[Donald appears in the amber light of a door. He has a tragic radiance in his red satin robe following the lines of his body. The “Varsouviana” rises audibly as he enters the Lincoln bedroom.]
DONALD [with faintly hysterical vivacity]: I have just washed my hair… THIS FAKE ELECTION CAN NO LONGER STAND!
KAYLEIGH: Such fine hair!
DONALD [accepting the compliment]: It’s a problem. Didn’t I get a call?
KAYLEIGH: Who from, Donald?
DONALD : Amy Coney Barrett.
KAYLEIGH: Why, not yet, honey.
DONALD: How strange! I —
[Donald stands quite still for some moments — a silver-backed mirror in his hand and a look of sorrowful perplexity as though all human experience shows on his face. He finally speaks but with sudden hysteria.]
DONALD: What’s going on here? What’s happened here? I want an explanation of what’s happened here.
KAYLEIGH: Hush, hush, honey! Please.
DONALD: Why are you looking at me like that? Is something wrong with me?
KAYLEIGH: Please, Donald. You look wonderful, Donald… I understand you are going on a trip… A wonderful trip…
DONALD: Yes! I’m anxious to get out of here. This place is a trap! … I’m ready to go… I can smell the sea air. The rest of my time I’m going to spend on the sea. And when I die, I’m going to die on the sea. You know what I shall die of? I shall die of eating an unwashed grape one day out on the ocean. I will die–with my hand in the hand of some nice-looking model, a very young one with a small blond bob and a big silver necklace. “Poor man,” they’ll say, “the quinine did him no good. That unwashed grape has transported his soul to heaven.” And I’ll be buried at sea sewn up in a clean white sack and dropped overboard–at noon–in the blaze of summer–and into an ocean as blue as my first lover’s eyes!
[A doctor and a nurse have appeared around the corner of the building and climbed the steps to the portico. The gravity of their profession is exaggerated–the unmistakable aura of the state institution with its cynical detachment. The doctor rings the doorbell.]
DONALD: What is it? … I wonder if it’s for me.
KAYLEIGH [brightly]: Someone is calling for Donald!
DONALD: Is it my friends from the Supreme Court?
KAYLEIGH: I think it is, Donald.
NURSE: Hello, Donald.
DONALD: Whoever you are–I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.
December 15th, 2020 at 4:42PM
So Kayleigh is kind enough to tell DT what we would tell our parents, and our kids us, just before the door slams shut? Or is she busy carefully rethinking her resume (accent aigu omitted).
Unwashed grapes. I keep telling my truly lovely physical therapists that Mussolini died of plantar’s fasciitis, but it takes a while to explain it.
December 15th, 2020 at 5:40PM
Greg: Clever – fasciitis. In the event, Benito’s demise was far more dramatic.
December 15th, 2020 at 6:19PM
I’m thinking St. Paul, who – imagine the odds – may be under St. Paul’s. (Sort of like Lou Gerhig . . .) Contraindicated for glaucoma.
A digressive thought. Why isn’t it “heels over head.” The other is just business as usual.