EPISODE 8/29/00
Simon And Lily Are About To Give Up Hope

Home
Simonscript
August, 2000


TUESDAY, AUGUST 29, 2000

Scene 1:
Place: Deserted island off of the North Carolina coast - Atlantic Ocean.
Location: The cave.

LILY WALSH SNYDER AND SIMON FRASIER

>> Lily: Well, breakfast is served. You guessed it -- mangoes. How many ways can you serve a mango? 20, 30? I heard you pacing all night. Look, am I being insensitive? I'm making quips about being here on the island, and you've lost your sister. Do you want me to leave you alone?
>> Simon: How could I have let it happen?
>> Lily: You did everything that you could. If you had followed her out there, you would've drowned, too.
>> Simon: I just don't understand how it came to this. I was up all night trying to pinpoint the moment -- the exact time that my sister just stopped simply being difficult. She turned into this cold, heartless, insanely greedy thing that I hardly even recognized.
>> Lily: Maybe that's just it. Maybe it is insanity.
>> Simon: No, no, no, no. Didn't she know that her obsession was gonna bring about her undoing? I keep turning it over and over in my head as if it would hurt less if I could just -- if I could just understand the steps that she took that ruined her. She's dead. Lily, she drowned. She drowned for some -- for some stupid hunk of glass.
>> Lily: The diamond's gone. She took it with her along with everything else. I'm so sorry.

Scene 2:
Place: Deserted island off of the North Carolina coast - Atlantic Ocean.
Location: The Cave

SIMON FRASIER AND LILY WALSH SNYDER

>> Simon: Celia, she drowned with the diamond. What a joke. What a very, very special kind of justice. The thing is, I think that she would much rather be dead with it than alive without it. Don't you see, Lily, that this is just the perfect ending to a very long and unhappy tale?
>> Lily: Perfect? Perfect? No, it's not perfect. It's -- it's --
>> Simon: It's bizarre. That's what it is. It's bizarre, just like Celia.
>> Lily: It's bizarre like everything else that's happened to us since we got stranded on this pile of dirt.
>> Simon: It's been tough, Lily, but we have to hang in there together. It's what's -- it's the only thing that's kept us alive so far, and it's the only thing that's gonna keep us going.
>> Lily: I'm tired of hanging in there. I am so tired of getting my hopes up just to have them shot down again. We built two rafts, Simon. Two! Just to find out that we would have drowned on them anyway. And I'm so tired of bony fish dinners and mangos for breakfast every single morning! And bathing in that hole -- I'm extremely hot, I'm extremely cold! I dream about my family! I dream about them welcoming me home with open arms, drowning me with kisses. And now I think about my family and I -- I can't even say it.
>> Simon: Say it, Lily. Say it.
>> Lily: Nobody back home misses me.

Scene 3:
Location: The cave.

SIMON FRASIER AND LILY WALSH SNYDER

>> Simon: You know what one of your great contributions has been the whole time that we have been here?
>> Lily: Mango butter?
>> Simon: Yes, that and hope. It is what has kept us going. I've told you that so many times, and I'm not gonna let you give it up.
>> Lily: Hope was what kept me going when I thought that I had to get home to my family. That someone there missed me. That pull, that drive to get home to them -- I don't have that anymore. So it's hard for me to go on trying. You're talking about planting crops, corn for next year --
>> Simon: Listen, that is survival. That is survival. That takes planning. And it also takes not losing hope.
>> Lily: How could I have hope if this is my life that I'm looking at?

Scene 4:
Location: The cave.

SIMON FRASIER AND LILY SNYDER

>> Simon: Look, making a long-term home here doesn't mean that we're not going to get off this island. Listen, it only means that we are being smart about staying alive. And if we get through next winter -- if we get through -- when we get through next through next winter, we will have a great crop next year. We'll have corn, fruit, a whole variety of foods to keep us healthy and strong. The longer we stay alive, the better chance we have of being found. Look -- very soon, the trees are going to start losing their leaves. Think about that. We're going to be a lot more visible from the air. And I will go up there on that cliff and I will build the biggest, most gigantic bonfire you have ever seen. And I will keep it burning constantly so we have a better chance of being spotted by a plane.
>> Lily: Cooley was here for 24 years -- 24 years, and nobody found him. What makes us different?
>> Simon: There is a huge difference! Cooley did not want to be found. We do. Don't give up. Just think of it as pooling our resources.
>> Lily: What do you mean?
>> Simon: It means we have to use everything that we have got to make the best of this situation. If envisioning yourself with Luke and Faith making mud pies helps to keep your spirit alive, then you've got to stoke those daydreams. It is difficult here, and neither one of us want to be here, but we have to take the hand that we have been dealt and ask ourselves, how can we make this better? And I'm not talking about coping, not merely coping. But taking this life and making the best possible life from the circumstances.
>> Lily: Is that all?
>> Simon: No. We never, ever stop looking for a way off. It's going to get easier.
>> Lily: Do you dance?
>> Simon: Dance? Where did that come from? Do I dance?
>> Lily: Yes. Yes. Yes.
>> Simon: Yeah, yeah.
>> Lily: Will you dance with me sometime? I used to love to go dancing. I miss that.
>> Simon: All righty then, let's go.
>> Lily: Oh, no, no, I didn't mean now.
>> Simon: No time like the present. Come on, what else have we got to do?
>> Lily: Okay. This is kind of difficult without the music.
>> Simon: Well, then, you're gonna have to hum something. Think of the last time that you went dancing. What was playing?
[ Lily humming ]

Scene 5:
Location: The cave.

LILY WALSH SNYDER AND SIMON FRASIER

[Lily humming.]
>> Simon: You know what we need?
>> Lily: What?
>> Simon: A little bit of Cooley's rocket fuel.
>> Lily: But Celia burned down Cooley's hut. Where did you get that?
>> Simon: The guy's smart. He must have buried it in the sand in case of emergency.
>> Lily: Oh, do we dare drink anything that he's touched?
>> Simon: Come on. Alcohol kills germs, doesn't it? I just say we throw caution to the wind and let the chips fall where they may. Bottoms up. I reckon you can just throw it back.
>> Lily: Well, it's -- look at it, it's like morning.
>> Simon: Oh, come on. This is an island. Where's the clock?
>> Lily: I'm not much of a drinker.
>> Simon: Well, this ain't much of a drink. Come on, see, that's the face that makes all my fishing and planting all worthwhile. Come on, chug it back.
>> Lily: [takes a drink] It's not bad. Wow.
>> Simon: That's not good.
[ Lily laughs ]
>> Lily: Wow.
>> Simon: You know, I haven't set out to deliberately get drunk since I was in secondary school. Me and a few mates, we tried to catch and ride a kangaroo.
[ Lily laughs ] I'll show you the scars if you want.
>> Lily: No, please, keep that to yourself. A kangaroo -- I've never ridden a kangaroo, but I also have never deliberately set out to get -- what was that word?
>> Simon: Smashed.
>> Lily: Smashed.
>> Simon: Drunk.
>> Lily: Smashed. But then again, I never thought I'd be stranded here on an island while some cheap showgirl shimmied her way into my life, so here's to ya. Smooth.


Home
Simonscript
August, 2000