Chapter 19
INT. MILL HALLWAY – NIGHT
Tatum bursts through a door into a hallway. The mill is like one giant maze. She turns, looking every which way.
She hides in a closet.
Another door slams open. Ned storms into the hallway, knife in hand.
NED: Oh Tatum – Tatum, dear! Daddy just wants to have a little chat.
Tatum squeezes herself down, holding her breath. Ned passes by her closet. She breathes a sigh of relief.
NED REAPPEARS OUTSIDE HER CLOSET, WRENCHING THE DOOR OPEN!
Tatum screams as he tears his way through. She lashes out, kicking him in the gut. He doubles over and she barrels past him.
Ned laughs.
NED: Hide and seek, is it? Oh, how much I've missed out on!
CUT TO:
Tatum races down the hall. She stops. Ned appears at the end of the hallway behind her. He's taking his time, toying with her. She grunts, looking around.
She chooses a random door and breaks through it.
CUT TO:
Tatum finds herself standing on a rafter at the top of the factory, several stories high. She whimpers as she gingerly steps out onto it, trying not to look down.
Ned appears behind her. Tatum screams, trying to scurry across to the other side. She makes it halfway, before she SLIPS!
Her fingers lash out, grabbing the edge of the rafter! Ned walks catlike along the rafter, knife pointed upwards.
NED: That's the beauty of eventually getting a job with a group like PANTHYR. You get trained in all sorts of martial arts that you never learn as a regular cop. Not to mention how to hack cell phones, tv's – heck, even prison compounds that Cyrus was too stupid to realize I was hacking the whole time!
Ned is slowly approaching Tatum as she struggles to pull herself up.
NED: It's such a shame, Tatum. We could've all been so happy together. You. Me. James. Heck, even John.
He reaches Tatum and kneels down, staring into her eyes.
NED: It's such a shame you chose Billy-Bastard over all of us. But don't worry – I'll attend to him after you. The two of you can join each other in death. Together – forever!
He raises his knife.
BILLY: Don't count on it!
Ned starts!
Billy is standing on the rafter, behind Ned, fists clenched. Ned roars with rage and raises his knife, charging Billy. The two struggle – and go over the edge together!
TATUM: NOOO!
Ned plummets the full height. It happens as if in slow motion. His eyes glaze over and – THUNK! He hits the ground facedown, landing on the blade of his own knife. Blood pools around him.
CUT TO:
ABOVE:
Tatum is holding onto the rafters with one hand, her fingers barely holding on. With the other hand, she clasps Billy's. He stares up at her with all the love and affection in the world.
BILLY: You saved me …
TATUM: You saved me too …
CUT TO:
EXT. MILL – NIGHT
Tatum and Billy sit on the back of an ambulance, blankets around them, a repeat of their survival of the first massacre as bodies are wheeled out in bags. Their fingers are intertwined. They smile at each other.
CUT TO:
Across Woodsboro, order has been restored. Dewey leads the police force in rounding up the remaining criminals. The National Guard helps out – they lead away many PANTHYR guards in handcuffs for crimes against the prisoners while in the prison.
CUT TO:
Governor Terrence and Mayor Osborne watch the proceedings. The governor is a defeated man. The mayor puts his hand on his shoulder and the governor sighs.
GOVERNOR TERRENCE: I think retirement suits me better.
CUT TO:
INT. HOSPITAL - MORNING
Dewey is sitting in a waiting room with the Minister from earlier. Both of their eyes are closed and their heads bowed as they pray together. Dr. Orth approaches and stops. He sighs.
DR. ORTH: Sheriff -.
Dewey's head pops up. The Minister squeezes his shoulder.
DEWEY: Give it to me straight, Doc.
DR. ORTH: (sighs) There's another complication –
Dewey buries his head in his hands.
DR. ORTH: (smiling) – but she made it through the night.
DEWEY: What?
DR. ORTH: Like I said, it took a miracle … but her condition stabilized.
Dewey clasps his hands looks upward in bare humility.
DEWEY: (looking up) Thank you.
DR. ORTH: You can see her now.
Dewey practically stumbles over himself – he stops.
DEWEY: You said there was another complication?
The doctor sighs and hands him a report. Dewey reads it and as he does his eyes widen more and more -.
DEWEY: A – a baby?!
CUT TO:
Gale is lying in her hospital bed having woken up. Dewey is at her bedside, holding her hand. Gale takes his hand and smiles.
GALE: You're going to be a father, Dewey.
DEWEY: (beaming) You're going to be an awesome Mommy.
