By Lotous Michalopoulou
Cast of Characters:
Daphne: Neurodiverse mature student (Me), early
forties
Muse: Daphne’s Alter ego, uses her voice, invisible to
other characters.
Thea: Daphne’s Aunt (father’s side), mid-twenties
Zoe: Thea’s girlfriend, mid-twenties, nurse
Olga: Daphne’s older half-sister (mum’s side), late
fifties, director and producer of documentaries in Greek National TV
Katie: early forties, Support worker from a theatre
group for disabled people that Daphne is attending.
Preferred stage: Proscenium arch stage
Scene 1 Opening scene, living room, morning
Inside a living room, morning. Two sofas
that create a Λ
shape. A coffee table in the middle with a coffee cup. Sunshine can be seen from a sliding back yard
door. DAPHNE and MUSE are sitting on the left sofa. MUSE is wearing a zipper
hoodie. Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxDXTfnaLjY
Daphne has an open laptop on her lap. We can see the laptop’s screen projected
on to stage, behind the sofas. Screen has an open word document. DAPHNE types: ‘Writer’s
blog.’ MUSE points on the laptop screen the spelling mistake. DAPHNE erases it
all. Writes again: ‘Writer’s block... writer’s block... writer's block.’ Email
notification on screen. DAPHNE turns off word file and opens emails. Three
unread emails for missing payments from energy supply, phone bill, and Netflix.
Another email pops up. Citizen’s advice for debts management. MUSE takes the
laptop, minimises emails, and opens the word file again. Music stops.
Muse: You
said no more interruptions.
Daphne: I’m
tired. Can we have a break?
Muse: To
have a break you need to start first. You must focus. You already messed up
your last assignment. I can’t believe you forgot to form your poem. A primary
school student would know better.
Daphne: It’s
just... I am still processing the last events and Ma leaving me in the middle
of the night.
Muse: Don’t
be melodramatic. What are you, a toddler or something? She told you she’s
leaving. She even gave you her blessing. What else do you want?
Daphne: I
just thought... I don’t know what I thought.
Muse: Writing
always helps you process emotions.
Daphne: I
know. Still, it’s like you forget that I’m human sometimes.
Muse: Hey.
It’s supposed that you asked me to help you write. How am I going to do that
when you get pathological demand avoidance, or something, with any of my
suggestions?
Daphne: What
suggestions? You’re just telling me to write. No suggestions for what to write.
I could use Google calendar for that.
Muse: Do
we have to do that every morning? You end up begging me to help you every night
before we sleep anyway.
Daphne: (Gets
coffee cup, realises its empty) I need another coffee.
Sound of cats fighting. MUSE closes the
laptop’s screen and rushes to the sliding back yard door.
Muse: But
first, we save our cat.
Lights out.
Scene
2 The conversation, evening
Inside
living room, evening. Deemed lights. DAPHNE and MUSE sit on the left sofa. THEA
and ZOE sit on the right sofa. On the coffee table there is a bottle of wine
and two bowls with snacks.
Daphne: It’s up to you girls. I’m a preferentist. I
have no advice about other people’s life. You are welcome to stay till her visa
expires. After that, you better go back to Greece.
Thea: How specific for a non-advice. And you just
say that because you always had the luxury of being away.
Muse: Away? Every year at least twice they visit
for days just to spy for their gossip. Every couple of years one of them comes
here for ‘a bit’ and stays for months somehow, just to mess about. I wonder
sometimes who is crazier, me or them.
Thea: I thought you are the one who keeps asking
everyone to stay with you. (picks up the bottle, drinks some wine, and gives it
to ZOE)
Daphne: That’s irrelevant. They all leave at the end
anyway.
Zoe: Your family is like a soap opera. I love
it.
Thea: (takes the bottle from ZOE) She’s adorable
when she’s drunk, isn’t she. (drinks some wine and leaves it back on the table)
Daphne: Full cute.
Muse: Your grandparents won’t see it like that.
Have you warned her?
Zoe: She has.
Daphne: About her mum’s family? As you said, people
usually find my side’s graphicness interesting, but her mum’s lot is the
opposite kind. Victorian style whateverness.
