Blackthorne--Episode 91

image from pinterest.com

Blackthorne

Cinemagenic Ninety-One

Home Fires

“When your time comes, sing your death song,

and die like a hero coming home.”

--Tecumseh.

1(sound cue) horses nickering, chickens clucking

over piano, cello, and harmonica.

2(overhead drone wide shot) Antlered Buck Ranch

sprawled out below; drone descends toward the

wide front porch of the main house.

3(zoom down to medium wide shot) Rod Buck stood

on the front porch in the morning sunlight. He was

pleased that the face of the ranch had changed; the

wide covered and pillared porch was rebuilt, sporting

a fresh coat of paint--white with forest green trim.

4(voice over) Buck: You sweet old lady, it feels good

to be tightening your corset again.

5(slow cuts and fades) The tall maple tree in the

middle of the yard had been trimmed. The crooked

split-shingle roof on the bunkhouse had been 

patched; tar paper stuck out like lettuce on a 

sandwich around the newer shingles. Adjacent to

the bunkhouse, a low lean-to wood shed bristled

with freshly split pine chunks. All the rail poles in

the corral fences were freshly white-washed.

Johnny had sharpened a sturdy red scythe he

found in the barn, and had cut the grass around

the main house. Buck had washed all the tall

windows on the ground floor. That morning, the

doors were opened, and the screen doors

glistened, airing out the old Victorian structure.

6(cut to a medium wide shot) to the first corral,

next to the bunkhouse, where the Eagle was

halter-training one of the more obstinate pinto

mustangs. 

7(pull back, widening the shot) to reveal two more

stock pens; the first one was rectangular, and it

held thirty head of sleek horses; wild-eyed, long-

maned saddlers that were milling around, eating

hay, but dreaming of the grasses of freedom.

8(cut to interior of the main house)

9(sound cue) heavy boots and screen door opening.

Buck appears in the doorway, and stops in the foyer.

10(sound cue) banjo and fiddle violin.

11(cut to overhead crane shot) To Buck’s right was

the living room, and his father’s adjoining den. To

the left was the kitchen and the dining room. Every-

where, furniture sat and stood just as it had been left

fifteen years before, draped in sheets that were dun

gray with a decade of dust. Ahead of him were the

wide stairs to the bedrooms on the second floor.

12(cut to the top of the stairs) observing Buck

ascending the stairs, stopping at the landing.

13(medium wide shot) His parent’s room was at

the head of the stairs, little Jack’s to the right, and

his old room was to the left. Buck stood staring at

the three brass padlocks on the door to the

master bedroom. 

14(flash back) the day of his mother’s funeral, when

his father, still in his funeral suit, clicked shut the

third padlock, screaming: Fuck you, God! You have

reclaimed my angel, and torn open my chest, and

devoured my heart! She loved you--I only tolerated

you for her sake...and this is your revenge?

15(cut to exterior ranch pond) Bill Buck tossed the

padlock keys out into the dark water, then slumped

weeping to his knees, pulled out a whiskey bottle

from his inside pocket, tipped it up and guzzled

it like lemonade.

16(sound cue) voice-over: Roddy?

17(back to the present) Buck turned slowly. He saw

himself as a ten year old boy at the bottom of the 

stairs, his oversize boots muddy, his shapeless hat

on the floor beside him, struggling to unbuckle his

raincoat, and chewing his lower lip.

Roddy, is that you?

Yes, Mama--looking up at Buck, his eyes bright blue,

his tousled blond hair starting to darken.

Did you wipe your feet?

The boy looked down and saw the mud he had

tracked in. He pulled off his boots and sat them by

the door, then looked up at Buck again, holding a

tiny finger to his lips for silence.

Yes, Ma, I wiped them...but I still got some mud on the

rug. Buck heard her footsteps, smelled the apple pie,

and suddenly, there she was.

Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub OLN