Mamá Capybara

Mamá Capybara

by Jacob Juntunen

First performed at Southern Illinois University as part of the #AfterOrlando response to the Pulse Nightclub shooting.

CAST

MAMÁ: Da'Veon Burtin
NIÑO: Christian Boswell

Directed by Kyle Aschbrenner, who also deserves credit for the stage directions and ending.

Setting:
Empty stage

NIÑO lies on the floor covered in a blanket.

                                                            NIÑO
Mamá! Mamá! Mamáma, Mamáma, Mamáma, Mamáma—

MAMÁ enters.

                                                            MAMÁ
What? What’s wrong?

                                                            NIÑO
Tell me the story.

                                                            MAMÁ
Go to sleep.

                                                            NIÑO
I’ll go to sleep if you tell me the story.

                                                            MAMÁ
Mamá capibara,
Con su niño en la cama,
Le dice buenas noches
y va a la cocina—

                                                            NIÑO
In English.

                                                            MAMÁ
It’s not an English story.

                                                            NIÑO
Teacher says to only talk in English.

                                                            MAMÁ
Your teacher’s an asshole. But you can’t say that.

                                                            NIÑO
Asshole! Asshole! Asshole! Mamá said—

                                                            MAMÁ
Okay, go to sleep.

MAMÁ exits. NIÑO lies back down under his blanket. He’s briefly asleep, then:

                                                            NIÑO
Mamáma, Mamáma, Mamáma, Mamáma, oh, God, help, somebody help, Mamáma, help—

                                                            MAMÁ
What’s wrong? Are you hurt? Hey— hey!

                                                            NIÑO
Tell me the story—

                                                            MAMÁ
What story?

                                                            NIÑO
Mamá Capibara.

                                                            MAMÁ
In Spanish?

                                                            NIÑO
Okay.

                                                            MAMÁ
Mamá capibara,
Con su niño en la cama,
Le dice buenas noches
y va a la cocina.

Mamá capibara,

                                                            NIÑO
Mama capybara

                                                            MAMÁ
Con su niño en la cama

                                                            NIÑO
With her baby in bed

                                                            MAMÁ
Oiga un llanto,

                                                            NIÑO
She hears him crying

                                                            MAMÁ
y corre a su lado.

                                                            NIÑO
And she runs to his side.

                                                            MAMÁ
What are you doing?

                                                            NIÑO
Telling the story.

                                                            MAMÁ
It doesn’t rhyme in English.

                                                            NIÑO
But I want to be able to talk English like all my friends.

                                                            MAMÁ
Listen: Don’t you be ashamed of who you are, ever, do you understand? You’re my Niño. You have pride, do you understand?

                                                            NIÑO
Pride.

                                                            MAMÁ
That’s right. You find your place, make it your home, and have pride. Fuck everyone else.

                                                            NIÑO
Mamá said fuck!

                                                            MAMÁ
Go to sleep.

MAMÁ exits. NIÑO lies back down under his blanket. He’s briefly asleep, then he throws the blanket completely off him.

                                                            NIÑO
Help! Help! Mamma, mamma, mamma,

MAMÁ enters

                                                            MAMÁ
What’s wrong? Are you hurt? Hey— hey!

                                                            NIÑO
mamma, mamma, mamma, mamma—

                                                            MAMÁ
This is Officer Gomez, I have a man down, require assistance—

                                                            NIÑO
Mamma, mamma, mamma!

                                                            MAMÁ
Just relax, relax, you’re okay, you’re going to be okay, the medics will be here soon, can you tell me anything about the man who was doing the shooting—

                                                            NIÑO
Tell me the story, Mamá!

                                                            MAMÁ
You’re in a nightclub. You’ve been shot. Can you remember anything that—

                                                            NIÑO
Please, Mamá, the story…

                                                            MAMÁ
What story?

                                                            NIÑO
Mamá Capibara!

                                                            MAMÁ
I don’t know that one. Hold on. I’m putting pressure on your wound. You’re going to be okay.

                                                            NIÑO
Mamá capibara,
Con su niño en la cama,
Le dice buenas noches
y va a la cocina.

Say it. Please.

                                                            MAMÁ
I don’t speak Spanish.

