FADE IN

 

INT – CECILE’S FLAT, KITCHEN – EARLY MORNING

 

CECILE sits, reading, in the corner of what appears to be a kitchen. Her shaven head, tattooed biceps and shapeless coveralls contradict a fragile face that seems younger than her 25 years. She is chewing her fingers.

 

A large wooden table sits centrally, its surface smothered by a pile of tools and building supplies. Kitchen units line one wall, gap-toothed, appliances long gone. HELEN slouches in: 30 years young; frayed and deodorant-stained; dirty blonde hair tied back with an elastic band.

 

Coughing tar, she stubs out her cigarette on the wall-mounted plastic sign that shouts in black capitals: No smoking, No men, No religious emblems. The ‘o’ in smoking exorcised by black marker pen and replaced with a child-scrawled ‘a’. Dropping the butt on the floor, she lights up again.

 

CECILE

Mum! That’s disgusting.

 

HELEN

Will you bloody shut up, Cecile.

You’re burning breakfast again.

          (BEAT)

Bad as your damn father, head

in a book all the time and

screw the rest of the world.

 

Cecile dashes to the open fireplace to stir the contents of a cast iron pan with a spoon wiped clean on a t-short only marginally cleaner than the floor.

 

CECILE

Bollocks. Fucking bollocks.

You know what, Mum? I just

Want out. Out of this shithole.

I’d go anywhere.

 

Helen smirks as Cecile burns her fingers. Until she is handed a bowl of porridge.

 

HELEN

I’m not fucking eating that.

No way. It’s bad enough when

it’s not bloody burnt.

 

CECILE

Well, you’ll have to cook for

yourself then, won’t

you? Not my fucking problem.

I’m late.

 

CECILE’s MOTHER (sneers)

Off to play with the nice

little Sisters in that

convent, are you? That’s as far

as you’re ever going to go.

 

Shovelling porridge into her mouth, Cecile ignores her mother. As she tips tools from the table into a backpack that has seen better days, a BUZZER sounds.

 

INT – CECILE’S FLAT, ENTRANCE HALL – CONTINUOUS

 

The intercom unit, mounted in a hallway too narrow to swing a punch, is cracked, revealing stripped wires.

 

CECILE

Hello? Mother Marie?

 

EXT – CECILE’S APARTMENT BUILDING – CONTINUOUS

 

MARIE, straight-backed, mid-fifties with pinned up waist length hair, leans against the spider-cracked glass of the front door panel, quietly confident.

 

MARIE

Hi Cecile, I was just passing.

Thought I’d stop and remind you

about lunchtime.

 

Waves of static flood Cecile’s voice. She sounds distracted.

 

CECILE

Lunchtime?

 

MARIE

Your appraisal meeting?

(BEAT)

 

CECILE

Oh, yeah, that. I’ll see you

Later then, ok?

 

The intercom goes dead. Perplexed, Marie pauses before walking away.

 

Marie’s POV: Over her shoulder, a crack rises through the concrete of the typically 1960’s high rise apartment building up to the 17^th floor, where an almost figure stands on the council-green painted balcony.

 

EXT – CONVENT GARDEN – MIDDAY

 

Cecile’s POV: The imposing red-brick building looms through the trees as she walks along a root-stricken tarmac path. What might once have been a lawn is dug over and crammed with vegetables. A gaggle of novices, awkward in wimples and jeans, half-heartedly tend to the vegetables.

 

Cecile smiles at CHLOE, lanky as only a teen can be, ineffectually attempting to strip turf.

 

CECILE

You won’t get far like that.

 

She takes the spade, drops her backpack and swings; it bites into the turf with a morning’s worth of aggression.

 

CECILE (contd)

You’ve got to put your back into

it. Think about Janet.

 

Cecile’s POV: A pretty bubblehead stands on the other side of the patch, holding court to a swarm of girls. Chloe takes a white-knuckled swing, she nearly overbalances but the spade sinks deep into the turf and she looks up, grinning.

 

CECILE (contd)

That’ll do. We’ll paint them

fingers green yet.

 

EXT – CONVENT – MOMENTS LATER

 

Cecile’s POV

The iron-striped sash windows on the first floor scatter paint flakes like dandruff. Above them, the space where a cross should be mounted feels awkward.

 

She takes a brick laying trowel out of her bag and carefully washes it under the garden tap. A line of nuns bob out of the front door and Cecile watches curiously.

 

INT – CONVENT – MOMENTS LATER

 

Cecile KNOCKS on a battered pine door, waiting for an answer before she tries the handle.

 

Cecile’s POV: The door opens just enough to reveal a small cluttered room. Two bookcases are visible, reaching from floor to ceiling. They are crammed with books, many in poor condition and piled two rows deep in places. A large desk at the far end of the room is overflowing with paperwork and what appears to be a pile of clean laundry.

 

A GROUP OF WOMEN are kneeling in front of the desk. Only two can be seen clearly. One of these is clearly Marie; the other is plumply middle-aged with grey-streaked hair escaping from a headscarf.

