01x07 - Stormy Weather

[bunniefuu]

[VICTOR LAVALLE]

In America, we rewrite history

by erasing it.

[PEOPLE ON STREET CHATTERING]

[PERSON 1] What are you doing?

Stop! Crazy f*cking bitch!

Okay, you need locking up!

[PERSON 2] What are you doing?

[PERSON 1] You need to

be f*cking locked up!

Let go of me! Please.

There you go, honey.

[APOLLO] "This is

Apollo. Leave a message."

- [LINE BEEPS]

- I've been calling you for three days.

I don't know where you are,

Apollo. I don't know where you are.

[LAVALLE] People wash up

in New York. Literally.

The Elk Hotel has been in

business for over 100 years.

Built to serve immigrants

passing through Ellis Island.

I'm here to unmake a deal.

[BREATHING SHAKILY]

[DOOR SQUEAKS]

[LAVALLE] One hundred years is

quite the American success story

[ELECTRICITY CRACKLES]

considering this is the

shittiest hotel in the world.

[REPORTER] Mozart

symphony has been discovered.

The Bavarian State Library,

where it was found,

said the complete symphony

was put in manuscript

form by Mozart's father

to save the cost of a note copier.

The newly discovered symphony will

be performed in public May 17th

- at a concert in Bavaria.

- [MOANS] He got you good.

[REPORTER] External investigators

are still trying to verify

the authenticity of the document.

However, a spokesperson

for the library

I remember this.

[CLERK] How long?

All of this.

- How long?

- I want Room 205.

- No, no. Look at the rates.

- [EXHALES SHARPLY]

The whole night.

- All night?

- [LAVALLE] Lester was weary.

- For 20 years he'd worked this desk.

- [PHONE RINGS]

His job was to differentiate

between g*ng member and m*rder*r,

- versus whore, drug dealer, john, or pimp.

- Mm-hmm.

[LAVALLE] He'd watched gangs

wage w*r outside this very door.

Teenagers Nay, babies,

senselessly k*lled on the sidewalk.

- [LESTER] How long?

- [SIGHS]

[LAVALLE] At first, he'd gone out

there and scrubbed at the cement.

Now it was rust-red.

Seventy-five.

[LAVALLE] g*ng members and

murderers were denied a room.

[LESTER] You get your

receipt when you check out.

[LAVALLE] Everyone else was welcome.

Of course, his deciphering

skills weren't always up to par.

Like the time a trans

woman was strangled,

stuffed under the bed in

a gold sequined dress,

and left undiscovered for two weeks.

- [LESTER] How many of you?

- Just me.

Oh, you alone, huh?

[LAVALLE] No one to claim

her, buried unnamed.

Alone.

[LESTER] Mm-hmm. There are

centuries of names in that book.

[LESTER] Storm coming.

Yes, there is.

- [BASEBALL GAME PLAYING ON TV]

- [COMMENTATOR SPEAKING SPANISH]

- Yo. [SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY]

- [CHUCKLES]

[BOTH CHUCKLING]

- Come on. Nah. [INDISTINCT]

- Get outta here! [INDISTINCT]

Excuse me. You move for a lady.

[SCOFFS, CHUCKLES]

[LAVALLE] We cast our dreams as a play.

Who fills each role so we may bring

the unconscious to consciousness?

[PERSON WHEEZES]

[WHEEZING, BREATHING HEAVILY]

Who plays each role?

[LAVALLE] And why?

[SICK PERSON WHEEZES]

Hey! Don't touch.

[STAMMERS] It's contagious.

[SICK PERSON WHEEZING]

[LAVALLE] Lillian didn't

need Apollo's forgiveness.

She needed her own.

And it laid behind this very door.

[LAVALLE] 1981 was a

bloody year in New York.

Even Lillian could not

escape the v*olence.

[GRUNTS]

[SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY]

[LAVALLE] She had seen

something that day.

[YOUNG APOLLO] No, Daddy!

[LAVALLE] Something

she could never unsee.

[ECHOING] Daddy! No!

[YOUNG LILLIAN BREATHES SHAKILY]

[BREATHING SHAKILY]

[LAVALLE] And it had

changed her once more.

[BRIAN] I know what you

did, Lillian. I know.

So, you're really just gonna

make me wait, huh? [PANTING]

[CHUCKLES] Yeah. You really

make me crazy, you know that?

