Month: April 2014

pt 98: WATER

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Scampi: I didn’t know that that episode of Tintin with the Emir and Prince Abdullah and everything used to be different.

 

Peter: Excuse me?

 

Scampi: Peter!

 

Peter: Yes?

 

Scampi: Pay attention.

 

Peter: Different in what way?

 

Scampi: When it was first written. Before the Germans took Belgium.

 

Peter: I see.

 

Scampi: Well, yeah. Then he changed it. Hergé. You know what I’m saying?

 

Peter: A Tintin book was revised.

 

Scampi: The one with the Emir.

 

Peter: I could point out, ahem.

 

Scampi: What?

 

Peter: I believe there are several occasions where the Emir makes an appearance in a Tintin comic.

 

Scampi: So what?

 

Peter: So you can’t say, “The one with the Emir”.

 

Scampi: Yes, I can. I just did.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: If we were in a boat.

 

Peter: [alarmed] Are we in a boat?

 

Scampi: Oh, I see.

 

Peter: We are not in a boat. Currently.

 

Scampi: Make up your mind.

 

Peter: It was you who brought it up.

 

Scampi: I did. Boats.

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: It was hypothetical. Theoretical.

 

Peter: The vessel?

 

Scampi: Vessel! The situation.

 

Peter: Oh.

 

Scampi: Do you want to cross the water?

 

Peter: Now? Or in general?

 

Scampi: Such questions.

 

Peter: I have a certain amount of maritime competence.

 

Scampi: Oh, no doubt.

 

Peter: It is the case.

 

Scampi: The water is wide.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: Would you trail your fingers in the water?

 

Peter: When?

 

Scampi: In the boat. That we aren’t in.

 

Peter: I have no idea.

 

Scampi: Part of me can see it. Them. You know. Your fingers trailing along in the lake.

 

Peter: Fascinating.

 

Scampi: That’s right. But the other part.

 

Peter: GRUMBLES & RUMBLES.

 

Scampi: A blackness. There’s a hole where the picture should be.

 

Peter: This is all very exciting.

 

Scampi: Well, yes. It is. Are you leaning back, drifting? Happy?

 

Peter: Your imagination is getting the best of you, it seems.

 

Scampi: Or it’s getting the worst of you.

 

Peter: I don’t know what that means.

 

Scampi: Precisely!

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: I could steer.

 

Peter: Oh?

 

Scampi: You could scan the sky for weather.

 

Peter: In our non-existent watercraft.

 

Scampi: Yes.

 

Peter: I’m sure that would be very nice.

 

Scampi: Are you humouring me?

 

Peter: Perhaps unsuccessfully.

 

Scampi: I think we need to make it to the other side. I think this could be the way.

 

Peter: Such urgency. Are we attempting some sort of escape?

 

Scampi: What do you think?

 

Peter: I think you are behaving like a felon on the run.

 

Scampi: So?

 

Peter: What I said earlier about your imagination still stands.

 

Scampi: You should be so lucky.

 

Peter: Pardon?

 

Scampi: Talking about my imagination like that.

 

Peter: There was no insult intended.

 

Scampi: Don’t bite the hand that feeds you.

 

Peter: I do not tend to mistake human flesh for comestible material.

 

Scampi: Yeah, sure.

 

PETER GLOWERS. BUT LIGHTLY.

 

Scampi: Did you know that the only thing filthier than a human bite is the bite of a Komodo dragon?

 

Peter: This is plausible, I suppose.

 

Scampi: Komodo dragons go around biting things and then going back and gobbling them up once they, the things, pass on. They eat rotten stuff.

 

Peter: I shall have to look this up.

 

Scampi: Oh, right. Don’t take my word for it.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: You know the capital of North Dakota?

 

Peter: Excuse me?

 

Scampi: Stop stalling. Do you know it?

 

Peter: Well, I. Let me think.

 

Scampi: Bismarck!

 

Peter: Right. Yes.

 

Scampi: Ha.

 

Peter: What are you crowing about now?

 

Scampi: Nothing. Just talking about the world at large.

 

Peter: I see.

 

Scampi: Mature conversation.

 

Peter: Perhaps you should work on the art of the segue.

 

Scampi: Fiddlesticks.

 

Peter: It was simply a suggestion.

