David Kranes Selected Plays

you.

an Introduction

A playwright is a person who hears voices.

Except that’s a lie—which is not a problem since—as the theater critic Harold Clurman reminds: lies are the blocks playwrights lay to construct truth. I’ve read that the body never lies and also that we are bodies which learn language. So let me try again: a playwright is a person who’s unable to tell the dancer from the dance…and is proud of it. In any worthy play, then, the central armature should be choreography, choreography plastered over with all sorts of spoken lies, half-lies and occasional truths.

For as long as I can remember, there were the words and the dance, the voice and the gesture…and myself somewhere between. I was a young person, surrounded by remarkable language, who rarely spoke. I was a lad in the midst of grace, strength and agility, who seldom moved. I was a person read-to but not a reader. I watched, fascinated, as the world moved but struggled with my own choreography. I was on-vacation between vocations. But I paid attention. And, in some back room of my brain, I was asking questions.

How do you get from here to there? was one of them. How do you summon courage? How do you tell the dancer from the dance? I was in dire need of dancing lessons. How do you cross your ‘t’s, cross the street, cross the stage? Do you wait until all the lights change—or are out? Do you hold off performing something until there’s no one home, no one around? Have you done something…if you do it in the dark with no one watching?

For my twelfth birthday, my doctor-father gave me a box of magic tricks. It was an unlikely gift; he was not a whimsical man, and he had to travel to Jack & Jill’s Novelty Shop just off Boston’s Washington Street to get it. Perhaps he thought the tricks would bring his withdrawn son out. If he did, he was right. I began a transformation almost immediately--from an immobile and silent watcher-and-listener into a young man who, for substantial hours almost every day, attempted to perform magic.

And I began to speak as well. Most of the tricks given me, and those I subsequently bought, came with patter—stories and monologues to accompany the tricks. In addition, I bought patter books written by a man named Robert Orbin—books of jokes and routines, many of them off-color. I got asked to perform, almost weekly, in the various homerooms of my school. I was entering and exiting. I was crossing the stage. I was a passive verb made active.

It was daunting and enlivening. Some tricks failed, and that began to teach me a little bit about recovery-from-failure. The choreographer Doris Humphrey has a central aesthetic of fall-and-recovery—a body seeming to be overtaken by gravity, and then suddenly transcending it. I was already learning that: some tricks were predicated on failure: they appeared to fail only to then pivot and accomplish something even more magical than had been hoped for at first. So I began to understand failure-in-an-attempt—failure-and-recovery—as its own mechanism.

I remember a particularly bad magic show where several tricks failed miserably. I was discouraged until an audience-friend approached, beaming: You were trying so hard, he said. And I was—I was trying so hard! Witnessing others trying compels us; watching them trying so hard is often riveting. Those who try don’t have to win. It’s not necessary. It’s the game; it’s the effort. And it’s the degree of difficulty. Willy Loman, in Miller’s Death of a Salesman breaks our hearts, I think, because of the degree to which he tries—however confusedly—to be a human being of import.

Why we go to theater is: to sit in the dark together in a community and watch one from among us—a neighbor, someone we recognize-- attempt to do something difficult. It’s a survival mechanism, and it’s age-old: the gathering to watch one-of-us attempt to get from here-to-there using only what he-or-she knows or guesses at and employing only his-or-her body and the available words. That they are the available words only is important. That they’re the only words that the one-among-us can grab at the critical moment matters.

Often they’re the wrong words. Often they’re employed thoughtlessly and clumsily. Or arrogantly. Or foolishly. Or with blind fury. Sometimes the words are empty, sometimes they’re full, and sometimes they simply make sound, like white noise. Sometimes they escape like air from a punctured tire; sometimes they have grace. Sometimes they flood the stage in torrential misery. Sometimes they swoop the air like birds, like poetry. We grab the available words in hopes that they might…perhaps fuel, perhaps lubricate…our attempt to do the difficult thing: say hello, say goodbye, take revenge, confess our love, reveal our secret, dance, sing. Play titles often name the attempted difficult act: The Homecoming. The Connection. Death of a Salesman. Long Days Journey Into Night. I Never Sang for My Father.

