Scene Seventeen:
Hemp facial
Late that night, around 2 a.m.— Carla’s kitchen. A single, small teapot and teacup on the
table.
The mobile dangles from the ceiling, center stage; it’s aesthetic is one of voo-doo—
homespun, personal, talismanic, strange.
In addition to the items from the old suitcase, now there are family photos, a child’s
snorkel and flippers, Esme’s blond baby doll, long ropes of seaweed. Carla’s laundry
basket, in the center of the mobile, hangs tipped at an angle, with laundry appearing to
spill out: white dress shirt, white boxers, white kid-sized socks, an undershirt, a white
cotton dress—the family’s laundry.
Carla is making four batches of tea. She has four containers on the counter—mismatched
ceramic bowls, each with a mismatched lid. Water boils on the stove. Carla wears a
bandanna tied across her forehead. Jasmine has grown across the backs of the chairs. It
creeps around the faucet handles of the sink, winds around the handle of a teapot, along
the kitchen counter.
Carla:
(to herself) Green tea… Anti-oxidant… (she pours a handful of loose green tea into one
jar) Chamomile… Anti-inflammatory….(she pours chamomile into the second jar)
Peppermint… neutralizes redness…detoxifying… (pours peppermint in the third
container)
The kettle whistles. Carla pours hot water over the four different teas, covers them.
Outside on the patio, Esme walks up to the front door, stockings ripped, hair disheveled,
lipstick, eye-shadow, mascara smeared, wildly blurred. She has corn husks, dried grass,
pebbles, flowers blossoms in her hair, and matted on her stockings and her clothes.
Carla (cont’d):
Lavender blossom…anti-acne…(she pours a handful of dried lavender into a fourth jar).
Esme enters. Pause.
Carla:
Hey, Stranger.
Esme:
You’re up.
Carla:
Of course I’m up.
Esme:
Well. Get some rest. (she heads upstairs) Don’t work too hard…
Carla:
Esme?
Esme:
Yes?
Carla:
Your lipstick’s all smeared.
Esme:
Oh?
Carla:
Your stockings are ripped.
Esme:
Oh… Yeah…
Carla:
You have grass and corn husks and things…matted in your hair.
Esme:
(pats her hair, tentatively) Huhn…. That’s so weird. (she goes upstairs)
Carla:
Esme.
Esme:
(saccharine, detached) Yeah?
Carla:
Can you come down here?
Esme:
I don’t think so.
Carla:
I could make us something. Something to eat.
Esme:
I don’t like eating. Unless I get stoned or something.
Carla:
I could get you stoned.
Esme:
Shut up!
Carla:
No, really. I have some…some stuff stashed away.
Esme:
You have a stash of weed? Where?
Carla:
Don’t. Don’t laugh. It’s—right up here. With all the skincare herbs.
Esme:
That’s hilarious. “Welcome to The Skin Farm...We use only the freshest, all-natural
ingredients on your face—lavender, calendula, emu oil—and weed…!” Do you use that
on your clients, too?
Carla:
No, but come to think of it, maybe I should! Hemp oil has the right proportion of omega3’s to omega-9’s—
Esme:
La, la, la, la, la…
Carla:
So—? Maybe I should add pot to my repertoire. Your skin looks like hell, by the way.
Esme:
Thank you so much.
Carla:
Anytime.
Esme:
Big of you.
Carla:
(infomercial voice) And now, presenting…the truth! Compliments of the house. (Rolls
joint) Listen, you can get high with me on ONE condition—no, two. One, you get your
ass to school tomorrow and don’t ever pull this bullshit about home-schooling again.
Esme:
I can do that.
Carla:
(as if the word tastes bad) Home-schooling…? Jeez.
Esme:
Sorry.
Carla:
And two, you let me work on your skin—
Esme.
NO.
Carla:
What do you mean, no?
Esme:
I’ve had my skin worked on by you enough to last a lifetime. And anyway, I don’t even
want clear skin.