Muse: Have you told her about the time they said
they’ll throw you off the window? Or was it the balcony?
(ZOE takes wine bottle)
Daphne: I really don’t understand how they didn’t get
over their puritanical mindset when your mum got with grandpa-Michael. I don’t
mean just the age difference. I mean him having nine kids from four previous
marriages.
Zoe: (almost chokes while drinking from
laughing) I keep forgetting about your dad.
Muse: The magic of the subconscious.
Thea: It wasn’t like that. We were just watching
on the news the pride festival, and they said if their son was gay... Anyway. We’re
thinking of going to Germany. We are both allowed to work there.
Daphne: Yes, but neither of you speaks German.
Muse: Can we stop ignoring Ganesha now?
Zoe: I need subtitles with you two.
Thea: Fine. What does the elephant in the room have
to say?
Muse: That you are too super cute together to
hide it.
Daphne: The only people you don’t want to know is
your mum and her parents, whether you’re there or in Germany. Now that you
finished your masters, maybe your family will finally let you be. You spend all
those money here in the UK for her tickets and this medical-terms-test. For
what? It seems they don’t want anyone from abroad. Not even nurses for the NHS.
Muse: Though, if she had passed the test, we’d
have another conversation now.
Daphne: Have you seen Utopia on Amazon prime? My
point is, it’s a creepy freaky world out there. Even eccentric as ours, family
is everything we got.
Zoe: Your mum is full cute. Last time I saw
her, she gave me a hat she knitted. Where is she now?
Daphne: She gives hats to everyone. She returned to
my sister.
Muse: Ma turned the meaning-of-life-party into a
fiasco.
Thea: I’ve heard. You’re still holding grudges
for that?
Daphne: No.
Zoe: What happened? What is the meaning of
life.
All
3: Forty-two.
Daphne: A sci-fi joke. G came from London with some
friends for my birthday.
Zoe: G?
Thea: Her sister’s son, George. You’ve met his
brother, Kostas. We went to his gig in London. Remember?
Zoe: Oh, yeah. That was super awesome. I loved
K’s song about OCD.
Muse: We were supposed to go to the pride
festival here. I told her not to come with us, because we’d walk a lot.
Daphne: I wanted to spend the day walking about.
Usually, my joints hurt. But that was a good day. I had missed those.
Muse: We had the cake and the videocalls with
family here first. We’re at the door, putting shoes on, and she’s like: ‘I’m
coming with you’.
Daphne: She wouldn’t take no for an answer. She just
started walking with us.
Muse: The minute we got there, suddenly she’s ‘dying’.
I think she was just bored.
Daphne: She asked to go to the hospital. She wasn’t
feeling well after all this walking.
Muse: Though, we hadn’t even started yet.
Daphne: Luckily, they had paramedics there, I called
one, and he’s like: ‘She’s fine, just give her some water.’ They checked her
vitals, and they said that all looks well.
Muse: Yet, she insisted to cancel the party
because she was ‘dying’!
Daphne: She wanted to return home. G and his friends
drove her. They had to go pick up the car first.
Muse: By that time, not even Sixty-nine could
save Forty-two.
Daphne: Forgive that blasphemy. (She takes the
wine bottle and raises it) To pride. (passes the bottle to THEA)
Thea: Cheers. (drinks and gives it to ZOE)
Zoe: Yia mas. (drinks and leaves it on table)
Thea: Tell us what happened with the heresy?
Daphne: The Mormons? I returned home earlier one day,
and two American dudes are sitting right here. Ma has that look in her face,
like if she’s a toddler that got caught having a bad tummy from eating the forbidden
cake.
Thea: I know that look of hers. Come one, you
have to admit that your mum is a dear. She had come to our place once, and she
opened the door for the cat to get out because Ging was mewing. She thought she
shouldn’t do that. She didn’t know that we do let him out. She had that very look
on her face when I asked her if she has seen the cat. I wish I had taken a
picture of her. It would make the best meme ever.
Zoe: Two dudes are here, and?
