The Machinist

Trevor Reznik is a factory machinist  that hasn't been able to sleep in a year,   causing his body to lose an unhealthy  amount of weight. One evening,   he's in his apartment rolling up a carpet to hide  a body inside it, which he then puts in his truck   and takes to the beach for disposal. When he dumps  it on the ground and kicks it towards the water,   instead of all of it falling together, the  carpet unrolls itself and reveals its contents   as a man with a yellow flashlight approaches  Trevor from behind and asks him who he is,   a question that shakes him to his care.  Moments later, he's back at his place,   washing his hands with bleach while the man's  yellow flashlight rests on a table. As he looks at   himself in the mirror, he discovers a post-it note  on the wall behind him asking him "who are you",   so Trevor starts thinking back on how it all  started. He's spending the night with Stevie,   a callgirl he visits often. She notices the state  of his body and says that if he were any thinner,   he wouldn't exist. She also offers to make  breakfast for him, but he needs to get to work,   so he leaves after tipping her generously. At the  factory, Trevor hears his supervisor Tucker scold   Miller for turning off a machine to clean since  it loses time. Trevor decides to chime in and   point out this is done because of safety reasons  established by legal regulations, so Tucker leaves   Miller alone, only to tell Trevor that he's  made it to his turd-list. When the shift ends,   all the machinists make plans for poker night and  invite Trevor, but he turns them down as usual.   He gets called a spoilsport for it, and his  coworkers can't help wondering what happened to   him, because he didn't use to be this way. In the  middle of the night, Trevor drives all the way to   the airport to have coffee at his favorite diner  where he knows the lovely waitress, María, who   teases him with the exact same phrase Stevie used:  if he were any thinner, he wouldn't exist. Trevor   ignores the sudden feeling of deja-vu that crawls  through his mind and continues to chat with her,   even flirting a little too when she brings him  some pie for him to eat and gain some weight.   María is sure she's figured him out and claims his  problem is loneliness, but Trevor assures her he's   fine with her company. He leaves after finishing  his coffee and leaving a good tip but without   touching the pie. Moments later, back in his  apartment, Trevor is going through his insomnia by   watching tv and reading a book - he almost manages  to doze off, but the noise made by the book   falling to the floor startles him awake. Next, he  decides to weigh himself, and when he notices he's   now one hundred twenty-one pounds, he writes  it on a post-it note and sticks it on the wall   next to all the other annotations of his weight  with numbers that have done nothing but go down.   Then he starts cleaning the bathroom floor with  a toothbrush and some bleach, which he ends up   emptying pretty quickly, so he writes a reminder  to buy more on yet another post-it note that he   sticks to the refrigerator. The next day at  work, Trevor is called to his boss' office,   who is worried about his health and wonders if he  is doing drugs. Trevor assures them he's fine, but   he's still asked for a urine sample so they can  run some tests. Afterward, he goes to the parking   slot to have a smoke, and for some reason, he's  bothered by the sight of the vehicle's lighter.   He tries to sleep a bit, but he's interrupted  by a red car that has parked next to him,   driven by Ivan, who is also smoking and wearing a  big pair of sunglasses. The man introduces himself   as another coworker that Trevor may've not seen  before because he works in the pit with Reynolds.   After some chitchatting, Ivan leaves, and  Trevor can't help noticing his peculiar boots.   Later, when he goes to see Stevie, he is too  tired to do anything with her other than rest.   When her ex calls and interrupts their time  together, she tells him to call later because   she's busy and calls him a psycho. The following  day, Miller asks Trevor to help him with one of   the machines, and after Miller promises  the safety is on as regulations require,   Trevor keeps only half his attention on it while  he watches the other workers around the factory.   He sees Ivan working nearby and is suddenly  startled when the man makes a gesture of cutting a   throat, causing him to step back and accidentally  turn on the machine they're working on.   Miller's hand gets stuck in it and they aren't  incapable of freeing him until it is too late:   he loses his arm. After calling his superiors  for help, Trevor checks on Ivan, but he's gone.   