The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey Quotes on Apple TV+

Ptolemy Grey: [to Reggie] I had a visitor just before you got here. But that was a long time ago. And then you showed up.

Reggie Lloyd: I think we’re going to have to shape you up before we present you to the world, Uncle.
Ptolemy Grey: Oh, no, no. I like it like this.
Reggie Lloyd: Yeah. You got a little Frederick Douglass going.

Ptolemy Grey: Oh, you know, Coydog used to say hospital where Black folk went to die.
Dr. Riley: Well, as a resident I practically lived in a hospital, and somehow I made it out alive.
Ptolemy Grey: Yeah, but you ain’t but so Black.

Reggie Lloyd: [referring to Ptolemy] He’s slipping, I know.
Dr. Riley: No, it’s not the slipping. It’s the rate of the decline. I mean, only a few weeks, and he’s already deteriorated.
Reggie Lloyd: You don’t have to tell me. I’m the one that’s there, right there with him. The only one. Hey, but otherwise, physically he’s…
Dr. Riley: Oh, he’s healthier than either one of us.

Dr. Riley: Look, I am told that Dr. Rubin has had lots of success with patients just like your uncle.
Reggie Lloyd: First off, ain’t nobody just like my uncle. What you saying, Milton? You telling I should go along with these tests? That’s the move?
Dr. Riley: All I’m saying is that this Dr. Rubin knows more about dementia than anyone I’ve ever met. Yeah.
Reggie Lloyd: That’s all you got for me?
Dr. Riley: That’s all I got. Other than the alternative.

Reggie Lloyd: [referring to Ptolemy mistaking a woman for Sensia] Papa Grey, what you doing?
Ptolemy Grey: The onliest woman I ever loved, right there. God’s one true gift to me. Sensia Howard.

Ptolemy Grey: You know, Reg, it seem like I can’t remember nothing no more. Like I sit, and I think about when little Maude Petit come live with us. Then I try to say what day it is. I ain’t got a clue.
Reggie Lloyd: So you want me to take you to that special doctor? The special doctor that might help you remember things.

Reggie Lloyd: Unc, you ever worry about losing your woman? Your family?
Ptolemy Grey: Family the most important thing you got.

Reggie Lloyd: Unc, I got something I need to say, and I don’t know who else to say it to. It’s about Nina and me. See, Nina got this ex-boyfriend who went to prison for killing somebody…
Reggie Lloyd: [as Ptolemy seems to be lost in thought] You still with me, Unc?
Ptolemy Grey: Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. Sure.
Reggie Lloyd: So, what do you think I should do?
Ptolemy Grey: That woman on the news. You know, the pretty, Black one? She said there’s a big wreck on the freeway, cars backed up for miles. Ain’t that something?

Ptolemy Grey: Where Reggie at?
Hilly: He couldn’t be here. Mama sent me to come get you.
Ptolemy Grey: “Get me”? What that mean, “Get me”?

Hilly: [as Ptolemy opens the door] Damn, Uncle. I ain’t think you was going to ever open up.
Coydog: Something wrong with this boy, Pity.
Ptolemy Grey: I got eyes, Coy. I can see.
Hilly: What?

Hilly: [after Hilly nearly gets arrested] Man, you trying to get me killed, bruh?
Ptolemy Grey: What?
Hilly: Come on, we need to go to the bus.
Ptolemy Grey: You the one fighting with the police.

Hilly: You get three checks every month?
Ptolemy Grey: Social security. This my pension from the post office. And this is death benefits from Sensia Howard. One, two, three.
Hilly: You a lucky m**herf***er, Unc. If I had that type of money, my life would be made.

Shirley Wring: Excuse me, sir. Hi. I’m Shirley. Shirley Wring.
Ptolemy Grey: Shirley Wring?
Shirley Wring: W-R-I-N-G.
Ptolemy Grey: Hello, W-R-I-N-G.

Ptolemy Grey: Whenever I go to the bank with Reggie, I always end up with near about three hundred dollars. One, two, three. This here ain’t but one. One hundred.
Hilly: [referring to Shirley] You don’t remember you gave your money to the old lady?
Ptolemy Grey: An even fifty. That’s what she took. Even fifty.
Hilly: No, she took almost two. I’m telling you. I saw her. She took almost two. Let me count it again.
Ptolemy Grey: Hands off my money. You stole enough of my money already. Thief.

Ptolemy Grey: [referring to everyone wearing funeral clothes] This Reggie birthday party?
Hilly: Kind of.

Ptolemy Grey: Where Reggie at?
Robyn: He got in trouble because he stayed in town so long taking care of you.
Ptolemy Grey: Reggie in trouble? Where at? We got to go help him.
Robyn: He ain’t in trouble no more. He’s fine.

Robyn: [referring to Ptolemy] Look at him. Just eating like a pig, don’t know s**t.
Billy: Well, he was there for Reggie when he needed a gentle hand. When we were kids, he used to let us play for hours, and never, not once, did he say a bad word.

Ptolemy Grey: [as Robyn shows him Reggie’s body in the casket] How come y’all got him in here like this?
Robyn: Somebody shot him.
Ptolemy Grey: Ain’t nobody tell me. Didn’t nobody say.
Robyn: Nobody ain’t call you?
Ptolemy Grey: Nobody said. No, I don’t think so. No. I don’t remember. I don’t remember. I don’t think so. Oh, Reggie. Oh, God.

