Montana

 Home  >>  Montana  >>  Missoula  >>  Historical Article

A House in the Country

By: Peter M. Coy

A HOUSE IN THE COUNTRY

a play in two acts
by
Peter Coy




Copyright 1993 Contact: Peter Coy
by Peter Coy 1867 Hickory Creek Rd.
all rights reserved Faber,VA 22938
Tel:434.263.8802
e-mail:theatersouth@hotmail.com









CHARACTERS

Asa a man in his early thirties

Dory his wife, in her early thirties

Holly a woman in her early thirties

Franz a German man, about forty



PLACE

Most of the scenes take place in and around a medium sized town in central Virginia. Some scenes take place in Calgary, Canada. Much of it takes place in the memory of the characters.



TIME
Present


A HOUSE IN THE COUNTRY

Act 1

(Time and place in this play are fluid. Changes in either or both could be indicated by changes in light or sound in conjunction with movement and intention of the actors. The action takes place in front of the audience a week or maybe two after the fire and almost as if it were some form of mediation. All four of the actors/characters stay on stage most time, at liberty to listen or ignore the stories as they unfold. What happens on stage and the interaction of the characters form a part of the discoveries for characters and audience involved.)


(The audience finds bare stage except for a bench up right, two chairs up center, a chair center, and a table with four chairs down left. All of the furniture is mismatched. Franz enters down left with two long skinny balloons, shaping animals out of them as he crosses up right. He is tall and angular and may have recently turned forty although there is something of a superannuated teenager about him. He speaks with a slight German accent. Holly enters next carrying a book. She is in her mid-thirties although pronounced lines have begun to appear on her face especially when she smiles. She sits at the table down left and reads ignoring Franz. Franz begins to juggle three bean bags that he takes from his pocket. Dory enters up left. She is thirty-four and eight months pregnant. She crosses to Franz, grabs one of Franz’ juggling balls in mid air, kisses him, and then crosses to speak to Holly. She touches Holly on the shoulder but they only exchange glances. Dory crosses up center and sits. She begins to sing “Hush little baby, don’t say a word”……etc. Asa enters down right. He is in his mid-thirties. He is under six feet, with a strong, taut workingman's build. He looks around at Holly, Dory, and Franz, then at the audience.)



ASA
(To audience.) We found an old house out in the country.

DORY
(Putting words to her humming) Hush little baby, don't say a word. Papa's gonna.....

ASA
I was tearing it apart piece by piece and building it back up again. (To Franz) It was for us. Dory, Little John, and me. (To Dory.) It was for you, Dory.

DORY
(Singing)....and if that lookin' glass get broke.... and if that lookin' glass get broke...

FRANZ
(To Dory, pulling a clowns flower from his sleeve.) Nothing is broken. (To Asa) Nothing is going to get broken.

DORY
(Singing)....and if....and if....

ASA
She taught school. Dory. She taught second grade. She would take Little John to nursery school on her way to work. He is five years old.



HOLLY
(To Franz) Asa spent three years working on the house, not that there was much of a house left when he started. The last year you were there every day full time, weren't you? You found the rocks to fix the foundation in the old stone fences that run through the woods. I saw all the bruises and scars of the work on your hands.

DORY
(Singing) Hush little baby....Hush.... (Dropping the flower) He wanted to plant trees.

ASA
(crossing up to Dory – the following four lines overlap) We were driving on an old gravel road, when we found the house, twenty-five miles about outside of Waynesboro, the three of us in the pick-up.

DORY
It was one of those windy late fall days, I was wrapped up in two heavy sweaters...

ASA
The heater in the truck doesn't work so well.

DORY
....and a scarf. Little John's face all splotched red with the cold.

ASA
We came around a corner and there, about fifty yards back from the road, with a big tumbledown barn behind it, was a house (Asa sits beside Dory – as if in a truck, the lights change to indicate trees.)

DORY
Asa, stop. This is it. This is our house. Stop the truck.

ASA
(They both stand out of the truck to inspect the house) Look at this porch, Dory, going around three sides. Isn't that what you've wanted your whole life?

DORY
I think it was yellow once.

ASA
It looks pretty much like it's been just weathered gray for a long time.

DORY
But once, once it was yellow. See, behind that shutter.

ASA
I wonder how all the windows got broken out. Kids, I suppose. And, see, the gingerbread’s mostly cracked. But I can fix that.

DORY
I can't believe they left the doors to swing open. The corners of the rooms are full of leaves.

ASA
There need to be more trees. I'll plant some trees. We need more trees.



HOLLY
He used to read all the time. Thomas Mann. The Magic Mountain, Death in Venice. And Tolstoy and Conrad. Reading and rereading them. Faulkner. A lot of Sundays he'd come into the store and stand for hours in front of the fiction shelves submerging himself in As I Lay Dying or War and Peace. Always something mighty.

DORY
Red oaks, white oaks. Sycamores. You said you wanted to see things grow into magnificence. You showed me a picture once that you'd found in a magazine....

ASA
....of the trunk of a sycamore tree that was fifteen feet in diameter.

DORY
You wanted to plant sycamores.

FRANZ
Dory. (Pause) Dory. (Dory turns toward Franz.) If he loved you he wouldn't be doing this. If he....

ASA
(Asa and Dory euphoric in there excitement) There are about three acres of open land around the house and barn. The rest is in woods up the side of Diggs Mountain. Across the road down to the creek there are twenty, twenty-five acres of pasture all overgrown in blackberries and cedars.

HOLLY
(To Asa – he does not leave his world with Dory.) When you were leaving the store, you'd stop at the counter to talk. You stayed sometimes an hour. Your eyes always seemed to drill right back into that hollow in me. Sometimes I couldn’t look at your eyes. I wanted to but I couldn’t. I was scared, I guess, you might see what was broken in there.

ASA
(To Dory.) It's known as the old Woodson place. The house was built in 1904, the barn around 1932, people don't seem exactly sure. They were known as a family that when they built something, they built it right. But no one much took care of the place after the flood and mudslides, when Hurricane Camille dumped forty-eight inches of rain on the county in seventeen hours. That was 1969. The house and barn weren't hurt. But Henry and Sister Woodson lost their son and daughter-in-law and three grandchildren - seven, six, and four years old. They got washed away about three in the morning in their trailer up on Davis Creek. Henry and Sister didn't do much taking care of the place after that. They never found the body of the seven year old.

FRANZ
If he loved you.... (Dory turns to Franz.)

DORY
If he.....

FRANZ
Dory.

DORY
(She crosses to center chair and sits.) Holly. What is he doing? What is Asa doing? You know him, Holly. He won't do anything? He won't, will he?

HOLLY
(Kneeling at her side) No, Dory. He won't do anything. Nothing.

ASA
( To Audience) We knew right away we wanted it.

DORY
This was the house we wanted Little John to grow up in, an old house, with a barn. He was one and a half.

ASA
He needed to grow up in the country.

DORY
Asa wanted to plant trees. (Time switching. Dory looks around frantically.) Franz. Franz! Where are you? (She exits up right. While off, she removes her pregnancy pad.)

