Angel
On My Shoulder
(a
two act drama)
Writing Sample:
ACT TWO, SCENE TWO:
(River sounds come up. It is mid morning. The garbage pile has grown considerably. There is no order or apparent care in the placement of the pieces. LUKE is laying in place from the last scene. SYLVIE enters lugging an old car bumper. She is dirty and hot, but she is looking a lot healthier and is obviously stronger than ever. She has one fake fingernail left. She wears a pair of LUKE’S shorts with a belt to keep it up and is makeup free. There is no wall. Just a lot of garbage strewn around the area)
SYLVIE
Come on you rusty sonofabitch! Stay up there! Shit! I broke a nail.
(Bites the last fake nail off her hand and spits it out. Looks at her hands again)
There. Perfect.
(LUKE gets up as she drags a large trunk to pile)
LUKE
Need some help?
SYLVIE
I could use a cigarette.
LUKE
Is this your idea of a wall?
SYLVIE
If I want your opinion, I’ll ask for your opinion.
LUKE
The deal was…
SYLVIE
I’m like waiting for the, uh, mother called it, the muse to strike.
(LUKE grabs day pack and starts off toward forest)
Where you going?
LUKE
Want to come with me?
SYLVIE
To the city?
LUKE
Going to pick some fiddleheads for supper.
SYLVIE
Those green fuzzy space alien things? Yulk.
LUKE
There may be some early mushrooms, if you would prefer….
SYLVIE
Excuse me.
(SYLVIE exits whistling 'WHISTLE WHILE YOU WORK." She sings to same tune)
ONLY ONE MORE WEEK TO GO....
(Whistles the next line)
AND THEN I'LL BE COMPLETELY FREE FROM DEAR OLD DADDY O
(SYLVIE reenters with more garbage)
You still here?
LUKE
Why don’t you take a break and come with me?
SYLVIE
For a smoke, I’ll come with you.
LUKE
Cigarettes will kill you.
SYLVIE
So why do you smoke?
LUKE
I’ve got a death wish.
SYLVIE
Like father like daughter. Now give me one.
(LUKE takes out pack of cigarettes. Only two are left in the pack)
LUKE
Outta luck. My last two.
SYLVIE
One’s enough.
LUKE
‘Fraid not.
SYLVIE
Why am I supposed to give up my bad habits if you don’t give up yours?
LUKE
You haven’t been out of this campsite since you’ve been here. There’s a lot to do out here besides dragging garbage from one place to …
SYLVIE
Like what?
LUKE
Like hiking around, swimming in the river, really looking at nature.
SYLVIE
Tobacco’s nature. Just give me a fucking cigarette.
LUKE
You eat with that mouth?
SYLVIE
You are so full of shit.
LUKE
(Ready to go)
Nice attitude.
SYLVIE
Let’s play a game for those cigarettes. Both of those cigarettes, right? Not just one, but like what’s left in the whole pack. What do you say?
LUKE
(Points upstage)
I’ll be straight up that hill about a quarter mile. Can’t miss it…
SYLVIE
Truth or dare. Ever heard of it?
LUKE
There’s a small field.
SYLVIE
(Overlapping)
Are you even listening to me!
LUKE
(Overlapping)
….to the left of it is a marshy place. That’s where I’ll be.
(He starts to leave)
SYLVIE
(Makes chicken noise)
You’re chicken, aren’t you?
(Makes chicken noise)
Don’t want to tell the truth.
(Makes chicken noise)
LUKE
How does it work?
SYLVIE
Truth or dare. I ask you a question and you answer truthfully and if you don’t, then I get to dare you…
LUKE
For my cigarettes.
SYLVIE
All of them.
LUKE
All of them. Then I get to ask you questions, right?
SYLVIE
Right. Except it’s like just one question. Not like, not like one of those interrogations in the movies or whatever it is you mercenary guys do in your… business. It’s just a game.
LUKE
I don’t play games like that.
