Quarantine the play will be posted on here for public feedback and review as Euginia writes for the next few weeks.
The Google Doc can also be accessed here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1eKNAeAFOjgluewXPGfNissWO6meg5p6VKgsfFxZq_pk/edit?usp=sharing
Quarantine
A daughter attempts to negotiate a murder on her mother during their time of quarantine.
Mother
Daughter
Scene 2
Night falls. Mother and daughter are still in their respective corners.
Daughter is slowly falling asleep. She drifts into slumber.
Mother seizes this chance to try to snatch the knife away from daughter, which is by her side.
Daughter feels the movement, catches the knife in time.
Daughter: What are you -
Mother: Please, please give it to me.
Daughter: No. It’s mine!
Mother backs away when she sees her daughter guarding the knife defensively.
Mother: Okay, okay, you can keep it…
Daughter: Go to sleep.
Beat.
Daughter: I won’t touch you in your sleep.
Beat.
Daughter: It’s too cruel.
Mother: Then why do you even want to kill me at all? Killing is cruel! Watching over me like a hawk, with that knife in your hand is also cruel!
Beat.
Daughter: How many today?
Mother: You didn’t let me switch on the radio, how would I know?
Beat.
Daughter: Will you give me permission to let me kill you?
Mother: What sort of question is that! Of course not!
Beat.
Mother: How did I raise you to become like this? How did I…
Daughter: You didn’t “raise” me.
Beat.
Daughter: You didn’t lift a finger.
Beat.
Daughter: You simply… let me be. I just… Was. I look at you doing things every day. Just, doing and doing. You would clean the table. Then sit at the table and talk on the phone. You would talk on the phone like… You were just talking. I couldn’t… I couldn’t feel anything from you. I heard your voice. I felt how clean the house was. But… where were you?
Mother: Do you know how many people would want to be you! Just to have a mother who does something for them! Do you know?
Beat.
Mother: What are you talking about with all this doing and doing? Of course I would be doing things! Life is about doing, it is about moving on. Who else would keep the house neat? Who else would keep things going? It was just two of us. I needed to be sure of everything!
Daughter: Yeah. But you looked at me, like I was just one of the objects in the house!
Beat.
Daughter: I could talk. I could breathe. I could dance, sing, bleed. Where was I to you?
Beat.
Daughter: Did you ever ask me how I feel about my father?
Mother: Don’t talk about him.
Daughter: You feel him gone. I feel him gone!
Mother: Don’t talk about him.
Daughter: You see! This is what you do! You just… do! You do, and do, and do. And nothing really gets done. You are cleaning this house. You are listening to the news. And you are just… a series of doing!
Mother: Give me the knife.
Daughter: Okay, I will. If you give me permission to use it on you.
Mother: No!
Daughter: Even if you don’t let me kill you, at least let me use it on you.
Mother: Why… Who would even do that? I will call them. You are crazy!
Daughter: Yes. I really am. So how? Call them.
Beat.
Daughter: Call them, let them come in their uniforms. Their gas. Their germs from the outside, into your clean house.
Mother picks up a phone/ receiver type device. She contemplates.
Daughter: Call them. You are also not sure what they will do. They don’t even have voices. They may not even be human, who knows? They will handle me, like I am a thing. They will lift me up like a vase. The corner where I touched will be empty. Then, they will move me away. They will take me away to somewhere run by them. Where everything is also clean. And nobody talks. And I will slowly spend my days there, alone.
Beat.
Daughter: You will no longer have anyone to do things for, at home. And then, what will you do?
Mother slowly puts down the phone/ receiver device. As soon as she puts it down, she seems to remember something. She begins to clean the phone, before she puts it down.
Daughter sees Mother cleaning, and lets out a slow, bitter laugh.