Randi and Shane share misgivings and Shane reveals family is in town.
Cast
Randi Halle Millien
Shane Mark Millien
SFX and Music Contributors
SFX
Q Tone [Query]
Tone 4.wav by patchen of freesound.org
Q Tone [Response]
Tone 3.wav by patchen of freesound.org
Music
Helen’s Second Letter
Epic Strings by Rowan30000 of looperman.com
Created by Mark and Halle Millien
Cover Art by Halle Millien
Written, Directed and Produced by Mark Millien
Glossary
Jude Philips: Shane’s older brother, who would eventually wind up fostering Shane in high school.
outers: slick silicate lined garments worn over normal clothes that are designed to repel liquids, oils and dirt as well as to be sterilized quickly in a residential or commercial sanitizer. Also called slickers.
specs: slang for qnet spectators.
Helen’s Second Letter:
Easter came and went in barren churches and cathedrals throughout the world. We’ve never been particularly religious but the absence of performative devotion is profound. No pastel peacocks. No restaurants teeming with brunch drunk disciples. No crowds of any kind. Deserted sidewalks and vacant roads, like the world is in mourning, which it is, I suppose. We take walks everyday, all of us, except your father of course, but the rest of us typically make the pilgrimage to visit the mausoleum that our neighborhoods have become. A place where living used to happen but is artificially frozen in place. Restaurants and barbershops and nail salons and bikeshops arrayed like toys. They could all be open tomorrow, tonight, but most won’t ever see another customer. They won’t rise on the third day, just die like the rest of us. I said the sidewalks are vacant. They aren’t. I saw blocks and blocks of chalk art framed in the jagged squares of concrete slabs under our caravan’s feet, though the children who etched them had vanished. Each of them inspired hope or unity. Patience and fidelity. There were signs on powerline poles that said “I can’t hug you but I can tell you that I love you”. I felt like an archaeologist clumsily navigating a long hidden utopia. The leader of the free world did a lot of lying today but that just made the chain of days seem more infinite without notable distinction. Until I read an article, which prompted me to write this today, to you. It was about a scientist. Her name is Kizzmekia Corbett. She is leading a team that is at the forefront of a vaccine. She’s 34. As I read I thought about Nina Simone’s song, Young Gifted & Black. Which made me think of you. That song was playing in the delivery room when you slid into the world greasy with afterbirth and wailing like an angel from Revelations. You’ve never found it hard to live up to such an auspicious first impression. This woman is equal parts genius and round the way girl. She clearly felt comfortable in the skins of her ambition and identity. I hope that you continue to foster that. There was something she said that really sticks out to me. “You understand that your work will have to be mighty so that it can do your speaking.” It might as well have been an incantation. I felt savage after reading it. My feet went kicking under the table as my arms shot up like one of those airblown advertising dummies. I startled you, siting across the table from me, the peanut butter jelly smear across your chin marring your perfect skin. Instead of reassuring you I lunged at you and trapped your cheeks between my hands, driving my eyes into yours like a madwoman. I told you “Speak that SHIT” but it came out more like a growl. It was a rare moment when we were alone. No one saw the madwoman grabbing and cursing her child. I don’t know what came over me. When the others came in from the backyard we were sitting quietly across from each other like the world hadn’t just tilted. No one knew, but us. I had soaked up the hope of the day and cycled it through the metabolism of my soul into something primal, inarticulate and unmistakable, like a screaming newborn. Like my firstborn daughter. I felt the hum of a subsiding hunger in me in that moment, that had drenched me but left me damp and wilted. But I pray that I left you with its fingers around your heart. I hope that I infected you.
#covid39 #covid19 #coronavirus #quarantine #rona #quarantinechronicles #covidchronicles #coronachronicles #quibi #generationc #ninasimone #younggiftedandblack #speakyoshit #kizzmekiacorbett