Carla:
(firm, serious) Everyone wants clear skin.
Esme:
Not me.
Carla:
Give me a break.
Esme:
I want skin that’s all boogered-up!
Carla:
Esme…!
Esme:
I want scars and cysts and lines on my forehead! I want dry patches and hyperpigmentation and blackheads and large, oily pores!
Carla:
You’re killing me…!
Esme:
Good. I want to kill you.
Carla:
(beat) All right, suit yourself. Guess I’ll have to smoke alone. (Lights up)
Esme:
I can’t believe I’m seeing this.
Carla:
Hey. I smoke a little pot, all right? I wasn’t born in a bubble.
Carla walks away from Esme, focuses on the doll-mobile project. Esme picks corn husks
and matted leaves slowly, hypnotically, out of her hair. She drops them, casually, when
Carla isn’t looking, into the little teapot that sits on the table.
Esme:
That copper wire is all wrong.
Carla:
What’s wrong with it?
Esme:
Too visible. You should use something undetectable. Something unseen.
Carla:
Like dental floss?
Esme:
Mm. No, more like fishing line.
Carla:
Wire is stronger. It won’t break.
Esme:
Wire’s too obvious. It won’t convey what you want.
Carla:
How do you know what I want to convey? I don’t even know / what I want to convey—
Esme:
Something in mid-fall. (beat) Something falling, irrevocably. (beat) Am I wrong?
Carla:
(considers) I don’t know…
Esme:
That’s what it looks like to me, anyway.
Carla:
Like something in mid-fall?
Esme:
Like something that’s overflowing and spilling out every which way. Like something
that’s never gonna be recovered. Not neatly, anyway. (takes a roll of fishing line out of
her pocket) Here. You need this.
Carla:
I do?
Esme:
Well, your project needs it—that copper wire’s not gonna cut it. (beat) What’s with the
hippie scarf over the forehead?
Carla:
I was derma-planing my skin, and the scalpel slipped.
Esme:
Nice.
Carla:
I’m just afraid it’ll scar.
Esme:
I can’t believe you get clients for that.
Carla:
I can’t either.
Carla ties a crab-claw to the doll’s foot. Esme watches Carla build the mobile, intrigued.
Esme:
Oh, all right. You can do my face.
Carla:
You sure? (passing the joint) Here—knock yourself out.
Esme smokes, picks leaf after leaf, twig after twig, husk after husk out of her hair.
Carla (cont’d):
Do you know…Julian named you?
Esme:
Julian?
Carla:
He loved the name. Some character out of a Salinger short story…
Esme:
Oh, God, the pain…! You’re going to get all Mother-And-Daughter on me, aren’t you?
Carla:
No, I won’t!
Esme:
Oh, yes you will—I can feel it.
Carla:
No, I won’t! I promise. I’ll take an oath. We can just sit here in—you know—in total
silence. (beat) I promise I won’t get all mother-and-daughter on you, I swear!
Esme:
‘Cause I don’t care how much pot you have? I just couldn’t stomach it.
Carla:
Hey. To be honest—I don’t think I could either. (examining Esme’s face clinically,
whistles) That’s angry skin if I’ve ever seen it. Chamomile. Definitely chamomile.
Carla gets batch of chamomile tea, pours some in a bowl, dips a rolled-up towel in the
tea, wrings out the excess. Suddenly, she stops, smells the towel. Smells the towel again.
Carla (cont’d):
This isn’t …! This isn’t chamomile! This is…? Jasmine…!
Esme:
Okay, so it’s jasmine—
Carla:
No, you don’t understand—this is jasmine!
Esme:
No. I think I do understand. That’s jasmine. (smells tea) Yup, that’s jasmine, all right!
Carla:
But—I didn’t make jasmine!
Esme:
Well, somebody did.
Carla:
No, this was—hang on a sec— (smells each container of tea, frantically) OH MY GOD!
Oh, my— Did you—? Did you fuck with my teas?
