Twenty-Nine

Establishing shots:

The flat, empty sea. Bleached bones and dead fish heaped along the shoreline. A pile of tires, an ancient TV set, a boat half-buried in sand. Salt-crusted docks surrounded by seagulls. The empty drive-in. Decaying houses and rusting trailers, several shot using a Dutch or canted angle.

All of it slightly tinged with a sickly and unhappy yellow, the result of a color filter added to the camera lens. Even without it, this land has obviously been cursed. Some rapid environmental catastrophe, maybe. Biological apocalypse. Or perhaps something supernatural.

A sign planted in desert dirt: WELCOME TO LONELY PINES.

The last time we saw it, it had been set among a lush forest thick with evergreens leading up to a happy community built along a crystalline lake.

Now it stands corroding amid desolation.

Something eating the world.

Next to the welcome sign, another displays a skull and crossbones against a bright yellow field with the words CONDEMNED. WARNING. KEEP OUT.

Extreme close-up on a pair of feminine blue eyes wide with dread. The camera lingers before a pullback to reveal PENNY, played by Ashlee Gibson. Her face shines in the morning sun's key light. A single tear courses down her cheek. Her jaw quivers as she holds back far more than this.

The slow pullback continues, bringing MICHAEL, played by Nicholas Moody, into the frame. The gang's old leader. It was his idea to come here. Judging by his scowl, he appears to be having second thoughts.

Next, we see KATIE, played by Clare Byrne, and brAD, played by Johnny Frampton, who gape in confusion at the wasteland. And finally JERRY, played by Bill Farmstead, and WANDA, played by Sally Priest.

Brad holds Wanda's hand, though she does not reciprocate its pressure. Unlike the others, she does not appear horrified, saddened, or confused. Her face is a mask of indifference, as if she expected this nightmare.

Her eyes, however, betray a cold, hateful fury at whatever did this.

They have come home to revisit the moment their world broke and they were flung into a far different one. They have all dreamed of it, their beautiful little village and the carefree childhood it offered. Now that they are here, Lonely Pines is still a dream, insubstantial and dissolving, recalled primarily as a feeling.

Today, they will dream again.

And become a part of the dream. Making it real until they realize all the years lived after this place had been the real mirage.

Here, they will sift through the detritus of their skeletal homes and favorite spots, discovering old toys and books and photos that ignite childhood memories witnessed as flashbacks. Together, they will revisit old crushes and feuds. Michael will try to force them to face their demons, only to be rejected as controlling and discover that he himself is broken. After telling Wanda he can fix her, Brad will admit he loves and accepts her as she is. Wanda will learn she is not alone and that sometimes, you go on simply to avoid making others suffer. Jerry will confess his life is not as happy as it looks, that he is struggling with suicidal ideation, and that he returned to Lonely Pines to destroy himself. And Katie will give up on Wanda and finally learn to put herself first as Wanda does.

In the dead ruins, a miracle will occur. They will never learn why their town marched into the lake to die, or why the land around it appears cursed. Still, these old friends will rediscover themselves and each other as adults, renew and reinvent their relationships, open old wounds, and heal.

Putting the worst of it behind them to make room for new dreams.

Leaving only Penny.

While her friends find closure and become complete, she refuses to participate. Racked by shame, she knows there is only one way to make this right. A singular path to redemption. Seeing herself as irrevocably damned and unfixable, she wants instead to fix the world. If she makes things right for all, she might accomplish the same for herself.

At last, she will reclaim the amulet in the dirt.

The ancient eye once again will flash open. It will swivel to see all.

As always, it will obey its master.