Yeah, sweetie. Yeah.

[WILLIAM] See you later.

[LAVALLE] She had been here before.

That night. That long

ago, terrible night.

This room that held a secret

she swore she'd never tell.

But secrets want out,

and prices will be paid.

That was your father's box.

Someone left it at the door.

[SWALLOWS]

[SMACKS LIPS, COUGHING]

[BREATHES SHAKILY]

[YOUNG LILLIAN] So,

tell me something else.

What should I tell you?

[YOUNG LILLIAN] Well,

you can't know anything

until you know everything.

So, everything it is.

[LAVALLE] It was unimaginable

what had become of her.

[INHALES SHARPLY, COUGHING]

What now, Lillian?

[LAVALLE] What now, Lillian? What then?

Tell me your story, and I

will tell you who you are.

- [g*nsh*t]

- [GASPS]

[CAR TIRES SQUEALING]

[BREATHING SHAKILY, PANTING]

[LAVALLE] It wouldn't be the

last time she'd hold a dying man.

If you're a stickler for numbers,

then this would be the first of three.

It is a tremor leading to the quake.

One person moves away, breaks free,

creates a seismic shift in

a family and in the land.

- But what is the cost of freedom?

- [SIRENS WAILING]

Had she been responsible for all

that happened after she fled Uganda?

[SOLDIERS YELLING]

[LAVALLE] Could she

have changed the course

of her family's history had she stayed?

[PEOPLE SCREAMING]

[LAVALLE] But she had left.

And after, The Butcher had

seized power from Obote

- and delivered a m*ssacre to her people.

- [BREATHING SHAKILY]

- [IDI AMIN INDISTINCT] they have to die.

- [LAVALLE] All were gone now.

All gone.

What god would make people suffer so?

What god would bring her all

this way to smite her now?

[BREATHES SHAKILY]

No god of mine.

[g*nf*re]

- [PANTING, GRUNTING]

- [LILLIAN] Arthur.

[BREATHING SHAKILY]

- [WHIRRING]

- [GASPS]

[BREATHING HEAVILY]

[LAVALLE] Lillian had

known for a long time

that there were realer things

than the King of Kings right here.

[LAVALLE] She remembered the hope.

The unbridled hope that everything

could be different in America.

New York had opened a cr*ck in her,

and the light had crept back in.

- She found room to dream.

- [HUMMING]

[LAVALLE] Her grandmother had

always said she had a lovely voice.

Maybe she could be a lounge

singer in a sparkling dress,

belting out torch songs

in some dusty saloon.

Maybe she would meet someone, fall

in love, have a bunch of kids.

America the Great. The promised land.

Apollo, I loved the

place. I believed in it.

I could see what America wanted to

be, and I would k*ll to be American.

But sometimes, most times,

it made me feel a little bit

like I had to get smaller.

Watch my words and my smiles.

Can't get too big, can't be angry.

[WHIMPERING] Don't you see?

Can't be visible.

- That's not our baby!

- [HORNS HONKING]

Apollo, have you heard me

say "I love you" enough times?

I've made some mistakes in this

world. You are not one of them.

[LILLIAN] But I layered onto

you, even at your young age,

my own dis-ease.

Unease.

Fear.

Don't get big. Don't speak loud.

Don't tell a joke. Don't

be too serious either.

Don't draw attention to yourself.

Don't throw a tantrum in the store.

Just don't do that.

Apollo, at four years

old you already knew

what it felt like to live life afraid.

When I was four, my favorite

thing in the whole wide world

was finding my jajja outside,

hunched over a big iron

pot, turning mandazis.

[SIGHS]

You never tasted those, hmm?

Soft, fluffy doughnut clouds.

Hot and spiced with a

little bit of cardamom,

a little bit of cinnamon

and a lot of coconut milk.

[JAJJA] Can't make a mandazi

without getting an oil burn.

[CHUCKLES]

[JAJJA] To make it taste

perfect in the mouth,

you must add the too, too,

too important ingredient.

- Love.

- [JAJJA] Love.

She was an oracle. Had a life

lesson for every minute of the day.

[JAJJA] Lillian, the

important thing in life

is what we do for the ones we love.

Lillian, don't let a man make

you crazy, 'cause he will try.

[CHUCKLING]

[PEOPLE SINGING]

[SINGING]

[JAJJA] Lillian, if you decide

to eat a dog, eat a fat one.