FRANZ
(Franz enters the classroom in Calgary with his bag.) We met last summer. Dory and I. I was teaching at the International Teachers Workshop in Calgary. Canada. She had come all the way from Virginia in the states by Greyhound bus to spend the summer working toward a masters degree in elementary education. My class was an elective: Poetry, Theatricality, Improvisation, and Clowning - how to use improvisational theater in the elementary school classroom. When she walked into the classroom I thought, Holy shit, here is one uptight lady. What will I do with her? ( He lies down center stage)

ASA
We were living in an apartment in town. You know the brand new, metal studs and three-eighth inch sheet rock, no insulation type place, where you can hear the neighbors opening drawers and coughing. Whenever Little John would cry, they'd bang on the walls.

DORY
(Entering up right.) Asa and I were married three weeks after our high school graduation. He was a diesel mechanic; he'd learned it from his father. I went to the community college for four years to get my degree in primary ed and child psychology. We never had any money to speak of. But we kept putting some in the bank every month for the down payment on a house we figured we'd find some day.

FRANZ
I had her dance in that first class.

DORY
We weren't going to have any kids till we could afford them. (Dory sits up center as if in class)

FRANZ
I was lying on the floor of the classroom with that group of teachers sitting in their chairs looking at me. I asked Dory her name.

DORY
(Softly.)Dory.

FRANZ
I could hardly hear her. Did all of you hear her name? Did you hear her name? .(Standing, to Dory.) Do you like to sing?

DORY
No.

FRANZ
Everybody likes to sing, I think so.

DORY
My mother told me I couldn't sing.

FRANZ
(To audience.)Ah, yes, the mother. Did I hear some of you snicker? None of that now.

DORY
She said, at school in the glee club I should just move my lips so I wouldn't ruin it for everyone.

FRANZ
Sing your name. Here. Come up here. Stand here. (Ad libbing some German commands – Machst schnell, etc. Dory joins him center.) Now, sing your name. Now, now, class. No tittering. I want laughs or groans. Something more committed than a titter. OK, now Dory, sing. Hold it. Class, do you think I should make her do this? Is this being cruel? You think I am humiliating her. OK, she doesn't have to do it. But let's hear from Dory. Do you want to sing your name?

DORY
(Almost inaudibly) Yes. I want to.

FRANZ
Can you say that so all of us can hear? Then we will know for sure.

DORY
(Overly loud.)I want to. I want to sing.

FRANZ
Ah, you see. Go ahead. (Pause)

DORY
(Singing) My name is Dory.

FRANZ
Dory. Just Dory.

DORY
(Singing) Dory. Dory. Just Dory.

FRANZ
Sing it with your whole self.

DORY
I don't know what that means.

FRANZ
Of course you don't. Just do it.

DORY
(Singing) My name is Dory. Dory. Dory. (Talking) But I...

FRANZ
Don't talk, sing. (Singing) Don't talk, Dory. Sing.

DORY
(Singing) But I don't know what I am doing. Dory. I don't know what I am doing.

FRANZ
Now dance your name.

DORY
I can't. I can't do that. I don't know how.

FRANZ
No one does. Dance. Dance.

DORY
I can't.

FRANZ
Your name. Say your name and move however it comes out. Pretend that I am jabbing you with a cattle prod. That's how you feel, I think so.

DORY
No.

FRANZ
Then sit down. (He turns away from Dory and speaks to the class.) What we need to examine in this class is our own willingness to do what... (He notices that Dory is starting to do something. He turns to watch.)

DORY
(She begins to move ever so slightly at first, just a timid swaying. Slowly more of her body joins in, awkwardly to start with. As it progresses she begins to enjoy it smiling and singing her name swinging her arms around. She briefly sticks her tongue out at Franz. Then gradually the dance begins to change. She seems to be reacting to jabs of electricity until she is dancing a full-fledged torture. It ends with her desperately pulling and ripping at imaginary hands grabbing at her body. She stops suddenly in shuddering sobs. Franz goes to her, wraps his arms around her trying to calm her)

Let go, Let, LET GO. (She crosses to bench, changing time) Why is he doing this, Franz? Why?

HOLLY
I met Asa and Dory right after Little John was born. In the baby food aisle at the Food Lion. (To Asa.) Excuse me. I see you are looking at baby formula. That's not the best one. At least I don't think it is. Not for the money. Here, try this one. It's really good.

ASA
This one?

HOLLY
Yes. Bonnie's been on that---she's my daughter, she's seven months---she loves it---she's been taking it for four months. Ever since Jim left us. He's my husband, I guess you could call him that. Anyway, he's the father of my child. He left us in the dust when Bonnie was three months old. In the dust. I get the picture of some 1950’s hot rod on a dirt road in Wyoming, don’t you? Maybe not. Anyway that's when my milk dried up. You don't want to know all this. A real prince of a guy. Not a postcard, not even a collect call from Wyoming. Maybe that’s… (Dory comes to Asa.) Oh, hi. (They shake hands awkwardly)

ASA
We'd been married eight years. Dory was teaching and I was working at the shop. We were making some money so it seemed to be the right time. We both thought.

HOLLY
(To Franz) They were strong together. They had a lot of plans. It was all working for them. That was five years ago when I was just starting my bookstore. Risking it all. I was sober, sort of. During the week. Bonnie and I needed them.

ASA
(To Dory, kneeling in front of her where she sits in a chair.) We want a child. We have always wanted a child.

DORY
Yes. I don't know. I don't know. A baby. A child.

ASA
Yes.

DORY
(She joins him in an embrace kneeling on the floor, down left) Yes.

ASA
I have never made love before, wanting a child.

DORY
Yes.

HOLLY
(To Franz , as she brings in a pile of books to the bench up right.) There were times when I'd drop Bonnie of at their apartment and leave her for two or three days. Asa and Dory would take care of her – do everything. I was kind of struggling with the store then, in the beginning. And trying to make my life work. Men, you know. There seemed to be a lot of them. Whenever it appeared that it might be something more than one night, I'd give Bonnie to Dory and Asa.

DORY
(Singing, stroking Asa’s hair) Hush little baby, don't say a word. Papa's going to....

FRANZ
(Running his finger along her arm) Dory.

DORY
(Pulling away) My name is Dory. I have a husband named Asa. And a child, Little John. John. We call him Little John. I can't sing now. Not right now. (She sits, writing in her journal)

HOLLY
(Bringing out another stack of books, she speaks to Franz.) I always try too hard. I guess I'm truly desperate. I scare them all away.


ASA
(Still on his knees, to Holly.) Holly, I never knew children before Little John was born. I had never even been near a human being so small. His fingernails looked like tiny scraps of wax paper to me and his eyes seemed to know something I couldn't imagine. (Dory begins humming the main theme from Wagner’s Overture to Tannhauser. She continues humming through the next few lines. )

HOLLY
I don't know if I should tell you this. It seems silly now. Sometimes when I'd watch the kids in the bookstore, I'd set them up with blocks in the children's section and put on music I knew you liked. When you and Dory would come to pick up Little John, Dory would play with the kids and I'd watch you standing in the aisles reading. Go Down Moses. The Power of Darkness. Something like that.

ASA
(To Holly standing, time switches.) What's that music?

HOLLY
It's supposed to make you want to buy books. They say you're supposed to have music on all day. Do you like it?

ASA
Yes.

HOLLY
Does it make you want to buy a book? You’re supposed to waft certain smells, I guess I mean aromas, through the shelves, too. But I haven’t gotten that far, not that sophisticated yet. Do you like the music? Does it make you want to buy a book?

ASA
Yes.

HOLLY
This is Wagner, I think.

