JAMIE
F’ing Merv asshole.
A-HOLE!
KEVIN
They asked me up to their camp tonight.
JAMIE
Merv did?
KEVIN
Not just Merv, there’s a bunch of them.
JAMIE
That’s one place you don’t want to go.
KEVIN
Just a bunch playing cards.
JAMIE
They’re looking for someone to get ugly at.
CHICKY
Kev, my smoke.
KEVIN
It’s coming.
He throws one but CHICKY steps on it by mistake.
Shit.
They just drink and play cards.
He throws down the package with the lighter tucked inside.
JAMIE
Don’t go.
KEVIN
You go.
JAMIE
Yeah but I’m me and you’re you.
You go up there and you’ll come home one sorry ass.
KEVIN
I’m not going to fight nobody.
JAMIE
You go up there and I’ll beat the crap out of you myself.
KEVIN
Fuck you. I can go anywhere I want. I can take care of myself.
JAMIE
So you think.
KEVIN
Yeah well, I know something about you, don’t I?
JAMIE
What?
KEVIN
I ain’t telling.
JAMIE shifts his weight so he is within striking distance of KEVIN, while pretending to hand him an empty beer bottle.
JAMIE
Is it about my stag?
KEVIN
Maybe. Maybe not. I ain’t telling you.
JAMIE
I’m going to be your sweet brother-in-law, you better tell me.
KEVIN
F you!
JAMIE grabs KEVIN and pulls him into a headlock. He begins to tug on KEVIN’s arm to get him away from his hold on the bridge.
I ain’t telling you.
JAMIE succeeds in pulling him from the side.
JAMIE
Hope you can swim.
KEVIN is very afraid.
KEVIN
Let go of me, man.
JAMIE
Think you know where that little hole is, that you’ve got to hit when you jump from here, or else your spine goes…
JAMIE snaps his fingers in quick succession as KEVIN struggles.
Just like that!
KEVIN
Let go let go let go of me.
KRISTA
Kev, you come down here.
CHICKY
Krista! Christ, Jamie’s throwing Kevin off the bridge, not the other way ’round.
Fuzzy! Jamie. Let him alone right now!
JAMIE
She wants me to let go of you, Kev, should I?
KEVIN
I’m going to fall, Jamie… I’m gonna fall!
JAMIE
Better tell me.
KEVIN
It ain’t about your stag, okay?
JAMIE
What then?
What, Kev, I’ll drop you.
KEVIN
I’ll tell ya, I’ll tell ya. I’m telling you, man. Just don’t get mad at me when you hear it.
JAMIE
You tell me, I’ll decide who to get mad at.
KEVIN
I heard Earl saying at the dance that he’s putting you on
chainsaw for the summer.
JAMIE
No he ain’t. You don’t make shit on chainsaw.
KEVIN
Starting the Monday after your wedding, he said.
JAMIE fakes it one last time like he’s going to drop KEVIN, then
slowly lets go of him.
JAMIE
That’s funny, I’m giving my week’s notice this Monday.
KEVIN scrambles out of reach.
CHICKY
Kevin, get your ass down here.
JAMIE
She wants your ass, Kev.
KEVIN
You can’t quit, Krista will kill you.
JAMIE
She don’t need to know.
KEVIN
She’s marrying you on Saturday.
JAMIE
A lot can happen in a week. In a week I might be the head of IBM.
KEVIN
He said the next time you quit, he wouldn’t take you back.
JAMIE
I don’t do dumb-ass work.
KEVIN
I’d rather work chainsaw.
Freaked me out too bad, that one time in the processor.
Everything tore up so bad, I couldn’t find my way out.
Four hours lost in the woods.
JAMIE
I leave a tree standing where I go in.
KEVIN
Anyway, Earl won’t take you back.
JAMIE
Earl don’t have shit left to log.
JAMIE hands KEVIN a newspaper clipping.
KEVIN
(reading) “Heli-logging. Training for men and women in an exciting high-paying career in B.C.’s Forestry Industry. Comprehensive three-month heli-pilot training program.”
Like Krista’s going to leave the Valley and move out there.
JAMIE
Krista. Krista!
KRISTA
Get down here, Jamie, we’ve got to get to town.
JAMIE
A wife has to go where her husband goes, right?
KRISTA
Is he going to town?
JAMIE
A wife has to go where her husband goes, right?
KRISTA
Jaaaaaaaaaaamie, come on!
JAMIE
You better answer yes, or this wedding is off.
KRISTA
Yes. Okay, yes. Now can we go to town?