Hilly: I’m supposed to take him.
Robyn: Yeah, well, he don’t like you. Says you messed up his stuff.
Hilly: His stuff was already messed up when I got there.
Robyn: Yeah, you made it worse.
Ptolemy Grey: Yeah. And he stole my one, two, and just give me three.

Ptolemy Grey: Reggie really dead?
Robyn: Yeah.
Ptolemy Grey: Well, who killed him?
Robyn: Nobody know.
Ptolemy Grey: I’m going to find who did it. I swear. I swear.

Ptolemy Grey: [referring to Robyn fixting the toilet and sink] How you know how to do all this here?
Robyn: My mama used to get sick, and we ain’t had no money, so it would be on me to fix things.
Ptolemy Grey: Oh, your mama’s sick?
Robyn: She died.
Ptolemy Grey: Oh, that’s too bad.

Robyn: [to Ptolemy] Just because there’s paper on the roll don’t mean wad it up. The pipes might work, but they’re angry about it, you hear?

Ptolemy Grey: You thinking about throwing away more of my stuff?
Robyn: I’m just trying to make things better for you. Better don’t sound so bad, do it?

Sensia: [as Ptolemy remembers Sensia] Why you standing out there, Pitypapa? You shy?
Coydog: She gone, boy.

Ptolemy Grey: And what your name is again?
Robyn: Robyn.
Ptolemy Grey: First bird of spring.
Robyn: Yes.

Billy: Why don’t you call Mr. Grey “Papa Grey” or “Uncle”?
Robyn: Because he ain’t either one.
Billy: It’s respect, love.
Robyn: What for, man? Like he going to remember no way.
Billy: Yeah. He’s still a man though. He’s our elder.

Ptolemy Grey: [referring to the shop] I like the way it smell in here. Smell like iron nails and motor oil.

Ptolemy Grey: [to the sales clerk, referring to Robyn] Mister, I don’t like the way you be looking at her. Your eyes bugging out your head, and your nose wide open like a horny dog smell a b**ch in heat. That ain’t how you look at a nice young lady like this.

Robyn: You owe that fat heifer money?
Ptolemy Grey: She came in here one time, and she smacked me down, took my change can. And that’s why Reggie put the extra lock on the door and told me don’t let nobody in but him.
Robyn: She lucky I ain’t cut her.
Ptolemy Grey: Oh, no. Lord, no. We don’t want that.

Robyn: You alright?
Ptolemy Grey: I don’t know.
Robyn: Rest easy, Uncle. Ain’t nobody out to kill a b**ch today.
Ptolemy Grey: No?
Robyn: No.

Robyn: Thanks, by the way.
Ptolemy Grey: Thank you for what?
Robyn: For what you said to the man in the hardware store.
Ptolemy Grey: What did I say?

Ptolemy Grey: Where I’m going to live when you blow up my house?
Robyn: Oh, I ain’t blowing up your house. Just pumping it full of poison.
Ptolemy Grey: That’s good?
Robyn: Depends on whether you’re in or out.
Ptolemy Grey: And what is we?
Robyn: We out, Uncle. We out.

Coydog: Where’s what I stole for you?
Ptolemy Grey: I can’t remember.
Coydog: Well, you got to remember. All a man is, is what he remember.

Robyn: What the hell are you doing?
Ptolemy Grey: He said help me. And I kicked him.
Robyn: You can’t run away from me like that, you hear?
Ptolemy Grey: I got away.

Ptolemy Grey: [referring to the dress and hair comb] I bring these?
Robyn: No.
Ptolemy Grey: Well, it ain’t got no business being here. In fact, I shouldn’t have kept it.
Robyn: They belong to your wife.
Ptolemy Grey: Yeah, but she dead. Maybe you can take them and treat them like a woman ought to.

Ptolemy Grey: Is we going home now? Is Reggie coming later?
Robyn: No, it’s just you and me. But Reggie did want you to go see this doctor, so I guess we heading there first.
Ptolemy Grey: Same doctor who had the woman with the head growing out of her neck?

Billy: Mr. Grey, what kind of doctor you going to?
Ptolemy Grey: The kind of doctor that got Dr Pepper, I hope.

Dr. Rubin: Mr. Grey, it is so great to finally meet you.
Ptolemy Grey: Yeah, I’m fine, thanks.
Dr. Rubin: Well, as you should be. That’s why you were referred to me, because you’re so strong.
Ptolemy Grey: Damn right, I am.
Dr. Rubin: Although, I have been told that you have been forgetting things.
Ptolemy Grey: I remember what’s important.
Dr. Rubin: Such as?
Ptolemy Grey: I know what’s right and what’s wrong.
Dr. Rubin: That is very important.

Dr. Rubin: Do you remember the way home, Mr. Grey?
Coydog: There’s one thing you need to remember.
Ptolemy Grey: Sometimes I just want to forget.
Dr. Rubin: I understand.

Dr. Rubin: And we’ve come very far in our research. We can virtually, if only temporarily, eliminate almost all forms of dementia.
Ptolemy Grey: When we going to go home?
Robyn: Hold up! The doctor not done talking.

Dr. Rubin: After two doses of the drug that we’ve developed are administered, Mr. Grey, within a week’s time, will remember everything that he has ever known. He’ll know details that you, or I, or any normal person couldn’t possibly remember.
Robyn: Did you tell Reggie all this?
Dr. Rubin: Sadly, no.