ASA
I know.

HOLLY
You do?

ASA
The best teacher I ever had was my music teacher in high school.

HOLLY
This is Siegfried's Rhine Journey. (crossing center – time switches) You loved Wagner. I'd put it on when I knew you were coming. I'd have it playing when you got there. Do you think that was silly?

ASA
Yes.

HOLLY
I wanted to look at the floor and… when you walked in… I didn’t want to look at the floor, I didn’t want to look away from you, but that’s what I’d do.

DORY
(To Franz.) Asa was in the delivery room when Little John was born. He took black and white photographs of the birth. The doctor gave him the baby to hold right after he was born. While I was still pushing the placenta out. He held Little John before I did.

FRANZ
You can't think of him as your husband now. He is not your husband now.

ASA
(To Holly.) When she was in labor she screamed at me. She screamed she hated me.

DORY
(Franz puts his hands on Dory’s shoulders.) Don't touch me. Don't touch me.

FRANZ
He cannot touch you now. He cannot now.

ASA
I had been told to expect something like that. But there I was with the cold washcloths and the crushed ice. Taking care of her. When she screamed at me, it came as a shock. I wasn't ready.

DORY
Asa was holding Little John while the doctor was manhandling my exhausted uterus trying to stop the bleeding. Asa was humming something. When I finally could hold my baby, I went to pieces. My whole body began to shake and I was sobbing. It was like I was having convulsions. They took him away. (She hums a few bars of Tannhauser.)

ASA
(To Holly.) After she screamed at me, I stood away, against the wall, and watched her give birth. (Dory has stopped humming. Asa begins to hum the Tannhauser theme.) When the doctor handed Little John to me, I sang to him. My chest was vibrating, resonating with the music. He could feel it, I know. He remembers, not consciously. Part of him remembers. His muscles and bones. I hummed the overture to Tannhauser. Maybe something from Die Meistersingers. Wagner. (Holly crosses backstage)

FRANZ
(To Dory - Juggling.) Do you remember calling me Doktor Fischer?

DORY
Doktor Fischer. Yes. I was scared of you. Intimidated.

FRANZ
Herr Doktor Fischer. Doktor of Clowns. You were scared of the world.

DORY
(She intercepts one of the balls, then takes all three balls and tries to juggle.)I had never seen anyone juggle before. On TV yes. But I never really believe what I see on television.

FRANZ
Der Franz, der Franzwurst kann juggle.

DORY
(Time shift to a time when Asa’s and Dory’s marriage seemed pretty strong.)Holly?


HOLLY
(Re-entering down to table with pie) Yeah?

DORY
(Holly and Dory share a piece of key lime pie) Is it fun, being with other men, I mean men, you know, out there?

HOLLY
Fun?

DORY
Yes. I’ve always thought a relationship ought to be fun. Love should be fun. Asa and I used to have water gun fights and chase each other around. Things have changed since Little John.

HOLLY
I don’t know. Yesterday I was folding Bonnie’s clothes out of the dryer, her little shirts and underpants and I remembered when she was first born. And suddenly I was hit with that incredible mystery that she grew in me. That I, after some sweaty little bout of sex, grew this tiny perfect creature in me and that she has now elbowed her way into my heart. They’ll change things, kids.

DORY
Asa’s changed.

HOLLY
You know what, though. When I stop for a minute and look at myself as a mother entrusted with a child, a real live child, a lot of stuff comes up and I have my face rubbed in all my secret brokenness and rage.

DORY
Rage? You…

HOLLY
Jim left. The fucker disappeared.

DORY
I didn’t think you…

HOLLY
Oh, yes, me. He just drove off into the sunset. But I’ve just got to laugh at the whole catastrophe. I can’t take Jim too seriously. I’m not going to make him that important.

DORY
Holly, Asa’s changed. I don’t know what to do. (Dory turns and walks away.)

HOLLY
(To audience.) Right away Dory and I spent hours together talking about kids and daycare and diapers and men, whatever we were feeling. It took a couple of years for Asa to begin to talk about anything except the books he read. Only after a couple of years did he say anything about himself.

FRANZ
(Wearing a pair of clown glasses, he crosses the stage.)Yes. Yes. I can juggle, ride a unicycle, and teach small dogs silly tricks. I would like to learn to eat fire.

ASA
(To Holly.) Holly, we bought the house. We couldn't get a mortgage because it's in such bad shape. The bank won't touch it. So the Woodson estate got a lien on my pick-up. They wanted to sell the house pretty bad. We'll be able to move into it in a year, I think. There's a lot of work to do. We’ve been dreaming, Dory and I, of what we're going to make it into. We dream.....(To Dory.) Dory?

DORY
(Looking back at their past with some disdain.)We dreamed, yes, long everyday dreams.

ASA
To start with, I'm going to have to rebuild this chimney. We need that first for the wood stove, for heat. Look at the mortar. It's practically turned to sand. I can scratch it out with my fingernails. I'll have to take it down brick by brick, save them, clean them up and use on the new chimney. Dory, look at this. Look what they built the chimney on. a huge piece of granite.

DORY
We had long grocery lists of dreams.

ASA
They must have found that granite and decided that was where the house should go, that's where the chimney should go. I wonder how big it is. It just keeps going deeper into the ground. The part I can feel is at least twenty feet across.

DORY
When I was a little kid we lived in Ohio. Jody Kirstenmacher's grandparents had this big house with a huge porch wrapping around it. We used to play tag on it. The post by the steps was home base. This was my dream. To have a house like that one. When we drove around that corner, there it was.

ASA
(Asa is bringing out tools, preparing to work on the house – his attentions are split) The barn and the house both need new roofs. Metal roofs. Jack Phillips can help me.

DORY
Jack Phillips?

ASA
He's a roofer. (He kisses Dory quickly and exits for more tools.) We can do it together, no problem. He can teach me as we go.

DORY
Jack's not the most reliable---

ASA
(Re-entering.)We'll get it done.

DORY
He doesn't always show up when---

ASA
Roofers are like that. They're an independent lot. (Exiting.) He does good work and we'll get the job done.


DORY
(Calling to Asa who is off stage.)I used to dream of you when we were in high school. You were distant and aloof and beautiful.

ASA
(Re-entering.)Some of the rafters are rotten because of the leaks. I'll have to sister two-by-tens onto those rafters where I can find some solid wood. I patched up most of the holes with silicone caulk.

DORY
You can find the rest of them next time it rains.

ASA
The metal is crumbling away. If the goddamn people had only painted the roof once in a while it would have lasted another fifty years. Don't worry, I'll get this roof done. (He brings out a stick poking out of a pile of dirt on a piece of burlap.) And look what I found.

DORY
A handful of dirt?

ASA
No, no, no. A tree. A chestnut oak. I found it in the woods. (He sets the “tree” down center and admires it. It will stay there for the rest of the play.) In a hundred years it will be magnificent. Can you see it? Magnificent.

DORY
For all four years in high school I watched you, in the halls, on the football field, in classes. I had a bunch of classes with you. I could hardly breathe when I was near you. We never talked. Until one night senior year just before Christmas when I got stranded at school after a meeting.

ASA
I'd been working in the biology lab (Time shift to high school days. He goes to get a backpack up left).

DORY
(The lights change.) Asa?

ASA
Yeah.

DORY
Have you seen Sharon?

ASA
She left about 10 minutes ago.

