2. An hospital
Martha sits in a hospital bed with her feet up above her head, cocooned in a spiderweb.
MARTHA: It’s necessary whether I like it or not. I am Martha Waits. I’m going to have kids someday. In a few hours, actually. Actually, in just a few seconds.
I’m going to give birth into a pot of boiling water. I’m going to PUSH! my stomach muscles and SQUEEZE! my husband’s hand and down the birth canal out of my uturus with the nurse pushing down too and my vagina spread to its limit and at last PUFF! and out comes a stream of dried tea leaves.
Did you know that tea was first synthesised in my womb on the way back from India in 1776? It was an accident…
A NURSE in high heels clicks across the wet rocks. In steps NURSE and Martha’s husband THRUSHBY.
MARTHA: Can you let my feet out of these cobwebs now?
THRUSHBY: Darling you’re ever so pregnant. I say good work. Well done on spreading your legs before marriage. Quite the little tart, you are. I say, are we ready yet? On with the bally show!
MARTHA: Is the kettle boiled?
THRUSHBY: No need for tea, old bird. I’ve brought something a little more celebratory for the occasion.
Thrushby holds up a bottle of absinthe to the light.
THRUSHBY: With real wormwood. Have a tot of this, love. Let’s get kicking with that old birth thing, what!
NURSE: I’m afraid there’s a problem, Mr and Mrs.
MARTHA: Is the kettle not boiled?
NURSE: No, petal, the kettle’s fine. It’s the baby.
THRUSHBY: Why whatever’s the matter, you crazed old dodo?
NURSE: When was the first time you two had sex?
THRUSHBY: Why I say! Bit personal, eh?
MARTHA: It was the wet seas
It was early in the evening
It was after the storm broke
It was hot and damp and it happened inside me
I was tired when we started
but I woke up when he put his cock into the inside of me
he went in bit by bit
it wasn’t bad but it wasn’t good
it was wet
it was raining on the statue of the Virgin Mary
my shirt was wet and stuck to me
there was rain dripping off his chin on to my chest
there was yellow lamplight on the cobblestones
I remember a street vendor passed us by
he sold us some popcorn
I started to come
NURSE: When?
MARTHA: About nine weeks ago.
NURSE: You see, Martha, the baby needs longer than this to live inside your body. At the moment your little boy or girl is only as big as my little fingernail. It’s not quite ready to come out into the world.
THRUSHBY: Well wait just one rotten second! I think a son of mine should be ready to face the world in nine minutes, let alone nine weeks!
MARTHA: Well what are we going to make our tea with?
NURSE: With me
MARTHA: You’re a nurse.
NURSE: I’LL SAY
THIS IS WHAT YOUR TAX DOLLARS PAY FOR! THIS IS WHY THE PHARMACEUTICAL BENEFITS SCHEME IS CRUMBLING! THIS IS WHY WE NEED TIGHT WHITE UNIFORMS! THIS IS WHY WE CAN’T HAVE NICE THINGS!
The Nurse crouches over a kettle of boiling water. The steam crinkles her face and it peels off and drops in the water. Bit by bit, her clothes melt away in the heat and drop into the water. Underneath is a wired, bespectacled youth with glasses and long dirty blond hair. It is HADLEY.
THRUSHBY: I say, darling, the nurse has dissolved in the water. Pour us a cup of that, won’t you?
HADLEY: Uh… yes. Okay.
Hadley pours three curps of nurse-tea and hands them out. Thrushby pouts a tot of absinthe into his.
MARTHA: Are you my baby?
HADLEY: Um. No. Actually, I think you’re mine.
MARTHA: But I’m pregnant.
HADLEY: No, you’re right. But let me get this straight – you’re Martha Waits?
MARTHA: Yes.
HADLEY: Here’s a funny thing, right – your first name is taken from a biblical story about Mary Magdalene and her sister Martha who is a complete square, and your last name is taken from a musician and it also means Martha waits because that’s what you do, you’re a very passive heroine.
THRUSHBY: Steady on, old boy-
HADLEY: No, I mean it. I would never say this to you in a stage version, but this is the eight and a half pesos mix and I can be honest with you – you’re lazy and passive to the point of being inert.
MARTHA: Look, I don’t want your ideas or your advice. I’m not like you.
HADLEY: No, listen. It’s not a bad thing – one of the most common symptoms that you’re in a dream is how accepting you are of your environment. Like the cobwebs around your feet have gone and you didn’t notice but you don’t care.
Indeed the cobwebs have gone and Martha doesn’t care and no-one cares.
THRUSHBY: Listen, Adam – be gentle with her.
HADLEY: There’s only two moments in this dream where you really lash out against what’s happening to you. They both happen when you’ve been pushed to the edge and all your buttons have been pressed.
MARTHA: Did you know that tea was first synthesised in my belly?
HADLEY: I’m going to start pressing buttons. You know your fiance?
THRUSHBY: He’s talking about me!
HADLEY: Right at the base of your brain there’s a bundle of nerves which are keyed to the deep, deep fear that you’re giving yourself into the hands of a FREAK – SEX – GOD!
THRUSHBY: I say, I like the sound of that!
Thrushby begins to transform into every woman’s dream. In the audience there is the distinct smell of forty women lubricating as one.
MARTHA: Why would I be scared of that?
HADLEY: No! Better yet! A GOD – SEX – FREAK!
Thrushby begins to transform into Merrick. First thing’s first – he grabs Hadley and begins to dance around the room with him.
MERRICK: Here we go – here we go
here we here we go!
Merrick waltzes Hadley into a wall and beats his head against it until Hadley is embedded in the wall. Now Merrick turns on Martha.
MERRICK: I got JAYSUS!
MARTHA: My love?
MERRICK: My love? My love? Jesus? What do I got to
what do I got to do to wake you up?
to break you up, to shake the structure up?
3 - An alley (second attempt)