Esme:
No, I did not fuck with your teas! Hello? I would never fuck with your teas!
Carla:
SOMEONE FUCKED WITH MY TEAS. THEY FUCKED WITH THEM! (inhales teas)
Sasparilla with rose petals…? Anise star pod …? Lemon verbena, mango peel… and…
ginger…? African roobios…with a twist of…clove …and maybe…a hint of carob bean?
Honest to God—this doesn’t add up! This doesn’t compute!
Esme:
Hm. Let’s see—rose petals, anise star pod, lemon verbena, carob, clove, mango, ginger—
sounds fragrant, intoxicating, enticing. Pungently aromatic and odoriferously satisfying!
All those herbs that go over great with your Big Sur types! Dude, why are you freaking?
Carla:
But I—but I—I didn’t make these! I had, um. I had, um. (starting to doubt herself) I had
a pot of Chamomile. A pot of green tea. One with lavender. And peppermint—so,
chamomile, green tea, lavender, peppermint! That’s what I had, okay?
Esme:
Yeah, but—
Carla:
I didn’t brew anything remotely like this! THESE TEAS SPONTANEOUSLY
COMBUSTED!!! I TURNED MY BACK ON THEM FOR ONE MINUTE, AND
THEY CHANGED!!! (smells tea again) THESE ARE NOT THE TEAS I MADE!
Jasmine winds its way up the banister of the staircase. A frantic Carla inspects the teas.
Esme:
Mom?
Carla:
Mm…?
Esme:
Mom!
Carla:
Yeah…?
Esme:
MOM!!!
Carla:
WHAT?
Esme:
YOU’RE STONED.
Carla:
I’m stoned?
Esme:
You’re stoned. You’re three sheets to the wind! You often are—! I know it, you know it.
You—you know—you’re stoned.
Carla:
But—
Esme:
But nothing, Mom. You made tea. You got stoned. You forgot what tea you made. In
your mind’s eye, you’re on some different day, some different week. You’re thinking of
tea you made in another life, tea you made in a dream. But this. Is. The Tea You Made.
This is it! These teas, in these containers, on this particular table, on this particular
night—in this particular dimension! Got it? This one. Right here, right now—THIS.
Carla:
But. But how—?
Esme:
Who knows how? Who knows how all the wheels are turning? I for sure don’t know—!
But, Mom, what I do know is this—you’re stoned. You made tea. You forgot what kind.
But guess what? You did it—it’s done! And now that you’re faced with it—
Carla:
Faced with what?
Esme:
The gap between what you planned and reality—now that your faced with it, this gap—
well, you know—it’s disconcerting.
Carla:
But this is. This is.
Esme:
This is what?
Carla:
A bit…incredible, that’s all. (she inhales teas) Anise star pods… lemon verbena…
ginger… rose petals…
Esme:
Hey. At least they’re cool teas! Interesting. Not your usual.
Carla:
I suppose…
Esme:
Lemon verbena rocks! Anise star looks like some kind of voo-doo talisman for fertility.
And ginger? Has a rockabilly twang that bounces around in your nose. I mean, tell me—
does the world really need another cup of chamomile tea? Personally? I don’t think so!
Carla:
But Chamomile’s safe.
Esme:
Chamomile’s boring.
Carla:
Chamomile’s tried and true! It doesn’t irritate!
Esme:
No one’s gonna complain about chamomile. But it’s not exactly off-the-beaten-path.
Carla:
(beat) Oh, my God. (beat) It happened. (beat) I’m there—or it’s here?
Esme:
What’s where?
Carla:
In my. (pause)
Esme:
Do you need some more pot?
Carla:
Definitely. I definitely need more pot.
Esme:
(gesturing to the cupboard) You want me to…?
Carla:
Do you mind…?
Esme:
(getting footstool, going to cupboard) No, not at all—not a problem.
Carla:
I’ve collided.
Esme:
(getting more pot out of cupboard) Like a car accident?