DORY
Oh.

ASA
Is something wrong?

DORY
No. It's just she said she'd give me a ride home.

ASA
I could take you home.

DORY
No. That's OK.

ASA
How are you going to get there, then?

DORY
I don't know.

ASA
I could give you a ride.

DORY
You could? It's not too much....

ASA
I'll take you home.

DORY
(They are sitting upstage right, on the bench, “in the car.”) Is this your car?

ASA
Yes.

DORY
It's a nice car.

ASA
It's my mother's.

DORY
Oh. You were in the biology lab?

ASA
Yeah. That frog muscle experiment.

DORY
I already finished that one. I was at a meeting.

ASA
I know.

DORY
How'd you know?

ASA
The food project. Aren't you on that committee?

DORY
Yes.

ASA
Vice president?

DORY
You take a right up at the corner.

ASA
Do you ever watch movies?

DORY
I guess, sometimes.

ASA
It doesn't sound as if you like them much.

DORY
(A little too demonstratively.)No, I do. I like movies.

ASA
There's a movie in town called Tomorrow. I've seen it twice.

DORY
I guess you like it.

ASA
Yeah.

DORY
What's it about, you know, that you like it so much.

ASA
Well, it's... I can't really tell you the whole story. Maybe you'd like to see it. I could take you.

DORY
You've already seen it twice.

ASA
I could go again.

DORY
Three times?

ASA
Sure. It's my favorite movie.

DORY
(To audience, crossing down left.) My dreams always come true.

ASA
(He picks up a shop rag and begins to clean his hands as he crosses center. To Holly.) I leave the shop after eight or nine hours messing with diesel motors and I drive out to the house. I work there until I feel my exhaustion about to get dangerous and I come pick up Little John. I don't want to lose a thumb to my skill saw.

DORY
I dreamed Asa. I dreamed our house.


ASA
(To Dory, sitting center.) This is the first time I really understand work. This is not for money. I'm building something, taking an old piece of wreckage and making a place to live. A house for you. For you, Little John, and me.

DORY
I dreamed....

ASA
There are times when I want to burn this old house down, all the rot and the shoddy repairs that those people left behind. Sometimes I want to build a new one, new wood, new plan. I think about starting from scratch, how easy it would be.

DORY
(She is behind him rubbing his back. She reaches around him and rubs his chest.) When we first made love, I found that terrible scar on your stomach right below your navel. You wouldn't let me touch it. You wouldn't even let me look at it. You said you had been hit by a car when you were a kid. You didn't want to talk about it.

ASA
I read somewhere, Dory, Tolstoy maybe, he said, “Where there is ruin, there is hope for a treasure.”

DORY
Tell me about the car, Asa.

ASA
Somewhere in this ruin of a house. (He stands and moves away from her.)I want to plant trees, Dory. (Dory turns away from him.) There are only three trees near the house. Those three big Norway maples on the east side of the house. They're probably seventy years old. They will maybe live another fifteen or twenty years. Not much more anyway. Especially the one with that branch torn off. The one with the huge open wound. The bark's started to grow back over it, but it'll take a lot of time to heal. Maybe more time than the tree has. We need trees around the house, to the south to give us shade in the summer. I love walking in the woods looking for seedlings to transplant. Buried treasure. Acorns burrowed in the years of old rotted leaves. White oaks, chestnut oaks, pin oaks, red oaks. And there are tulip poplars all through the woods.

DORY
(She and Holly sit at the table sharing a piece of pie.) I wasn't a virgin. I think he was disappointed even though he never said anything. He wanted me to be a virgin. I was almost. Once before only. On a date I drank a lot of some Halloween punch and let myself be forced. I guess I thought it was time but I needed a push. I didn't fight. I don't know if it was time. The next day I threw away the dress I'd been wearing.

ASA
(Crossing down stage.To audience.) I have always looked forward to spring. The quiet explosion of spring. Everything gets to be born all over again. This year.....(Asa’s talking has touched a raw nerve in Dory. She stands and crosses angrily up right to the bench where she sits.)

HOLLY
(To audience.) Dory went to Calgary, in Canada, that summer. She was going to be away for three and a half months.


ASA
(Crossing to Holly.) I'm not getting the work done on the house. We've owned it for more than two years. We've got to move in soon. Last week I started ripping that green and yellow linoleum off the kitchen floor. They had nailed plywood over the pine floor, hundreds of tiny nails, so the linoleum would lay flat. I had to get the plywood off too. I have an eight foot pry bar that I slide between the plywood and the pine, knocking the nails out of the way. Then I lift up on the bar to separate the plywood from the floor. It was pretty slow going. When I was halfway across the kitchen, I slid the bar under and lifted. The end of the bar broke through the pine floor. It turns out that everything under the plywood on that side of the kitchen is rotten. Not just the floor but the subfloor, the joists, and part of the sill. I had to rip the whole thing out. (Asa sits at the table.)

DORY
(Dory kicks the books off of the bench in anger and addresses the audience.) That summer I went to study in Canada.

HOLLY
(Standing behind Asa. To audience.) Asa stopped reading. Actually something strange happened. He developed some kind of a disorder. After about three minutes of reading he'd fall asleep. Several times in the store he was reading standing up and I heard the book drop on the floor. He couldn't read anymore. The books he loved.

DORY
(To Franz. Time shift to shortly after Dory’s arrival in Calgary.) I was dying in the classroom. Twenty-three seven year olds looking at me from 8:00 in the morning until 3:00 in the afternoon all day every day, looking for something in me to love, to excite them. In college they didn't teach me how to stay alive. I started taking more education courses at night. "The Creative Classroom" was one. They all turned out to be hollow formulas that the kids saw through in a second. I could feel my whole body stiffening up.

FRANZ
So you came to Calgary.

DORY
It was the brochure that hooked me. It was posted on the bulletin board at the community college. A very straight academic brochure. But part of it had been scribbled on by some kids. Your picture....

FRANZ
My picture. There I was, long nose and stringy neck and all.

DORY
Your picture, Doktor Franz Fischer, and a big ugly cigar coming out of your mouth with smoke and these rabbit ears. I thought someone at the college had done it. Then I saw it had been printed on the picture.

FRANZ
Those damn kids.

DORY
Did you do it yourself?

FRANZ
I sent them my photo. They like the feel of it, I guess. Or maybe they were trying to embarrass my professorial stature, I think so.

DORY
Poetry, Improvisation, Theatricality, and Clowning: a workshop in creative juice making in the elementary classroom.

FRANZ
I don't know why they let me call it that. Part of the same perversity.

DORY
I'm surprised it was posted on the bulletin board.

FRANZ
It is a crazy group of subversives that has signed up. Except for you. (Franz exits the scene.)

DORY
(To audience.) I knew I had to go to Calgary. Some things you just know. I applied for a scholarship.

ASA
(Asa and Holly sit at the table down left.)Holly, you know Dory’s going to Canada this summer.

HOLLY
Yes.

ASA
Something called the International Teacher's Workshop. She got a full scholarship. Not bad. She'll have all the credits she needs for her master's degree by the end of the summer. I can't believe Little John is four already. When I drop him off at day care in the morning, he just opens the door of the car, says "bye papa", and runs off. He doesn't even look at me. No tears. Nothing.

HOLLY
That's what happens, I guess. You must be doing something right. He must be feeling pretty good about himself.

