walks, she remembers something Seamus said, about a week ago, sitting at a bar, slowly sipping his beverage.

“Drinking is like the ocean, if you don't respect it, it will destroy you.”

He had become a master of the social drink. He was never hungover, because he never overdid it. His early twenties were rotted with drunk driving and philandering. He had seen himself in Sarah, but never said it. He never judged her and for this she loved him, more than she had ever loved another person in her entire life.

She snaps out of the flashback and finds herself at Seamus’s house. The two friends embrace after their weeklong hiatus.

Seamus says . . .

“Listen, I’m gonna jump in the shower, then I’ll be ready to go.”

Sarah sits and grabs a Skateboard magazine from Seamus’s coffee table. She hears the shower turn on, a sound she always loved. She remembers when her mom would take a mid-day summer shower, just to cool off.

A cozy Sarah flips through pages of the skate magazine. She notices an old shoebox, much older than she, peaking out from under the couch. Sarah lets go of the magazine with one hand and curiously pulls out the box. She puts the magazine down, picks up the box and places it on her lap, and innocently opens it. The young lady is shocked upon viewing the contents . . .

Sarah pulls out old photographs . . . of herself when she was a little girl.

A pile of pictures of little two-year-old Sarah and her mom. She places her hand over her mouth, as not to scream. Sara flips through the photos in a state of disbelief and confusion.

She lands on a photo of Seamus at NASA, sporting an older style spacesuit, holding his space helmet, subtly smiling for the camera. He stands in front of a rocket-ship from twenty years ago. She flips the photo over, the date confirms this. He doesn't look a day younger than the night they first met.

Sarah continues to quietly go through the box. She gently pulls out a NASA space flight medal.

Something in the box catches Sarah’s eye. In utter disbelief, she slowly pulls out a plastic rocket-ship toy. She can’t process this. It’s the toy from the faded memory of her father.

The faint memory hits her again – she sits as a two-year-old, listening to her father playing piano, gripping a little rocket-ship he gave her as a gift. The shower stops. Sarah gently puts everything back in the shoebox, except the rocket-ship, which she places on Seamus’s coffee table.

Seamus walks into the room. Sarah is gone. He sees the rocket-ship on the coffee table.

Seamus’s intuition leads him to the abandoned hospital, where he and Sarah had previously explored. He sneaks into a backyard, hops the short fence with the bright green artificial hedge slats, traverses seven flights of stairs and walks out on to the roof. Sarah stands there, quietly observing the dusk-lit ocean.

“Sarah,” Seamus says, a little out of breath.

The silence is defining as Sarah gazes into her father’s eyes, for the first time since she was two.

She figured it all out. Her dad didn't die, he didn't go down in some plane. He was an astronaut, sworn to secrecy, floating in space, aging slower than those he had left behind. But why ? In her stillness, in her soul, she couldn't figure out why.

Seamus stands quiet and still. Sarah, speaking through held back tears, calmly says . . .

“Why did you leave me ?”


Seamus responds gently,


“I had no choice.”


He walks over to her, sorrow in his eyes,

“I was a young astronaut . . .”

He takes a deep breath,

“Twenty-five years old, twenty-five years ago, earth time.”

Sarah is stunned, her father had experienced time dilation - a concept that had stimulated her mind, so many times before. In her state of confusion, Sarah asks . . .

“Why didn’t you tell me ?”


“I couldn't, I was sworn to secrecy.”

Sarah stands at the well-wall of the roof, self-soothing by slowly stroking the brick. Seamus continues in a soft, secretive voice.

“Earth was under threat. Threat of complete annihilation. NASA received a transmission from deep space, a message from an advanced civilization, far away.”

Seamus looks into his daughter's hazel green eyes.

“. . . Lightyears away. The transmission was concise; we were considered a potential threat to the universe and deemed unworthy of continued existence.”

Seamus explains his journey. The launch, the time dilation, the council of beings that he met on the distant, earth-like planet.

“I tried to reason with them, but their minds were made up. But there was one man who listened. The only one of the five with any sense of empathy on his human-looking face.

The man walked with me.

I told him that I had created life, and for the rest of my life, it was my responsibility to take care of it, to take care of her. So that she can flourish, and grow, and one day create life of her own. I told him that, more important than my mission as a diplomat, that I had a mission as a human, as a father.

I pulled from my space-suit your toy rocket-ship, I told him it was yours and that I had taken it for luck. He took it from me.

The next morning I stood at the council again, this time, the man stood by my side. He explained to the others, that we were worth sparing, that we too, love and laugh and that forgiveness was the better option, than vengeance, than finality.

The man pulled out your toy rocket-ship, approached the council and quietly spoke to them. The main council member looked at your toy and then into my eyes.

So . . . they let me go.”

Seamus furrows his brow, as not to cry.

“ . . . and they let us live.”

Sarah stands still, in a state of confusion.

“Your mother was also sworn to secrecy, she burned all my photos, to protect you.

She couldn't risk involving you if I came back. We had planned to tell you in secret, but by the time I returned, she was gone.”

Sarah speaks with a gritty, curious voice,

“When did you get back ?”

Seamus stares west, where the meteorite hit their little beach town. Sarah understands. It was no meteorite, it was her father returning, the morning of her twenty-seventh birthday, having aged hardly at all. Seamus remembers the morning perfectly.

