by Rajiv Joseph
MUSA: You lied to me!
TOM: So what?
MUSA: We came here for a toilet seat?
Do you hear how you talk?! Listen! Toilet seat! Toilet seat! You want something to shit on!
TOM: It’s a gold toilet seat.
Musa takes this information in.
MUSA: Gold. Gold toilet seat . . . Gold toilet seat . . .
TOM: Make sense now?
MUSA: I follow you around like a dog, everywhere. Ficky-fick, ficky-fick, the middle of the desert, so you can have sex, so you can get a toilet seat so you can shit all over this place.
TOM: It’s a job, Habib. Do your job.
MUSA: (takes out the gold gun) Yeah, Johnny . . . a job.
A job.
TOM: Check it out man . . . you actually brought it with you. Holy shit.
MUSA: Yes, check me out.
TOM: Give it to me, Habib.
MUSA: You want the gun, Johnny?
TOM: Give me the fucking gun.
MUSA: (points it at Tom) You want the gun, but you lie to me.
You want the gun, I want to leave.
TOM: Don’t you point that at me!
MUSA: (stops pointing) Or what?! What will you do now? What else can you do to me now?!
TOM: I said we can leave when I get my—
Musa shoots Tom in the stomach.
MUSA: Your toilet seat! Yes! You need a toilet seat! And you need your gold gun! You need gold gold gold and fuck you and your gold and your goddamn bullshit all the time!
TOM: You shot me . . .
You fucking shot me . . .
Musa points the gun at Tom as if to shoot him again.
MUSA: (his rage giving way to tears) I am tired! I am so tired of everyone . . .
TOM: Stop it . . . Stop it, please God, stop it . . .
Musa stands over Tom and puts the gun to Tom’s head.
MUSA: Don’t pray to God. Don’t you pray to any god, you piece of shit, man. No god is going to hear you. Not out here. Not anymore . . . no god is going to . . . no god is . . .
Musa takes the gun away. He stares at Tom.
TOM: I’m sorry . . . I’m sorry . . . Please . . .
Musa exits, quickly.
Tom crawls and props himself up on a rock.
TOM: Habib . . . ! Habib, don’t leave me here . . . I mean . . . I’m sorry . . .
(he coughs; he winces in pain)
The leper enters.
WOMAN: (Arabic) Do you want water?
Treed muy?
Tom is startled by her voice.
TOM: Who’s there? Who said that?
WOMAN: (Arabic) Do you want water?
Treed muy?
TOM: I’m hurt.
WOMAN: (Arabic) Do you want water?
Treed muy?
TOM: I don’t know what you’re saying.
I don’t understand.
Kev enters from the ruins, carrying a duffel bag. Both Tom and the woman turn and look at him.
TOM: Oh God, here we go ...
KEV: El-salamu-aleikum.
WOMAN: U-aleikum el-Salaam.
TOM: Kev ... Kev ... You gotta help me, man ...
Kev takes a gold toilet seat from the bag.
KEV: Hey Tommy. This yours?
TOM: Kev, can you help me? Can you go get help for me? I got shot, man!
WOMAN: (Arabic) Does he want water?
Yireed muy?
KEV: (to Tom) She wants to know if you want some water.
TOM: Can you go get help?
KEV: From who?
TOM: Anyone! Anyone, okay!?
KEV: I can get you some water. How about that?
TOM: She has water?
KEV: I guess so.
TOM: Wait ... You speak Arabic?
KEV: I kind of picked it up in death.
TOM: Well, how come she can see you too?
KEV: Dude, I don’t know all the fucking rules okay?
TOM: Jesus. Yes! Yes, I want some water!
The woman hobbles into the ruins.
KEV: What’s it like getting shot?
TOM: It sucks.
KEV: Yeah.
TOM: Can’t you go tell someone I’m here? Please Kev, can’t you do that?
KEV: Sorry, man. But this is the best I can do.
