Treading Backward Thru Quicksand by Sandra Marie Vago
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This Play is the copyright of the Author and must not be Performed or Copied without the Author's prior consent THE SET:
A rooftop apartment with ledge on West 83rd Street in New York City.
Center: a table and a couple of metal and plastic weave lawn chairs, a
single separate chair near the chimney, some wilted plants, a tree
that needs water in an old planter. There is a door leading into
Sophie's apartment and an old barbecue pit near it. The backdrop
should give us the feel of a rooftop, rent controlled apartment on the
Upper Westside, the noisy, grittiness of New York City with a touch
here and there of Sophie's outrageous and colorful, playfulness.
AT RISE:
Mattie, a woman looking younger than her years, is talking and
nervously walking as she does. Sophie, outrageously dressed and doing
Tarot cards, watches her and occasionally walks around checking the
roof as if looking for something as Mattie talks.
MATTIE: I dreamt…no, not dreamt, actually experienced death last
night…Maybe this morning…yes, it was still dark but it had to be
around four thirty or five, I was sleeping, I wasn't awake, it was
either that or I was actually dead.
(Sophie gets up and is looking for something.)
SOPHIE: Go on, I'm listening.
MATTIE: It was just so…weird. I've never been dead before.
SOPHIE: I'd say, this is a good thing.
MATTIE: Did you lose something?
SOPHIE: Just Bernie, but he'll show up. You want some
wine?
MATTIE: It's 11:00 AM.Maybe just one glass of red.
SOPHIE: So, go on, you were in the middle of dying?
MATTIE: Geeeze, it certainly felt like it!
SOPHIE: Unless my eyes deceive me, you're still alive.
MATTIE: Minchia, Soph, it was a dream. I mean, I'm sure it was,
I'm here, I'm alive But whoa, everything seemed so real…it
stopped dead, my brain turned off…so to speak. It was pretty scary,
I mean it's impossible to turn off every single solitary thought,
right? Even when you think you're not thinking, you are thinking.
There they are, thoughts, popping in and out of your head like kernels
of corn in a microwave.
(Sophie looks up.)
SOPHIE: Mine would burn. I never could make popcorn in the microwave.
MATTIE:
I was not speaking in the literal sense.
(Sophie walks to the edge of the roof and looks off shivering.)
SOPHIE: So…go onthe thoughts were popping…
MATTIE: Well, that's how I knew I wasn't actually dead!
SOPHIE: You were maybe smoking a little of that Colombian Gold we used
to smoke before you went to bed?
MATTIE: No, I was not…We smoked that in 1978!
SOPHIE:
That's right…Pretty good stuff, if I remember.
MATTIE: Anyway, once I realized that dead people don't think, you
know, I was okay.
SOPHIE: I beg to differAre you saying my Bernie doesn't think?
MATTIE: This is very difficult for me to tell you, Soph, but no, I
don't! And you'll forgive me for this next statement but,
especially not since they buried him.
SOPHIE: Well, he does, and he let's me know about it too… All the
time, he let's me know about it! Okay…so, did you see a white
light? If you didn't see a white light, you didn't die completely,
the thoughts would stop popping…you know.
MATTIE: White light or not, I was close enough! If I'd been any
deader, I'd have been…really dead!
SOPHIE: How do we know for sure who's really dead and who's not?
Like my Bernie… For years the man never spoke ten words in one
breath, then he passed and now you can't shut him up!
SOPHIE (To Bernie's chair): Now, he drives me meshugenna!.... Just
kidding, Boubie! A little levity, a very little levity….
(She is again looking for something.)
MATTIE: Sophie, sit downcan I get you something?
SOPHIE (to Bernie's chair): You want I should lie? Who knew?
MATTIE: Soph, Bernie was a quiet man when he was alive but, trust me
on this one, he isn't talking to you now because he is, forgive me,
definitely dead.
SOPHIE: So maybe he's not completely dead?
MATTIE: You're starting to scare me!
SOPHIE: Don't be such a pischer! If you died last night, at least
you came back without being buried first. Others have not been so
lucky…. Where the hell did he go now, he's starting to disappear
sometimes? Why, Mattie?
MATTIE: Hello…Earth to Sophie! Help!
SOPHIE: You do need help, I'll try calling Bernie again, he can tell
us what's going on.
MATTIE: Call him where? In the Bronx? At his office? Where you gonna
call him?
SOPHIE: BERNIE!!! Dammit, BERNIE!
Mattie slaps her hand over Sophie's mouth.
MATTIE: Don't do that!
SOPHIE: Never mind, he's here. Bout time too, I was getting
worried. You wanna burger?
MATTIE: Bernie or Me?
(Sophie pours them more wine and goes back to her Tarot cards.)
