Ashes, Ashes
by Adam James
Cast of Characters
GARÇON: a waiter.
MISS: a woman.
CHIEF: a fireman.
SETTING: Evening. The dining room of a rundown (previously opulent) restaurant, which occupies a tall building’s uppermost floor. White cloth covers a table at center. Directly behind the table, upstage, a window is open wide.
(AT RISE: A young woman, MISS, is seated at the table. The lone remaining diner, she wears a wedding gown and veil. GARÇON stands behind her at the window—hovering, too close. The waiter’s face is ghoulishly pale, caked like a clown’s in powdery makeup.)
GARÇON: If you insist on staying, miss, I suggest you sip on something stiffer. (Reaching over her shoulder, he pours from a pitcher and refills her water glass.)
MISS: Water’s fine for now. I’m expecting someone. Any second.
GARÇON: So you’ve said, miss . . . (Lights a cigarette and inhales. Holding his breath, holding in the smoke) . . . several times. (He exhales, blowing smoke out the window.)
MISS: It’s truer now than it was before.
GARÇON: If you don’t mind my saying, miss, there’s no real shame in failure. Inaction—that’s a shame.
MISS: I’ll keep that in mind.
GARÇON: Prudent. I only wonder, miss, if disaster did surprise you, would you not take some modest countermeasures?
MISS: You mean like fight or flight?
GARÇON: Yes, miss, more or less.
MISS: I couldn’t tell you. It’s never come up.
GARÇON: No, miss, I’m not surprised. (He tosses his still-lit cigarette out the window. Addressing the audience.) Look: a madwoman. She sits alone at catastrophe’s edge. By the grace of her delusions, she is, for the moment, suspended in space and time. (He sticks his head out the window, stares straight down. Turns back around to the audience.) See what awaits when she opens her eyes: infernal forces have her surrounded.
MISS: Did you say something?
GARÇON: (To MISS.) Hypothetically speaking, miss, in the case of some unforeseen crisis—if you found yourself in a housefire, for instance—how might you react?
MISS: What are you planning? Arson? Some kind of insurance fraud?
GARÇON: No, miss. There are no plans. None whatsoever. (To the audience again.) Below, the place is already ablaze. Flames devour the paper walls. They swallow skyward while, farther down, their brethren gnaw on loadbearing beams.
MISS: Did you hear that? What was that?
GARÇON: (To audience.) See beneath that obscene cover: the madwoman’s brow is wet. Her body, at least, responds to that which her head won’t register. The body knows better.
MISS: Didn’t you hear that? I’m hearing things.
GARÇON: (To audience.) Beyond this, the stench is unmistakable: a black, woody char; the acid smack of burning hair; the skin’s porcine stink like a luau.
(Faint screams issue from the building’s lower floors.)
MISS: What’s that noise? It must have been a ghost. I’ve always wanted to see one of those. Have you ever seen one?
GARÇON: (To MISS.) What, miss?
MISS: You look like you’ve seen one or two.
GARÇON: I’m absolutely certain, miss, you would not believe what I have seen.
MISS: (To herself, muttering.) I’d like to see for myself.
(An axe-wielding fireman, CHIEF, enters left. He wears the standard helmet and fire-retardant pants. Like something out of a calendar, though, he’s shirtless; suspenders stretch over his naked torso. Winded and wheezing, he staggers toward center.)
CHIEF: That’s some fucking climb. You don’t serve many cripples here, huh?
GARÇON: See here, chief.
CHIEF: It’s hot. (He approaches MISS, but the waiter stops him; GARÇON steps left and grabs his arm.) What gives?
GARÇON: Look out.
CHIEF: Take your damn hands off me, man.
(GARÇON lets go but scowls at him. CHIEF scowls back, standing his ground.)
GARÇON: Look alive, however you are. Believe when you see what they’ve known all along, the babies and the dead.
CHIEF: Come again?
GARÇON: Believe it or not, but don’t you dare deny it: there are such things as dragons.
CHIEF: Is that a fact?
GARÇON: Look around. Here’s no place for a go-lucky sit. What’s going down doesn’t concern you; it’s got diddly squat to do with yourself.