The woman hobbles out from the ruins with a goatskin flask slung around her shoulders. She brings it to Tom and drops it in his lap.
TOM: Thank you.
Tom drinks.
TOM: Oh ... man ... Okay. I gotta get back to the jeep ...
KEV: Habib took the jeep.
TOM: Aw fuck! Okay, come on ...
What else ...
Look can you ask her if she knows anyone around here? I’m dying, Kev, can you ask her if she can help me?
KEV: (Arabic) My friend is dying. Can you help him out?
Sedeekee day-moot. Tigdereen itsa’dee?
WOMAN: (Arabic) I have a first-aid kit.
Endee isa’fat aweliye.
KEV: She said she has a first-aid kit.
TOM: She has first-aid!? She’s a leper, she’s got a first-aid kit!?
KEV: That’s what she said.
TOM: Fuck, man! Tell her to go get it!
Kev nods at the woman, she reenters the ruins.
TOM: I’m not gonna die here ... I’m not gonna die. I’m gonna fuckin fight through this, you know?
KEV: At least you got your toilet seat.
TOM: (clutching toilet seat closer) Fuck you.
The woman enters with a very old metal box. She gives it to Kev.
TOM: Oh, God, thank you ... thank you so much ... thank you ...
Kev opens the box, and turns it upside down. A Band-Aid floats out of it.
TOM: (directed at no one; half-laughing, half-crying) I got shot in the stomach what the fuck I need with a Band-Aid!
He coughs, clutches his stomach. Realizes he’s dying for sure.
TOM: Oh, God ...
Kev, I’m gonna die.
KEV: Yeah, man, I know.
TOM: No ... no no no ...
I can’t believe I’m going to die.
I can’t believe I’m going to die here. Out here in the middle of nowhere.
I’m from Michigan.
It’s shaped like a mitten.
I was never supposed to die here.
(beat) What happens when you die?
KEV: You know when you’ve been drinking all night? And you start to fade? And you can’t keep your eyes open, even when you’re talking? That’s how it goes, man. It’s not too bad.
TOM: I don’t want to die.
KEV: Yeah, I know.
TOM: Tell her ... tell her I don’t want to die.
KEV: (Arabic) He doesn’t want to die.
Hoo-eh mayreed ymoot.
WOMAN: (Arabic) My body has been decaying for my whole life.
Jissmi de-yit’akel ttul hayati.
TOM: What ... what she say?
KEV: She said that she has been decaying her whole life.
WOMAN: (Arabic) I am made of sand.
Ani masnoo’a min remmull.
KEV: She says she is made of sand.
TOM: She’s made of sand.
KEV: Yeah.
TOM: Can you ask her how long she’s not had any hands?
How long she’s just had stumps.
Kev thinks. He then asks the woman in Arabic.
KEV: (Arabic) He would like to know how long you have not had your hands.
Yireed yu’roof shked sar-lich bidoon eedain.
WOMAN: (Arabic) When I was fourteen years old they fell off. They slowly fell off over time.
Min chan oumri arbata’ash seneh eedainatee wig’ow. Wig’ow shwaya, shwaya bmuroor il-ayam.
KEV: Since she was fourteen.
She said they slowly just fell off.
Tom shows his hand to the woman.
TOM: (to Woman) This is what you get now if you lose your hand.
It’s top of the line.
I
t smells like milk.
TOM: Don’t leave me, Kev.
The woman speaks to him plainly.
WOMAN: (Arabic) Nothing.
Wala-shee.
There is no God.
Makoo Ulleh.
No heaven, no hell.
La jenna, wala je-hen-nem.
Death is nothing. It is peaceful.
Il-moat moo-shee. Il-moat musalim.
Scene 4.
The garden of topiary. Musa enters. He walks to a topiary shrub.
MUSA: (hushed, whispered, to himself) My horse. My poor horse.
(goes to another topiary) Look at you ... Such a pretty ... so lovely ...
