Night Swimming (the screenplay) / Story guide
Who's who, and what's where
The people, places and things in Night Swimming (the screenplay). Every card starts with what you'd know when they first turn up. Anything later is folded under a spoiler.
Characters
Jordan
Teenage acid dealer in Ocala
A high school kid who deals LSD with his partner Dom and hosts his customers at his own place while they trip. He runs everything on rules: no bystanders at a deal, nobody touches the girls, and no stupid shit. He calls it playing it safe. Dom calls it paranoid.
First appears: Scene 2, Qball's Pool Hall
Spoilers
An arcade deal turns into an ambush and a car chase that leaves his Prelude shot up, and the night he spends at Kate's afterward starts the trouble with Josh. He falls for Kate, lies about taking her to Star Wars, and loses both his best friend and the business in one hallway conversation. By Year Two he's selling to movie producers and music people in Orlando, buying 15 to 40 books at a time in Miami, using pay phones and seeing cameras everywhere. After the Fourth of July he asks Kate to move in, she stands him up, and he drives to Miami, where Miguel hands him over to Vasquez just before the police raid the boat. He checks into the Hilton on a Visa card with someone else's name on it. The draft breaks off with a cop firing at him.
Kate
The girl Dom brings to the pool hall
She turns up at Qball's with Dom and holds Jordan's eye over Dom's shoulder while she kisses him. She's quick, teasing, and very hard to read.
First appears: Scene 2, Qball's Pool Hall
Spoilers
For most of Year One she's Josh's girlfriend, and she keeps drifting toward Jordan's place. On the roof she tells him she started shooting heroin at fourteen, and about John, the boy she held every night while he was dying, before her family moved from New Hampshire to Florida. She names Jordan's thinking tree after her middle name, Marie. In Year Two she breaks up with Josh, then comes back for the Fourth of July and spends the night with Jordan. She promises him an answer about moving in on his birthday, then cancels on moving day and ends up back in bed with Josh.
Dom
Jordan's Year One partner
Jordan's partner in the business, a decent pool player who knows how to work the lean on his favorite table. He brings his girl along to a deal, which Jordan does not like at all.
First appears: Scene 2, Qball's Pool Hall
Spoilers
Jordan pulls him into the bathroom hallway at Qball's and lays out the rules about bystanders, and Dom backs down. He's at the studio for Craig's first trip, and he doesn't appear again after that night. By the next scenes Kate is Josh's girlfriend, not his.
Josh
Jordan's best friend and Kate's boyfriend
Jordan's best friend and part of the business, and Kate's boyfriend. He likes getting high more than he likes keeping promises about it.
First appears: Scene 3, The Studio
Spoilers
He flakes on the Star Wars night he and Jordan planned, and when he finds out Jordan took Kate instead and lied about it, he ends the friendship and the business in the school hallway. By Year Two, word is he's selling crack, has been kicked out of school, owes people money, and has dropped Jordan's name. Jordan quietly sends him money through Kate. The last time we see him he's shaking in a corner while Kate cancels on Jordan.
Craig
A customer
A customer who meets Jordan at Qball's, tips his cap, and follows him home in a royal blue 1964 Chevy Impala with two friends.
First appears: Scene 2, Qball's Pool Hall
Spoilers
He and his friends drop at the studio, and Craig is the first to feel it, saying everything twice.
Eliza
Jordan's girlfriend, the sheriff's daughter
Jordan's girlfriend, asleep in his bed in Superman Underoos when the customers arrive. Her father is the head sheriff, which makes Dom very nervous.
First appears: Scene 3, The Studio
Spoilers
Jordan thinks of her as his wild card: the sheriff won't send officers into a house where his daughter might be carried out on the news, not in an election year. After her father is re-elected, Jordan calls him and sends her home. He hears later that she's doing well in school and got her scholarship back. The draft calls her both Eliza and Aimee.
The sheriff
Eliza's father
Eliza's father, the head sheriff, up for re-election. Jordan says he's heard a few of his secrets.
First appears: Scene 3, The Studio
Spoilers
He never appears on screen in this draft. After he's re-elected, Jordan calls him to come get his daughter, and he's waiting downstairs when she comes down with her bags.
Rufus
The buyer at the arcade
Jordan's contact at The Power Pellet, playing Marvel vs. Capcom in a crowd of friends and talking like a B-movie.
First appears: Scene 4, The Power Pellet
Spoilers
Jordan beats him twice on random select and leaves. As Jordan walks out, Rufus makes a phone call, and a Buick is on Jordan's bumper a minute later.
Theron
Kate's friend
Kate's friend, at her house the night Jordan shows up with his car shot full of holes. Jordan takes one look at him and wonders if Josh is jealous.
First appears: Scene 5, Kate's home
Spoilers
Kate says Josh has no reason to be, since Theron is gay. Later, when Josh hears Jordan on the phone, Kate tells him it's Theron.
