Honor, a woman in her early thirties, is standing on raised platform (the roof of the building), looking down. As the lights go up, a muffled crowd can be heard below, in a general state of panic. One woman shouts, don't jump. Honor rolls her head around on her neck, basking in it.
John (an average-looking man in his mid-forties, very middle-management, with a glazed, recited look and feel to everything he says and does) enters from upstage right, like he's just come up onto the roof.
JOHN
Excuse me.
Honor jumps, puts her hand to her chest, a pantomime of what frightened should be.
HONOR
God. You scared me.
JOHN
Ah. Yeah, that probably wasn't a great idea...
They stare at each other awkwardly for a moment. John coughs.
JOHN (CONT'D)
Um, ma'am, I'm going to have to ask you to get down from the ledge there. It's against building protocol for non-security employees to be up on the roof like that. So if you could just...
HONOR
Are you joking?
JOHN
No, those are the rules.
HONOR
I know those are the rules. Those are the rules everywhere. I don't care about the rules. I'm going to jump.
This had honestly not occurred to John before now. He is mildly surprised to receive this news.
JOHN
Oh. Huh. That's...don't do that.
HONOR
(theatrical)
If you've come here to stop me, you can save your breath. I'm not going to listen.
JOHN
Well, it's probably not all that--
HONOR
There's nothing you can say. My mind is made up.
JOHN
You could at least hear me out. Common courtesy being what it is.
HONOR
Why bother? I already know what you're going to say. It's just not worth it anymore. Every day is a worthless circle. Get up, brush my teeth, take a shower, go to work, get home, go to sleep, rinse, repeat. Life is not worth living.
JOHN
Then jump.
HONOR
...excuse me?
JOHN
Listen, don't take this the wrong way, but you're kind of pissing me off right now.
HONOR
I'm what?!
JOHN
You think that everyone who wears a tie and drinks coffee out of a 'Life's a Beach' mug doesn't think strikingly similar things about all of their strikingly similar lives? What the hell makes you so special? Hmm? That you get to stand up here and bitch about it to everyone? That you get to quit instead of sucking it up and typing up expense reports like the rest of us? If you want to jump, go ahead and jump. Who am I to stop you?
HONOR
(knocked off balance by his words, to herself)
But...well. This is interesting. A new technique, or something? It must be. I've never heard anything like that before.
JOHN
Before? Like you've been in this situation before?
Honor laughs awkwardly.
"Oh. Huh. That's...don't do that." - That line made me laugh so hard.
ReplyDeleteI think it's weird that John is suddenly like you're pissing me off. Other than that specific and personal complaint, this is really awesome and I look forward to more.
That appears to be the general consensus, that him getting pissed is sudden. But I feel like no one would react to this situation in a predictable way, especially not anyone with a lot of underlying anger about his life. I guess I need to do a better job of conveying that.
ReplyDeleteWhy do you talk about punk on SP ?
ReplyDeleteYou're like the opposite of Punk ?
I also talk about people jumping off of buildings and airplanes. I am neither of those things, but I haven't received any complaints as of yet.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I'm interested: what is the opposite of punk? A symphony orchestra? Martha Stewart's tissue-box cozy? An internship at Fox News? I'm none of those things either. Shit, we need to figure this out, cause now I'm confused.
Oh, goodness. Upon which bandwagon have I jumped, good sir?
ReplyDelete