This Is An Abandoned Building

                (An abandoned building.  C. and M. stand facing each other.)

C:  This is an abandoned building.

M:  Roof fall.  Danger.  Destory.

C:  Back.  Back to me.

M:  Sorry.

C:  Repeat.

M:  This is an abandoned building.

C:  Struggling?

M:  So much.

C:  The comet hasn’t hit yet.

M:  Yet.

C:  They shouldn’t have let you go.

M:  And you?

C:  I’d be all right.  I wasn’t really all that crazy.  Just suicidal.  Suicide now seems…redundant.

M:  But me?

C:  You’re crazy.

M:  Cruel.

C:  You need to stay here no matter what.

M:  Drops lightly, makes a splash.  Makes impressions.

C:  Stop with the poetry.  Try to focus on making sense.

M:  I’m not good at this.

C:  You need to learn.

M:  There’s a reason I was where I was.

C:  It’s time to recalibrate.  In a few short hours, mankind is going to be experience a major step forward in its history.

M:  Termination.

C:  Maybe.  Or we have the opportunity to evolve.

M:  That would take millennia.

C:  The rules are different now.

M:  The rules aren’t different just because we say they are, or because they have to be.  Nature doesn’t shift when it’s convenient for us.

C:  Then explain to me why I can breathe underwater.

                (A beat.)

M:  What?

C:  I’ve done it.  I can do it.  Get me a bucket and fill it up with water and I’ll show you.

M:  We should be conserving our resources, not doing parlor tricks.

C:  First we have to straighten you out.

M:  I feel fine.  The medication must be settling in.

C:  But what happens when it wears off and then we run out?

M:  Then you should leave me here.

C:  I can’t leave you here.

M:  Why not?  This is a hotel.

C:  No, it’s not.

M:  Fine, it’s a gymnasium.

C:  No, it’s not.

M:  A hall of mirrors then!  A underground train station!  A notebook factory!

C:  This is an abandoned building.

M:  I know that.  I was just messing with you.

C:  Say it.

M:  This is an abandoned building.

C:  Believe it.

M:  You can’t make me believe something I don’t believe.

C:  You don’t believe where we are?

M:  I think we’re still back where we were.

C:  They let us go, remember?

M:  I don’t know.

C:  Do you remember something else?  Do you remember us escaping?  Do you think they’re looking for us right now?  To take us back and have us die in little cells like prisoners?

M:  I remember waking up next to you on the bus.

C:  What bus?  There wasn’t a bus.

M:  Then I don’t remember that.

C:  You’re faltering.

M:  I’m not a robot.

C:  You sound like one.

M:  And you sound like a technician, but I’m not a robot and you’re not my fixer, so back off.

C:  What am I going to do if something happens to you?

M:  I’m not going to die.

C:  Worse than that.  If you…I’d have to leave you.

M:  Leave me where?

C:  Here?  Somewhere.  I don’t know.  I just couldn’t be responsible for you.  I can’t be responsible for anybody.  Those days are over.

M:  I can take care of myself.

C:  What day is today?

M:  Wednesday.

C:  Lucky guess.

M:  What day is today?

C:  What?

M:  You asked me now I’m asking you and I just told you so you should be able to tell me.  What day is today?

C:  It’s—uh—

M:  Is it Thursday?

C:  Uh…

M:  Is it Tuesday?

C:  This is an abandoned building.

M:  I didn’t ask you that.

C:  But I know that.

M:  But that’s not what I asked you.  What day—

C:  It’s Thursday!

                (A beat.)

M:  You need to stay here.

                (M. starts to leave.)

C:  Where are you going?

M:  I can’t take you anymore.  I can’t be responsible.

C:  You’re not.  You’re not!

M:  If you die, it would traumatize me.  If you become—I’m in no state myself.  At least, I don’t think I am.  And with the circumstances—

C:  Then bring me back.  If you’re going to leave, then bring me back first.

M:  Back to where?  Where are we?

C:  This is an abandoned building.

M:  Is it?

C:  Yes!

M:  You sure?

C:  Why are you doing this?

M:  We need to depend on each other.  I can’t depend on you.  I want to believe I can, the same way you wanted to believe you could, but flocks fly and chickens die, don’t they?  Cluck cluck.

C:  What?

M:  Disaster impending, sending waves of—oh God.

C:  It’s happening, isn’t it?

M:  You need to take care of me.

C:  You were going to leave me!

M:  Because I couldn’t take care of you, and now I can’t take care of myself.  Descriptions, prescriptions, nothing helps.  Nothing helps.  Testing—

C:  Stop!  Let’s go back.  Let’s play our game again.  Let’s tell each other things we know.

                (They begin speaking over each other.)

M:  No, instead, believe, derive, derivative—

C:  This is an abandoned building.

M:  Mess, fees, loss, knees, script—

C:  This is an abandoned building.

M:  Trust, must, lust, fuss, fess up, all right?

C:  This is an abandoned building.

M:  Loss.

C:  I think.

M:  Loss.

C:  I think I know, I…

M:  Wait.

                (They stop.)

M:  Did you hear that?

                (Nothing.  They listen.  They wait.)