When he returns home, he washes his hands with  bleach and throws up in the toilet before writing   down his weight as one hundred nineteen. While  having dinner, he opens a letter that warns him   he may lose power soon if he doesn't pay his debt,  so Trevor makes another post-it note reminding   himself to pay utilities and when he goes to  stick it on the refrigerator, he finds a little   piece of paper already there with the beginning  of a game of hangman. Surprised and confused,   he decides to take the rent money to his landlady  Mrs. Shrike and take the chance to ask her if   she's seen anyone hanging around his apartment  or anything unusual in general, but she hasn't.   The next day, Trevor's bosses interrogate him  about the accident, and he admits it was all his   fault for having gotten distracted by Ivan. Nobody  understands what he's talking about because there   is no Ivan working there, which he confirms  when he looks for him but finds him nowhere.   Feeling rather disorientated after this talk,  Trevor goes to the airport to have his usual   at María's, who wonders why he drives all  the way to the airport just for coffee.   When the subject of mother's day comes up, Trevor  mentions his mom passed away some time ago,   so María invites him to come with her and her son  to the amusement park, which he accepts. Things at   the factory change from now on, Trevor's coworkers  start watching him with distrust and they even   admit to him that they don't want him there. As  he's leaving the building to go home, he notices   Ivan driving away in his red car, so Trevor gets  on his truck and follows him until their vehicles   are next to each other in front of the red lights.  Trevor wants Ivan to tell his superiors about what   happened, which he refuses, but Ivan does accept  to talk to Trevor privately and asks him to follow   him to a bar. After ordering a whiskey even if  he usually doesn't drink, Trevor asks Ivan some   questions about work, but Ivan dodges them  all and instead shows him his deformed hand.   Trevor tries asking again and Ivan just  tells them his coworkers are messing with   him by pretending Ivan doesn't exist before he  goes to the toilet, so Trevor takes the chance   to go through this wallet for clues and finds a  picture of Ivan on a fishing trip with Reynolds.   Starting to think this is all a conspiracy, Trevor  steals the photograph before returning home,   where he calls Reynolds and tells him he has proof  on him and he's gonna use it, but Reynolds simply   hangs up. When he goes to the kitchen, he finds  that the hangman note has been drawn on: the   stick figure now has a head and a body, and the  letters E and R have been added at the end of it.   Freaking out, Trevor throws the note in the trash  and goes to see Stevie, who at first asks him to   come back in an hour because she has company, but  she takes care of it when he begs for her help.   Trevor tells her about the accident and  how his coworkers don't want him there,   which he doesn't blame them for but he finds these  little games of theirs very weird. It's then that   he realizes the answer to the hangman could be  Tucker, but Stevie points out that if they wanted   him out, they would've already fired him. Mother's  day comes and Trevor goes to the amusement park   with María and her son Nicholas. While taking  a picture of them in front of the carrousel, he   notices some strange glowing next to them and gets  distracted, but when María asks, he just says he's   getting nostalgic because he used to come here as  a kid. Their fun is interrupted by María getting   a call from his ex, so Trevor offers to take  Nicholas on a ride so she can speak privately.   On their way there, he tells the boy that his  father left him when he was a child and he   didn't appreciate how much his mother did for  him until he was an adult, so Nicholas should   appreciate María as well. The ride Trevor chooses  for them is horror-themed and called "Route 666",   and their decorations are pretty standard at  the beginning, but soon the imaginary starts   growing extremely disturbing for a family game.  There are body parts being hacked, a hanged man,   a motel depicting lecherous acts, and a very  realistic car crash scene. When the option   comes to choose between the path to hell and the  path to salvation, Nicholas goes against Trevor's   request and chooses hell, where the flashing  lights cause Trevor to see visions of various   uncomprehensible things and Nicholas to have an  epileptic seizure. Trevor picks him up and rushes   out as he cries out for help, but María arrives  and tells him an ambulance won't be necessary,   this is normal and it passes soon. Moments later,  Trevor takes them to their home on his truck,   and María invites him to come in and have a  drink with her after putting Nicholas to bed.   Trevor can't help noticing a strange clown-like  statue and a beautiful glass bowl in her living   room, getting a sense of deja-vu again. Once María  brings their glasses of wine, she asks him why he   always leaves such generous tips, and he replies  it's because he wants to thank her for her company   as well. María tells him he doesn't need to buy  her companionship and he can just take her out   to a movie someday, which he accepts before  going to the kitchen to pour some more wine.   