I’m not a reliable analyst of my own work. But I suspect that the five plays collected here all concern a character who is either trying hard or not trying because he’s afraid of failure. Cantrell’s Cantrell is tireless in his attempt to change his life. Future Tense’s Andrew Chalmers draws uncertainly back from any attempt to be brilliant. Neil, in House, Bridge, Fountain, Gate tries too hard and too late to become Stephen’s father. Literally, he dies trying. Gene, in Nevada, fears the loss of himself in some unknown state, should he unconditionally love Shelly. We don’t much like Harold Freed during the opening scenes of Salmon Run, but in the end he’s won us over because of how hard he’s tried to bring fathers and sons together.

I’ve become a gambler. More accurately: I’ve become a player. I know the odds aren’t in my favor; still—since I discovered magic—I play. My play is, at once, wild hope and willful defiance. I understand that Loss lurks in the shadows; still I play for Gain. And I’m always on the lookout for ways of transforming Loss into Gain. A lot of music—certainly The Blues—is played for the same reason. You play in spite of. You attempt in spite of—to get from here to there, to cross the stage, to say hello, to say goodbye. And sometimes—abracadabra!—the dance is both dancer and dancer’s words. Sometimes the trick works… and there’s magic.

I like applause. But I like applauding better. Here is the short list of those I applaud and why. I applaud my parents for the exemplary lives they led—one of heart; the other, of mind. I applaud my wife, Carol, for her loving constancy in what have sometimes been my cross-currents. I applaud my sons, Jonathan and Michael, who provide consistent evidence—writing to the contrary—that I helped to bring value into the world. I applaud those directors who have willingly directed second and third Kranes plays: Jon Jory, Rich Rice, Kenneth Washington, David Chambers. I applaud the Sundance Playwrights’ Lab for allowing me to give to the creation-of-new-plays some of the caring and attention which I’ve received. I applaud the editor of this volume, Jon Tuttle, for his own plays as well as his loyalty over long years. I applaud all gifts of art and friendship.

DAVID KRANES

FUTURE TENSE

Future Tense (Acts I and II) was first produced by The Actors Theatre of Louisville’s Fifth Annual Festival of New American Plays, February 18, 1981. Park City Midnight was directed by Jon Jory; After Commencement was directed by Frazier Marsh. The cast and crew were as follows:

Andrew Chalmers Christopher W. Cooper

Julie Forester Laura Hicks

Debra Lund Susan Cash

Theodore Long Timothy Busfield

Thomas (T.R.) Forester Kent Broadhurst

Howie Metzger Brian Keeler

Friday Lisa Goodman

Set Design Paul Owen

Costume Design Kurt Wilhelm

Lighting Design Jeff Hill

Sound Design John North

Co-Property Master Sam Garst

Co-Property Master Sandra Strawn

Stage Manager Benita Hofstetter

For

Kenneth Washington

Act I: Park City Midnight

CHARACTERS

Andrew Chalmers

Julie Forester

Debra Lund

PLACE

Living area of a ski condominium in Park City, Utah. Standard stylish-comfortable-rustic. Couch. Chairs. Pillows. A free-standing contemporary fireplace—gas logs—which throws flickering light out on anyone in front of it. It opens away from the audience. Back are a kitchen area and table, cabinets, etc. Music is from an expensive tape deck and speaker system (portable) which one of the characters, probably Long, has brought. High ceiling. If the production allows a balcony off the sleeping area: above right. If not: the start of a stairway up, with the first landing before it disappearing out of sight.

TIME

April.

Park City Midnight

(Before the curtain: music. It crossfades with the sounds of offstage laughter and play—Deb, Julie and Long outside the condo.

At rise: Andrew is standing and on the phone.)

ANDREW …I understand. …I understand. Look: please—I’m not trying to be difficult—really—I’m not that way: just tell me.… (He waits impatiently while he is being told something at the other end.) Sure.… Right.… I understand.… (Again.) No; but my only point is.… (Again.) No; my point is: is he asleep or sedated? I mean, if he’s only asleep, then I’d appreciate it.… I’d like to apologize for what happened. I’d like to…yes.… Right.… I understand.