Dr. Rubin: Early on in our research, we developed another treatment. It doesn’t provide a hundred percent lucidity, but it does provide cognizance.
Robyn: You mind saying that in simple English?
Dr. Rubin: In short, the treatment will give Mr. Grey the ability to think clearly, and to make his own decisions.

Dr. Rubin: I know that this is very difficult, but his own doctor’s reports tell me that he’s on the very edge of what this procedure can reverse. By next week, maybe even tomorrow, he’ll be too far gone.
Robyn: So, what you give him? Like a pill or something?
Dr. Rubin: No. No, it’s a single shot, the effects lasting twelve to twenty-four hours approximately. There are no side effects. But the treatment will only work once. Once it wears off, treating him again will do absolutely nothing for him.

Robyn: This man say he might could help you remember again.
Ptolemy Grey: Even where Coydog’s treasure is at?
Robyn: He want to give you a shot to help you make sense of all of this crazy s**t for yourself. Is that what you want?
Ptolemy Grey: I don’t know. I want to know. Don’t I?
Dr. Rubin: Yeah. You do, Mr. Grey.

Robyn: [after Ptolemy recieves the shot from Rubin] You turned the TV off.
Ptolemy Grey: Yeah. That’s what I was trying to do.
Robyn: You ain’t worried you going to lose the channel?
Ptolemy Grey: How I’m going to lose it? It’s right there on the TV.

Ptolemy Grey: And Reggie is dead. Somebody killed him.
Robyn: You remember that.
Ptolemy Grey: They know who it was?
Robyn: No, nobody know for sure. The cops don’t even care.

Ptolemy Grey: I want to go see where Reggie got killed at.
Robyn: But the shot the doctor gave you only going to last maybe a half-day, and then you’ll forget again. And you had it about four hours ago already.
Ptolemy Grey: Well, I guess you better hurry up then.

Ptolemy Grey: You okay?
Robyn: I am. It’s just, you know, you’re so different.
Ptolemy Grey: Really? I don’t feel no different.

Robyn: [referring to Rubin] Listen to me. You need to talk to this man. Let him tell you everything you need to know about this treatment so you can make a clear choice how far you want to go with it.
Ptolemy Grey: I already know what he going to tell me.
Robyn: How?
Ptolemy Grey: You told me already.
Robyn: Yeah, well, that’s just crazy.
Ptolemy Grey: What’s crazy about it?
Robyn: Because I don’t know what the f*** I’m talking about.

Robyn: The doctor said there’s going to be drawbacks to the next shot.
Ptolemy Grey: That don’t make no difference.
Robyn: Why not?
Ptolemy Grey: Well, for Reggie. For you.
Robyn: For me?

Ptolemy Grey: [referring to Reggie] He was always doing for me. So, how I’m going to let folk forget his name? What kind of man would I be if I didn’t recognize the injustice of his passing?

Robyn: [as Ptolemy’s loses his memory again] Why is this happening? It ain’t even been twelve hours! He’s way worse than he was before.

Robyn: Can he die?
Olga: Some used to, not as many now.
Robyn: What do you mean “not as many”?
Olga: Your uncle’s a very brave man. He’s willing to take the chance to wake from this condition. It is what he wants.

Ptolemy Grey: I’m going to die. I’m going to die! I can’t do this by myself!
Coydog: [flashback] If you die, then everything is lost. You understand that? There’s no laws and no rules for Black men like you and me. There’s right, and there’s wrong. As far as white people care, it’s a crime we breathing their air. You understand me?
Pity: Yes, sir.

Ptolemy Grey: [to Robyn] Why this happen, Bird? What you done did to me?

Robyn: You been in and out. Mostly out. How you feel now?
Ptolemy Grey: Like I was dead, and been drug across hot coals back to life.
Robyn: Yeah. You were screaming and yelling in your dreams.
Ptolemy Grey: Didn’t feel like no dream. Felt real. Coydog always after me about what I ain’t doing. And I ain’t understand.

Ptolemy Grey: I’m starting to get it now. It’s about the black heart.
Robyn: What’s a black heart?
Ptolemy Grey: This treasure Coydog stole. He told me what I need to do with it. He even told me where it was. But now I don’t know what I did with it, or where it’s at.

Ptolemy Grey: I feel like I ain’t ate in a month of Sundays.
Robyn: My daddy used to say that.
Ptolemy Grey: Where is your daddy?
Robyn: Dead.
Ptolemy Grey: Your mama?
Robyn: Her too.
Ptolemy Grey: You told me that before, didn’t you?

Ptolemy Grey: I don’t remember like I remember remembering. And not everything. It’s like the things I can’t recollect is behind this closed door. And I can hear my memories, but I can’t see them, or touch them. You know like Coydog’s treasure, and Reggie. I know he told me some things, but I can’t quite hear them right. So, I think when I do, I’ll be able to figure some stuff out.
Robyn: Like what?
Ptolemy Grey: Like, you know, why he got killed. And maybe even who killed him.

Ptolemy Grey: The fever I can handle. What gets me is what’s going on in my mind. It’s a whole lifetime just spinning around in there, but not everything. Especially not the time when I was afflicted. And you said I would remember it all.
Dr. Rubin: Well, we’re only halfway there, Mr. Grey. Now you’ll need the last injection before all blockages are cleared.
Ptolemy Grey: That’s when all of it comes back?
Dr. Rubin: Yes. More than you can ever imagine.

