Glory - Almost, Maine

EAST Hello.

GLORY (To him.) Hello. (Resumes looking to the sky.)

EAST I thought I saw someone. (Little beat.) I was about to go to bed. I saw you from my window … (Beat.) Can I - ? … Is there something I can do for you?

GLORY (To him.) Oh, no. I’m just here to see the northern lights. (Back to the sky.)

EAST Okay. Okay. It’s just – it’s awful late and you’re in my yard …

GLORY Oh, I hope you don’t mind! I’ll only be here tonight. I’ll see them tonight. The northern lights. And then I’ll be gone. I hope you don’t mi//nd!

EAST (Looking out.) Is that your tent?

GLORY Yes.

EAST You’ve pitched a tent … >

GLORY So I have a place to sleep, > After I see them—I didn’t know I was in somebody’s yard— I hope you don’t mind.

EAST Well, it’s not that I –

GLORY Do you mind?

EAST Well, I don’t know if –

GLORY Oh, no, I think you mind!

EAST No, it’s not that I mind –

GLORY No, you do! You do! Oh, I’m so sorry! I didn’t think you would! I didn’t think --. You see, it says in your brochure >That people from Maine wouldn’t mind. It says (Pulling out a brochure about Maine tourism.) that people from Maine are different, that they live life “the way life should be,” and that, “in the tradition of their brethren in rural northern climes, like Scandinavia,” that they’ll let people who are complete strangers like cross-country skiers and bikers and hikers, camp out in their yard, if they need to, for nothing, they’ll just let you. I’m a hiker. It is true? >That they’ll just let you stay in their yards if you need to? ‘Cause I need to. Camp out. ‘Cause I’m where I need to be. This is the farthest I’ve ever traveled – I’m from a part of the country that’s a little closer to things – never been this far north before, or east, and did you know that Maine is the only state in the country that’s attached to only one other state?!?

EAST Um –

GLORY It is!! (Taking in all the open space.) Feels like the end of the world, and here I am at the end of the world, and I have nowhere to go, so I was counting on staying here, unless it’s not true, I mean is it true? >Would you let a hiker who was where she needed to be just camp out in your yard for free? >I mean , if a person really needed to? >Reallyreally needed to?

EAST Well, if a person really needed to, sure,//

GLORY (Huge relief!) Oh, I’m so glad, then! Thank you! (beat) Sorry about that

EAST It’s okay

GLORY Sorry—I just—really need to be here and do this, so—thanks

EAST Sure (beat) So—

GLORY Oh, no!

EAST What?

GLORY Oh, God! I need that!

EAST Huh? Oh. Here. (He gives it back.)

GLORY Thank you. (She resumes looking to the sky.)

EAST Sure. (Beat.) Okay -- . Okay … (Beat.) So you’re just lookin’ for a place to see the northern lights from?

GLORY Yeah, Just tonight.

EAST Well, you know, you might not see ‘em tonight, ‘cause //

GLORY Oh, no. I’ll see them. Because this is the right time: Solar activity is at an eleven-year peak. And I’m in a good place: Your latitude is good. Well, as good as it can be, under the circumstances. I was gonna go to a higher latitude—like, up to Canada somewhere—but I forgot to renew my passport, so I couldn’t, and Alaska is just too far away, so this was the closest place I could get to in the lower forty-eight states that sees the northern lights regularly, so I flew, and I took a bus, and then I hiked to get here, so, anyway, everything’s in order. And, wow, you have good sky for seeing them. It’s so big! And dark! And it’s flat. And there are no trees in the way.

EAST Yeah, used to be a potato farm.

GLORY Oh. Makes for a big sky

EAST Yeah

GLORY So—you’re a farmer?

EAST No. Used to be a farm. I’m a repairman

GLORY Oh.

EAST Fix things.

GLORY Oh. (Laughs.)

EAST What?

GLORY You’re not a lobster man.

EAST No …

GLORY I guess I thought that everyone from Maine was a lobster man and talked in that funny … way like they do in Maine, and you don’t talk that way.