Uday enters.
UDAY: Oh, Mansour!
Uday is so proud!
Stupid Kid American. Ha!
He suffered, Mansour. He died slowly in the desert all alone.
And do you know what the best thing? He called out for you! Begging you to come back and save him!
He begged you! Ha!
Fuck me, man, you’re good! That’s advanced: getting a man to beg you to come back to him after you’ve shot him!? And shot him why? Because he was annoying you! Because he wouldn’t shut up.
I agree. Annoying people should all be shot and left to die. Because fuck them!
Mansour. Oh, Mansour.
Uday is so proud.
MUSA: You don’t know anything. It wasn’t supposed to happen. I didn’t want to kill him.
UDAY: I know what you mean. Accidents like that are happening to Uday all the time.
MUSA: I’m not like you are ...
I am not the kind of person who does this. It is not who I am.
UDAY: Sometimes we change. As people. This is the type of shit they teach you in boarding school.
Like you: how one day you are translating, and another day you are shooting people because they annoy you.
MUSA: That’s not why I killed him!
UDAY: (excited) Then why?
MUSA: Not because of that.
UDAY: You tell me. Tell me why. Uday wants to know. Why?
MUSA: Because ... we were in the desert ...
and the sun was going down ...
And ...
(beat) And the sun was going down.
UDAY: ... What?
MUSA: (quiet) The sun was going down.
UDAY: The sun was going down!
(claps with delight) Holy shit my man, that’s your excuse!? The sun?!
That’s all it takes, eh Mansour? You know that happens every day, right? The sun goes down. Fuck me, even my father needed better reasons than that!
I thought you were good, Mansour, but this?
Musa holds the gun out.
MUSA: Take it back.
UDAY: It’s yours now. You’ve earned it.
MUSA: I’ll never use it again.
UDAY: Come on! Not even once?
MUSA: Never.
UDAY: Don’t tell me you didn’t like it! It felt a little bit good, didn’t it? Killing the boy, leaving him to die.
When you realized the bullet hit, that it caused pain, you felt relief.
I know it, man. The pain went away.
MUSA: Yes, the pain went away.
UDAY: Good. You’re beginning to learn about survival.
MUSA: It brought him to his knees.
UDAY: Yeah, yeah, and then?
MUSA: He screamed. He prayed to God.
UDAY: And you told him ... ?
MUSA: I told him not to pray to God. I told him no god would ever hear him.
UDAY: Nice. Good line.
MUSA: I stood above him and pressed the gun to his head.
UDAY: But you let him live. Better he can suffer.
MUSA: No. No more, no more ...
Musa puts the gun in Uday’s hand.
UDAY: Mansour ... you can’t let go now! You have a taste for blood. You like it. You want it again and again and again.
Uday holds out the gun. Musa spits on it.
UDAY: This is very rude, Mansour. Very rude.
You know what your problem is Mansour?
MUSA: I don’t have a problem.
UDAY: Your problem is this: the best thing you’ve ever done, in your entire life, was only possible because of me. Without Uday, you’re just a petty gardener.
Uday goes to the gun, picks it up, wipes it on his coat.
UDAY: With Uday, on another hand, you’re the artist, building topiary, doing these great things. Because I wanted them. Because I employed you. Because I provided you with thousands of gallons of water in the middle of the fucking desert.
MUSA: This is my garden.
UDAY: No, Mister Fuck-Shit! This is Uday’s garden! You think this place is yours? These animals are yours? Even your memory? It all belongs to Uday.
MUSA: No, no, I can remember a life without you ... I can remember my sister without you ...
UDAY: (beat; Uday leans in to Musa) When the blades of your shears touched her skin, she burst like a grape.
Ruined my suit.
Uday holds the gun out.
UDAY: Oh Hadia. Hadia Hadia Hadia. Such a small creature, making such a great noise.
Musa stares at him and then takes the gun.