 

Scampi: Thank you for your feedback. It will be processed in due course.

 

Peter: The air is cooler when the sun sets.

 

Scampi: Nice segue.

 

Peter: Ahem.

 

Scampi: I am suddenly so tired.

 

Peter: Perhaps a small cup of coffee would not go amiss.

 

Scampi: I think that’s true.

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: Do you think we were different before the war?

 

Peter: What war?

 

Scampi: I don’t know.

pt 77: POPULAR MECHANICS & LA CHALEUR HUMAINE

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Scampi: Speaking of equations.

 

Peter: Were we?

 

Scampi: No. Yes.

 

PETER CLEARS HIS THROAT.

 

Scampi: Well, that’s nothing new.

 

Peter: What?

 

Scampi: It’s all you do these days. Clearing your throat.

 

Peter: Ahem.

 

Scampi [derisive snorting]: On the ex wye axes.

 

Peter: What?

 

Scampi: Blah blah. Et cetera.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: Do you want to take a nap?

 

Peter: Not at all. I want to fill my lungs with air.

 

Scampi: Good luck with that.

 

Peter: Thank you.

 

Scampi: There are several things to be said on each point.

 

Peter: Oh?

 

Scampi: I can barely keep my eyes open.

 

Peter: I find that enjoying the outdoors can help.

 

Scampi: What do you know about it?

 

Peter: The outdoors?

 

Scampi: Or anything.

 

Peter: I know a few things about grade eight level mathematics.

 

Scampi: Buzz buzz.

 

Peter: Are you an insect?

 

Scampi: Would it matter?

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: I think so. It would matter.

 

Peter: Uh. Are you crying?

 

Scampi: What the hell is wrong with you, Peter?

 

Peter: From an evolutionary perspective?

 

Scampi: Asking these insane questions.

 

Peter: [chuckles.]

 

Scampi: What are you laughing at?

 

PETER SIGHS.

 

Peter: In fact, I do not know.

 

Scampi: Usually.

 

Peter: Hm?

 

Scampi: You’re a bit on the perky side today.

 

Peter: Oh no. Not I.

 

Scampi: Fiddlesticks.

 

PETER GLOATS OVER HIS OWN HIGH SPIRITS.

 

Scampi: Pow.

 

Peter: What was that?

 

Scampi: Sharpshooting.

 

Peter: Are you still on about Annie Oakley?

 

Scampi: No. These are sixshooters.

 

Peter: What are?

 

Scampi: See these paws?

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: Pow pow pow pow.

 

Peter: What are you doing?

 

Scampi: I’m blasting all your posters off the walls. Yeehaw!

 

Peter: Must you?

 

Scampi: Bang-a-lang.

 

Peter: This is very childish behaviour.

 

Scampi: You are.

 

Peter: There you go again.

 

Scampi: I sure do. Smouldering goats! I’m on a RAM-PAGE.

 

Peter: Heavens.

 

Scampi: God, I’m tired.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: And don’t touch my forehead.

 

Peter: I was doing no such thing.

 

Scampi: I know.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: Tangent.

 

Peter: Pardon?

 

Scampi: Oh, nothing.

 

PAUSE.

 

SCAMPI SIGHS.

 

Scampi: The possibilities bloom like roses.

 

Peter: I see.

 

Scampi: Do you?

 

Peter: Well, no.

 

Scampi: The fixed points; the abstractions. Ex here, wye there.

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: It all seems fairly straightforward.

 

Peter: Okay.

 

Scampi: We have the capacity, as humans.

 

Peter: Yes?

 

Scampi: And yet.

 

Peter: And yet.

 

pt 70: HATCHLINGS

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Scampi: I, for one, have no problem discussing things that aren’t there.

 

Peter: Isn’t that called gossiping?

 

Scampi: Not at all. Gossiping is discussing people that aren’t there.

 

Peter: I agree.

 

Scampi: But I said things. Things.

 

Peter: So, you like to gossip about things.

 

Scampi: You are deliberately obfuscating my purposes.

 

Peter: How dare you.

 

Scampi: Ditto.

 

Peter: I didn’t realise you were in such a foul mood today.

 

Scampi: And this is how you achieve détente? Honestly.

 

Peter: Détente?

 

Scampi: Oh, I’m sorry. That entry in your lexicon has probably been hacked out. With a pair of plastic children’s arts and crafts scissors. Probably.

