by James Reston
NORMAN: Do you have any books on Vietnam?
KATHY (Pause): Yeah, A few.
NORMAN: Are they good books?
KATHY: Well, you know, some are, some aren’t. Why?
NORMAN: I just, you know, wondered, that’s all. (KATHY watches NORMAN go to the stove and fumble around with the coffee percolator. SHE shrugs and goes out. We hear the bathroom door close and, moments later, the sound of a shower running) Actually, I’ve been thinking I’d like to read some books about Vietnam. I mean it’s been going on all this time. I don’t know, though. I’ve never read any books about it. Maybe if I could read one book, then I’d know a little more about it and I could decide if I wanted to read another. Would it be O.K. if I borrowed one of your books to start with? I’d give it back as soon as I finished it. (HE looks around and sees HE’s alone. HE goes out the door. We hear the bathroom door opening and a yell)
KATHY (Offstage): Goddammit, Norman, what are you doing in here?
NORMAN (Offstage): I was wondering if you’d lend me . . .
KATHY (Offstage): Hey, get the hell out of here, I’m taking a shower.
A door slams.
NORMAN (Offstage): I just wanted to know if it was O.K. for me to borrow one of those books about Vietnam.
KATHY (Offstage): Well, Jesus Christ, can’t you wait till I’m done?
NORMAN (Offstage): Oh . . . yeah, I’m sorry. (Pause) Is that all right with you?
KATHY (Offstage): Hey, don’t stand around out there. You can borrow as many goddamn books as you want, only get away from the door, ’cause it just so happens I don’t like a lot of people standing around outside the bathroom door while I’m washing.
NORMAN comes back into the kitchen. HE fixes a little more of the coffee, then goes to the hall door and yells down the hallway.
NORMAN: I’ll just make the coffee first, and when you’re finished in there I’ll come down to your room with you and get the book. Hey, listen, if you decide to have your coffee in here, could you go down to your room first and bring the book in with you? Yes, that’s probably better. Hey, is that O.K.? (Pause) Hey, is that O.K.?
No answer. NORMAN is left baffled, as the lights dim and BOB’s piano chords keep going and going.
Scene 2
It’s a few days later. NORMAN is reading. RUTH is making sandwiches, and COOTIE and MIKE are rolling up a banner.
COOTIE: I don’t know about the wording.
MIKE: I think it’s pretty good wording.
COOTIE: I’m not too happy about it.
MIKE: You’re unhappy about the wording.
COOTIE: Well, I’m not, you know, cut up about it or anything, but I’m definitely not as happy as I could be about it.
MIKE: Ruthie, we need an impartial third voice over here.
RUTH: Who wants orange marmalade?
MIKE: I’d like an orange marmalade.
COOTIE: I want two orange marmalade and one chunky peanut butter, please.
RUTH: How ’bout you, Norman?
COOTIE: And I wouldn’t mind a chunky peanut butter and orange marmalade mixed.
RUTH: Hey, Norman, do you want sandwiches or not?
COOTIE: You gotta have sandwiches handy if you’re coming, Norman. On your average march you’ll find you get through a good two peanut butter and jellies before you even get to where you’re supposed to demonstrate, and then after circling round and yelling militant slogans at the monument or park or poison gas plant or nuclear missile establishment for a couple hours, you’re just about ready for another peanut butter and jelly.
MIKE: Or cream cheese and olives.
COOTIE: Bacon, lettuce, and tomato. I mean, I know you meet a lotta pretty groovy people at these marches, but you can’t count on them having extra sandwiches for a new acquaintance.
RUTH: Hey, Norman, willya please tell me if you’re coming with us or not?
NORMAN (Unfriendly): I’m going with Dick.
COOTIE: You’re lucky there. You’ll get hamburger on toasted roll if you go with Dick. He takes sterno and cooks right out there in the middle of lines of charging cops and tear gas and mace and everything.
DICK enters.
MIKE: Hey, Dick, you better hurry up and get dressed for the march.
COOTIE: Yeah, Dick, you don’t want to be late or all the best ass’ll be grabbed up.
DICK (Indicating banner): What’s it say?
COOTIE: “Buy Government Bonds.”
RUTH: You want some of our peanut butter and marmalade?