UDAY: Good boy. You take it, and go out tomorrow, and find someone else. It will be easy. The sun will set and you’ll have no choice but to kill somebody.
Musa points the gun to his own head.
UDAY: (exasperated) No, Mansour ... Someone else.
MUSA: I won’t be like you. I am myself. I am myself.
Hadia enters, slowly strolling through the topiary, looking at it, spellbound. Covering her eyes.
HADIA: Can I look yet? Can I look now, Musa?
MUSA: Not yet.
UDAY: Don’t you bring her into this, Mansour! I will take her again.
HADIA: I want to see it! Let me see the garden, Musa! Can I look?
UDAY: I will do it all again. I will tear her to pieces again and again and again ...
Musa leaves Uday and goes to her.
MUSA: You can look but then you have to go. But for now, Hadia ... Open your eyes.
HADIA: A lion! A camel ... an elephant ... a ... What is that?
MUSA: That is my giraffe.
HADIA: How do you do it?
MUSA: I don’t know. It’s difficult to explain.
UDAY: Fine, okay ...
(starts to move toward Hadia) This is not going to end well, boss.
HADIA: It’s beautiful here.
MUSA: It is.
HADIA: Who could have ever thought, eh Musa? That such a place could be here? That trees could grow like this? Who could have ever thought?
MUSA: Hadia ... leave now. Go home. Go home quickly. Never come back. Leave.
HADIA: I’ll leave in a moment. I want to see the rest.
Uday takes Hadia by the arm, holding her firmly.
UDAY: You could stay in this garden forever, man. Watching me and her, me and her, me and her ...
Is this what you want to see?
Okay, man. Watch. I’m going to take her back there and make her into a topiary. This time, I’m going to wear a bib.
Oh, one more thing ...
That boy you killed ...
He was the boy who killed me.
Thank you, Mansour.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Uday exits with Hadia.
MUSA: (to Uday, but to himself) I will live with your voice, okay?
I will live with it.
It doesn’t matter, because my hands belong to me.
And my hands have their own memory.
And when I put them on a plant, they create something.
They will create something.
Musa says it but he has not convinced himself.
He cocks the gun and stares at it.
Tiger approaches and stands behind Musa. Musa doesn’t see Tiger.
TIGER: Look, I don’t mean to interrupt, but I coul
dn’t help overhearing ...
Did you make this place?
Musa looks at Tiger. Takes in the reality of a ghost of a tiger before him, seems to be okay with it.
MUSA: I made this place.
TIGER: Are You who I think You are?
MUSA: I don’t know who I am.
TIGER: Look, I’ve been looking for You, I’ve been calling out Your name.
MUSA: (covers his eyes in exhaustion)
Too many ghosts. Ghosts everywhere.
TIGER: It’s not just me! I brought this girl here. She’d been killed, you know? She was just a little girl. She wanted to know when You’d be back. She wanted to know how You made these things. All these animals. Elephant, horse, giraffe ...
MUSA: This garden is a wound. I want this place to burn, I want to set it on fire.
TIGER: Wait! I mean ... The girl ... She’s not going to like that very much.
MUSA: (turns to Tiger) Tell her I’m sorry. Tell her I’m not who she thought I was. Tell her I’ve done horrible things, and I ...
I don’t know what I’m going to do next.
Tell her to forget about me.
I’ve become a different man.
Musa puts the gun in his pants.
TIGER: You’re not a man. You’re God.
MUSA: No. I am not.
Musa starts to leave.
TIGER: Yes, You are! I’ve been waiting for You. I’ve been waiting for You to speak.
MUSA: God has spoken. This world. This is what He’s said.
Musa exits.
TIGER: This?
This isn’t enough!
I want You to say more than this.
You know what? You belong in a cage.
We should hunt You down lock You up just like every other wild thing in the world.
I can see it: God in a cage, right here. Finally get a look at You.
All the great mysteries of creation could be revealed at the zoo.
