Короткие пьесы - [53]
(PETER starts crying. MICHAEL tries to hug him but is pushed away.)
MICHAEL: We have talked about a lot… about a lot big things… adult things… It’s all new to you… I’ve been completely honest with you… and I love you.
PETER: I want Papa…
MICHAEL: He’ll be home soon for dinner… Let’s try not to upset him… He’ll be tired. Papa doesn’t know that you know so much. (Pause) This has been hard for me. I’m tired too. (Pause) And now if you don’t want to play “hide and seek,” tell me where my razor is.
PETER: Why do you want your razor?
MICHAEL: I’d like to shave and shower, and put on a clean shirt, neaten up for dinner…
PETER: You haven’t shaved all week and now that Papa is coming home you want to shave!
MICHAEL: Jake likes me clean-shaven…
PETER: So you and Papa can kiss each other?
MICHAEL(stunned): What have you seen?
PETER: I saw how you and Papa kissed… I never saw him kiss my other babysitters… Every babysitter left after awhile, and another one came. Why are you always here?
MICHAEL: Papa entrusts you to me. We agreed we’d see how you and I got along.
PETER: You’ll be here, even when Papa is home?
MICHAEL: We all will be sort of like a family.
PETER: A family?
MICHAEL: Not a family like your friends Andy or Zack has with their parents… It would be another sort of family…There are a lot different kinds of families nowadays…
Our family would be a better family than you having one babysitter and then another babysitter. We will all get to know each other better.
PETER: It means you’ll live with us always?
MICHAEL: Maybe….I like to read to you… I like to play with you… I love you. (Pause) We’ll get different kinds of power from each other… Like Harry Potter has powers beyond anybody else…
PETER: What kind of powers?
MICHAEL: Who knows? So much happens that we don’t understand…
(PETER has been getting more and more unsettled.)
Peter, what do you want to ask me about? What’s the matter?
PETER: I don’t it like when you pick me up at school!
MICHAEL: Why not?
PETER: When you started to come, the mothers and babysitters hurried my friends away. (Pause) Yesterday Andy and Zack didn’t let me play with them. Today they pushed me around and called me “fairy!”… I want a babysitter like all the other kids.
MICHAEL: I’d better talk to your teacher…
PETER (Beginning to cry): No! No! You can’t go to school… No don’t talk to Mr. Allen
MICHAEL (nervously): Peter, OK… Don’t cry… I only want to help you… Soon your Dad will come and he’ll see your tears… I promise not to go to school…
PETER (Stops crying): I can take care of myself. (Pause) I think your razor is in my room…
(MICHAEL, relieved and smiling, exits. PETER pushes the old drawing aside and starts a new drawing.
MICHAEL (beginning to cry): Peter! I don’t see it!
PETER: Where are you?
MICHAEL: I’m by your table.
PETER: Cold.
MICHAEL: Now I’m standing near your bed…
PETER: Warmer!
MICHAEL: Here it is. It was under your pillow!
(We hear the razor running as PETER concentrates on drawing. MICHAEL returns with the razor running he shouts over the razor noise.)
Up to your old tricks again? I won’t have time to shower… I’ll just change my shirt then I’ll set the table.
(He turns the razor off.)
I have a nice pot roast and in the oven. What do you want for dessert?
PETER: Key lime pie.
(MICHAEL suddenly peers at PETER’s drawing.)
MICHAEl: What’s this?
PETER: It’s you.
MICHAEL: But I shaved off my beard.
PETER: I drew it from memory.
MICHAEL: Why my portrait?
PETER: To take to school and give to Mr. Allen. (PETER is watching Michael with a smile)
MICHAEL: What for?
PETER: I’ll tell him… you are kind of my mother… do you think the teacher will understand me?
MICHAEL: Mr. Alen will understand you, but your friends will not understand.
PETER: I don’t know what to do?
MICHAEL: Don’t cry. I have idea. Your father has black hair, but you are blond. I think you are like your mother. You could paint your face with long hair and say to Mr. Alen that this is your mother.
PETER: This is idea, thank you. And you could take your portrait for the idea.
MICHAEL: Thank you, I will nail it in my room… I love you…
THE END
FATHER’S DAY
DADDY: 40 years old
SARA: 15 year old daughter
DADDY sits at kitchen table. He just wearing socks. He’s sipping a beer, he appears sort of depressed. There is a news paper, but he is looking at a picture of a middle aged woman. There is a pile of neatly folded laundry on the edge of the table.
There is the sound of footsteps. He sighs kisses the picture and puts the picture down. SARA flounces in texting on her cellphone. She throws off her backpack full of books.
DADDY: Hi Princess… Why Late? Heavy backpack!
SARA: Bio today. That book is the heaviest. Field hocky went late..
DADDY: I was missing you!
SARA: You’re missing Mom.
DADDY: You’re getting pretty. Like your Mom. All the men used to look at her.
SARA: Daddy! Mom again?
DADDY: She died two years ago tomorrow…
SARA (looking at the photo of her mother) I know…. I still have dreams about her.
DADDY: I wish you knew more about her.
SARA: (running stage left