 

Cecile starts as she notices a large wooden crucifix on the desk. The women start to recite the Lord’s Prayer as Marie fetches a plain-looking chalice from underneath the pile of laundry. As she turns, Cecile jerks the door shut.

 

EXT/INT – CHIP SHOP – CONTINUOUS

 

The corner chip shop is headed by a neon sign: ‘Macey’s: The best fish and chip’s in town’ alongside a cartoon fish logo. Through the grubby window a THIN, SALLOW MAN is gesticulating at the BORED-LOOKING MAN across the counter as he grabs a cone of chips and stuffs as many into his mouth as he can. As he leaves the shop, scratching week-old stubble and playing with the cross on a chain around his neck, it starts to rain and he dives into a covered alley.

 

INT – CONVENT – CONTINUOUS

 

Cecile, pale-faced and shaking, creeps into what is clearly a classroom and sinks onto a plastic chair at the back.

 

Cecile’s POV: Next to the door is a large poster of Karl Marx. Neatly printed underneath in rounded capitals are the words: Only through communism can human freedom be fully realised. A film is being shown on a black and white television at the front. Behind the television stands a blackboard on which is written: The aftermath of the 2010 disaster and the growth of new government: lessons for 2210.

 

The television is showing a mushroom cloud engulfing the White House, followed by scenes of a row of demolished houses. The CHILDREN CHEER as the White House falls, encouraged in their exuberance by their TEACHER. Very little is left standing, fires are burning and cars lie upside down, windows smashed. Two men are looting, carrying food and valuables out through a broken window.

 

The picture cuts to a formidable building fronted with fake Greco-Roman columns in white marble. A fountain in front of the building shoots high into the air, splattering much of the courtyard with spray and sending business clad clones scurrying around the edges. A VOICEOVER begins to play.

 

ANNOUNCER

The first world government was

formed in the aftermath of the

North American incidents. China,

as the remaining superpower,

was awarded a majority in the

senate and soon ‘nations’ were

a thing of the past.

 

Flash images:

 

A mob is ransacking a thirteenth century church, burning the altar cloths, cross and any religious icon they can get their hands on.

 

Rows of identically dressed children sit on the floor in the church. A large projection screen is showing images of the White House falling. They are screaming in delight.

 

A group of identity-carded white-coated scientists are herded out of a laboratory building by heavily armed guards. They are handcuffed and loaded into the back of a cattle truck.

 

The same group of scientists, still identity-carded but now wearing orange jumpsuits, are cleaning up debris from the same building.

 

A queue of drably dressed men and women wait outside of a job centre. The queue is not moving. It is raining.

 

Four buses pull up at a pair of iron gates outside what appears to be a factory. They are full despite displaying, ‘Sorry, I’m not in service’. People stream out of the buses and in through the gates, scanning ID cards in a practised manner as they enter.

 

Drumming her feet softly on the floor and shifting as if sitting on pins, Cecile twists the silver ring on her finger, exposing sore, reddened skin. Marie tiptoes in through the open door and takes a seat, followed by Jane, tall and jumpy.

 

CECILE

Were you praying? Why would

you…

 

Marie chews her lip until she realises what she is doing.

 

MARIE

We were indeed praying.

 

CECILE

After all you taught me?

 

Scraping her chair backwards, Cecile makes as if to stand up. Marie grabs her thigh, forcing her back into her chair.

 

CECILE (hisses)

Get your fucking hands off me,

you bitch. You’re worse

than my bloody mother.

 

She launches herself off the chair, pushing Marie away.

 

CECILE (contd)

You lied. Swearing to renounce

all this religious bollocks and

to serve the community and you

never believed a bloody word

of it, did you?

 

MARIE

We are serving the community.

 

CECILE

Bollocks.       

 

Panting with rage, Cecile crashes through the door. Jane starts to follow her.

 

MARIE

Let her go, Jane. She just

needs some time to cool off.

 

Cecile storms back in, red-faced and shaking.

 

CECILE

I won’t be back. Not in a

million fucking years.

 

Spitting on the floor, she slams the door as she leaves. Jane arches her eyebrows.

 

JANE

Sure about that, are you?

She’s still got a temper on

her. We’ve given her a lot

of leeway. Because…

          (beat)

 

MARIE (sharply)

                Because of her mother?

 

 

Jane shrugs, looking at the floor as Marie buries her head in her hands.

 

EXT – LONDON STREET – EARLY EVENING

 

We could be on any major London road. Three story Georgian houses line the road, their facades soot-blackened. There is a conspicuous absence of traffic until an old Routemaster pulls up, displaying, ‘Sorry, I’m not in service’. The windows are steamed up and the bus is crammed - with people in every available space.

 

Cecile wriggles through the crush and jumps out carrying her tool-laden backpack and a large grey holdall slung over one shoulder.

