The Preferred Death of Kings

A boardroom.

MICHAEL is sitting.  GARY has just walked in.

MICHAEL:  Gary, are you all right?

GARY:  I’m a little shaken to be honest with you.

MICHAEL:  Is it the news about the merger?  Because we’re keeping our dental plan, but you’ll probably have to switch dermatologists.

GARY:  No, that’s—I just used the men’s room.

MICHAEL:  Well, I’d like to stop talking now and just begin the meeting.

GARY:  There’s nobody else here.

MICHAEL:  I know.  We’re the meeting.

GARY:  I thought we were meeting with corporate.

MICHAEL:  I’m corporate now.  Hi, Gary.

GARY:  Oh corporate, thank god you’re here.  I have a huge problem.

MICHAEL:  Well, I’m happy to pretend to help.  What can I pretend to do for you?

GARY:  I was just in the men’s room—

MICHAEL:  You really need to take this up with your union.

GARY:  We don’t have a union.

MICHAEL:  Well, I’d tell you to start one, but then I’d have to fire you.

GARY:  It’s really not that big of a deal, although it has rattled me to my core.

MICHAEL:  Were you coughing up blood like King what’s-his-name?

GARY:  Henry?

MICHAEL:  Hmm—did King Henry cough up blood?  I guess they all must have at some point.

GARY:  Michael, listen to me.  I was in the men’s room—

MICHAEL:  That was sort of the preferred death of kings.

GARY:  --And a woman walked in.

(A beat.)

MICHAEL:  A woman?

GARY:  Yes.

MICHAEL:  It wasn’t Louis from Payroll with the soft skin?  By the way, we fired him.

GARY:  No, it was a woman.  She said there was a line to get into the women’s room—

MICHAEL:  I believe that.  We’ve turned half the women’s bathrooms into silent, men-only meditation closets.

GARY:  It doesn’t matter.  There shouldn’t be women in the men’s room.

MICHAEL:  I couldn’t agree more.  You must have been really traumatized.

GARY:  I was!

MICHAEL:  Well, the good news about the merger should help calm you down.  Without this deal, I’d be out of a job, did you know that?

GARY:  The whole company would fold.

MICHAEL:  Exactly.  You should have told that to the woman who was traumatizing you.  She was startling a man right before he was about to go into an important meeting about a company-saving merger.  Did you recognize her?

GARY:  Well, she had womanly hair.

MICHAEL:  Okay.

GARY:  The legs of a woman.

MICHAEL:  Shoot, I should be writing this down.  Why is there no paper in here?  Oh right, we burned all the paper to save money.  Okay, go back and describe her again, but this time I’m going to repeat what you’re saying back to you so I won’t forget it.

GARY:  Womanly hair—

MICHAEL:  The breasts of an angel.

GARY:  No.  I mean—

MICHAEL:  The lips of a devil.

GARY:  Her lips were—

MICHAEL:  The promise of a young, hopeful basketball player.

GARY:  She was a redhead.

MICHAEL:  We have redheads here?  I thought they all worked in the Omaha office.

GARY:  Maybe it was a wig.

MICHAEL:  Did you try pulling at her hair?

GARY:  I thought about it, but she looked very strong.

MICHAEL:  Women can be surprisingly strong.  My wife once threw me into an oak dresser.

GARY:  Why did she do that?

MICHAEL:  Well, the house was on fire.  She was very upset.

GARY:  Oh.

MICHAEL:  And I was trying to talk to her about our cable bill, and she just shoved me out of the way as if she’s the one paying for all that HBO.

GARY:  This woman looked very fit.

MICHAEL:  Could she have been my wife?

GARY:  I never met your wife.

MICHAEL:  No, I mean, do you think she and I would look good together?  I’m looking for a new wife.  The old one never came back after the house burned down.

GARY:  Uh—

MICHAEL:  She really liked that house.

GARY:  Michael, are you going to do something about this?

MICHAEL:  I rebuilt the house, Gary.  And I put up a porch light in case she was looking for me.  I’m not sure what else I can do.

GARY:  No, I mean, about women using the men’s room?

MICHAEL:  Oh that!  I think we should just change all the bathrooms into napping pods.  Wouldn’t that be nice?

GARY:  But then where would we go to the bathroom?

MICHAEL:  In the privacy of your own home, where else?

GARY:  I can’t wait all day to use the bathroom, Michael.  Sometimes I’m here for nine—ten hours!

MICHAEL:  Are you talking about overtime?

GARY:  Well—

MICHAEL:  No more of that, Gary.  From now on, work only as hard as you have to work but look as though we’re paying you to work twice as hard as you’re actually working.

GARY:  And where should I pee?  In a bucket next to my cubicle?

MICHAEL:  This conversation is inappropriate.

GARY:  How?

MICHAEL:  Because it’s making me feel uncomfortable.  Although these pants are too tight, so that could be it as well.

GARY:  Can’t you just give the women their bathrooms back?

MICHAEL:  Gary, it’s a slippery slope.  You give them back their bathrooms, and the next thing you know, you’re giving them back maternity leave.

GARY:  You took away maternity leave?

MICHAEL:  Well, first we asked them to stop having babies, and they said we couldn’t ask them to do that, so then we just took away maternity leave, and now we’re finding that it’s pretty difficult to have a baby if you have to go to work every day and calling out gets you fired.

GARY:  You can’t call out?  What about sick time?

MICHAEL:  Are you sick?  If so, please don’t come near me.  My immune system was compromised by inhaling all that smoke during the fire.

GARY:  This has become a really terrible place to work.

MICHAEL:  Because of the rats?

GARY:  What?

MICHAEL:  What?

GARY:  What rats?

MICHAEL:  Rats?  Who said anything about rats?  Those three we found under your desk were probably left there by your union to send a message.

GARY:  You found three rats under my desk?

MICHAEL:  Don’t worry.  Two of them were dead.  We think the third one killed them.  When there are that many of them, they start cannibalizing each other.  It’s a fascinating thing to—

GARY:  I quit.

MICHAEL:  Gary, I’m not saying you’re a sexist—

GARY:  What?

MICHAEL:  But the fact that you can’t share a bathroom with a woman is—

GARY:  There’s only one stall!  We were standing next to each other!

MICHAEL:  She was standing?

GARY:  She was waiting for me to finish.

MICHAEL:  Did you finish?

GARY:  No, I was too nervous.

MICHAEL:  You really shouldn’t hold it in, Gary.  It’s not healthy.

GARY:  You just told me to wait until I go home!

MICHAEL:  Well, maybe you should go home now.  Of course, if you do, you’ll be leaving early, and that could result in disciplinary action.

GARY:  I am going home.  I’m going home because I quit.

MICHAEL:  Fine.  What is it you do here exactly?

GARY:  I’m in charge of the merger.

MICHAEL:  The—Oh.

GARY:  Good luck, Michael.

MICHAEL:  I don’t suppose you’d write me a letter of recommendation.

GARY:  Michael, I didn’t even know you worked here until you called this meeting.

MICHAEL:  So you wouldn’t say I’m a model employee then?

GARY:  Good-bye.

(GARY exits.)

MICHAEL:  If my wife ever comes back, she is not going to be happy about this.

                End of Play