John
Kate's first love
The boy Kate tells Jordan about on the roof. She was fourteen, he was seventeen, and he was already sick.
First appears: Scene 6, The party
Spoilers
He came home from New York HIV positive and was turned away by both of his remarried parents. Kate met him at his best friend's funeral, ran away to live with him, and held him every night. He died of an overdose, and she woke up next to him.
Eddie
The popcorn guy at the theater
The kid behind the concession counter, whose name tag says Eddie. Kate decides he could take Jordan in a bare-knuckle brawl.
First appears: Scene 7, Movie theater
Spoilers
Jordan keeps the joke going the next morning with Josh, which nearly gives him away.
Coach Mc'Davon
Gym coach at Forest High
A coach who stands in the school parking lot watching Jordan and Josh across the street, and yells at them to get to class.
First appears: Scene 8, Forest High School
Spoilers
He trades insults with both of them, uses slurs, and threatens push-ups and failing grades. He turns up again right after Josh ends the friendship.
Chris
Jordan's friend and roommate
The friend Jordan claims he took to Star Wars. Jordan calls him the smartest one of the bunch.
First appears: Scene 8, Forest High School
Spoilers
In Year Two he moves into Jordan's living room. He won't come along on business because his dad's a cop. On the Fourth of July he wants to fly off the roof, and Kate talks him into test flights from the ground first.
Jack
Jordan's roommate
A friend who asks to live in Jordan's coat closet, and does.
First appears: Scene 8, Forest High School
Spoilers
On the Fourth of July he and Isa stay downstairs while the others go up to watch the fireworks.
Isa
Jack's girlfriend
Jack's girl, who takes four tabs at once and splits them with him.
First appears: Scene 9, Fourth of July
Spoilers
She spends the Fourth of July wrapped up in Jack, making paper airplanes.
Miguel
Jordan's supplier in Miami
The man Jordan picks up from in Miami. He's waiting on a late shipment and tells Jordan to bring his gun, because things have been getting hot.
First appears: Scene 10, The last morning
Spoilers
He's getting out of the game with a baby on the way, and this trip is to hand Jordan over to his people. When the police raid the boat he stops to grab a load of books, gives Jordan one of his two guns, and is shot in the head on the way out.
Vasquez
Miguel's connection on the boat
The man in the dealing room on the docked boat, polite and absolutely clear about the rules.
First appears: Scene 11, Miami
Spoilers
He'll call Jordan, never the other way around; late, early, or carrying anything electronic means death. When the police come aboard he refuses to drop his gun and fires first.
The man in the burgundy coat
The gunman in the cold open
A figure in a burgundy leather coat with a Glock in his waistband who gets out of a white 1978 Oldsmobile at a red light in the pouring rain.
First appears: Scene 1, Empty street
Spoilers
He fires two rounds through the Daytona's driver's window and drives off as the light turns green. The posted draft doesn't yet say who he is or who was in the car.
Places
Ocala
Jordan's hometown
Jordan's small Florida hometown, where he decides to stay because a bigger city would mean more trouble.
First appears: Scene 8, Forest High School
Ocala is the county seat of Marion County in North Central Florida, incorporated as a city in 1885 and known as the Horse Capital of the World for its hundreds of thoroughbred farms. The city has its own police department, led by an appointed chief; the elected sheriff serves Marion County as a whole.
Ocala, Florida (Wikipedia) ↗Chief Lee McGehee Biography, Florida Police Chiefs Association ↗
Spoilers
In Year Two he moves into a studio downtown and lies low here while the money comes from Orlando.
Qball's Pool Hall
Where the business meets its customers
A pool hall with a lean on Dom's favorite table, where Jordan and Dom wait for customers.
First appears: Scene 2, Qball's Pool Hall
Spoilers
Jordan meets Craig at the door here and walks him out to his car, a shot that mirrors the gunman in the cold open.
Jordan's studio apartment
Jordan's place in Year One
Jordan's apartment, where customers drop under his rules: stay inside for eight hours, no phones, no fighting, and nobody touches the girls.
First appears: Scene 3, The Studio
Spoilers
It has a bedroom, a dining room, and a kitchen window onto the overhang above the front door, where Kate tells Jordan her story. A park across the street holds his thinking tree.
The downtown studio
Jordan's place in Year Two
A second-story studio in downtown Ocala, above a pawn shop, with a fire escape up to the roof.
First appears: Scene 8, Forest High School
Spoilers
Chris sleeps in the living room and Jack in the coat closet. The Fourth of July trip happens here, and so does the morning Jordan asks Kate to move in.
The Power Pellet
The local arcade
A local arcade where Jordan meets Rufus over a game of Marvel vs. Capcom.
First appears: Scene 4, The Power Pellet
Spoilers
The deal goes fine inside. The parking lot is another story.