Ptolemy Grey: But you have lied.
Dr. Rubin: Mr. Grey, I would do anything to achieve a cure. But I think that you already knew that.

Dr. Rubin: [referring to the contract] Would you like me to read it to you?
Ptolemy Grey: I can read, Satan. Says here you want ownership of my body.
Dr. Rubin: That’s the basic agreement, yes.
Ptolemy Grey: But not my soul.
Dr. Rubin: I have no use for a soul, Mr. Grey.
Ptolemy Grey: Good. Because I’m going to need mine.

Ptolemy Grey: How come it don’t bother you when I call you Satan?
Dr. Rubin: There’s a lot of money behind this research. Individual trusts, big pharma, plenty of wealth and privilege. I assume that you’re just calling it like you see it.

Ptolemy Grey: [to Rubin] I’m sure your money bought plenty of Black souls and bodies. But I ain’t selling. Me and you, we just trading favors.

Dr. Rubin: I need a signed release before I give you the last dose.
Ptolemy Grey: Listen here. I got a lot of things to do, and I need my memory to do it. All of it. Give me that, this body is yours.

Ptolemy Grey: Tell me something, Satan.
Dr. Rubin: Yeah, what’s that?
Ptolemy Grey: You enjoy your work?

Ptolemy Grey: You still mad, huh? You think I made a mistake.
Robyn: What you care about what I think?
Ptolemy Grey: What you think is very important to me.

Robyn: Them people don’t give a s**t about you.
Ptolemy Grey: Yeah, I know.
Robyn: Then why you ain’t listen to me? I could’ve got you out of there. Why you let them people f*** with you like that?

Ptolemy Grey: What if it’s you who smelled like body waste? You who can’t remember from one word to the next. You who got the mind of a child in a grown woman’s body. What would you do? And don’t say you’d jump out a window, because you can’t even remember how to open the damn thing up. And that’s how this thing is. You don’t know whether to hate your condition, or to hate yourself.
Robyn: You felt all that?
Ptolemy Grey: Yeah. All the time.

Ptolemy Grey: Her folks is dead. And she come to stay with me till she get herself together.
Shirley Wring: Ptolemy Grey to the rescue again.
Ptolemy Grey: Ooh, no, no, no. If anything, she’s saving me. I don’t know what I’d do without that girl.

Ptolemy Grey: I hope I didn’t embarrass myself when I met you at the bank.
Shirley Wring: You? I’m the one should apologize. Asking a stranger for money? Lucky I met someone as kind as you.
Ptolemy Grey: No, no, no, no. I ain’t as nice as you think.
Shirley Wring: Oh, you need to stop.
Ptolemy Grey: I ain’t saying I’m bad. It’s just that, you know, I never stood up to be counted. I always kind of blended in with the crowd and went along with the program.
Shirley Wring: You stood up for me.

Ptolemy Grey: I’m going to heat up my coffee, think about Shirley Wring.
Robyn: Well, don’t strain yourself.
Ptolemy Grey: Get on out of here, dirty girl.

Robyn: What it feel like remembering all that after so long?
Ptolemy Grey: Ooh, like I’m standing on the tallest mountain in the world, and laying down in my grave at the same time.
Robyn: Well, would you like to come on back down to Earth and go with us?
Ptolemy Grey: Where to?
Robyn: To the diner to thank Billy. You buying him lunch.
Ptolemy Grey: Well, lucky me.

Billy: What’s this medicine called, man? I mean, I have an auntie can’t remember her husband’s face.
Ptolemy Grey: Well, it ain’t got no name, or nothing yet. But I’ll tell you, it is the devil’s brew, and you got to be willing to sell your soul if you take it. Remember, the devil come knocking, you better answer, or he’ll burn your house down.
Billy: You deep, uncle.

Ptolemy Grey: I can see it all so clear now. I can see everything except that one thing. Where I put Coydog’s treasure.
Robyn: Don’t worry. It’ll come. And until then, you can think sweet thoughts about your new girlfriend.
Ptolemy Grey: Shirley’s nice. But she ain’t the kind of girl you dream on. Now, Sensia. I ain’t never been happier anyplace than I was with Sensia.

Ptolemy Grey: Sensia the most beautiful woman I ever beheld.
Robyn: That’s it. Nice thoughts.
Ptolemy Grey: Sensia worth giving up my life for.

Sensia: [1976, we see the first time Ptolemy meets Sensia] What kind of name is Coydog?
Ptolemy Grey: Well, he’s not really my uncle, that’s just what I called him. But Coydog was his name, because, well, that’s the only name I ever heard anybody ever call him.
Sensia: Well? What does your not-uncle Coydog have to do with you running?
Ptolemy Grey: Coydog said, “There will come a time in every Black man’s life when he’s going to have to run. So, if you don’t practice, when that time comes, you may not be able to reach the required speed.”
Sensia: Sounds like a smart man.
Ptolemy Grey: He was.

Ptolemy Grey: Coydog always said, “The best thing a Black man can do is know how to read and think for himself.”
Sensia: I think I would have liked your uncle.
Ptolemy Grey: He sure enough would have liked you.
Sensia: Oh. And why you say that?

