Edited by Alloe Mak

PROLOGUE:

Enter THE PLAYWRIGHT, there she is again, at a desk, at a stage, lingering in the doorway of a Room that does not know her, a room she does not know. There she is, peering out from behind a deep red velvet curtain into the dark of an empty stage, knuckles white as she tries to steady her breathing. Here goes nothing, and nothing goes, again and again. She smiles and smooths down her skirt, tucks her hair behind her ears, and she is ready, ready again / to try. A memory of that last summer up north flashes in her head, and her heart betrays her as it drops. For a moment, she feels as she did then, standing on the cliffs, dripping lake water, staring down at the black, thinking / fearing / hoping, This Could be It. She shakes the thought away—this is a different moment entirely. It doesn’t matter; her time in the wings is up. She gives a big smile to the cast and crew and takes a step back, into the dark, hands clasped. 

LIGHTS UP

ACT 1:

Moon’s full, and Halloween night skitters to a stop as ghosts and ghouls and monsters of the night approach their bedtime. The lamplight glows yellow on THE MASKED CHILD, a bulging pillowcase close to her chest, skin sticking to her costume mask. Steps heavy up creaking steps, her hand shakes in the cold as the key pushes into the lock. 

The door swings open on a house that is all wrong, all wrong, nothing like she knew it when she left. Creaky bones gone dark and bad and mean. The wallpaper warps and peels as the hallway stretches out and goes black, a stench like dinner gone bad seeping out from under the kitchen door. The lamplight fades as the door slams shut, and for a moment she thinks her eyes must be closed, the way everything disappears. THE MASKED CHILD calls out, voice small, hoping for her momma, but the house sighs instead, the voice of warped Ol’ Oak hoarse. Under the rubber mask, the little girl’s face twitches in fear. In a home no longer her own, the box TV turns on, static glow like an island in the blackness. The dust in the dead air glows, suspended / her face pressed up close, she holds on. 

Something big and old wakes alongside the house at the television’s white noise, nails scraping the hardwood upstairs. Big eyes flash in the dark, here and there and here again, a snarling mouth of dog teeth. THE MASKED CHILD calls out, voice small as she speaks the thing’s name, she knows it, she does. Animal teeth can hear no pleas. Burst with sparks into violence / bark meaner than bite / cutting into the static song. Little hands shake as the face of the MASKED CHILD warps in terror, but the rubber atop her face is unrelenting, doesn’t falter as the Dog snarls, the latex beast stoic. It’s me, it’s me. The Dog keeps barking, keeps growling, teeth gnashing as it fails to see eyes go wide. 

The dark slats in the mask stay mean, teeth bared with promise of equal violence. The air around the girl goes black and cruel, and she disappears, only a twisted rubber face to remain. The Dog circles, unsure, for once. Eventually, the thing whimpers, slinking away in defeat at the hand of a creature more immovable than he. THE MASKED CHILD shakes, short of breath, back pressed against the static screen. 

The room closes in as the TV shuts off again, rot lingering in the air. THE MASKED CHILD doesn’t bother getting her fingers under the seam where the mask meets her neck, knowing she will face no monsters with more malice than she.

ACT 2:

Welcome to Summer’s End, the last night where the kids are still kids. Through the doorway to a yellow-painted bedroom, stuffed with trinkets and toys and books and dreams, enter THE FALSE ANGEL. Of course, she isn’t anything near heaven now, as she stands in front of her bedroom mirror, face bare and wind-whipped, hair still damp–in this moment, she is unmistakably human. The walls in this room reflect her eyes, her skin, her mouth, as she threads the needle, careful as red pushes silver. She thinks she could touch heaven tonight / girls in their bedrooms everywhere drape in pearls and stars and become Other. THE FALSE ANGEL dons her wings instead, delicate white feathers on a wax-coated metal frame. She sews them tight to her back / red through white through red through silver again. The colours in the room blur into each other before going black, as the angel leaves, expecting never to return. 

In the dying light, the evening is golden, and everything is as it should be, one last time. Pieces of the sunset split off, becoming avian. Sunbirds swoop and dip and flit across the faces of all those THE FALSE ANGEL ever loved. The bodies in the meadow grow wings too, becoming masses of golden light. Everything is as it should be, one last time, as these near godly creatures spin and dance. Their faces split wide open as all the light shines out. THE FALSE ANGEL can pretend, can’t she, with her makeshift divinity? In this golden age, nothing can be quite wrong.  