Kate's home
Where Kate lives with her mom
Kate's house, with a phone in the kitchen. Jordan calls here looking for Josh.
First appears: Scene 5, Kate's home
Spoilers
He drives over with his windows smashed and a crowbar stuck in the door, and cries into her neck in the driveway.
Paved Paradise Park
Where Josh and Jordan talk
A park with a bench where Josh confronts Jordan the day after the ambush.
First appears: Scene 5, Kate's home
Spoilers
They settle it, set up a first-timer named Dallas, and make plans to see Star Wars.
The movie theater
The theater near Jordan's place
The theater within walking distance of Jordan's apartment, with a ticket collector who gives advice and a popcorn guy named Eddie.
First appears: Scene 6, The party
Spoilers
When a couple takes their seats, Jordan and Kate watch the rest of the movie from a stool and an upturned bucket in the aisle.
Forest High School
Jordan and Josh's high school
The high school Jordan and Josh attend, when they bother to cross the street and go in.
First appears: Scene 8, Forest High School
Forest High School is a real public high school in Ocala, part of Marion County Public Schools. It opened in 1969, after court-ordered integration closed Howard High, and its mascot is the Wildcats. It sat on the original Ocala High School campus on Fort King Street until it moved to Southeast Maricamp Road in 2005.
Spoilers
It's where Josh finds out about the Star Wars night and ends everything, down the A-wing hall from a vending machine.
Josh's house
Where Kate goes instead
Josh's place in Year Two.
First appears: Scene 10, The last morning
Spoilers
Kate takes Jordan's call here on moving day, with Josh shaking in the corner, and that night her phone buzzes unanswered while she's in bed with Josh.
Miami
Where the books come from
Where Jordan picks up his acid, in books, at the seaports.
First appears: Scene 3, The Studio
Miami is the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida. The county was called Dade County until voters approved the name change on November 13, 1997, and its police force was long known as the Metro-Dade Police.
Spoilers
His last run takes him to the Hilton, a Subway across the street, and a boat at the dock.
The Miami Hilton
Jordan's hotel in Miami
A downtown hotel across the street from the Subway where Miguel is waiting.
First appears: Scene 11, Miami
Spoilers
The desk won't take cash, so Jordan pays with a Visa card that reads Dallas Cruz and gets a top-floor suite.
The docked rig
Vasquez's boat
A boat tied up at the Miami dock, with ship security at the door and a glass-walled dealing room inside.
First appears: Scene 11, Miami
Spoilers
Past the kitchen is the warehouse room where the product is stored. It's where the raid turns into a firefight.
Things
Marie the Tree
Jordan's thinking tree
A huge tree in the park across from Jordan's apartment, a park that doubles as a police training course. Jordan sits in its roots to think.
First appears: Scene 7, Movie theater
Spoilers
Kate names it Marie, after her own middle name. Sitting in its roots, Jordan tells her he's fallen in love with something he can't have.
Books
How the acid is bought
The unit Jordan buys in: eight pages, a hundred tabs to a page.
First appears: Scene 3, The Studio
Spoilers
In Year One he picks up books at the Miami seaports and sells the sheets for $300 apiece, keeping some for sales and some for fun. By Year Two he's buying 15 to 40 books at a time.
Jordan's Prelude
Jordan's car
Jordan's black 1994 Honda Prelude.
First appears: Scene 2, Qball's Pool Hall
Spoilers
After the arcade ambush it has bullet holes, smashed windows and a crowbar stuck in the door frame, and it's barely running. He drives it to Miami anyway, and Miguel asks what happened to it.
The Dodge Daytona
The car at the red light
A black 1989 Dodge Daytona with rusted paint and fresh chrome rims, stopped at a red light in the rain.
First appears: Scene 1, Empty street
Spoilers
Two rounds go through its driver's window, and a man spills out of the passenger side. The posted draft doesn't yet say whose car it is.
The starlight
Jordan's gun
Miguel's word for the gun he tells Jordan to bring to Miami.
First appears: Scene 10, The last morning
Spoilers
On the boat Jordan admits it has no firing pin, and Miguel swaps it for one of his own.
The Star Wars remakes
The movie night
The Star Wars re-release Jordan and Josh plan to see together.
First appears: Scene 5, Kate's home
Star Wars returned to theaters as a Special Edition on January 31, 1997, for the film's 20th anniversary. George Lucas restored cut scenes such as Han Solo's meeting with Jabba the Hutt and added new digital shots, and some changes, like who shoots first in the cantina, drew lasting complaints from fans.
Spoilers
Josh doesn't show, so Jordan takes Kate, who has never seen it. Jordan thinks the remastering is good and the added footage is horrible.
Groups
The men in the Buick
Driver and passenger in the ambush
Two men in a white Buick Delta 88 who pull in behind Jordan outside The Power Pellet, one with a crowbar.