CHIEF: Diddly or not, I’ve got a date.
GARÇON: Leave it be. Believe me, you’d better stick to grass. Stay gone, high and dry by the shore. I’m warning you, don’t cast your line if you can’t stand the smell of fish.
CHIEF: So, I won’t order the salmon.
GARÇON: It wouldn’t listen to you. No, what’s good here is only the riddance. The tables have all been taken; they vanished in the night. Between you and me, there’s no room for two.
CHIEF: What are you saying, this dump’s booked up?
GARÇON: The inn is full. Skedaddle, and count your blessings. Someplace else can cross your T’s.
CHIEF: For Christ’s sake, I’m hungry.
GARÇON: Go eat your P’s and Q’s. You won’t find satiation here.
CHIEF: O yeah? Y not?
GARÇON: I’m asking nice: avert your I’s. C yourself out, chief.
CHIEF: F you!
GARÇON: That’s the spirit.
CHIEF: Keep the peas and your stinking fish.
GARÇON: Yessir, better yet. Go on.
CHIEF: Nobody tells me where I can and can’t chow down. Lucky for you, I’ve had a look around. I’d rather starve than eat the slop you’re serving in this shithole. (He storms away left but stops, turns around. He sprints to the table and kneels beside MISS.) Excuse me, miss.
MISS: Yes?
CHIEF: There’s something here.
MISS: (Blushing, excited.) I think so too.
(CHIEF licks his thumb and presses it to her forehead. Wiping, he leaves behind a black smudge.)
CHIEF: That’s better. (Glancing at GARÇON, he catches the waiter’s rage-filled stare. CHIEF runs off, exiting left.)
MISS: Who was that?
GARÇON: I couldn’t say, miss.
MISS: You know, I’m expecting someone.
GARÇON: Yes, miss, you mentioned it.
MISS: Was that him?
GARÇON: Who, miss?
MISS: Well, did I miss him?
GARÇON: Miss?
MISS: Yes?
GARÇON: Excuse me. (GARÇON exits right.)
MISS: (To herself, muttering.) I’m expecting. Any second.
(GARÇON reenters right. He carries a leatherbound book on a silver platter. Reaching over MISS’s shoulder, he sets the book in front of her, between her fork and knife.)
GARÇON: Here you are, miss.
MISS: I didn’t order this.
GARÇON: Something to tide you over, miss.
MISS: What is it?
GARÇON: A bite, miss. Amuse-bouche.
MISS: A moose’s what? I won’t pay for it.
GARÇON: No, miss. Gratis. On the house.
MISS: Free?
GARÇON: Yes, miss. Complimentary.
MISS: In that case… (She lifts her wedding veil. Taking up her fork and knife, she gingerly opens the book’s front cover. With the utensils, she tears out a page. Then, with her hands, she wads up the paper. She tosses the wadded page over her shoulder, flinging it out the window.)
GARÇON: How is it, miss?
MISS: Tough. Compelling, though. Not half bad. There’s plenty to chew on here. (She repeats the ritual “eating” exactly as before: tearing, wadding, tossing. She starts again at once and continuously “eats,” discarding page after page.)
GARÇON: I’ll leave you to it, miss. (To the audience.) The mind, I’m afraid, is a place all its own. “A matter of perspective,” you might say. “Subjective.” Objectively, it’s a tired line. What can you say to that but “goodbye”? (Steps left toward the exit.) I know how it sounds, but the room is on fire. She takes the alarm for a dinner bell. She’d wear her own ears as a necklace to keep from hearing the truth. (Looks back at MISS.) Behold: the fate of idle sitters. Of all the possible prejudices, contentment kills the most. Watch what becomes of those who wait.
(GARÇON exits left. MISS goes on “eating” as screams again rise from lower floors—louder now, closer. The roar of an enormous fire crescendos until deafening, swallowing the screams. Blackout.)
(END OF PLAY.)
Adam James is a Chicago-based writer of scripts for the stage and screen. His writing has been featured by the Keats Letters Project and the British Association for Romantic Studies. In 2022, Adam was awarded the Dick Scuglik Memorial Residency and Scholarship by Write On, Door County. He holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in writing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.