Carla:
No. More like…a meteor.
Esme:
I’m with you. A meteor, crashing...
Carla:
It’s like Holger was saying…
Esme:
Who’s Holdner?
Carla:
…my body-life has finally collided with my other life—except he called it a parallel life.
But—I mean, if they were truly parallel, they’d never intersect! Would they?
Esme:
Mom? I don’t mean to be rude or anything—but what the fuck are we talking about?
Carla:
About my unseen life. My unlived life of possibility. Of—ah, dreams. Or something.f
Esme:
Uh…okay…?
Carla:
Like a life that no one sees.
Esme goes to the freezer, opens it, looks in.
Carla (cont’d):
Are you going for the Eskimo Pies?
Esme:
What else?
Carla:
Those are Julian’s!
Esme:
I’ll replace them, okay?
Carla:
Since when do you replace anything? Those are not free!
Esme:
I said I’d replace them! (pulls money from her pocket) There. Will that cover it?
Carla:
(beat) Where did you get all that money?
Esme:
Bob gave it to me.
Esme searches for Eskimo Pies, piling items from the freezer onto the counter.
Carla:
Well, give it back to Bob! And who’s Bob, anyway? I’ve never even met Bob—
Esme:
You were talking about a meteor crashing?
Carla:
Uh. Oh, yes—Yes. For a long time now. I’ve lived this life. This other life. A parallel
life. I mean, I’m here, in a body, living one life. But. Just as real, is this other life. A life
of the mind.
Esme:
A parallel life…?
Carla:
Yes—a parallel life, that takes place just off to one side of you…sometimes you bump up
against it in fantasy, other times in dreams… Kind of like…? The service road that runs
alongside the freeway…?
Esme:
(brings two Eskimo Pies to the table, gives one to Carla) Okay...?
Carla:
You know how the service road stops and starts all along the coast…it goes for a while,
then dead-ends, then picks up again, somewhere further down the line…?
Esme:
(serious) I do.
Carla:
And you know how…most people only drive on the freeway…? They don’t even know
the service road exists…?
Esme:
(serious) Totally.
Carla:
…but sometimes you slip onto the service road, by accident—? Like that time I got off at
Avila when I meant to get off at Pismo? I just happened on the service road…? That very
first time?
Esme:
Sure…
Carla:
And after that, I thought, you know—shit! This is totally amazing! I never want to drive
on the freeway again! Right? Because the service road, it’s slower, it’s more beautiful.
But the thing I like most about it? You can look out at the sea.
Esme:
(eating, but engaged) Okay...
Carla:
I mean, from the service road you can see that the ocean is living and breathing, that it’s
actually alive and thinking and scheming and raging and sometimes even turning in on
itself and sabotaging its very own trajectory—like a snake eating its own tail, eating itself
alive—! Like when the waves pull back from the shore? I mean—the ocean, if you really
look at it? Is doing all kinds of crazy things!
Esme:
(serious) Sure it is.
Carla:
And you know what I do, when I see the ocean up close and personal from the service
road? (carried away) I talk to it, I tell it things—I—you know—I come clean. And
then—this is really weird, I can’t believe I’m actually telling you this, but—this is the
first time I have ever said this to anyone—but I actually worry I’m leaning too heavy on
the ocean, telling it everything. Like—I can’t help thinking, who does the ocean tell its
secrets to, you know? To whom does the ocean bare its teeth?
Esme:
Bare its soul, you mean—?
Carla:
I mean, the ocean cleans everybody off, you know? Exonerates everybody! But who
exonerates the ocean? I ask you? I mean, I feel for the ocean, I really do! So whenever
I’m near the ocean, I close my eyes and say to it, Water, talk to me.
Esme:
Dude? How weird is that?
Carla:
I know. Why do you think I’ve never told anyone? But do you see what I mean?
They are lost in thought, lost in the Eskimo Pies.
