A drama in three acts
by Terry J. Aman

Dramatis personæ

KYLE: A 30ish professor of English at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis.
WILL: A writer, barista and lover of life in her late 20s.
GIN: Kyle’s sister, a beautiful, busty woman, 30.
CYRIL: A one-man messaging empire, late-20s.
HOLLY: Cyril’s Type-A career-driven girlfriend, late-20s.
ROB: A philandering, emotionally abusive and soon-to-be ex-husband, 32.

Excerpt: Act 1

AT RISE: Spacious third-floor Minneapolis apartment in mid-September. Two lights focus as from streetlights on the front-of-stage area, in which there is a park bench and a wire garbage bin about half full. There is also light coming in from the kitchen entrance on stage. Stage is otherwise dark. Other stage doorways include exits to bathroom, bedroom, closet and front door. Furnishings are moderately upscale and include a standing lamp, a couch, a television stand with TV and VCR, a coffeetable with a couple of dirty dishes and an ashtray on it with the ashtray maybe half-full of cigarette butts. There’s a window DSR and it’s open. There’s also a bar off to the side and a piece of interesting nonrepresentational art on an upstage flat. If there’s a clock, it should read about 11:30 p.m. Kyle could maintain a not-unattractive houseplant. There’s an armchair with a package sitting nearby. A guitar stand holds an acoustic guitar. Gin’s suitcase can be open in the corner and there could be a few of Gin’s clothes strewn about near it. There’s a blanket on the couch, which has been Gin’s bed for the past week. The apartment is not, however, in any serious state of disarray.

…

KYLE: (Grabs guitar, plunks down in comfy chair, strums)

GIN: (Shift under blanket for a few chords, sit up) What did mom have to say?

KYLE: (Calm, and strumming throughout) Hm?

GIN: You said she called. (Find cigarette) On Wednesday.

KYLE: Ah, Wednesday. The day it had rained and you’d filled out 83 job applications.

GIN: Look, buttmunch, I know where you’re going with this. I heard you downstairs ... (Cross to Kitchen, find lighter, flick light switch, sit back down at couch)

LIGHT CUE: Stage lights up.

KYLE: Going? I’m not going anywhere. Just that, by Wednesday – the day it rained – by 1:57 p.m. you had filled out 83 job applications.

GIN: (Challenging) Yeah?

KYLE: (Strum) That’s very productive.

GIN: (Light cigarette) I’m in a productive place right now.

KYLE: (Still calm) That’s close to 30 a day if you’d been here all day Monday.

GIN: Look, you ...

KYLE: (Barely a pause) Which you hadn’t. You’d showed up in town here as of the close of business Monday, so you only had, call it six hours Tuesday and six hours Wednesday in order to get back here at 2 p.m.

GIN: Yeah. So?

KYLE: Call it two hours – and I think I’m being generous, here – two hours on foot, time spent looking for businesses and then waiting in line to get applications in the first place, each day, you have less than eight hours to fill in 83 job applications.

GIN: (Quick calculation) No, that is eight hours.

KYLE: (Still strumming) That is, actually, seven hours and 54 minutes if you are back here at the apartment at 1:57 with a smile ready to receive phone calls from prospective employers.

GIN: (Defensive) Eight hours, 7 hours and 56 …

KYLE: 54

GIN: 54 minutes, I mean WHAT’S THE FRICKING DIFFERENCE?

KYLE: (Stop strumming) Did you even leave the apartment during business hours?

GIN: (Up) Oh my God, are you insane?

KYLE: (Lets it go, continues strumming) I had a package delivered here by mistake, accidentally, by a friend of mine at the U. Accidentally. Around 10 a.m. or so. (Stops strumming to pick it up from under chair) I see it made it into the apartment. (Put it back down, continue strumming)

GIN: That? That was ... it was sitting outside your door when I got back here Thursday.

KYLE: At 1:57 p.m.

GIN: Smartass.

KYLE: (Strums) It’s been a bane of my existence here in this apartment building that deliveries can’t actually get in the door without being buzzed in ...

