Characters and Index:
Main Characters
The Doctor: --Dr. Bash
The Nurse: --Rosario
The Roommate: --Oliver Reams
The Fiancé: --Eva Fremont
The Patient/Husband: --Lee Walters
Minor Characters
*The Mother [Eva’s parent]: --Holly
*The Father [Eva’s parent]: --Bruce
*Elsie [Lee Walters Mother]
Miscellaneous Characters
Glen and Harry [Friends of the family at the trailer park]
The Gate Keeper at the Trailer Park
The bartender
The gay man at the bar
Music: Composition and Lyric’s by D. L. Siluk [see annex at end of book]
Music: “It Was Always You” With Feeling
“The Dancer” Brite 4
“Death [departure] Easy Waltz
“The End of Day’s” Talk
“As Love Goes By”
Chapters/or Acts:
Act I In the Hospital
Act II In the Trailer Park
Act III Back at the Hospital
Act IV At the Apartment [three poetic-musical lyrics read]
Act V Before the Bar/Outside the Apartment
Act VI The Jam Bar/the Tragedy
The Annex: The Poetic-Music/Lyrics [composition in Annex]
Additional Poetry: “2nd Ave”
Annex:
Songs in lyrics:
Five songs of sheet music [available]
Notes: Fragments of Life
[About the story]
A Note on the construction: The first Act was written 3/2003, the second and third Act’s were written 4/2003; Act five written in 5/2003. The play has been written in a way to be read, similar to a screen play one might say. The first week of July, 2003, the play was re-edited, and lightly modified, preparation for publication. Reviewed for publication on internet 2/2006.
The Fruit Cake
Act I
In the Hospital
[l993]
This is the “hospital” room of Lee Walters. The room [and, by observation the ward] is big, and let me add noisy –. I can’t say much for the hospital apparatus. Some of the equipment looks like tubes hanging everywhere, not sure where they go and could careless. A copy of the book, “Never-where,” is lying on the table-desk next to his bed. Lee is waiting to go home after surviving a stroke and heart attack; he had some complications with his surgery, but all seems well now; the doctor has explained to him he actually had a second heart attack, the first being two weeks prior to his second, and he didn’t know it, a minor one he assured him, compared to this most recent one, the major one that is, in which he got to the hospital in time.
He has been in the hospital for three weeks now, with bypass surgery, and had a stroke on the operating table, but again I emphasize, he made it through all these trials. You got it: --he’s getting bored, --now, for recovery, it has its own little miracles planted throughout the week. We shall get to that in a moment. He wants the doctors to release him this morning. But just a minute, against the doctor’s better judgment, that is.
Now you see when the curtain goes up, Lee Walters trying to get comfortable in his bed, stumbling with the pillows behind his back and head a bit. And Miss Fremont [let’s just refer to her as “Eva” make life easy] –standing in the doorway, shaking her head [thinking, what a dumb clucks, Lee is; we’ll get to Lee also in a moment] “Some kind of bug in your bed, Lee?” She says. He leans back hard against the back of the bed, boredom on his face, a sound coming out of his mouth, more akin to a hiss, I don’t’ think he appreciated the remark, but then he is getting acclimatized to them, or he should be by now. This situation doesn’t seem to amuse anyone, that is, her comments, and his getting situated; he sinks back lower into his bed—
No response
Eva. Lee!
Still no response
Lee, relax please, it isn’t good for you to use so much effort [remarks Eva again]
Yet, there still remains silence from Lee
Ok –-(annoyed)—it’s your show, I could care less [says Eva].
Lee is a thirty-five years old male. He is a Mail-Carrier that makes $35,000 dollars a year. He has no whiskers but he keeps rubbing his face as if he has a nervous impulsive reaction. He is a hyper person by nature. His mouth is open a bit, ready to say something, or can’t seem to breathe properly through his nose [one or the other]. In either case, it doesn’t help his already annoyed state of being in the hospital for so long—twenty-one days. He has finally gotten comfortable and lifts his head up to eye level with his fiancé [a light pause], focusing his attention on her face now. She seems a bit dumbfounded now that she has his attention: --lost for words one might say.
