Five Plays. Samuel D. Hunter
TROY: Look, we’re—. We’re at the Holiday Inn. (Pause) Let’s please not blow this out of proportion, okay? We’ve been here before. Just—. Just stay and have some food, I’ll see if I can get off early and we’ll go talk, and work things out. We always work things out.
(Isabelle enters.)
ISABELLE: Oh, hey. Troy—I thought you had table nine?
TROY: Yeah, I do. Sorry.
(Troy gets up.)
ISABELLE (To Tammy): Would you like anything, or are you just here to talk to Troy?
(Brief pause.)
TAMMY: Yeah, uh. I’ll have the soup salad breadsticks thingy. Extra breadsticks.
ISABELLE: You want the Zuppa Siciliana or the Zuppa Toscana?
TAMMY: What?
TROY: Veggies or meatballs.
TAMMY: Meatballs.
ISABELLE: Not a problem.
(Isabelle exits. Pause.)
TROY: Look, I’m sorry, okay?
(Pause. Max enters.)
MAX (To Troy): Buddy they’re really looking for you at table nine.
TROY: Okay.
(Troy exits with Max.
Becky enters to get the remaining dishes from the other table. She doesn’t look at Tammy.)
BECKY: You guys divorced yet?
TAMMY (Impulsively): You know one day you’re gonna wake up and there won’t be anyone left in your life that gives a damn about you. Let’s see how fucking smart you are then.
(Becky stops, looking at her. Tammy looks down.)
Shit.
(Becky quickly starts to exit.)
Becky, I didn’t mean that, I—
(Becky is gone. Isabelle reenters with salad and breadsticks. She puts them down in front of Tammy.)
ISABELLE: Here you go.
(Pause.)
TAMMY: It’s Isabelle, right?
ISABELLE: Yeah.
TAMMY: When you were seventeen did you and your mom hate one another?
ISABELLE: My parents died when I was twelve.
TAMMY: Oh my God I’m so sorry—
ISABELLE: It’s okay, it’s been forever. Car accident, I was in the back seat. My grandparents raised me, they were okay. They always treated me like I was a fucking princess just because my parents were dead. Oh my God I just said the F-word.
TAMMY: It’s okay.
ISABELLE: I got fired from Kmart in high school for swearing. Anyway, don’t worry about her, she’s okay. You remember being seventeen. You hate everything when you’re seventeen.
TAMMY: Actually, I was fine. I liked my life. It’s now that I hate everything.
(Tammy grabs a breadstick, starts eating.)
ISABELLE: Well she’s just getting it out of the way now, then. (Pause) Do you—want me to sit with you for a while?
TAMMY: Oh, you don’t have to—
ISABELLE: Seriously, you’re my only table. I don’t mind.
(Tammy looks at her, smiles.)
TAMMY: Well—okay, yeah.
(Isabelle sits and starts eating salad straight from the bowl.)
ISABELLE: I just think, like, we all have to go through a period in our lives where we think everything is shit. After that everything else feels a little bit better.
TAMMY: Yeah.
(Pause.)
ISABELLE: Look if you’re holding something in, let it out. It’s the middle of the afternoon, there are barely any people here. Go for it, say what you’re feeling.
(Pause.)
TAMMY: I’m just—so fucking miserable.
ISABELLE: Fuck yeah!
TAMMY: Jesus. I’m fucking miserable.
ISABELLE: You see? Now there’s nowhere to go but up!
TAMMY: I sort of wish they wouldn’t come home.
(Pause. Tammy thinks.)
ISABELLE: What?
TAMMY: Troy took Becky last night, they’re at the Holiday Inn, and I sort of wish they’d just—stay there. I mean I know that’s not realistic, but—. They’d be fine. It’s nice, there’s a pool.
ISABELLE: Oh, wow, I’m not sure I—
TAMMY: And I could just go home, be alone, and just—sleep. Get up in the morning. Go to work. Like a—normal person.
(Pause.)
ISABELLE: Oh.
(Eddie enters. Isabelle stands.)
Oh, I—. Sorry, Eddie, I was just—. I’ll get back to / the—
EDDIE: No, it’s okay. It’s Thursday, we have staff lunch, let’s just—. Let’s get everybody together and eat now. Tammy, you can eat with us.
ISABELLE: No, I’ll—really, Eddie, I—
EDDIE: Sit down, eat. You want something else?
ISABELLE: I can give you a hand in / the kitchen—
EDDIE: No, really—stay there. Give me a minute, just— . . .
(Eddie exits. Isabelle and Tammy stare at one another for a moment in silence.)
TAMMY: I was planning on going to South Dakota.
ISABELLE: Oh, cool! What?
TAMMY: My sister Ellie, she lives in South Dakota. On this organic farm, it’s so beautiful. I thought that as soon as Becky graduated and moved out of the house, I could make a clean break, move out there, and—.
(Pause.)
But that’s never going to happen. We’ve been together since high school. We don’t even know how to be adults apart from one another.
(Pause.)
But maybe—maybe I just need to accept that. I mean maybe we both just need to realize that we aren’t gonna be the people we wanted to be, we aren’t going to— . . . I mean there are plenty of unhappy people in the world, why should we be the ones who get to be happy? Maybe we’re just—unhappy people.
(Tammy looks at Isabelle. Pause.)
Does that make sense?
(Tense silence.)
ISABELLE: Yeah, I mean— . . .? (Pause) Actually, I don’t know if I’m the one to—
(Eddie reenters with Max, Troy, and Becky.)
MAX: What are we doing?
(Eddie pushes two tables together, creating one large table.)
EDDIE: It’s Thursday. We have staff lunch on Thursday.
TROY: Eddie, c’mon—not this week, okay?
EDDIE: The last table just left, we probably won’t get anyone else until four thirty, that’s an hour from now.
BECKY: I’m not hungry.