[LAVALLE] If we're lucky, each of

us has the memory of a kitchen.

The warmth and aroma of

something being cooked with love.

Regardless of who we

are, where we're from,

kitchen stove or iron pot, we

are all gifted this heirloom.

If we're lucky.

[INHALING DEEPLY] The

pot is all that's left.

There you go, honey.

[JAJJA] Lillian, ask

help from the spirits

when you have used all your strength.

Apollo, I never made you mandazis. Why?

Because I wanted you to like

regular American kid food.

I wanted you to fit in with

your mac and cheese diet

and your hot dogs and

your white bread PBJs.

[RAIN PATTERING]

But I made them with love.

[SIGHS]

[BRIAN] I know what you did

- [THUNDER RUMBLING]

- Storm is coming.

[BANGING ON DOOR]

- [LESTER] Leak! Bucket!

- [METAL CLANKS]

[PERSON] It's pissing

through the ceiling, Lester.

I got a f*cking guest, man.

[LESTER] Oh, is that what

we're calling them now?

You'll have to wait your turn, Angelica.

I'll get there when I get there.

[ANGELICA] Just like you, Lester.

You'll get there when you get there.

Take your snail-ass f*cking time.

[LESTER IN FRENCH] Si tu savais, cher.

what those words mean, assh*le.

[WATER DRIPPING]

[BELL RINGS]

- I want children.

- [YOUNG LILLIAN] Excuse me?

I want the chance to be a good

husband and a great father.

I think I could do that. You know?

[PERSON] There you go, honey.

[LILLIAN] Used to be advice

passed from woman to woman,

drawn from the well of her knowledge,

how we do this hard, hard thing.

- I reach back to my mother

- [SNIFFING]

and she holds my hand,

and she reaches back to

her mother before that.

A human chain of information

back and back and back.

[BRIAN] Lillian.

There was some cracked magic

in the air when I met your dad.

We'd come from far-flung places,

me from Uganda and he from Syracuse,

so we could fall in

love in New York City.

[LAVALLE] Correction.

I loved your dad.

[LAVALLE] Correction.

I can't tell you what

being in romantic love is.

I never felt true

happiness or contentment.

All those tummy things people

talk about? I never felt those.

Just blank spaces.

Only from my son were

those holes filled.

Oh, I know that was

no good either, Apollo.

Putting all that pressure on a child.

Burdening you with the

weight of all of my happiness.

Loving you more than

I can ever love myself.

And sometimes sometimes

hating the burden of loving you too.

But us mothers mustn't

speak of such matters.

The divine inconvenience.

[BREATHES DEEPLY] The grief,

the sorrow, the regret.

The anxiety of caring for a child.

[LILLIAN] Am I enough?

You are a burrowed tick in my mind.

And it occurs to me, a mother is

something I can never not be again.

[CLICKS TONGUE] Can I be mother enough?

Well, now there is no choice.

'Cause, kid, I'm all you've got.

Of course, I had hopes and dreams.

Don't we all grow up wishing on a star?

I gave all my dreams to you.

Okay. Before I tell you what

I don't want to tell you,

let me first give him color.

He was wounded deeply by

a mother who hated him.

[SMACKS LIPS] I think of it,

and I wrap him in my mind's arms.

- The dad was worse.

- [METAL CLANKING]

But the betrayal of the mother was

something he could never get past.

Should have served as a red flag.

I was color-blind.

[METAL CLANKS]

Your dad loved you with fire,

but he also got satisfaction

from achievements and other

worlds that didn't orbit you.

- I was I am jealous of that.

- [OFFICER] Officer West, congratulations

and thank you for an

outstanding performance.

[LILLIAN] Your father

kept a lot of stuff.

Stuff, stuff, stuff, boxes of it.

[LILLIAN] As if things were

proof he led a meaningful life.

Things filled the void left by

parents who couldn't love him.

They say we are destined

to repeat our patterns.

[LILLIAN] And ta-da, he chose a

woman who couldn't love him either.

But I needed him.

Needed him to cover my mistake.

[SLURPS, SWALLOWS]

- [BREATHES SHAKILY]

- [BOTTLE SLAMS]

There would be times I would look

at him and think, "I hate you."

And other times, he was the guy I chose.

Because, boy, I knew he would love you.