Ptolemy Grey: Ptolemy Grey. A lot of folk think that’s an African name, but really it’s Greek.
Sensia: Oh, you got family from there?
Ptolemy Grey: My mama loved history. So, when Alexander the Great conquered Egypt, three hundred years before Jesus was born, the governors became kings, or pharaohs. And three of them was named Ptolemy. One of them was Cleopatra’s daddy. So, not only was he Greek, he was the king of Egypt.

Sensia: That’s why I’m here. I need to be with a man like you. A man to make every day a surprise.
Ptolemy Grey: Well, that’s about all I can offer.

Sensia: My ma and Alberta also taught me, “You can’t have everything. You got to accept that, and settle on what you need.”
Ptolemy Grey: And what is it you need, Sensia Howard?
Sensia: I used to think I wanted a man who could buy me fancy dresses, nice clothes. I got the clothes. But they fit like ropes and chains. Now, I want a man who can read to me from some book every night. So, I guess I got to settle on you.
Ptolemy Grey: I got anything to say about that?
Sensia: Of course you do. As long as you say yes.

Ptolemy Grey: [to Sensia, after he stops her from shooting at Ezra] I don’t mind starting this here thing with a little blood. But I ain’t about stepping over no dead bodies to get there.

Sensia: Come on. Let’s get you to bed.
Ptolemy Grey: [we see him as he is now] I could use some sleep.
Sensia: [as she kisses him] And when you wake up, you need to dig up that treasure and put it to work.

Ptolemy Grey: [as he remembers where he put the treasure] Ain’t nothing going to get in the way now. We about to find it.
Robyn: Well, what are we about to find?
Ptolemy Grey: The future, Bird. The future.

Robyn: [referring to the money in the suitcase] Where you get all this?
Ptolemy Grey: Back before I lost my marbles, I used to cash my retirement checks. And what I ain’t use, I put in here.
Robyn: How much is it?
Ptolemy Grey: I don’t know. Been a while since I been in it. So I’m going to have to say, oh, forty, fifty.
Robyn: Forty or fifty what?
Ptolemy Grey: Thousand.

Ptolemy Grey: You scared of money?
Robyn: My daddy was killed over some money he owed. And my mama used to do stuff for money.
Ptolemy Grey: I get scared too, but you got to carry on. Plus, you need a good night’s sleep on a good bed. And you need some new clothes, and some spending money.
Robyn: That’s money for me to make. You should keep your own money.
Ptolemy Grey: What I need with money when I got gold?
Robyn: You can’t pay your bills with them old coins.
Ptolemy Grey: That show what you know.

Robyn: [referring to the money] Well, you still got to get it out this ugly-a** suitcase.
Ptolemy Grey: Ugly-a** suitcase? What you talking about? This genuine imported alligator from Florida, Louisiana, where they grow them exotic-a** alligators. This here the real s**t. Feel that. S**t. It don’t come no better than this here.
Robyn: Yeah, well, it’s still trouble waiting to happen.

Ptolemy Grey: Listen, girl. Anybody know that you going to be whatever it is you choose to be. Now, man ain’t got the luxury of choosing like that. He got to get out there and make something of himself, and do what need to be done in this world.
Robyn: Maybe in your world. But in this one, women are carrying just as much of the load. They’re running Fortune 500 companies, getting elected into office, locking down the Nobel Peace Prize for editing genomes, and s**t.
Roger Dawes: They may even make it to Mars one day. Well, as for me, I’ll still be here on the earth, trying to figure it out. But I’m working on it, Mr. Grey.

Roger Dawes: Did I say the wrong thing? It feels like I said the wrong thing.
Robyn: Oh, what? No. There’s no such thing as the wrong thing.
Roger Dawes: How you figure?
Robyn: Well, is there a right way to talk about somebody being murdered?
Roger Dawes: No, I guess not.

Robyn: [referring to Roger] He wants to take me to a movie. But I told him I had to check in with you first.
Ptolemy Grey: Why? You don’t answer to me.
Robyn: What, you don’t want to know?
Ptolemy Grey: I like the boy.
Robyn: Yeah, he’s alright. A little corny.

Robyn: I’m worried about you.
Ptolemy Grey: Well, don’t worry about me. When you get to be a certain age, you ain’t scared no more.
Robyn: Yeah, but what if ain’t nothing left to find? What if you waste what little time you have left looking for answers that ain’t even there?

Dr. Rubin: Your vitality is amazing, Mr. Grey. It takes to the treatment like a fire to dried grass. And your mind is completely alive, more so than anyone that I’ve ever seen. But you also know that a fire like that can only leave scorched earth. So I can’t tell you for how long that it will last. But I can tell you that it will be the brightest light in the heavens.

Ptolemy Grey: The man what helped raise me was named Coydog. He said sin is a long road that run from downtown hell to uptown heaven, and your sins determine where you stand on that road. But ain’t no person all good or all bad. Except God and the devil.

Ptolemy Grey: Can I ask you something, Satan?
Dr. Rubin: Yes, of course, Ptolemy.
Ptolemy Grey: Could it be that once I got old and decrepit, I got so scared of what I knew that I just forgot it?
Dr. Rubin: All I can tell you is that if I knew all that you do, damn, if I wouldn’t run like hell.

