FADE IN
HELEN AND INEZ ARE UNLOADING BAGS FROM THE CAR WHICH IS PARKED IN FRONT OF A RUSTIC HOME, SURROUNDED BY GREENERY. HELEN EXAMINES INEZ FROM A NUMBER OF DIFFERENT ANGLES.
HELEN
Hair's good.
INEZ
Not too red?
HELEN
No, it's nice and she did a good job on your eyebrows too. God, I don't remember the last time my heart went pitty pat with the anticipation of a boyfriend. I'm jealous.
INEZ
I'm a nervous wreck. It's so stupid. God, I'm sixty two years old. But this will be our longest time together and I can't stop thinking about all the things that could go wrong.
HELEN
Well, we get to meet Matt this time. You promised.
INEZ
I can't stop thinking about all the things that could go wrong.
HELEN
Well, Aunt Norma will keep your mind off of it for a few hours.
INEZ
Yeah, belittling me a Scrabble. Really Helen. I don't want to play.
HELEN
Oh come on Nezzie. It's just a game.
INEZ
Bull. You guys are evil.
THE FRONT DOOR OPENS AND DAVID, AN IMPECCABLY GROOMED MAN IN HIS SEVENTIES GREETS HELEN AND INEZ WITH HUGS AND HELPS THEM CARRY IN THE BAGS.
HELEN
I brought those Vietnamese sandwiches she likes and I baked the almond cookies for you guys.
DAVID
What a sweet girl you are. Listen darling, Hilda is still helping Auntie with her ablutions and I have to make a quick trip to the pharmacy. Norma will be out in a few minutes so just make yourselves at home for a bit.
DAVID EXITS
INEZ
God, I love it here. It's exquisite but totally lived in. And man, what a view.
HELEN
Lemme show you her office.
CUT TO
INEZ AND HELEN IN NORMA'S OFFICE. THERE ARE SHELVES OF BOOKS AND A WALL COVERED WITH PHOTOGRAPHS.
HELEN (POINTING TO A PHOTO)
That's Norma and my mom, and my Uncle Seymour and my Grandma.
INEZ
You look like your Grandma.
HELEN
My mom was always embarrassed by her. Said she was frumpy and unsophisticated. And Norma, of course, was a disheveled beatnik.
INEZ
Well, Edie was fancy schmancy.
HELEN
You know that she and Norma went for decades without speaking. Something about a nose job. I never got the straight story. But in the end, just as Edie was starting to lose it, somehow they patched things up. Norma was with her when she died.
INEZ (pointing to a photo of Norma in her WAC uniform)
Norma right?
HELEN
Yup. Serving her country. She was at a base on the British coast. That's where she met Randolph.
INEZ
I saw Censor.
HELEN
Oh, she hated that movie. They turned it into a romance. She was furious. I have the book if you ever want to read it. It's really harrowing. Can you imagine what it must have been like to read and censor all those letters to and from the soldiers at the front? She was younger than Hannah. But she did get her PhD on the G.I. Bill.
INEZ
It never even occurred to me that women in the service would be eligible for that education stuff.
HELEN
They had to fight for it and make a lot of fuss.
INEZ (pointing to another photo)
Oh my God! That's Norma with Eleanor Roosevelt!
HELEN
Yeah, Norma was an adviser when they started the United Nations.
HELEN (pointing to another picture)
Know who that is?
INEZ
It's Norma, but who's the other woman?
HELEN
Hannah Arendt. Heard of her?
INEZ
Jeeze. I may suck at Scrabble but I have been educated. "The banality of evil..."
HELEN
They taught together at Wesleyan.
HELEN (pointing to another picture of three men and Norma on the deck of a sailboat)
Check this out.
INEZ
Oh my God. That's David. And Norma and Randolph. And that must be Walter. He was so handsome and David was just gorgeous. God, he's still handsome but what a knock out...
HELEN (pointing to another photo)
There they are with Christopher Isherwood. Walter was amazing. He reminded me of Cary Grant. He was the first person I knew who died of AIDS.
INEZ
What, like 1983?
HELEN
Maybe '84. Horrible horrible horrible. Burned in my psyche. I can still conjure the odor. David nursed Walter to the end. And of course Norma would go next door and help out.
INEZ
Oh, they were neighbors?
HELEN
Oh, yeah. That's how they met and became friends. You don't know the story?
INEZ
What?
HELEN
Oh, the weirdest saddest thing you can imagine. Walter was dying and Norma was helping David. They never said anything explicitly but I think they may have hurried things along a bit. Norma stayed until the coroner left. Then she came home and found that Randolph was dead on the kitchen floor. Aneurysm.
INEZ
So they both lost their partners on the same day?
HELEN
Yeah. They took it as some sort of omen. David moved in here and they rent out the house next door.
NORMA (from outside)
Is there someone snooping around in my office?
CUT TO-
NORMA, VERY OLD BUT ELEGANT AND HANDSOME ENTERS USING A CANE, LED BY HER HELPER HILDA, OUT TO THE PATIO AND SEATED. INEZ AND HELEN FOLLOW. INEZ NOTICES A SCRABBLE BOARD SET UP ON A TABLE AND GIVES HELEN A DIRTY LOOK. HELEN KNEELS AND KISSES NORMA AND RISES TO HUG HILDA.
HILDA
She's all ready to slaughter you at Scrabble. I'll see you tomorrow.
SHE EXITS
INEZ
Helen was just showing me the photos in your office....
NORMA
Oh, what a life you've lived old lady...
INEZ (STAMMERING)
I didn't mean...