ASA
Out at the house, I take him out there in the evenings, he carries my tools around.

HOLLY
Helping you out.

ASA
Helping me, right. Dory's busy teaching all day and taking classes at night. When Little John and I come back to the apartment it's dark already. (He is feeling Dory’s abandonment.) Most of the time Dory's not there yet. We're asleep by the time she gets home.

DORY
(To Holly and Asa, in response to Asa’s complaint..) On Saturday mornings we play a special game when Little John crawls into bed with us. He buries himself in the covers and pretends he is a baby chick in an egg. Asa's the rooster. I'm the mama hen. (Dory begins to cross upstage to the bench) I say, "Where's my baby chick. All the other mama's have their babies. The mama sheep, baaah baah). The mama cow, mooo. Where's my baby."



ASA
(Asa crosses upstage moving and making noises like a rooster) You've been sitting on that egg for three weeks now. It's never going to hatch. It's time to push it into the river and lay another.

DORY
(She sits on the bench as if it’s their bed.)Oh, no. I know there's a baby chick in there. Don't push it into the river. Please. Please.

ASA
It's time. It's never going to hatch.

DORY
Oh, no. Just one more night, please.

ASA
OK, just one more night. But in the morning I'm going to push it into the river. I'm going to sleep now. (He sits on the floor and snores.)

DORY
I know there's a baby chick in there. I know it will come out. I'm going to sleep. (She snores.)

ASA
Cock-a-doodle-do. The sun is coming up. It's morning. Time to get rid of this old egg.

DORY
No, please. Not yet. Wait. Look. (To Holly) Then Little John would start to move. He'd push one arm out from under the covers. Look, it's moving. It's coming out of the egg. Oh, it's our baby chick. Oh look how fluffy its feathers are. It's my best baby chick.

ASA
Oh, yes, our baby chick. I'm glad you made me wait.

DORY
Here's your papa, the king of the barnyard. Don't be scared of him, baby chick. He loves you. You are the prince of the barnyard. Someday you'll be the king.

ASA
Yes, baby chick. You'll grow big and strong.

DORY
You'll grow up and be just like your papa.

ASA
We love you so much, baby chick.

DORY
Then we hug. (Asa and Dory look at each other over the imaginary Little John between them. Dory breaks off this moment and exits up right to get a laundry basket) Holly?

HOLLY
(Crossing center. To audience.)Once, before all this happened, Dory… I had come back from a weekend with… I forget his name… in Philadelphia of all places. I would have said my soul felt bruised. But after a weekend with Brad…that was his name…after a weekend with him I wasn’t sure I had a soul at all. When I went to pick up Bonnie Sunday night…

DORY
(Entering up right with laundry basket. She crosses center.)Did you have a good weekend?

HOLLY
Oh, I… yes, I guess, as good as could be expected.

DORY
Brad isn’t the love of your life?

HOLLY
I hope not.

DORY
Bonnie’s asleep.

HOLLY
I’ll get her. She’ll stay asleep in my arms.

DORY
Would you like something, a beer?

HOLLY
Are my hands shaking that bad?

DORY
What?

HOLLY
No thanks on the beer. I’m a tad bit tired.

DORY
(Dory invites Holly to sit down with her, they fold laundry while chatting) What did you do in Philadelphia?

HOLLY
We might as well have been in Waynesboro.

DORY
Not much going on?

HOLLY
It wasn’t that. We hardly left his apartment. He said he had everything he needed right there. A little drugs, a little rock and roll, a couple of bottles of Stolichnaya, and me. Or rather a woman’s body. Mine would do.

DORY
He said that?

HOLLY
Oh, yes.

DORY
What did you do? Why did you stay?

HOLLY
Hey, I was there for the weekend.

DORY
Oh. Are you going to see him again?

HOLLY
No. There was a time when I might have.

DORY
I don’t know what it’s like…

HOLLY
What what’s like?

DORY
You know… To… I’ve never slept…I’ve only slept with Asa. I don’t know what it’s like to sleep with anyone else.

HOLLY
Nothing to write home about.

DORY
Is it different? It must be different with… Maybe it’s not different. I don’t know.

HOLLY
It’s different. But in the greater scheme of things, even in the lesser scheme of things, it’s essentially the same.

DORY
How?

HOLLY
A man and a woman. There’s only… (Dory throws a sock at Holly)

DORY
How is it different?

HOLLY
Different? Oh, well, let’s see… there’s smell, the way he uses his hands and fingers, and how much ego he has invested in… you know…, and attention to detail, caring, gentleness maybe or not, I don’t know. In the end there’s not much…

DORY
I don’t know if I’m staying with Asa because I love him or because I’m afraid of the outside world.

HOLLY
Oh.

DORY
I don’t know if I’m staying because I love him. I mean… I don’t know what I mean. I remember when I was first married. I went to the supermarket one day. I was really happy. It was summer and I had on a T-shirt and I wasn’t wearing a bra. I felt… And I came to the checkout counter and there was a man cashier and, after he rang me up, he looked at me, at my chest, and said, I like your shirt, and my whole body knotted up, a hard knot. I just now realize it was fear.

HOLLY
Of men? No need for that. Just think of them as...

DORY
I think staying with Asa, I’ll be afraid forever.

HOLLY
You’ve got little John.

DORY
I know. I’m just talking. (Dory stands and starts to pace) Asa knows where I am every day all day. He wants to know. It’s as if he needs to know. I feel him watching me wherever I am. He’s everywhere I am.

HOLLY
He’s not watching you.

DORY
I know. I know. Everything he does he says he’s doing for me. Everything. Even when we make love, every move is for me. Sometimes I want to shake him and say, What about you? Don’t you want to do something for yourself? I’m just tired. He says I’m his only friend. I have to go, Holly.

HOLLY
What?

DORY
I mean, you have to go. I’m home. You have to go. You have to get Bonnie to school in the morning. You have to go to bed. I have to go to bed. I’ll get Bonnie. (Dory moves away.)

HOLLY
(To audience.) Asa began to stop at the bookstore more and more on his way home from working on the house. Little John loved to play with Bonnie. Asa would walk up and down the aisles looking at the books, holding them. He seemed to be running the stories through his head, touching those friends he had made reading. He couldn't read anymore.

ASA
Holly.

HOLLY
One night he came in. He was holding Little John asleep on his shoulder.

ASA
Holly. I quit my job at the shop today.

HOLLY
Oh, wow.

ASA
I need to finish the house.

HOLLY
You quit. You've been working there a long time.

ASA
I guess Dory'll be glad.

HOLLY
She doesn't know?

ASA
She doesn't like the way I smell like diesel fuel all the time. Lately she won't even talk to me unless I take a shower first thing after work. Of course, that is if she's home. Which she isn't much these days. I can work full time now to finish the house. (They sit at the table down left.)

HOLLY
When does she leave for Canada?

ASA
June 2nd. I don't know exactly why she's going all that way. And it's three and a half months. We've never been apart even a week. You'd think she'd be able to get her credits a little closer to home. But she's got that full scholarship. And now she'll be making more money in the fall. We don't need my job anymore. I'll get the house done. You know I kicked a hole in our bedroom wall in the apartment. The neighbors were playing their TV up loud. Something just surged up out of me. I used to be able to read through any of their noise. I miss reading these books.

HOLLY
It's not getting any better?

