Ravenhill Plays: 1: Shopping and F***ing; Faust is Dead; Handbag; Some Explicit Polaroids (Contemporary Dramatists) (6 page)

Robbie
     Why’s that then?

Lulu
     Please I want it off.

Robbie
     Is that your blood?

Lulu
(
pawing at her face
)     Where is it?

Robbie
(
indicates forehead
)     Just – yeah – that’s it.

Lulu
     Is it all gone? Everything?

Robbie
     Yes. It’s all gone.

Was that your blood?

Lulu
     No. It must have splashed me.

Robbie
     Who’s blood is it?

Lulu
     Why does it have to be like this?

Robbie
     I knew something was up.

Lulu
     I mean, what kind of planet is this when you can’t even buy a bar of chocolate?

Robbie
     I think that’s why I worried so much.

Lulu
     And afterwards of course you feel so guilty. Like you could have done something.

Robbie
     They attacked you?

Lulu
     Not me. The Seven-Eleven.

Walking past and I think: I’d like a bar of chocolate. So I go in but I can’t decide which one. There’s so much choice.

Too much. Which I think they do deliberately. I’m only partly aware – and really why should I be any more aware? – that an argument is forming at the counter. A bloke.

Dirty, pissy sort of –

Robbie
     Wino?

Lulu
     Probably. Wino sort of bloke is having a go at this girl, young –

Robbie
     Student?

Lulu
     Yes. Student girl behind the counter. Wino is raising his voice to student.

There’s a couple of us in there. Me – chocolate. Somebody else – TV guides. (Because now of course they’ve made the choice on TV guides so fucking difficult as well.)

And wino’s shouting: You’ve given me twenty. I asked for a packet of ten and you’ve given me twenty.

And I didn’t see anything. Like the blade or anything. But I suppose he must have hit her artery. Because there was blood everywhere.

Robbie
     Shit.

Lulu
     And he’s stabbing away and me and TV guide we both just walked out of there and carried on walking.

And I can’t help thinking: why did we do that?

Robbie
     Look. It’s done now.

Lulu
     I could have stayed.

Am I clean?

Robbie
     All gone.

Lulu
     I could have intervened. Stopped him.

It’s all off?

Robbie
     Yes.

Lulu
     It’s like it’s not really happening there – the same time, the same place as you. You’re here. And it’s there. And you just watch.

I’m going back.

Robbie
     What for?

Lulu
     Who called an ambulance? She could be lying there.

Robbie
     No. There must have been someone.

Lulu
     Or I could give a description.

Robbie
     Did you see his face?

Lulu
     No. No, I didn’t.

Robbie
     He’s a wino. How they going to find a wino out there?

Lulu
     I don’t know.

Robbie
     Look, they’ll have a video. There’s always like a security camera. They’ll have his face.

Lulu
     And I’ve still got. You see I took.

She produces the chocolate bar from her pocket
.

I took the bar of chocolate. She’s being attacked and I picked this up and just for a moment I thought: I can take this and there’s nobody to stop me. Why did I do that? What am I?

Pause
.

Robbie
     They must be used to it. Work nights in a shop like that, what do they expect?

You go home.

Lulu
     I can’t.

Robbie
     You’ve had a shock. You need to rest.

Lulu
     We’ve got to do this.

Robbie
     I know.

Lulu
     We’ve got to do it tonight.

Robbie
     You’re in no fit state. You’ve gotta sleep.

Lulu
     I don’t want to sleep. I want to get on with this.

Robbie
     I’ll do it.

Lulu
     We’ve got to do it together.

Robbie
     Think I can’t manage? I can cope.

Lulu
     Of course you can.

Robbie
     I want to do it.

Lulu
     Out there on your own?

Robbie
     I’m educated. I’ve read the books. I’ve got the bits of paper. It’s only selling. I can sell. Go home. Go to bed.

Lulu
     You’re right. I am tired.

Robbie
     Then sleep.

Lulu
     They’ll have me on the video. With the chocolate.

Robbie
     They’ll be after him. Not you.

Lulu
     Suppose.

It’s all here.

Lulu
give
Robbie
a bum-bag
.

Robbie
     Right then.

Lulu
     Look there’s just one rule, OK? That’s what they reckon. If you’re dealing. There’s just rule number one. Which is: He who sells shall not use.

Robbie
     Yeah. Makes sense, doesn’t it?

Lulu
     Right. So just don’t . . .

Robbie
     Course not. Rule number one. I’m a big boy.

Lulu
(
hands
Robbie
flyer
)     Show them this on the door.

Robbie
     Still love you.

Lulu
     Haven’t said that for a long time. Wish we could go back to before. Just you and me.

Do you think I look great?

Robbie
     In the right light. And a fair wind.

Lulu
     And a couple of E?

Robbie
     . . . I better go.

Exit
Robbie
.

Lulu
looks at the chocolate bar for a beat. Then eats it very quickly.

