Below is the original story and Here Is the Movie!

It was an average April afternoon in the city. Diana took a lunch break and was heading toward her favorite cigar club on the Upper East Side. The knocking of her fifteen hundred dollar heels against the street concrete was suppressed by the noise of car breaks, slamming truck doors, yelling taxi drivers and other voices of the city, coming straight from its egocentric soul. Her Channel sent was brutally attacked and destroyed by the pervasive odors of the meat and spices coming from the street bodegas and cheep delis. It is as if the city was trying to conceal any sign of her upper class.

She finally reached her destination. “Welcome Miss Stronly,” said a neatly uniformed doorman as he, with white-gloved hands, opened a massive wooden door and let Diana through. The sound of his voice startled her. She paused for a second and looked into his grey, tired, childishly sparkling eyes. He was an older gentleman in his early 60s. His white gloves concealed his developing arthritis, and the spark in his eyes belied its pain. She was coming there four times a week. Four times a week he would open a door for her, and yet she never even concerned herself to make a small talk with him or at least ask his name. For a moment she felt uneasy, almost ashamed of herself; lowering her eyes, she walked in.

The inside was dim. Burgundy velvet curtains prevented sunlight from penetrating the room. The club owners prided themselves for the mysterious and rich atmosphere they have created for their guests. They never called their guests customers or clients because such terms created an unpleasant for the owners hierarchy, which put them into the serving position in relation to those who attended the club. Guests, on the other hand, allowed them to construct an environment in which they were perceived as generous owners inviting people into the world of great food, seasoned wine, and obscenely expensive handmade cigars.

A host walked Diana through the club to her favorite table by the bookshelves. As they passed the bar, and walked across the dining room, with its brown leather chairs and ivory linens, Diana noticed that the club was almost empty. There were a few people here and there, such as the CEO of Dreams Pharmaceuticals with his best friend and renowned artist Aremi de Vilmont. In a corner sat, what appeared to be, a Wall Street banker. His last season Armani suit, unpolished shoes, and a two-year old Daytona Rolex betrayed his precarious financial situation. Forced to keep up the appearance, he could no longer afford to shine. A party of four sat by the window. These are Harvard club members, reliving their college days while smoking some Cuban contraband and drinking straight up Blue Label.

Diana sunk into her soft leather chair. Her table stood by the bookshelves that housed first rare additions of Voltaire, Hugo, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, Aristotle, and other genius men; the only men she ever cared about. As she comfortably situated herself, she asked the waiter to bring her regular order: green salad for a start, fillet mignon for the second course, a glass of red vine, and a box of Davidoff Nicaragua Toro, her favorite cigars.

As she light up her cigar, Diana smiled to herself. She wondered what would have Freud about said about her preferring the thickest out of the three sizes in which Davidoff Nicaragua comes in. Or was it just a cigar?

Diana was approaching 45. Elegant, thin brunette, she rarely concerned herself with aging and its process. What has she accomplished in those year?… She appeared successful to those who measured success in paychecks, closed club memberships, and designer clothes. She looked miserable and unaccomplished to those who valued family, loyalty, and simplicity. To her, most of those people were poor failures as well, so their mutual feelings of pity rather amused her.

Heavy clouds of smoke filled the space around her. Her fascination with smoke dates back to her teenage years, when she and her 3 girlfriends would smoke in a kitchen while her clueless parents travelled abroad. In one night, they would smoke so much that their eyes would hurt. The smoke would eat into their hair, they clothes, and their skin. Smoking was their socializing ritual. They would lit up one cigarette after another and talk about boys, dream about rich princes, wish for rewarding jobs, strong families, travel around the world, and other ambitions of emerging adulthood.

Where are they now?… Tina has 3 kids. Her ex-husband is happily married to his thirty year old colleague from a law firm. He claimed that Tina, unable to finish college while taking care of kids, lost her feminine appeal. He disliked her lack of ambition and rapidly aging body.

Brooke lived happily on a grape foundation in southern France. Her disabled and obscenely rich husband appreciates her taking care of the business. In return for her efforts, he ignores occasional affairs she has with seasonal plantation workers.

Joanna works as a news reporter in some failing newspaper down south. Two of her marriages resulted in restraining orders against abusive husbands. The third was peaceful yet boring as hell. She would drink herself to sleep on occasion, unable to decide what exactly went wrong in her life.

Diana finished her salad. She kept smoking. A musky smell penetrated her nostrils, bringing up images, memories, thoughts… She was successful, probably the most established of them all. There were no abusive or cheating husbands, nor there were any needy children. There was just her: her bank account, her business, her closet, her apartment, her loneliness…

Her wondering mind brought Diana back to the doorman… She knew nothing about him, but she knew enough people to imaging what he was like. She thought for a second. He is probably a hard-working man. All his life, he worked low wage blue collar jobs to put his kids through school, to buy his wife $5 dollar flowers from the grocery, to present his grandchildren with Christmas toys. He never lusted over any other woman than his wife. She, in turn, appreciative of the little he was able to give her, kept asking herself “what if?” They still live in their old, never renovated, two-bedroom co-op in Brooklyn, and he travels everyday to the upper east side to open doors for people like her, people who are at least ambivalent about his existence.

Diana finished her lunch, paid her bill and headed out of the club. The rest of her day was filled with meetings, conference calls, and no time for sentiments.

“Have a nice day Miss Stronly” said the doorman. Diana looked at him with the same feeling of unease. After a few seconds, she said: ” please Diana is fine…