April 3, 2002 Transcript
Jail Scenes

(Sonny is in a jail cell and Alexis is on the other side of the bars. Sonny takes off his suit jacket)

Alexis: Would you like a paper bag?

Sonny: What?

Alexis: They let me carry my briefcase in here and I always carry an extra one –

Sonny: (begins unbuttoning his shirt sleeves) Why would I need a paper bag? Huh?

Alexis: To breathe.

Sonny: Oh.

Alexis: Carly told me that you have –

Sonny: Carly blames herself for me getting locked up in here. So –

Alexis: It’s not without reason.

Sonny: Do you know what? You want to help? You go upstairs, you keep her calm. Or better yet, get her out of here before she makes things worse.

Alexis: If you haven’t noticed, she doesn’t listen to me.

Sonny: Well, she’ll listen if you tell her that I’m the one asking.

Alexis: Sonny, Carly isn’t going anywhere until you’re released, and neither am I.

Sonny: All right. You know what? The go – go back upstairs and call a judge – your friend --

Alexis: Griffen?

Sonny: Griffen, yeah, the one who sent you the dirty letters or whatever it is, I don’t know –

Alexis: First of all, they aren’t – weren’t – dirty letters. They were unseemly expressions of affection.

Sonny: Whatever.

Alexis: Second of all – and this is the most important part – is a judge isn’t going to do you any good until the D.A.’s office decides whether they’re going to prosecute this case or not. And all that I’ll accomplish by going upstairs is to pace around and aggravate Mac and his staff.

Sonny: Well, they deserve what they get for doing this to me. So go make them suffer. Come up with grounds for a harassment suit against Taggert. Maybe – you can do that, can’t you? Huh? If he loses his badge, I’ll pay you triple.

Alexis: I think you just want me to leave.

Sonny: No, I’m trying to get you to lose your job.

Alexis: Calm down. I think that you don’t want me to see you like this.

Sonny: I don’t like wasting my money.

Alexis: How does having a panic attack – how does – what does that have to do with your finances?

Sonny: I don’t panic!

Alexis: Sorry. I’m sorry. That was a poor choice of words.

Sonny: Wrong choice, wrong assumption. I don’t – there’s nothing wrong with me, Alexis. And I don’t need a babysitter. What I need is for my attorney, who I pay a small fortune to keep on retainer, to stop watching me like I’m – like I’m an animal in a cage! I want you to get your condescending, overpriced butt upstairs and do your job!

Alexis: You’re claustrophobic, and for some reason – and I don’t understand why – you see that as a sign of weakness. It appears that you are trying to distract yourself by trying to pick a fight with me.

Sonny: SHUT UP!

Alexis: Don’t you ever speak to me that way again! I like you, but I have no intention of serving as a target of opportunity for your anger. (Sonny puts his hands to his face) You hate being in jail, I hate that you are in jail too. But I have offered my help, if you don’t want it, a polite refusal will be sufficient. But I’m not going to stand here and fight for the privilege of having you yell at me. ( Picks up her briefcase and walks away, leaving Sonny shaken and stunned. We hear a door shut. Sonny sits down and tries to breathe and then gets back up again. We hear a door open and then some footsteps)

Sonny: Alexis?

Alexis: (comes from around the corner) That wasn’t so hard, was it? (Sonny shakes his head no)

Alexis: (to an officer off camera) Hey, thanks for the chair. (sits down in front of Sonny’s cell)

Sonny: When’s the first time you noticed it?

Alexis: You’re going to have to elaborate.

Sonny: That thing you do. When you talk until you can’t breathe. And don’t say it’s asthma because I think we both know it’s – it’s this or something like it. It was probably something from when you were a kid. That’s why you can’t get rid of it, because it’s not about who you are now, it’s about how you felt before you could fight. And even though you – you say it’s fine now, you know, it’s over 20 years later, you still carry it around. It’s part of you.

Alexis: You could try visualizing or maybe if you just closed your eyes and breathe –

Sonny: Alexis, I asked you a question. Just – you don’t have to tell me how it started or what happened when you were a kid. Sometimes you don’t want to say something, you know. I mean, I understand that. Whew. I was just curious as to when you thought that you were, you know – it was always going to be with you in some way, you know? When you knew that it could come out of the past and wrap itself around your throat and choke you.

Alexis: Ahem – boarding school.

Sonny: You went to boarding school?