Pushing away all those gut warnings

that told me something

wasn't quite right with him.

Something.

I didn't see the fissures

that led to the quake.

I didn't see the reasons he chose me.

Perfect fit.

- [ZIPPER CLOSES]

- Wouldn't you know?

He tells me

You make me so angry

I wanna punch the walls

till my fingers are powder!

He also tells me

You shine a light on me so

strong that I am blinded by it.

We live day-to-day somewhere

between those two extremes.

[CROWD CHEERING]

[CHEERING CONTINUES]

[THUNDER RUMBLES]

- [ELECTRICITY HISSES]

- [SIRENS WAILING]

[LESTER] f*cking cheap-sh*t broken

city. The hell we paying taxes for?

[ANGELICA LAUGHS] You never paid

a cent to the taxman in your life.

[KNOCKS]

[LESTER] Lady!

[SICK PERSON GROANING]

[LAVALLE] That's someone's son.

I know.

[SICK PERSON BREATHING HEAVILY, MOANING]

[LAVALLE] Who fills each role?

And why?

[BREATHES HEAVILY] Thank

you. I'm scared of the dark.

The morning always comes.

I was beginning to think

I didn't exist. [PANTING]

Is this heaven?

The exact opposite.

- [THUD]

- [ANGELICA] I want my money back.

I ain't paying for no g*dd*mn

room with holes in the ceiling.

Light and heat from candles?

[LESTER] No one else would have

you in their place, Angelica.

[ANGELICA] f*ck you, Lester. f*ck you

and your shitty-ass excuse of a hotel.

Where's your mama?

She's in Massachusetts.

[ANGELICA] I'm done with this place.

I'm telling you, I'm taking

my business to The Duchess.

- [LESTER] I won't miss you.

- [ANGELICA] The Elk Hotel is a haven

for roaches and rat sh*t.

[STAMMERS] If you get sick at The Elk,

it's from dope smoke

and-and mold inhalation.

The service is nil.

You come here to die.

- She never leaves.

- [ANGELICA] This here? This is a no-tel.

That's my review. Zero stars!

Zero stars, you assh*le!

Where I come from, when you get

sick, your family takes care of you.

Where I come from, they

used to burn witches.

How you end up here?

S-Series of wrong turns.

You shouldn't be alone.

I haven't slept in so long.

When I can't sleep, I

pretend my bed is a boat.

And the bed is drifting off to sea.

I have to lie right in the center,

no limbs hanging over the sides,

because otherwise a shark might

jump up and snatch a foot or an arm.

That doesn't sound very relaxing.

Maybe not.

Why are you staying here?

[BRIAN] I know what you did.

[SICK PERSON BREATHING HEAVILY]

Can I get you some water?

[BREATHING HEAVILY]

Anything?

I miss my mom.

[SIGHS]

I'm gonna die tonight.

Me too.

Came here with Bill.

I told my mom that it was

a bunch of us sightseeing.

And Bill told his wife it was business.

We'd heard about it. This thing

that had been affecting our people.

Bill was scared. [STAMMERING]

I didn't tell him that

I'd started to feel bad.

Badder, because, well, we

had tickets to see Lena.

Third row. Right up front.

And the idea of not experiencing

her "Stormy Weather," I don't know.

The end of the dream was coming anyway,

and not seeing her would somehow

mean that it had all meant nothing.

All the anger and the

hiding and the confusion.

We came in on a bus.

People must've thought that

he was my dad or something.

[CHUCKLES]

Then it happened.

It was really sudden, like a

like a change in the weather.

Just, the cough got bad,

and the people started

staring at me, disgusted.

[STAMMERS] I was running

a fever, sweat dripping.

I could see the look in his eyes.

That was two months ago.

We stayed at a nice place and

then then his wife called.

An emergency. He had to go

back, but he would return.

He was gonna come back in time for Lena.

And when he didn't

I just I tore that room

apart like a loaded rock star,

looking for those tickets.

Couldn't find them anywhere.

I didn't have much money. I

kept having these blackouts.

I know I should have

used what I had left.

I know I should've.

I should've got a bus back home.

But I couldn't do it.

I couldn't.

I couldn't do that to my mom.

Just imagine what that would do to her.

You know, seeing the perfect body

that she delivered into the world

all rotted and ruined.

So I found this place, and I

gave Lester the rest of my cash.