ASA
No. I used to read all through lunch break. For the last few months I've just been sitting by a little creek that runs behind the shop. Things would happen. A leaf might get hung up on a rock near the edge of the bank. I'd get sort of enchanted watching. The water tugging at it again and again, tugging again and again. It might finally be pulled loose and glide like some slippery muscle over the rest of the rocks till I lost it. Or I might have to go back to the shop before. Now I'll have time to finish the house.

DORY
(Initially to Asa.) I've been having a recurring dream. It's a dark night in a rundown city somewhere, India maybe. (To Franz, to the whole class in Calgary.) I'm on a small bridge where canvas tarps are set up on sticks on the sidewalks. People are living under them. In the light from the street lamp there is a line of dark-haired children, young, eight or nine years old. They are standing there waiting for something, I don't know what. They look at me wanting something as I walk by, wanting something from me, and they stretch their hands out at me. They have long bony fingers. I don't have anything to give them. They start making confused noises, then they begin to wail, all the time staring at me. Their eyes are hard and black. They keep reaching for me and grabbing at my arms and legs and body. (She begins to pull at imaginary hands she feels on her body.) I try to pull their hands off me and run away but they crowd around me. Then I wake up.

HOLLY
(To audience.) After he quit his job he was alone most of the time. No people to speak of, no books. Just him. And Little John at night. When Dory left for Canada I expected him to bring Little John around a lot. But he didn't. Only a few times. It felt like he was staying away on purpose.

ASA
(Asa crosses to the center chair and sits) When I was nine, I was hit by a car. I was crossing the street to trade baseball cards with Jeff Smith and there was a semi truck coming west. When he slowed down for me the black and white Buick that had been stuck behind him for the last fifteen minutes pulled quickly around him to pass. Bang. I was unconscious for three days. (Pause) I had significant internal injuries. I have a six inch scar just below my navel where the doctors opened me up. (Pause) I was in and out of hospitals for six months. Once I had to go into Johns Hopkins Hospital for a few weeks of tests and radiation therapy to soften the internal scarring. One night late, after my mother had gone home, the orderly came into my room. I liked him. His name was Raymond. He kept a purple puppet named Gary in his pocket and he would put on little shows with Gary, who would talk in funny voices. He'd do magic tricks, make a penny disappear and find it hiding in my ear. Raymond was short and scrawny with slicked-down black hair. He called me Asa kid and made me laugh. This night he came into my room. I was having a test the next day that required general anesthesia. He had come to give me an enema. I hated them and I began to cry so he held my arm tight as he guided me into the bathroom. "It's nice you got a private room with a bathroom," he said. "You don't have to worry about no one else." He closed the door. He filled the bag with warm water, hung it on the hook, and he turned me around to face the toilet. He told me to lean over and put my hands on the seat. He slipped my pajamas down to my ankles. He opened the jar of Vaseline and rubbed it on me. Then I heard a zipper. I tried to look around but he held my neck. "Hey, Asa kid, this won't hurt. Just a little maybe at first. It'll be just fine." He hunched over me and I felt a fire go into me. He was moving back and forth against me. "Good, good, Asa kid, yes, yes," he said. Then he made a noise, a kind of a squeaking sound and he was still. He took some paper towel and wiped me off. Then he gave me the enema and took me back to bed. "That wasn't so bad now. Hey, come on, stop that crying. Gary, tell the boy to stop crying. (In Gary's voice) Asa kid, it's not so bad. (In Raymond's voice) Goodnight, now. And, kid, don't tell anyone what happened or you might not wake up from your operation tomorrow. Does he understand, Gary? (In Gary's voice) Yes, he's a very smart little kid." The following night he came back again. I was so groggy from the anesthetic I hardly remember anything. But the next night, when it was time for my mother to go home, I started sobbing and clutching at her. The nurses had to tear my arms off her so that she could leave. As she walked down the hall, I suddenly stopped crying and my body went dead. Raymond came that night. Then he didn’t come back. He never came back. I never saw him again. But every night I was terrified till I left the hospital. It's strange, though, it feels like it happened to someone else, not to me. That nine year old kid doesn't seem to be me. I don't know how to explain it.

DORY
(Dory crosses to Asa, stands behind him, and holds him while singing.) When Little John was tiny, just home from the hospital, I would hold him when he fussed at night and walk around the apartment singing. (Singing) Hush little baby, don't say a word. Papa's.....

FRANZ
Dory.

DORY
(Dory crosses to upstage center chairs) No. No. No.

HOLLY
Dory, there wasn't any way we could know what would happen. Asa was....

DORY
He won't do anything, Holly. He won't.

HOLLY
No.

DORY
No. (She bites her own arm.)

FRANZ
Stop. Dory, stop.

DORY
I have.....Inside me there is a life, a tiny life growing. Kicking at me. Another. I am afraid. (She tears at her belly.)

FRANZ
(To Asa) Stop.

ASA
(To audience, standing.) Last summer when Dory left us....

DORY
I didn't leave you.

ASA
When Dory left us last summer. (To Dory.) You did. You left Little John and me for the summer, alone. He was only four years old.

DORY
It wasn't like that. It wasn't that I was leaving you. We talked about it. The masters degree. The program in Calgary.

ASA
That was it?

DORY
I needed the masters degree. So I could make enough money. You wanted to quit your job. You wanted to finish the house.

ASA
I was working on the house for you.

DORY
We needed the money. I wasn't leaving you.

ASA
You could have stayed near home.

DORY
I wasn't leaving you.

ASA
Jesus.

DORY
It happened. I'm sorry. It happened. (Silence)

ASA
You didn't do anything? It just happened?

DORY
(Dory sits center) I'm not saying that.


ASA
What are you saying?

DORY
I'm not saying I didn't do anything.

ASA
What then? (Silence)

DORY
Nothing. I'm not saying anything.

ASA
Jesus.

DORY
Nothing. (Silence)

HOLLY
(To audience.) One night last summer Little John told me he'd planted a white oak in the middle of the circle in the driveway. He told me that in 200 years it would be bigger than the house, bigger than the biggest house in the world.

DORY
(Dory stands and crosses up center to Franz. She has her journal and a pen in her hands. It is early in her stay in Calgary.) Herr Doktor Fischer?

FRANZ
(He is in his classroom. He has his red clown nose on.)You are making a joke of me. I think so.

DORY
No. What should we call you?

FRANZ
We?

DORY
I. What should I call you?

FRANZ
Yes, what name?

DORY
Yes.

FRANZ
What form should our intercourse take, you mean? Conversation, I mean. Talk. What do you want me to call you?

DORY
Dory. (Singing, the way she did in class.)My name is Dory. Dorothea. Dory.

FRANZ
I am Franz.

DORY
Franz. Franz?

FRANZ
Yes? (He shuffles through his bag, finds his red make-up, begins to put it on his cheeks.)

DORY
I am not sure what is going on in the workshop. You talked so fast. I couldn't follow. I wanted to write it down. You were too fast.

FRANZ
Yes. It is not a lecture course. It's a workshop. (Speaking very fast.) I could have simply forbidden note taking. But I chose to go too fast instead. You like it?

DORY
Yes. But I need to understand what's going on.

FRANZ
What don't you understand?

DORY
You were talking about poetry.

FRANZ
Yes.

DORY
I didn't understand.

FRANZ
You weren't supposed to.

DORY
I need to.

FRANZ
Oh.