SYLVIE
I was just trying to find like a way to explain the rules so you could understand…
LUKE
Interrogation is not a game!
SYLVIE
Whoa! Like, okay, right, I didn’t mean that you did that sh… stuff.
(He starts to walk away)
Hey, don’t walk away from me.
LUKE
I don’t like your idea of a game.
SYLVIE
It’s just a little game! Loosen up, will ya?
(He stops)
God, you don’t even know how to be… human. Hey, people, real people like play this game all the time and don’t get so… I don’t know….
(Goes in front of him)
So what do you say? I ask you a question. You answer truthfully. I don’t get the cigarettes. But if you lie, then I do. Then you get to ask me one. We’ll do one round.
LUKE
Those rules don’t sound right.
SYLVIE
My interpretation. You playing?
LUKE
You coming up the hill with me?
SYLVIE
If you ask me a question that I won’t answer, then yes.
LUKE
I’m playing. Who goes first?
SYLVIE
I do. It was my idea so I go first. Now, let’s see what could I ask you…. Have you ever interrogated people with knives and electric shocks and stuff like the Nazis did in those old movies?
(Pause)
That’s my question, Daddy O. And if you don’t want to answer… truthfully, then the cigarettes are mine.
LUKE
(Pause)
No. I’ve never done that.
SYLVIE
(Pause)
I didn’t think you’d tell the truth. I dare you to give me your cigarettes.
LUKE
You have no way of proving I’m lying.
SYLVIE
Oh, come on.
LUKE
Prove it.
SYLVIE
Right, you prove it.
LUKE
My turn.
SYLVIE
You don’t play fair.
LUKE
Why do you have a death wish?
SYLVIE
Oh, that’s so bogus. It was… it was just a comment.
LUKE
How do I know you’re not lying?
SYLVIE
You didn’t answer first so it’s still my turn. So, tell me the truth or give me the cigarettes.
LUKE
I told you the truth.
SYLVIE
You didn’t tell me anything.
LUKE
(Approaches her)
Does it have anything to do with the blood?
SYLVIE
What blood? I don’t know what you’re talking about!
LUKE
The blood on your birthday. You were crying and…
SYLVIE
How do you know about that?
LUKE
When you were sick, that’s all you…
SYLVIE
I was sick.
LUKE
(Puts his hand against the wall near her)
Who is responsible for raping you?
SYLVIE
(Makes a penalty sound like a horn)
Penalty. Now you have to tell me your deepest darkest secret.
LUKE
How old were you?
SYLVIE
Those are the rules.
LUKE
Was it Shark?!
SYLVIE
The absolute worse interrogation you have every done.
LUKE
Was it Shark?
SYLVIE
The absolute worse thing you have done to ANYBODY!!
LUKE
Was it Shark?
(LUKE pens her against the wall)
SYLVIE
Anybody capable of killing is capable of interrogating the crap out of people for like information not to mention intimidating his own daughter because of a stupid game! And no it wasn’t Shark! It was long before Shark! And I was thirteen. Thirteen years old!
(Pause. LUKE backs away)
This game is going so fast that… Seems to me you were asking a lot of questions without… without it like being your turn. That, Daddy O, is cheating.
LUKE
Who was it, Sylvie?
SYLVIE
It’s not that simple.
LUKE
What did your mother do about it?
SYLVIE
I couldn’t tell her who it was. I couldn’t.
LUKE
Can you tell me?
SYLVIE
Like what could you…
LUKE
I could … interrogate him for you.
SYLVIE
(Laughs. Stops)
Like you would too, right?
LUKE
Give me a name.
SYLVIE
It wouldn’t do any good.
LUKE
Give me a name.
SYLVIE
It’s like too late, okay? I mean, if you had been there…
(Pause)
I can’t give you a name because…. I mean,… it’s over.