Ptolemy Grey: Sensia was one of the most beautiful, pure souls I have ever known. She was also a woman of great appetites. If she’d know about that treasure, wouldn’t have been no stopping that woman.
Robyn: Oh, so you’re saying she would have stole it.
Ptolemy Grey: Oh, no, no. She wouldn’t spend it all on herself. She’d spread it around. Friends, family, lovers.
Robyn: Wait. You mean like boyfriends?
Ptolemy Grey: It ain’t always have to be men.
Robyn: What? It was like that? And you just accepted it?
Ptolemy Grey: I accepted her.

Syed Mousa: This marble bust is of the great Roman emperor, Hadrian. He wrote a poem a long time ago, right before he died. My father knew it well.
Ptolemy Grey: “Dear fleeting sweeting, little friend. My body’s comrade and its ghost. What region now must be thy goal, little numb and naked soul. Unable, as of old, to jest.”

Syed Mousa: When Mr. Grey left, I asked my father why he trusted a Black man that he had never met before. He told me, “You cannot tell a man from his color, his clothes, nor his nationality, nor his God. You can only know a man from what he has in his heart.”
Ptolemy Grey: That Jafar. He was a good man. I came by every month till I paid him back.

Robyn: What you over there brooding about?
Ptolemy Grey: Everything I ever knew, all at once.
Robyn: Yeah, that sound like a lot of work.
Ptolemy Grey: Sure is. But I ain’t got but a few more days to get my affairs in order.

Robyn: It don’t bother you, thinking about how it’s going to go back to the way it was?
Ptolemy Grey: I done made my peace with it. Bother you?
Robyn: What you think?

Ptolemy Grey: Devil told me that I would go back to the way I was. Not die.
Robyn: He said it could be worse.
Ptolemy Grey: If I ain’t took his medicine, we wouldn’t be talking right now.
Robyn: You just don’t understand me.
Ptolemy Grey: Okay. Then make me understand.
Robyn: I was happy when my mama died. I knew that she arranged it so that I could stay at Auntie Niecie house. I hoped in my heart, I wish that I didn’t, but I hoped that she would pass, just so that I could get out of that house. So, I’m the one you should be calling devil.
Ptolemy Grey: No, no, child. You are not the devil.
Robyn: What I mean is, you’re the first person I was ever close to that I didn’t want to die. I just don’t want you to go away. I don’t want you to go away.

Darwin Andrews: I’ll be filing a report with social services. They’ll drop by from time to time to check on you and Miss Barnet.
Ptolemy Grey: That’s mighty white of you, Darwin.

Ptolemy Grey: I know what’s in Niecie’s heart. But Niecie would take everything I got, and turn around, and think she doing right by me.
Robyn: Did you ever think that way about me?
Ptolemy Grey: No. That thought never crossed my mind.
Robyn: Not even when I took the comb?
Ptolemy Grey: Young girl see something that beautiful, and don’t want to touch it, that’d be a crime.
Robyn: Yeah, but I didn’t just touch it. I put it in my pockets.

Ptolemy Grey: Robyn, you ain’t got a crooked bone in your body.
Robyn: How do you know that?
Ptolemy Grey: I just know. All your life you wanted so hard, you worried you’re going to take something ain’t yours.

Ptolemy Grey: Some Black folk, and some white folk too, want things so bad, they just can’t help theirself. But that don’t make them bad people.
Robyn: What? So what it make them then?
Ptolemy Grey: Trapped. They caught in the quicksand, and we need to help them out.

Hilly: You calling me a thief?
Ptolemy Grey: To your face.

Niecie: [to Ptolemy] I just don’t think it’s right to have some stranger doing our family business.
Robyn: So, I’m a stranger? I cleaned your house, made your meals. I do more for you than Hilly ever did. You going to call me a stranger?

Ptolemy Grey: [referring to Robyn] You really like her, huh?
Roger Dawes: Yes, sir. I like how tough she is. Pretty too.
Ptolemy Grey: Well, you know she been hurt by folks supposed to love her before?
Roger Dawes: I know.

Ptolemy Grey: Reggie told me, before he got killed, he was thinking he was going to have to leave town.
Billy: So?
Ptolemy Grey: So, I want to know who killed my nephew.
Billy: What for?
Ptolemy Grey: What would you do if somebody killed one of your loved ones?

Billy: What you about to do, Mr. Grey?
Ptolemy Grey: Oh, I’m about to kill me a m**herf***er, Billy. That’s what I’m about to do.

Robyn: Good night. Sleep tight. Don’t let the bed bugs bite.
Ptolemy Grey: They do, they going to get drunk.

Ptolemy Grey: Can you make me a will?
Moishe Abromovitz Jr.: Of course. Are there many heirs?
Ptolemy Grey: A few, but I want Robyn here to be in charge of who gets what, when.
Robyn: Wait. Me? No.

Ptolemy Grey: Robyn come into my life when I needed someone to care for me very, very badly. I was in bad shape, Mo. She pulled me out of a deep, deep hole. And I sort of adopted her. But I trust Robyn with my life, way more than I trust my own kinfolk.
Moishe Abromovitz Jr.: I understand your feelings for this girl, but do others share your conviction? Namely, your family? What are the chances they’ll contest?
Ptolemy Grey: One hundred percent.

Moishe Abromovitz Jr.: My father’s records indicate that Mr. Grey declared this coin forty years ago. As his property.
Charles Southerby: He paid the taxes, even though we advised against it.
Moishe Abromovitz Jr.: The current worth?
Charles Southerby: Seventen point two-nine million.
Robyn: Dollars?
Charles Southerby: Yes.