Esme:
So—you’re saying—there’s this invisible-ish, nebulous, flowing, meandering ServiceRoad-Life that travels alongside your regular day-to-day-good-old-ordinary-go-directlyfrom-point-A-to-point-B-at-seventy-miles-per-hour-Freeway-Life, right? Isn’t that what
you mean? The freeway life is utilitarian and practical, but also un-beautiful, un-attuned
to nuances and subtleties…whereas the service road is like this other unlived parallel life
—lyrical and elegiac and poetic and loaded with numinous possibility, but for the most
part, un-tapped into, unexploited—like, a wasted resource, for all practical purposes—
and that’s sort of a tragedy. Isn’t that what you’re implying?
Carla:
(eating Eskimo Pie) Exactly.
Esme:
And—correct me if I’m wrong, but—tonight, when you made your basic boring, no-frills
teas, in a running-on-automatic, freeway-kind-of-way, the other dimension—the parallelservice-road-dimension of open-ended, vast possibility—inserted itself into your freeway
life, without you even knowing it—until you checked your teas. And but so—all the time
you were preparing the teas, you were not in any manner aware that this other more
mystical, mysterious service road was about to intersect with the usual, staid, static
Freeway-Reality that we normally think of as Life On The Skin Farm. And but so—as a
result of this intersection of the mystical and the mundance, you wound up making these
really fanciful, spectacular teas. In short—there was an overlap of dimensions and
relative realities.
Carla:
(agreeing, finishing Eskimo Pie) What you said.
Knock at the door. Carla and Esme freeze.
Carla:
What the—? It’s three in the fucking morning!
A wild flurry of activity: Esme runs to the pile of frozen items on the counter, tosses them
back in the freezer, dislodging the gun that Gerard stowed in the ice-maker earlier.
Esme:
Mom!
Throughout this exchange, Carla hides the bag of pot, sprays air freshener, opens a
window, turns on a fan, gargles, throws a mint in her mouth.
Carla:
What?
Esme:
Mom! There’s a gun in the freezer!
Carla:
Put that back immediately! That’s Julian’s!
Esme:
But why does he / have a—?
Carla;
Sh! Just put it back!
Esme:
Mom? That is so totally not-okay!
Carla:
I know it! Don’t you think I know it? Put it back I said!
Another knock at the door.
Carla (cont’d):
(to Esme, whispering) Go see who it is!
Esme runs to the window, which is crowded with jasmine, peeks out.
Esme:
About fifty-ish? Black hair? Kind of looks like Robin Williams and Gabriel Byrne had a
love child?
Carla:
Oh, shit!
Esme:
Ooooooooo…! I didn’t know you were seeing someone…!
Carla:
I’m not!
Esme:
Night time visit, heh? Booty call!
Carla:
I’m—I’m not seeing him! It’s more like—he’s seeing me—!
Another knock, persistent.
Holger (from off):
Carla?
Esme:
Mom! Oh my God! Are you seriously gonna answer the door like that?
Carla:
Like what?
Esme:
Oh, my God, Mom! At least put some lipstick on!
Carla:
What’s wrong?
Esme:
Don’t you have like a mirror in your salon?
Holger (from off):
Carla? Are you all right in there?
Carla:
(calling to Holger) One second!
Carla darts into the salon. As soon as she’s out of sight, Esme opens the freezer, and
drops the gun into her ‘Hello Kitty’ bag. Carla re-emerges.
Esme:
(laying it on thick) Ohhh—much better now!
Carla:
What are you talking about? I don’t look so bad!
Esme:
Oh, no, much better! Much, much! Get the door! Prince Charming awaits!
Esme sprints up the stairs with the ‘Hello Kitty’ bag, exits into the bedroom she shares
with Jasper, closes the door. Carla opens the door, revealing Holger, who wears a big
bandage over one eye, and carries a box half-filled with raspberries.
Carla:
Holger—what are you doing up so late?
Holger:
I heard you screaming about tea! Is everything all right?
- End of dialogue sample -