Bedsit
.

Gary
hands
Mark
the bottle of champagne
.

Gary
     Horrible int it? Little kid with his arse bleeding.

Mark
     Sorry. I need to go.

Gary
     Arse like a sore.

Mark
     It’s not that.

Gary
     Thought I’d healed.

Mark
     Yes, yes. Sure.

Gary
     This bloke, my mum’s bloke . . .

Mark
     No. Don’t, please.

Gary
     I tried to fight him off, but I think he gets off on that.

Mark
     Please, if you . . .

Gary
     Whatever, you lie back, you fight, he still . . .

I started to bleed.

Mark
     No.

Gary
     He comes into my room after
News at Ten
. . . every night after
News at Ten
and it’s, son. Come here, son. I fucking hate that, ’cos I’m not his son.

Mark
     Sure, sure. I understand.

Gary
     But I thought . . . now . . . I . . . got . . . away.

Mark
     FUCKING SHUT UP OK? KEEP YOUR FUCKING MOUTH SHUT.

Gary
     Sound like him.

Mark
     Listen. I want you to understand because. I have this personality you see? Part of me that gets addicted. I have a tendency to define myself purely in terms of my relationship to others. I have no definition of myself you see. So I attach myself to others as a means of avoidance, of avoiding knowing the self. Which is actually potentially very destructive. For me – destructive for me. I don’t know if you’re following this but you see if I don’t stop myself I repeat the patterns. Get attached to people to these emotions then I’m back to where I started. Which is why, though it may seem uncaring, I’m going to have to go.

You’re gonna be OK?

I’m sorry it’s just –

Gary
cries
.

Mark
     Hey. Hey. Hey.

He makes a decision. He takes
Gary
in his arms
.

Come on. No. Come on. Please. It’s OK.

Everything will be OK.

You don’t have to say anything.

Gary
     I want a dad. I want to be watched. All the time, someone watching me. Do you understand?

Mark
     I think so.

Gary
     Does everyone feel like that?

Mark
     Well . . . no.

Gary
     What do you want?

Mark
     I don’t know yet.

Gary
     You must want something. Everybody’s got something.

Mark
     I used to know what I felt. I traded. I made money. Tic Tac. And when I made money I was happy, when I lost money I was unhappy. Then things got complicated. But for so many years everything I’ve felt has been . . . chemically induced. I mean, everything you feel you wonder . . . maybe it’s just the . . .

Gary
     The smack.

Mark
     Yes. The smack, coffee, you know, or the fags.

Gary
     The microwaves.

Mark
     The cathode rays.

Gary
     The madcow. Moooooo.

Mark
     Right. I mean, are there any feelings left, you know?

The coins clatter
.

I want to find out, want to know if there are any feelings left.

Gary
(
offering two Pot Noodles
)     Beef or Nice and Spicy?

Scene Seven

Accident and Emergency waiting room
.

Robbie
sits bruised and bleeding
.
Lulu
is holding a bottle of TCP
.

Lulu
     I asked the Sister. She said I could. It’ll sting a bit.

But with blood. It might get infected. Like gangrene.

Lulu
applies the TCP to
Robbie
’s face.

Lulu
     Keep still. Don’t want to end up with like – one eye mmm?

Look good actually.

Robbie
     Yeah.

Lulu
     Yes, suits you. Makes you look – well . . . tough.

Robbie
     Good.

Lulu
     I could go for you. Some people a bruise, a wound, doesn’t suit them.

Robbie
     No.

Lulu
     But you – it fits. It belongs.

Lulu
slips her hand into
Robbie
’s trousers and starts to play with his genitals
.

Lulu
     Is that good?

Robbie
     Yeah.

Lulu
     That’s it. Come on. That’s it.

Tell me about them.

Robbie
     Who?

Lulu
     The men. Attackers.

Robbie
     Them.

Lulu
     The attackers. Muggers

Robbie
     Well.

Lulu
     Sort of describe what they did. Like a story.

Robbie
     No.

Lulu
     I want to know.

Robbie
     It’s nothing.

Lulu
     I don’t want to just imagine.

Robbie
     I wasn’t like that.

Lulu
     Come on then.

Robbie
     Look.

Lulu
     What was it like?

Pause
.

Robbie
     There was only one.

Lulu
     Didn’t you say gang?

Robbie
     No.

Just this one bloke.

Lulu
     A knife?

Robbie
     No.

Lulu
     Oh.

So. He pinned you down?

Robbie
     No.

Lulu
     Got the money.

Robbie
     I didn’t – there wasn’t any money alright? I never took any money.

Lulu
     You never / sold?

Robbie
     No.

Lulu
     So before you even got there this man. With his knife –

Robbie
     / There wasn’t a knife.

Lulu
     Attacks and gets the E.

Robbie
     No. I got there. I was there with the E.

Lulu
     So?

Robbie
     So.

Pause
.

Lulu
     You’ve lost it. (
His erection.
)