sixteen
16. (9.29.2009)
a cool glass of water and a place to lay my head.
The porch.
In a modern house that looks off into the woods behind it.
Down a bit is a small creek where people used to play but goes untended now.
Margerine sits in a white wicker chair.
Donald enters with two glasses of water and sets them on a table in front of her.
MARGERINE
Thanks.
DONALD
Yep.
MARGERINE
It’s nice out.
DONALD
Not too humid.
MARGERINE
Yeah.
That’s the problem with summer.
The humidity.
DONALD
My dad used to say that.
MARGERINE
That exact sentence?
DONALD
No.
He used to say:
It’s not the heat that gets you, it’s the humidity.
MARGERINE
Oh.
I’ve heard that before.
DONALD
Yeah.
It’s a pretty common saying.
MARGERINE
Yeah.
I guess it is.
A pause.
DONALD
DO you ever think about what it would be like if I was just now coming back from war?
MARGERINE
No.
You mean like right now?
DONALD
Yeah.
If I just came walking up that path with a green duffle bag draped over my shoulder.
Scars on my face.
MARGERINE
Lots of scars?
DONALD
No.
Not lots.
But more than I had when I left.
MARGERINE
Which I assume was close to zero.
DONALD
Pretty close.
MARGERINE
No.
DONALD
No what?
MARGERINE
I don’t ever think of that.
DONALD
I don’t either.
…
well I didn’t until just now when I did think of it.
…
I thought of it once before, but I wasn’t thinking about coming back from war to you. Not to say that I was thinking of coming back from war to be with someone else, it just wasn’t you I was particularly thinking of.
MARGERINE
Was it Dover?
DONALD
Dover, Deleware?
MARGERINE
No, was it Dover you were coming back to?
DONALD
Dover was someone I would walk away from, not towards.
Even when I did…
I was always walking away from.
…
does that make sense.
MARGERINE
Yeah.
Yeah it does.
DONALD
I think, since it’s a different time in my head, like 1865, just after the civil war, I think that it’s you, but it’s the you from a different era, does that make sense?
…
And I don’t even know you all that well, but I know you from town, and my family would be dead, because of cholera, or some disease that was happening a lot during the civil war and I’d walk up the path between the woods there with a green duffel bag on my shoulder and I’d say:
Hello ma’am.
I’m sorry to bother you, but I was wondering if I might trouble you for some hospitality.
MARGERINE
What would I say?
DONALD
Well, I’d imagine, that even one hundred and forty-four years ago, a relationship between the two of us would be waiting just underneath the surface, so you would say you don’t know, but that you wanted to help. So you’d say… okay.
MARGERINE
And I’d take you in.
DONALD
Mmhmm.
MARGERINE
And I’d offer you a cool glass of water and a place to lay your head.
DONALD
It’s all I really need.
Donald, who has been seated, puts his head in Margerine’s lap. She combs his hair through her fingers.
He begins to drift off to sleep.
DONALD
A cool glass of water and a place to lay my head.
a pause.
MARGERINE
No.
I don’t think about it.
link