                                                            NIÑO
Mamá capibara,
Con su niño en la cama
Oiga un llanto,
y corre a su lado.

                                                            MAMÁ
Wait, I got some of that. Mama Capybara, with her baby in bed, she hears him crying, and runs to his side.

                                                            NIÑO
Mamá capibara,
le dice a su angelito
No llores más
Estoy siempre contigo

                                                            MAMÁ
Mama Capybara, she says to her little angel, Don’t cry anymore, I’m… I’m… what?

                                                            NIÑO
Estoy siempre contigo… I’m always here with you.

                                                            MAMÁ
I’m here. Right here with you.

                                                            NIÑO
Mamáma…

                                                            MAMÁ
I’m right here. Hey! We need a medic here!

                                                            NIÑO
Mamáma…

                                                            MAMÁ
He’s bleeding out! Come on! I need someone now!

                                                            NIÑO
Officer…

                                                            MAMÁ
I’m Officer Gomez. I’m right here. I have pressure on your wound.

                                                            NIÑO
Tell Mamma, I could feel her right here with me.

He dies.

                                                            MAMÁ
Medic. Medic!!

MAMÁ take the blanket and puts it over NIÑO, as if she’s about to cover a dead body. Instead, she raises it to his chin, and tucks him in.

                                                            MAMÁ
Buenos noches.

MAMÁ kisses NIÑO goodnight.

Blackout.

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Our First Times

Our First Times

by Jacob Juntunen

Podcast inspiration: http://www.wnyc.org/story/outcry-over-sentence-stanford-rape-case/

JANE: A woman
EMILY: A woman
HEATHER: A woman
BRICK: A white man

Setting:
Three hardback wooden chairs on stage.

Each woman stands in a space to herself, near a chair; BRICK moves between the spaces.

                                                            JANE
I’ll never forget my first time, even though I was sure I would never see him again.

                                                            EMILY
I never though it would happen to me. When it finally did, it started like something out of a bad romance novel. But then I never thought I’d see him again.

                                                            HEATHER
It’s hard to believe, I guess, but it was years after I graduated college before my first time, and I really didn’t want to see him again.

                                                            JANE
He was graduating high school in our tiny little Ohio town, and I was just a sophomore.

                                                            EMILY
I was such a nerd in high school. But it got me into OSU, and Columbus seemed like the big city after the tiny little town I came from.

                                                            HEATHER
I was great at math. I saw equations like other people hear music. Right out of college, I was able to get a job in Columbus with a state senatorial campaign working the polls. And it was amazing. I loved it. I couldn’t wait to move up the ranks because as Ohio goes, so goes the country.

                                                            JANE
We’d met a few times because he was the quarterback and I was a cheerleader, even if I was only junior varsity. After all the family graduation stuff, people met out at the old quarry, parked their pickups in a circle, and we partied in the headlights.

                                                            BRICK
(to JANE) “Hey, you want a drink?”

                                                            JANE
“Sure.”

                                                            BRICK
“Wait here.”

                                                            JANE
I watched the bugs fly around in the beams of the trucks’ lights as Brick went to grab me a beer. My heart was pounding as fast as the beat of the music because I knew Brick had just broken up with his girlfriend. And he picked me to give a drink to!

                                                            EMILY
It was my freshman year, and between classes and getting used to dorm life, I didn’t make a lot of friends. Or maybe I’m just not very good at making friends. I never had very many in high school, either. So I was bored enough or lonely enough or whatever enough to go to a party with my roommate.

                                                            BRICK
(to EMILY) “Hey, you’re in my bio class, aren’t you?”

                                                            EMILY
I was. He and I sat next to each other every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and he had never so much as said hello to me before.

                                                            BRICK
“You want a drink?”

                                                            EMILY
“Sure.” I knew he was at OSU on a football scholarship, so I didn’t know why he wanted to talk to the nerdy girl in the plain sweater sitting alone on a couch in the corner. But, why not?

                                                            HEATHER
The math in politics is my true love, but my first love? Sports. Any sports. Football, baseball, basketball, whatever. You want to talk about math in action? That’s sports. Especially college teams before everything gets so tainted with money. And, believe it or not, being a girl who liked sports made it easier to make my way in politics. It made me seem more like one of the guys. I sometimes even met clients at this sports bar near my house to make them less nervous about having a woman in charge of their campaigns.

