Here’s a major downer for the holiday season. This is essentially a staged version of a very late chapter in a novel I’ll probably never finish. Rape figures fairly strongly into its plot (being based on the multifarious Medusa myths), so it may no longer be something audiences can get anything out of.
This play is very very Pinter.
Medusa Magdalene
Lights up on a collapsed church. All images have fallen, making no denomination clear. There are candles about. The place is generally dim. There is a lantern sitting prominently near the middle of the wreckage, but it is conspicuously unlit.
MAGGIE enters. She is dressed in filth and castoffs. She has been unsexed and disaged: her face is covered with scars and infected welts. She is hunched and walks in a slow half-stumble, as though perpetually performing the opening moves of a dance, missing its partner. She is holding a pair of books in one hand.
Somewhere, an empty can is knocked over. MAGGIE hears this, and instantly hobbles to hide her books under a destroyed altar. She fetches up the unlit lantern and sits in some refuse that vaguely resembles a chair.
SARAH enters, very cautiously. She is dressed well, conservatively. She is almost thirty, but has the air of a child trying to act older than she is. She holds a single book in both hands, resting in front of her crotch, like a boy in middle school. The left hand secures the book, while the right covers most of the left hand.
SARAH looks about, still very cautious. MAGGIE is not hiding herself, but is still obscured by the dimness and her own resemblance to the garbage around her. After a moment SARAH spies her, but is still unsure if she is actually a person. SARAH carefully creeps closer, continuing to shield herself with her book. Until…
MAGGIE speaks. She has an educated, nonspecific manner of speech. On rare and elevated occasion, the vestiges of a Southern twang may creep into a vowel or two. Her voice is deep, or scratched, or harsh, or feral. It is unclear if this is the genuine result of an injury or age, or merely an affectation.
MAGGIE
Sarah Hammond.
SARAH
(Gasps, then) Hello.
SARAH speaks with a deeply regional Georgian accent, only partially modified by internet globalization. She stops progressing toward MAGGIE, keeping her book at crotch level, occasionally bending at the waist to lean a bit forward, should certain speech require.
Silence. Then…
MAGGIE
Hello. Sarah Hammond.
SARAH
Uhh… Hi. (silence) I—
MAGGIE
Hello.
SARAH
Heh… Hi.
MAGGIE
Hello.
SARAH
I don’t… Are you all— Uh… Maggie?
MAGGIE
Yes. Maggie. Sarah Hammond.
SARAH
Are you… (Silence. SARAH is expecting MAGGIE to interrupt, and MAGGIE is refusing to do so. In time…) Hi.
MAGGIE
Hello. Sarah. Hammond.
SARAH
What… Should I go?
MAGGIE
Why?
SARAH
You don’t, I mean I, you don’t— Um, we um, we just um, we just keep saying hello over and over.
MAGGIE
That’s the polite response. Isn’t it. “Hello.”
SARAH
Yes ma’am—
MAGGIE
And there we are, stuck in an infinite loop. I could descant on that, but. Not much point.
SARAH
No, ma’am.
MAGGIE
“Ma’am?”
SARAH
Well…
MAGGIE
That’s a polite response. Too.
Silence.
SARAH
About, umm… about Jake?
MAGGIE
What about. Jake. Sarah Hammond.
SARAH
Well uhh, about Jake? Umm. It’s Sarah Gardner. Now. I am. Sarah, um, Gardner. Now.
A long, long Silence. SARAH looks around briefly, never moving. She does not look behind her, but gives serious thought to backing away and leaving. But she does not move. Silence. SARAH considers speaking, but is too… something. Maggie makes a small motion, and SARAH tenses as though awaiting a strike. But nothing happens.
Silence.
MAGGIE
Congratulations.
SARAH
(melting instantly) Thank you so much, Maggie—
MAGGIE
What about Jake.
SARAH
(stopping short) Umm, he. He’s not. We had a baby—
MAGGIE
Congratulations.
SARAH
Th—umm, thank you. Um. Jake—
MAGGIE
What. About Jake.
SARAH
He. … He’s really—
MAGGIE
Don’t!
Pause.
SARAH
Okay. Umm—
MAGGIE
Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm…
SARAH
Sorry, um – uh, sorry. Uh—
MAGGIE
What?
SARAH
Jake. Is… sick.
MAGGIE
Oh no.
SARAH
It uh – It – It started, right before the baby was born—
MAGGIE
Boy? Or girl.
SARAH
(long pause) Boy.
Long pause.
MAGGIE
Of course.
Pause.
SARAH
His name’s Timothy. (pause) You pro’lly don’t care.
MAGGIE
Are you concerned? If I care? Cause if you are—
SARAH
No no, um, sorry, uh, I – Sorry.
MAGGIE
STOP! SAYING! You’re sorry.