Alexis: In New Hampshire, up until I was – oh, from the time I was fourteen. It was the happiest day of my life when I got on that plane to fly away from Greece. I remember looking out the window of the airplane and I was watching the airport get smaller and smaller. (Sonny begins to see Alexis smaller and smaller and farther and farther away. Her voice becomes distant to him) And then I looked at the sky and it was so blue and so clear and so open. And all I could think about were the thousands of miles between Helena and myself. Anyway, the plane landed, and the school had sent a car to drive me to campus. And I remember when I stepped out of the car, taking what felt like the first breath. It smelled like pine needles and fresh-cut grass, and if you told me I was going to die tomorrow, I’d get in the car and I would drive to Briarton-Griggs just to breathe that air again.

Sonny: Did you have a uniform?

Alexis: It was green and gray. I know that sounds hideous, but I liked it. Actually, I liked everything about that school. I had a great time, a lot of friends. It was just one moment where I thought I saw Helena. I didn’t, but in that split second that I thought I saw her, I decided that I was going to run so she couldn’t take me. So she – Sonny? Sonny? Sonny, look at me. It’s okay.

Sonny: So what happened? It wasn’t Helena, you didn’t run away, so what happened?

Alexis: Nothing. My stomach unclenched and I went to the library, I think. It was that night that I was working on some history assignment or something and I – I came up with what I thought was a great idea, and I went to tell my study partner about it and I kept talking and the words kept coming but the meaning was less and less. I knew that I should stop talking, but I couldn’t. And then I couldn’t breathe at all, it felt like, and I ran outside and sat on the front step and I just started literally gulping the air. You know fresh air is really helpful and that is probably the least helpful thing that I’ve just said to you.

Sonny: Fresh air’s good. Once when I was released – It was not only winter but was a snowstorm. And I drove – I drove home with the windows open. I’ll do that again tonight.

Alexis: It’s possible that you may not get released tonight.

Sonny: Well, don’t say it like it’s a tragedy. It’s claustrophobia, you know, it’s not a fatal disease. I’ll pace and maybe I won’t be able to breathe that much and I will – and I may want to scream, but I won’t do it because, you know – and then it’ll be over.

Alexis: I know that every minute that you are in there is torture for you and I must say that you are handling it remarkably well.

Sonny: It helps having you here.

Alexis: Have you ever been to New Hampshire?

Sonny: I think I drove through it once.

Alexis: Briarton-Griggs is in the hills. There are trees around it for miles.

Sonny: Brick buildings?

Alexis: Yep.

Sonny: And lawns that look like carpets?

Alexis: You have the idea.

Sonny: Two or three times a year, they – they take you to Manhattan for a field trip. They take you to, you know, museums or maybe to the opera.

Alexis: (gets up and walks towards Sonny) I preferred the ballet.

Sonny: I took my mother to the ballet once. I’d been out of the house for a couple of years and I was making good money as a numbers runner. And I walked past Carnegie Hall and there was a poster. My mom used to, you know, watch ballet on public television. She used to tell me all the time how, you know, it was – she used to go to the ballet all the time, you know, to – in Cuba when she was a little girl, so I decided I’d take her, and so I bought two box seats. They were for the afternoon when I knew that Deke would be working, so I went to the house and I surprised her. She was so excited, you know – her whole face changed and she was like 10 years younger and beautiful again and she – she even wore this suit that she hadn’t worn since she was -- she had stopped working and – so we went to the ballet and she was looking around, you know, and she was like a little kid seeing everything and she – all she kept telling me was how much bigger this theatre was than the one in Cuba. So we get to the box seats and there were all these girls and they all had uniforms.

Alexis: What color were they?

Sonny: I don’t – I don’t -- I don’t remember, but they were giggling and flirting and they kept looking at me, you know. And I just kept thinking, we’re – we’re so different, you know, because to them this is, like, a fun day in the afternoon. They’re going to go back to their rich schools and rich lives and they’ll forget the ballet. But to me and my mother, it was like we were visiting another planet. (long pause) What I didn’t know then is that even rich people can hurt as bad as poor people.

Alexis: I wonder if on any of my field trips I ever looked over from my box at the ballet and saw a beautiful Cuban woman with her son. (pause) I don’t think so. I would have remembered you.

Sonny: I’d have remembered you too. (we hear footsteps. Taggert enters)

Alexis: I take it A.D.A. Jensen has decided to make an appearance.

Taggert: A.D.A. Jensen’s ready to review his statement. So if you’d step away from the bars, Ms. Davis. It’s time to go, Sonny boy. (Sonny begins putting his clothes back on to go upstairs) Well, unless you’d rather stay here, you know, if you’re comfortable and everything.

Alexis: If you’re done goading my client, can we just move this along, go upstairs, and end this once and for all?

Taggert: Oh, yeah. I’m all for that. There we go. (opens the bars for Sonny)

Sonny: (whispers to Alexis) Sorry. (she acknowledges with a smile)