JERRY DOLAN, a young priest, sits across a table from KATIE CACHENCKO, an attractive young married woman. He is...trying to hear her confession. However, as the scene has developed, they have found themselves talking about a parish reunion they attended the night before...
JERRY: (pause) I had a wonderful time last night.
KATIE: Did you?
JERRY: For the first time in my life I really felt what it was like to be part of a memory. I’d shake hands with a guy, and I wouldn’t see the guy, I’d see the boy he was. And I’d know he wasn’t looking at me, but at a kid with a face full of freckles and a runny nose and a baseball cap and creme from a Twinky at the corner of his mouth.
KATIE: (a bit wistfully) Oh, Jerry. FATHER! (Jerry reacts) Jerry.
JERRY: What’s the matter, Katie?
KATIE: I had such a wonderful time last night.
JERRY: Well, I’m glad. That’s what reunions are for.
KATIE: And you...really did...have a wonderful time, too, didn’t you?
JERRY: (an uncomfortable pause) Are you ready now?
KATIE: (fast) For what?
JERRY: For...confession.
KATIE: Not yet. I want to talk a little more.
JERRY: Sure. About what?
KATIE: Well, I mean, we’ve known each other since we were kids, there must be a million topics we could discuss.
JERRY: I bet.
KATIE: There’s...politics.
JERRY: Politics.
KATIE: Religion.
JERRY: That’d be good.
KATIE: Except you probably get that all the time.
JERRY: It comes up a lot in my job, yes.
KATIE: There’s literature.
JERRY: There’s that.
KATIE: There’s dancing.
JERRY: (a chord) Dancing?
KATIE: Wanna talk about dancing?
JERRY: What’s...there to talk about?
KATIE: I danced a lot last night.
JERRY: Did you?
KATIE: Yes. Oh, yes.
JERRY: (another uncomfortable pause) The band was great, didn’t you think?
KATIE: The band was phenomenal, yes.
JERRY: They were very inventive...with all the old songs.
KATIE: Phenomenally inventive.
JERRY: I mean, you wouldn’t’ think “Moon River,” “My Boyfriend’s Back” and “The Ballad of the Green Berets” would ever work in a medley, would you?...What were we talking about?
KATIE: Dancing.
JERRY: Oh. Yes. You danced a lot last night. You were telling me.
KATIE: And you didn’t leave your dancing shoes at the seminary, either.
JERRY: I made my way to the floor a few times.
KATIE: Nine.
JERRY: You counted?
KATIE: You’re a priest. Everybody counted.
JERRY: You’re not upset, are you?
KATIE: Why should I be upset?
JERRY: I don’t know.
KATIE: I mean, you never took a vow against the Hully Gully, right?
JERRY: Right.
KATIE: So, there’s no reason for me to be upset, now, is there?
JERRY: No reason at all.
KATIE: Jerry Dolan, the Dancing Padre!
JERRY: But you did count.
KATIE: Count what?
JERRY: My dances.
KATIE: Yes.
JERRY: So...?
KATIE: But...that was easy.
JERRY: What was easy?
KATIE: Counting your nine dances.
JERRY: (carefully) Why?
KATIE: (Fast) Because six of them were with me! (Leaps into the kneeler) Bless me, Father, for I have sinned!