         

EXT/INT – GEORGIAN TERRACE – CONTINUOUS

 

A man meanders up the street, staggering into the low walls that line the rank of terraces. We recognise him as the man from the chip shop. He stops at Number 66 and pulls the metal gate halfway open before the hinges fail and it drags drunkenly across the floor.

 

Squeezing through the gap, he falls over the wall onto concrete, lying splayed out like a modern Vitruvian man. Flickering light from upstairs pathetically fails to penetrate the gloom. SARAH opens the screeching sash window.

 

SARAH

Peter?

(BEAT)

 

          PETER (slurs)

Sarah?

 

          SARAH

You drunken bastard.

 

She CLATTERS out through the front door and drags him into the hallway, head lolling. He hits the lino with a thud.

 

EXT – LONDON STREET – CONTINUOUS

 

Head down, Cecile walks down the street, avoiding the pools of light from those street lamps that haven’t already been smashed. She ducks into an alley.

 

Cecile’s POV: The alley is claustrophobically narrow. Trees and overgrown bushes scratch at her, grey in the darkness. Her backpack catches on a branch and she panics, clawing at the trees. Beginning to jog, she skids on slimy bricks. A BANG that could be a car backfiring sounds in the distance.

 

INT - GEORGIAN TERRACE – CONTINUOUS

 

Peter is lying on the faux-terracotta lino in the entrance hall, snorting the breaths of a comatose drunk. The wall is shedding textured wallpaper that has all but disintegrated in the damp. Sarah strides in, carrying a plastic bucket which she upends over Peter’s head, soaking him. He GASPS and SPLUTTERS.

 

PETER

Bitch! What the fuck?

 

SARAH

Oh, just get up will you?

 

Peter tries to stand but settles for crawling and wedges himself into the stairwell where the water dripping from him almost leaves the carpet cleaner.

 

                           SARAH (cont)

Where the hell have you been

anyway? It’s almost curfew.

 

PETER

Just had to go see a man.

          (BEAT)

 

SARAH

You’re not still forging

travel papers are you?

 

A loud BANGING on the front door and Sarah lapses into silence. They watch the front door. The banging starts again.

 

SARAH

Don’t just sit there. Get

upstairs, I’ll answer it.

 

Peter opens his mouth but the words die on his lips and he crawls upstairs. Sarah makes to smooth the creases out of her trousers and swings open the front door, hands on hips. A MAN in the traditional bouncer mold is stood on her doorstep; he is pot-bellied but no less intimidating for it.

 

                           SARAH

                Well? Can I help you?

 

                           MAN

                I’d like to speak to Peter.

 

He tries to muscle his way inside but Sarah steps forwards, blocking the entrance.

 

                           SARAH

                I’m afraid he’s out.

 

                           MAN

                You can let him know that I

called.

 

                           SARAH

                And you are?

 

                           MAN

                It doesn’t matter. Just make

sure you pass on the message.

 

Cecile’s face appears behind the man, milk pale. Sarah motions towards the street stiffly, pretending to stretch. The man turns around but Cecile has ducked out of sight.

 

                         MAN (suspiciously)

                I’ll see you again tomorrow.

 

He lumbers down the path, passing Cecile, who is leaning against the wall. He presses up close to her as he passes,

 

                           MAN

                Maybe I’ll see you again

sweetheart.

 

Cecile reaches out to him, smiling and then drives her knee into his groin.

 

                           CECILE

                I doubt it sweetheart.

 

INT – PETER’S HOUSE – MOMENTS LATER

 

Peter is lying on the floor in a bedroom barely big enough for the double bed that partially blocks the doorway. It appears cleaner than the hallway, although not by much. VOICES can be heard.

 

                           CECILE

                Where is he then?

 

                           SARAH

                Upstairs. A bit worse for wear

               

                           CECILE

                Well I expected that.

 

The women slide through the doorway one at a time. Between them they manage to manoeuvre Peter onto the bed. He does his best to fall off again so they sit down, wedging him in and talking over his head.

 

                           SARAH

                He only just got in

 

                           CECILE (thoughtfully)

                So I wasn’t the only one

cutting it fine to make curfew.

 

Slipping a finger under the chain around his neck, Cecile flicks the cross out from under Peter’s t-shirt. This reveals a tattoo just below his collarbone which matches the logo on the chip shop sign.

 

                          CECILE (contd)

                I thought he gave that up.

 

                           SARAH

                He did. At least for a while

after Helen kicked him out.

 

                           CECILE

                What does the tattoo mean?

 

                           SARAH

                Couldn’t tell you. But it

                means something.

 

Peter tries to sit up but is wedged too firmly between the two women. He tries to pull something out of his pocket.

 

                           PETER

                Was that John? At the door?

 

                           SARAH

                Don’t know any John. Bloke

                looked like he’d had one too

many chip butties to me.

 

          PETER

Cecile? Look after this, would

you? In case he comes back.

Need to take it to Barry.

 

          SARAH

Who’s Barry?

 

          CECILE (unconvincingly)

It doesn’t matter. I ain’t

                taking anything off him.