(Pause)
It was like… my birthday, okay? And like there was this special project at school I was supposed to bring in. A story I was supposed to perform. I had this African wrap that mom gave me and…. It was my special day. And what was so really great about it was…. You see, only that week I…
(Pause)
Mom called it that time when a girl turns into a woman. Anyway, she helped me memorize this story from this tribe somewhere in Africa. In Kenya. She had a thing about … about Kenya. Maybe that’s where our ancestors are from, I don’t know.
(African drums can softly be heard)
She called it learning ….
(ANGELA appears in the forest shadows. LUKE sees her)
SYLVIE/ANGELA
….a different way of breathing.
SYLVIE
She and I rehearsed this dance and while I danced, I told this story about this one girl who went through this change like I just had. And….
(Slowly piles some of the garbage pieces together)
ANGELA
She changed into the ways of a woman.
SYLVIE
Anyway, this story was about how all the women of her tribe got together and gave her presents for her home and sang these songs ….
(Music of the singing women)
….about what womanhood would be like. You know, what the girl was expected to do for the rest of her life. Stuff like how to behave with men, having babies, ... and... and how to be strong during sad times, that sort of stuff.
(Songs end. Drums end)
And after the songs were over, the girl's mother said to her,
SYLVIE
"My child is dead."
ANGELA
(Echoes Sylvie)
My child is dead.
SYLVIE (continued)
And then the mother would cry for two days and two nights and mourn her child's death.
(ANGELA hums AM I BORN TO DIE)
And after school that day, my homeroom teacher asked me to stay behind. He said that my piece was really good. That I had a talent. And one thing lead to another and…
(Pause)
The whole time he was doing it, I thought. My songs are different. They aren’t sung by the women of my tribe. They’re sung by boom boxes on the streets. My gifts are not for cooking and home making. They’re pills and joints and needles being sold at every street corner. And my ceremony’s not a gathering of the community. It’s in a janitor’s closet on a pile of rags with my homeroom teacher who threatened to kill my mother if I told.
(Pause)
I thought he was my friend. I thought he… Anyway, he hit on enough kids that somebody else turned him in. That’s when Mama found out who. Then she thought it was better to not say anything. Keep my name out of it.
(Pause)
So I guess you’d have to go to Riker’s Island to interrogate him, Daddy O.
(Goes back to building the wall)
Mom cried for two days and two nights. And I can’t help thinking that that’s when the cancer started. Like I started it. When I broke her heart.
(Piles more on her now developing wall)
And in the two days and two nights, I could hear her calling your name through the walls of her bedroom. And I went in there to tell her how sorry I was. That I didn’t mean to hurt her and she told me that there were still heroes out there. That my dad was not dead like I thought he was all my life. That he… traveled a lot and someday he would come and get me and protect me. And I didn’t need to look for somebody to take his place …. But you know what? It was a joke. At least dead, you could be anything I wanted you to be. But like knowing you were out there. Alive….made me mad.
(Really seals up the wall with pieces)
So I made up my mind to find my own family. One that stayed with me. One that could protect me from scum like that teacher. And, you know, no matter what you say, what you think, you know who like is really responsible for me getting into smack and cocaine, and crack and….?
LUKE
Sylvie.
SYLVIE
I heard his name enough through the walls of my bedroom at night.
LUKE
No.
SYLVIE
You can’t even like face up to the truth, can you? No more than you can like face up to the fact you’re more fucked up than I ever was. How could you….. how could you not be there? At least I’m just addicted to drugs. You, you’re addicted to…
LUKE
Don’t say it!
SYLVIE
To killing. Killing me. Killing mom. Killing…everything!
(Pause)
Truth.
(Pause)
My turn. What is like the single most horrible thing you’ve done in your life?
(LUKE hands her the pack. SYLVIE pulls out a cigarette, puts it in her mouth. LUKE exits. She angrily kicks wall and knocks off jewelry box. Picks it up, listens to music, puts cigarettes inside. Holds the box to her heart. Places the box in the wall. Carefully builds a barrier around box, thus starting to carefully build the wall. She breaks down and cries. Lights fade to black as the African sounds come up)
END OF ACT TWO, SCENE TWO