GIN: FINE! Next time I’ll leave your precious packages in the rain.

KYLE: (Strum) Weather was fine on Thursday.

GIN: JESUS CHRIST! (Plunk down at couch)

KYLE: (Stop strumming) Y’see, cutting out travel time, if you’d had seven hours and 54 minutes on Tuesday and Wednesday to fill in job applications and spent, on average, 10 minutes or so with each one, you’d have managed to fill in maybe 50 of them. And as you got farther away from the apartment, as your job search took you farther away, you’d have less and less actual time to fill in applications.

GIN: What’s wrong with you?

KYLE: But even if you’d only filled in 50 by Wednesday afternoon, surely someone would’ve called by today.

GIN: Actually ...

KYLE: (Set guitar aside) So, dearest my darling, what have you done all week?

GIN: OK ... don’t freak out, OK?

KYLE: “Freak out?” I’m not going to freak out. If you needed to just crash here for some downtime, that’s fine. You don’t need to find a job to spend a week or two at my place ...

GIN: (Turn television off)

SOUND CUE: Mute television noise.

GIN: I’ve been working.

KYLE: Working? Why would I freak out ’cause you’re working?

GIN: Kyle, I’ve been ... working.

KYLE: (Pause) Oh.

GIN: The late nights, the weird hours? I’ve been dancing at the Sundowner.

KYLE: (Pause) Wow.

GIN: Look, I knew you be upset ...

KYLE: (Upset) I’m not upset.

GIN: Aw, Jesus, you’re upset.

KYLE: (Rise) I’m not upset at all. I mean, you have a fight with Rob, you get upset, naturally you run into the first bar you find and take all of your clothes off!

Excerpt: Act 2

At rise: The Bean Genie in downtown Minneapolis.

CYRIL: It’s working. It’s working just fine, honey. We get together. We talk. You say we never go anywhere, and look, we’ve gone out for coffee. (Pause) It’s out of the apartment, at least. We’re spending time together outside the apartment.

HOLLY: (Irritated) Yes, for another whole 18 minutes, during which time you will gulp at your latte and look at your watch every 20 seconds ... until you dash headlong through rush hour traffic, risk death at least three times per city block and for what? What’s driving this?

CYRIL: I made a commitment ...

GIN: Here you are.

CYRIL and HOLLY: (Silence while GIN sets out lattes, bagel sandwiches and a bill, CYRIL staring at her just short of ogling.)

HOLLY: Ah yes, your commitment. Commitments to clients, commitments to customers … (Follows CYRIL’s stare.)

CYRIL: (Notices HOLLY’s following his stare, stops staring at GIN, grins at HOLLY and grabs coffee)

HOLLY: (Almost no pause -- quietly, but with intensity) Look at me, damn you. You’re committed to everyone except me.

CYRIL: I am committed to spending time with you. I said I would. You wanted to meet downtown, it had to be today, you said it was important, and I’m here. And I’ve got (Look at watch) 16 minutes before I need to be anywhere at all.

HOLLY: I suppose I should be grateful for whatever time I get. I never see you anymore. You decide you’re going to be a 24-hour messenger service and don’t take on any actual staff -- just you and the weirdest hours.

CYRIL: It’s exhausting, I know. I know it’s been hard. On both of us. But it’s really starting to roll in, and I’m getting used to the hours. It’s only for a little while longer. I mean, look how far I’ve come in a year. In just a year of carting packages from one end of town to the other faster than anyone -- there’s offices who’ll only work with me now, and -- not even a year, Holly. I’ve only been going for 11 months, and I’m getting name recognition.

HOLLY: That’s great, Cy. It really is. But (Sees CYRIL glance at watch) -- oh, jeez, I’m down to 14 minutes here. (Sips latte, settles, focuses) Cy, Bill called me into his office today.

CYRIL: Oh Jesus, not again.

HOLLY: Hear me out, Cy, this is important. FinanSysCo Services is growing. Big time. Branching out. The core staff for the Chicago office is almost completely assembled.

