Youth Page #3

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The lifeguards withdraw.

The forty-year-old woman with a kindly, patient face is his

companion, apparently. She sits next to him and lovingly rubs

his hair with a towel, caring for this immense whale.

FADE OUT.

2. EXT. VENICE. NIGHT

Guitar notes - irregular, sporadic, imploded, muffled sounds

that seem to come from the deepest depths of the sea or your

own conscience - surface now and then during the scene.

What we see next is like a vision.

A breathtakingly beautiful vision: high water in a deserted

Saint Mark’s Square. That vast space, with its unforgettable

porticos and palaces, is now a square lake, water lapping at

the columns.

A narrow, raised walkway intersects the Square. But there’s

no one on it, at least not right now.

Then, in the dead of night in this most mysterious city, Fred

Ballinger appears at the far end of the long walkway. Like

all old people, he looks vulnerable as he shuffles along,

taking tiny, trying steps.

Fred looks up and espies a statuesque female figure coming

toward him from the other end of the walkway. They move

toward each other, the only human beings in this surreal,

submerged Venice. They’re closer now, they’re about to meet.

With ill-concealed amazement, Fred fixes his eyes on the

woman:
she’s 6’1”.

7.

An impossible beauty, with black hair and eyes so green they

seem fake, wearing a one-piece bathing suit and a sash that

says MISS UNIVERSE.

She’s even closer now, approaching him with the solemn,

inhuman gait of a top model in a big-time fashion show.

They’re about to meet. But the walkway is only three feet

wide, so they both move aside to let the other pass without

falling in the water. It’s inevitable that they touch. Miss

Universe’s plentiful decollet. brushes against Fred’s scrawny

chest.

He gazes up at her from below, as if he were beholding a

benign tragedy.

Like all beauty queens, she stares coldly into space, not

even noticing her perfect body’s fleeting contact with Fred.

Having avoided a mishap, they each proceed on their way. The

beauty queen sways off into the full moon, surrounded by that

expanse of water, like in some debatable Dolce & Gabbana

dream.

Fred shuffles along the walkway. He’s afraid now, and with

good reason:
the water is rising quickly, flooding the

walkway and swirling around his feet, his ankles, his knees.

Fred tries to hurry, but he’s old and the water tugs at his

legs. He turns and cries out in a suffocated voice, as if

begging Miss Universe for help.

FRED BALLINGER:

Melanie, Melanie!

But Miss Universe is no longer there, it’s as if she

evaporated.

Fred keeps going, but not for much longer. The water is up to

his chest now, his neck, his chin, he’s panicked, a stifling

guitar note sounds, when, luckily...

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