THE COFFEE SHOP
Marty walks in to find Giovanni with his head down, sitting at the table.
MARTY: You okay?
GIOVANNI: I really don’t think so. You seem up.
MARTY: I feel up.
GIOVANNI: That’s very good, I’m happy for you.
MARTY: What’s the matter?
GIOVANNI: There’s a lot of things that are the matter, in fact, if you are truly up, which by the look on your face, that I haven’t seen in a very long time, is accurate, by my…
Giovanni seems frozen.
GIOVANNI: What’s the word when you are getting something off of someone else?
MARTY: A read?
GIOVANNI: Reading? Read. Reading… No, that’s not it. Whatever, from what I’m reading from you… That’s not it.
MARTY: It’s fine.
GIOVANNI: That’s the point, it’s not fine, and that’s what I’m saying. You gotta get out of here is what I’m saying, because I’m in no mood to handle the mood you seem to be in, by way of reading you, and I don’t want to be the one to crash down upon that. I don’t need that guilt right now on top of everything else. You dig?
MARTY: I can handle it.
GIOVANNI: What’s going on with you?
MARTY: With me?
GIOVANNI: What are we doing here? Is there a third party I’m not seeing? Yes, you.
MARTY: I’m good.
GIOVANNI: You’re good?
MARTY: I’m really good.
GIOVANNI: Well, tell me everything quickly, so we can get it out of the way, cause we need to talk, or we don’t and you should just leave now. I’m saying this from a place of love. I’m really going the wrong way here. You see what I’m saying?
MARTY: I do.
GIOVANNI: So, tell me.
MARTY: Ninety days.
GIOVANNI: Huh?
MARTY: Ninety days and I feel great. Although a variation on what you suggested, what Vincent suggested rather, and I’m feeling great. My son is great, we just had a blast of a weekend and I am feeling excellent.
GIOVANNI: You get a job?
MARTY: That I did not, but that, and this is something I feel, will come.
GIOVANNI: You got a broad?
MARTY: Same answer, but my son is excellent, and whatshername has truly become whatshername and she can dance with every Spaniard this side of Texas for all I care.
GIOVANNI: I am truly happy for you.
MARTY: Thank you.
GIOVANNI: You good?
MARTY: I am.
GIOVANNI: Mary Newton’s mother just passed.
MARTY: Mary?
GIOVANNI: Newton, my ex. The blonde with the legs.
MARTY: I remember.
GIOVANNI: Calls me last night and tells me her mom passed. Just right out of the blue.
MARTY: Oh my god, is she okay?
GIOVANNI: I just told you she’s dead. No, she’s not okay, by any stretch.
MARTY: Mary!
GIOVANNI: Oh. No, she’s a fucking mess.
MARTY: Horrible.
GIOVANNI: I agree.
MARTY: That’s life.
GIOVANNI: No, it’s not. It’s death. Why do people say that when people die? That’s life? It’s not. It’s the polar fucking opposite of life. It’s death.
MARTY: It’s a part of life.
GIOVANNI: And the exact opposite at the same time. Never say that again.
MARTY: Okay.
GIOVANNI: I’ll tell you what life is… Life is moving forward and making people smile, or that’s what mine has been anyway, but now I’m starting to think, and this unfortunately has nothing to do with the lovely-legged Mary Newton’s mother, God rest her soul, but forget that. I’m not even talking about her, nor does she have anything to do with what the hell we’re dealing with here.
MARTY: You need some water?
GIOVANNI: No, I don’t need water, I need a bridge to get over the water, pal, because truth be told, quiet as kept, I’m slipping into the river here.
MARTY: What’s the problem?
GIOVANNI: I’m done. I can’t do it anymore. Something is changing. I’ve been playing a role for the last thirty-something years that all of a sudden I just don’t fit for the part anymore, and nothing happened. It just is what it is. Mary’s mother, whatshername, this one, that one. IT JUST IS!