 

Peter: With what?

 

Scampi: Forget it.

 

Peter: How can I forget it if I don’t know what it is?

 

Scampi: [Nice use of italics. Copycat.]

 

Peter: Excuse me?

 

Scampi: Nice weather we’re having.

 

Peter: Uh.

 

Scampi: Fancy a trip to the ballet?

 

Peter: What, now?

 

Scampi: Why the hell not, Peter?

 

Peter: There’s no need to say my name so…..

 

Scampi: Acidly?

 

Peter: Well, yes.

 

Scampi: I wasn’t.

 

Peter: Oh.

 

Scampi: I would never use your own name as a weapon against you.

 

Peter: Well, that’s a comfort.

 

Scampi: I was merely suggesting that perhaps a trip to the ballet’s in order.

 

Peter: Okay.

 

Scampi: Perfect. I shall book our tickets presently.

 

Peter: That is to say, I must first consult my schedule—

 

Scampi: There is a hard k sound in that word, I’ll have you know.

 

Peter: Perhaps I have a previous engagement. And of course, today may not be—

 

Scampi: Right.

 

Peter: You see.

 

Scampi: A simple ‘no’ would suffice.

 

Peter: When has a simple ‘no’ sufficed with you? May I be so presumptuous as to inquire?

 

Scampi: You wouldn’t know if it had.

 

Peter: Well, when has it?

 

Scampi: When last you tried it. And when was that?

 

Peter: Well, I—

 

Scampi: Bingo!

 

Peter: Are you calling me a hound?

 

Scampi: In a manner of speaking.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: Anyway, I’ve seen a lot of sunsets lately.

 

Peter: [murmurs.]

 

Scampi: Not that you care. But I have been present for a number of them. Setting suns. Well, I don’t always see them. But I know what’s going on.

 

Peter: When?

 

Scampi: When the sun sets. Like, I might not be watching the colour.

 

Peter: Fascinating.

 

Scampi: Yes. Nonetheless, I know night’s coming on.

 

Peter: It is?

 

Scampi: It has been. It was.

 

Peter: Is this a grammar review?

 

Scampi: Probably. With bonus background squalor.

 

Peter: Such as?

 

Scampi: The racket of crows. Racketeering.

 

Peter: But that means –

 

Scampi: I know what racketeering means, Maestro. Jay-sus.

 

Peter: I believe you just called me Maestro.

 

Scampi: I’d like to see you prove that in a court of law.

 

Peter: I could.

 

Scampi: No doubt. I am waiting, on tenterhooks, as they say.

 

Peter: I feel you are making a mockery.

 

Scampi: Of what, your legal aspirations?

 

Peter: No,

 

Scampi: Litigation’s not your strong suit, I don’t think.

 

Peter: I never said it was.

 

Scampi: Yes. And I’m saying it isn’t.

 

Peter: The accuracy of your judgment has been called into question before.

 

Scampi: By who? The invisible magistrate you’re busy romancing with your silver tongue?

 

Peter: Pardon me?

 

Scampi: Ha! Pardoned, my lord!

 

Peter: Really.

 

Scampi: Perambulation, now. This could be your strong suit.

 

Peter: I am an excellent walker.

 

Scampi: And a shameless braggart, to boot.

 

Peter: Are you speaking of me?

 

Scampi: Har. Not at all, not at all. I am speaking around you. Do you know what they call this?

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: That’s right. Circumlocution. Like a choo-choo train in the 1800s.

 

Peter: I object.

 

Scampi: Sustained!

 

Peter: That’s enough of that, that,

 

Scampi: Sustained, I say! Case closed!

 

Peter: Uh huh.

 

Scampi: Congratulations, counsel.

 

Peter: (flattered) Well, thank you.

 

Scampi: You are an excellent specimen of human elasticity!

 

Peter: Oh. I.

 

Scampi: A barrister of note! A solicitudinous solicitor!

 

Peter: Yes well.

 

Scampi: In light of your great achievements, I would hereby like to call you to the bar!

 

Peter: Wait, doesn’t that happen before—

 

Scampi: The COFFEE BAR!

 

Peter: What?

 

Scampi: Pardon? Or would you like some tea?

 

Peter: In fact, I would.

