CAST:
PAUL - Any race, shabby, unemployed, often homeless, redeems soda cans to survive, 40ish.
SAMANTHA - Any race, a bit pretentious, 35.
Setting: Present day, sidewalk outside Samantha's Brooklyn brownstone. Two trash bags sit on corner.
(PAUL pulling a cart loaded with empty soda cans. He
stops and rummages through two trash bags.)
(SAMANTHA exits her home and encounters PAUL.)
SAMANTHA
Excuse me. Would you please refrain from rummaging through my trash.
PAUL
Lady, once it’s out here on the curb it’s not your trash anymore.
SAMANTHA
I think you’re mistaken. I don’t lose possession of my trash simply from setting it out
on the curb. Anything you find on that curb still belongs to me.
PAUL
Would you like me to gift wrap this pile of dog shit for you? I almost stepped in it.
SAMANTHA
I’m sure the smell would be an improvement.
PAUL
Are you saying I smell? You don’t know me.
SAMANTHA
No. Not first hand I don’t. But if you spend your day searching through trash cans, I
would expect you to smell unpleasant.
PAUL
Well your trash is the first of the day, lady. So I’m still smelling rather rosy.
SAMANTHA
Is this how you make your living? Rummaging through other people’s trash, hoping to
find discarded Pepsi cans?
PAUL
Diet Coke. You only drink Diet Coke. So in your case I’m hoping to find some empty
Diet Coke cans.
SAMANTHA
That’s an invasion of privacy. I don’t know how I feel about a strange homeless man
knowing what soft-drink I prefer.
PAUL
Collecting your empty soda cans isn’t an invasion of privacy. Me knowing your social
security number is 100-62-5578 is an invasion of privacy.
SAMANTHA
Wait a minute. That’s correct. That’s my social security number. You’re a thief.
PAUL
I didn’t steal anything. I just memorized it. It was right here in your trash and I just
happen to have a very good memory. You should look into getting a paper shredder.
Most folks these days aren’t as honest as me.
SAMANTHA
You have no right memorizing my trash. Whatever is in those bags is personal and
confidential. I don’t want you looking through my trash anymore.
PAUL
Lady, I told you. It’s not your trash once it hits the curb. What good is your social
security number to me? Do I look like an identity thief to you? It’s hard enough being
myself. I can’t imagine being a 35 year old, divorced woman , with three cats, a bachelors
degree in French Literature, behind on most of her credit cards, and having an affair with
the Spanish guy at the corner bodega.
SAMANTHA
Do you sit down at Starbucks with a bucket of my garbage and just have a good read?
You have no right to know so much about me.
PAUL
I just have a good memory. Honestly, I don’t intentionally read your trash. But once
something catches my eye it gets recorded in my memory banks. I have what they call a
photographic memory.
SAMANTHA
Keep your memory out of my garbage bags. It’s not proper.
(SAMANTHA takes out iPhone and snaps a picture of
PAUL.)
PAUL
Did you just take a picture of me?
SAMANTHA
Yes I did. I don’t have a photographic memory, and I just might need to describe you to
the police one day.
PAUL
Your mother’s right.
SAMANTHA
I beg your pardon?
PAUL
You think you’re better than other people. That’s why you didn’t go to your sister’s
bridal shower. You thought she could do better than a guy who works for Jiffy-Lube.
SAMANTHA
You are a vile wicked man. It’s bad enough that you rummage through my trash, but you
actually read my mother’s letter?
PAUL
It was more like a short note. And who throws away letters from their mother? She
won’t be alive forever. I’ve kept every letter my mother ever wrote me. They come in
handy when you start missing them.
SAMANTHA
Forgive me if I don’t take relationship advice from a street junkie.
PAUL
There you go again. Assuming I’m a junkie because I’m out here collecting soda cans. I
guess it would never cross your mind that I might be an environmentalist? Maybe this is
my small attempt to erase your carbon footprint. If it wasn’t for me your Diet Coke
cans would find their way into the landfill. And most of this other stuff-- you should be
composting. You have a nice little backyard.
SAMANTHA
What do you know about my backyard? Have you been in my yard? Have you been in
my house? I think I need to call the police. Something isn’t right here.
(SAMANTHA starts to call 911.)
PAUL
Hold on.! Hold on! I’ve never been in your backyard. I’ve never been in your house.
Listen, I just want your cans. I don’t want any trouble. I know about your backyard
because you threw away a bunch of photos, last year after the divorce. It was a picture
of you, Tiny, Elvis, and Bradley Cooper.
SAMANTHA
You know the names of my cats? You know I got divorced?
PAUL
Divorce isn’t easy, Samantha. He used to drink 7-Up. His name was Jack, right?
SAMANTHA
Yes. That’s my ass-hole of an ex-husband. Wait. Did you just call me Samantha?
(exasperated) Well of course you know my name. Is there anything you don’t know
about me? When was I born?
PAUL
January 3, 1979.
SAMANTHA
What high school did I graduate from?
PAUL
Woodrow Wilson High School in Syracuse, New York.
SAMANTHA
What’s my guilty pleasure?
PAUL
Re-runs of The Love Boat on the Lifetime channel.
SAMANTHA
What’s the name of my best friend?
PAUL
(silence) You don’t have one.
SAMANTHA
I most certainly do to have a best friend.
PAUL
(silence) No, you don’t. Wasn’t it your best friend who cheated with Jack?
SAMANTHA
Get away from me. Get away from my house. Get away from my garbage. I don’t want
to ever see your face around here again! You have no right to rummage through my life!
PAUL
I’m sorry, but you asked. And I’m not breaking any laws. I haven’t worked in five
years. I need these cans.
SAMANTHA
Listen, why don’t I separate the cans for you. How about that? Each week I’ll have a
separate bag that will contain all of my Diet Coke cans. Just stay away from the other
parts of my garbage.
PAUL
You would do that for me?
SAMANTHA
Yes, I would do that for you. But only if you promise to stop memorizing the rest of my
trash.
(PAUL starts rummaging through his cart.)
PAUL
Let me give you something.
SAMANTHA
No! Please! I don’t need anything from your cart. I mean, I’m sure you need everything
that you have.
PAUL
It’s not a problem. It’s not even mine. It’s yours, actually . I saved it. Here.
(PAUL hands SAMANTHA a letter.)
(SAMANTHA scans the letter.)
SAMANTHA
It’s the note from my mother about missing the bridal shower. Why would you save
this? She called me terrible things in it..
PAUL
I know. I read it all the time. All day long people call me terrible names. A lot worse
than anything your mother wrote in that note. But at the end of the day, I read your
mother’s letter and it always make me feel better.
SAMANTHA
My mother calling me terrible names makes you feel better?
PAUL
No. What she writes at the end of the letter. That always makes me smile.
(SAMANTHA reads ending of letter.)
SAMANTHA
“But in spite of all your shortcomings, I love you from now to eternity.”
PAUL
Yeah, isn’t that nice. You can keep it. I have it memorized.
(PAUL walks away pulling his cart.)
PAUL (cont'd)
Thanks for the cans. And think about starting that compost pile.