SCENE FOURTEEN
On the street. PAUL is waiting for STELLA to exit the dance studio. She exits and sees him almost immediately. She stops as he stares.
STELLA
Do I know you?
PAUL
I’m Paul. Paul. Banks. Paul Banks. We’ve - You don’t remember me.
STELLA
I meet a lot of people.
PAUL
I’m Roland’s friend, no, don’t leave, I understand, I do, you you you come on, please, I know you’re upset with him, he didn’t mean what he did -
STELLA
What do you know? About it! What do you know about it?
PAUL
That he left you.
STELLA
Anything else?
PAUL
What?
STELLA
Do you know anything else?
PAUL
What do you mean? I -
I’m just trying to find him.
STELLA
He’s gone? Good. This town is better of without him.
PAUL
It is?
No, please, would you please stand still! Listen to me! He was missing, I didn’t think he was gone, I kept thinking I saw him, in the park, at my job, out of the corner of my eye, and just when enough time passed and I forget… I saw him again. He looked bad, bad bad. Worse than I’d ever seen him.
STELLA
Good! He deserves to be back on the streets, the filthy fucker.
PAUL
He - haaa- he nearly killed me.
STELLA
Lucky.
PAUL
He said he needed to see you.
STELLA
No.
PAUL
He’s in bad shape.
STELLA
He’s not here is he?
PAUL
No.
STELLA
Then why do I smell him?
Oh, it’s you.
PAUL
I, uh, changed jobs. I’m at a meat processing facility.
STELLA
A slaughterhouse.
PAUL
Yes.
STELLA
Roland would come home from work smelling like a hundred dead pigs. It always turned me on. Still does. Paul Banks, you aren’t trying to seduce me, are you?
PAUL
No! No.
STELLA
Because you could. That thick smell, lights off, I could almost-
.
.
.
.
You tell him to meet me. Why put off the inevitable.
You ever been in love Paul?
PAUL
No.
STELLA
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