                                                            JANE
We drank our beers, and I listened.

                                                            BRICK
“And she’s like, ‘I don’t care if you’re going to Columbus, we can date long distance.’ Can you believe that?”

                                                            JANE
“What a bitch.”

                                                            BRICK
“Right? Columbus is like a two hour drive from here. And she wants me to come back and forth? I’m on a fucking scholarship. I’ll have practice. She doesn’t understand.”

                                                            JANE
“I have to get up at five every morning for cheerleading practice.”

                                                            BRICK
“Right? You really get me.”

                                                            JANE
I couldn’t believe his ex just asked him to do a long distance relationship. My mom always told me to get a guy to do what you want, you have to make him think it’s his idea.

                                                            BRICK
“She just expects me to pick up everything and drive back here for her every couple of weeks?”

                                                            JANE
“But if a girl really loved you, she could drive up and see you on breaks and stuff.”

                                                            BRICK
“She doesn’t have a car.”

                                                            JANE
“I do. And I get my license in the fall.”

(Slight pause as BRICK considers this.)

                                                            BRICK
“Hey, wanna get out of here?”

                                                            JANE
I did.

                                                            EMILY
I wasn’t used to drinking, so I mainly just listened to him and tried to keep my head from spinning.

                                                            BRICK
“The coach here doesn’t appreciate me. If he’d let me be the starter instead of that asshole, we wouldn’t have an 0 and 2 record going into homecoming.”

                                                            EMILY
I nodded. He didn’t need a lot of encouragement to just keep talking. Eventually, he said,

                                                            BRICK
“Hey, I like you. You’re good at that bio stuff, right?”

                                                            EMILY
That ‘bio stuff’ was my major, so, I said, “Yeah, I guess.”

                                                            BRICK
“We should study sometime.”

                                                            EMILY
The college quarterback asking me to study with him? Even if he was second string? Maybe it was the beer or the adrenaline or the hormones, but I felt like I was outside myself watching a movie, the music pounding around me. I gave him my number, and he went off and talked to other people. I went home.

                                                            HEATHER
I went to my bar to watch the Ohio-Michigan game, and of course the place was packed. I grabbed a beer, and asked these guys if I could stand at their table. During a commercial, they asked me what I did. I said it was boring, but they insisted. I just said I worked in politics, but they kept asking, and I started to explain the polls I run, the mathematical models, and got too into it, on a roll, until one of them said, “Okay, we get it. The game’s on.” Asshole. So I grabbed my beer and tried to find another table, when this guy nearby said,

                                                            BRICK
“Hey, you wanna share my table?”

                                                            HEATHER
So I sat.

                                                            BRICK
“That sounded cool. You’re in politics? Hey, you need another drink?”

                                                            HEATHER
“Sure.”

                                                            JANE
I got in his truck, and he drove me out to the swimming hole. During the drive, he held my hand and talked about how incredible he was gonna be on the team at OSU. I knew if I was amazing enough, I could convince him to date me long distance. His stupid ex just didn’t know how to play the game right. He parked the car next to the lake and turned out the lights.

                                                            BRICK
“Come on.”

                                                            JANE
He had a blanket in the back of the truck, and he laid it out on the grass in front of the water. We sat. There were millions of fireflies out, like stars in the trees and above the lake.

                                                            BRICK
“Will you look at that?”

                                                            JANE
“It’s like a fairy ball.”

                                                            BRICK
“It’s almost as beautiful as you.”

(BRICK and JANE kiss)

                                                            BRICK (cont.)
“Come on, let’s swim.”

                                                            JANE
“I don’t have a suit.”

                                                            BRICK
“So what?”

                                                            JANE
He took off his shirt and looked at me.

                                                            BRICK
“You’re, like, the most beautiful girl at school. You shouldn’t be embarrassed to go skinny-dipping.”

                                                            JANE
I needed to be amazing enough for him to date me, so that I’d see him again after he left for OSU. I took off my clothes.

                                                            BRICK
“You’re so fucking beautiful.”

