DAVID: I’m sick. You’re walking out on a sick person.
MAUREEN: We’ve taken
you to the doctors. They said there’s
nothing wrong with you.
DAVID: It’s Exile’s
disease.
MAUREEN: David, that
is not a disease.
DAVID: So all these
people are just making it up? That’s
what you’re saying? People from all
around the world who all have this one thing in common are just coming up with
this on their own?
MAUREEN: I trust the
doctors.
DAVID: That’s because
you are one.
MAUREEN: That might be
why, yes.
DAVID: Are you coming
back?
MAUREEN: Of course I’m
coming back.
DAVID: I know you
hate it here.
MAUREEN: I wasn’t too
fond of Rhode Island either, but I lived there for most of my life. I get used to things. You’re never going to like where you
live. You don’t appreciate something
until it’s not staring you in the face everyday.
DAVID: So you do miss
it?
MAUREEN: What?
DAVID: Rhode Island?
MAUREEN:
Sometimes. Don’t you?
DAVID: I miss
Bristol. The Fourth of July parade. I miss that.
MAUREEN: Of all
things to miss.
DAVID: Why can’t I
miss that?
MAUREEN: We have a
Fourth of July parade here.
DAVID: Not like the
one in Bristol.
MAUREEN: All Fourth
of July parades are the same, David.
DAVID: Some are
better.
MAUREEN: David—
DAVID: Some are
better, Maureen. It’s a fact.
MAUREEN: Are you
going to be okay while I’m gone?
DAVID: No.
MAUREEN: Why are men
such babies when they’re sick?
DAVID: So you agree
that I’m sick?
MAUREEN: I think you
think you’re sick, and that’s enough to make you act like a child.
DAVID: I’m not acting
like a child.
(A
beat.)
Can you
make me spaghetti before you go?
MAUREEN: I have to
catch a plane.
DAVID: Do you really
need to go back?
MAUREEN: Aren’t you
even slightly concerned about our daughter?
DAVID: She’s at
college, Maureen. She’s not pregnant in
Bombay.
MAUREEN: Mumbai.
DAVID: What?
MAUREEN: It’s Mumbai
now, not Bombay. And what made you say
that?
DAVID: I don’t know,
I just—it was just an example.
MAUREEN: That’s—never
mind. I have to get going.
DAVID: What time is
the appointment?
(A
beat.)
MAUREEN: What?
DAVID: With the doctor? What time are you seeing the doctor?
MAUREEN: I…David, I—
DAVID: You thought I
wouldn’t find out?
MAUREEN: It’s
nothing.
DAVID: If it was
nothing, you would have told me.
MAUREEN: Minor
surgery, that’s all.
DAVID: For what?
MAUREEN: It’s
exploratory. They need to find out what’s
going on inside of me.
DAVID: So they’re just
going to—what?—poke around in there?
MAUREEN: I wanted
them to try—whatever they could try.
DAVID: Why didn’t you
go to a hospital here?
MAUREEN: Because I
didn’t want you to go off on the kick you’re already on—that, somehow, by being
exiled, I’ve contracted—something.
DAVID: But you might
have.
MAUREEN: But I haven’t. That’s not what this is.
DAVID: Have you had
the symptoms?
MAUREEN: The symptoms
are everything, David. Sneezing is a
symptom. Headaches are a symptom. Not being able to breathe underwater is a
symptom.
DAVID: Maureen, this
is serious.
MAUREEN: Don’t you
think I know that?
DAVID: Then call it
what it is. There is something wrong
with us, and it’s because they made us leave.
MAUREEN: Well then, I
should be fine in six hours, because I’m going back to Rhode Island.
DAVID: And what if
you are fine when you get back? Then what? Will you stay there?
MAUREEN: I—I mean, it
would make sense for me to—Wouldn’t you?
I mean, wouldn’t you want to be there if it meant we’d be healthy?
DAVID: I don’t like
having to do something just because it’s good for me.
MAUREEN: Well, now
you sound like a New Englander.
DAVID: If we go back,
I want it to be because we want to, not because we have to.
MAUREEN: Even if it
means life or death?
DAVID: Is that what
you think it could mean?
MAUREEN: I don’t
know. That’s the—I don’t know. Maybe something about being here is making me
sick. Maybe it’s making you sick
too. Maybe I’ll be just as sick in Rhode
Island, but—It’s not like we have any great life here, David. It’s pretty average. It wouldn’t be heartbreaking to leave, would
it?
DAVID: And then
what? Never leave again?
MAUREEN: Well…we used
to take vacations. Nothing happened when
we were only gone for a week or so.
Maybe just being away for a longer—
DAVID: So we’re going
to die there? In Rhode Island?
MAUREEN: You have to
die somewhere, David. What’s so bad
about Rhode Island?
DAVID: I just…Being
sick and then hearing you on the phone with the doctor—
MAUREEN: So that’s
how you found out.
DAVID: It made me
think about dying. How I want to
die. I just…I have very romantic notions
about it, and I’m not sure Rhode Island coincides with those notions.
MAUREEN: David, ultimately,
you die in a hospital. In a bed. With me standing next to you.
DAVID: Not if you’re
dead.
MAUREEN: David, I won’t
die before you die.
DAVID: What makes you
so sure?
MAUREEN: Because
right before I die, I plan on killing you so I go last.
DAVID: (Laughs.) Maureen, I—
MAUREEN: A hospital,
David. A bed. Hopefully one by a window. And that’s all you get. Nobody drives you to the shore like in
Beaches so you can die watching a sunset.
It’s a lot more pedestrian than that.
DAVID: And that doesn’t
depress you?
MAUREEN:
(Shrugs.) I find it
comforting. Like Target.
DAVID: Target?
MAUREEN: Most Targets
are all the same. To some extent. When we first moved here, I got homesick—even
though I didn’t think I would. So, I
would go to Target and pretend I was still in Rhode Island. It always worked. I think death will be the same way. Put me in a hospital, close the curtains, and
I’ll tell myself I’m wherever it is I want to be.
DAVID: Or we could just…get
in a car and…drive until we can’t drive anymore.
MAUREEN: Oh
David. You are not Thelma, and I am not
Louise.
DAVID: Maybe we were
just meant to be trapped in that tiny little state forever.
MAUREEN: I do miss
our girl.
DAVID: Well, that’s a
given.
MAUREEN: Remember the
days when you lived down the street from your kids.
DAVID: When we
thought about moving to Boston after we first got married, my mother said ‘You
might as well be going to China.’
MAUREEN: Now we’re a
plane ride away and it’s…
(A
beat.)
DAVID: Speaking of
planes—
MAUREEN: I better get
going.
DAVID: Me too.
MAUREEN: What do you
mean?
DAVID: Oh, I booked a
ticket. After I was done eavesdropping.
MAUREEN: David—
DAVID: Don’t even
attempt to talk me out of it. You know
better than that.
MAUREEN: Fine.
(Kisses
his forehead.)
I love you.
DAVID: Are you
sure? I booked first class and left you
in Coach.
MAUREEN: That means
if the plane goes down you’ll go first.
DAVID: I wouldn’t
want it any other way.
(They
smile. Lights.)
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