I get that he has a

wife and all that stuff.

I get it.

But I wish

I just wish I could

I don't even mind it all

ending up here in this room.

But I wish I could have seen

her sing "Stormy Weather."

I wish I had that image in my mind

so that I could just picture

it at the exact last moment.

You know?

Like I could just imagine Lena

just holding that last note

as the curtains finally close.

[SINGING "STORMY WEATHER"]

[SINGING CONTINUES]

[RAIN PATTERING]

Sleep tight.

[BLOWS]

[LAVALLE] No. She would not pray.

No god of mine.

[ANGELICA SCREAMS]

[LESTER] Angelica!

[ANGELICA STRAINS]

[LESTER] Angelica!

[CHOKES]

[ANGELICA] Help me. Help me.

- [WILLIAM] Hey, man! Get outta here!

- [LESTER] Hey! Let go now.

- [LESTER] Let her go right now.

- This has nothing to do with you.

No one's ever gonna see you again.

- You're gonna find yourself

- I paid.

stuffed in a suitcase at

the bottom of a river. Get up!

- Get up!

- Whoa! Hey.

Hey, man. Come on.

Hey. Dude! Put it down!

[LESTER] I'm gonna give you

a sh*t to get outta here.

If you don't take it, you see

that stain on the wall over there?

That's gonna be what's left of you too.

Now, go! Go!

[SOBBING]

- [GASPS, SHOUTING]

- Angelica. It's okay.

- It's okay. I got you.

- [ANGELICA CRIES]

[LESTER] It's okay.

It's okay. He's gone.

I got you.

Who's gonna come find me?

[ANGELICA CRIES]

I don't exist.

You do. I'm looking at you.

You're right where you need to be.

- [BREATHES HEAVILY]

- I got you. I got you.

[LAVALLE] What would happen to her?

What would she tell Apollo?

How would she tell him?

- [YOUNG APOLLO CRIES]

- [YOUNG LILLIAN] I'm coming for you!

Who's gonna help you sh**t a basket?

Who's gonna teach you the

rules of American sport games?

Sandcastles I can do.

Changing light-bulbs.

Removing spiders from tubs.

But handmade Father's

Day projects at school?

What if something happens to me?

What if I die in the night?

No one will come for you.

Because no one knows

you're alone. [SNIFFLING]

[SNIFFLES, SIGHS]

How do you tell a child

his daddy isn't coming back?

Apollo, you felt he didn't want you,

but it was precisely the opposite.

He wanted you too much.

You shine a light on me so

strong, I am blinded by it.

[YOUNG LILLIAN CHUCKLES]

[LILLIAN] I need to explain.

I need an explanation.

It was a really hot day.

Humid too.

We took the tramway to Roosevelt

Island to have a picnic by the water.

[YOUNG LILLIAN] Tuna salad.

Huh. Kinda boring, huh?

- [CHUCKLES]

- [YOUNG LILLIAN] What did you say?

[BRIAN] I ain't say nothing.

And it was the first time he

didn't say anything that wasn't,

"Oh, Lillian, you're so beautiful."

"Lillian, you are a rose in a landfill."

Hey, Lillian, you know this whole

island used to be an insane asylum?

- No.

- Yeah.

Luxury apartments now.

Probably haunted, huh?

- [YOUNG LILLIAN] Hmm.

- Hey, you see that right there,

- the that lighthouse?

- Mm-hmm.

That lighthouse right there,

that used to light the way for

the ships bringing in the wackos.

- Mmm.

- You know, you're pretty crazy.

- [SCOFFS]

- You are certifiable.

- [CHUCKLES]

- I'd get you put in there. I could.

You know, back in the day,

husbands, they would have

their wives put in that place

for, like, masturbation

[CHUCKLES] or menstrual

problems, or even smoking. [LAUGHS]

- Except it's not funny, is it?

- Mmm.

If you're one of those women?

[LAVALLE] Novel reading,

ill-treatment by a husband, laziness,

political excitement,

asthma, bad company.

You know, if something like

that ever happened to you,

no one would know.

Like, your family and that, you

know, because they're all gone.

So sad.

[LILLIAN] And it felt like a thr*at

and I felt a door shut inside of me.

It's my fault

that I didn't listen to

words said over tuna salad

on the banks of Roosevelt Island.

His and theirs.