(He hangs up. Long enters on Andrew’s last words through the outside door, which is partly ajar anyway. He throws a snowball out and shuts the door. Laughter/whatever from outside. He will go mix himself a drink as he talks, takes chips, dip, whatever are the remnants of their all-night party.)

LONG Deb’s so bombed! You gotta see what she’s doin’ out there. (He sings a line with the music.) --Think there’s any place here—delivers pizza at midnight? (Sings/hums. Re: the phone:) Andrew: you’re not going to find him. Really—noshitman—forget it: the dude dogged off a mogul backwards into you, hit you; you didn’t him him. Besides: you know how many Christensens there’ve gotta be in the Salt Lake City phonebook?!

(Andrew, who has dialed another number, holds up a hand to indicate: he can’t answer at the moment.)

LONG Hey: maybe I’ll bag B-school next year. You know? Sell condos in Park City, Utah! Six months: I could own a Maserati and forget about Hegel, Keynes and Milton

Friedman: supply side economics, man! Hey, is Julie pissed at me or something? She acts like she’s on third-generation anti-depressants: just because I didn’t get what she was saying about Gustav Mahler! I’ll talk to her about George Harrison any time she wants! (Re: the previous topic and Andrew by the phone:) Nevada bindings, Andrew! He was a jerk.

ANDREW Long:they took him off the mountain in a helicopter. He wasn’t moving. –-Besides, I found him. He’s in a place called LDS Hospital there. He’s got some kind of injury to his…he wasn’t awake. (He checks his watch.) Figures. And they really weren’t too big on a lot of specific information.

LONG …Sorry, man. (Andrew shrugs.) Listen: what happens when you mix a lot of tequila with a lot of Cabernet Sauvignon? Think maybe I’ll wake up tomorrow and write The Sun Also Rises—Two?

(A burst from outside.)

LONG Jesus: Deb’s started up on her cartoon number again. Roadrunner—(indicates himself—then out:)–-and Coyote. Andrew: really: why do I continue to select these kinds of women? Speak to me. Man, you are my one gifted friend. I have to know.

ANDREW Deep need.

LONG Yeah! (He laughs.) Hey: you serious about Julie? …Really, man: I’ve been watching you watching her. I think you’re in the toilet, this time. I think this is deep Eros. You’re gone; you’re changing; you’re not the same person. (Catching something in Andrew’s reaction:) Did I nail it? You want to talk to the Doctor? Really: I’m holding hours: the Doctor’s in; the Doctor’s open for consultation. Man, hey: it’s happened to me: believe me. ’Never let it happen again, but.… More than happy to talk about it. Confess? (He gets a smile.) Huh? Huh? Come on; your life’s in crisis: confess!

(Julie enters followed, a beat later, by Deb. Deb carries a half-empty bottle of Jack Daniels.)

JULIE (To Andrew:) Deb built a snowman.

DEB And we’re talkin’ man—right, Princess? (Grabbing Long; a dance:) Ever circumsize a snowman, Long? Come on, Cartoon!

(She throws herself into a particular movement frenzy with the music.)

JULIE (To Andrew:) Remember me?

ANDREW I do.

(Deb throws herself against a wall, but.…)

DEB Shit: in the cartoons, when the Coyote does this—when the Roadrunner chases him into a wall—all these little hairline cracks come. Then he comes apart! And then he comes back together again after he comes apart! Am I doing something wrong? Maybe if I swallowed a strobe light.…

(She belts more from the Jack Daniels.)

JULIE Switch to wine, Deb?

(Julie goes back to pour some wine.)

LONG Hey, guys: did we rip up those runs today—or did we…? What’s the verdict, Jule?

JULIE (Watching, concerned about Deb:) I suppose: guilty.

LONG Guilty! Yeah!

(Deb stands up with her bottle and heads for the door.)

DEB Gotta come apart! Gotta come apart before you can come back together: Cartoon says…!

JULIE Deb? How about some wine instead of that…?

(But Deb is out the door.)

LONG Andrew? Me? On Jupiter? This afternoon? On the moguls? Olympic competitive?

JULIE (Pointing Long to Deb’s exit:) Long? Shouldn’t you pay a little attention to…?

LONG Wo! Right! Deb! --Coyote! --Beep-beep!

