The Normal Heart and The Destiny of Me: Two Plays (18 page)

ALEXANDER’
s comic books.
)

RICHARD:
Come here, you!

ALEXANDER:
(
From his room.
) I’m not home from school yet!

RICHARD:
I warned you if I caught you buying comic books one more time I’d take away your allowance. You’ll never get into Yale.

ALEXANDER:
I’m going to go to Harvard.

RICHARD:
You are not going to go to Harvard.

ALEXANDER:
(
To
NED.
) What am I supposed to say? Poppa, this strange man who lives down the block
gives
me the comic books. If I let him stick his finger up my tushie and suck my penis. He says he’s in medical school and I’m helping him learn. Isn’t it all right to have comic books if I don’t spend my own money on them?

NED:
Mordecai Rushmore.

ALEXANDER:
Why do I have to lie? (
Entering dressed.
) Hi, Pop. What’s a penis? (
Grabbing the offending comic books.
)

RICHARD:
(
Leaving to wash up.
) Look it up in the dictionary.

ALEXANDER:
It isn’t in the dictionary.

RICHARD:
Then ask your mother. (
Exits.
)

HANNIMAN:
(
Enters with a large bottle of pills.
) Take two of these every two hours. You have a watch. I won’t have to remind you.

NED:
(
As
ALEXANDER
stuffs the comics behind a book on a shelf.
) What are you doing?

ALEXANDER:
I always hide them here.

NED:
(
Reading the book’s spine.) Psychopathia Sexualis
by Dr. Richard von Krafft-Ebing.

HANNIMAN:
There seem to be more and more unusually dressed people gathering outside. What are they going to do?

NED:
Look, can we please try and be friends?

ALEXANDER:
Hey! I think if you’re going to be with me, you really should be with me.

NED:
I’m sorry if I upset you.

HANNIMAN:
You’re not sorry. You’re scared shitless. (
Leaves.
)

RENA’S VOICE:
Somebody please help me!

(
RENA WEEKS
manages to open the front door, carrying large bags of groceries. She is in her forties. She wears a Red Cross uniform—skirt, jacket, and hat.
)

ALEXANDER:
(
Helping her.
) Hi, Mom. Dad says to ask you what’s a penis.

RENA:
I told you.

ALEXANDER:
Tell me again.

RENA:
When you grow up, you’ll insert it into the woman’s sexual organ, which is called the vagina. The penis goes into the vagina and deposits semen into my uterus, and, if it’s the right time of the month, pregnancy occurs, resulting, nine months later, in a child.

ALEXANDER:
That’s all?

RENA:
What else would you like?

(
RICHARD
returns, drying his hands on a towel, which he then puts around his neck. The telephone starts to ring.
)

RICHARD:
Why are you so late?

RENA:
You want to eat, don’t you? Can’t anyone else ever answer the phone?

RICHARD:
Who calls me? (
Takes out some new money, peels a bill off.
)

RENA:
(
Answering the phone.
) Hello.

RICHARD:
I’m raising your allowance from fifty cents to one dollar.

ALEXANDER:
(
Surprised.
) Thanks, Pop.

RENA:
Oh, Mrs. Noble! This is Rena Weeks, Home Service Director, Suburban Maryland Chapter American Red Cross.

RICHARD:
(
Trying to give the rest of the money to
RENA.
) Count it. I got a raise!

RENA:
(
Taking the money and putting it down.
) Could you possibly send some of your wonderful Gray Ladies to help us out driving our paraplegic vets to the ball game this Saturday while our regular volunteers work the monthly Bloodmobile?

RICHARD:
I hate it that you work.

RENA:
Yes, it is hard finding volunteers now the war is almost over.

(
ALEXANDER
accidentally drops some canned goods.
)

RICHARD:
That table cost two hundred dollars!

ALEXANDER:
One hundred and seventy-five.

RENA:
Yes, some other time. (
Hangs up.
)

RICHARD:
They fired fifty more. Abe Lesser and his wife moved out of their apartment in the middle of the night. Nobody heard them leave. How could anybody not hear them leave?

(
ALEXANDER
sits down and reads part of
RICHARD’
s newspaper, unconsciously jiggling his leg up and down with increasing speed.
RENA
puts out a cold meal; in a hurry, she’ll rush through the serving, eating, and clearing.
)

RENA:
It’s been a terrible day for tragedy.

RICHARD:
Abe Lesser is no more a Communist than Joe DiMaggio.

RENA:
We had a dreadful fire in Hyattsville.

RICHARD:
I went to Yale with Abie.

RENA:
Six entire families were burned out of everything they owned.

RICHARD:
I don’t want to hear about it.

RENA:
I found shelter for all of them. Six entire families, Richard.

RICHARD:
That’s enough! I asked you not to talk about it.

ALEXANDER:
Louella Parsons is very angry at Rita Hayworth.

RENA:
(
Telling
ALEXANDER.
) And I had to call a lovely young bride and break the news that her husband—he was just drafted, they didn’t even have time for a honeymoon—he was killed on his very first training flight.

ALEXANDER:
Louella says playing bold hussies only gets Rita into trouble.

RENA:
His plane just fell from the sky.

RICHARD:
Didn’t you hear me!

RENA:
She hadn’t even started receiving his paychecks and he’s dead!

ALEXANDER:
Louella says she should start playing nice girls like Loretta Young.

RENA:
Somebody has to take care of them!

RICHARD:
And I never get a hot meal!

RENA:
Oh, you do too get hot meals!

RICHARD:
I like my tuna salad with egg and you know it!

