The Normal Heart and The Destiny of Me: Two Plays

by Kramer, Larry

  FELIX: Maybe it isn’t paranoia. Maybe what we do with our lovers is what we should be thinking about most of all.

  (The phone rings. NED answers it.)

  NED: Hello. Hold on. (Locating some pages and reading from them into the phone.) “It is no secret that I consider the mayor to be, along with the Times, the biggest enemy gay men and women must contend with in New York. Until the day I die I will never forgive this newspaper and this mayor for ignoring this epidemic that is killing so many of my friends. If. . .” All right, here’s the end. “And every gay man who refuses to come forward now and fight to save his own life is truly helping to kill the rest of us. How many of us have to die before you get scared off your ass and into action?” . . . Thank you. (He hangs up.) I hear it’s becoming known as the Ned Weeks School of Outrage.

  FELIX: Who was that?

  NED: Felix, I’m orchestrating this really well. I know I am. We have over six hundred volunteers now. I’ve got us mentioned in Time, Newsweek, the evening news on all three networks, both local and national, English and French and Canadian and Australian TV, all the New York area papers except the Times and the Voice. . .

  FELIX: You’re doing great.

  NED: But they don’t support me! Bruce . . . this fucking board of directors we put together, all friends of mine—every single one of them yelled at me for two solid hours last night. They think I’m creating a panic, I’m using it to make myself into a celebrity—not one of them will appear on TV or be interviewed, so I do it all by default; so now I’m accused of being self-serving, as if it’s fun getting slugged on the subway.

  FELIX: They’re beginning to get really frightened. You are becoming a leader. And you love to fight.

  NED: What? I love it?

  FELIX: Yes!

  NED: I love to fight? Moi?

  FELIX: Yes, you do, and you’re having a wonderful time.

  NED: Yes, I am. (Meaning FELIX.)

  FELIX: I did speak to one of our science reporters today.

  NED: (Delighted.) Felix! What did he say?

  FELIX: He’s gay, too, and afraid they’ll find out. Don’t yell at me! Ned, I tried. All those shrinks, they must have done something right to you.

  NED: (Giving FELIX a kiss with each name.) Dr. Malev, Dr. Ritvo, Dr. Gillespie, Dr. Greenacre, Dr. Harkavy, Dr. Klagsbrun, Dr. Donadello, Dr. Levy . . . I have only one question now: why did it have to take so long?

  FELIX: You think it’s them, do you?

  NED: Dr.—I can’t remember which one—said it would finally happen. Someone I couldn’t scare away would finally show up.

  FELIX: At the baths, why didn’t you tell me you were a writer?

  NED: Why didn’t you tell me you worked for the Times? That I would have remembered.

  FELIX: If I had told you what I did, would you have seen me again?

  NED: Absolutely.

  FELIX: You slut!

  NED: Felix, we weren’t ready then. If I had it, would you leave me?

  FELIX: I don’t know. Would you, if I did?

  NED: No.

  FELIX: How do you know?

  NED: I just know. You had to have had my mother. She was a dedicated full-time social worker for the Red Cross—she put me to work on the Bloodmobile when I was eight. She was always getting an award for being best bloodcatcher or something. She’s eighty now—touring China. I don’t think I’m programmed any other way.

  FELIX: I have something to tell you.

  NED: You’re pregnant.

  FELIX: I was married once.

  NED: Does that make me the other woman?

  FELIX: I thought I was supposed to be straight. She said I had been unfair to her, which I had been. I have a son.

  NED: You have a son?

  FELIX: She won’t let me see him.

  NED: You can’t see your own son? But didn’t you fight? That means you’re ashamed. So he will be, too.

  FELIX: That’s why I didn’t tell you before. And who says I didn’t fight! What happens to someone who cannot be as strong as you want them to be?

  NED: Felix, weakness terrifies me. It scares the shit out of me. My father was weak and I’m afraid I’ll be like him. His life didn’t stand for anything, and then it was over. So I fight. Constantly. And if I can do it, I can’t understand why everybody else can’t do it, too. Okay?

  FELIX: Okay. (He pulls off one of his socks and shows NED a purple spot on his foot.) It keeps getting bigger and bigger, Neddie, and it doesn’t go away.

