A Moment's Peace
                by Keith Scollick

[Lights slowly illuminate from darkness, but still retain a darkish
hue.  All that is seen is a single bed with white sheets that have
at first having a blinding quality only to be softened as more color
is added via lights.  A solitary figure in the bed is tossing and
turning having obvious trouble sleeping.  She moans and grunts in 
strained breaths until the pain inside her wakes her up with a 
violent scream.  Silence.  She sits up looking around trying to
calm down without much success.  Trembling from fear with a slight
touch of drowsiness she reaches under her pillow and finds a pack of
cigarettes.  She takes one out ready to light, but she cannot find 
one.  Even after throwing pillows and ransacking the bed, she
finds her cordless phone but no lighter or match and promptly takes the
cigarette out of her mouth and throws it as far way from her as possible.
She calms down a little.  Having lost her first vice she takes the 
second---her phone.  She dials from memory.]


WOMAN: Hello, Kevin?  Hi, it's me.  How are you ... No, I don't know what 
time it is.  I ... I had trouble sleeping.  What?  Oh, sorry, I didn't 
realize it was that late.  Well, you see ... I ... I needed someone to
talk to.  It's been a bad day, and ... I'd rather it not wait until 
morning.  I don't think I can make it until morning.  Kevin, I want
to ask you something?  Are you listening? ... I can't hear you.  Can you
hear me? ... I said I wanted to ask you something. (long pause) Do you 
love me?  I just want a yes or no.  ... No, I don't need a long-winded 
diatribe.  I just ... What?  Rachel is awake ... No, I don't want to talk 
to your wife while you get on the other phone, I just want an answer ... 
wait, what are you ... Hi, how are you doing?  I was having a bad night, 
and I needed to talk to Kevin.  It's no big deal really, I didn't mean to 
wake you up it's just that ... Kevin?  Goodnight, Rachel.  Sorry, to have 
woken you ... Is she off?  Are you sure?  Well, I guess I don't really
care if she finds out.  I mean it's not like she doesn't already suspect ...
Of course, I know.  We've been practically dating for months, and you
think you've got her fooled? ... No, I didn't call to get into this
discussion again.  I've learned to live with that.  You didn't answer
my question ... Do you love me? ... It's important to me ... Don't worry, 
this is just the start.  It's not a complicated question; the answer may 
not be so easy.  I don't think either one of us wanted this at the start, 
or maybe sub-consciously we did; I've already lost too much sleep trying to 
understand the philosophical semantics of state and understanding.  All I 
know is that when I'm with you, there is something ethereal, something 
perfect about those moments.   But, it's all so delicate.  I have nightmares 
seeing it all come crashing down, powerless to stop or even remotely control 
what's happening ... I'm not crazy.  I wish I was.  I wish I could so 
quickly and easily attribute and find faults in me and move on from there, 
but it doesn't go away.  It's so Newtonian how for every good thing there 
must be an equal and opposite bad thing so that you can't fully enjoy 
yourself.  Maybe, it's just being a Catholic. I can't stop it.  It's always 
a struggle.  Always keeping secrets, telling lies, living a lie just so I 
find happiness.  And, what kind of happiness is that?  I wonder what I do 
it for.  I wonder if it's for your sake or for mine.  Probably for neither 
which, of course, makes absolutely no sense.  But, it's a part of living 
that I accept and for the most part relish until the next wave hits, and 
I feel like giving in and stopping the deception.  Just tell everyone the 
truth and be done with it.


Kevin there is no need to get upset.  You don't need to yell at me.  Yes,
you are.  Listen, will you please listen for a moment?  I've got something
big to tell you.  You probably should sit down for this.  It goes beyond 
what you're thinking.  This was just meant to ease the blow.  Are you 
sitting? ... (takes a deep breath) I don't know where to start; it's not 
like there is a true beginning.  Well, (fumbling a little) I guess ... 
remember the last time the bloodmobile was at work?   I gave blood like I 
always do.  It's no big deal, I've tried to donate at least twice a year.  
Anyway, a while later, I get a call asking me to come in for a blood test.  
The doctor checked me over asking me a lot of questions.  I went back two 
more times ... I didn't want you to know because I didn't want you to 
worry ... Well, I'm telling you now.  Anyway, she checked me over, and I 
knew there was something she wasn't telling me, but I never suspected ... 
I got a call this evening ... I'm HIV positive. (she sighs, collects her
thoughts and continues on almost without breath)  The nurse told me just
like that.  No preparation, no ready, set, go.  She told me flatly just
like that, as if I was like the thirtieth person she had to tell that day.  
(more to herself) God help me if I was.  She went on to tell me that it 
wasn't AIDS, yet, and I should learn and understand the distinction as if 
it really matters.  "You can still lead a productive and full life."  It's 
just that you are carrying something for which there is no cure now or in 
the foreseeable future.  It may not get you today, or tomorrow, or maybe 
even ten years from now, but it will get you.  Once you have it, it won't 
go away.  "Have a pleasant rest of your life."