There, he finds a Mother's day card with the same  kind of stick figure he saw on his hangman note.   Getting more worried, the first thing  he does when he arrives home later is   to retrieve the note from the trashcan and fill  the spaces with the word "mother". Afterward,   he retrieves an old photo album from his closet  and finds a picture of his mother and him as   a kid in front of the carrousel in a position  incredibly similar to María and Nicholas' own   picture. The following day, Trevor is sent to  work on a different machine from usual. He sees   Miller has come by to say his final goodbyes and  get paid, so Trevor takes the chance to apologize   and tell him he can count on him for anything,  but Miller promises there are no hard feelings.   When he goes back to working on the machine, it  activates and captures his arm like it happened   to Miller. As he cries out for help, Trevor  reaches out with his free hand and grabs a   random tool that he uses to close the distance  to the power button and turn the machine off.   His coworkers arrive then and help him get  unstuck, but Trevor isn't grateful - in fact,   he starts causing a scene, believing one of them  did it on purpose. When Reynolds points out he's   imagining things again, Trevor asks him about Ivan  and searches his wallet for the photo that could   prove the conspiracy but he can't find it. Tucker  comes to check on him and Trevor finally loses it,   pushing his superior against a machine with the  intention of beating him up. His coworkers pull   them apart before Tucker finally fires  him. When he goes back to his apartment,   he finds out his electricity has been disconnected  because he never paid the bill, so he uses a   yellow flashlight to search the entire place for  the photograph to no avail. There's a dark liquid   coming out of his refrigerator as well, but he  never notices it. Next, he returns to the bar,   but he can't find Ivan there either. When he goes  to the bathroom to wash his hands with bleach,   he sees a familiar pair of boots under the door  of a stall and decides to open it, only to find   a couple getting intimate. Afterward, he goes to  see Stevie and finds her with a bruise on her eye,   which she calls an occupational hazard. After  they make love, she asks him when he's going to   save her from this life, because she's willing  to give up being a callgirl if he wants her to,   and he accepts. When he returns to his apartment  later, he turns on lanterns to make up for the   lack of power and gets worried when he hears  someone forcing the door open, but it's only Mrs.   Shrike. She's come over because there's a leak in  her apartment and she's sure it's coming from his,   she also takes notice of a terrible smell.  Trevor tells her there's no leak and sends   her away before checking the kitchen, where the  refrigerator is leaking blood everywhere and the   note on its door shows the hangman has been drawn  on again. The letters I and L have been added, so   this time, Trevor thinks the answer is Miller. The  next day, Trevor visits Miller at his house and   accuses him of having turned on the machine that  got him as revenge. Miller tries to ignore him,   but when Trevor insists, he punches him on the  groin and kicks him out of his property. Outside,   he finds Ivan and his red car waiting for him,  so Trevor assumes he's been working with Miller.   He rushes to his truck and starts following him  to the countryside, this allows him to get close   enough to see the license plate. He also notices  there's someone on the passenger seat next to   Ivan, which distracts him and almost causes him  to crash against another truck. Luckily he dodges   it just in time, but now his own vehicle refuses  to go on any longer, and Ivan manages to escape.   He returns to the city and visits the DMV to  get some information on the license plate,   the clerk explains those details are private  unless some crime has been committed. Trevor   goes out on the street and, after several minutes  of hesitation, he throws himself in front of a   moving car. With enough bruises to be believable,  he goes to the police station and fills in a fake   report on a hit-and-run. While sitting in  the waiting room he almost falls asleep,   but he's interrupted by a cop who tells him they  investigated the license plate and the red car   appears to be registered as Trevor's, it was also  reported as wrecked a year ago. As Trevor starts   to feel disorientated again, the police officer  points out filling fake reports is a felony,   so Trevor starts running away before they can  arrest him. With two cops closely chasing him,   Trevor takes the stairs to the subway station  and escapes by opening a manhole he finds there,   making his way down into the sewers, where he  finds two different paths to choose from again.   