MIKE: What’s this about giving away all our peanut butter and marmalade all of a sudden? He wouldn’t give us any of his lousy hamburgers. We had to pay for those hamburgers on common stock.
DICK: Where’s Kathy and Bob?
MIKE: Yeah, where’s good old Bob? (Yells) HEY, YOU GUYS, ARE YOU COMING?
KATHY (Offstage): Yeah, hold on a minute, willya?
MIKE: They’re coming.
COOTIE: Hey, Norman, I been watching you pretty closely for the last few days and I have this definite impression you’ve been displaying hostility toward me, Mike, and Ruth, in that order.
NORMAN: I’m just reading this book . . .
COOTIE: Don’t be negative, Norman. You’re trying to pretend I hadn’t noticed your emotions. You happen to be up against a disciple of Freud, Jung, Adler, Pavlov, Skinner, and the honorable L. Ron Hubbard, to mention but a few. It just so happens I can detect subatomic trace particles of hostility within a six-mile radius of anywhere I am.
MIKE: It’s no use contradicting him, Norman. If he says he can feel hostility, that’s it. I mean, even I can feel it and I’m only moderately sensitive to hostility up to about a hundred eighty yards.
NORMAN: I’m not feeling hostile . . .
COOTIE: You’re not only feeling it, you’re dying to tell us about it. That’s a basic axiom of hostility.
NORMAN: Oh, boy, you guys.
DICK: Leave him alone.
COOTIE: Dick, that’s the worst thing you can do. I know you think you’re being a good shit and everything, but if the guy is riddled with hostility and he doesn’t get it out of his system, it’s gonna go haywire and zing all around inside his body till he’s twenty-eight years old and then he’ll get cancer.
RUTH: You know, we’re gonna be really late if those guys don’t hurry up . . .
MIKE: That reminds me of a guy I was reading about. He got so pent up with hostility his head fell right down inside his body, no shit, that’s what I was reading, right down between his shoulders.
COOTIE: Fell?
MIKE: Yeah, straight down till all you could see was these two little eyeballs peeping out over his collarbone.
COOTIE: Mike.
MIKE: What, Mel?
COOTIE (Pause): Fell?
MIKE (Pause): Sank?
COOTIE: Subsided.
MIKE: Right.
COOTIE: In fact, as I remember it, his head eventually disappeared completely.
MIKE: Don’t rush me, I’m coming to that. Now, Norman, I want you to pay very close attention because this case is a lesson in itself. You see, everybody used to warn this particular guy to loosen up and maybe see an analyst, but the guy refused on the grounds that it would cost too much, and that turned out to be really stupid economy, because with his head inside him like that he couldn’t see anything and he had to hire a guy, full time, seven days a week, to lead him around. The guy was so tight with his money he tried to solve the problem by rigging up this ingenious system of mirrors, like a periscope, but the natural movements of his body kept knocking the mirrors out of alignment, so in addition to the guy that led him around, he had to hire another guy, full time, seven days a week, to keep readjusting the mirrors. You can imagine the expense involved.
COOTIE: There was a very fine article about that guy in the Hostility Journal, spring number. Did you happen to catch that article, Norman?
MIKE: Did it tell about what happened to him?
COOTIE: Well, it was one of those storie
s in two parts, and wouldn’t you know it, that’s just when my subscription ran out.
MIKE: Oh, well, you missed the best part. You see, when his head got down as . . . subsided as far as his stomach . . .
COOTIE: . . . thank you . . .
MIKE: . . . he went and hired a topnotch transplant surgeon to replace his belly button with a flexible, clear plastic window so he could see where he was going.
COOTIE: Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat!
MIKE: And I’m happy to announce, the operation was a complete success.
COOTIE: Fantastic! No problems with rejection or anything?
MIKE: Nope. The Dow Chemical Company set up a ten-man, two-woman research team and they developed a type of clear plastic window that matched the guy’s antibodies perfectly. In a matter of weeks, the guy was able to live a completely normal life again, skin diving, stamp collecting, a lot of political work. He could even go to the movies when he felt like it, but he had to sit up on the back of the seat and it caused a lot of hard feelings with the people sitting directly behind him. But that’s the great thing about the average moviegoing audience; they respected his infirmity.
COOTIE: Fuck a duck!
MIKE: Shut up, sonny boy, I ain’t finished yet.