Ptolemy Grey: [after Robyn refuses Ptolemy’s trust account] Look, I know it’s a lot of money.
Robyn: It’s a f***ing fortune. I can’t be messing with that.
Ptolemy Grey: But it’s all in my will. Everything you need to do is right there. It’d be just like I’m there with you.
Robyn: Yeah, but you won’t be.

Robyn: You’re not hearing me. I don’t want the money. I don’t want any of it!
Ptolemy Grey: You didn’t want to come to a house smell like s**t, with bugs treading all over everything, and talking to a crazy old man that didn’t know his damn a** from a hole in the ground neither, but you did. And you did it because you was the only one could do it.
Robyn: But I did it because I had to. I ain’t had nowhere else to go. And I cleaned up this mess because I didn’t want to stay in it. I didn’t do it because I’m some kind of saint, and still you keep on…
Ptolemy Grey: Keep on what?
Robyn: Seeing me for something that I’m not!

Ptolemy Grey: I see you for who you is!
Robyn: No, you don’t! Everything I’ve done, it’s been about you. Not about me, or how I feel. Because if you really saw me, you would see that I’m seventeen years-old, and I’m not ready.

Robyn: You doing to me what Coydog did to you.
Ptolemy Grey: That’s why I know how you feel.
Robyn: Then why you making me do it?
Ptolemy Grey: You free to do whatever you want, okay? I’m just asking for your consideration. Just consider, just maybe, just maybe, I know what I’m talking about.

Roger Dawes: [referring to Ptolemy not getting better] Don’t seem fair.
Robyn: Well, s**t ain’t ever fair. It’s just real. People suffer, and then they die, and then nobody give a f***.

Roger Dawes: [referring to him mother and father] She could ask him anything, because they were everything to one another. We should all be so lucky to find a love like that, that deep. I know I wouldn’t mind knowing something like that. I mean, not saying us. Not yet.
Robyn: You can’t be serious.
Roger Dawes: Is it so crazy? The thought of me and you being together?
Robyn: Wait. Together how?
Roger Dawes: Like, you love me so much you want to kill me, together?

Roger Dawes: My father asked my mother to marry him six times before she said yes. I mean, I’m not saying that’s us. I’m just saying.
Robyn: You stupid.

Ptolemy Grey: [at Reggie’s eulogy] So, I called y’all here to bear witness that I, Ptolemy Roberts Grey, will do everything I can to make sure Reggie’s bloodline has every chance in a world where folk don’t give a damn whether we live or die.

Robyn: Your daughter, Doris. In all that time, you ain’t never try to make things right with her? Not once?
Ptolemy Grey: No.
Robyn: What happened to her? How she die?
Ptolemy Grey: She committed suicide. You hate me now?
Robyn: You know better than to ask me that.

Ptolemy Grey: My uncle Coydog used to say, “You got to let the river take its course.”
Nina La Fontaine-Lloyd: Well, what does that mean?
Ptolemy Grey: I don’t know. I used to ask him the same thing. He said, “We all in that river, boy. And the river know right where it’s going.”

Shirley Wring: I liked what you had to say in your speech. Sounds like you’ve come to terms with some truths in your life.
Ptolemy Grey: I don’t know about that.
Shirley Wring: Well, at least it seems like you’re ready to admit that I was right. You’re a good man.
Ptolemy Grey: A good man? Yeah, here I am sitting here holding your hand, like we got a future, when the doctor done told me my days is numbered.
Shirley Wring: You think an old woman like me doesn’t know that any day might be her last one?
[Ptolemy kisses her]

Dr. Rubin: Tell me something, Ptolemy. Why did you invite me here?
Ptolemy Grey: Well, the old folks used to say, “You got to give the devil his due.” And you are sacrificing my life.
Dr. Rubin: Your sacrifice will save millions of lives up the line, Ptolemy.
Ptolemy Grey: Will it?

Ptolemy Grey: I used to think I had to save all the Black folks in America because of something a great man stole.
Dr. Rubin: But you changed your mind?
Ptolemy Grey: No. But I have figured out though, that what he wanted me to do was to empower the peoples. To pass on the blessing, more and more, until everybody was lifted up.

Sensia: [flashback] If you had a free day, rent paid, money in the bank, what would you do?
Ptolemy Grey: I’d get us up before the sun. Take the bus down to Lake Altoona. We’d take off our socks and shoes, walk down to the shoreline, watch the sunrise.
Sensia: That all?
Ptolemy Grey: Then we’d go to a museum, surround ourselves with the beauty of art.

Hernandez: When I was seven, my parents came up from a farm in the south of Mexico.
Ptolemy Grey: Still speak Spanish?
Hernandez: No, just got this accent is all. I know some words. Funny, the things that stay with you, huh?

Ptolemy Grey: [making a recording] Robyn. I’m sitting here waiting, waiting for the truth. Even though I can remember all the way back now, I don’t know for a fact what happened. And a man needs to know the truth. I know I do, so I can act accordingly. I’m sorry for what’s about to happen here today. But I got to set things right. That m**herf***er got to pay for what he done. I know this ain’t what you wanted, but ain’t no other way. I love you, Robyn.