(Long exits after Deb.)

ANDREW (Touching Julie:) …You okay?

JULIE She’s just going to go up—in fire one day. I swear!

ANDREW She did front-flips—all the way down a mogul field this afternoon. And I don’t mean standing. (Brief pause.) I got hold of the…[guy/hospital].

(Deb re-enters. Long trails.)

DEB Snowbound! And they send a wire-haired terrier after me! (Long barks.) Where’s my brandy? (Putting a hug on Andrew:) You my hypothermia kit, darlin’?

LONG I love this life!

DEB Actually, I was doing sentry duty. For the Condo Man!

LONG (As if it is a theme song from a cartoon or TV series:) Condo, Condo, Condo Man!

(He grabs a guitar for backup, keeps the theme going in the background.)

JULIE I’m sorry I missed—

DEB Oh, it was awesome, Princess! It was devastating. But we knew. We understood. You were up on your balcony! Staring out at the glimmering.…

LONG Condo Man, Oh, Condo Man…!

DEB (Of Andrew:) Chalmers saved our lives!

ANDREW Hey: come on…!

DEB Really! Seven-thirty: this guy…re-run, Long!

(Long will assume the role of the Condo Man.)

DEB …Guy comes through the door—trying to invade, trying to take our unit! --And Protector Chalmers…we hadn’t locked anything. I mean, it’s all victimless crime at a resort anyway: right? All very beach-head! Protector Chalmers—

ANDREW (Mostly to himself; not amused:) Anybody want more wine?

LONG (As Condo Man, a drunk Texan:) Hey! Isn’t this my condo? I thought this was my condo!

DEB (Pointing to Long:) Forties. Very drunk. Two hundred dollar parka. From Texas. (She snatches up the fireplace poker.) "No, sir: this is not your condo. This is our condo! If you’da been there, you’d’ve said, Oh, Andrew! Andrew!"

LONG "This is your condo? No: this is my condo. What number is this condo?"

ANDREW Yeah: and meanwhile Deb’s of course being very helpful in the background—saying things like: Mondo Condo! and Watch out, sir! He’s the Condo Blondo!

(Deb swings at Long with the poker.)

JULIE Andrew? Did you actually swing at the man? With that—?

DEB Great moments—from great campaigns! --Cut!

LONG Condo, Condo, Condo Man…!

DEB (The voice of her father:) Nobody really wants to kill, Sugar. Just sometimes.… Combat zone! (To Julie, of Andrew:) He’s a dragon-slayer, Princess. Third in his fucking class, college pool record in the—what was it you told me, Long? Butterfly. Shit: they have to airlift them off the mountain when your old Savior here’s fightin’ for his right to Recreation! And Long’s so proud of you, Sunshine! No shit, Deb—he’s my friend; he’s my buddy; ten years, he’s gonna be the youngest junior senator from Connecticut!

ANDREW (To himself, of Deb:) Relentless!

DEB The American Boy!

LONG (Amused by it, to Julie:) The guy had breezed into the wrong condo!

DEB I think the Princess figured that out, Long.

ANDREW So was that the cartoon, Deb? That qualify? Or is it only assaults on yourself that…[qualify]?

DEB What: assaults on myself? What’re you talking? I’m indestructable, Chalmers. You know that. In-de-struct…! I’m the Coyote!

ANDREW Right.

DEB (Pursuing Andrew:) I’m the Coyote. Right! And night is my wall! Night is what I’m running into—from the time I wake up all-put-together in the morning until the time that I hit it. An’ I’m indescructable. Because the Cartoon tells me…that if I can run into the wall hard enough…make the Cartoon true and break into enough pieces…then I can sleep. And if I can sleep…then all the broken pieces will melt back together again…and I will be the Total Coyote, the Medal-of-Honor-Bronze-Star-Purple-Heart-Total-Coyote in the morning…when the Cock Crows!

(An uneasy pause.)

LONG Hey: listen: …I mean: what is the focus of this party? This party’s getting out of focus.

DEB (Moving away:) It’s Chalmers.

LONG All right! We got a focus! What’s the theme?

JULIE (Wanting her teasing to be gentle:) Do you have a theme, Andrew?