[CHANTERS] A storm is

coming. A storm is coming.

A storm is coming.

A storm is coming.

A storm is coming.

If I could teach you anything,

it's to look for the signs.

He said

You don't exist.

- Excuse me?

- Hmm?

[LILLIAN] And I started

living in a kind of fear.

He really didn't do

anything wrong though.

Apollo, know that.

Not until Until he said

[DOOR CLOSES]

[YOUNG LILLIAN] Apollo's

finally sleeping.

[BRIAN] Knock, knock.

Who's there?

Uh, banana.

- [LILLIAN] Sometimes when I was sad

- Banana who?

- [BRIAN] Knock, knock.

- he would tell jokes, make me smile.

- [YOUNG LILLIAN] Who's there?

- [BRIAN] Banana.

[YOUNG LILLIAN] Banana who?

[LILLIAN] He was funny

and sweet like that.

Who's there?

Orange.

Orange who?

Orange you glad I didn't say banana?

[YOUNG LILLIAN LAUGHS]

Hey, Lillian.

Hmm?

I will know you until we are dust.

Why does that sound like a thr*at?

[LAVALLE] He'd found the

receipt and confronted her.

She'd sworn up and down

she didn't know where that bill

for a stay at The Elk

Hotel on 9th and 42nd

had come from.

- We'd just got together, Lillian.

- I don't know what this is.

[LAVALLE] An affair

in this shitty hotel?

Laughable. He thought it was her boss.

Charles Blackwood.

- [LAVALLE] As if.

- [LAUGHS]

[LAVALLE] As if she would deign

to spend time in a place like this

with a man like that.

He's married.

With two children.

Oh, yeah? You sure know

a lot about him, huh?

He keeps their pictures on his desk.

You started saying he

was knocking at the door.

[BRIAN] Knock, knock.

I go back to work when

you are two months old.

I have to.

I'm shattered from getting up

through the night to feed you,

and then working, and then home.

I got angry.

I scolded him.

I withdrew.

I planned. I plotted my escape.

Apollo, if you ever have a child,

the cruelest act is to rip him

from his mother, months old,

and have her go back to work.

Don't ever do that, Apollo.

Unless you wanna see crazy.

[BRIAN] Knock, knock!

We split up.

That part's obvious.

And now I see him in every color.

[BRIAN] You are screwed now, girl.

- You're going to wake my baby.

- "My baby"?

[LILLIAN] I'm petrified he

will take my child from me.

And I will never see you again.

Everything seems lost.

[STAMMERS]

He's the American I would k*ll to be.

He has all the power.

You're just like my mother.

That's a stinging cut.

I take the little scar, and I add it

to my collection of little scars

[PANTS] and I'm panicking.

He speaks to me in this wary tone,

because he's convinced

himself I'm crazy.

He has to believe it, so he

can amputate me and take you.

I would like to say

f*ck you! Who do you think you are?

But I can't.

I would like to smash

him in the f*cking face,

but he's the American.

No one's coming to get you,

Lillian. You understand that?

It is simple. Nobody's coming to get you

because no one who loves you is left.

And then the earthquake erupts.

He's come to visit you. It's a

Saturday, and he finds this hotel bill.

And I can't imagine where he found it

unless he planted it on me himself.

He's raging, even though

we're not together anymore.

He's out of his mind.

The vein bulging in his

neck. His eyes on fire.

He's saying if he can't

have me, no one can.

No other man is raising my son!

[YOUNG LILLIAN] Your son?

My son. I will take you to court.

I will finish you, Lillian.

You say goodbye. It is all over.

I would never! Could never! Have never!

When would I even have the time?

What do you imagine sleeping with

my boss would actually do for me?

Liar! Liar! Liar!

You're all glamour, Lillian.

You only appear as you wish to be seen!

And then I come home one day.

I've bought a Happy Meal for you.

You always ate the fries first.

I come home

and I see something I can never unsee.

- [YOUNG APOLLO SCREAMS]

- [BRIAN YELLING]

[BREATHES SHAKILY]

And so I turn off the light.

[BRIAN] Our bed was a

boat when we cannot sleep.

But you, Lillian, you were the shark.

[LAVALLE] A cop?

A white American cop, of all people?

They would burn her for what

she'd done. They would vanish her.

You are a f*cking liar!

But he's the American.

[LAVALLE] Like the women before

her and the witches before them.

