GE 1997-8 Season 4 Episode 16: Back at Mom's
Note: this is not a transcript, but a working draft of the script, so there may be differences in the aired version.
PAUL: January 3, 1992, first day back in St. John's -
after Los Angeles, after stimulant induced cardiac
arhythmia and arrest, after deportation, after two
long, lost years.
All I had to show for it were a few tantalizing souvenirs,
clues to the mystery racking my newly sober conk - the charge
card, the prescription, the scars on my groin.
First day back in St. John's. First day clean and sober in
many, many years. First day back at Mom's.
Back at Mom's, after all that happened, back at Mom's.
She greets me with a piping hot bowl of rabbit soup, home made
bread, and strong tea. After lunch, I pick up the phone and
begin the process of integrating myself back into the community.
Call Ger Cadigan, there's a post-Christmas racket going on -
ugly talk about custody of the kids and whether Ger would keep
the Duster.
Try reaching Bill Murphy. Turns out he's spending the Yule
season as a guest of Her Majesty.
Next, Ish Lundrigan, to ...what ? Beg for a job ? He answers
and I can't speak, I just hang up.
I find I'm shaking. I'm exhausted, deeply shagged from a
decade of abuse and doubt.
I shuffle up the stairs, down the hallway to my room. How
small it seems, and when I lay down on the bed, how familiar the view.
Night falls yet I cannot sleep. There is another call to make,
to Noreen Raymond, my old girlfriend, the girl I'd left behind
when I blew this frozen burg for the bright lights. The girl
whose heart I'd broken, my vanity the instrument of destruction.
I mean to call her, but ... pride ... no ... I love her enough
to leave her be. She's happy now, over the moon happy with six
kids and a husband who I'll confess is a decent bloke. And still,
this time of year, some nights ...