Busy?
FAYE: But she wasn’t out to wreck your life?
JULIE: Oh no—goodness, not at all.
FAYE: That’s nice. It gives you a leg up.
JULIE: Yes. I’ve certainly had good luck.
FAYE: . . . You’re a happy woman, aren’t you?
JULIE (Truly contrite): I’m so sorry.
FAYE: I don’t begrudge you.
I don’t understand it—Benny, that pischer.
JULIE: He’s your brother—it would be unseemly if you did under / stand.
FAYE: But everything you gave up.
JULIE: I didn’t give up anything.
FAYE: The movies! You were a movie / star
JULIE: I was a teenager
FAYE: You were delightful.
JULIE: My main talent was not looking like Sandra Dee.
Or whoever was being Sandra Dee that year.
It was only four movies, isn’t that something?
Just a phase, really.
I love that it happened to me but it was nothing to give up. And I’ve loved everything that’s happened to me since just as much.
FAYE: You make it sound as if you never did anything on purpose.
JULIE: It’s been like that.
I’ve always just been borne along to pleasant places.
FAYE (Affectionately): You’re a disgrace.
JULIE: I know—I’m a throwback, it’s dreadful.
Terrible times—hellacious times and
I’ve slipped between the cracks.
I’ll surely burn for eternity.
But for now . . .
FAYE (Wandered back to her own distress): But this is what I think, though. Tell me if you agree:
If you’ve lost someone—if someone is lost to you—
hurting them is a way of having them.
Isn’t it? A blow like a signature.
A claim.
Yes?
JULIE: . . . Yes. I’m sure / that’s so
FAYE: So, in that case, to wound is to love.
Isn’t it? Don’t you think?
JULIE: I’m certain it is.
FAYE: Really? You agree?
JULIE: Yes. I do.
FAYE (Bursting into tears): But it’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever said!
JULIE: What can I do? How can I help?
FAYE (Rummages through her bag): No, I’m fine, I can handle this. (Rummages harder. Panic, then the dread realization. No longer crying, beyond that) Oh God. Oh God.
JULIE: What?
FAYE: Julie—
JULIE: Yes?
FAYE: There’s something you can do.
JULIE: Anything—
FAYE (Urgent): Give me a pill.
JULIE: Oh—I’m sorry—damn it, I’m not depressed!
I’ve got nothing. Don’t you have a prescription somewhere?
FAYE: How nutty I am these days—
I left the bottle in Roslyn.
You have to have something.
JULIE: . . . There might be a few Valium
FAYE: I’ll take them
JULIE: But they’re from when I was pregnant.
FAYE: With which?
JULIE: Timmy.
FAYE: Fine
JULIE: He’s four, Faye.
FAYE: I’m no connoisseur, I won’t notice if they’re a little stale—
JULIE: What if they’ve gone poisonous?
I would hate for Christmas to turn into some bathetic Jackie Susann situation with you sprawled on the kitchen floor.
FAYE: Do you want me to hate you the way everybody thinks I should?
JULIE: I don’t . . .
FAYE: Then gimme.
JULIE: Does everybody think you should hate me?
FAYE: Yes.
JULIE: Why?
FAYE: Don’t be disingenuous, just pass me the Valium. Please.
(Julie reluctantly does. Faye starts unscrewing the lid.)
JULIE: Wait until I get you water at least—
FAYE: Water isn’t necessary, water is a garnish. (She swallows them. She’s instantly calmer)
JULIE: That’s uncanny.
FAYE: This isn’t calm; it’s the anticipation of calm.
(Julie smiles uncertainly.)
The goose, on the other hand, looks perfectly at ease.
JULIE (Calls out): Everybody get ready for dinner!
FAYE (Calls): And that’s you, too, Mort!
Library. Ben and Mort with drinks. They’ve been talking.
BEN: Yes. Well . . . Yes.
MORT: Sure. Everything was under the counter, then.
When Faye worked at Goody’s store, do you think he was paying taxes?
BEN: I dunno.
MORT: Every third day, the register was “broken.”
She wrote receipts by hand.
She was making numbers up.
That whole family. That’s what they were like.
BEN: I suppose.
(They nod at each other. Pause. More a standoff, really.)
Are we going to continue this way?
MORT: What way is that?
BEN: Chitchatting in this mode.
MORT: I got nothin’ else goin’ on.
BEN: You’ve always been a brutal man, Mort.
(Beat.)
MORT: Okay.
BEN: Your whole family was
MORT: I know you think that.
BEN: Your father was a thug. And your mother—I don’t even want to name what your mother was.
(Beat.)
MORT: My mother was a beautician.
BEN: In the front room.
MORT: People had loose lips.
BEN: I popped my cherry in the back room of that “beauty parlor” so you can drop the veneer with me.
(Beat.)
MORT: It was the Depression.
BEN: People were seamstresses.
People were locksmiths.
People had jobs sticking labels on dented cans.
(Beat.)
MORT: That was them.
(Beat.)
BEN: A fucking string of phony rubies!
MORT: You should lower your voice.
BEN: I can’t believe you’d—I’m incredulous to think
it’s come to this—it’s beyond the power of my imagination—
MORT: You don’t have to imagine nothing. It’s true.