ANDREW (To Julie; soft:) Julie, please.

DEB His theme’s A Better World: right?

ANDREW Jesus: cut this! Grow up!

DEB I did!

ANDREW Well, do it again!

DEB: Christ: I’m the only grown up in this entire group! Shit: I’m fucking tending you kids! Look, man: ninety percent of my time is spent with Mature Men. I grew up on a base. I grew up on many bases. I grew up surrounded by mature Guardians of our Liberties and Freedoms. And what I’m doing is what they do: drink, talk loud and blow up the fucking world!

ANDREW Deb, would you please cut this? You’ve made your point. I apologize for being raised in one house with one set of parents outside a war zone. I’m sorry I’m bright. I regret my ability. I’m the victim of my environment: white wine, a crisp approach shot and Toscanini. And a father who says: treat the world well, Pal, and you won’t regret it. Obviously, if I’d just had the right opportunities, I, too, could be horrendously self-abusive and lonely!

(He turns away to make himself a drink. All eyes on him, Julie’s with a special curiosity/surprise.)

DEB Wooo! --Woo: I’m impressed!

ANDREW Flashes. Every once in…[a while].

DEB Sunshine: no; no; I am impressed. For someone who’s never had hand-to-hand guerilla training, I think you—

ANDREW Well, that’s my life, Deb. Everything’s easy. You know what I’m saying? Until it isn’t. Until it matters.

DEB Yeah: and with a lot of shit under the surface too.

ANDREW True. Pretty much a volcano. That’s right. Iceberg—pretty much.

LONG (Things have been getting tenser than he likes:) Mixed metaphor: watchit!

DEB (To Andrew:) Well, I’m the Titanic. (She kisses him.) Right? (She backs away, flashing her hands:) Mayday! Mayday!

ANDREW It’s a confusing signal.

DEB I have a lot of signals. Mucho fucking sig—

ANDREW And a mouth.

DEB Hon: maybe you shouldn’t, you know, knock it until you’ve tried it.

ANDREW (Checking his watch:) Hey—gee—look at that! I had no idea! Look: it’s the far side of midnight!

DEB Chalmers, Chalmers, Chalmers!

LONG God: I do not want to fly back to Boston tomorrow.

DEB Oh, Chalmers!

LONG Really: can’t I spring ski for the rest of my life? (Voice:) Can’t I buy this condo?

DEB (To herself:) Chalmers, Chalmers!

LONG (To Andrew:) She does everybody’s last name.

DEB Long: I don’t do everybody’s last name. I call Lover Sunshine. And Princess, Princess. You just think it’s advertising. But that’s just between us—okay?

ANDREW (To Julie:) Want to go out for a…?

DEB Go for the gold! Right, Chalmers? Andrew and…Julie-ette!

JULIE (As in: you don’t need to do this:) Deb.

LONG (Trying to restrain:) Deb.…

DEB No: boy from insurance-exec family in Connecticut/girl from upper East Side of Manhattan whose mummy plays N. Y. Philharmonic cello? I mean, this isn’t just tricks it seems to me that we have here. This is tender courtship!

ANDREW (Exasperated:) Long…?

DEB I’m sorry. –-I am. I mean it.

(She means it; she doesn’t enjoy, really, being at the point she’s at. The other three sense something fragile in the moment: that Deb might break…cry…scream.)

DEB (Subdued now:) …God, where are Walter Lantz—or Walt Disney when I really need them? --Where’s thermonuclear war? Cartoooon!

LONG (To Deb:) Should we go up and…?

DEB Just a minute!

(Silence. Julie has gone to Andrew.)

DEB (Direct:) Fuck: why not: if you can find some gold…take it.… Take it.

LONG (Tentative; to Deb:) …You ready now to…?

DEB (Subdued:) Just one more drink. One. –-Almost. (She pours it. To Andrew and Julie:) Hey: don’t mind me—okay? I’m just an airforce brat. One of those rude airforce brats. (A private howl: a mock of something she’s heard too many times:) Lets have another war! Fire up the economy! (Now out again, belting her drink down:) …Airforce brat. …Daddy’s locked in the cockpit of an F-111. While Mommy entertains the.… (She covers her eyes with a hand, squeezes her temples. Then her hand comes quickly from her face:) …Dumb, shitty little airforce brat…who keeps trying to meet…(poking Andrew in the chest with her finger:) her True Astronaut of Love. …Don’t give up on me, Chalmers. Please? Okay? --Really. That’s the point.