EAST Nope. You’re not Down East. You’re up north. And this is how we talk up north, pretty much.

GLORY Oh.

EAST No real accent up here

GLORY Oh

EAST Plus, ocean’s a couple hundred miles away. Be an awful long ride to work if I was a lobster man.

GLORY (Enjoying him.) Yeah. Well, anyway, thank you. Thank you for letting me stay and do what I need to do. It’s important that I do it, and—…I’ve just had a pretty rough go of things lately, and I just really appreciate your kindness and understanding—

EAST Oh , gosh—I’m sorry

GLORY Um …

EAST I’m sorry—are you okay?

GLORY Yeah

EAST I’m really sorry I did that. It’s just — you just seemed sad>

GLORY Um—

EAST And also: I think I love you

GLORY Huh?

EAST Yeah—I saw you from my window and … I love you.

GLORY Um—okay—Well … that’s really nice of you to say, but that’s not—…I’m so sorry, but I’m not here for that

EAST Oh, no! I didn’t think//

GLORY I’m here to pay my respects. To my husband.

EAST Oh no

GLORY Yeah: My husband. Wes. I’m here to say goodbye to him, ‘cause he died recently.

EAST Oh, jeez

GLORY: Yeah. On Tuesday, actually. And, see, the northern lights—did you know this?—the northern lights are really the torches that the recently departed carry with them so they can find their way home, to heaven, and, see, it takes a soul three days to make its way home, to heaven, and this is Friday, this is the third day, so, you see, I will see them—the northern lights-because they’re him: He’ll be carrying one of the torches. And, see, I didn’t leave things well with him, so I was just hoping I could come here and say goodbye to him and not be bothered, but what you just did—said—there just a second ago—that bothered me a little, I think—or—no—it didn’t bother me, but It’s going to get in the way of me saying goodbye to him, I think—or something—and, so, I think maybe I should go find another yard—

EAST No!//

GLORY Yeah—

EAST I’m sorry I did that—I don’t really know what happened

GLORY Well, I do, I know what // happened

EAST I’m not the kind of person that usually does things like that! Please! Don’t go! Just—do what you need to do and I won’t bother you. Maybe just…consider what I did a-a-a-a…a warm Maine welcome. Or something. Um—you know what? I’m just gonna get outta your way and let you do what you need to do. All right?

GLORY All right

EAST All right

GLORY Thanks

EAST Sure. Sorry about…all that

GLORY It’s…okay

EAST And if you need anything—bathroom…heat—just give a holler, okay?

GLORY Okay. Hey! Thanks for letting me stay. I really appreciate it

EAST Sure

GLORY And, um—I’m—my name’s Glory. Just so you know

EAST Okay. Hi, Glory>

GLORY Hi

EAST I’m East

GLORY Huh?

EAST My name’s East. For Easton. It’s the name of the town – little ways that way – where I was born. Mess-up on the birth certificate … “a son, Easton, born on this sixth day of January, [insert year] in the town of Matthew, Maine” … instead of the other way around

GLORY Oh.> Well, happy birthday a few weeks late

EAST Thanks

GLORY so, (Referring to the place.) Easton, >Yeah! I passed by near there on my way here, and, by the way, where is “here”? I couldn’t find it on my map

EAST Um … Almost.

GLORY What?

EAST You’re in unorganized territory. Township Thirteen, Range Seven. (Glory checks her map.) It’s not gonna be on your map, cause it’s not an actual town, technically.

GLORY What / / do you mean –

EAST See, to be a town, you gotta get organized. And we never got around to gettin’ organized, so … we’re just Almost.

GLORY Oh …

EAST Okay, well, like I said, holler if you need anything

GLORY Okay. Thanks. Oh! Oh, God!

EAST What? What’s wrong?

GLORY My heart!

EAST What? Are you

GLORY My heart! (Seeing that he has her bag; pointing to the bag.)

EAST What?

GLORY You have my heart!

EAST I wh//

GLORY In that bag! It’s in that bag! >Please give it back!,// Please! It’s my heart!, I need it!, Please!