BEN: If my sister knew what you were doing
MORT: But she won’t.
BEN: Do you understand what hokum this is?
MORT: Nah, I don’t see that, / Benny.
BEN: A ruby necklace—it’s Agatha Chris—it’s
Arsène Lupin! We’re a potboiler here!
Snapshots? A private detective?
MORT: There’s no pri / vate detective
BEN: This spy
MORT: A friend, a goddamn Teamster—
BEN: Teamsters! Morty . . . This is crazy.
You see me on the street. With some woman. In an incautious moment.
Suddenly the world is upended?
I mean: Come on. I love Julie.
I love my wife.
I love my family.
MORT: Oh I know that, Benny. If you didn’t, I wouldn’t have anything to work with here.
BEN: You’re making something ruinous out of this nothing?
MORT: Nothing? You think that’s nothing?
BEN: Hypocrite! Like you’ve kept it in your pants for thirty / years
MORT: In fact yes.
BEN: Bull / shit
MORT: Jewish boys make the best husbands. Everybody says.
BEN: Oh so what? You’re excommunicating me now?
MORT: Excommun / icating?
BEN: You’re eliminating me from the race—relig—tribe, whatever it is we are?
. . .
Listen. We’re nothing to each other, you and I. We’re . . . holiday-tolerant.
I grew up on Van Buren Street. You were on Kosciuszko.
Two blocks apart.
I have n
o memory of you.
When I was in the back room of your mother’s “beauty parlor,” I had no idea you were in the apartment upstairs.
We both went to movies at The Sumner.
So what?
How did it get us here?
What happened that made you hate me so much?
MORT: I don’t give a crap about you, Benny, I never have.
You’re okay.
You couldn’t play stickball for shit but you were a little kid. Maybe you improved.
Anyway, it’s in the past.
This is just business, Benny.
BEN: This is not how business is done.
MORT: Isn’t it?
I thought it was.
BEN: . . . This is unimagin / able
MORT: Again with the imagining.
You don’t gotta imagine nothing, Benny.
Just do.
BEN: Morty, the thing is . . . this was a gift; it was a gift from my mother to my wife
. . . Let me give you money instead
MORT: Not interested.
BEN: It will exceed the value of this paste, this piece of junk that / you’ve set your
MORT: I do nicely
BEN: Oh yes, your career as a “fruiterer”?
I’m not even pursuing it—
MORT: I make a nice living.
I got no complaints.
BEN: No complaints?
MORT: Uh-uh . . .
BEN (Says it): Your entire life has been determined by a drunken fuck with a woman you didn’t know and don’t love and that led to a child you regret.
(Nothing Ben has said before has got to Mort; this stops him. He stares at Ben, almost trembling, angry and hurt and contemptuous. He looks as if he might do something, lunge, but he controls it. Pause.)
MORT: You don’t understand shit, Benny. (Decides to pretend to toss it off)
I don’t mind.
So what are you gonna do?
(Pause. Mort takes Polaroids out of his chest pocket, looks at them, puts them back.)
BEN: Your bidding.
MORT: . . . So nu?
BEN: . . . I’m going to my mother’s hospital room. I’m going to spend some time alone with her.
MORT: Uh-huh.
BEN: While I’m there, she’s going to have a sudden lucid spasm. During which she’ll instruct me as to her wishes regarding the disposition of the “ruby necklace” she gave my wife to celebrate our engagement. So many years ago.
MORT: Very, very good.
BEN: I’m going to return home and report them.
To Julie.
And because she is impeccable—because she is impeccable, Mort—she’s going to give me her blessing.
So sweetly.
And then I will hand over to you this piece of crap you so covet.
MORT: Very very good.
BEN: Yes.
MORT: When you gonna do it?
BEN: Tomorrow morning.
(Beat.)
MORT: When you gonna do it?
(Beat.)
BEN: Tonight.
After the panettone . . . And the cognac.
And before the demise.
Presumably.
MORT: Good, Benny.
Good boy.
JULIE (Off, from a distance): Everybody get ready for dinner! /
FAYE (Off, from a distance): And that’s you, too, Mort!
You better give me those Havanas. (Ben hands them over)
They’re illegal, you know.
You’re dealing in illegal cigars, Benny.
You know what that is?
(Ben looks at Mort.)
Unimaginable to me.
A hallway. Jeff on the phone.
JEFF: No, we haven’t eaten yet. They eat late.
So where were you when I called before?
Oh. What movie?
Un-huh. No I didn’t see—
Uh-huh . . .
So what did you do after?
Oh.
Un-huh.
And how was
Uh-huh. Their spare ribs have always been very hit-or-miss.
. . .
Yeah it’s great here.
It’s incredible.
You would love the apartment, Mom—it’s like the sets of those plays you love.
With the “breezy dialogue.”
They sort of talk that way and everybody’s unbelievably nice and, like, gracious and happy.
It’s like you go to New York and you look for New York but it isn’t there? But it’s here . . .
Maybe you will some day.
Maybe they’ll invite you, who knows?
