LOOP

© Bruce G. Marcot
  

The scene opens with a man in a city apartment hearing commotion on the street below him. He opens the window and looks down the two stories, into the night, and below sees a small crowd surrounding a wildly gesticulating figure of a man waving a pistol and shouting something. Another man from the crowd approaches the armed maniac, holding a rosary in his hands; he is a priest. The priest begs the man to give up the gun, that whatever he has done cannot be so bad that he cannot be forgiven. In a flash, the man shoots the priest, and as the man with the gun tries to run away, a policeman appears and apprehends him.

The man at the window staggers back, reeling. He collapses onto the couch, head in hands. He slowly drifts back onto the couch and closes his eyes.

He opens his eyes and finds himself outside at night on the street. There is a commotion in the alleyway in front of him. He presses forward and sees a small crowd of people, and then he spots a man waving a pistol around in the air, yelling something. Somebody shouts "Someone get the police!" and for a moment he hesitates, disoriented. Then, as he turns to dash to the corner where a cop is standing, he hears a shot ring out behind him from the alley. The cop already hears the commotion and gunfire, and rushes past him, knocking him down onto the sidewalk. He hits his head and blacks out.

He opens his eyes and he is standing on the street in the dark, a small pool of streetlight at his feet. He looks down and there is a pistol in his hand and his hand is shaking. He suddenly hears sounds of people shouting and many quickly-advancing footsteps, looks up, and there is a small angry crowd coming toward him. He runs down the street and ducks into a dark side alley but it is a dead end among apartment buildings. He desperately looks around for a way out, and looks upward and briefly catches a glimpse of a figure looking down on him from a window two stories above. The crowd follows him into the alley, shouting and throwing things. He waves the gun around and shouts for everyone to stay back, stay back. The crowd stops advancing but is still yelling, and he is shouting back at them. A man dressed in black slowly steps from the crowd toward him, his hands outstretched, palms up, a rosary in one palm; he is saying something but the man with the gun cannot understand him above the noise of the crowd. He continues to wave the gun, stepping backwards, and suddenly as he trips over trash cans in the alley, the pistol discharges directly into the chest of the man dressed in black, and he falls backwards and hits the pavement hard and blacks out.

He opens his eyes and there is a small throng of people standing next to him, yelling at a man in an alley who is waving a pistol about. He hears the man threaten to shoot and to get back. He looks down and sees a rosary in his hand which is outstretched, and he suddenly realizes what is happening and what must be done. He starts slowly walking forward, advancing on the man with the gun. He tells the man that he must repent, he must seek contrition, he must seek forgiveness. Just as the gun fires, he finally can clearly see the gunman's face, and it is his own.

  

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