Etiquette and Vitriol by Nicky Silver (classic fiction .txt) 📗

Gone? Gone where? Where does she live? Is she missing? Should we search? Have a hunt?

PHILIP: I mean she’s gone!

CLAIRE: That’s the same thing. Don’t be cryptic.

AMY (Stepping forward): He means for good.

CLAIRE: Amy, what are you doing?

AMY: Helping.

PHILIP: I threw her out!

CLAIRE: Oh no.

AMY: They’ve broken up.

CLAIRE (To Amy): I understand.

PHILIP: I want to die!

CLAIRE: Don’t even say that.

PHILIP: I loved her!

CLAIRE: I know you think so.

AMY: She was awful.

PHILIP (To Amy): You didn’t know her!

AMY: Well, she was.

CLAIRE (To Amy): Go to your room.

AMY: No.

PHILIP: I loved her!

CLAIRE: We think so. We always do. We think we’re Edison discovering love. But we learn too soon.

AMY: It’s for the best.

CLAIRE: I never liked her.

AMY: She was wretched.

CLAIRE: She had dubious posture.

PHILIP: She was beautiful!

CLAIRE: She wasn’t right for you.

PHILIP: Can’t you see? I was in love!

AMY (To herself): So was I.

CLAIRE: She’s better forgotten. Now, you must come out with Tony and me tonight. I insist on it. You can’t mope about the house, wallowing in pity. It won’t do. Now go change. Go, go, go, go. We’ll all have a marvelous time!

PHILIP: I’m not going out with you—

CLAIRE: Trust me.

PHILIP: You’re to blame! It’s your fault it happened!

CLAIRE: What are you talking about?

PHILIP: You brought him here!

AMY: He didn’t belong.

PHILIP: He ruined everything!

AMY: We’re a family.

CLAIRE: What happened?

AMY: Tony was here.

PHILIP: And I walked in!

CLAIRE (To Amy): Send him up.

AMY: I can’t.

PHILIP: I threw him out.

CLAIRE: What!?

AMY: Thank God.

CLAIRE: Why!?

PHILIP: I saw them together!

CLAIRE: Who?!

AMY: Tony and Vivian.

PHILIP (To Amy): Don’t interrupt—

CLAIRE: This doesn’t concern you!

PHILIP: It’s none of your business!

CLAIRE: Go to your room!

AMY: Leave me alone!

PHILIP: I caught them together and it was disgusting! He was on top of her! He was inside of her!

CLAIRE: STOP IT! I don’t know what you’re talking about—you must be—

PHILIP: I saw them!

AMY: So did I!

PHILIP: And I threw them out!

AMY: He did.

CLAIRE (To Amy): I SENT YOU TO YOUR ROOM, GO TO YOUR ROOM!

AMY: NO!

PHILIP: My fiancée and your lover! Rolling around on the floor, filthy and fucking like dogs! I got rid of them!

CLAIRE (Deadly): You had no right.

PHILIP: You’re my mother!

CLAIRE (Composure snapping): AND YOU SHOULD MIND YOUR OWN GODDAMN BUSINESS! HOW DARE YOU INTERFERE!—WHEN DID HE LEAVE?

PHILIP: He didn’t love you.

CLAIRE: What would you know about it? There are different kinds of relationships! How could you do this to me?

PHILIP: What’s wrong with you?

CLAIRE: Who are you to judge me? WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT ME? I need him. Is that simple enough? BASIC enough? I need him holding me and listening to me and looking at me—GOD! Don’t let me cry. I don’t want to cry.

PHILIP: Oh my God.

CLAIRE: I’ll call him. And he’ll come back, and we’ll make love like we did this morning and last night and the night before and the night before, beautifully and ruthlessly, like nothing ever happened. And we’ll go on, because nothing ever happened. DO YOU HEAR ME?!

PHILIP (Overlapping): Oh my God. Oh God. You don’t care.

You just don’t care . . . at all.

AMY (Overlapping Claire): You see?

PHILIP: BUT IT DID! You can pretend all you want! Pretend Tony loves you!!

CLAIRE: He does!

PHILIP: NEVER!

CLAIRE: THEN SO WHAT!? SO WHAT IF HE DOESN’T OR NEVER REALLY DID OR NEVER REALLY WILL? SO WHAT?! WHAT DIFFERENCE COULD THAT POSSIBLY MAKE!?

PHILIP: Pretend you love me! BUT THAT DOESN’T MAKE IT SO!! IT! DOES! NOT!

CLAIRE: You’re insane!

PHILIP (Wildly, happily): How else could I live? You mean you couldn’t tell? My LOVING mother? My DEVOTED mother?! My doting, CHARMING mother!? Couldn’t you tell that I’m sick? Couldn’t you tell that I’m crazy? THAT I CAN’T FEEL A SINGLE FUCKING THING? DIDN’T YOU NOTICE? COULDN’T YOU TELL? MY PERFECT, MY FUCKING, MY BEAUTIFUL MOTHER! NOW YOU CAN HATE ME FOR THIS! (Spent, he falls onto the bed and withdraws from the scene, into himself)

CLAIRE: Oh my God.

PHILIP (Random, overlapping): You can hate me. You can hate me for this.

CLAIRE: It’s all right, Philip. I’ll go to him. I’ll fix everything.

AMY: I did it.

CLAIRE (After a moment): I cannot say that I’m surprised.

AMY: I told him the truth.

PHILIP (Continuing, random): I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry for whatever I did.

AMY: I told him about the boys before him.

CLAIRE: I see.

PHILIP: I’m sorry I remind you you’re not eighteen.

AMY: And the boys after him.

PHILIP: I’m not what you want me to be.

AMY: I made him see he wasn’t using you, you were using him. I made him hate you.

CLAIRE: Why?

AMY: I had to save Philip.

CLAIRE: At my expense?

AMY: I wanted to.

(Amy and Claire look at each other for a moment. Then Claire can take it no longer.)

CLAIRE: I’ve got to go. I’ve got to find him.

AMY: I know.

(Claire exits.)

PHILIP (After a moment): Mother?

(Amy sits at Claire’s vanity. There is a pause. Before she speaks, Amy dusts herself with Claire’s powder and straightens her posture.)

AMY: Yes?

PHILIP: I didn’t mean to do anything wrong.

AMY: I know.

PHILIP: Are you mad at me?

AMY: No. I love you.

PHILIP: I hate her.

AMY: Who?

PHILIP: Vivian.

AMY: Don’t. It’s not her fault. I learned, just recently, there is no happiness to be had.

PHILIP: I hate her.

AMY: We’re alone. All alone. All of the time. It’s our nature.

PHILIP: No.

AMY: We’re alone and frightened and there’s nothing we can do about it but cease existing and forget. We can take someone to our beds and pretend we love them. Or not bother. We can hold them against ourselves, feel their skin against ours, smell them and taste them, and for a minute or two, we can forget, that we are, afterwards and always, alone.

PHILIP (Simply): I can’t.

AMY (Going to him): Try.

(She turns his head toward hers. He sees her for the first time.)

PHILIP: Amy?

AMY: Try.

(She holds him. They embrace. At first it is tentative. Then it becomes mutual and passionate. After a moment, he takes command: they lunge abruptly into a romantic embrace identical to that of Tony and Claire in Act I. As they kiss, we hear “Love Is Good for Anything That Ails You.”