 

Scampi: Is that all? Why didn’t you say so in the first place?

 

Peter: I don’t know.

 

Scampi: One pot o’ tea, coming right up.

 

Peter: Ah.

 

Scampi: Let me just put the kettle on.

 

Peter: Rather.

 

Scampi: Oh look!

 

Peter: Yes?

 

Scampi: The sun is setting.

 

Peter: Correct.

 

Scampi: The colours. At the risk of repeating myself.

 

Peter: You brave that precipice regularly.

 

Scampi: I do.

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: It is a risk I am willing to take.

 

Peter: It is.

 

Scampi: I do love the colours, Peter.

 

Peter: I know you do.

 

Scampi: I love them every time.

pt 94: LA TRISTESSE DURERA TOUJOURS

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Scampi: Do you think of yourself as the Executive Officer of this boat?

 

Peter: No. What boat?

 

Scampi: Very interesting.

 

Peter: To which boat are you referring?

 

Scampi: Stop being coy.

 

Peter: [FLUMMOXED.]

 

Scampi: Perhaps if you climbed up the mast, we could see where we were going.

 

Peter: Excuse me?

 

Scampi: You know, like a lookout. From the crow’s nest.

 

Peter: That is hardly necessary.

 

Scampi: That’s what you say now.

 

Peter: Yes. It is.

 

Scampi: There’s no need to be so terse with me.

 

Peter: Oh?

 

Scampi: That’s right. No need whatsoever.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: Look at the sun on the water!

 

Peter: Ah.

 

Scampi: The coruscating wavelets!

 

Peter: Are you quite well?

 

Scampi: Of course I am.

 

Peter: I see.

 

Scampi: The brighter the sun gets, the fluffier the clouds.

 

Peter: Although I by no means give credence to the relationship inferred, I will agree that the sun is bright and the clouds are fluffy.

 

Scampi: Orotund.

 

Peter: Are you speaking about me?

 

Scampi: Of course not. Absurd!

 

Peter: Oh.

 

Scampi: The green trees are waving in a summer breeze. I could almost capitulate.

 

Peter: Figuratively?

 

Scampi: No, to the ice cream vendor.

 

Peter: Is the ice cream truck here?

 

Scampi: No.

 

Peter: Oh.

 

Scampi: If he were, you would have heard the song.

 

Peter: Is that a song?

 

Scampi: It’s a tune, anyway. On top of his van.

 

Peter: I know it well.

 

Scampi: Of course you do.   [SINGS] And when I die, there’ll be one child born…

 

Peter: I declare it a beautiful day for a stroll.

 

Scampi: I concur.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: You know what the sun reminds me of?

 

Peter: What?

 

Scampi: A giant black pit.

 

Peter: Black holes? Are you talking about space?

 

Scampi: No. I am saying that this brightness reminds me of the darkness.

 

Peter: That is the contrarian way.

 

Scampi: It is not!

 

PETER LAUGHS. SCAMPI HURLS HERSELF INTO THE VOID.

 

Peter: Are you all right?

 

Scampi: No, I am all wrong.

 

Peter: What was that?

 

Scampi: It was my attempt at a cartwheel.

 

Peter: Ah.

 

Scampi: “Are you all right?” Blah blah.

 

Peter: Please do not mimic me in this fashion. It is highly distasteful.

 

Scampi: Such a connoisseur, that’s our Peter.

 

Peter: I belong to no one.

 

Scampi: Don’t be so sure.

 

Peter: It looked more like you were attempting to give yourself a concussion. Or at any rate, a contusion.

 

Scampi: The latter object may have been a success, after all.

 

Peter: Are you bleeding?

 

Scampi: None of your beeswax.

 

Peter: This is very disquieting.

 

Scampi: What is?

 

Peter: I simply wished to go for a stroll.

 

Scampi: So? What else is new?

 

Peter: It was not an attempt at novelty.

 

Scampi: One of us has to step up to the plate on that score.

 

Peter: To what end?

 

Scampi: I can’t think.

 

Peter: Why is that?

 

Scampi: Who are you, Sigmund Freud?

 

Peter: No. I am Carl Jung.

 

Scampi: I can’t think any more today.

 

Peter: Might I aver that I would never refer to myself as Carl Jung?

 

Scampi: No.

 

Peter: It has grown rather noisy.