Yeah know, at first I didn't cry.  I didn't know what to do.  It happened 
so fast, it's almost as if I wasn't hearing it.  I felt removed, detached 
from it all as ... as if watching myself not really interacting.  I can see 
my reaction plain as day.  The initial shock turning to horror and (starts 
to cry).  Kevin, I can't do this alone.  I don't want to go through this 
alone (long pause) Kevin? ... Please say something ... How?  ... That's all 
you can say is how? Is it that important to you?  The need to brand me, put 
me into some neat little group so you people can marvel at me and watch me 
like some circus side-show freak.  You know I don't do drugs, and I'm not a 
hemophiliac.  So, what you want to know is if I've been sleeping around.  
Is that why you won't answer me?  (shouting) I WANT TO KNOW IF YOU LOVE ME.
I want to know what's going through your mind.  Are you hurt?  Are you 
trapped?  Are you relieved to know that it's out in the open?  Well, I can 
tell you that you're the only person I've slept with in the past year, and 
I know I didn't have this damn virus before I met you.  It was hard for me 
to accept that I was sharing you with your wife, but that's more my fault.
But, how many other women are there?  How many more women have you made
feel like they were something special and cared for them only so that you
could fuck them and toss aside?  I love you.  I care and desire you as I
have for no one else I've ever met.  And, to show for it all I get for my 
vulnerability is betrayal and a disease, excuse me, "syndrome."  Wham, bang.  
It was good, now it's deadly.  It's only the first night I've known, but I 
can feel it in me.  The blood pumping through my heart carrying it, infecting 
every part of my body.  Nowhere is safe, my toes, my fingers, my heart, my
breasts, not even my brain.  Every thought conceived from now on tainted and 
tarnished because it was supplied by it.  No more looking at myself in the 
mirror.  I don't see myself anymore, I just see it pumping through me, 
destroying me.  You're not supposed to be able to see it, but I do.  I know 
it's there, and that's enough. 


I don't want to hear your explanations.  I don't care where or how or from 
whom you got this from.  Don't you see that it doesn't matter anymore?  Hows 
and whys and whatfors will not escape the fact that I have it, and most
likely you have it, and God knows who else.   And, I was afraid to tell you.  
I didn't want to call.  I'd just wake up in the morning and all this was a 
ghoulish nightmare, an apocalyptic asterix no more true than any of the 
others.  But, I can't even sleep.  It's already too much a part of me.  


I'm not sure where to go from here.  Thoughts keep racing through my head 
not making any sense.  The past, present, and future fused together in a 
single solitary confining moment that I can't escape from.  Endless 
possibilities lost forever.  A Socratic isolation that makes you want to 
scream.  Yell so loud that you can be heard.


And, that's why I called.  I didn't call you to inform you for your safety
or for Rachel's for that matter.  I'm not that noble.  I called because
as long as someone knows, I'm still alive.  As long as I can reach out
and talk to someone, I'm still alive.  I'm polluted, but I intend to fight.  
I intend to walk up straight and not flinch from their knowing, frightful 
looks.  I still have power over myself.  I'm on the edge of losing 
everything: my job, my family, hell, probably even my insurance, but they 
can't take who I am away.  I'm still a person, living and breathing
as long as I can interact.  I need a link to the world.  I need someone
on the other end of the line. And, whether you can say it or not, I love 
you, Kevin.  You gave me this, and by all accounts I should hate you for 
the rest of my shortened life.  But, there is one place this virus can't 
find.  It may pump through my heart and infect what's there, but it
can't get to what's underneath.  My feelings, my emotions.  I have control
of those as long as I have my strength.  I don't think I can do it alone.  
As long as I have these feeling for you, I know that there is a part of me 
that is still clean, uninfected, and pure.  I'm alive with you.  Don't leave 
me alone with it ... (yawns) It's really late, maybe we should talk about 
this over lunch (slight smile)? ... Okay, breakfast ... Goodnight ... (starts 
to cry from what she hears) ... I love you, too.


[She hangs up the phone, lies down, and lights fade.]