The wind blows away the linen that is hung on the clothesline. Plumber and Starlet are sitting behind it on the bench, the same bench on which Starlet and Dick had kissed earlier the same day. The torn-up flowers that Dick had brought are still scattered in front of the bench.
“I don’t know what to believe anymore,” Starlet says while her cry bursts out. “Everything is so confusing.”
“Perfect!” Plumber says confidently. Starlet is dazed by his response. “That is a great start,” Plumber continues. “Life is confusing. It is supposed to be ambiguous. Not knowing the truth of things for sure, and still standing up for what is right, is what makes life beautiful. People who offer you certainty, they are nothing but deceitful salesmen, trying to fool you to behave in their favor, to live for their benefit. Otherwise, there is nothing certain in this life.”
Plumber holds Starlet’s hand. “Do you feel there is a chance that his love might have been sincere? I am not saying if you know it for sure, just if you can imagine it to be true?”
Starlet takes his look down at the smashed flower on the ground. “I saw something sincere in the way he looked at me. I believed that then, and I believe it now.”
“That special feeling, if it’s true, do you think would worth more than the becoming-a-star route that Lady is pushing you into?”
Starlet looks at Plumber and nods.
“There you have it, my dear. That is your enlightenment. That, there could be something in this life that would make all the reaching-for-the-stars lifestyle advertised by this city just a ridiculous illusion, a deceitful mirage.”
Starlet turns her look down. She is thinking. She needs more time to digest the view that was presented to her. Plumber takes the watering can and gets up to resume watering the plants. He waters a green flower, with big, green leaves. Starlet is still thinking. Plumber washes the dust off the flower leaves.
“This city,” Plumber says while washing the leaf, “this city has developed a very corrupt culture.” Starlet looks up. “Once you are born into it, it is very hard to break free. The city replaces life with career, teaches life’s goal as becoming a celebrity, a star, a winner, someone that all the other losers would look up to and say I wish to be that person. Then, tricks you to sacrifice the most valuable things in life, and to invest it all into the becoming-a-star illusion.”
Tears well up in Starlet’s eyes. Plumber has finished washing the leaf, but would rather continue his speech without turning back to Starlet. He starts patting the leaves. “Life is not about winning or losing, or becoming different than others. Life is about life, about being able to see the beauty of giving life to new things or preserving the existing ones. People who cannot see the beauty of life, are dead already. And this city, this damned city takes the life out of humans, and turns them to clockwork zombies.”
Plumber turns back to Starlet. He finds Starlet looking at him intently. Tears are flowing down her face. The sense of peace that has been growing in her heart, is now resting on her face. She smiles. Plumber smiles back. She stands up, goes towards Plumber, and hugs him. Plumber kisses her on the head. She looks up and makes eye contact with Plumber. Then, without saying a word, she takes the watering can from him, and starts watering the plants.
The bone knife is lying on the ground behind the willow tree.