Sample extract from ‘Aurora’ by Craig Norman
Scene Seventeen. Lights up on Bridget and RAGS.
RAGS
Daniel.
BRIDGET
Your name.
Pause
RAGS
Not very good with ‘em.
BRIDGET
Not very good with your own name?
RAGS
Just…..remembering. What he was trying to say back
there.
BRIDGET
I don’t understand.
RAGS
Esme.
Pause.
BRIDGET
You named her. I thought it was beautiful.
RAGS
Other stuff.
BRIDGET
Sorry?
RAGS
You said she was into other stuff.
BRIDGET
Oh. Don’t ask me what it is. Things on
channels…..flicking through. It’s all…colours and crazy
characters and it’s on. I don’t sit and watch….or if I do I’m
not watching if you know what I mean. Hours go by
sometimes.
RAGS
Know what you mean.
BRIDGET
But why Daniel?
RAGS
(Breaking away from her, standing) Stop calling me that.
Don’t know who that is.
BRIDGET
It’s you. That’s who you are.
RAGS
Is it?
Pause
BRIDGET
This place is horrible.
RAGS
You said it was nice.
BRIDGET
I lied.
Pause.
Have you had anything to eat? You look….
RAGS
Should have seen the last place.
Pause.
BRIDGET
So many gaps I don’t know where to begin. Do you want
to begin?
RAGS
Everything has just begun.
BRIDGET
What?
RAGS
Didn’t call you.
BRIDGET
I called back. You did call me.
RAGS
Did I?
BRIDGET
I called back. Spoke to your friend. He told me what
happened. About the photograph. The number. I
thought…...I thought maybe when I walked in it wouldn’t
be you. That maybe someone else had found the
photograph or found it in a pocket of something you had
given away or lost or…..so many things, Daniel. So many
things like this I’ve thought. So many times. The if’s and
or’s and how’s and where’s and questions driving you
crazy. Your mind can’t switch off from them. It just won’t
stop. It won’t let you stop. I mean, how dare you. How
fucking dare you? But it doesn’t cover the half of it. I
mean, you have a child for Christ’s sake. You have….
Pause
When I walked in I thought I had made a mistake.
Thought it wasn’t you. Then I looked deep into your eyes
and saw something there. It was the only way I could
recognise you. It’s like….you’re one of those people burnt
beyond recognition in a fire and the only way they can
identify the person is by their teeth. That’s what it’s like.
She goes to look at him and stands with her hands over
her mouth, horrified. He stands in front of her, awkward.
She goes back to her seat
Can you open a window?
He does. She watches him
Thank you.
Pause
I would walk around the house and see your books about
monkeys. You always loved monkeys and it made me
laugh. They’d be lying around the house with
these…pictures and I couldn’t bear to close them
because it was like closing the chapter on you so I would
try to get Esme interested in them but she wouldn’t….
Pause.
She’s going to school now. I have to take my lunch at
quarter to three to go and pick her up from school and
then I take her to Jackie’s to look after her until I come
home. My boss is very understanding. I think Jackie talks
to Esme about spiritual stuff. I get it quoted back at me at
the table. It would make you laugh. Jackie’s been great….
Pause
I go to school assemblies and parents evenings and
school fetes and things on my own. People have stopped
asking about Daddy. I don’t really get invited out anymore.
Nobody wants to invite a single woman to their dinner
parties. Do you see? Do you see this is what my life has
become? And you say you didn’t call me. Did you not
want to call me? Just wanted to forget all about me?
Wipe me and your daughter from your memory?
Pause
RAGS
I’m sorry.
Bridget laughs.
BRIDGET
Do you not speak anymore either?
RAGS
I…don’t know.
BRIDGET
OH CHRIST, YOU’RE PATHETIC!
Pause
I feel like a cigarette and I haven’t smoked for five years.
But I shall abstain. I’ll be strong enough to abstain.
Pause
I knew you were doing stuff. You did it at university but I
never thought…..SPEAK TO ME, DANIEL!
RAGS
Don’t know where to start.
BRIDGET
Try.
Long Pause.
RAGS
Got lost somewhere.
Pause
BRIDGET
Lost.
RAGS
Lost. On a bender. With some people. Don’t think I
knew them. Trying to think….Can’t.. Think I tried to get
back. But there was more and more. Woke up in a car.
Think …..think I lived in a car. Never got rid of the
photograph. Knew it was something good. Something
worth carrying on for.
BRIDGET
It is. Go on.
He is really concentrating
RAGS
Can’t. Don’t know. Places. Different places. All sorts of
different people. Good. Bad. Mostly bad. He’s good, I
think. Was a bit bad before. Good now. Thought I had
something. Stashed. On me.
BRIDGET
We have to get you away from this.