Daphne: I just mind my own business and go make a
coffee. I overhear them telling her that it’s only ‘the Devil’ putting doubts
in her heart. I go back in and ask her if she’s comfortable with all this, and
she starts crying and mumbling. They stand up—and they’re both like two meters
tall—and they tell me not to interfere, and to her that they have already made
all the arrangements and she can’t back up now. It tuns out they’ve had been contacting
her for weeks and they planned her to be baptised.
Thea: I thought your mum was very religious
already.
Daphne: She is. Yet, after the priest of the Greek
community told her no one can drive her there every Sunday, she was looking for
a church nearby, so when they knocked the door, she thought it was an answer to
her prayers. However, when she realised that she must renounce her orthodox
faith, she felt trapped.
Muse: I get into Avatar-mode, and I tell them
that it’s not OK to proselytize 83-years-olds with early dementia, and they
should leave my property at once.
Zoe: Wow.
Daphne: Then I spend days writing letters to YWAM. A
missionary training Olga sent me when I was nineteen. I was kicked out last
week of the six months course when they caught me kissing a boy.
Zoe: A boy?
Thea: She’s bi.
Muse: Can you believe they let the boy stay?
Daphne: They asked me if I was OK with that. He was
there with a church scholarship. He would really get in trouble.
Zoe: Did they answer to your emails?
Daphne: They did, paradoxically.
Muse: They stopped when they read the last email.
It was a bit too much.
Daphne: I was like: ‘I was raised in a Christian
environment. I was born-again when I was nine. I came to India, to serve God.
Instead, I was kicked out, returned in shame. I never went back to church. I
lost my faith. I turned to philosophy. I need answers, and it took me more than
twenty years to find the courage to ask the questions.’
Thea: Super graphic indeed.
Muse: I bet they thought: ‘if you kept your
tongue away of boys’ mouths’. You should just focus on your assignment girl.
Thea: Oh yeah. How is this going? (takes wine
bottle)
Daphne: Bad.
Incoming
videocall. We see it on the screen. DAPHNE picks it up. THEA is showing
something on her phone to ZOE. ZOE laughs.
Olga: Turn on your lights, I can’t see you well, and
lower the volume.
Daphne: It’s not the tele.
Thea: (holding the
bottle) Hey Mrs. Olga.
Olga: You’re
drinking now? That’s new. Are you making a collection of disorders? Anorexia
and bulimia aren’t enough for you? I can’t take care of you forever you know. I
heard you got sick again. What got you to the hospital this time?
Daphne: Take-away ramen.
Muse: (whispering
to DAPHNE) Are you just going to let her talk to you like that?
Daphne: You know what? I’m tired of you patronising
me.
Thea: Did you just hang
up on her?
Zoe: That escalated
fast.
Muse: Finally.
Thea: I didn’t know you
were sick.
Muse: That one was
extra traumatic.
Daphne: After
weeks of emails and phone calls with PayPlan, when they got every little detail
of my personal information, they told me that I don’t have sufficient funds to
arrange payments for my debts, because, and I’m quoting, I’m ‘using too much
money for toiletries!’ I was like: ‘you recorded all my data, to conclude that
you can’t help me because I use too much toilet paper?’
Thea: Lolliest
lol ever.
Daphne: I
asked her to show the recording to her supervisor, and I tried to make it explicit:
‘is not OK to take peoples sensitive info, with the promise to help them, just
to dump them to their fate at the end.’ Anyhow, I ended up getting sick.
Thea: From
being upset?
Zoe: Mood
affects a lot all chronic conditions.
Daphne: The fifth day I was throwing up, I made the
mistake to go to the hospital. When the nurse saw me, she said she’ll put me
higher in the priority for the doctor. One or two hours later—I lost track—the
door of the doctor opens, and she finds me on the floor sleeping. I hadn’t
sleep for days. Then, I put my fingers in my mouth, it was instinctive. I was
feeling I was drowning, but they kept asking me how I feel. They were loud and
overwhelming, and I got non-verbal.
Thea: Bless your cotton socks.