Since there is a person walking on the  bright path, he takes the dark one instead.   By the time night falls, Trevor is back on  his truck and drives back to his apartment,   but he sees the police at the door talking to  Mrs. Shriek, so instead he goes to visit Stevie.   While she bathes him and takes care of his  bruises, she insists on taking him to a hospital,   but he refuses and asks her if he can stay  the night. Stevie tells him he can stay as   many nights as he wants and confesses his love  for him. Afterward, while she's cooking dinner   and talking about possible jobs for her, Trevor  puts on some clothes that her regular clients   leave there and sees a familiar pair of boots  in the closet. His mood only gets worse when   he finds the picture of Ivan and Reynolds on a  frame and he furiously starts making a scene,   accusing Stevie of being Ivan's ex and hiding him  somewhere while he continues to plot his revenge   on Trevor for sleeping with his former girlfriend.  Stevie doesn't understand what he's talking about,   since she found that picture with the tip money  he left her and she thought he had wanted her to   have a photo of him. Now it's Trevor's turn to  be confused, not understanding why Stevie keeps   saying that the person on the picture with  Reynolds isn't some Ivan but Trevor himself.   Refusing to look at the photograph directly,  Trevor calls Stevie a liar and insults her with   a slur, so Stevie slaps him and kicks him out  as she calls him a psycho. Trevor drives away,   thinking about all the times she was on the phone  with her ex and assuming it must've been Ivan,   he also thinks she was the person he saw on the  passenger seat. When he makes it to the airport,   he goes straight to his favorite diner, only to  find there's another waitress instead of María.   The woman tells him there has never been a  María working there, and she's always been   the one serving Trevor his coffee. In fact,  she's surprised to hear him talk now because   he's always been so quiet that she had thought he  was a mute. Trevor starts making another scene,   accusing everyone in the area to be part of the  conspiracy before leaving. In the parking lot, he   sees Ivan in his car and follows him back to town,  where he parks in front of his own apartment. The   biggest surprise, however, is to find out that  the person with him isn't Stevie: it's Nicholas.   Trevor follows them inside and finds Ivan  playing with his knife in front of the mirror,   but Nicholas is nowhere in sight, and Ivan implies  he's already killed him and the body is in the   tub. Furious, Trevor jumps on him and after they  struggle over the knife, he manages to take it and   kill him. Afterward, he opens the shower curtains  but finds the tub empty. Next he goes to check   his refrigerator, which he opens to find it full  of spoiled food and rotten fish that matches the   one in the photograph, causing Trevor to finally  remember it as it truly it is: the person with   Reynolds has always been him. The scene loops  back to the beginning of the story then: Trevor   rolls Ivan's body inside the carpet and takes it  to the sea, but when the carpet starts to unroll,   he finds nothing in there. The man using Trevor's  yellow flashlight is Ivan. When he returns to his   apartment, Trevor looks at the post-it note asking  him who he is while Ivan laughs behind him in   the mirror and finally remembers what actually  happened a year ago. While driving his red car,   Trevor got distracted while searching for the  lighter and accidentally ran over Nicholas.   The sunglasses, the car, the boots, all  the things have always belonged to Trevor,   who instead of staying at the crime scene drove  away as María made it to her dead son's side.   Ivan, the waitress that looked like María,  and the time they spent together have all   been hallucinations caused by his own guilt. So  was the insomnia. After crying for a long time,   he completes the hangman to form the word "killer"  with permanent ink instead of pencil like the   previous times. Some days later, Mrs. Shrike  comes to see him after she heard he is moving out.   In his boxes, she finds all the things  Trevor had seen in María's apartment,   and when she asks if she could buy the bowl,  he reveals this stuff used to belong to his   mother. He sends her away after promising her a  truck will come by to pick up his things later,   then he goes back to the road with Ivan in the  passenger seat. Originally he was on his way to   the airport, but when the time comes once again  to choose a road, this time he chooses salvation   and turns his truck back into town. Trevor goes  to the police station to turn himself in for   having killed Nicholas, and when the cops take  him to a cell, he finally gets to sleep again.