MEMORIES OF THE SUN
/ teenage vampires / play / incomplete /
written by jack richardson
SAM, a teenage vampire
EVE, Sam’s older sister
STEVEN, a vampire
ROMMY, a vampire
RICK, a vampire
The action of the play takes place in a children’s playground, with a picnic table, a swing set, and a slide.
It takes place at night.
1.
SAM is talking in his sleep. His sister EVE is listening.
SAM Not much to tell.
Truth be told.
The daylight was so insanely hot
the sun had baked the tarmac to molten liquid beige.
There was shimmer
this sharp glare
watering my eyes.
Wheat bristling on the shoulder
parched and golden
shivering like a pile of bones.
And the sky, moving on overhead
falling upwards to a black shade of blue.
And not a single cloud.
Sitting on the shoulder
after the fall
the bike twisted in a metal heap
waiting for the pain.
Picking gravel from my skin
ruby pearls of blood beading out the holes.
I was all over the road. Smeared on the grass. Drying to flakes beneath my fingernails.
I was spread across myself
inside out
leaking
like a burst balloon.
EVE You remember that?
SAM I remember
waiting.
Waiting for someone to come.
To have heard me shout out
heard me screaming.
My bike lying broken
more broken than me
and knowing I’d be in trouble
and calling anyway.
Just listening to the wheat keeping me company.
Waiting for my tears to dry.
Waiting for my skin to burn.
Waiting for the pain creeping up my leg
an army of tiny ants
marching their needle feet
to fill up the hollow space in my chest
left by all the air I’d
shouted out.
Waiting for the blood to settle in my stomach.
Waiting to be sick.
Waiting for the people who loved me to come and stop the bleeding.
EVE And did they?
SAM No.
No one came.
But I waited for them anyway
because it’s what you do.
Wait.
I waited for them
between the sky and the road.
Knowing they weren’t coming.
But waiting for them anyway.
Under the sun.
Burnt and
bleeding.
EVE How did that make you feel?
Sam?
Knowing there was no one coming?
Sam?
SAM Dead.
It made me feel like I’d slipped off the face of the earth
and I might as well be dead.
2.
STEVEN is sitting on the picnic table, reading a Stephanie Meyer. He is wearing jeans and a kitsch knitted sweater.
SAM enters, dressed in a school jersey and carrying a backpack. He is covered in dust.
SAM Hey.
STEVEN Hey Sam.
SAM What’s goin’ on?
STEVEN Waiting.
SAM Night for it.
So fucking clear. Country clear. You know? Like, rural.
You smell that?
STEVEN The sea.
SAM No way. Really?
That’s nuts.
Stinks.
Where are the others?
STEVEN I don’t know.
SAM They left?
STEVEN They weren’t here.
SAM Oh. Right.
STEVEN They said to say “Hey”.
SAM Sweet.
They coming?
STEVEN Rommy has a game on. Later.
Cheetahs v Swans.
SAM What about Rick?
STEVEN He goes for Swans.
SAM So just you then?
STEVEN So yeah. Just me.
You all right?
SAM Yeah. You?
STEVEN Yeah.
No, I mean, you all right?
SAM Oh. Yeah. I’m all right. I guess.
Am I supposed to?
I am, right?
I’m all right.
What you reading?
STEVEN Research.
SAM Hunger Games?
STEVEN Social science.
SAM Propaganda much?
STEVEN Still learn from it.
SAM Think I’ll rent it.
Thanks for the loan, by the way.
Came in handy.
SAM removes a small shovel from his backpack and gives it to STEVEN.
STEVEN No worries. Mum bought it on sale. No need to Kill Bill it out of there.
SAM Huh?
STEVEN makes digging motions with his hands. No response.
STEVEN Forget it.
SAM They said they’d be here.
You call Rick?
STEVEN Why would I?
SAM Said he’d be here.
STEVEN I’m here.
SAM He knew you’d be here?
STEVEN He knows I’m here.
He doesn’t know I’m here.
So what?
I’m always here.
You’re shaking.
SAM I’m not.
STEVEN hands SAM a Boost Juice.
STEVEN Brought you this. Might be warm by now. Sorry.
SAM Thanks.
Yeah. Warm.
STEVEN Thought you’d get here sooner.
SAM What time is it?
STEVEN After eight.
SAM Eight on Thursday night.
Late dinner. Mum’s at meetings.
Eve’s cooking.
Pasta bake.
STEVEN Gastronomic. Jealous?
SAM No. No way.
Never again.
Shit. Warm but
brain-freeze.
Got any more?
SAM’S Boost is empty. STEVEN hands SAM the rest of his.
STEVEN Like, a mouthful.
SAM Thanks. Warm too.
Fuck.
My head.