(Andrew understands more compliment than attack in her words. Deb moves apart, pours herself a last tall drink, stands alone. They watch her. Uneasy stillness.)

LONG …Hey: that must’ve been really weird today, Julie. Running into your father like that on the slopes.

JULIE Well.…

DEB (Sudden transition back into the group:) How long since you’ve seen him? --Seriously; no shit. I’m not trying to make a thing out of it. How long since…?

JULIE Only about…it’s been three years.

LONG So what’s he like?

JULIE Really: I’d rather not.… He’s brilliant and dangerous.

ANDREW Nice looking man.

JULIE He told us he was.…

DEB Goddamn: let’s hear it for divorce!

ANDREW (To Julie:) She can’t let—

DEB (Stange, ironic laugh:) Long? You want to tell us about your parents’ divorce?

LONG Not particularly: No. –-It’s amicable!

DEB Ami-what? Shit: I must be with college kids.

LONG Amicable: I see them both.

DEB Through a window? They send pictures?

LONG It’s not that bad.

DEB So how bad is—

LONG It’s better than when they were married!

DEB (It’s what she wanted.) …Okay. …Okay. (She notices Andrew, who has separated himself—back at the fridge somewhere:) Listen up, Chalmers! We’re getting topographical maps now. We’re getting reconnaisance photos!

LONG (To Julie; a kinship:) Did it, you know, seem strange? Seeing…?

JULIE He had a girl about—

ANDREW (To Long, as he returns with a chip bag:) Nacho cheese?

DEB (To Andrew) Listen up.

ANDREW (To Deb) I was there.

JULIE --about twenty something. With him. –-It was all very civilized. Daddy, this is my friend Andrew. Andrew.…

ANDREW We talked about the best runs and the best snow.

DEB Of course.

JULIE This girl…with him…had this—no possible way could it have been real—incredible tan.

ANDREW She was from Las Vegas.

JULIE She said that? --God! I hate that: hate that—beautiful, decorative women!

DEB Well, that’s—of course; right? --’cause you’re afraid of being one.

JULIE (To herself: a promise:) Not me.

DEB I mean—what does a princess become when she grows up, you know? Besides a queen?

JULIE Not me, Deb.

DEB There beside Chalmers on the Campaign Platform, or breaking a bottle of champagne over the—

JULIE Hey: my life…I don’t know what my life exactly is going to be: I mean, I have ideas and ambitions which I’m, of course, hopeful for. But I’m not going to be some smile. Or some tanned bunny on a man’s.…

DEB Good luck. –-Long?

LONG Ready?

DEB Say: beep-beep.

LONG (The Roadrunner:) Beep-beep!

DEB Good. –Let’s go up. It’s coming.

LONG (Moving to her:) Beep-beep.

DEB Coyote hears you.

LONG Beep-beep.

DEB Coyote hears you, Long. It’s almost time. –-G’night, you guys.

(They move upstairs.)

ANDREW ’Night.

JULIE ’Night, Deb.

DEB Just chalk it up to a different background: okay? I just come from a different background than you guys. Un…something. Un—what, Chalmers? Refined?

LONG Beep-beep.

DEB Unrefined. –Ciao.

(They are off. Pause. Andrew and Julie look at one another.)

ANDREW …Intense.

JULIE You imagine her as a waitress?

ANDREW Long says—at the hotel where he met her, where they were both working last summer in Booth Bay, the customers, the women, actually liked her.

JULIE She’s bright. Under it.

ANDREW Long’s women are all…very wired.

JULIE Figures.

DEB (Off at first:) Chalmers!

(Unexpectedly, abruptly, Deb is on the landing above. Andrew turns to her.)

ANDREW …Hello?

DEB We’re who we are: okay? We’re what we come from.

ANDREW Fine.

DEB Issue.

ANDREW (Repeating: no idea what the hell she is talking about:) –Issue: right.