GALE: No one better mess with my kid – Mama Bear's got claws.
DEWEY: You're – you're not going to make another documentary about all this, are you?
GALE: Uh – duh.
DEWEY: Just … just make sure you get my good side this time.
CUT TO:
Tatum and Billy, both bandaged, watch Dewey and Gale banter together. They smile, holding their hands.
BILLY: Is that gonna be us when we're married?
TATUM: I hope so. (Beat) So … you still want to marry me after finding out my dad was a psycho and my sister tried to kill us four years ago?
BILLY: In the immortal words of Gale – "Uh, Duh."
Tatum beams. Then her face falls. Billy notices.
BILLY: What's wrong?
TATUM: (playing with her hands) There's … there's something I have to tell you and I should have told you a long time ago …
WE ANGLE ON:
We see Tatum explaining her situation to Billy, though we don't hear her words. We see Billy's face fall, see him pacing as Tatum continues talking, see him slide down on the floor and bury his hands in his face.
The audio comes back.
TATUM: … so I understand if you want to call things off …
BILLY: (looking up) What? No!
He stands up.
TATUM: I don't know how long we'll have together.
BILLY: That doesn't matter. It's not the quantity of the time spent – it's the quality. What matters is making the most out of however long we have together.
TATUM: I love you, Billy. Always and forever.
BILLY: I love you too.
They embrace, and their lips part.
CUT TO:
The scenery changes around them as they kiss, morphing into the interior of the church, Tatum and Billy now in their wedding clothes, sharing their first kiss as husband and wife.
CUT TO:
Martha sits in a house with a television on, a laptop on her lap. She hits play. A recording appears on the television. Randy again. He's got a headset on and he's doing his old podcast. He's giving a final monologue. Martha smiles at the sight of her brother.
V/O RANDY: So what do you say in the midst of some of the most horrific events you can imagine? When friends are forced to say goodbye, sometimes forever? When things are completely out of your control and you feel helpless?
We watch Billy and Tatum holding hands in a doctor's office, worry on their faces.
V/O RANDY: When the cold candle of life goes out, the vapor of our lifespan evaporates?
Billy and Tatum kneel before a gravestone in a cemetery – RENEEE RILEY.
V/O RANDY: Well, there's nothing to say. It isn't the fact that you keep living forever. What's important – is that you lived.
Tatum throws Billy a surprise birthday party. He walks in stunned as she, Gale, Dewey, Martha and Billy's mother Debbie pop out. Gale is holding a little baby boy and Dewey is beaming.
V/O RANDY: But you may ask – isn't it unfair? Some people get lifetimes together and others a few short years, while others maybe even a few minutes? Well, the forces of the universe have their own agendas. We're to be taught something - it isn't the duration, it's the quality!
We see Tatum and Billy in the same doctor's office – but now, they're positively beaming. We see an ultrasound of Tatum's womb – a baby.
V/O RANDY: We take the wins, the precious joys we get and we hold them in our heart forever. We hold them tightly, so that when the moments of adversity come – tragedy and heartbreak, we have something to hold on to. That's what keeps us going. That's what keeps us sane. That's what keeps us human. We sail forward on the eternal ocean, keeping an eye on the horizon that meets us.
We see a sailboat. Billy is standing there, hoisting its sails. His little daughter, NICHOLETTE – the spitting image of Tatum, laughs as the boat bobs along the waves. Tatum has her hand on her shoulder, pointing to a dolphin. Behind them, Gale and Dewey hold their son, DWIGHT JR. They stand with Billy, watching the horizon.
V/O RANDY: And we realize that the reason the horizon never meets us is because this isn't the end. It isn't goodbye. Love, like the horizon, is eternal. When it' s the real thing, it exists forever. Trying to shut it down is like trying to catch the horizon. So in closing, though the universe crumble around us, though friendships be severed, relationships cut short, we continue forward, holding on to the dearest moments and realizing that's it's not important how long we lived – but that we live.
We see an old mantle. Dozens of photographs are there. Tatum and Billy at their wedding. At a carnival. On Billy's boat sailing. In France. Kissing in front of the Leaning Tower of Piza. Holding a newborn baby girl. In each one, their smiles are unmistakable.
And no one who saw those pictures could ever doubt: they did live. However long they have left together, whether a few years or an entire lifetime, they hold and cherish each second with each other.
CUT TO:
The images swirl around, back to the present day. Billy and Tatum are in the church on their wedding day, kissing as the audience applauds. They live in this moment, holding it forever.
THE END