COOTIE: There’s more?
MIKE: Yeah, you see, the really incredible thing was when the guy woke up one morning and realized his head was still sinking . . .
COOTIE: . . . subsiding . . .
MIKE: . . . and he went to this doctor to check it out. He was just walking along, you know, and when he got to this corner to stop for a red light a dog peed on his leg, and when he bent forward to see what was making his pants wet a guy up on some scaffolding right behind dropped a pipe wrench on his back, and the impact of this wrench, plus the slightly inclined position of the guy’s upper body, knocked his head back into place.
COOTIE: Hot diggity!
MIKE: Well, the guy went apeshit, jumping all over the place, singing songs right out there on the streets . . . and that’s just when it all had to happen. This poor guy, after all his suffering, was finally looking forward to a happy and produtive life . . .
COOTIE: Oh, shit, yeah, I remember now. The poor son of a bitch.
MIKE: Yeah, you ’member, he was just standing out there in the street stopping traffic in both directions, tears of humble gratitude streaming down his cheeks and some stupid . . . (HE sees KATHY and BOB standing in the hallway door ready for the march) . . . oh, hi, Bob, hi, Kathy.
RUTH: Hey, do you guys want some of our peanut butter and marmalade?
BOB: I’ve got an announcement.
COOTIE: We used to have a nearsighted canary . . .
RUTH: Listen, I gotta make these sandwiches and we’re gonna end up short if I don’t get some cooperation around here.
COOTIE: Hey, Norman hasn’t even got a banner. Norman, aren’t you gonna bring a banner?
BOB: Mel, willya please shut up? I’m trying to tell you guys something.
COOTIE: Well, fuck you, I’m talking to Norman. You want him to get all the way down to the demonstration and they disqualify him ’cause he doesn’t have a banner.
RUTH: Everyone is gonna fucking well eat whatever I make.
DICK: You want some help?
RUTH: Look, it’s not like I don’t know how to make sandwiches . . .
MIKE: Hey, everyone, c’mon, c’mon, let’s have a little order around here. Everybody stay where you are and don’t panic. O.K., Bob, I think we got everything under control now.
BOB: Thank you.
MIKE: That’s O.K., Bob.
BOB: I’ve just got this . . .
MIKE: Bob?
BOB: What?
MIKE: Anytime.
BOB: What?
MIKE: Anytime you want a little peace and quiet so you can make an announcement without a lot of people talking over you, just ask me and I’ll do what I can for you.
BOB: Thank you, Mike.
MIKE: That’s O.K., Bob, you’re a good shit.
BOB (Hesitates, trying to find words to frame his vague thoughts. When HE speaks, it is halting): Look . . . I just thought maybe it was about time somebody around here . . .
MIKE: Do you want some water or anything?
RUTH: Oh, for chrissake, shut up, Mike.
COOTIE (Cooling things): Yeah, shut yet mouth, sonny boy, yer creatin’ a public nuisance.’
RUTH: Go on, Bob.
BOB: No, no, look, all I want to say is . . . Norman, if there is one way to remain irrelevant and ineffective it’s to sit with your nose buried in a book while life is raging all around you. (NORMAN looks up and closes his book) Thank you. O.K. Announcement . . . (HE walks around the room, again trying to think of how to put it. As HE starts to speak . . .)
MIKE: Earthquakes in Singapore . . .?
RUTH (Incredible rage): SHUT UP!
BOB: Never mind.
MIKE: Sorry. I’m sorry.
KATHY: What’s wrong, Bob?
BOB: Really, nothing, nothing at all. I just had this stupid thought the other day in humanities. Johnson was saying something idiotic, as usual, and I just started to watch him carefully for the first time talking to us, you know, thirty kids who think he’s a prick, and I realized that he probably thinks all of us are pricks . . . and I just started to wonder what we’re all doing. You know what I mean? What the fuck are we all doing, seriously, tell me, I’d really like to know . . . in twenty-five words or less. . . . No, no, sorry, come on, carnival time. Let’s go marching.
KATHY: I found the letter, Bob.
BOB: What letter? (KATHY takes an official letter out of her bag) Kathy, where did you get that? Come on, give it here.
KATHY: We’re supposed to be like all together in here. If you can’t say it yourself, I’ll say it for you.