RENA:
I didn’t have time to boil eggs!

ALEXANDER:
But Rita says the bold and the brazen are the only parts they offer her.

(
RICHARD
suddenly and furiously swats
ALEXANDER’
s leg with his part of the newspaper.
)

What’d I do now!

RICHARD:
You’re boring a hole in the rug!

ALEXANDER:
Four hundred dollars.

RENA:
Alexander, eat.

RICHARD:
Five hundred dollars!

ALEXANDER:
Four hundred and forty-nine ninety-five.

RICHARD:
Isn’t Ben coming home again?

RENA:
I don’t know.

RICHARD:
Four hundred and ninety-nine ninety-five! Tax, delivery, and installation. He’s Alexander again?

ALEXANDER:
At least seven full weeks ago I changed my name to Alexander. Alex, which I thought suited me, was only the whim of a foolish child, a mere moment in time. And Benjamin has always,
always,
preferred Benjamin. You’re the only one who insists on shortening him to Ben. And no, Benjamin is not coming home. He had football practice this afternoon, tonight he puts the school paper to bed, and then he’s sleeping over
at one of his chums. And,
and,
he has told me confidentially that he hates eating at home. With us. Everyone fights too much. (
Salts his food vigorously.
)

RENA:
He didn’t say any such thing.

RICHARD:
(
Slapping
ALEXANDER’
s band.
) You cannot put so much salt on everything! Do you want your stomach to fall apart when you grow up?

ALEXANDER
and
NED:
I’ll let you know when I grow up.

NED:
It did.

RICHARD:
(
To
NED.
) What did I tell you? (
To
ALEXANDER.
) Ben your bosom buddy? He doesn’t even know you’re alive.

ALEXANDER:
He does so! (
Salts his food vigorously.
)

RICHARD:
Do you see what he’s doing?

RENA:
Richard, please don’t say things like that to the boy.

RICHARD:
Am I talking to the wall?

RENA:
They love each other very much. Benjamin was dying for a brother. He ran all the way to the hospital.

ALEXANDER:
And when he saw me he said, “God, he’s ugly. What a lemon!” Why do you always have to tell that story? (
Salts vigorously again.
)

RICHARD:
I wash my hands of him. He’s your son.

RENA:
He’s your son, too. I forgot to put any salt in, I was in such a hurry.

RICHARD:
You always take his side.

RENA:
There aren’t any sides. We’re all on the same side. We’re a family.

RICHARD:
Where’s my Gelusil? My ulcer’s acting up.

NED:
Take Alka-Seltzer. It’s the only thing that works for me. (
Gives
RICHARD
one.
)

ALEXANDER:
Here it comes, Alexander’s ulcer.

NED:
Did they have Alka-Seltzer then?

RICHARD:
(
Preparing it in one of
NED’
s hospital cups.
) I get these pains in my gut and the doctor says there’s no cure and I said, of course not, how can you be cured of your own son.

NED:
Of course they had Alka-Seltzer then. Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses—all the Jews took Alka-Seltzer.

RICHARD:
You haven’t shut up since the day you were born.

NED:
The Jews
invented
Alka-Seltzer.

ALEXANDER:
And I won’t shut up until the day I die!

NED:
Jesus took Alka-Seltzer.

RENA:
Both of you stop it! Where did this fight come from?

ALEXANDER:
(
To
RICHARD.
) Why don’t fights with Benjamin cause your ulcer? Why is it always Alexander’s ulcer?

RENA:
You fought with Benjamin?

ALEXANDER:
When he won his appointment it didn’t look like the war would ever be over.

RICHARD:
I won’t let him throw away a West Point education!

ALEXANDER:
But now there’s no point to West Point.

RICHARD:
A war isn’t over just because you say it’s over.

NED:
World War II ended in ‘45 and McCarthy was the early fifties. I’m not remembering this properly.

ALEXANDER:
Yes, you are, you are! You’re remembering it just fine.

NED:
(
Starting to take some of the pills
HANNIMAN
left.
) I don’t remember what I’m remembering.

ALEXANDER:
Isn’t that the point? I’ll tell you when you’re wrong.

NED:
I’m sure you will. (
Noticing the container.
) He knows I won’t take this poison! (
Pumps the nurse’s bell.
)

RENA:
Richard, you’re going to have to work the Bloodmobile on Saturday.

RICHARD:
I’ll be goddamned if I’ll work the Bloodmobile on Saturday or any other day.

RENA:
Then you can drive the paraplegics to the ball game. Take your pick. And watch your language.

RICHARD:
The Bloodmobile on Saturday, Sunday you teach at Temple, and I never get a hot meal.

RENA:
Now I’m not supposed to teach at Temple? How else could we pay for Alexander to learn about the history of our people?

ALEXANDER:
Don’t blame that one on me.

RENA:
It’s bad enough living in a place where we’re the only Jews. It was bad enough his not being bar mitzvahed. My mother would die if she knew.

ALEXANDER:
How will she know? You made me write her how sad we all were she couldn’t come all the way from L.A. to see me become a man and thank you for your generous check.

NED:
(
To
RENA
.) Do you know I think that was my first conscious lie?

RENA:
(
To
NED.
) I was only trying not to break my mother’s heart.

(
Goes into her bedroom.
)

ALEXANDER:
Mordecai Rushmore was my first lie.

NED:
He was kind of humpy.

ALEXANDER:
I don’t have to tell you there are a lot of comic books hidden behind Dr. Krafft-Ebing.

NED:
So you like it?