While We Wait 1
A play about silence and continuity
This short play is part of the NOISE/QUIET cycle. If you are just joining, I recommend starting at the beginning with Overture: Sound Collage Collapse which can be read here.
As I wrote in the first post of this series, NOISE/QUIET started with three short plays. One was absurdist, another satirical, the third had virtually no dialogue. If I wanted to combine these three fragments into a larger work, I needed to write a fourth piece with gravity to give the overarching cycle a foot on the ground. So I wrote While We Wait as a realistic drama.
After I established the play’s scenario, I thought it would be useful to divide it into three sections that return. If the cycle started in reality with While We Wait 1, it could skyrocket into absurdity and beyond, then return to earth in While We Wait 2 and 3.
As I began working on this fourth piece, I realized the three other plays lacked a crucial element: characters the audience could deeply connect to—which reminded me of novelist Kurt Vonnegut’s eight rules for writing, his second rule being:
Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
In While We Wait, I gave the audience two.
The more I worked on it, the more I fell in love with the characters in this drama. As the piece that comes back three times throughout the cycle, it functions as both the spine and the heart of NOISE/QUIET.
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While We Wait 1
The sound of fluorescent lights. The sound of a ticking clock. Minimal design—chairs, an analog clock on the wall. Lights up on two women in a waiting room. They are not sitting near each other.
MAY—late sixties or early seventies.
JUNE—late thirties or early forties.
MAY is reading a book, The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton. JUNE is looking at her smartphone. They silently read for a while. All we hear are the fluorescent lights and the clock ticking. MAY notices JUNE.
MAY: (To JUNE) First day?
JUNE: Yes.
MAY: It’s been three weeks for us.
JUNE: How’s it going?
MAY: Still waiting on test results.
JUNE: They told us it could be weeks before they know anything.
MAY: He’s tired after. He usually sleeps the rest of the day after we get home. But the next day he has more energy. He’s been eating more.
JUNE: That’s good.
MAY: It is.
Silence. The sounds of the lights and the clock.
MAY: I’m May by the way.
JUNE: (With a smile) Ah… June.
MAY: Oh how funny.
JUNE: My mother’s idea—if my dad had his way, I’d be Jennifer.
MAY: Our mothers had good taste.
Silence. The sounds of the lights and the clock.
MAY: It’s your husband?
JUNE: Yes.
MAY: He must be young.
JUNE: Forty-two.
MAY: I’m sorry.
JUNE: We had no idea. He didn’t show any signs. He still doesn’t look like he’s sick. It showed up in a blood test—it was advanced when they found it… this treatment was the only option.
MAY: Children?
JUNE: Two. Sam and Beth.
She pulls up photos of the children on her phone. MAY moves to the seat next to JUNE to see the photos.
MAY: Adorable.
JUNE: Eight and six.
MAY: Precious. Duke and I had four. We’re grandparents to eight now.
MAY realizes she shouldn’t have said that. JUNE goes quiet.
MAY: I’m sorry.
JUNE: It’s alright. It’s… very new. I’m still processing the possibilities. We haven’t told the kids yet.
MAY: I don’t know that I would either. They’re young for that kind of news.
JUNE: We weren’t sure.
MAY: You’ll know when it’s time to tell them.
Awkward silence. JUNE notices MAY’s book.
JUNE: What’s the book?
MAY: The Age of Innocence.
JUNE: Is it any good?
MAY: Oh it’s wonderful.
JUNE: I’ve never heard of it. Who wrote it?
MAY: Edith Wharton. She was a master of subtext—everything that matters in her writing is what the characters don’t say.
JUNE: I’m not much of a reader.
MAY: You should give Wharton a try. Her novels are beautiful and crushing. She was trapped in a loveless marriage for twenty-five years, but she kept writing. Tough lady. I brought her book because this room offers everything she said one needs for quality reading.
JUNE: What’s that?
MAY: “Silence and continuity.”
Silence. The sounds of the lights and the clock.
JUNE: Since the kids I haven’t had time to read. The last book I think I read was Bridget Jones’s Diary and that was... I can’t even remember.
MAY: I remember. Everyone was reading that when it came out. Not a literary masterpiece, but it was clever the way the author drew from Austen.
JUNE: She was from Texas?
Silence. The sounds of the lights and the clock.
MAY: (Gently) Jane Austen. Nineteenth century English novelist. (With a wink of assurance) One of my favorites.
JUNE: Oh you said drew from Austen. I thought I heard… I’m not that… I… anyway.
MAY understands JUNE is overwhelmed. Silence. The sounds of the lights and the clock.
JUNE: What’s the Wharton book about?
The sound of a text notification. It’s coming from MAY’s purse that she left at her first seat. She gets up to get her phone out of her purse. She takes the phone out of her purse and reads the text message.
MAY: He’s ready. I’ve got to pick him up. It was nice to meet you June.
JUNE: Nice to meet you as well. May?
MAY: Yes. You’ll be here next week?
JUNE: Yes.
MAY: Good. I’ll bring you one of those books. In case you change your mind.
MAY turns right before she exits.
MAY: If he’s tired when you get him home. Let him sleep.
BLACKOUT
The sound of the clock ticking speeds up. It transforms into a digital sound that whisks us into the futuristic world of End of the Hunt.
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Continue the Cycle
Next: End of the Hunt—A play about searching and finding
I originally published End of the Hunt as a standalone piece, before this cycle came together. If you’re reading NOISE/QUIET for the first time, continue with it now—it’s essential to the sequence.
Coming Tuesday, Februray 24: Lizard People—A play about chaos and conspiracy.
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Love the title. The dialogue flows naturally and authentically while the Austen Texas moment leavens the subdued mood. It’s not clear to me how they know each other’s names at the end, though I like the fact that they’re two adjacent months.