Daphne: I was trying to explain, when one doctor was
asked to go out of the room by the other one, because she was obviously
stressing me more. Then I was given a pill and told not to drink water for half
an hour. I remember looking at my watch to check when thirty minutes will pass.
I was seeing black dots when I raised my eyes. I tried to get up but my limps
where twitching and not keeping me steady. I think I fall when I was stepping
at the door. Then the scary one came back, and she started punching me at the
chest and saying that I’m faking it. She said that my behaviour is not normal.
Thea: She what?
Muse: For reals.
Daphne: I am autistic with fibromyalgia, I’m tired of
hearing that all my life whenever I ask for help.
Zoe: Did you make a complaint?
Daphne: I told Olga. She said it’s my fault for
putting my fingers in my mouth, and she is surprised they didn’t lock me up.
Thea: (to
ZOE) They used to medicate her behind her back when she was a teen. She realised
only when she moved out and had withdrawals.
Zoe: No...
Thea: Yes!
(To DAPHNE) You need to see ‘Hell camp—teen nightmare’. Their own
parents paid people to torture them into becoming ‘well behaved’. Also,
remember ‘Orange is the new black’? Piper went
out, and Tasty got blamed for a murder she didn’t do. They both went to the
same prison. It’s just one had support from her family, the other didn’t.
Zoe: See? It’s not always the institutions to
blame.
Daphne: Hmmm. Well, remember
the theatre company I’m attending? I told them about the hospital incident, and
they got their safeguarding team working on a formal complaint. They were so
supportive.
Muse: I read The Gulag Archipelago last summer.
Solzhenitsyn’s conclusion was that there could not be a dictatorship if we were
all kind to our family and friends.
Zoe: I
don’t get that. How?
Muse: He
was thrown to exile, without having done anything. He wasn’t even against the regime.
In Siberia he met a lot of people that was send there, like him, by someone
they knew. Family, friends, neighbours.
Thea: How?
Daphne: Someone accused them of being against the government, just because
they didn’t like them. Or they liked their friend’s girlfriend a bit too much,
and that would leave her single. Any stupid motive. It doesn’t matter. What
matters is that it wasn’t some kind of impersonal tyranny. It was people they
once trusted that got them there. Totalitarianism to work, people need to let
it.
Muse: Yeah, maybe, it’s not always the Romans to
blame.
Thea: (To ZOE) She calls institutions and stuff ‘Roman
empire’.
Muse: (unzips her hoodie and takes it off) To Pax
Romana.
(DAPHNE picks up bottle and passes it
to ZOE)
Zoe: To being kind to each other. Or at least
kinder.
Thea: (Looks at her watch) It’s always
nice when it’s just the three of us. Yet I didn’t realise it was so late.
Friends are waiting for us in the centre.
They all get up. THEA and ZOE kiss DAPHNE goodbye. They
ignore MUSE. MUSE’s t-shirt on the back says: imaginary-Friend/Alter-ego/Muse.
THEA and ZOE exit SR.
Lights out.
Scene 3 Finale, living room, night
Lights on.
Inside
living room, night. DAPHNE is sitting on the sofa with an open laptop on her
lap. MUSE is sitting next to her. Screen has
an open word document. DAPHNE types: ‘assignment 2.’ The phone rings.
Muse: You
promised no interruptions.
DAPHNE
rejects call and turns phone off. She types: ‘Scene 1.’
Daphne: Thank you. I know I don’t say it much.
Videocall on screen.
Muse: Again?
Daphne: No. That is from the theatre group. (picks it
up) Hello.
Katie: How are you today?
Daphne: Trying some writing therapy at the moment.
Katie: Perfect. I have neutral and good news. Which
one first?
Daphne: Always bad news first.
Katie: I didn’t say bad. Don’t worry. The process
of the formal complaint is moving forward. It will just take a bit longer than
we hoped.
Daphne: I thought no one will even care. I’m already feeling
that there has been some justice. I am not used to being listened.
Muse: (whispers to DAPHNE) Ask about the good
news.
Katie: The good news is that we’d like you to write
a script.
We
hear the song from the beginning.
Lights
out.