DORY
I want to.

FRANZ
What is poetry?

DORY
I don't know. It is words. And form. Words used to their fullest. In a form. And it should be beautiful. OK, what?

FRANZ
Would that make sense to your students?

DORY
Second graders? No.

FRANZ
Is it any good then, your understanding of poetry?

DORY
I don't know.

FRANZ
I know. Do you like poetry?

DORY
Yes.

FRANZ
Does it scare you?

DORY
No. Only that I might not understand it.

FRANZ
What is in the words?

DORY
Thought. Feeling.

FRANZ
How about dreams, wants, wishes, needs, crimes, cravings, lies, fantasies, cruelties - everything we are capable of?

DORY
But form gives us a chance to control all that....

FRANZ
Handcuff all that terrible energy? What is the form of your life?

DORY
What?

FRANZ
Yes. Answer that. The form of Dory's life.

DORY
I get up in the morning and brush my teeth, then...

FRANZ
No. Death. That is the only form around your life.(Dory begins to take notes.) That is what form is in poetry, I think so. Death. It is all we can know for sure about life. Everything else is maybe dream and improvisation? And it is everywhere. The classroom is death - a wooden box. Our minds - boxes. I think so.(He grabs the pen from her hand and uses it as a cigar.) We must teach our children to improvise with poetry. So they learn all that is possible. (He gives her the pen back.)I am late. I have to go to a meeting. And just as we were about to dance.

DORY
What?

FRANZ
It is not important. Some other time. I have to rush now. One thing I will leave you with. A question. If you know what is going to happen, is it worth doing? Yes? Good evening.

ASA
(Asa crosses over to Holly at the table) Any problems picking Little John up.

HOLLY
It went fine.

ASA
Thanks for doing that. I had to get....

HOLLY
Don't thank me, Asa. I'm glad to help.

ASA
Well, I want to thank you. I'm sorry I'm so late.

HOLLY
It's only 10:30. Do you want a beer?

ASA
Yesterday I dropped Little John off at day care and drove out to the house. Once in a while something good happens. I decided, since I'd fixed the floor, I'd do something to the walls and ceiling in the kitchen. So I began to rip the plywood off the walls. And I found the original beaded pine paneling in almost perfect shape. It was under that goddamn acoustic tile on the ceiling. I began to explore the walls all through the house and I found heart pine tongue and groove paneling almost everywhere.

HOLLY
Is that something special?

ASA
Yes. Yes. (He grabs her by the hands and swings her around.) I wanted to call Dory right then and tell her. I began talking to myself, running from room to room, dancing little jigs as I pried off the improvements these people had made over the years. I'll fix it, I'll fix it, sand it, finish it, then I'll show it to her when she gets home. It'll blow her away. I've got to get it done. Yes, it is something special. At five o'clock I picked up Little John and took him out to the house to show it to him. I wanted him to be part of it.

HOLLY
Did he like it?

ASA
He was pretty cool about it. I don't think walls are high on his priority list.

HOLLY
I guess.

ASA
Last night I tried to read to him. Fifty Famous Stories. The one about King Canute ordering the tide not to come in. But I kept falling asleep in the middle of sentences. He'd poke me awake and I'd try again. Finally he fell asleep watching TV.

HOLLY
Let me get you a beer.


ASA
No thanks. Well, yes. I'd like a beer.

HOLLY
Great. (She exits up right.)


HOLLY
It's great for Bonnie to have Little John here for supper. It's good for her manners. (She re-enters and hands Asa a beer.)

ASA
Thanks.

HOLLY
What do you hear from Dory?

ASA
She's fine. Really excited by the work. We talk to her on the phone. We got a postcard of the Rocky Mountains a couple of days ago. She was on trip to some hotel in the mountains. I don't know. She's happy.

HOLLY
She's not missing home?

ASA
Not much it seems.

HOLLY
Oh, would you like some supper? I kept it warm for you. Roast chicken.

ASA
No thanks.

HOLLY
Rice and gravy.

ASA
No. I grabbed a burger.

HOLLY
You sure?

ASA
Yes, I'm sure.

HOLLY
I'd like to see them. I'd like to see all the work you've been doing, that heart pine paneling.

ASA
When it's ready. When Dory comes back we'll have a party. People aren't going to believe it. There's an old cast iron tub there, claw foot. The enamel is in good shape but the underside is rusted. I've been wire brushing it. The whole time I think about Dory lying there in it.



HOLLY
I could come out some day and take pictures - before pictures, you know. I could help you paint or varnish or whatever. I'm pretty good at it. Take care of Little John.

ASA
No. I've got to do this myself.

HOLLY
I'd love to.... You deserve something more than…

ASA
I don't want any help.

HOLLY
OK. This Saturday Bonnie and I have been asked to go tubing on the Rockfish River. The water's still pretty high. I got June to take the store. I thought you and....

ASA
I've got to keep at the house.

HOLLY
One day. It'll be fun. I can make us a picnic.

ASA
Let me get Little John. We need to get home.

HOLLY
Little John would love it.

ASA
No.

HOLLY
Asa, stay a little, won't you. Finish your beer.

ASA
Where is he? We've got to get up early.

HOLLY
Come on, Asa.

ASA
Where is he?

HOLLY
On my bed.

ASA
Thanks.

FRANZ
(Franz enters down left. He is dressed in clown wig, red nose, and red cheeks. He grabs a chair and crosses up right to Dory.) Come in. Come in. Welcome. Why not sit down. (He sits by the bench where Dory is sitting) There. Now.


DORY
I am not sure I want you in my room, Franz.

FRANZ
I have come to show you something. (He stands and waves his hand in the air and a flash of fire appears. He does a little jig of joy.)

DORY
Very nice. Very nice. I am tired. I have to go to bed.

FRANZ
You didn't come to dinner tonight. We did not have our usual chance to talk.

DORY
I was at the party.

FRANZ
Ah, but you didn't dance with me. It has been a week since we danced.

DORY
You didn't ask me.

FRANZ
My humble apologies. You were quite dazzling. You surprised me. Your husband dances well with you?

DORY
Never. He doesn't dance.

FRANZ
He is missing something special, I think so.

DORY
I don't dance very often. At a wedding maybe. I usually feel people are watching me. Talking about me. Inside my head a voice is saying you're not supposed to dance like that. I am always a proper dancer. Very correct. I took ballroom lessons in high school. I was very good.

FRANZ
You were not proper tonight.

DORY
No.

FRANZ
No one ever cared what I did. That is a contradiction in terms. Correct dancing.

DORY
I'm usually thinking. Thinking. My body ratcheting along like a mechanical doll. Tonight I was different.

FRANZ
Yes. Do you have some music?

DORY
No.

FRANZ
Walkman? Radio? We could dance. Here.

DORY
Walkman?

FRANZ
You wear the headphones and sing for us.

DORY
Terrible idea.

FRANZ
I can dance to anything.

DORY
I'm tired, Franz.

FRANZ
You don't want me to see your voice tonight?

DORY
No. Not now. No examinations.

FRANZ
Then I must sing.

DORY
Oh, no.

FRANZ
(He begins to sing a tango. He grabs her and they dance. He is loose and unorthodox. She is stiff and correct.) No. You are cheating. You are being correct. No one is watching. (They keep dancing. He stops dancing and sits.)

DORY
No fair. Keep dancing.

