Thrive - Part 8

INT. JANICE AND BILL'S BEDROOM - DAY

Janice and Bill come into the bedroom, it's nine o'clock in the morning and they have just returned from staying up all night in the hospital. Janice goes to the closet and starts to undress. Bill stands in the doorway and looks at her.

JANUS: I can't do this anymore.
JANICE: I know how you feel. It seems impossible that this is happening.
JANUS: No, you don't. You don't know how I feel. This isn't an expression of frustration. I seriously cannot do this any more.
JANICE: What choice do we have?
JANUS: There are some people who are able to do things like this, there are people who can suffer through tragedy and feel like it makes them stronger. I'm not one of them.
JANICE: How do you know? How have you suffered before this?
JANUS: You, I think, are one of those people. You can be the hero in this, the patient one, the longsuffering one. I'm the villain here, I know it. I am designed to be the asshole.
JANICE: You need to go to sleep Bill, we have to go back in four hours.
JANUS: I am the weak one, the one to hate. The one that had to be lost. You can be the one who was somehow able to make it. The woman who's only son is in the hospital, who's husband left her, just when she needed him--
JANICE: What?
JANUS: Who's husband left when things started to look bad, he just dropped her, left everything there his son, his house, and found another life, another woman to live with.
JANICE: Stop it. Bill. Stop it.
JANUS: Who never saw him again.

Janice picks up a shoe from the ground and throws it at him.

JANICE: Quit it right now. How can you say those things?
JANUS: Who fought against him, begged him to stay but he wouldn't listen. When she held onto his feet when she punched him as hard as she could-- which is not very hard, she's a small woman--he pushed her away, he ran, he literally ran out the door, slammed the car door as she stood on the steps crying until she collapsed.
JANICE: Why are you doing this to me now. Stop. Please stop, I can't take this.
JANUS: You can. It's me who can't take it-- and he backed out of the driveway looking her in the eyes the whole time. You see he never had a soul, never really loved her, or his son, and he had to get out.
JANICE: Get out!