MARTY: You’re having a moment.
GIOVANNI: That indeed I am.
MARTY: It will pass.
GIOVANNI: Not this one. I got off the phone last night, tok a hit of some weed to try and relax, and when I woke up, I was anything but. This is serious.
MARTY: Did you dream?
GIOVANNI: Like a monster, but I can’t remember shit… Actually scratch that. Remembering is all I have and that’s what I’ve come to. All I got is, look back, and a bunch of “you remember that?” What the hell am I doing? I’m having a thing here and I need you to help me.
MARTY: I’m right here, and that’s what I want to do.
GIOVANNI: I gotta search, we gotta search. We gotta do better than the people that came before us and all I’m doing is chasing broccoli. You understand?
MARTY: What happened?
GIOVANNI: The good old days, that’s what happened. That’s all I got. Remember when we used to have a blast? It was a blast, wasn’t it?
MARTY: Wasn’t it?
GIOVANNI: All of it. It all seems so great looking back. Remember having fun? Remember when we were wild and free and we killed that policeman together?
Marty doesn’t reply.
GIOVANNI: Well?
MARTY: What policeman?
GIOVANNI: Exactly. It might as well have never happened.
MARTY: It didn’t.
GIOVANNI: That’s my point. It might as well have and that’s what I’m saying. It doesn’t matter what really happened if I ain’t got nothing up front.
MARTY: Wait a minute.
GIOVANNI: I don’t know if I got it to wait.
MARTY: You’re happy.
GIOVANNI: I’m a clown.
MARTY: You’re the best.
GIOVANNI: I will be, but not right now. I got to get out there and find out what the hell I’m doing. You? You’ve been doing it. You think it all comes so easy, because it has. You’ve been in the shit, and that’s why you walk in here like you did today. You earned it. I got myself spread all over the place cause I just don’t know where to land. The struggle’s the road to the fruit, and I need to get into it, or something like that.
Marty takes a beat.
MARTY: Are you okay?
GIOVANNI: I think that I am.
MARTY: We’re gonna be fine.
GIOVANNI: Tell me why?
MARTY: I can’t tell you why, I can only tell you that it’s so because it has to be. You got this thing, this thing that everybody in the world wishes they had. You serve a purpose in people’s lives and to say that it’s been a waste of time is a waste of time. Half the shit I been through in my life, I don’t get through it without you.
GIOVANNI: Okay, what about me?
MARTY: Maybe it’s my turn? And to be honest, I’m looking forward to it.
GIOVANNI: Okay.
MARTY: What do you need?
GIOVANNI: I don’t know.
MARTY: That’s okay, too.
GIOVANNI: I think I might have some fears, but that’s not to say that I am scared of anything.
MARTY: It’s okay if you are.
GIOVANNI: Okay, that’s good.
MARTY: Tell me.
GIOVANNI: What is this?
MARTY: You don’t like it?
GIOVANNI: I don’t like anything right now.
MARTY: This is funny.
GIOVANNI: No it’s not. It’s an entire mess of a group of many bunched together things, but funny is not one of them. Or rather an adjective to explain it. Any of it.
MARTY: This is good.
GIOVANNI: Who the fuck do you think you are?
MARTY: Tell me what you are afraid of.
GIOVANNI: This is just too weird.
MARTY: For my sake.
Giovanni thinks about it.
GIOVANNI: That’s good. That I can do. Very strategic. I like your style.
MARTY: I learned from the best.
GIOVANNI: Don’t push.
MARTY: Sorry.
GIOVANNI: Okay. For your sake. Speaking my mind for the sake of helping you. This I can do. Okay. I met this gal a few weeks ago… No, forget that.
Giovanni is trying to put it together.
MARTY: Take your time.
GIOVANNI: Shut up.
MARTY: Sorry.
GIOVANNI: Please. I’m trying to help you out here.
MARTY: I appreciate that.
GIOVANNI: Any gal. Remember Tracy?