FRANZ
Make me. Make me want to.

DORY
At the party I wanted to be crazy. I wanted to dance wildly with everyone. So you wouldn't think you were someone special. I wouldn't have danced with you tonight even if you had asked. (She begins to dance around with an imaginary partner. Franz pretends to say something in German to an imaginary friend.) What was that? What did you say?

FRANZ
Nothing.

DORY
Tell me.

FRANZ
I told my friend here that you have lovely breasts.

DORY
(For a moment Dory’s body seems to collapse in on itself. A moment of terror. Then she fills with life.) I know. (She dances alone again. Soon Franz joins her. They dance ever more intensely. Finally he dips her and they fall to the floor in a heap laughing. Dory extricates herself from the tangle and stands up. She takes her sweater off.) I am so hot. I am sweating. I need a shower.

FRANZ
No.

DORY
(Dory crosses to sit on bench) I take a lot of showers. (Smelling her sweater.) Stinky.

FRANZ
You don’t like the way you smell?

DORY
I have always been interested in the way I smell, but I am sure no one else would be.

FRANZ
Ahhhh.

DORY
Babies smell good. Little John smelled soft and creamy when he was a baby. They have to. If they smelled bad no one would want them.

FRANZ
Yes.

DORY
Grown ups, me.(Points to herself, not to him.) We are different.

FRANZ
Ah.

DORY
I like the way you smell. Men usually… Not good. (Franz moves toward Dory. She crosses to the table down left, to get her journal.) How do you say I love you in German?

ASA
(Asa and Holly talk across the stage to each other, Asa down stage right, Holly down stage left.) We call her every night at Little John's bedtime. It’s a date for him every night. Eight o'clock. It is six in Calgary, a half an hour before her evening session. Most of the time Little John doesn't want to talk to her. She’s always in a hurry. Sometimes she isn’t there.

HOLLY
He must be hurting, Asa.

ASA
Most of the time he walks away when I ask. Sometimes, though, he cries on the phone.

HOLLY
Poor little guy.


ASA
One night I found him in bed holding a picture of her, crying. I asked him if he'd like a hug. He said, "I just want to cry and tell Mama I miss her. I wish her body was here. I wish I could color an envelope and crawl into it and send my body to Mama."

HOLLY
It makes me want to do something for him. I don't know what. Something.

ASA
Evening sessions in Calgary go late, one-thirty our time. I have to have Little John at day care by eight. I have to go to bed early. I haven't really talked to Dory. Not since she's been away.

FRANZ
I love you? Auf Deutsch.

DORY
Auf Deutsch.

FRANZ
No, no. Auf Deutsch means "in German".

DORY
You creep.

FRANZ
Do you want me to tell you I love you in German, I think so?

DORY
No games, Franz. Just tell me how to say it.

FRANZ
Are you flirting with me?

DORY
No.

FRANZ
Ah. Of course not. Ich liebe dich.

DORY
Ich liebe dich? That's it?

FRANZ
Ich liebe dich. I love you.

DORY
Ich liebe dich. Sounds bad.

FRANZ
It does? Ich liebe dich. You think so?

DORY
Like cleaning the back of your throat. Ich liebe dich. How can you say it seriously?


FRANZ
Seriously? Ich liebe dich. I have never really tried to say it seriously before. Shall I try now?

DORY
No.

FRANZ
(He crosses center, toward her.)Do you want to try?

DORY
No. I was thinking I'd tell it to Little John on the phone tomorrow night. He's at that age when he tells me he loves me all the time. He hugs my leg and says, "Mama, you know what? I love you." Ich liebe dich. I think it's better in English. (She picks up the bean bags from off the table and begins to juggle)

FRANZ
I love you.

DORY
Not bad.

FRANZ
(He crosses close to her.)Dory, I love you.

DORY
I know.

FRANZ
You do?

DORY
Yes.

FRANZ
I am that obvious?

DORY
Yes.

FRANZ
You are not so obvious.

DORY
It is not a question of love. I am married. I have a child.

ASA
(To Holly.) I write her letters. Two or three a week. She's written back a few times. One. She told me about the program, the friends she was making. Europeans, Swedes, Danes, Dutch, Germans. Some Americans, a couple of Australians. The group leaders are all European. Swiss and German. She wrote that she had always thought German was an ugly language; but now that she's heard it spoken she's thinking about taking German at the college when she gets back.

DORY
It is not a question of love. I am married. I have a child.

FRANZ
Yes. I know. You are trying very hard to be distant.

DORY
I am not trying hard.

FRANZ
I suppose not.

DORY
I don't have to try.

FRANZ
I suppose not. You had me tell you how to say I love you in German.

DORY
That was for Little John.

FRANZ
I think not.

DORY
No?

FRANZ
I think not.

DORY
Ich liebe dich?

FRANZ
It was for you, I think so. I love you.

DORY
(She crosses up right away from him) Is that what you tell all of them? Your students who you...

FRANZ
I do not fall in love with my students. I have always kept them at a distance. You are different. You are not a student, not to me. You are....

DORY
(They face each other across the stage.)It is exciting to feel these things. I think so. That I want someone and he wants me.

FRANZ
Yes.

DORY
Exciting. That's all. (She crosses center, faces down stage.) When I was eleven or twelve, there was a place I'd go outside of town. An old quarry. They used to cut huge rocks out of the earth, dig down, way deep down and cut rocks out of the earth. Then they hit water. The quarry filled up with water. No one ever knew how deep it was, hundreds of feet. If you fell in, there was no way to get out, just sheer rock walls. There had been a ladder once but it had rotted away. Underneath the water on the bottom, I used to picture the old rusting machinery, bulldozers, cranes. Creaking monsters. I'd go out there alone and climb the fence and stand right on the edge looking over at the water. I'd stand so the wind was to my back. Those monsters were down there growling for me to jump in, to wrap myself in their rusty cables. I'd start sweating and I'd yell at them and the echoes would swirl back around me.

FRANZ
It was exciting to hear them calling for you? (He crosses to stand behind her.)

DORY
I was scared. But it was not enough, Franz. Not enough.

FRANZ
No?

DORY
I was alone.

FRANZ
Yes.

DORY
I needed someone there with me.

FRANZ
Asa was not there?

DORY
No. Asa can't be there for me. I can’t talk to him. He can’t feel these things.(She kisses him impulsively, then pulls away, down right.) No.

FRANZ
We should not do this, Dory, I think so. I have wanted you here and I am not sure.... (He begins to leave)

DORY
I am, Franz. I am sure.

FRANZ
(He turns toward her.)We are not at a quarry. This is not a game. You have a family.

DORY
No. This is not a game. (He goes to her. He touches her face and kisses her. They hold each other.) My knees are shaking. I'm going to fall.

FRANZ
We will swim together in the quarry?

DORY
I will not die. Little John will not die. We will not die, Franz.

FRANZ
You think so.

DORY
I think so. (Franz swoops her up, cradling her in his arms, facing up stage.)

HOLLY
(To audience.) She had never cared a lot about what she looked like. She had a kind of natural warm glow. But when she hit thirty-three last spring something changed. We joked about it. She said she felt she was finally a woman. Far enough away from thirty to be over worrying. Real age. She started to think about her body as a barometer of her current state. She had always been strong, strong shoulders, strong thighs, strong hands. And she'd never been skinn

Missoula History
A Natural Meeting Place