ACT TWO
The house has been manifestly refreshed, presumably by Johnnaâs hand. The dull, dusty finish has been replaced by the transparent gleam of function.
Of note:
The study has been reorganized. Stacks of paper are neater, books are shelved. The dining room table is set with the fine china, candles, a floral centerpiece. In a corner of the dining room, a âkidâs table,â with seating for two, is also set. The warm, clean kitchen now bubbles and steams, redolent of collard and kale.
At rise:
Three oâclock of an eternal Oklahoma afternoon. The body of Beverly Weston has just been buried.
Violet, relatively sober now, in a handsome modern black dress, stands in Beverlyâs study, a bottle of pills in her hand.
Elsewhere in the house: Karen and Barbara are in the dining room. Johnna is in the kitchen.
dp n="69" folio="58" ?VIOLET: August . . . your month. Locusts are raging. âSummer psalm become summer wrath.â âCourse itâs only August out there. In here . . . who knows?
All right . . . okay. âThe Carriage held but just Ourselves,â dum-de-dum . . . mm, best I got . . . Emily Dickinsonâs all I got . . . something something, âHorseâs Heads Were Toward Eternity . . .â
(She takes a pill.)
Thatâs for me . . . one for me . . .
(She picks up the hardback copy of Meadowlark, flips to the dedication.)
âDedicated to my Violet.â Put that one in marble.
(She drops the book on the desk. She takes a pill.)
For the girls, God love âem. Thatâs all I can dedicate to you, sorry to say. Other than them . . . not one thing. No thing. You think Iâll weep for you? Think Iâll play that part, like we played the others?
(She takes a pill.)
You made your choice. You made this happen. You answer for this . . . not me. Not me. This is not mine.
(Lights crossfade to the dining room. Barbara and Karen, wearing black dresses, fold napkins, munch food from a relish tray, etc.)
KAREN: The present. Today, here and now. I think I spent so much of my early life thinking about whatâs to come, yâknow, who would I marry, would he be a lawyer or a football player, would he be dark-haired and good-looking and broad-shouldered. I spent a lot of time in that bedroom upstairs pretending my pillow was my husband and Iâd ask him about his day at work and what was happening at the office, and did he like the dinner I made for him and where were we going to vacation that winter and heâd surprise me with tickets to Belize and weâd kissâI mean Iâd kiss my pillow, make out with my pillow, and then Iâd tell him Iâd been to the doctor that day and Iâd found out I was pregnant. I know how pathetic all that sounds now, but it was innocent enough . . .
Then real life takes over because it always doesâ
BARBARA:âuh-huhâ
KAREN:âand things work out differently than youâd planned. That pillow was a better husband than any real man Iâd ever met; this parade of men fails to live up to your expectations, all of them so much less than Daddy or Bill (you know I always envied you finding Bill). And you punish yourself, tell yourself itâs your fault you canât find a good one, youâve only deluded yourself into thinking theyâre better than they are. I donât know how well you remember Andrew . . .
BARBARA: No, I remember.
KAREN: Thatâs the best example: hereâs a guy I loved so intensely, and all the things he did wrong were just opportunities for me to make things right. So if he cheated on me or he called me a cunt, Iâd think to myself, âNo, you love him, you love him forever, and hereâs an opportunity to make an adjustment in the way you view the world.â And I canât say when the precise moment was that I looked in the mirror and said, âOkay, moron,â and walked out, but it kicked off this whole period of reflection, just swamped in this sticky recollection. How had I screwed it up, whereâd I go wrong, and before you know it you canât move forward, youâre just suspended there, you canât move forward because you canât stop thinking backward, I mean, you know . . . years! Years of punishment, self-loathing. And thatâs when I got into all those books and discussion groupsâ
BARBARA: And Scientology, too, right, or something like that?â
KAREN: Yes, exactly, and finally one day, I threw it all out, I just said, âNo, itâs me. Itâs just me, here and now, with my music on the stereo and my glass of wine and Bloomers my cat, and I donât need anything else, I can live my life with myself.â And I got my license, threw myself into my work, sold a lot of houses, and thatâs when I met Steve. Thatâs how it happens, of course, you only really find it when youâre not looking for it, suddenly you turn around and there it is. And then the things you thought were so important arenât really important. I mean, when I made out with my pillow, I never imagined Steve! Here he is, you know, this kinda country club Chamber of Commerce guy, ten years older than me, but a thinker, you know, someone whoâs been around, and heâs just so good. Heâs a good man and heâs good to me and heâs good for me.
BARBARA: Thatâs great, Karenâ
KAREN: Heâs got this great business and itâs because he has these great ideas and heâs unafraid to make his ideas realities, you know, heâs not afraid of doing. I think men on the whole are better at that than women, donât you? Doing, just jumping in and doing, right or wro...