EAST Okay, okay, okay. (He gives her the bag.)

GLORY Thank you. (Her breathing normalizes.)

EAST You’re welcome. (A long beat while East considers what he has just heard.) I’m sorry, did you just say that … your heart is in that bag?, is that what you just said?, that //

GLORY Yes.

EAST It’s heavy.

GLORY I guess

EAST (Beat.) Why is it in that bag?

GLORY It’s how I carry it around.

EAST Why?

GLORY It’s broken

EAST What happened?

GLORY Wes broke it.

EAST Your husband?

GLORY Yeah, He went away

EAST Oh.

GLORY With someone else.

EAST Oh, I’m sorry.

Yeah. And when he did that, I felt like my heart would break. And that’s exactly what happened. It broke: hardened up and cracked in two. Hurt so bad, I had to go to the hospital, and when I got there, they told me they were gonna have to take it out. And when they took it out, they dropped it on the floor and it broke into nineteen pieces. Slate. It turned to slate.

EAST Great for roofing. Wait—how do you breathe?>

GLORY Huh?—Oh—

EAST If your heart is in that bag, how are you alive?

GLORY (Indicating the heart that’s now in her chest.) Artificial …

EAST Really.

GLORY Yeah. ‘Cause my real one’s broken. And there’s always a shortage of real hearts for transplants, so I got an artificial one…

EAST Oh. So..why do you still have this one?

GLORY Well, it’s my heart.

EAST But it’s broken.

GLORY Yeah//I don’t really

EAST ‘Cause of your husband.>

GLORY Yeah.

EAST Wes>

GLORY Yeah

EAST Who left you

GLORY Yeah, // I really

EAST Why are you paying your respects to him if he left you?

GLORY Because that’s what you do when a person dies, you pay them respects

EAST But he left you, >

GLORY Yeah, but –

EAST and it seem to me that a man who leaves somebody doesn’t deserve any respects

GLORY (Deflecting.) Well, I just didn’t leave things well with him, >and…and I need to apologize to him

EAST But he left you! >

GLORY I know, but I –

EAST Why should you apologize?

GLORY Because!

EAST Because why?!?

GLORY Because I killed him!

EAST Oh. (This stops East; he backs off a bit.)

GLORY And I’d like to apologize. (Beat. Then, admission:) See, I was over a year into my recovery from when they put my artificial heart in—I was all better, doing almost all the things I used to be able to do-and then Wes just shows up at my place one day and says he wants me back. And I said, “West, I have a new heart now. I’m sorry. It doesn’t want you back.” ANd that just killed him

EAST (Relief.) Oh. But, it didn’t kill him, you didn’t kill him –

GLORY Well, yeah, I did, kinda, because he got so sad that my new heart didn’t want him back, that he just tore outta there and ran out into the street, and a bus was coming, and it didn’t see him, and he didn’t see it, and it just…took him right out, and if I’d have been able to take him back, >he wouldn’t have torn outta there like that >and been just taken out like that, and so, I just wanted to say goodbye in my own way—not as his sad ex-wife at some big public service—but just privately, you know?, And—and—and—(hug) Oh, God—I’m sorry > I’m so sorry I did that

EAST Don’t be! I love you!

GLORY What? No!

EAST Yeah!

GLORY Well..DON’T!

EAST Why?

GLORY Because I won’t be able to love you back: I have a heart that can pump my blood and that’s all. The one that does the other stuff is broken. It doesn’t work anymore—

EAST Let me have this!

GLORY No! It’s mine!

EAST I can fix it!

GLORY What? No! > Give it back to me now!

EAST But it’s broken >

GLORY Please!

EAST It’s no good like this

GLORY But it’s my heart!

EAST Yes, it is. And I believe I have it. (This stops Glory. Beat.) And I can fix it. (Beat.) I’m a repairman. I repair things. It’s what I do.

GLORY Oh! Oh, wow! Oh, they’re so beautiful … (Remembering who they are.) Oh! Oh! -- Wes!! Wes!! Goodbye! I’m so sorry! … Goodbye, Wes! Hello, East.