Mr. Perlman: We rip out so much of ourselves to be cured of things faster than we should that we go bankrupt by the age of thirty and have less to offer each time we start with someone new. But to make yourself feel nothing so as not to feel anything - what a waste!
Mr. Perlman: Have I spoken out of turn? Then I'll say one more thing. It'll clear the air. I may have come close, but I never had what you two have. Something always held me back or stood in the way. How you live your life is your business, just remember, our hearts and our bodies are given to us only once. And before you know it, your heart is worn out, and, as for your body,
there comes a point when no one looks at it, much less wants to come near it. Right now, there's sorrow, pain. Don't kill it and with it the joy you've felt.
Elio: Does mom know?
[long pause]
Mr. Perlman: I don't think she does.
Oliver: Is there anything you don't know?
Elio: I know nothing, Oliver.
Oliver: Well, you seem to know more than anyone else around here.
Elio: Well, if you only knew how little I really know about the things that matter.
Oliver: What "things that matter?"
[long pause]
Elio: You know what things.
Oliver: Why are you telling me this?
Elio: Because I thought you should know.
Oliver: Because you thought I should know?
Elio: Because I wanted you to know.
Elio: [to himself] Because I wanted you to know. Because I wanted you to know.
Because I wanted you to know.
Elio: [to Oliver] Because there's no one else I can say this to but you.
Oliver: Are you saying what I think you're saying?
[Elio nods]
Oliver: Wait for me here. Don't go away.
Elio: You know I'm not going anywhere.
Elio: They know about us.
Oliver: I figured.
Elio: How?
Oliver: From the way your dad spoke to me, he made me feel like a part of the family, almost like a son-in-law. You're so lucky! My father would have carted me off to a correctional facility.
Elio: Elio. Elio, Elio, Elio, Elio,
Elio, Elio, Elio, Elio...
[long pause over the phone followed by a sigh]
Oliver: Oliver. I remember everything.
Mr. Perlman: You two had a nice friendship.
Elio: Yeah...
Mr. Perlman: You're too smart not to know how rare, how special what you two had was.
Elio: Oliver was Oliver.
Mr. Perlman: Parce-que c'etait lui, parce-que c'etait moi.
Elio: Oliver may be very
intelligent but...
Mr. Perlman: Oh no, no, no. He was more than intelligent. What you two had, had everything and nothing to do with intelligence. He was good. You were both lucky to have found each other, because you too are good.
Elio: I think he was better than me. I think he was better than me.
Mr. Perlman: I'm sure he'd
say the same thing about you. Which flatters you both.
Elio: Malfada? Mom? Yeah, it's me. Yeah, everything's fine, I'm at the station in Clusone. Listen, Mom, can you...
[voice breaking]
Elio: Can you come get me, mom?
Annella Perlman: [Reading from The Heptaméron] A handsome young knight is madly in love with a princess, and she too is in love with him, though she seems not to be entirely aware of it. Despite the friendship that blossoms between them, or perhaps because of that very friendship, the young knight finds himself so humbled and speechless that he is totally unable to bring up the
subject of his love. Until one day he asks the princess point-blank: Is it better to speak or to die?
Elio: I'll never have the courage to ask a question like that.
Mr. Perlman: I doubt that. Hey, Elly-Belly. You do know that you can always talk to us?
Mr. Perlman: You're too old not to accept people for who they are. What's wrong with them? What's wrong with them? You call them Sonny and Cher behind their backs...
Elio: That's what mom calls them. That's what mom calls them!
Mr. Perlman: ...and then accept gifts from them. The only person that reflects badly on is you. Is it
because they're gay or because they're ridiculous?
Elio: I miss you.
Oliver: I miss you too, very much. I have some news.
Elio: News? Oh, you're getting married, I suppose.
Oliver: I might be getting married next spring, yeah.
Elio: You never said anything.
Oliver: Well, it's been off and on for two years.
Elio: That's wonderful news.
Oliver: Do you mind?
[Oliver opens the door to Elio's room]
Oliver: Elio, come here. Take your trunks off.
[Elio complies and Oliver briefly goes down on him in the doorway]
Oliver: Well, that's promising. You're hard again. Good.
[stands up and closes the door to Elio's surprise and his own]
[writing a letter to Oliver, voices overlapping]
Elio: Please don't avoid me. It kills me. I can't stand thinking you hate me. Your silence is killing me. I'd sooner die than know you hate me. I am such a pussy.
Elio: [to himself] Way over the top.
[rips the paper out and writes another note]
Elio: Can't stand the
silence. I need to speak to you.
Oliver: The Cosmic Fragments by Heraclitus: The meaning of the river flowing is not that all things are changing so that we cannot encounter them twice, but that some things stay the same only by changing.