NORMA
No, it's David. He put all that stuff up. The little shrine. My grotto. I know he means well but it feels reductionist. She was here. She was there. She met so and so. And there you have Norma Finer. I'm ninety-six God dammit. There's a helluva lot more than those pictures on the wall...
DAVID ENTERS
DAVID
Is she blathering on now about her rich and complicated inner life? The razor sharp mind stuck in the decrepit body? I'm almost twenty five years younger and I take six different medications a day. Norma takes a vitamin. Usually washed down with gin. We're stuck with the old bat.
NORMA
Pshaw! If you're ninety-six and not thinking about the grim reaper, you're a moron. And you know what pisses me off?
DAVID
That's a very long list. Shall I begin with "A"?
NORMA
I'd bore the hell of you if I were a sweet little old lady. I spoke at Davis Meyer's funeral last month. And with that, there are none of my colleagues left to eulogize me. My books are all out of print.
DAVID
They'll trot out one of your grad students. And you had that article in The Journal of Social History just over a year ago.
NORMA
Well Inez, I hope you've been practicing your Scrabble...
CUT TO
THE FOUR ARE SEATED AROUND A SCRABBLE BOARD. NORMA USES A MAGNIFIER. DAVID POURS GIN. HELEN PICKS UP THE GAME BOX AND REMOVES A THICK SHEAF OF YELLOWED PAPERS
HELEN
Look, she's kept the scores of every game since the fifties.
NORMA
There's a bunch of them from when your grandma was still alive.
There's a bunch of them from when your grandma was still alive.
HELEN (looking through the papers)
Here's one of you and Grandma and my Mom. Grandma won. Oh, here's my mom and dad and you and Randolph. 1954. Mom won. God, my dad sure sucked.
NORMA
That's who! It's been bothering the life out of me. I knew that Donald Trump reminded me of someone. It's your dad!
HELEN
Yeah. You sure ain't a sweet little old lady. But the similarities had occurred to me.
NORMA
Your dad, well at least as far as I know, wasn't that crooked. But he sure was hungry for approval.
HELEN
Actually, pretty crooked. And like Cheeto, 3 wives, two foreign born.
NORMA
Well, you know. It might be nice not to kick the bucket until the impeachment. Nixon's was so divine.
NORMA
Well, you know. It might be nice not to kick the bucket until the impeachment. Nixon's was so divine.
INEZ FRANTICALLY ARRANGES AND REARRANGES HER TILES
DAVID
It's your turn Inez.
INEZ
Yeah. Just a sec.
INEZ VERY TENTATIVELY PUTS SOME TILES ON THE BOARD. THE OTHER THREE ROLL THEIR EYES. HELEN GRABS INEZ'S TILE RACK AND PLOPS TILES DOWN ON THE BOARD.
DAVID
OK, That's Q on a triple word, two for the D....fifty two points.
INEZ
QI? QI is a word?
ALL THREE IN UNISON
YES!
THE OTHER THREE TAKE THEIR TURNS QUICKLY. DAVID KEEPS SCORE WITHOUT HAVING TO LIFT THE TILES.
INEZ
Oestral? What's oestral? Is that a word?
DAVID
I wouldn't challenge her.
HELEN
Oestral. Means fertile. As in "Inez, since menopause, is no longer oestral and will therefore not require contraception when her boyfriend arrives.
NORMA
Inez, your turn.
INEZ STARES AT HER TILES AND REARRANGES THEM AGAIN AND AGAIN.
NORMA
Edie was always attracted to vapid, handsome men...our Helen is much smarter.
HELEN
You're saying that my dad was vapid? Inez, are you ever going to move?
INEZ GRIMACES AND CONTINUES LOOKING AT THE BOARD AND HER TILES
NORMA
Your father could be very charming dear but lord knows, he was no Wittgenstein.
HELEN GRABS INEZ'S TILES, GLANCES AT THE BOARD AND PLOPS DOWN A WORD
DAVID
Gardyloo?
NORMA
Should we challenge it?
DAVID
Nah. Helen knows better than to try anything untoward.
THE THREE TAKE THEIR TURNS QUICKLY, DAVID CONTINUING TO KEEP SCORE.
NORMA
Ian on the other hand, I like very much. If you have to choose between looks, money and brains, I think brains is the most enduring. At least you can have deep conversations when you're too old to screw...
DAVID (to Norma)
What a vulgar old bat you are. Did you tell Helen about New York?
NORMA
I'm not going to New York.
DAVID
The Society of Social Historians wants to give her a life achievement award. I really think we could manage the trip.
NORMA
I don't want to manage the trip. Being pushed around the airport in a wheelchair. Everyone talking down to me like I'm three years old. Or admiring my pluckiness. I don't need to go anywhere. I have my friends and my garden. We have the Netflix. And Helen showed us how to run those podcasts that we listen to with dinner. Why should I go anywhere? I've been everywhere I ever wanted to go. And to a lot of places I didn't want to go to. Well, I would have liked to see India...
DAVID
You'd have gotten diarrhea. Inez dear, it's your turn.
INEZ STARES AT THE BOARD CATATONIC, HELEN GRABS HER TILES AND PLOPS DOWN A WORD
DAVID AND NORMA
Beazort?
DAVID
Challenge?
NORMA
No, add up the points so we can eat.
DAVID
Hah! Inez is the winner. 368 points.
CUT TO
INEZ AND HELEN IN THE CAR
HELEN
I always think it'll probably be the last time I see her. Someday it will be. Soon I imagine.
INEZ
Glad you brought me.
HELEN
I made up "beazort."
INEZ
Daddy's girl.
INEZ
Daddy's girl.
FADE OUT
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