 

Scampi: Let’s run away.

 

Peter: I prefer to walk.

 

Scampi: Don’t I know it.

 

Peter: Are you limping?

 

Scampi: No.

pt 61: THE SLOWER ROAD

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Scampi: Peter, I don’t know what to think.

 

Peter: Oh? Why is that?

 

Scampi: Well, I don’t know.

 

Peter: Hardly surprising, I suppose.

 

Scampi: Everything’s going so slowly.

 

Peter: I thought you said just the other day that time was whipping past at an appalling rate.

 

Scampi: Perhaps I did. But things are going very slowly as well.

 

Peter: I see.

 

Scampi: Something or other haunts my dreams.

 

Peter: Something or other?

 

Scampi: Yes. It haunts me.

 

Peter: What does?

 

Scampi: I just told you.

 

PETER FUMBLES HIS GLASSES IN FRUSTRATION.

 

Scampi: Oh, don’t give me that.

 

Peter: Give you what? I’ve given you nothing.

 

Scampi: No one’s going to argue with you on that score.

 

Peter: Pardon me?

 

A NORTH SEA FOG DESCENDS UPON PETER’S HEAD, MUFFLING HIS VOICE.

 

Scampi: I’m sorry. I really didn’t mean that. You are a gift. A treasure, to be sure.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: Look, I didn’t mean that.

 

Peter: That I’m a treasure?

 

Scampi: No, the other part. Let’s forget it.

 

Peter: Okay.

 

Scampi: Sweet equanimity.

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: I’m not sure what to make of anything, at present.

 

Peter: Oh?

 

Scampi: I know you’re not a big fan of jazz, for example.

 

Peter: What is that an example of, pray tell?

 

Scampi: Your musical tastes.

 

Peter: Ah.

 

Scampi: No jazz: check. But me on the other hand.

 

Peter: But you on the other hand.

 

Scampi: That seems pretty much all there is to say about it, really. I am on another hand. If I’m anywhere at all.

 

PETER SCRATCHES HIS HEAD.

 

Scampi: Are you very restless today?

 

Peter: No, I don’t think so. Why?

 

Scampi: All this moving about with your head and your accessories.

 

Peter: I do not feel that there has been undue movement.

 

Scampi: Well, not undue, no.

 

Peter: Then we are agreed.

 

Scampi: I love it when that happens!

 

PETER CLEARS HIS THROAT.

 

Scampi: What would you compare me to, if you had to compare me to something?

 

Peter: I would not.

 

Scampi: A mountain? A bird’s nest?

 

Peter: No.

 

Scampi: It was worth a try.

 

Peter: What was?

 

Scampi: The poking, the prodding. It’s nice to figure out what’s going on.

 

Peter: In my warehouse of analogy?

 

Scampi: Precisely.

 

Peter: I believe that building belongs to you.

 

Scampi: I suppose it does.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi (magnanimously): But you may visit whenever you like.

 

Peter: You are too kind.

 

Scampi: Ain’t it the truth. When was the last time you used a hammer?

 

Peter: Me?

 

Scampi: No, the postman.

 

Peter: What postman?

 

Scampi: Yes, you. A hammer. When did you use one last?

 

Peter: That’s not really the sort of thing I keep track of. That is to say,

 

Scampi: Maybe to put up a picture in your house?

 

Peter: Maybe.

 

Scampi: If I pressed a hammer into your hands at this very moment, what would you do with it?

 

Peter: I don’t know.

 

Scampi: Well. There you go, then.

 

Peter: What are you talking about?

 

Scampi: Tools.

 

Peter: I see.

 

Scampi (dreamily): I don’t know, either.

pt 60: BEASTS

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Scampi: Well, Peter.

 

Peter: Well.

 

Scampi: It seems to me.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: Or, to look at it another way.

 

Peter: Hm?

 

Scampi: I’m just trying to appreciate all angles here.

 

Peter: Okay.

 

Scampi: However.

 

Peter: Indeed.

 

Scampi: I wasn’t finished.

 

Peter: Oh.

 

Scampi: Have you ever gone to Australia?

 

Peter: I have not.

 

Scampi: Oh. I knew that, actually.

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: How do you imagine it to be?

 

Peter: I don’t, really. I don’t think about Australia that much.

 

Scampi: And why would you?