                                                            EMILY
Honestly, after the party I thought I’d never see him again except in class. But he actually texted me one night before a test:

                                                            BRICK
“Study 2nte?”

                                                            EMILY
“K”

                                                            BRICK
“Library now?”

                                                            EMILY
“CU there.” It was a quiet Wednesday night, and we found an out of the way carrel on the fourth floor.

                                                            HEATHER
The game ended, and we lost, so most of the bar cleared out. Those dicks that I sat with at first stuck around and got loudly drunk and sometimes tried to talk to me, but I barely cared. The guy I was with was really fun.

                                                            BRICK
“My name’s Brick.”

                                                            HEATHER
“Really?”

                                                            BRICK
“It’s a football nickname. It stuck.”

                                                            HEATHER
“Where did you play?”

                                                            BRICK
“OSU. Hurt my knee, so that was that.”

                                                            HEATHER
“You played with the Buckeyes?”

                                                            BRICK
“Yeah, but that was four or five years ago.”

                                                            HEATHER
“Wait, not Brick the second string quarterback?”

                                                            BRICK
“Well, that’s not how I like to think of myself.”

                                                            HEATHER
“Right. Sorry.”

                                                            JANE
I thought we would go swimming under the fairy lights.

                                                            BRICK
“Come here.”

                                                            JANE
“Let’s get in the water.”

                                                            BRICK
“I said come here.”

(BRICK turns one of the chairs around so it’s back faces the audience. He pushes JANE down into the chair so her legs are spread around the chair’s back.)

                                                            JANE
I didn’t say no. I hadn’t done it before, and I didn’t want to, but I didn’t say no. And when he was done, he got off me, put his shirt back on, and said,

                                                            BRICK
“Get in the truck.”

                                                            EMILY
He didn’t really know how to study. I started to think he just wanted to meet at the library because he didn’t even have notes from the class. I was starting to get frustrated.

                                                            BRICK
“I don’t know if studying together is working.”

                                                            EMILY
“You think?”

(BRICK kisses EMILY)

                                                            EMILY (Cont.)
That was unexpected.

                                                            HEATHER
“I was at OSU when you were playing.”

                                                            BRICK
“You saw me play?”

                                                            HEATHER
“I did.”

                                                            BRICK
“What did you think?”

                                                            HEATHER
“They should have played you more.”

                                                            BRICK
“I know, right?”

                                                            HEATHER
He actually wasn’t that good, but what was the harm in stroking his ego a little? Political aides don’t have time to really date, so I figured I could have a little fun at the bar, see if it went anywhere that night, and then never see him again.

                                                            JANE
I picked the rocks out of my backside and put my dress back on. I could tell my back was all scraped up and I was scared I’d bleed on my clothes. In the truck, he didn’t say a word, just drove back to the quarry where the graduation party was happening. When we got there, he stopped the truck, looked straight ahead, and just said one word:

                                                            BRICK
“‘Night.”

                                                            JANE
He didn’t even drive me home.

                                                            EMILY
It wasn’t my first kiss, but it was my first college kiss. And certainly the best. It was exciting! He texted me to come here! Not to study! I hate to say it, but I was flattered that he didn’t like me for my brain.

                                                            BRICK
“Hey, come on, I know a place.”

                                                            EMILY
He “knew a place.” I should have noticed that phrasing. It implied a plan? But, I went with him. I thought we’d make out and maybe see each other again sometime.

                                                            JANE
He and his girlfriend stayed together for a few months long distance while he was at OSU. I never told anybody what happened. I got married, had a few kids, and worked in a Wal-Mart in the same town where I was born. I assumed I’d never see him again.

                                                            HEATHER
I had to go to the bathroom.

                                                            EMILY
He took me to a stairwell.

                                                            HEATHER
Someone knocked on the door when I’d barely had time to sit down. “Just a minute!” I said.

                                                            EMILY
It wasn’t the most romantic place, but it was private.

                                                            BRICK
“You’re beautiful.”

                                                            EMILY
People normally told me I was smart, or, at best, that I had pretty hair.

(BRICK turns the second chair around)

                                                            BRICK
“Come on.”