SARAH
S—Okay.
MAGGIE
Let me make one thing clear.
SARAH
Yes.
MAGGIE
I do not care who is sorry. Or why. Or how. I do not care.
SARAH
Okay.
MAGGIE
Since you seem so concerned. If I care.
SARAH
Okay.
MAGGIE
O. K.
Silence.
SARAH
Jake is sick. And, we’re just not sure what’s wrong.
MAGGIE
(affecting a fake hillbilly accent) Ol’ Doc Humphrey’s been stumped, huh?
SARAH
Well.
MAGGIE
Oh. Ah. Well. I’m sure he’d be stumped, all the same.
SARAH
Well.
MAGGIE
That’s a funny word. Well. Has a lot of different meanings.
SARAH
(provides a polite hiccup of laughter) Yeah.
MAGGIE
I’d descant on that. But. Pearls before swine.
SARAH
Is that from the Bible?
MAGGIE
Jake. Is sick.
SARAH
Um – S—Yeah. So, we was, we thought it was just the flu, but it’s been goin’ for a while. I thought he might be exhausted, cause he’s been doin’ a lot of double shifts up in the city, but of course he wouldn’t listen, bein’ a man, bein’ Jake.
MAGGIE
Bein’ Jake.
SARAH
Well, uh, s’, yeah. Mmm… He just. He’s not sleepin’. He’s sweatin’ all the time. He’s callin’ in sick to work, and he ain’t never done that. Never. He’s not gettin’ any rest, he just looks like—
Pause.
MAGGIE
What. Does he look like?
SARAH
He looks sick.
MAGGIE
Does he look like death?
Pause.
SARAH
Yeah.
MAGGIE
So. Jake. Is sick. That’s the problem? Jake is sick. And you don’t know what’s wrong.
SARAH
Yeah.
MAGGIE
So. Fucking. What.
SARAH
I was, I was talkin’ to my brother Arny. And he said about, when, the time he got sick in high school. He was a couple years ahead of us?
Pause.
MAGGIE
Uh huh?
SARAH
He. Well he. Arny was talkin’ about the time he got sick in high school, and – He thought maybe – He thought you might maybe know what was wrong with Jake.
MAGGIE
Mm. Because of my big city education. That it? (pause) Hm? (pause) That it?
SARAH
No.
MAGGIE
Then why? Would I know? Why Jake’s sick. Hm?
SARAH
Because.
MAGGIE
Are you a fucking eight-year-old! “Because!” Because of what! Sarah Hammond! What!?
SARAH
We thought you might know, cause of… Cause of your past.
MAGGIE
My past. My past?
SARAH
We thought, maybe… when you and Jake—
MAGGIE
Me and Jake. Did nothing. (Silence) Do you understand? Do you get it? Huh?
SARAH
But—
MAGGIE
No! Me and Jake did nothing. Jake did. Jake. Did. Some thing.
SARAH
Okay.
MAGGIE
To me.
SARAH
Okay!
MAGGIE
It’s NOT! Okay!!
SARAH
S – O – What!? (finally flings the book away) What do you want me to say!?
MAGGIE
(finally stands) I don’t know, Sarah! You’re the ones who called me the know-it-all! I never said that. You did! You tell me! What do you want me to say? What magical words can I speak that will suddenly make everything okay? What are those words!?
SARAH
I don’t know!
MAGGIE
Then neither do I! You fucking self-righteous, willfully stupid monsters glare at me, spit at me, judge me! And now you come to me!? That fucking coward can’t even come here himself! He sends you instead?
SARAH
He didn’t send me! He can’t get out of bed, Maggie!
MAGGIE
Good! I’m glad he can’t get out of bed. I’m glad he’s suffering. I’m glad he’s dying!
SARAH
Dying? How do you know—
MAGGIE
Because maybe there is justice in the world, Sarah. That’s how I know. I know because that’s what feels good! (instantly, her manner alters. Silence) There it is. The magic words. It’s true, because I want it to be true. That’s how. The wisdom of the deliberately stupid.
Silence.
SARAH
Maggie. (pause) Maggie! Jake.
MAGGIE
Jake is dead, Sarah. Jake is dead, and it makes me soooo happy.
SARAH
What do I do?
MAGGIE
Tell yourself he’s gonna be fine. Jake’s gonna be fine, and you’re soooo happy.
SARAH
Maggie.
MAGGIE
Or he’s gone to a better place. He’s gone to a better place, and you’re soooo happy.
SARAH
Maggie!
MAGGIE sits again.
MAGGIE
Sorry, Sarah Hammond, but you don’t really exist. You don’t exist, and it makes me soooo happy.
Silence. SARAH turns and exits. MAGGIE starts humming “Auld Lang Syne.”
Lights fade out.