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: But really the question is, why wouldn’t you? Eh?

 

Peter: Because it is not in my brain. There is no need.

 

Scampi: Maybe you need to learn a little more about your neighbours. Did you ever think of that?

 

Peter: What neighbours?

 

Scampi: On this earth. Your fellow men. Your humanoid compatriots.

 

Peter: Humanoid? Do you mean human?

 

Scampi: Don’t patronise me, mister. I know what I mean.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: And I’m not the only one. You know what I mean, too.

 

Peter: Oh really.

 

Scampi: Yes. Anyway, if we need to learn about Australia, we can jolly well learn about Australia.

 

Peter: If.

 

Scampi: That’s right. Besides, I bet you know a lot more about Australia than you let on.

 

Peter: How much are you betting?

 

Scampi: It’s an expression. It means, I am correct.

 

Peter: Hm.

 

Scampi: For example, in Australia, everyone walks around upside down. Did you know that?

 

Peter: Please.

 

Scampi: What? What?

 

Peter: Refrain from this prattle.

 

Scampi: Prattle? Pardon me?

 

Peter: You just said that in Australia people are walking around upside down.

 

Scampi: Perhaps I did. Perhaps they are.

 

Peter: SIGHS.

 

Scampi: The world is rife with strange beasts.

 

Peter: PICKS AT HIS TEETH.

 

Scampi: And perhaps we are the strangest beasts of all. Some of us anyway.

 

Peter: Are you talking about me?

 

Scampi: No. I am talking to you.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: Fungi floppily cushion the forest floor. Behind the trees, brown bears dip their magnificent paws in wild honey.

 

Peter: Is this a children’s tale?

 

Scampi: Is that what you think? Bears and mushrooms belong in fairytales?

 

Peter: Perhaps.

 

Scampi: Well, I think they belong in the world. We are all in the world.

 

Peter: Is this what passes for philosophy these days?

 

Scampi: Don’t start with me. Philosophy is welcome to take a long walk off a short pier.

 

PETER REMOVES HIS EYEGLASSES AND RUBS HIS EYES WITH ONE PALE, CRUMPLED PAW.

 

Scampi: I am sure you have no wish to deny the existence of bears, mulching leaves, mushrooms, and Australia.

 

Peter: The existence of them?

 

Scampi: That’s right. You do not deny it. Do you?

 

Peter: Uh. No.

 

Scampi: Precisely! That’s what I’m saying. We’re all in this together.

 

Peter: Well, now—

 

Scampi: Don’t well now me. We are all crunching and whispering across the forest floor. Going from here to there. Looking for a soft place to sleep.

 

Peter: Well yes.

 

Scampi: Of course. There could be a blanket of snow, there could be a blanket of leaves, there could be a blanket of fine alpaca fur.

 

Peter: One has to have dreams, I suppose.

 

Scampi: What?

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: What was that?

 

Peter: Uh.

 

Scampi: Dreams? Are you talking about dreams?

 

Peter: It was a just a.

 

Scampi: Do you have dreams? Is this what you’re saying?

 

Peter: I wasn’t really. Saying anything.

 

Scampi: Dreams. The finely silted dreams of Peter.

 

Peter: Silted? What are you talking about?

 

Scampi: I don’t know.

 

PAUSE.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: I don’t know.

pt 29: TRADE WINDS

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Scampi: You know what time it is?

 

Peter: I believe it is approximately two p.m.

 

Scampi: It’s time to start counting down the snowflakes.

 

Peter: What snowflakes?

 

Scampi: They’re on their way.

 

Peter: Are you gesturing at the advent of winter?

 

Scampi: The season is upon us.

 

Peter: What season?

 

Scampi: The season of DEMOCRACY!

 

Peter: Like, pumping your fist in the air?

 

Scampi: That’s right. DEMOCRACY is on its way. I can feel it in my teeth.

 

Peter: My teeth hurt.

 

Scampi: You should brush them more often.

 

Peter: I do brush them often.

 

Scampi: With a toothbrush I mean. And paste.

 

Peter: This may or may not be the correct interval to mention that I see no evidence of democracy or snowflakes in the air.

 

Scampi: I’m not sure that was the correct interval. I will make a note of your suggestion, and address it in due course.

 

Peter: Thank you.