DEB That’s all I wanted to say. G’night.

ANDREW G’night.

DEB (Calling off:) Long?

LONG (Off:) Beep-beep!

(Deb disappears again. Andrew looks into her vacated space. Julie comes up behind—arms around him.)

ANDREW …Very wired.

JULIE Are we staying? Up?

ANDREW That all right?

JULIE (Moving to withdraw:) You know: it’s funny; I’d wondered, maybe whether.…

ANDREW What?

JULIE I don’t know. I’d just had this possible thought… that at some point tonight, my father might have.… (She shakes the thought away.) Andrew: what do I look like, do you think? I mean, to someone who doesn’t know me really? Someone discerning.

ANDREW Where does… [that come from]?

JULIE Just say.

ANDREW I’d say elegant.

JULIE Really?

ANDREW Why not?

JULIE You mean, like…pretty?

ANDREW No; I mean elegant. I’m sorry: did I miss some connection? How are we, suddenly, off onto… [this topic]?

JULIE I’m just curious. –And, I guess, keyed up.

(Pause. Julie moves again to the window.)

ANDREW Hey—I tried to tell you before, but…I found that guy.

JULIE …The skier?

ANDREW Todd Christensen: yeah. He’s…at a hospital.

JULIE [Oh] Andrew!

ANDREW Yeah. They gave me his parents’ phone number. And I called them. But they weren’t in. So I called the hospital back. Got his floor. Talked with somebody on the staff. I asked what it was. They said they were still checking. I said checking what? And the resident, or whoever, said, it’s a spinal problem. I said, How bad? Guy said, That’s what we’re checking. Can I talk to him? Guy said no; that it wasn’t a very good idea, that he was possibly sleeping but probably sedated. I said, "I’m the person who did it—

JULIE Why did you…?

ANDREW --and I’m leaving on an early flight back to the east coast tomorrow morning." They weren’t too accommodating.

JULIE My friend, Stephanie, at Wellesley—I don’t know if you ever met her; I don’t think you did—she was a dancer. She did an internship with Alwin Nikolais’ company, summer between our sophomore and junior years. Then junior year, in the fall, on—Christ: would you believe a football weekend?—she got into this terrible fight with this boy, Kyle, who she was dating from Dartmouth. And something happened to a couple of her lower vertebrae. Now she uses those arm brace things that you walk with. She’s very brave. I really admire her. She can’t dance. (Brief silence.) …More wine?

ANDREW …Sure.

(Julie moves to pour each of them more wine.)

JULIE God: you know—I really hate my wrists. There’s no rotation in them practically. I have a great aunt who wanted more than anything else to paint but…stopped because she had the family wrists. Couldn’t execute certain brushstrokes. Mummy escaped them. But they found me. They affect my piano.

(Julie brings the wine, hands Andrew his.)

ANDREW Why…?

JULIE What?

ANDREW Why did you tell me that story?

JULIE About my wrists?

ANDREW About your friend.

JULIE Well, you just said…about the boy: the one this noon. His spine. And so I thought of Stephanie. (Andrew nods.) Did you…think I was making some kind of point? What other point would I have…?

ANDREW I don’t know. I thought you were maybe getting into…who knows? Deb’s got me gun shy. Men or something. Competition. Roughness. Obviously I’m feeling…I’ve never really injured somebody: okay? So that whole thing is kind of circling like a hawk or something in my brain.

JULIE He ran into you.

ANDREW I know.

JULIE This guy with Stephanie, this Kyle, I mean, he was enormous. He was an animal. And he was drunk. And besides, Andrew: --I mean, in another sense—you have to hurt people. (She studies him.) In your life. At certain times. You have to hurt people; it has to happen. Maybe that’s what Deb was getting at. With you. That you’re too…too nice or something. Too.… You have to hurt people. –I mean, you’re very sweet. You’re really, probably, the most sweet and boyish man I’ve ever known, but.…

ANDREW Those are compliments: right? (He smiles:) Tell me those are.…

(They kiss. Break.)

JULIE …I’m certainly…not trying to hurt you…in any way.

ANDREW Can we…?

JULIE What?

ANDREW …Talk?

JULIE Sure.

(Slight