1.MAY MORNING

Seamus awakens to the pneumatic sound of his cryo-sleep chamber, as it slowly opens. He gazes at earth, through a thick glass window. He sets his coordinates for his little beach town. The ship reenters the earth’s atmosphere, darts quickly through the clouds, and lands on the beach. The main hatch creaks open. The sun is just beginning to rise. Seamus knows NASA will come for him, to ensure his secrecy, so he runs. Seamus quickly traverses the boardwalk on this early May morning, and from the distance he sees a blue bike on the beach. His blue bike, and a young lady, sleeping in the sand, soaking in the morning warmth of the sunrise. The closer he gets, the surer he is, it’s her. It’s his daughter he left behind when she was two, an adult now, the same age as he. He stops running and stands fifty feet away from Sarah, in a confused state of awe. Her hair is long and light brown, like when she was little. Two NASA agents locate Seamus, run up from behind and handcuff him.

Seamus sits in an interrogation room, deep in the confines of NASA, where he is again sworn to secrecy.

Seamus returns home, he walks around his beach town. It looks different. Twenty-five years have passed, but Seamus has only aged a year. He picks up a newspaper dated ‘May, 1st’ and reads the front page. . .'

‘METEORITE HITS SMALL BEACH TOWN’

Seamus throws the newspaper in his backpack.

Later that night, Seamus walks into the ‘Tiki Bar’; a Hawaiian-style saloon. Dimly lit Tiki Hut awnings hang above totem pole wall mounts. Seamus sits at a table and pulls out his newspaper. He begins to read the ‘METORITE’ cover up story and laughs to himself. He hears someone enter the bar, they stumble past him and settle a few tables away. Seamus looks at her carefully, its the girl he saw sleeping on the sand, next to his old blue bike, Its Sarah, his daughter, a sad drunk look in her eyes.

7.A RETRUN

A disarrayed Sarah lays on her couch, the morning after her father told her everything. It’s as if her only true friend had disappeared and her father came back from the dead. This experience leaves her exhausted. She slowly sips a banana beverage. Just a little bit of sweetness with her sadness. The cognac and banana, subtly muting inner tones of sorrow. All she ever wanted was her family, and she had found it, not in the return of her father, but in his friendship, which all seemed to fade away once she knew the truth, like finding out your dad let you win in some dumb game.

Sarah sits at her piano. She opens the fall-board revealing her rocket-ship toy, an envelope leaning against it. Somberness strikes her heart, her lips daintily tremble. She re-centers herself, opens the envelope and pulls out a letter . . .

‘Dear Sarah,

As I stood on the boardwalk, watching you sleep in the sand, next to my old bike, I realized you had grown up in pain and grief. And that the shock of the truth would never reverse that pain. I never meant to burden you with the tragedy of my return.

As I sat in the deep confines of NASA, signing my life away, I decided, there and then, not to tell you who I was or what I’ve done. I decided to wait, for when the time was right. I decided to leave this place.

Pure chance brought us together at that bar. I knew I shouldn't intervene, but I saw my kid, lost. Lost, so long, in the forest of grief and anguish, lost in loneliness, lost in life. My little girl was struggling and I couldn't ignore it, I had to try and help. I had to try and find the smiling little girl I left behind.

I planned to watch you from afar, but we found each other. The more time I spent with you, the more I realized you’d be ok without me. But at that point, I wanted a relationship with you, even if it was too late. Even though you were already grown, even though I knew I was risking everything. So, I stayed and our bond grew stronger.

I see now, that you’ve raised yourself to be a kind, gentle, intelligent, self-sufficient young lady. I see that you haven’t allowed your heart to grow cold, despite it all. You were right about me, I am so proud of you, of the person you’ve become. And when you’re ready to have me in your life, in any way, at any time, I’ll be there. You’re my blood, and no amount of distance or time can ever change that. I love you, little monkey.

- Love Dad’

The young lady welts up with tears, she envisions her father’s pain, forced to leave her, with the weight of the world literally on his shoulders.

Sarah closes her piano, in too much pain to play.

8.THE BOND

A week goes by. Sarah’s windows are open, letting in a late summer breeze as she plays sad songs, pondering the insanity that has ensued. She contemplates the confusing timeline of her father’s exploits and sacrifices – the abandonment, the adventure, and the return, and her place in it, and earth’s place in the Universe. The screen door ventilates her little ranch-style home with fresh ocean air, making its way in between every thought, attempting to alleviate her thinking mind. Sarah gently lets go of the confusion, like a child's hands, loosening a toy as they fall comfortably asleep.

The front door creaks open. While still playing, she slowly turns her head and sees a man.

Seamus walks over and sits down next to his daughter, echoing the faint memory of Sarah’s youth. An unclear anamnesis that had floated in her mind forever. A memory of love that had tortured her with vagueness. A moment of safety, which she had ached to return to. Seamus watch's Sarah’s hands dance on the keys. She can feel his smile. He presses one key, in perfect timing and tone with Sarah’s song. The two play together, sharing the unbreakable bond of music. The bond that had stood the test of space and time.

Sarah’s smile reverberates the room with a sense of relief; she had found her family in friendship. And for a moment, unbound by grief, unfettered by sadness, she finds peace, watching her dad play the piano, like she had done so many years ago, so many times before.