  End of Act One

  Act Two

  Scene 8

  EMMA’s apartment. EMMA and NED are having brunch. She uses a non-motorized, i.e., regular, wheelchair.

  NED: You look very pretty.

  EMMA: Thank you.

  NED: Where’s your cat?

  EMMA: Under my bed. She’s afraid of you.

  NED: Do you think being Jewish makes you always hungry?

  EMMA: I’m not Jewish.

  NED: You’re not?

  EMMA: I’m German.

  NED: Everyone thinks you’re Jewish.

  EMMA: I know. In medicine that helps.

  NED: How many of us do you think already have the virus in our system?

  EMMA: In this city—easily over half of all gay men.

  NED: So we’re just walking time bombs—waiting for whatever it is that sets us off.

  EMMA: Yes. And before a vaccine can be discovered almost every gay man will have been exposed. Ned, your organization is worthless! I went up and down Christopher Street last night and all I saw was guys going in the bars alone and coming out with somebody. And outside the baths, all I saw was lines of guys going in. And what is this stupid publication you finally put out? (She holds up a pamphlet.) After all we’ve talked about? You leave too much margin for intelligence. Why aren’t you telling them, bluntly, stop! Every day you don’t tell them, more people infect each other.

  NED: Don’t lecture me. I’m on your side. Remember?

  EMMA: Don’t be on my side! I don’t need you on my side. Make your side shape up. I’ve seen 238 cases—me: one doctor. You make it sound like there’s nothing worse going around than measles.

  NED: They wouldn’t print what I wrote. Again.

  EMMA: What do you mean “they”? Who’s they? I thought you and Bruce were the leaders.

  NED: Now we’ve got a board. You need a board of directors when you become tax-exempt. It was a pain in the ass finding anyone to serve on it at all! I called every prominent gay man I could get to. Forget it! Finally, what we put together turns out to be a bunch as timid as Bruce. And every time Bruce doesn’t agree with me, he puts it to a board vote.

  EMMA: And you lose.

  NED: (Nods.) Bruce is in the closet; Mickey works for the Health Department; he starts shaking every time I criticize them—they won’t even put out leaflets listing all the symptoms; Richard, Dick, and Lennie owe their jobs somehow to the mayor; Dan is a schoolteacher; we’re not allowed to say his last name out loud; the rest are just a bunch of disco dumbies. I warned you this was not a community that has its best interests at heart.

  EMMA: But this is death.

  NED: And the board doesn’t want any sex recommendations at all. No passing along anything that isn’t a hundred percent certain.

  EMMA: You must tell them that’s wrong! Nothing is a hundred percent certain in science, so you won’t be saying anything.

  NED: I think that’s the general idea.

  EMMA: Then why did you bother to start an organization at all?

  NED: Now they’ve decided they only want to take care of patients—crisis counseling, support groups, home attendants . . . I know that’s important, too. But I thought I was starting with a bunch of Ralph Naders and Green Berets, and the first instant they have to take a stand on a political issue and fight, almost in front of my eyes they turn into a bunch of nurses’ aides.

  EMMA: You’ve got to warn the living, protect the healthy, help them keep on living. I’ll take care of the
dying.

  NED: They keep yelling at me that I can’t expect an entire world to suddenly stop making love. And now I’ve got to tell them there’s absolutely no such thing as safe sex . . .

  EMMA: I don’t consider going to the baths and promiscuous sex making love. I consider it the equivalent of eating junk food, and you can lay off it for a while. And, yes, I do expect it, and you get them to come sit in my office any day of the week and they’d expect it, too. Get a VCR, rent a porn film, and use your hands!

  NED: Why are you yelling at me for what I’m not doing? What the fuck is your side doing? Where’s the goddamned AMA in all of this? The government has not started one single test tube of research. Where’s the board of directors of your very own hospital? You have so many patients you haven’t got rooms for them, and you’ve got to make Felix well. . . So what am I yelling at you for?

  EMMA: Who’s Felix? Who is Felix?

  NED: I introduced you to him at that Health Forum you spoke at.

  EMMA: You’ve taken a lover?