MARTY: I do.
GIOVANNI: How about Lucy?
MARTY: I might get confused if you throw too many names out there.
GIOVANNI: Me, too. Hold on. Don’t matter. No names. This one’s right, this one’s wrong, I like the wrong one and the right one makes me sick. Or at the very least, bored.
MARTY: Why do you think that is?
GIOVANNI: I don’t know, my mother was an asshole.
MARTY: Right.
GIOVANNI: But I know that.
MARTY: That’s good. So you know that, then what are you afraid of?
GIOVANNI: Who said I was afraid of anything?
MARTY: You did, like three minutes ago.
GIOVANNI: Right. I’m working here.
MARTY: I see that and I’m proud.
GIOVANNI: All right with the bullshit.
MARTY: Stay focused.
GIOVANNI: Okay. What if it don’t work?
MARTY: It probably won’t.
GIOVANNI: What?
MARTY: Odds are it doesn’t. Wait, what are we talking about? This or the girl?
GIOVANNI: What girl?
MARTY: No girl. What are we talking about?
GIOVANNI: Some fucking help you are.
MARTY: What if what doesn’t work?
GIOVANNI: Lucy. This one, that one. Any of ’em. The right one.
MARTY: That’s what I’m saying, it usually doesn’t. But you move on until it does. I learned that from you.
GIOVANNI: I was just saying it so you would move on, not because I thought it was true. Or thought it was false. What are you saying? Forget what I say or said. You’re making a mess here.
MARTY: That’s life. It’s a mess. It’s not so simple. It’s like getting a part, it’s not a performance that ends up good or bad, it’s both. It’s a mess, and that’s what makes it what it is.
GIOVANNI: I like clean.
MARTY: Then keep doing what you’re doing?
GIOVANNI: How come you know so much all of a sudden?
MARTY: I don’t know shit and it’s beautiful.
GIOVANNI: And I’m talking to you.
Marty takes a beat.
MARTY: Kelly, Kelly, Kelly, Kelly, Kelly, the mother of my thirteen-year-old son, Kelly. That is the first time I’ve said her name in three months and it feels great. You know why? Because I love her and I will always love her. And not to take away anything from your friend Vincent, because what he passed on to you that you then passed on to me was amazing. It worked, but let me tell you what it did in the grand scheme of things. Dick! It ends the same way. I love her and I always will. From the bottom of my heart.
GIOVANNI: Oh, good. Things as they should be. Back to square one. I can be me again and you can be you. SHE SUCKS SHE SUCKS SHE SUCKS! Snap out of it.
MARTY: That’s not the point.
GIOVANNI: Then what is?
MARTY: It will always hurt. It never goes away. When you say I love you and mean it, that’s it for the rest of your life. It always hurts, just less and less as time goes by, but it’s never gone. It hurts because it’s supposed to hurt. That’s life and staying away from it because of what I just went through and might go through again with someone else is chicken shit.
GIOVANNI: You calling me chicken shit?
MARTY: If you’ll accept it, then yes I am.
Giovanni takes a long beat.
GIOVANNI: Okay, I accept it.
MARTY: That’s good.
GIOVANNI: But I got a little ways to go before I can… You know.
MARTY: I understand.
GIOVANNI: Thank you.
MARTY: I love you.
GIOVANNI: I need a breather.
MARTY: That’s fine.
GIOVANNI: A break, maybe.
MARTY: Okay.
GIOVANNI: From all the various… The gals… Gather my thoughts a bit, saddle up, and move forward.
MARTY: I’m right here.
GIOVANNI: I do got my mind on one, though.
MARTY: That’s good.
GIOVANNI: She’s really great.
MARTY: Even better.
GIOVANNI: I may have hurt her feelings.
MARTY: You never know.
GIOVANNI: Forget the breather. I’ll find out.
MARTY: Good.
GIOVANNI: Okay, but in the meantime, there’s something I need you to do for me.
LIGHTS OUT