Ptolemy Grey: When I was a boy in Burdette, Mississippi, old men used to tell us boy children not to drink liquor out of no bottle that wasn’t sealed.
Alfred: Oh, yeah? Now, why’s that?
Ptolemy Grey: Well, back then, men had enemies put a dram of poison in your liquor in a minute.
Alfred: Yeah, but you’s drinking from the same bottle.
Ptolemy Grey: Did you see me drink?

Alfred: You better stop f***ing around, old man. You’re liable to get yourself hurt.
Ptolemy Grey: See, and that right there is another reason might be poison in that bottle. Like you say, I’m old, throwing my life away just to ease the pain.
Alfred: You telling me you put something in this whiskey?
Ptolemy Grey: You kill my nephew?

Ptolemy Grey: What would you do if you had these coins?
Alfred: Take them to a Jew jeweler. And if it’s real gold, I sell it for weight.
Ptolemy Grey: Exactly what I expect a fool to say.
Alfred: And who the f*** you calling a fool?
Ptolemy Grey: You.

Ptolemy Grey: [after Alfred admits to killing Reggie] Do you believe in the devil, Mr. Gulla?
Alfred: [pulls out his switchblade knife] I got your devil right here.

Alfred: Yeah, you think you can beat me?
Ptolemy Grey: [pulls out his gun] I don’t know about that, but I can sure as hell shoot your a**.

Ptolemy Grey: [after Ptolemy kills Alfred and is put in a mental hospita] Satan. Is we in hell?
Dr. Rubin: How are you?
Ptolemy Grey: Beat the devil. Ain’t that something?
Dr. Rubin: Yes, you did.

Ptolemy Grey: Coydog. I done what you asked, and the treasure stayed a treasure, because it was anointed in blood.
Coydog: I always knew you would.

Ptolemy Grey: Reggie, I’m so sorry.
Reggie Lloyd: Sorry about what?
Ptolemy Grey: Oh, I forget.
Reggie Lloyd: Ain’t nothing to be sorry about, Uncle. You did the best you could.
Ptolemy Grey: I guess I did, huh?

Angela Liem: Do you know why we’re here today, Mr. Grey?
Ptolemy Grey: Yeah, in order for me to make a binding will, I have to prove that I’m in my right mind, of sound mind.
Angela Liem: You are aware of the video camera recording our conversation?
Ptolemy Grey: Oh, yeah. Yeah, this is my first time being on video camera.

Ptolemy Grey: [during his video recorded message] Robyn, I want you to know that because of who you are, and the things that you’ve done, I know that Coy would be glad that I’m leaving his legacy in your hands. You saved me. You helped me keep my promise. And I want you to know that all them years before you, they mean nothing. I love you, Bird.

Robyn: I don’t care what my mother was. She loved me.
Judge Alison McCarty: So did Mr. Grey, it seems.
Robyn: I’ve never known anybody like him. He waited his whole life to do right, and he made it by a hair.
Judge Alison McCarty: He murdered Alfred Gulla.
Robyn: Yeah, well, Alfred deserved it.

Judge Alison McCarty: You don’t want the money?
Robyn: What I want? I want my degree in astronomy, and I want a seat on Elon Musk’s flight to Mars.
Judge Alison McCarty: If you don’t want the money then why are you here?
Robyn: It’s because I love Papa Grey. And I know he would’ve wanted me to stand up for myself and represent him.

Niecie: [after the judge rules that Robyn can govern Ptolemy’s estate] He’s my blood, Robyn, not yours.
Robyn: Then how come you never treated him like blood?
Niecie: You think I didn’t treat Papa Grey…
Robyn: If you’d stepped one foot in that apartment, you’d be overseeing his affairs, not me.

Niecie: Robyn, I took you into my home.
Robyn: And then you kicked me out!
Niecie: Because I was trying to protect you. How do you not see that?
Robyn: Whatever. You know, because Papa Grey didn’t even know me, and he took me in. And he didn’t want nothing from me, and I didn’t want nothing from him! Come on, please. Please. I’m not trying to hurt you. I’m just following what Papa Grey wrote down. I got to do that.

Robyn: I missed you.
Niecie: And I got to keep fighting.
Robyn: But…
Niecie: I got to do that.

Robyn: [as she visits Ptolemy in at the mental hospital] How you feeling, Uncle?
Ptolemy Grey: There’s devils in here. Girl, you better get out of here before they lock you up too.

Robyn: We going to get you back to your old apartment. And I’m going to take care of you. And so is Ms. Shirley Wring.
Ptolemy Grey: Huh?
Robyn: W-R-I-N-G.

Robyn: [as she reads from her book] “There are more stars in the universe than grains of sand on the shore. And they all come from the same place.” You know where that place is, Uncle?
Ptolemy Grey: Home.
Robyn: [she lies down next to him] Yeah. Don’t cry.
Ptolemy Grey: Home.

Coydog: [flashback] One thing you got to remember, Pity, is that we born dying. Every gasp we take is one gasp closer to eternity. If you deny that, then life lose all its purpose. You got to take life with death if you want to have any chance to be a man.
Pity: But I miss Maude. And now she gone forever.
Coydog: You remember how she sounded when she’d laugh? You remember you and her running out here on the Tickle River here, laughing and splashing?
Pity: One time we grabbed a napping catfish, and dragged him up onto the bank before he could do nothing. Mama made us catfish stew that night, and we helped.
Coydog: Well, that’s the magic of life. As long as you can think of your little girlfriend and smile, then somewhere she’s smiling too.
Pity: Yeah?
Coydog: Yeah.