  NED: We live together. Emma, I’ve never been so much in love in my life. I’ve never been in love. Late Friday night he showed me this purple spot on the bottom of his foot. Maybe it isn’t it. Maybe it’s some sort of something else. It could be, couldn’t it? Maybe I’m overreacting. There’s so much death around. Can you see him tomorrow? I know you’re booked up for weeks. But could you?

  EMMA: Tell him to call me first thing tomorrow. Seven-thirty. I’ll fit him in.

  NED: Thank you.

  EMMA: God damn you!

  NED: I know I should have told you.

  EMMA: What’s done is done.

  NED: What are we supposed to do—be with nobody ever? Well, it’s not as easy as you might think. (She wheels herself directly in front of him.) Oh, Emma, I’m so sorry.

  EMMA: Don’t be. Polio is a virus, too. I caught it three months before the Salk vaccine was announced. Nobody gets polio anymore.

  NED: Were you in an iron lung?

  EMMA: For a while. But I graduated from college and from medical school first in my class. They were terrified of me. The holy terror in the wheelchair. Still are. I scare the shit out of people.

  NED: I think I do, too.

  EMMA: Learn how to use it. It can be very useful. Don’t need everybody’s love and approval. (He embraces her impulsively; she comforts him.) You’ve got to get out there on the line more than ever now.

  NED: We finally have a meeting at City Hall tomorrow.

  EMMA: Good. You take care of the city—I’ll take care of Felix.

  NED: I’m afraid to be with him; I’m afraid to be without him; I’m afraid the cure won’t come in time; I’m afraid of my anger; I’m a terrible leader and a useless lover . . .

  (He holds on to her again. Then he kisses her, breaks away from her, grabs his coat, and leaves. Emma is alone.)

  Scene 9

  A meeting room in City Hall. It’s in a basement, windowless, dusty, a room that’s hardly ever used. NED and BRUCE wait impatiently; they have been fighting. BRUCE wears a suit, having come from his office, with his attaché case. Both wear overcoats.

  NED: How dare they do this to us?

  BRUCE: It’s one-thirty. Maybe he’s not going to show up. Why don’t we just leave?

  NED: Keeping us down here in some basement room that hasn’t been used in years. What contempt!

  BRUCE: I’m sorry I let you talk me into coming here. It’s not the city’s responsibility to take care of us. That’s why New York went broke.

  NED: What we’re asking for doesn’t cost the city a dime: let us meet with the mayor; let him declare an emergency; have him put pressure on Washington for money for research; have him get the Times to write about us.

  BRUCE: The mayor’s not going to help. Besides, if we get too political, we’ll lose our tax-exempt status. That’s what the lawyer in your brother’s office said.

  NED: You don’t think the American Cancer Society, the Salvation Army, any charity you can think of, isn’t somehow political, isn’t putting pressure on somebody somewhere? The Catholic Church? We should be riding herd on the CDC in Atlanta—they deny it’s happening in straight people, when it is. We could organize boycotts. . .

  BRUCE: Boycotts? What in the world is there to boycott?

  NED: Have you been following this Tylenol scare? In three months there have been seven deaths, and the Times has written fifty-four articles. The month of October alone they ran one article every single day. Four of them were on the front page. For us—in seventeen months they’ve written seven puny inside articles. And we have a thousand cases!

  BRUCE: So?

  NED: So the Times won’t write about us, why should we read it?

  BRUCE: I read it every morning. The next thing you’ll say is we should stop shopping at Bloomingdale’s.

  NED: We should picket the White House!

  BRUCE: Brilliant.

  NED: Don’t you have any vision of what we could become? A powerful national organization effecting change! Bruce, you must have been a fighter once. When you were a Green Beret, did you kill people?

  BRUCE: A couple of times.

  NED: Did you like being a soldier?

  BRUCE: I loved it.

  NED: Then why did you quit?

  BRUCE: I didn’t quit! I just don’t like being earmarked gay.

  NED: Bruce, what are you doing in this organization?

  BRUCE: There are a lot of sick people out there that need our help.

  NED: There are going to be a lot more sick people out there if we don’t get our act together. Did you give up combat completely?

  BRUCE: Don’t you fucking talk to me about combat! I just fight different from you.