 

Scampi: Speaking of snowflakes, I am finding the air uncommonly warm.

 

Peter: Yes, it buffets us about with its uncommon warmth. We are truly blessed.

 

Scampi: We are.

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: I have made a pot of tea. Would you like some?

 

Peter: No thank you.

 

SCAMPI DRINKS HER TEA. IT IS UTTERLY DELICIOUS.

 

Scampi: This tea is delicious.

 

Peter: I have no doubt.

 

Scampi: I do. I am plagued with doubts. They shimmy with me across the floor. They steep in my cup.

 

Peter: Oh.

 

Scampi: Have you ever looked out, way out, to the edge of the water?

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: Me too.

 

Peter: You’re looking a little queasy.

 

Scampi: I am?

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: It’s the waves. They’re swamping me.

 

Peter: Oh. Perhaps I will have some tea after all.

 

Scampi: Help yourself.

 

PAUSE.

 

Peter: You, ah—

 

Scampi: Don’t say it.

 

Peter: Right.

 

Scampi: Your hands are still so delicate. They are like moths.

 

Peter: Um.

 

Scampi: They’re practically phosphorescent. I can tell you’ve been reading lots of books.

 

Peter: How can you tell that?

 

Scampi: From your hands. They’re as delicate as your synapses.

 

Peter: There’s nothing delicate about my synapses.

 

Scampi: Of course not. Your synapses are firing a sixteen gun salute as we speak.

 

Peter: How terrifying.

 

Scampi: For my part, I salute your synapses, and their utter lack of delicacy.

 

Peter: I think I’m getting a migraine.

 

Scampi: It’s all that gunpowder going off in your hippocampus.

 

Peter: [SHUDDERS.]

 

Scampi: That was theatrical.

 

Peter: Yes well.

 

Scampi: Can you feel the wind on your face?

 

Peter: Why wouldn’t I?

 

Scampi: As we have previously discussed, you have hair growing out of your face.

 

Peter: So what?

 

Scampi: So maybe you can’t feel the wind. I don’t know anything about it.

 

Peter: I can feel the wind.

 

Scampi: Can you feel it rifling through your beard, looking for secrets?

 

Peter: No. There are no secrets in my beard.

 

Scampi: If I had a beard, I would fill it to the max.

 

Peter: With secrets?

 

Scampi: Yes. It would be the ultimate piggy bank.

 

Peter: Well, good for you.

 

Scampi: Thank you. Covert operations are my specialty. What direction is this wind coming from?

 

Peter: It’s coming from the far side of the world.

 

Scampi: It smells a bit like yesterday.

 

Peter: Yes. This is due to physics.

 

Scampi: Tell me.

 

Peter: Tell you what?

 

Scampi: Something I don’t know.

 

Peter: First I will have more tea.

 

Scampi: Go ahead. I’ve got all day.

pt 20: SCIENCE

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Scampi: Are you equal to the sum of your three sides?

 

PAUSE.

 

Peter: What’s the – that’s no kind of definition of a triangle.

 

Scampi: LAUGHS UNCONTROLLABLY.

 

Scampi: You think of yourself as a triangle?

 

Peter: A triangle has three sides.

 

Scampi: Hahahahahahaha.

pt 15: MAD, BAD, FLINT

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Scampi: You, Peter, have never read anything by Gumilev. You are like a nightmare that takes place on Gladstone Avenue in a foreign language.

 

Peter: I am in the bath. I am taking no note of this invective.

 

Scampi: You are like a girl sitting outside a butcher shop in September wishing she wasn’t too mad to cry. Except the opposite.

 

Peter: Sometimes, you don’t make any sense at all. When this happens, I prefer to absent myself.

 

Scampi: You sellout piece of shit.

 

Peter: I’m not listening.

 

Scampi: Due to hearsay, I am aware that Gumilev also wrote a poem about a giraffe. You’ll never guess what it’s called.

 

Peter: I hate guessing.

 

Scampi: This is because you are a sore loser.

 

PETER IS NOT LISTENING.

 

Scampi: People with inflated notions of themselves that do not appropriately correspond to materiel/other success are often sore losers. This is a fact.

 

Peter: Oh really?

 

Scampi: Yes. It is in the dictionary.

 

Peter: Which one?

 

Scampi: You have never seen a dictionary, and wouldn’t know anything about it.