CYRIL: Don’t tell me.

HOLLY: Bill really wants me doing p.r. down there. And it’s not like I’m the only choice he’s got, Cyril. This could be a huge move up for me. For us. For both of us.

CYRIL: (Disgusted) So when do we pack?

HOLLY: Damn it! Damn you! (Focus, regroup) I am trying to include you in this. Baby, your Almost There company ...

CYRIL: ALREADY There. I’m the “Already There Messenger Service.”

HOLLY: Sorry. Already There.

CYRIL: How are you going to work p.r. for anyone if you don’t get the names of companies right?

HOLLY: Your ... you-on-a-bike thing is great. But you’d be just as fast in Chicago ...

CYRIL: I would not be just as fast in Chicago. On top of five years delivering pizzas, I’ve spent 11 months now honing the fastest shortcuts between, around and through buildings here. I’ve got the rhythm of the lights damn near nailed down. I know where I can stash a bike for awhile, what newsstands I can keep skateboards and in a pinch, what manholes lead to storm sewers when traffic is sludgy. I’d have to learn all of that over again if I were to move anywhere.

HOLLY: It’d be hard, I know. But honey ... (Pulls pink beeper from her purse) ... I made a commitment too. I care about you. But I never see you. I see this thing more often than I see you.

CYRIL: (Take her hand, or try to) Another six months, Holly. Just another six months more of the 24-hour service and I’ll have built up enough to bring in some help. That’s going to be hard, too, with the training and the hours and establishing the name-face thing everywhere and all that, but I could do it.

HOLLY: Another month, babe, another six months, another year (Shakes off his hand if it’s on hers). I’ve heard this before. I get a nice evening planned, people coming over, and your phone will go. How many nights have you had to dash off somewhere?

CYRIL: Holly ...

HOLLY: I mean, Jesus, Cy, if you were a doctor I could lie to myself and maybe even sometimes convince myself that you had to go, that it was life or death, that your running out on me was at least saving someone’s life.

CYRIL: (Glancing at watch) Honey ...

HOLLY: But I CAN’T! Your running out on me is always someone else’s ABYSMAL LACK OF PLANNING! Think about it! Why would they pay you twice as much for same-day messenger service when if they’d had it done on time they could send it UPS? There’s companies that actually budget for employee incompetence. “Call Cyril! Cyril will save our ass again ...”

CYRIL: (Picking up package, rising)

HOLLY: LEAVE IT!

CYRIL: (Remain standing, package on table, but don’t move yet)

HOLLY: I’m warning you, Cy, if you walk out now there will be nothing left to come back to.

CYRIL: (Package under arm) I’m ...

HOLLY: Oh my god, you’re already calculating stop-lights and which side of the building to enter to catch the closest elevator. (Stand) You know, Cy, it’s not even them. The companies. Screw them. I’m talking about you. Catering to them. Allowing this. Enabling this. You are so talented. The mind that stays on top of all this ...

CYRIL: (Start to walk past her)

HOLLY: (Grip his arm, turn as he passes) Please let that active, adrenaline-driven mind think past the company for once.

CYRIL: (With resigned reluctance) Oh, that’s great coming from you.

HOLLY: (Let go) What?

CYRIL: Half the stuff you arrange -- most of it -- is to get you ahead in Fiasco ...

HOLLY: FinanSysCo.

CYRIL: Whatever. You’ve said more than once that this meeting or that meeting is critical, crucial, that my not being there put you way behind this or that muffinhead. That when I do show up, if my tie is crooked or my hair’s messy I’m making a bad impression.

HOLLY: (Stunned) Cyril, I ...

CYRIL: (Heading toward front door) You’ve got to be so careful about image, impressions, appearances. (Pause, consider, decide to say it) Something about believing your own press releases. (In earnest) I’ve always wanted what’s best for you. Maybe, down deep, I wanted you to get passed over. Maybe I wanted us to build our life here.

HOLLY: (Don’t move)

CYRIL: But maybe all you need is Chicago. (Exit front door)