                                                            EMILY
He tried to push me down onto the dirty cement under the stairs. It wasn’t like I was a virgin. Even nerds get together in high school. Band camp and stuff. But I barely knew this guy, and in a filthy stairwell?

                                                            BRICK
“You’re the one that came here with me.”

                                                            EMILY
He was way stronger than me.

(BRICK pushes EMILY down onto the second chair, legs straddling the back of the chair)

                                                            EMILY (cont)
I told him no. I tried to get him off me. I didn’t scream. I’m not sure why not. When he finished, he said,

                                                            BRICK
“Give me a call sometime.”

                                                            HEATHER
The person just kept knocking, so I hurried up, and opened the door, and there he was.

                                                            BRICK
“Hey, come here, I want to show you something.”

                                                            HEATHER
Before I could do anything, he grabbed my elbow and pulled me out the back door to the dumpster.

(BRICK tries to kiss HEATHER, and she pushes him away)

                                                            HEATHER (cont.)
“Dude, we’re by a fucking dumpster. It stinks.”

(BRICK turns the final chair around; he pushes HEATHER into it so her legs straddle the back)

                                                            HEATHER (cont.)
He pushed me to the ground and got his hand under my pants. I was getting scraped up by the asphalt, and trying to push him off of me. He put his arm on my neck so I couldn’t breath, and I could feel his other hand groping around under my underwear as I started to see black around the edges of my vision, when suddenly I could breathe again.

                                                            EMILY
I stopped going to my bio class even though it was part of my major. It was the only time I failed a class in college. But I wanted to make sure I never saw him again. Eventually I transferred schools, just to make sure.

                                                            HEATHER
Those two guys from the bar who didn’t want to hear about my job were holding Brick, one was calling the police. When they saw him go after me, and didn’t see us come back, they wondered if I was okay. They asked me if I was all right. I couldn’t talk yet. But I could by the time the police got there, and I told the officers everything, I told the doctors every embarrassing detail while nurses took pictures of the bruises between my spread open legs. When I pressed charges, I was sure I wouldn’t have to see him again. That he’d settle. There were witnesses. They had to hold him so he wouldn’t run away: that’s evading arrest. But he didn’t settle. We went to court. But I still didn’t think I’d have to testify. Those two guys saw him on top of me, choking me, pulled him off me. But I had to. I had to face him down in court and say what he did. I had to answer his asshole lawyer when he asked me, “Was this your first time?” And I looked him square in the face and said, “Yeah. It was the first time I’ve been raped.”

(JANE falls into her chair, in shock)

                                                            JANE
It was years later, I was walking through the TV section of Wal-Mart, and I saw him coming out of a courthouse in a suit. It was like a kaleidoscope of my… Well, of the guy who did that to me. Every TV showing him: that’s how I saw the world after he did that to me. Like every guy wanted to do that. He’d gained weight, but he looked the same.

                                                            HEATHER
The jury came back with a unanimous guilty verdict. Then I was sure I’d never see him again. Even so, I had horrible anxiety attacks. I moved, in case he knew where my old apartment was. I found a new bar. I didn’t talk to strangers anymore. I sold my car and got a new one in case he’d seen the old one.

(EMILY falls into her chair, in shock)

                                                            EMILY
It was years later, I had the TV on while I was working on my dissertation, and I saw him coming out of a courthouse in a suit. He looked shorter than I remembered. He was a giant monster in my nightmares.

                                                            HEATHER
I thought my boss, a woman running for Ohio state senate, would be understanding, but she said she couldn’t be tainted by me. That keeping me on might be interpreted as a “feminist gesture.” So I even got a new job, working for an up-and-coming young guy with a strong family life whose image would be burnished by hiring a victim from the newspapers. I thought I’d never see Brick again.

(HEATHER falls into her chair, in shock)

                                                            HEATHER (cont)
But after the judge lowered his sentence to six months county jail from a potential fourteen years in prison, I saw him on TV, answering reporters’ questions.

                                                            BRICK
“Hey, this was just a mistake made by two drunk adults outside a bar. I think she and I both learned our lesson here. I’ve never done anything like this before, and I never will again. What can I say? The judge knows this was my first time, and I shouldn’t be judged too harshly by my first mistake.”

(Blackout)

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