 

Peter: I give up.

 

Scampi: Don’t think I mistake the flint in your voice for something [exhaustion/depression/general irritable nature] else. Everyone gives up on me.

 

Peter: It’s hard to imagine why.

 

Scampi: I believe that people give up on me due to your lack of imagination.

 

Peter: [THIS PORTION OF WHAT PETER BELIEVES HAS BEEN CENSORED BECAUSE IT IS TOO BLEAK. IT IS AS BLEAK AS A HOUSE]

 

Scampi: Maybe you don’t absorb enough vitamin C.

 

Peter: Sometimes, I wish I had never met you.

 

Scampi: So what.

 

Peter: Stop mis-hearing me.

 

Scampi: I know what you meant.

 

Peter: I just pointed out that it’s past your normal bedtime. You’re tired.

 

Scampi: I hate you.

 

Peter: Don’t talk to me like that.

 

Scampi: I hate fighting with you.

 

Peter: You need to calm down.

 

Scampi: How come your eyes are every single colour?

 

Peter: They’re hazel.

 

Scampi: Freaky.

 

Peter: We should spend less time together.

 

Scampi: Someday, there will be no Peter, and no Scampi, and we won’t have a choice.

pt 65: I HAVE LONG BEEN A SLEEPER BUT I TRUST

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Scampi: Antarctica is full of snow.

 

Peter: What’s this?

 

Scampi: Valleys and plains, all made of snow. Lakes of snow.

 

Peter: Oh, really? Have you been?

 

Scampi: You know I have not.

 

SCAMPI REFLECTS UPON THESE AND OTHER FACTS FOR ONE OR TWO, PERHAPS SEVERAL DAYS.

 

Scampi: I am in the air on the subject, like a weather balloon.

 

Peter: What subject?

 

Scampi: I have been thinking.

 

Peter: Laudable.

 

Scampi: Is it?

 

Peter: Well, I suppose.

 

Scampi: You suppose so. Do you?

 

Peter: I suppose I do.

 

Scampi: Suffused with supposition. That’s you.

 

Peter: Where’s this going, now?

 

Scampi: Where do you want it to go? To the mountains?

 

Peter: Onward and upward.

 

Scampi: As they say.

 

Peter: They do. Wait, who does?

 

Scampi: They say it all the goddam time, Peter. You know this.

 

Peter: Are you in a violent frame of mind this morning?

 

Scampi: Who, me? I am a dove, a dove.

 

Peter: [PERTURBED]

 

Scampi: [ATTEMPTS THE QUIET OF MOUNTAIN RANGES.]

 

PAUSE.

 

Scampi: Would you like to play a game?

 

Peter: Unlikely. What sort of game?

 

Scampi: A parlour game. An old-fashioned rigamarole of a time.

 

Peter: What?

 

Scampi: This diversion is called “Fill in the blanks”. Ready?

 

Peter: I suppose.

 

Scampi: Ahem. The death of a loved one is ______?

 

Peter: What?

 

Scampi: You’re supposed to fill in the blanks.

 

Peter: I don’t understand this game.

 

Scampi: Why not?

 

Peter: It doesn’t make any sense.

 

Scampi: No. It doesn’t.

 

Peter: I would like to clear my throat.

 

Scampi: I support that.

 

Peter: Thank you.

 

Scampi: Have a clearance sale. Folks will come for miles. PETER’S BIGTIME THROAT-CLEARANCE SALE! EVERYTHING MUST GO!

 

Peter: I don’t know what manner of amphibian is setting up shop in there.

 

Scampi: In your throat?

 

Peter: Indeed. But I feel he should select a different habitat.

 

Scampi: Sometimes one has to move.

 

Peter: Yes.

 

Scampi: Sometimes one is in the wrong spot.

 

Peter: Quite.

 

Scampi: The significance of this is not lost on me. For example.

 

Peter: Oh, very little is.

 

Scampi: Very funny.

 

Peter: I thought so.

 

Scampi: I could tell.

 

PETER CLEARS HIS THROAT.

 

Scampi: Did we ever make it to Mexico?

 

Peter: I don’t know.

 

Scampi: Are we leaving them behind? Or are they leaving us?

 

Peter: Who?

 

Scampi: Our loved ones.

 

Peter: I don’t know.