Glock
Neil?
(No response)
Neil?
Many a mockingbird will sing a song so sweet,
the wind will even take the time to listen.
And the grass grows green while the wind blows the sweet song
back to where it came from.
(No response)
Follow me, Neil. It’s time to laugh out loud. Laughter is the voice of reason.
The sound of the hyena just before it kills the lion.
But some men think it best to remain silent, and thought a fool,
then to speak up and remove all doubt.
Can I get you some coffee?
(Walks over to his rock)
(No response)
I said coffee, bean juice, cup o’ joe, high test, low test, Mississippi mud ...
you drink the stuff?
Neil
Yeah, I drink coffee.
Glock
(Pouring coffee into mug)
Well, o’kay then. Settle down, Neil.
There’s no need to be nervous. You’ve already got the part.
There never was an audition and there are no rehearsals.
My next question is .... how do you like it?
Neil
How do I like what?
Glock
Your coffee.
Neil
Black. Black is fine.
Glock
I knew that. That’s how I drink mine, too. Pitch black. The darker the better.
I already know alot of things about you, Neil.
Neil
How do you know my name?
Glock
I know you like the New York Giants, raspberry swirl coffee cake,
Thousand Island dressing, and peanut brittle but not peanut butter.
I looked it all up in the Encyclopedia of Possible Messiahs. You were on page 5, Neil.
Look at this coffee mug...it’s even got your name on the side. See?
I wasn’t sure if it’s spelled correctly but I’m not a very good speller anyway.
Somebody else made the mug ... but I make the coffee, Neil.
And it’s good. Very good. That’s the truth.
Here you go.
(Hands Neil his coffee.)
Neil
You’ve been expecting me.
Glock
Of course we’ve been expecting you! WELL.....waiting for you is more like it.
Please. Have a seat, Neil. Alot of people have been waiting for you.
Ever since the tunnel building ever began. And that was a long, long time ago.
You, Neil Potter, are the reason many people still have a shovel in their hands.
People have been digging and building these tunnels ever since there was dirt to dig. There is no other explanation.
It’s kind of like standing in your own stadium on opening day.
How does it feel? How does it smell?
The people like you, Neil, and they want to meet you. They want to shake your hand up and down until it falls off, so they can walk away with it. They’re fanatics!
They are your fan club, Neil. Congratulations.
They’ll make shirts, hats, buttons, bumper stickers. They’ll make whatever they want. They’ll even say your name when they feel like swearing.
“NEIL POTTER, DAMNNIT!” Maybe, maybe not. Who knows? The whole Shabang. How’s that sound? Pretty good, huh?
But none of these people know you smoke, drink, still love that Matilda girl in Georgia, eat pork, gamble, and are obviously a little ripe around the armpits.
If they knew all of this. .. they might have wished you never surfaced.
But you did. They’re waiting for you to walk into their wonderland.
And to tell you the truth, Neil, I’m a little surprised you even bothered to show up.
Neil
You have mistaken me for somebody else, obviously.
Glock
Nice try, Potter. Sure, there’s alot of drowning men out there who want to be saved,
but the lifeguard gets dragged down with `em. The hug of death.
You made it through these tunnels alive, Neil. Not a small feat.
And that means only one thing.
You, Sir, have got yourself a bottomless cup of coffee.
Can I get you some more?
Neil
Ridiculous as this may seem, I am not interested in any more of your coffee.
Glock
Well isn’t that nice. Oh, that’s really nice. I like that.
A man who makes up his own mind.
But the people will expect more from you than that, Neil.
They’ll expect their own image. They like coffee.
And they also like two forms of appropriate identification.
So, ...let me think ... I’ll give you my big, funny hat and I’ll give you my shoes.
Rubber sole. See? These shoes should last you forever.
The rest of the clothes you’re wearing are fine.
And if you like, I can demonstrate how to pull rabbits out of the hat.
Neil
Some other time.
Glock
Sure, Neil. Very good. Very nice image. Very polite. That’s good.
But the people expect you to pull rabbits out of this hat.
And they expect you and your new shoes to tap dance between the raindrops.
Many people will try to do the same, but only the thunder will speak your name.
This is what will happen, Neil. This is what the people expect,
because this is what they believe.
The same people built these tunnels, old and crumbly as they are,
and they’ll keep building what they believe brick by brick
until their inspiration is finally paid off and firmly in place.
One day these tunnels will crumble but for now it keeps the rain off my head
and provides the rabbits with some place to go.
And it’s here that I can talk to you.
I like to talk.
Neil
If you’ve been expecting me, then who are you and who are “they?”
Glock
Me?! I’m not who you think I am, Neil.
And I’m certainly not a balloon animal blown up by the mouth of a clown.
Some people think I’m a king. An old man locked away inside a kingdom,
inside a room where no one can ever find me.
And that’s not entirely true, either, Neil, because you found me.
So I’ll tell you who I am.
I’m the Mayor of this place. A supervisor kind of guy.