I’m the only non-blood relative, so
. . . Okay, I know how to behave you don’t have to give me tips in etiq—
They’ve already invited me for the summer!
They like me.
Yeah, they’ve got a place on (He forgets where)
The Vineyard.
Saltbox, very Hughdie Auchin
. . . Yes I told her.
I told her, Mom.
I’ll tell her again to be sure.
You loved her in the movies especially in—uh-huh.
No. She can’t come to the phone—
it’s chaos here—masses of people.
Yeah—masses of blood relatives.
Yeah, like Catholics.
So. What?
Don’t ask if you can ask just ask
. . .
I can’t believe you’re asking that.
I can’t believe you’re aski—
Why did I reverse the charges?
Do you—
What?
do you begrudge me the dollar fif—
I can’t fargin myself a phone call to my par
. . .
No, they didn’t ask me to—I did this at my own—
Because it’s the considerate
. . .
What?
That is so twisted.
That is such a tortuous—
No—they are not going to think that I think they’re cheap.
They will not take this as an insult.
Maybe because they have developed beyond the ghetto mentality that has dominated you and destroyed any chance you—
Jesus. Jesus—
Why are you trying to make me—
Why do you want me to think I’ve erred . . .
Just because you might feel ill-at-ease at a place like—
Listen.
Do not attempt to inoculate me with your fucking
first-generation diasporic insecuri—
No it is not pretentious—if you had ever
read a book or had an idea you would—
God! This is so fucking indicative!
You’re so fucking primitive! This is so fucking typical!
The way you pounced on the buffet table at graduation brunch I thought I’d
(Controlling himself:)
No I didn’t bring that up then and I’m not
(He takes deep breaths.)
JULIE (Off): Everybody get ready for dinner!
FAYE (Off): And that’s you, too, Mort!
JEFF: Listen
I’ve got to dress for dinner . . .
Yes. They do.
Because it’s fucking civilization here.
Merry Christmas. Oh yeah right, I forgot, you’re so Orthodox.
Joyous Tisha B’Av. (Hangs up)
Hallway/Timmy’s room. Scotty pauses a moment.
Timmy’s in bed singing to himself. Scotty comes in.
SCOTTY: Timmy?
Timmy?
TIMMY: Scotty.
SCOTTY: Hey how do you feel, buddy?
TIMMY (Mutters): Okay.
SCOTTY: You still got a fever? You still a little hot? (Kisses his forehead)
Not too bad.
Right, buddy?
You feeling a little better?
(Timmy nods.)
Good.
TIMMY: You eat yet, Scotty?
SCOTTY: Not yet.
TIMMY: What are you gonna eat?
SCOTTY: Oh now, I’m not gonna tell ya that, bud. ’Cause I don’t want you to puke when I say we’re having mm-mm and you picture it and you puke. You don’t want that to happen, do you?
TIMMY: No.
SCOTTY: No . . . So you been okay when I was gone?
Till you got sick, I mean?
TIMMY: Yeah.
SCOTTY: ’Cause I missed you.
TIMMY: I missed you, too.
SCOTTY: Well, I hope so.
Because I would be devastated if that were not the case, bud.
Absolutely de-molished.
TIMMY: I know.
SCOTTY: Yeah . . .
And Mommy and Daddy?
Have they been okay?
When I was gone?
(Timmy nods.)
Yeah?
Nothing oogly and disgooted about Mommy and Daddy when I was gone?
(Timmy laughs.)
TIMMY: No.
SCOTTY: Okay.
Good.
Know what, babe?
You get better, I’m ’onna take you places.
TIMMY: Where?
SCOTTY: The Planetarium. With the stars, right?
An’ it’ll just be you an’ me, okay?
None of the inglebroody and incrappitated people need apply.
TIMMY: Yeah.
SCOTTY: Good.
JULIE (Off): Everybody get ready for dinner!
FAYE (Off): And that’s you, too, Mort!
SCOTTY: That’s me bud. I’m everybody.
TIMMY: But you’re not every everybody.
SCOTTY: That’s very true. And thank you for pointing it out.
I’m not every everybody.
I’m just the majority of everybody.
You go to sleep, okay?
I’ll come look in on you later but you won’t know it
’cause you’ll be where the wild things are.
(He kisses Timmy on the forehead.)
Love ya, bud.
(Timmy grabs Scotty’s head and kisses him on the forehead.)
TIMMY: You feel hot.
SCOTTY (Smiling): Ya know what you are, kiddo?
TIMMY: What?
SCOTTY: A laff-riot. (He starts off, looks back) So everything’s okay, right?
Part of the kitchen and part of the dining room.
Faye and Julie emerge from the kitchen with dishes.
JULIE: Come! Come and witness the immemorial scene:
Women Bearing Platters of Food!
Hurry before it’s lost to the Mists of—oh!
(Scotty enters the dining room. Then Ben and Mort. Julie, having deposited her tray on the table, goes to Scotty.)
Sweetie, you’re all sparkly! You look as if you’ve been bathing all day in waters fed by artesian—are you getting Timmy’s flu? (Because she’s hugged him and put her hand to his forehead and he feels warm)
The Assembled Parties Page 4