BOB is momentarily confused, then realizes that KATHY thinks HE was trying to tell everyone about the letter, HE finds the situation absurd, annoying and funny.
BOB: Kathy, that letter has nothing to do with anything and it’s none of your business and would you please give it back?
KATHY hands the letter to RUTH. RUTH reads.
RUTH: Oh fuck.
RUTH hands the letter on. EACH reads in turn. It ends in MIKE’s hands. BOB waits impatiently as the letter makes its round, HE’S embarrassed and then begins to find it funny that EVERYONE, especially KATHY, has construed the letter as his problem. MIKE is by now looking quite seriously at him.
BOB (Laughing it off): It’s just for the physical. I mean, I’m not dead yet.
As BOB says this, something amusing passes through his mind and HE stops talking, MIKE is looking at the letter again. The OTHERS watch BOB.
MIKE: They misspelled your name?
BOB (Comes out of his brief daydream): Huh?
MIKE: Jobert.
BOB (Amused): Oh, yeah.
MIKE: Jobert Rettie. Dear Jobert Rettie. Hi, Jobert.
BOB: Hi, Jike.
MIKE: Good old Jobert.
COOTIE: How ya feelin’, good old Jobert?
BOB: Dead, how ’bout you?
MIKE (Sees what’s happening and comes to the rescue. Pause): Hi, Jel.
COOTIE: Hi, Jike.
MIKE: Hi, Jorman.
NORMAN: Huh?
MIKE: Hi, Jorman.
NORMAN: Oh, hi.
MIKE: Hi, Jathy, hi Jick.
DICK: Fuck off.
MIKE: Juck off? Why should I juck off, Jick?
The doorbell rings. COOTIE rushes over and answers it. At the door, a young man [RALPH] in a suit and tie and horn-rimmed glasses, with an attache case, which HE has concealed just out of sight behind the doorframe.
COOTIE: Hi, Jister.
MIKE: Ask him his name, Jel.
COOTIE: What’s your name?
RALPH: Ralph.
COOTIE: Hi, Jalph, I’m Jel and that’s Jathy, Jorman, Jike, Jick, and Job, and we’re just on our way down to City Hall to beat the shit out of some cops. Wanna come?
RALP
H (Pauses momentarily, then launches his pitch): I’m from the University of Buffalo and I’m in the neighborhood doing market research. You don’t mind my asking you a few questions, do you? (As HE says this last, HE reaches down, takes up his concealed attache case, bends his head like making ready for a dive, and advances swiftly but deliberately into the middle of the room. This swift movement, plus the running patter, is designed to force the average housewife to back away and give ground, but since COOTIE merely steps aside when RALPH bends down for his attache case, we are treated to the entire technique out of context. RALPH ends up in the middle of the room still bent over, motionless. HE looks up and around and straightens himself, laughing nervously at EVERYONE watching him) Do all you people live here?
MIKE: No, we’re just using the place for a few days. This is a fantastic coincidence because the guy that lives here just went away for a few days to do a series of special guest lectures at the University of Buffalo.
RALPH: Really? No kidding? That’s some coincidence, huh? That’s really a fantastic coincidence. Well, ahhh, here’s what I’d like to do. I’d like to interview one of you people. I’ll choose one of you at random and everybody else can listen and if the guy I choose has a particular opinion that differs significantly from what the rest of you believe, we’ll just stop and take a consensus, O.K.? Hey, you guys all work, don’t you? I mean, you’re not students or anything?
COOTIE: We mostly hold various government jobs.
RALPH: I see. Are any of you married?
RUTH: I’m married to him [MIKE] and she’s married to him [KATHY and BOB].
BOB: Actually, we’re getting a divorce.
RALPH: Oh, I’m very sorry.
BOB (Very sincerely to RALPH): No, please. It’s just, I’ve been dying for a while, nothing serious, you know, but now I’ve decided I’m definitely dead, you see, so I’ll have to change my name. It’s a legal technicality. We’ll marry again under my new name. Jobert. (Pause) Job.
RALPH: Oh . . . well . . . that’s certainly very unusual. Now this is going to get a little difficult, really. I’ve got to improvise some of these questions because the standard form is pretty rigid, like, you know, it asks things about your children’s opinions and that would hardly apply in a case like . . .