CHICKY
Fuzzy, did you make that call?
JAMIE
You shut your trap about any call, sis. I mean it, too.
CHICKY
Krista, aren’t you curious about this call I’m not supposed to talk about?
KRISTA
Is it about my wedding present from Jamie?
CHICKY
Oh—(Christ). Has Jamie talked about quitting?
KRISTA
He’d better not. I got to pay for the hall and the supper with his next cheque. (urgent) Jamie.
Chicky slips on her shoes and prepares to leave.
JAMIE
Where you going, Chicky?
CHICKY
Home to feed your father.
JAMIE
Let the whore come and cook his dinner.
CHICKY
That’s our mother you’re talking about.
JAMIE
(lightly) Your mother is a whore. My mother is a fucking whore.
CHICKY
Do you ever listen to what comes out of his mouth?
KRISTA
Well, your mom has lived with a lot of men.
CHICKY
(Jesus).
KRISTA
She left you kids when Travis was a toddler, what kind of mother does that?
CHICKY
Okay, I’m going now.
KEVIN
You leaving, Chicky?
CHICKY
I should have been leaving when I got here. I got four hours mowing yet, Reg’s stripping sod on Friday.
JAMIE<
br />
Hey! I ain’t ready to go.
CHICKY
I’m walking.
KEVIN
I’ll walk with you.
JAMIE
Kevin wants a blow job.
KEVIN
Shut up.
JAMIE
I said “new job,” Kevin wants a new job, a nude job.
(laughs) Hey, sis. Save me some dinner.
CHICKY
Why should I?
JAMIE
’Cause I’m your little brother, and you’ve got to take care of me.
CHICKY
Starting Saturday, I don’t, do I?
KRISTA
Call me.
CHICKY and KEVIN leave.
You coming down?
Jamie?
We got stuff to do in town today.
JAMIE
Like what?
KRISTA
Like I already said.
JAMIE comes down.
You’ve got to pick up the washing machine, too.
JAMIE
Don’t know why you’re buying their shit.
KRISTA
Dolores is getting her mother’s.
JAMIE
Dolores is getting her mother’s.
KRISTA
You’re in a pissy mood.
JAMIE
I’m ovulating.
KRISTA
A new one would cost us seven hundred dollars.
JAMIE
Wash at your mother’s.
KRISTA
I’m not doing that, I told you.
JAMIE
I got no place to store a washer.
KRISTA
Take it to the trailer!
JAMIE
Can’t.
KRISTA
You didn’t get the key from Danny yet?
JAMIE
Nope.
KRISTA
He was supposed to move out two weeks ago. He knows we’re
getting married this week. You told him he had to move out. Why ain’t he moved out?
JAMIE
I’ll take it home for now.
KRISTA
Does Danny think he is going to live with us?
I’m calling him and telling him he’s got to be out tomorrow.
JAMIE
I told him he could have the trailer until October.
KRISTA
Yeah, right.
JAMIE
That’s twenty-five hundred in cash.
KRISTA
No way. Jamie, where are we supposed to live? Not with your father.
JAMIE
He knows to leave us alone.
KRISTA
He hates my guts. He don’t speak to me.
JAMIE
We need the money, okay? Every time I turn around you need money for invitations, to rent the hall, to rent white fucking tuxedos to go with the fucking bought bridesmaid off-the-shoulder cocktail-length fucking dress. Then there’s the turkey sit-down meal and four hundred and fifty for the fucking DJ?
KRISTA
I don’t want to live with Clarence.
JAMIE
Krista, the trailer is worth more to us rented. We rent to Danny for
a few months, we’ve got enough to get somewhere.
KRISTA
I told you I don’t want a honeymoon. It don’t matter to me.
JAMIE
I told Danny he has it.
Fuck. You love me or you don’t.
KRISTA
I’m marrying you aren’t I?
KRISTA kisses him playfully until he responds a little.
Weddings cost money.
JAMIE
We’ll have enough by Christmas.
KRISTA
Christmas? Jamie!
JAMIE
I promise. I do I do I do.
He starts to crow like a rooster. He does a sort of endearing rooster dance. KRISTA laughs. He kisses her hungrily.
KRISTA
No. Jamie, we have to go to town.
JAMIE
I can’t wait.
KRISTA
Not here.
JAMIE
Why not?
KRISTA
Robby might come back, or anybody.
JAMIE
So, never stopped us before.
KRISTA
Wellllll… I’ve been thinking.
The wedding is Saturday.
Maybe we shouldn’t, you know, make love until our wedding night.
JAMIE
Funny.