  NED: I haven’t seen your way yet.

  BRUCE: Oh, you haven’t? Where have you been?

  NED: Bruce, Albert may be dying. Why doesn’t that alone make you want to fight harder?

  BRUCE: Get off my back!

  NED: Get off your ass!

  (TOMMY enters.)

  TOMMY: Wonderful—we finally get a meeting with the mayor’s assistant and you two are having another fight.

  BRUCE: I didn’t have the fight, he had the fight. It’s always Ned who has the fight.

  TOMMY: Where the hell are we? What kind of tomb is this they put us in? Don’t they want us to be seen above ground? Where is he? I’m an hour late.

  NED: An hour and a half. And where’s Mickey?

  TOMMY: Not with me, lambchop. I’ve been up at Bellevue. I put a sweet dying child together with his momma. They hadn’t seen each other for fifteen years and he’d never told her he was gay, so he didn’t want to see her now. He’s been refusing to see her for weeks and he was furious with me when I waltzed in with her and . . . It was a real weeper, Momma holding her son, and he’s dead now. There are going to be a lot of mommas flying into town not understanding why their sons have suddenly upped and died from “pneumonia.” You two’ve been barking at each other for an hour and a half? My, my.

  BRUCE: Tommy, he makes me so mad.

  NED: CBS called. They want our president to go on Dan Rather. He won’t do it. They don’t want anybody else.

  BRUCE: I can’t go on national television!

  NED: Then you shouldn’t be our president! Tommy, look at that. Imagine what a fantastic impression he would make on the whole country, speaking out for something gay. You’re the kind of role model we need, not those drag queens from San Francisco who shove their faces in front of every camera they see.

  BRUCE: You want to pay me my salary and my pension and my health insurance, I’ll go on TV.

  TOMMY: Both of you, stop it. Can’t you see we need both your points of view? Ned plays the bad cop and Bruce plays the good cop; every successful corporation works that way. You’re both our leaders and we need you both desperately.

  NED: Tommy, how is not going on national TV playing good cop?

  (MICKEY enters.)

  MICKEY: I couldn’t get out
of work. I was afraid you’d be finished by now.

  BRUCE: (To MICKEY.) Did you see his latest Native article?

  MICKEY: Another one?

  NED: What’s so awful about what I said? It’s the truth.

  BRUCE: But it’s how you say it!

  MICKEY: What’d you say?

  NED: I said we’re all cowards! I said rich gays will give thousands to straight charities before they’ll give us a dime. I said it is appalling that some twenty million men and women don’t have one single lobbyist in Washington. How do we expect to achieve anything, ever, at all, by immaculate conception? I said the gay leaders who created this sexual-liberation philosophy in the first place have been the death of us. Mickey, why didn’t you guys fight for the right to get married instead of the right to legitimize promiscuity?

  MICKEY: We did!

  TOMMY: I get your drift.

  MICKEY: Sure you didn’t leave anybody out?

  NED: I said it’s all our fault, every one of us . . .

  (HIRAM KEEBLER, the mayor’s assistant, enters, and NED carries on without a break.)

  . . . and you are an hour and forty-five minutes late, so why’d you bother to come at all?

  BRUCE: Ned!

  HIRAM: I presume I am at last having the pleasure of meeting Mr. Weeks’ lilting telephone voice face to face. (Shaking hands all around.) I’m truly sorry I’m late.

  MICKEY: (Shaking hands.) Michael Marcus.

  HIRAM: I’m Hiram Keebler.

  TOMMY: Are you related to the folks who make the crackers? Tommy Boatwright.

  BRUCE: Bruce Niles.

  HIRAM: The mayor wants you to know how much he cares and how impressed he is with your superb efforts to shoulder your own responsibility.

  BRUCE: Thank you.

  NED: Our responsibility? Everything we’re doing is stuff you should be doing. And we need help.

  TOMMY: What Mr. Weeks is trying to say, sir, is that, well, we are truly swamped. We’re now fielding over five hundred calls a week on our emergency hot line, people everywhere are desperate for information, which, quite frankly, the city should be providing, but isn’t. We’re visiting over one hundred patients each week in hospitals and homes and . . .