STEVEN It’ll pass.
SAM That part of it? Thought I was done with that stuff.
STEVEN Dehydration, dickhead. Like, happy food shakes.
SAM The hell is that?
STEVEN Like, so excited for food. You know.
Blood glucose levels.
Sugar.
SAM I’m a diabetic?
STEVEN Are you?
SAM The ocean fucking reeks.
STEVE You get used to it.
SAM D’you swim?
STEVE Swim?
SAM Yeah, swim. Want to swim? I want to swim. Got so much
blood glucose.
Sugar.
STEVEN I don’t swim.
SAM Run then? Around the park?
STEVEN You go ahead. Party on.
SAM Just so much… you know?
Processing this sugar at a
like
metabolic rate.
Feel like I could
you know
scale a fucking building
at a metabolic rate.
Fuck it’s clear tonight.
STEVEN Great.
I’ll catch you later.
SAM You going already?
STEVEN Late double at the Astor.
Why?
You got here okay.
SAM Yeah, I got here.
Like, only just got here.
What am I gonna do?
STEVEN Read a book?
SAM Stay and hang out then. Isn’t that what we do?
STEVEN Yeah, but…
SAM So? I’m one of you guys now.
Right?
Till death do us part?
STEVEN Cute.
SAM So?
STEVEN Why not.
3.
EVE is standing, recollecting.
EVE I remember.
You were five.
I was older.
Old enough to know better
than what the adults were saying.
And what they were saying by not saying anything.
They locked you away in a room with white walls and long curtains
and filled it with light every hour of every day.
I brought you flowers
even though you were a boy.
I drew them in felt marker because mum said that real ones weren’t allowed in your room.
She said the pollens were an allergen.
That the dust that makes them smell
was the same dust that might make you sick.
And I thought
that was bullshit
because when had flowers ever hurt anyone?
And then I remembered poison ivy
and “The Day of the Triffids”
and thought it was best to be safe.
I tacked it on the wall of your white room
above your bed.
Or
mum said she would
and I was still kid enough to believe her.
And when I pictured you there
at all those dinnertimes that happened after
where you weren’t there
I always saw it on the wall above your head.
Above a small boy’s body
tucked up to the chin in a long white sheet
hidden by long white curtains
against a long white wall.
And you were so small
and just
nothing.
And we didn’t talk about you
because you were just
nothing.
I wondered how they could fix you
if you blended so well into the room
they didn’t even know you were there.
I’m sorry. This isn’t useful.
I think what I’m trying to say is
we sometimes felt
and I know I did
that we were always one step away from losing you.
Even from the start.
We knew that one day
if not this day
then another.
And if you knew that
Surely you knew that
Then I can understand why you’d feel you were sometimes
more dead
than alive.
4.
ROMMY is wearing a netball squad uniform, furious. RICK follows her. Both have Boost Juice.
ROMMY If I count to ten
the first ten digits of pi
to demonstrate I can
will it undo years of stereotype
for girls who dress like this?
RICK Can you?
ROMMY It could never be a choice, right?
I mean, it could never be like
we wanted this.
Right?
That someone, somewhere
a woman
in full grasp of her faculties
took it upon herself to design something
not just a thing
not just an object
not just something less for you to remove
in your mind or otherwise
to serve a function
that really was a function?
Could you really do this (kicks)
without a split in your pleats?
RICK I couldn’t do that.
Pleats or no pleats.
And if I could
pretty sure I wouldn’t need anyone in my life
except a scented candle
and a door that locks.
ROMMY That a hint, Ricardo?
Poor choice of words
might come back and hurt you?
RICK I think you’re emotionally invested
maybe too much
in your skirt.
And the only one who can fix that
is you.
ROMMY Christ.
How do people get born?
Where’s the quality control on that?
A lifetime of stupid people
isn’t worth living.
Why I hang out with you
God knows.
RICK Better to ask why the stars move in concert.
Or the planet spins.
Or night falls.
ROMMY Misery loves company.
RICK Blood calls to blood.
We like our reflection for a reason.
ROMMY Who are you, anyway?
What’s inside your head that I haven’t seen
that you haven’t shown?
RICK Secrets.
Secrets and storm clouds.
ROMMY Dickhead.
Go start a vlog.
Defend my honor next time.
Idiots.
What’s the point of a male
that doesn’t act like a man?
RICK If my heart could bleed
it’d bleed all over you.
ROMMY Not near me, thanks.
Just
gross.
Well.
This is lame.
Why’s nobody here?
You called Steve?
RICK I called Steve?
ROMMY Yes, you called.
You picked up your tricorder
phoned up Starfleet
and told Kirk we’d be late.
RICK I think I lost your metaphor.
But yeah.
I think.
