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1
He sits on the floor in a room which is bare, apart from a table, a bed and a carpet hanging on the wall. His fingers are working plasticine into a strange shape. He finishes and puts the strange thing he has created in a bowl of glutinous dirty-white mixture. Then he takes the lead plates out of a car battery and bangs them on the edge of the bed to knock the residue off them, breaks them into pieces and puts them in a pan. He fetches a small hob with a bare element, places the pan on the hob and turns the hob on. He takes the bowl and touches its contents with his hand: it is as hard as stone. He scrapes out the plasticine. He looks into the pan – a small lead-coloured pool of liquid reflects his face and a white pin of light from the lampshade on the ceiling. He takes the pan and pours the lead into the bowl. The remains of the plasticine hiss, catching light, and flare up. Smoke rises to the ceiling and goes in his eyes. The tears well up. He turns away, but the tears continue to roll down his nose and then down to the corners of his mouth. Now he is actually crying. He is sobbing.
Crying as if he knew something . . .
The bowl cracks . . .
2
The entrance hall of a shabby five-storey block of flats. MAKSIM climbs up the stairs to the fourth floor. People pass him on the way up. They are silent, their faces empty. The stairway comes to an end. There is a door in front of MAKSIM. It is open; a felt boot stuffed in the crack keeps it ajar. There is a mirror hanging inside opposite the door. A red plush tablecloth with a fringe hangs over it, covering it. MAKSIM stops by the mirror and looks at it. The tablecloth suddenly falls to the floor and MAKSIM sees his own reflection in the mirror. He looks at it in amazement as if he was looking at it for the first time.
Someone touches him on the shoulder. MAKSIM turns around and sees a WOMAN in a black shawl.
WOMAN. What you do that for? You shouldn’t have. Are you a schoolmate of his?
MAKSIM nods.
Go on through . . .
MAKSIM goes into the main room. It is full of people. In the middle of the room there is a coffin with its lid on. MAKSIM stands behind TWO OLD WOMEN. He stands on tiptoe, trying to look at the coffin.
FIRST OLD WOMAN. Hey – don’t push!
MAKSIM. You what?
FIRST OLD WOMAN. Get out of it.
MAKSIM looks at her in bewilderment.
I said get out of it.
MAKSIM. But I . . .
SECOND OLD WOMAN. Go on then.
MAKSIM moves away.
FIRST OLD WOMAN. There was one like him on the bus. He got right behind me and started to rub himself up and down on me. Got a hard-on straight away. I took a-hold of him and pulled his hair. The things that blimmin’ go on. I mean, you’d think he was only a kid – but he was already getting it up . . .
A VOICE FROM THE ENTRANCE HALL. The crane is here.
The WOMAN in the black shawl goes over to the window and looks out. A LITTLE MAN in an over-large jacket goes up to her.
MAN. Where do you want the logs?
WOMAN. What? Oh . . . (She was caught up in her own thoughts.) Put them over there and here. It’s all the same, isn’t it . . .
The MAN goes out and the WOMAN begins to open up the french windows onto the balcony. The windows are sealed for the winter and the doorframe is stuffed with rags. She rips the rags out, getting angry.
WOMAN (it isn’t clear whom she is talking to). Couldn’t they have opened them up before now? The bastards . . .
She tugs at the balcony door and it flies open with a crash. Cotton wool scatters from the doorframe.
VOIC...
