Miller's Girl

Fuck.

What is an adult?

Becomin' one didn't suddenly transform me

into anything outstanding or significant.

I am 18 and entirely unremarkable.

Languishing in the wilds

of nowhere, Tennessee.

In this tomb of a house left to me

by my brilliant and selfish parents.

They're not dead...

though they pretend I am.

They're permanently abroad.

Literature is my solace in the solitude.

And writing is my only means of escape.

Because, you see...

I've never left the edges of this town.

It's positively gothic, really.

Lonely girl longs to escape

the interminable boredom of her small village.

Lonely girl longs to be meaningful.

Lonely girl longs to be loved.

Books make longing seem romantic, but it's awful.

It's greedy.

And I wear longing like a fucking veil.

(CAPTIVATING INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC PLAYING)

But today?

Today comes with something new.

Something surprising.

Today I meet a writer, like me.

A teacher.

One who somehow found inspiration

in a place like this.

If you can believe it.

Well...

I suppose even graveyards grow flowers.

(CAPTIVATING INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC CONTINUES)

Good morning.

Morning.

You know, class doesn't start for another hour.

I know. I don't like crowds.

Uh-uh...

-Do you live far? -Close enough to walk.

-Oh, where's that? -Lovell Hill?

You live in Lovell Hill?

-You know it? -I just didn't think it was

occupied by anything except ghosts.

-Who says it is? -(CHUCKLES)

You, you really live in Lovell Hill?

Wow.

It's enormous.

My parents are lawyers.

-Hmm, what kind? -The expensive kind.

And you wanna be a lawyer?

About as much as I wanna be a high school student.

What's your name?

Cairo Sweet.

-I'm Mr. Miller. -I know.

My friend Winnie recommended your class.

Uh-huh. (INHALES SHARPLY)

Uh...

Now I'm assuming that you got one of these before...

the holidays.

Got a chance to look it over?

I read it.

I, I, I know it looks like a lot,

but I promise you we'll get through it

as quickly as we can.

I read the whole list.

Wait, you read these?

Well, like, there's 12 books on that list.

I party hard.

-Winnie. Mm. Hmm, hmm.

One semester wasn't enough for you?

Did you miss me?

I did not.

Well, that's too bad.

You're overdressed as usual, I see.

Your underwear, as usual, I see.

How boring.

Censorship is dead.

It can't exist with the Internet.

And yet it does.

Do you know why?

-(INHALES DEEPLY) Yeah.

-Do you? -(JONATHAN GRUNTS)

Ignorance is a product of laziness.

-Not limitation. -(WINNIE'S STOMACH GROWLS)

Oh. (BLOWS RASPBERRY) Excuse me,

but what's that you say?

You want a chicken biscuit

and a Coke?

Mm. Well, you heard the boss.

It's chickybikky Coke-y time, let's go.

You want anything, Mr. Miller?

No, thank you, Cairo.

Sweet of you to ask.

I see what you did there.

"Cairo, sweet of you to ask."

Not.

Good one.

Like we've never heard that before.

Jesus.

My God.

What you reading?

-Uh, nothing. -Doesn't look like nothin'.

It's a student's.

Oh, yeah? What's her name?

How do you know it's a girl?

Oh, boys are too lazy to read porn.

How do you know it's porn?

"Marcelle wants me to fuck her.

"She leaps off the couch

-"and pushes herself..." -Boris.

"...between the girl and me.

"It's all so fantastically horrible

-"that I can't move." -Give me that.

-"Marcelle stretches..." -Okay.

-"...her tiny split fig." -That's quite enough...

-All right. -...of your elocution...

-And test tomorrow, kids. -I think. (SIGHS)

Well, "Split fig" is fucking poetry.

-This coffee for me? -Biscuit, too.

One of yours?

Oh, yeah, that's one of yours.

One of mine. Exactly.

-Christ! -(LAUGHS)

I don't know what you're doing,

-but it's some... -Oh, you know. Come on, now.

I'm trying to just entice you. What the...

-Man, that's good. -"Oh, I read The Paris Review.

-"I'm so smart." -Can you not?

"Everybody, I'm in high school.

-"But I read The Paris Review. - Boris. Boris. Come on.

"I'm better than most people."

-Stop, please. -Is this her diary?

Oh, what do we have here?

Well, well, well.

"Apostrophes and Ampersands..."

six abysmally romantic short stories

by Jonathan Albert Miller.

-She has my book? Mm-hmm.

It would appear so. It would also appear

she's the only one who checked it out.

Yeah, well, don't you have a class to teach?

Well, you know,

I can't start my day without seeing you.

No, you really can't.

Hey, how'd you score the big room anyway?

They cut the theater program.

But they kept you?

Along with the other props, yeah.

-Damn. -Mm-hmm.

-Hello, wife. -Hello, husband.

Beatrice.

-What? -Look at me.

Huh.

Red-Letter Day.

What, your school finally get computers?

Better.

Indoor bathrooms?

A writer.

One who reads Finnegans Wake

of her own volition. Can you believe that?

Well, I'm forever stunned that the children

in that backwater shanty can read at all.

And, uh, guess what else?

-Naked Lunch. -Mm-mm.

Apostrophes and Ampersands.

She...

She checked it out of the library.

They carry your book at the library?

-(CLICKS TONGUE) Aw. Fuck. -(CELL PHONE VIBRATING)

-A Confederacy of Dunces. - Mm-hmm.

Well, deep breaths.

-Happy place. -(SIGHS)

My happy place has all their heads

impaled on Montblanc pens.

Share your riches.

-(JONATHAN INHALES SHARPLY) -(CELL PHONE STILL VIBRATING)

Hello, Amy.

What? Are you fucking joking?

I've been back and forth all day

with the Nashville office who can't seem to articulate

what it is they want

and somehow think they can articulate

to me, which is pretty ambitious

considering how they think

"articulate" is a Danish cheese.

So, I'm about to start fucking scooping out

my teeth with a baby spoon.

Mm. They can go

fuck themselves if they think I'm gonna change the ending.

Okay, have a nice day, bye-bye.

(THERE'S A BLESSING BY JOHNNY COPELAND PLAYS OVER SPEAKERS)