Chapter 45
GIRLFRIENDS
FADE IN:
EXT. H STREET CORRIDOR - EVENING:
Early January. The sky not yet black but blackening. Balmy for a winter’s night, wind blowing like a ragged breath.
CAT skips over cigarette butts on the sidewalk.
She passes the WHOLE FOODS, its yellow lights beaming into the street, she passes SOLID STATE BOOKS.
Black men haunt the street, muttering. A red streetcar circles the neighborhood like a caterpillar gone mad.
The Corridor: a gentrifying purgatory with a rugged historical feel.
CAT turns down Seventh Street. FRESCA TAQUERIA sits on the corner, its cluster of red umbrellas shut for the season. She stops in front of an old apartment where…
INT. MILAN’S APARTMENT, KITCHEN - EVENING:
MILAN, 24, hears a knock on the door. She’s not expecting company. She fetches a butcher knife and holds it behind her back. Carefully cracking the front door, she finds…
CAT lingering in the hallway in a white coat, staring at her gloved hands.
MILAN
What do you want?
CAT
It’s cold out here.
MILAN
(Turning to go inside, but leaving the door ajar)
The heat’s broken in the building.
CAT follows MILAN. We find ourselves in a studio apartment.
Cramped, crumbling, zoned by the city for people living paycheck to paycheck, but cozy: a secondhand love seat, tasseled pillows, an incomplete photo wall.
In the corner, a full bed with a cheap lavender comforter.
On the windowsill, a monstera that’s probably dead.
MILAN shuffles around the small kitchen. She slips the butcher knife into a block of wood.
MILAN
Why didn’t you just text?
CAT
Would you have responded?
MILAN
No.
(Gesturing to her two-person kitchen table)
Would you sit down? You’re stressing me out.
CAT sits but keeps her coat on.
CAT
(Pauses)
I shouldn’t have said what I said. It was mean.
MILAN
What I said was mean too. I was mad, I wasn’t thinking.
CAT
No, same. I’m sorry.
MILAN
(Long pause. Thinking, thinking, thinking.)
I hate when we fight.
MILAN pulls a blanket from her bed and wraps herself in it. Imagine: a child pretending to be a superhero. It flaps behind her as she slumps in the seat opposite from CAT.
CAT
I still love you, you know.
MILAN
I still love you too, you hoe.
CAT
(Pauses)
Please don’t quit the play.
MILAN
(As if Cat hasn’t spoken)
Ryen wants me to be in his film. It’s his first feature-length. It’s kind of a big deal.
CAT
(Irritated)
Why can’t you do both?
MILAN
Who said I can’t?
CAT
(Reaching forward to touch Milan’s hair)
I like the short braids. It’s very Living Single.
MILAN
(Grinning childishly, swinging her head)
They’re cute, right?!
CAT
I’m thinking about getting color.
MILAN
GIRLALALA, don’t tempt me, ’cause I’ll turn you into an Ice Spice carrottop in a heartbeat. Wait—
MILAN goes to rummage through the cupboard under her sink, returning with an armful of box dyes, toners, bleach, falling on the table, an avalanche of junk.
My mom gave me a bunch of shit from her salon
CAT
(Picking up a glossy purple box, a smiling Black woman with honey-blond hair on it)
MILAN
Blond would be brat. You wanna go full? Or just money pieces?
CAT
I was thinking more like Bey’s highlights.
MILAN
It’s wild you think I’m a real hairdresser, like, there’s no world in which you’re leaving my apartment with Bey highlights. Be serious. You MIGHT leave here a likkle bald baddie if I get this bleach wrong though.
MILAN and CAT laugh together.
CAT
I hated not being able to talk to you. It felt like forever.
MILAN
Ew, I know. I was stalking you on IG but you never post anything new. Also, you need to take down that picture of us in front of the cafeteria junior year. I look like a complete mess.
(Gesturing at the hair products scattered on the table)
You wanna do this now?
CAT
(Pauses)
Fuck it, yeah.
MILAN disappears into the bathroom, returning with a pile of old towels she spreads on the floor. A black stylist’s cape flutters as it falls over CAT’s chest.
MILAN
(Running her fingers through CAT’s hair)
You need a trim, babe.
CAT
Yeah, I know.
(Leaning back into Milan’s chest, looking up at her)
Something happened last week. But you can’t tell anyone.
MILAN
(Gently parting CAT’s hair with the tail of a comb)
You can tell me anything. You know that.
FADE OUT.