INT. ROOM. AFTERNOON.
Eleanor sits on a couch. There is a window behind her that looks out on trees; the sky is blue between the trees. She looks happy.
ELEANOR
I started this vlog for in case I died. I wanted there to be some evidence that I existed, something beyond a birth certificate and a death certificate and the quickly fading memory of me in the minds of my step-mother and step-sisters and Lumi.
I’m still alive.
Eleanor laughs.
ELEANOR
I was in a lose-lose situation, and I won. Maybe it wasn’t exactly the way I wanted, or planned. Maybe it was because I married out, because I was the girl who needed the guy, but you know what, I don’t care. Because I’d rather be a stereotype than dead any day of the week.
And maybe… maybe he needs me too. Not the way I need him, not to get out, not to still be alive. But somehow, some way, he needs me. I wouldn’t be where I am if he didn’t.
I love him. Maybe it’s silly, and you’re all thinking, how can you love him already? You barely know him. But I’ve seen things that you haven’t, and I know myself. I love him.
Some of you probably think I’m doing this for the money, or to get out, and you think I’m being selfish. Maybe I am. But isn’t that what love is? You know that you have the power to hurt someone else, to use them and abuse them, and you stay with them anyway, because you want them. So maybe I’m selfish, and maybe I’m bad for what I’m doing, but I don’t care.
But the point of this isn’t to defend myself.
Now, I have something to show you.
Montage going through a park.
ELEANOR
(V.O.)
This is goodbye, I guess. It was nice while it lasted, and I’ll be honest: I think you saved my life. You, my silent, invisible viewers, because you gave me a reason to come back, week after week, and say something. Because I was running out of reasons.
My last goodbye, though, has to be to someone else. Lumi. Lumi, I–without you, I would have died a thousand deaths, and then I would have killed myself, and there would be nothing left of me. I know you believe in heaven, or that you want to, so…nobody deserves it more than you.
My name is Eleanor Gray, and… goodbye.
510A 