What if it’s even more mysterious than this? And what can we really know about someone we are not? After all, many don’t even have a clearer understanding of who they think they are themselves. How strange is it that others might go after what utterly appalls us? Or ask silly questions like, “what’s it all mean?”
Suffer the little children. And some big ones too.
MYSTERIOUS SKIN
Written and directed by Gregg Araki
[b]Brian: [narrating] The summer I was 8 years old, five hours disappeared from my life. Five hours. Lost. Gone without a trace…Last thing I remember I was sitting on the bench at my Little League game. It started to rain. What happened after that remains a pitch black void.
…
Neil [narrating]: I met Wendy Peterson when I was ten. She was eleven, one grade ahead of me in school. If I wasn’t queer we would have ended up having sloppy teenage sex and getting pregnant, contributing more fucked-up unwanted kids to society. But instead, she became my soulmate
…
Man: I know what you’re thinking. That wasn’t safe. But we’re in Kansas, thank God, not some big city full of diseases. Plus, you’re only a kid.
…
Wendy: Even Hutchinson has its share of freaks. You trick with the wrong guy and I’d find pieces of you everywhere.
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Neil: I am so fucking sick of this stinkin’ little buttcrack of a town!!!
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Neil: I hate it when they look like Tarzan but sound like Jane.
…
Eric: I got a postcard from Wendy.
Neil: I think she’s mad at me because I owe her like 3 letters.
Eric: Yeah, her last P.S. is “Tell Fuckface to write me.”
…
Wendy: You’d better be careful.
Eric: Of what?
Wendy: I’m serious, Eric. You’re not in Modesto anymore. I see the way you look at him.
Eric: He’s so beautiful. I can’t help it. He’s like a god.
Wendy: You don’t have to tell me, I was infatuated with him too once. But I know all Neil’s secrets and there’s shit there you don’t even want to know about. Trust me. Once I’m gone, you’ll be all Neil has and you have to understand one thing. Where normal people have a heart, Neil McCormick has a bottomless black hole. And if you don’t watch out, you can fall in and get lost forever.
…
Neil: Different folks, different strokes.
…
Eric: “Okay” is a relative term.
…
Wendy: We’re not in Kansas anymore, Neil. You have got to be so careful.
Neil: I know.
Wendy: Don’t “l know” me, Neil McCormick. This is New York City. You do the wrong thing with the wrong person and you die.
…
Dad: Brian, don’t be like this. I drove all this way. I just wanted to see how you’re doing.
Brian: Well, let me tell you what I want to know. Something happened to me when I was little. Do you know what I’m talking about? What happened to me that night I woke up bleeding in the cellar? Where were you that night?
Dad: You’re drunk.
Brian: Quit avoiding the subject! I was bleeding, I kept passing out! I wet my fucking bed and you never asked why! And what about that Halloween when I blacked out again? Something happened to me both those nights! What do you know about it? Tell me!
Dad: I’m sorry, Brian, l… I can’t help you.
…
Neil: Then we played the 5 dollar game.
Neil: [narrating] And as we sat there listening to the carolers, I wanted to tell Brian it was over now and everything would be okay. But that was a lie, plus, I couldn’t speak anyway. I wish there was some way for us to go back and undo the past. But there wasn’t. There was nothing we could do. So I just stayed silent and trying to telepathically communicate how sorry I was about what had happened. And I thought of all the grief and sadness and fucked up suffering in the world, and it made me want to escape. I wished with all my heart that we could just leave this world behind. Rise like two angels in the night and magically disappear.[/b]