First appears: Scene 4, The Power Pellet
Spoilers
Jordan rams their car, pinning the passenger's leg in the door. The driver smashes the Prelude's windows, leaves his crowbar stuck in its frame, fires five shots into it, and chases Jordan through a string of red lights until he wrecks into a parked car in a dead-end neighborhood.
Dade County Police
The police at the dock
The officers who pour onto the boat in Miami.
First appears: Scene 11, Miami
Dade County's own police force was known for decades as the Metro-Dade Police. The county became Miami-Dade County after a November 13, 1997 vote, and today the force is the Miami-Dade Sheriff's Office.
Spoilers
They shoot the ship's security guard on the way in, then trade fire with Vasquez and his men. One of them kills Miguel.
Story beats
Show the story beatsSpoilers for the whole book
Cold open
- Shots at a red light
In the pouring rain, a man in a burgundy coat walks up to a Dodge Daytona at a stoplight and fires two rounds through the driver's window, then drives off as the light turns green.
Scene 1 ↗
Act One: Year One
- Nine ball at Qball's
Jordan loses at pool to Dom while they wait on a customer, then notices the girl Dom brought, Kate, looking right at him.
Scene 2 ↗ - No bystanders
In the bathroom hallway Jordan chews Dom out for bringing Kate to a deal, then lays out why: no stupid shit.
Scene 2 ↗ - The sheriff's daughter
Back at the studio Dom asks about Eliza, and Jordan explains why keeping the sheriff's daughter around protects them.
Scene 3 ↗ - House rules
Everyone drops, Jordan reads out his five rules for tripping in his house, and the walls start to breathe.
Scene 3 ↗ - Year One
Jordan's voiceover: books from Miami, business booming, sending Eliza home to her father, and Kate coming around more as things with Josh go wrong.
Scene 3 ↗ - Kate at the door
Kate shows up crying about Josh, and Jordan tells her she doesn't have to be an open book, then leaves to make some money.
Scene 4 ↗ - The arcade ambush
A deal with Rufus goes smoothly over Marvel vs. Capcom, then two men in a Buick come at Jordan's Prelude with a crowbar and a pistol and chase him through town.
Scene 4 ↗ - Shaking in Kate's driveway
Jordan can't reach Josh, so he calls Kate and drives over, too shaken to get out of the car, and cries into her neck.
Scene 5 ↗ - Josh asks questions
On a park bench Josh wants to know why Jordan went to Kate's, then lets it go and they make plans to see Star Wars.
Scene 5 ↗ - Kate's story on the roof
At a party, Kate lights Jordan's cigarette on the overhang and tells him about heroin at fourteen and the dying boy she loved.
Scene 6 ↗ - Josh flakes
Josh lies on a friend's floor listening to Old McDonald on repeat while Jordan calls and calls, so Jordan invites Kate instead.
Scene 6 ↗ - A stool and a bucket
Kate teases Jordan all through the movie, and when someone takes their seats they watch the rest from the aisle.
Scene 7 ↗ - Marie the Tree
Kate names Jordan's thinking tree, and he admits he's fallen for something he can't have. When she understands he means her, she says she should go.
Scene 7 ↗
Act Two: Year Two
- The lie about Chris
Jordan tells Josh he took Chris to the movie, and a coach shouts at them to get to class.
Scene 8 ↗ - It's over
Josh finds out Jordan took Kate and ends the friendship and the business in the school hallway.
Scene 8 ↗ - Year Two
Jordan's voiceover: Orlando producers, 15 to 40 books a time, Josh on crack and dropping his name, a downtown studio shared with Chris and Jack, and an email from Kate on the Fourth of July.
Scene 8 ↗ - Fireworks on the roof
The friends drop together, Chris tries to fly, and Jordan and Kate watch the fireworks from the roof until she rests her head on his chest.
Scene 9 ↗ - Ask me on your birthday
The next morning Jordan asks Kate to move in, and she pinky swears to give him an answer on his birthday.
Scene 10 ↗ - Kate cancels
On moving day Kate calls it off from Josh's house, and that night she's in bed with Josh while Jordan waits by the phone.
Scene 10 ↗ - Miguel's last setup
Miguel tells Jordan he's quitting and this is the last time he'll set him up, and to bring his gun. Jordan leaves home feeling he may not see it again.
Scene 10 ↗ - Meeting Vasquez
In Miami, Jordan checks into the Hilton on someone else's card, and Miguel introduces him to Vasquez, who sets out rules that all end in death.
Scene 11 ↗ - The raid
Police storm the boat, Vasquez opens fire, and Jordan and Miguel crawl out of the crossfire and run for the stern.
Scene 11 ↗ - Miguel goes down
Miguel stops to grab an armful of books and is shot in the head. The draft breaks off as the cop fires at Jordan.
Scene 11 ↗