RAGS
Says I remind him of his brother. Trying to go straight.
BRIDGET
At least he’s trying. Are you trying?
Pause.
He seems to know more about you than I do.
Pause.
Your friend said there was a bit of trouble. What
trouble?
RAGS
Always trouble.
BRIDGET
Always trouble and you choose to live this life.
RAGS
Didn’t choose.
BRIDGET
You walked out one night and never came home. How
was that not a choice?
Pause
I had to call the police and report you as a missing
person. You were in the back of The Big Issue. Your
face in papers and posters. Newspapers and shop
windows. So many things. You didn’t choose? What do
you mean you didn’t choose? You had a home and a
family. A home. A comfortable home that we worked for.
A job. You were a teacher, Daniel. A wonderful teacher
and you loved the kids you taught and they loved you.
They way they looked at you with their faces beaming
and hanging around your legs and looking up at you
and I was so proud. We were all so proud. I loved you
so much. And a little bit of a smoke sometimes, I could
smell it under the door when you were marking, I’d
come in and have a little bit myself sometimes do you
remember? But you couldn’t stop there….you had to
progress, hah, progress, what a stupid way of
describing it….progress onto other stuff, more stuff, I
don’t know what Daniel…
RAGS
STOP CALLING ME THAT!
BRIDGET
(During the following RAGS starts getting more and
more agitated and starts banging and kicking the
furniture and Bridget gets more and more upset) I don’t
know, I’ve no idea, I don’t want to know…The picture I
used of you….The picture I used of you was you on the
day you graduated from teacher training college….you
all smart and bohemian and cool and smiling and I had
a feeling in the pit of my stomach that the two of us
were going to have an exciting life and I loved being
with you and couldn’t wait to be with you and spend the
rest of my life with you and have your children and now
it’s all tainted by this horrible….years have gone by
Daniel….
RAGS
Shut up…..
BRIDGET
Years that we’ll never catch up on. I don’t think I’ll ever
really know what happened. I don’t know if you want to
tell me. I don’t know if you want me, even. Any more. I
don’t know if I….. I don’t know if I want you.
Pause.
I thought I made a mistake. I took one look at you and
nearly walked out again and I don’t think you would
ever have known. You were intelligent, Daniel. You
were a great guy but now you can’t even remember
your own name. Your own daughter’s name. How could
you, Daniel? How could you forget your own daughter’s
name? Your own daughter waiting back at home for you
with her toys all over the carpet but Mummy’s too tired
and distraught to play but Daddy could….Daddy could
but no, it’s me like a walking zombie now and sobbing
myself to sleep every night. This pull in my heart. A hole
in my life. A gigantic empty aching hole in my life is
what you’ve left but while you fill yourself with chemicals
and get that high I’m beyond low, Daniel, far far beyond
low.
RAGS
You don’t understand…..
BRIDGET
THEN TALK TO ME DANIEL? TELL ME. WHERE
HAVE YOU BEEN! WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN? WHAT
HAPPENED? WHY? WHY?
RAGS violently smashes up the furniture in a fury.
Bridget tries to stop him and manages to put her arms
around him from behind. She holds him close to her for
a while
How did you end up here? How did we end up here?
Pause
Too many questions for one day.
Pause
We’ll go home. You’ll come back. Come back with me.
Come home.
She turns him to face her.
You have another child. You have a son called Thomas.
I was pregnant when you left. There’s everything to live
for.
STU enters with a carrier bag with a box of teabags in it.
He sees the damage to his kitchen.
STU
Shit.
BRIDGET
I’ll pay for any damage.
Pause
STU
I got the teabags.
BRIDGET
I think we might be off.
Pause.
STU
Right. Thought you might.
BRIDGET
Thank you for your hospitality.
STU
Pleasure.
Pause.
(To RAGS) You alright mate?
BRIDGET
He’ll be fine.
STU
Was nice to have someone about the place. Not much
conversation mind you, could hardly get two words out
of him. ’Cept when he starts quoting off the telly.
BRIDGET
I know.
STU
Don’t forget the mug.
BRIDGET
We’ll leave it. Thanks.
STU
Right.
BRIDGET
Right.
Pause.
Thank you.
STU
You don’t need to worry about this. (Indicating the
damage) This place is a dump anyway, was thinking of
moving on.
BRIDGET
Where will you go?
STU
Dunno. Got a few plans. Irons in the fire.
BRIDGET
Right.
Pause.
Goodbye. (They start to leave)
STU
See ya mate.
RAGS
See ya.
Pause.
Everything has just begun.
They leave. STU stands still. He puts his carrier bag on
a table and goes over to the chairs. He picks up the
Ren and Stimpy mug and holds it in front of him, smiling.
Lights slowly fade.