I make sure the people with the picks and shovels keep digging.
They’re the ones who built these tunnels, like I said. And nobody’s gonna stop `em. They dig and they dig dusk `til dawn. For what?
Well, maybe that’s something you can tell me. I don’t know.
They’re digging all over the planet and the truth is
I don’t even know if they know what they’re digging for! Maybe you know.
I just hope they’re happy while they dig for it.
Neil
They’re digging.....?
Glock
That’s all. I’m just here for converstaion.
I like to relax, take my shoes off, make my coffee and introduce myself.
Have I done that yet?
Neil
No, not by name.
Glock
Well, pardon me. Sometimes I can be very rude.
I like you, Neil, and I like to talk. I also like to pour coffee and every now and again
I like to pull rabbits out of my big, floppy hat. Why not? It’s funny.
And you know what Neil? Some people study each bunny
until they’re convinced it’s very much real.
Then there’s the other people who try to pull the whiskers off.
And all that does is make my rabbit very, very angry.
I’m sorry about your friends in the tunnel, but not really.
Neil
You killed Sam and Karen.
Glock
Look at this. I’ve had this little doo-dad for years.
(Opens hand and a pencil appears in his palm)
I can’t spell very well, so it’s funny that I even have a pencil.
You know. One of those things.
You look at it and you think HEY! It’s a No. 2 pencil. And you know what, Neil? You’re probably right. You’re right. It’s just a No.2 pencil.
(No response)
Oh sure. It’s just a No.2 pencil. I’m aware of that, Neil. Believe me.
But mankind knows very little about this pencil.
They think it’s made of lead, graphite, clay, or charcoal.
But the truth is most people don’t care about the lead, the graphite, the clay, or the charcoal. They care about themselves, Neil, the whiskers on the rabbit.
And they care about the color of the pencil.
This happens to be a bright, shiny, yellow pencil.
The graphite inside is actually made from the compressed bones of your friend Karen. Your friend Sam is now a No. 2 pencil tucked away in my back pocket.
Henry David Thoreau made pencils. And then I made pencils from Mr. Thoreau.
You know him? Brilliant man. Good pencil, too.
Neil
You expect me to believe...
Glock
I built the machine a long time ago. A mass producing pencil-making machine.
It was quite a project.
Then I learned how to do it myself.
Being me you can do things like that. Don’t ask me how I do it.
It’s a “trade secret.” And I’d like to keep it that way, if you don’t mind.
Neil
Who are you?
Glock
Well, first of all, obviously you don’t like my coffee, and I find that hard to believe. Secondly, they say there’s no such thing as a dumb question. Only dumb answers.
But I don’t want to give you a dumb answer, Neil.
And thirdly, don’t be nervous. I’m not gonna turn you into a pencil.
Somebody else can try and do that. And I know they will try, so let me think....
let me see.....you need a name to know who I am....I got it!
Why don’t you call me `Glock.’ My close friends call me Glock.
Some people call me Skip. The rest call me collect.
That’s a little joke, Neil.
Here. Have a pencil. It’s the least I can offer.
Neil
No, thank you.
Glock
I insist, Neil. Please. It’s a complimentary gift. Here. Take it.
Look it...
(Point on pencil materializes)
there’s even a point to it now.
Neil
I said no thank you.
Glock
Isn’t that funny? Neil Potter is a very, very polite young man
who is afraid of a very ordinary No. 2 pencil.
It’s just a pencil, Neil.
Neil
You killed Sam and Karen.
Glock
Are you sad, Neil? Whenever I’m sad, I mean really, really sad,
I cry and I cry and soon enough I can see a rainbow! It’s the darndest thing.
I sneeze and the weatherman calls it a hurricane.
I scratch myself ... and there’s an earthquake. On and on...
Most things I do, I cannot prevent. Why did they die? Why did they live?
I leave it up to you, Neil. You inherit the wind. All I do is make the rainbows.
Neil
What about the rabbits?
Glock
The whiskers of a wise man is all he understands. The rabbits are not in the tunnels, Neil. But they will find you. One by one, they will surround you, hobbling on three feet, sniffing you until they feel courageous enough to ask you questions. Rabbits are very curious animals, much like people, and some seek revenge until a human foot is on their key chain. Life will be very strange when the rabbits find you, Neil. Perhaps, by then, there will be no more whiskers and no more reason to understand. I have to go. You have a job, Neil. Or is it a mission?
Neil
Where are you going?
The skies are grey. I have to make more rainbows. What else do you want me to do?
Don’t forget your pencil. And, of course, your pencil box.
(Neil opens pencil box... Poem on spinning slate.....)
"This box of tools
for ship of fools
will mend the mast and bow.
A box of wind will blow you in.
No one to teach you how."
(Neil walks up stairs in back of room towards field outside where 10 people in various religious allegiance are lined up like bowling pins. A gust of wind topples them over and Neil
walks towards them, dazed yet enlightened staring ahead clutching his pencil box.)
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