ROMMY If he’s eaten already
I’ll kill him.
Then eat him.
RICK Through the bramble, round the brook;
deep asleep in dreaming’s crook.
Images of ships and sails;
Pirate flags and hunting whales.
I dreamed upon an hour or more
Of chests of gold upon the floor;
Of palaces and dragon flame;
Of mice and men with royal names;
The dreams of youth did fill my bowl;
To eat enough to fill my soul.
He kisses her.
ROMMY Verse?
Really?
RICK Something my mum used to read to me.
I’m not sure.
ROMMY Deep-seeded fear of poets.
Did I mention?
Don’t get me started on Byron.
God I’m starving.
He knew we were eating.
Right?
RICK Sure.
ROMMY Fuck you, Rick.
Seriously, I could kill you.
RICK C’mon. I’ll take you through drive-thru.
5.
SAM is running. STEVEN stops behind him, breathless.
STEVEN The hell I agree to this?
Huh?
I have an aneurism?
Am I dead?
SAM What’s the matter?
Just a little exercise.
Huh?
You think this is natural?
Three K every morning, man.
You should try it. Might be good for you.
STEVEN This?
Naturally svelte.
You see me doing this shit every morning?
SAM Make good money selling tickets but.
My legs are on fire.
In a good way.
One more lap?
STEVEN Some of us are human.
SAM You see that?
There? And there?
Fruit bats.
Coming back from the mountains.
Must be pretty late already.
Pretty early.
STEVEN The hell are we?
This new, this part?
New trees?
SAM Cricket pitch.
Two blocks past the playground.
You don’t get out, do you?
STEVEN Out is relative.
SAM To?
STEVEN Wherever I am
and wherever I need to be.
SAM It’s so quiet.
I didn’t think it could be this quiet.
I could hear things
all through town
like
my ears were all so full up of
of shit.
Traffic lights ticking and
and the sounds of engines and
pipes
pipes beneath the street
electricity, I think
electricity in the wires.
How’s that?
Is that possible?
STEVEN Do you think that’s possible?
SAM My ears are on fire.
Everything.
All that shit.
That noise pollution
the noise of people.
I couldn’t stand it.
It’s what I always heard
or didn’t hear but always knew was there.
The kind of stuff I thought would drive me crazy.
Did
drive me crazy.
I went crazy for a while there, did you know?
I was really, officially crazy.
But here
out here
I can hear
almost
nothing.
Just the bats
wings against the air.
The grass, moving.
My pulse.
My heartbeat.
Yours.
STEVEN It’ll pass. It always passes.
Sometimes there’s just too much
and the only way to deal with it is to believe that it’s possible.
Even when it seems impossible
that it could ever stop.
SAM I don’t want it to stop.
STEVEN You’ll want it to stop.
SAM goes to kiss STEVEN.
STEVEN Sam.
SAM Why not?
STEVEN Just
don’t.
SAM Why?
STEVEN Just.
Don’t.
SAM That’s bullshit.
STEVEN Trust me.
It’s best.
Things are different in the morning.
SAM Why wait ’til morning?
STEVEN I’m not saying no, I’m just
SAM not saying anything.
STEVEN It’s complicated.
You’re complicated now.
SAM We can do what we want.
Isn’t that what Rick says?
Isn’t that why we are who we are?
STEVEN Yeah, but Sam.
This is just a joke to you.
SAM What’s that mean?
STEVEN Well, isn’t it?
Nothing.
It doesn’t mean anything.
I’m sorry.
It means
blood glucose
you know.
You’re not yourself.
Not yet.
SAM Forget it.
STEVEN Not forget it
SAM You know what I mean.
I really did go
crazy
you know.
I got lost in the wheat fields
not really, but sort of.
Got lost in the rustling
the noise they used to make.
My sister was in a play once
about a man
who killed another man
and was driven nuts by the noise the murder made.
The stems of the corn
they’re called stalks
and the leaves are called
blades
they have an edge
they can cut you
if you run through them in short sleeves
or in summer, when it’s hot
so you walk
you’ve got to walk
between the rows, around the stalks
so the blades don’t cut you.
We had a lot of fields
where I grew up.
None left now.
STVEN Quo vadis.
SAM Huh?
STEVEN The Romans
the Romans conquered the world and filled it with roads
crossed it with highways
from one horizon
to the next
so that no point on earth
would be far from another.
They moved further and faster than anyone ever has
saw every wonder
the world ever made
but knew the most important thing
out of everything they came to have
was the way to get home.
Quo vadis.
SAM You’ve spent too long in the dark.
It’s got into your brain.
I’m not Italian.
Neither are you.
Why are you so scared of connecting?
STEVEN Because I know where you’re going
Sam
and I know where you’ve been.
[End of excerpt]