KRISTA
To make it more special.
JAMIE
Krista hon-ey!
KRISTA
Please.
JAMIE
Okay, starting Friday night.
KRISTA
I’m spotting.
JAMIE
Christ.
KRISTA
He said we have to go off the pill after we’re married.
JAMIE
This wedding is really starting to suck the big one.
KRISTA
Don’t say that.
JAMIE
It’s not like not doing it is gonna turn you into a virgin.
KRISTA
Okay, let’s do it, so we can get to town.
JAMIE
What about the… (spotting)
KRISTA
It don’t hurt or nothing, just spotting a bit.
JAMIE
Baby, I wouldn’t last seven days! You make me wait that long, and
the minute you say I do, I’ll be on you. The minister will be saying, “I said kiss the bride, not screw her.”
KRISTA
I hate it when you call it that.
JAMIE
Sorrrry. I said to kiss her not make love to her. Make love to her. Make lovvveee to her.
JAMIE kisses her grandly until she is laughing.
Oh, baby, you know what I like.
KRISTA
Soon as we’re married I’m divorcing you.
JAMIE pulls her down on the sand.
KRISTA takes the hunting knife off his belt and holds it to her mouth. Her tongue touches the tip.
JAMIE
Why do you like that? Doing it with the knife?
She lays the knife carefully beside them. She begins to kiss him.
KRISTA
It makes it more fun.
It makes it fun-er.
They kiss.
Lights down.
Scene 3
CLARENCE sits in his chair with his ear to the phone.
CLARENCE
Betty? You didn’t let me finish. I’m saying they got places now, not like when Trav died, there are places now. I’m just saying don’t
cremate him, because then you got no cells, no DNA.
CHICKY comes in.
(pause) Yeah, Ronnie, I was explaining it to Betty. I’m not trying to kill her with nonsense. I’m trying to be a good neighbour, to give her scientific information…. It’s been on “Oprah,” it’s been on “Larry King Live,” Jesus I’m giving ya hope…
The phone has obviously been disconnected.
CHICKY
You’ve got to stop calling Betty.
CLARENCE
I been wondering if there was going to be any dinner around here.
CHICKY
You heard me.
CLARENCE
They should have flown him straight to Florida.
CHICKY
For Chrissakes Clarence. The
woman’s lost a child. She’s beside
herself.
You should know that.
CLARENCE
I do know. I do know.
I’m telling her they got equipment down there.
CHICKY
He’s dead. He died at the scene.
CLARENCE
They put them in liquid oxygen. Twenty-five years from now they’ll have a cure for it.
CHICKY
There is no cure for a ten-year-old, without a helmet, flying off the back of a dirt bike onto the highway. Don’t call Betty again.
CLARENCE sulks. But he has news that he can’t hold back on.
CLARENCE
I got something in the mail today.
I got something to show you, Chicky.
CHICKY
I thought you wanted your dinner.
CLARENCE
Look, I got it right here.
Here.
CLARENCE opens a large brown envelope and takes out a pencil drawing of a young man of about nineteen.
CHICKY
Who’s that supposed to be?
CLARENCE
It’s an artist rendition.
Read the back.
CHICKY
(reading) “Extend Your Memory is proud to present you with this portrait of your son…”
CLARENCE
Travis, yes!
Jesus, didn’t you recognize our little Trav?
CHICKY stares at the drawing.
It’s what he’d look like today. I sent that school picture of Trav before he got sick to this artist in the States, and that fellow took it and drew him nine years older.
CHICKY gives the drawing back to CLARENCE.
He looks good don’t he?
CHICKY
How much?
CLARENCE
Don’t matter.
CHICKY
We still owe on the headstone. What did Jamie say?
CLARENCE
I’m telling Jamie I’m paying for it out of my disability.
CHICKY
Yeah, you pay for that, then we pay for your smokes.
CLARENCE
Where you been half the day anyway?
CHICKY
At the river with Jamie.
CLARENCE
Ain’t he working?
JAMIE comes in. CLARENCE quickly tucks the picture out of sight.
CHICKY
Apparently no.
Thought you were taking Krista to town?
JAMIE
I am. I had to check on Sky. He’s off his food.
CLARENCE
A bird can’t survive after hittin’ a power line. Not even a big bird like him.
JAMIE
Vet said he could. He had been eating good.
The burn is healing up.
CLARENCE
Eagles that can’t fly lose their will to live.
JAMIE
Like a man that can’t work, right, Clarence?
CHICKY
Speaking of work, are you working nights this week?
Bone Cage Page 2