MATTIE: Maybe another glass of wine, a very big glass…
SOPHIE: We should do the Tarot cards. They were trying to tell me
something the minute you started talking about the dying thing. I got
these really weird signs, like the Hanged Man, followed by The Moon
and then….
MATTIE: No! I do not want you to read my cards. I always get the Tower
and you know how much I hate heights…. You got the hanged man?
SOPHIE
It's not always the card, but where it falls. I'm telling you
they were spelling out your future.
(She starts laying out the cards again.)
MATTIE: I don't wanna know!
(She takes a seat next to her anyway and watches her lay them out.)
SOPHIE: I didn't believe either, then last March, the cards told me
Bernie would try and kill Harry Greenbaum, my lawyer, he used to play
Bridge with us at the Center on Sundays. One night he came by to read
me his…nothing, just some papers and when he left…
(Louder and addressing it to Bernie's chair.)
SOPHIE: I did not want Harry to read me your Will….Will, schmill,
who needs it? I didn'tOh really, well I thought pushing him in
front of a speeding taxi was too good for him!
MATTIE: My god, Bernie pushed Harry Greenbaum into a speeding taxi?
SOPHIE: No, Bernie's hands would've gone right through Harry, unless
you suddenly believe he's really here?...No?Well, anyway this is
man that I loved for 30 years and if he didn't like Harry flirting
with at me when we played cards at the center, why did he want him
reading me his damned Will?
MATTIE: Sophie, you're making me crazy!
SOPHIE: Where was I?
MATTIE
I'm no longer sure.
(She gulps down her wine)
SOPHIE: Doesn't matterI've missed you. We haven't done much,
like we used to, since the funeral.
MATTIE: You were going through a lot, I didn't wanna add my
dumb problems. The kids moving out after college and then just stupid
things with Frank, you had enough to deal with…
SOPHIE: You know, Mattie, this dying dream you had, I think it's Frank
who's killing you.
MATTIE: You're totally pazzo, Soph!
SOPHIE: It's true.
(Sophie turns to Bernie.)
Awright, awready! The man who doesn't talk is really kvetching… He
says I should tell you…. The dreamit could mean that something
inside you is dying….your heart.
MATTIE: My heart?
SOPHIE: When I lost Bernie, something died for me too; only in my case
it was him!
(Mattie hugs her)
Not to worry, he's still here making me crazybut you, Mattie, you
need a life, one with love!
MATTIE: Not so easy.
SOPHIE: You're telling me?
(To Bernie)
Okay awready! Oy, this man! He says, maybe this dying dream was a good
thing.
MATTIE: Ah, yesThank you, Bernie!
SOPHIE: He says you're welcome. Maybeit's time to leave home
and start a new life before they carry you out feet first?
MATTIE: Right, I'll just go start a new life!
SOPHIE: You can't live without love.
MATTIE: I've been living without it for 25 years…. God, why did I
say that?
SOPHIE: Maybe because it's true? Bernie says
MATTIE: Butt out, Bernie!
SOPHIE: Okay, Mattie…if you won't leave Frank, maybe you should
have an affair!
MATTIE: What?
SOPHIE: I should just happen to know a very nice widower, Mr.
Shapiro…
MATTIE: Mr. Shapiro, the dry cleaner? The man is 79 years old! You
don't get out much now, do you Sophie?
SOPHIE: Okay, so maybe he isn't the best choice
(to Bernie)
What? No! You think?!
(To Mattie)
Ah, Bernie thinks maybe there's someone you're already
considering?
MATTIE: I am not considering Danny O'Reilly. Stop talking to
Bernie.
SOPHIE: Oh, so it's an Irishman that you're not considering?
MATTIE: Yes…I mean no! Got anymore wine?
SOPHIE: Too bad, I used to get horny watching those old Irish Spring
commercials…I only joke, Boubie.
(She pours them another glass.)
SOPHIE: Danny O'Reilly, I know this name?
MATTIE: Dammit, you're right you know…not Bernie, you and NOT
about me having an affair, about Frank.
SOPHIE: Good, so this means, instead of him killing you, we are gonna
kill him?
(Sophie empties the wine in their glasses.)
MATTIE: Maybe we should open another bottle.
SOPHIE: Not literally kill Frank. Not with, like with a 9mm automatic
...although in his case I could make an exception!...Sorry, I jest.
MATTIE: Ah haI'm never quite sure, Sophie. But leave Frank. I
can't I leave a man I've been married to for 25 years.
SOPHIE: Frank? Sure you can, move in here with me! We can put a bed in
Bernie's office, he's not using it now.
MATTIE ( In a whisper): A bed in Bernie's office?
SOPHIE: Mattie, it's not "the haunting", it's Bernie. He doesn't use it anymore.
[end of extract]
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