Lee. Eva! Do you have something worthwhile to say?
No response
Eva!
Still no response
Eva!
Eva [with a tired attitude]. Monkey see, monkey do, isn’t that how it is in our world?
Lee [shaking his head, indignant]. So you say [he sucks in a breath of air] did you come here to point out my faults, or what?
Eva. You can figure that out for yourself smart guy, for yourself.
Lee. I sure can [smugly]!
Eva. I was trying to find out how you were feeling and I got your old snotty remarks as usual; you’re snotty, snotty—shit.
Lee. Gee, I thought you were worried if I had a bug in my ass, I mean bed. Real concerned about my well-being, how about you admitting you are part of my boredom, I’m so used to your smart remarks.
Eva. For once you’re half right, I forgot about the ‘bug’ remark. Ok, you win, now let us begin—begin, again, you know, from scratch, ok?
Lee. Oh boy, what does that mean? what am I in store for, another round of trying to fix my pillow so I don’t get annoyed with you again?
The patient in the other bed is getting an ear full
Eva [somberly]. I can’t help it if we annoy one another. We are so used to making fun of everything—we’ve forget how to be serious. But I was crying when I heard you had a stroke on the operating table, along with your heart surgery, I really was, ask your brother. You know you were out for three days; --your left side was paralyzed—out [a slight pause]; out like having…I don’t want to talk about it. You also were having fits for twelve-hours; man o man, you are so lucky…!
Lee. Yes, I know you were crying, I remember something of that. Dr. Bash, Bush or Bean Head, I don’t know his name [a pause, he tries to get his breath], ok, Dr. Bash came last night and said I was doing great—inasmuch as I came out of this alive. But he added, and I hate to repeat it, but I will, for a while there, I was a “Fruit Cake,” for a while meaning, a few days that is. Can you imagine someone calling you a ‘…fruit cake?’ after you had a stroke?
Eva [looking straight ahead, thinking]. Well [pause], now that you say it, you were kind of one, I mean, you really were kind of a ‘fruit cake’ [Lee looking annoyed at Eva]. Can’t do much about that, can we now—but I suppose it would bother me somewhat, I think. On one hand you were a fruit cake, or out of it, you were having those fits you know, or what do you call those things, you know, makes the body jumppp…all over the place, whatever they were, it wasn’t good. We all thought you would not recover, they [the doctors] were going to put you into a coma state because you had 12-hours of these tantrums; your brother was here, and—and he had a hard time with it as did your mother, she was here everyday, I mean everyday, I think she would have died if you would have; --I’ve seen a few tears in your brothers eyes, but you fooled everyone, and recovered in three days. Everyone says you’re the miracle of the ward. And so maybe you were a fruit cake, for awhile, but on the other hand, you are not anymore.
Lee [his crabbiness showing]. See, you never take my side, even when I’m sick. Well [pause; a moment to think], …what if I get another stroke, and remain a forever, fruit cake, are you going to take care of this fruit cake, or throw it in the garbage can? maybe even leave the fruit cake dry up to nothingness!
Eva. That really hurts me that you ask such a question, or is it a statement [?]
Lee. Well?
Eva. You heard me!
Lee is not certain what to say, and taking his time he lowers his eyes. He is beginning to realize he had asked the wrong question, and possibly the right one. And he figured the answered would be, ‘Yes, I’ll leave you.’ Both Eva and Lee are silent; she shakes her head ‘yes.’ Rosario the nurse comes in. She looks around, then shuts the curtain around him, and leaves Eva by herself standing in the doorway.
Eva. Can I be of assistance, Ms Nurse? [Lee shakes his head no to indicated to the nurse he does not want her there.]
Nurse Rosario. No thank you Miss Fremont, I just have to do a few things. [She is taking his pulse and listening to his heart. He eyes her shape up. She has a nice well-formed figure, and her skin looks a bright-olive, she is all of twenty-nine years old. She is about five feet two inches tall, and she speaks slow, but confident.]
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