But Night always comes. The sun dies on hills of goldenrod as the sky goes dark, faded turquoise striped across the bottom half. Big silver stars cut themselves into the night sky, twirling in the blue as the field goes quiet. It looked so different, so empty now, without all that love crammed between oak trees. A crumpled white body remains, THE FALSE ANGEL, left alone in the grass. They’d all gone now, taken flight and left a place that could no longer hold them. Gone off with the gold, into light, into dust, leaving this world from the fringes of the fabric. But wax wings don’t take you far, so THE FALSE ANGEL is here instead, in a night that will never lift. Her wings are bent, wire poking into ribs, tearing up the blue all around. Angels are wrong for this place, even the false ones. 

She pulls out stitch after stitch, the wings slipping, her face turned up into the sky. THE FALSE ANGEL can plead, can beg, but there’s always another stitch / red through white through red through silver again.

These Desperate Sins of ours never really cut free, do they, angel?

ACT 3:

LIGHTS UP, on a play inside a play. Enter MARY in a miniature theatre, velvet curtains crammed between velvet curtains. She fidgets in the cushioned seat, spotlight trained on her as masked actors enacting masked actors become winged and fanged and birds and beasts in the magic of the theatre. All false creatures of the Midsummer glow at their borders under stage light, they dance on Fir. Feet tight in patent leather shoes, MARY feels so young again, too warm in her dress, a child at the ballet with her parents. 

Swooping and spinning, nylon and satin mix and split, the followspots on two masked dancers in a romantic standoff. Circling, circling, neither character recognizes that the other is their old lover, and they spiral and spin apart and together and back again. Then one, her dress like starlight and masked in silver, crystal droplets spilling down in front of her mouth, halts, body rigid. Under the stage light, her hand is so white it could be made of heaven, shaking as it rises. She pulls the delicate silver veil away. It falls to the floor and shatters, light catching as crystal breaks off / skitters across shiny wood. Under all that sewn starlight, the dancer is sticky with sweat, barefaced, cheeks red from exertion. So horribly human in juxtaposition with all the glamour on the stage, but for a moment, MARY sees her as transcendental. Her lost lover sees it too, pulling away their own porcelain mask to reveal a tear-streaked face, the black paint circling their eyes smudged down sunken cheeks. For a single moment, the static is so loud that MARY flinches. 

Then, like a switch is flicked, the Lovers embrace, costumes tangling and limbs wrapping. Wings and heaven and stardust fall away until they are just One thing, all leotard and sweat and ache. Light, oh, such light, spills out from the lines where they’re pressed up against each other, spills from their faces, fills up the stage, fills up the theatre. 

Nothing will ever be the same / Though, it hasn’t ever been, has it, my darling? 

Eventually, the inner curtain falls, and the pseudo audience gasps and bursts into applause, leaping from their chairs as they bask in the intimacy of the moment. Spotlight still on MARY, she hasn’t moved. Instead, all of the light left over is caught in lines on her wet cheeks / she cries, mouth twisted. Her lips pursed like they’re trying to keep all the sorrow and fear and hope and malice from getting out. The light lingers on her, waits, waits, and MARY’s mouth opens in a gaping sob, before the theatre goes black.

The outer curtain falls. 

THE END (Curtain Call):

The night had gone soft and blurred outside the doors of the theatre, the only moment remaining being this one here, as the curtain rises again. Applause shatters the darkness as the actors return to the stage one last time. The little girl, finally unmasked and unafraid, comes out first, bowing and waving to her mother in the crowd, a big smile on her face. The angel, a young woman, hair frizzed from sweat under the stage lights, beaming as she dips, her first show after recovering from an injury. The Lovers, Mary, winged teenagers, the Dog, they’ve all returned to themselves, their names their own. The crowd thanks them in waves of cheers for what they’d been for the night. The rest of the cast, the crew, and the conductor all receive their dues for playing their parts in painting the scene. 

Finally, shoulders tight, heels clicking on Fir, enter THE PLAYWRIGHT, one last time. When she reaches the middle of the stage, she turns, smiles brightly, dipping modestly in a bow. The sound of the audience fuzzes out in her ears, clapping hands surely numb by now. She stands for a second, waving, as the curtain begins to dip down. It is then that THE PLAYWRIGHT sees her, an old woman, still seated, white hair bright amidst the deep red of cushioned seats and bodies. She’s crying, yes, she must be, her cheeks streaked with silver. For a moment, everything is quiet. And then the woman is gone, lost in the sea of theatregoers. 

The curtain obscures it all, the evening done. THE PLAYWRIGHT lingers, darkness settling around the stage as all falls away. 

Even in all this quiet, she is still THE PLAYWRIGHT, inescapably so. Again, she will be at a desk, at a stage, lingering in the doorway. Again, she will wait in the wings, lake water pooling in her patent leather shoes. She remains. 

Exit THE PLAYWRIGHT, she fades to black.