I'm coming for you!

- [YOUNG APOLLO CRIES]

- [BRIAN GRUNTS]

[STRAINS]

[BREATHES HEAVILY]

[RAIN PATTERING]

The answer is no.

I can never be enough.

The mom I want to be

is not the mom I am.

What I've taken from you, Son.

- [YOUNG APOLLO] Mommy!

- [BRIAN, LILLIAN GRUNT]

What I've erased.

[BREATHES SHAKILY]

The mom I am is just like he said

The mom I am

- [YOUNG LILLIAN] The mom I am

- [LILLIAN] Hey!

- [YELPS, BREATHES HEAVILY]

- No.

No. No, no.

This is not how Lillian's story ends.

[CRIES]

[LILLIAN] She came inside

and closed the window.

Imagine the cheek of asking someone

to scrape you off the sidewalk.

[CRIES] I can't. I can't.

She came inside. Oh, my God.

[YOUNG LILLIAN CRIES]

Who are you?

Bad things in this world.

But nothing so bad is worth that fall.

Brian West doesn't win!

[BREATHING HEAVILY]

Just a dark night of the soul.

Lillian had lost her

connection to anything higher.

[YOUNG LILLIAN BREATHING

HEAVILY, CRYING]

[LILLIAN] A dark night calls

for a spiritual response.

Are you God? [BREATHING HEAVILY]

A lady God?

I knew it.

Are you here to punish me?

[JAJJA] Lillian, ask

help from the spirits

when you have used all your strength.

[YOUNG LILLIAN CRIES]

Do you think you should

be punished, Lillian?

[YOUNG LILLIAN GROANS]

Haven't you always felt that?

Because you left.

Because you survived.

Because of the lie you told

to your husband and child?

[CRIES]

[LILLIAN] For all you've done?

Should you be punished?

[YOUNG LILLIAN] I'll believe.

I promise I'll believe.

Hail Mary, full of grace.

The Lord, uh

Blessed is

I don't know this one.

Attempting to leave your

son alone in this world?

[YOUNG LILLIAN WHIMPERS]

Should you be punished?

[BREATHES SHAKILY]

I'll make a deal with you.

Please, I'll do anything.

Are you here to tell me what to do?

Lillian wondered, was there

another woman somewhere

on her knees,

making a deal for the son

that was lying in room 200?

I won't leave.

I am his mother.

That's all I ever need to be.

I'll be a good one.

I promise.

I'll be the best one I can be.

I'll do anything.

If you let me get away with this thing.

If you If you make

it go away, somehow.

These deals we make,

they're real.

[SIGHS]

What Lillian didn't know was

that 35 years from this very day,

Apollo Kagwa would pay the price

for the bargain his

mother made in this room.

What did you say?

Hmm?

Nothing.

The gods will take what they are owed.

[LESTER] You're gonna find

yourself stuffed in a suitcase

at the bottom of a river.

And then it came to Lillian.

The answer to her problem had

been in this room all along.

- She didn't need to confess.

- [SIGHS]

[LILLIAN] She didn't

need to call the police.

She didn't need to tell Apollo.

She can make it go away all herself.

[BRIAN] Oh, I know what

you did, Lillian. I know!

Do be quiet!

You don't get to win, assh*le.

Lillian realized

that no one in the whole

wide world needed to know.

Ever.

She would go carefully, thoroughly.

She had decided to eat the dog,

and it was indeed a fat one.

But for all his talk,

Brian hadn't anyone who cared

whether he was alive or dead either.

[SIGHS] There is

nothing we will not do

[BOTH] For the ones we love.

Lillian remembered a long-ago promise.

One she'd forgotten she made.

I will never let anything happen to you.

I will protect you

with my breath and soul.

With every molecule.

[BREATHES DEEPLY]

And she kept that promise.

She was the mother she had vowed to be.

And look, the sun is peeking through.

Time to turn the light back on.

["SOLID LOVE" PLAYING]

[LILLIAN] Lillian could finally believe

that things were going to be better

than they'd been since the day she

stepped foot on this country's soil.

She felt American.

[LAVALLE] It would be accurate to

say that Lillian's first child

and only child

was conceived in the

beautiful blur of 1977.

In America, we rewrite

history by erasing it.

But history will not stay buried,

deals cannot be unmade,

and gods will take their pay.