Aiden

12Nov09

This is my first post all semester, for some reason. I won’t bother with excuses. But here’s what I’m working on right now: a play, probably short, starring a mean 17-year-0ld named Aiden who is on a quest to find bigfoot. Here’s the plot as I’ve outlined it so far:

ACT I
Aiden’s family returns home and questions him about not going to church. Aiden is busy studying an alleged photograph of bigfoot.
Dad asks Aiden to go with him to a monument called “Carhenge,” and tries to persuade him by claiming he’s dying.
Elie declares that she’s going to use up some of these lemons selling lemonade. She wants help with writing an advertisement for a lemonade stand (she’s dyslexic), and Aiden tells her to get lost. X, also in the room, asks Aiden why they have so many lemons. Aiden explains that his parents meant to plant an orange tree but it turned out to grow lemons.
Aiden plans to leave on a train to investigate bigfoot for himself, but first he needs money for a train ticket (dramatic question).

ACT II
Mother bakes cookies and no one eats them.
Elie paints a loch ness monster. Aiden makes fun of her and thinks it’s a cow.
Aiden and Elie run into Doomsayer, who claims the world is going to end in 2012. Aiden says he doesn’t care and reveals his somewhat nihilistic philosophy. Later, to Elie, he says he does not know if he actually believes his own words.
Aiden sees that Elie has started “Sasquatch’s lemonade stand”, using the monster she was painting as a sign.
Aiden gets in some sort of argument with Elie about how he wants to be left alone. Afterward, he cooks Elie’s fish, antagonizing her out of rage.
Elie reveals that she has been saving the money from the lemonade stand to help Aiden buy his train ticket.
Aiden guiltily accepts the money and gets on the train. On the train, he has a conversation with one of the passengers that persuades him to go back home. When his stop comes, he does not get off.

ACT III
Aiden walks back in, hugs Elie (or some other small gesture), sits next to dad and reluctantly agrees to go to carhenge.

Act 2 needs a lot of work. I also need to work on combining scenes and helping them to flow together… I seem to have the trouble of thinking about it too much like a film, where too many shots can be spliced together. I want to make as much of the plot as possible occur in a single room, and have as few stage directions as possible. It’s a chance to practice my dialogue skills. Here’s the dialog fragments I’ve written so far.

 

SCENE 1
(In a small white kitchen. There is a large bowl full of lemons on the kitchen table. Aiden is sitting at a table examining a photograph. A door opens)

Aiden: how was church?
Mom: How was it? It was the house of God.
Dad: Why weren’t you there?
Aiden: didn’t feel like it.
Elie: How come? You never come anymore.
Aiden: Boring.
Mom: Boring? God was there.
Aiden: God’s boring.
Mom (to dad): listen to our son.
(Dad shrugs. Aiden looks back at his photograph, and Elie looks over his shoulder)
Elie: what’s that?
Aiden: evidence. See that dark spot?
Elie: looks like a smudge.
Aiden: It’s not a smudge. It’s a sasquatch.
Elie: What’s a sass-kwach?
Aiden: You know, bigfoot. Probably the missing link between monkeys and humans. There’s been a sighting.
Dad (walking in): A sighting of what?
Aiden: A sasquatch.
Dad (leaning over): Looks like a smudge.

PAINTING
(Elie is at a table painting something. Aiden walks in.)
Aiden: Nice cow, Elie.
Elie: It’s not a cow.
Aiden: Then what is it?
Elie: You’ll find out when I’m finished.
Aiden: It even has utters.
Elie: Shut up.

LEMONADE STAND
A: What’s this?
E: I’m an entrepreneur.
Aiden: You don’t even know what that means.
E: Uh-huh! I Learned it today.
A: (walks closer) Nessie’s lemonade stand?
Elie: You were talking about the loch ness monster and I thought it was cool. Don’t you think my sign is cute?
A: The Loch Ness Monster isn’t supposed to be cute. It’s supposed to be scary and mysterious. Besides, you can’t name a lemonade stand after Nessie. People are going to think it tastes like a swamp.
E: It tastes delicious.
A: That’s not the point.
X: Nessie’s Lemonade stand, huh?
E: Yup.
X: Cute sign. How much?
E: 75 cents.
(X pays, drinks cup)
X: Pretty good.

RESEARCHING (opening?)
Elie walks in.
Elie: even the dogs hate me now.
Aiden: what are you whining about?
Elie: (holding a book) Aiden, I can’t understand this. Can you help me?
Aiden: Why? I’m busy.
Elie: No you aren’t.
Aiden: Yes I am. Get lost.
Elie: what are you doing?
Aiden: Researching.
Elie: Researching what?
Aiden: What do you care? Go away.
Elie: Why do you care if I care? Just tell me.
Aiden: Alright, I’m researching Nessie.
Elie: Who’s Nessie?
Aiden: You know, the loch-ness monster.
Elie: But that’s not real, right?
Aiden: That’s what you think.
Elie: you’re crazy, Aiden.
Aiden: You’re stupid, Elie.
Elie: Am not.

Aiden: Mhm. And you’re adopted.
Elie: Nuh-uh!
Aiden: Oh yeah? Ask mom.
(Elie runs off)
Aiden: (to himself) success.

ADOPTED (alternate)
Elie: You make the family look bad.
Aiden: You mean I make you look stupid. You, not the family.
Elie: I’m part of the family.
Aiden: You’re adopted.
Elie: What?
Aiden: You’re adopted. Your real family left you in a dumpster somewhere.
Elie: You’re lying.
Aiden: No I’m not. Ask mom.
Elie: Mom, am I adopted?
Mom: Of course not, Elie. Who told you that?

LEMONS
X: Why are there so many lemons?
Aiden: Are referring to this obnoxious bowl or are you looking for a theodocy?
X: What? The first one.
Aiden: When my parents first bought this house, they bought some seeds that were supposed to grow tangerines, but instead it grew a lemon tree. They’re sour as hell, too.
X: Hmm. but tangerines can’t grow lemons. That’s not possible.
Aiden: Mhm. I guess that orange was some kind of freak of nature. It’s sort of like a miracle, only it sucks.

CARHENGE, dying
Dad: Aiden, we should go to Carhenge this weekend. You and I.
Aiden: Carhenge? What the hell is that?
Dad: It’s like stonehenge, only it’s made entirely of cars. It’s in Nebraska. We should go.
Aiden: Sounds stupid.
Dad: I’m dying, son.
Aiden: No shit. What does that have to do with some rediculous monument in the middle of nowhere?
Mom: (offstage) Don’t use that word.
Dad: dying?
Mom: The S word.
Aiden: Shit?
Mom: stop it.
Aiden: fine. (pause)
Aiden: It’s your own damn fault, you know.
Dad: What?
Aiden: That you’re dying. If you really are, that is. Are you?
Dad: I don’t know.
Aiden: (pause) Well I’ve got sh– stuff to do.

Aiden: the most defining feature of human existence is boredom.

Mom: I made cookies. (somewhere earlier in the play)

COOKIES
Mom: How come nobody ate my cookies? There’s not anything wrong with them, is there?
Dad: They were good.
Elie: Yeah, mom. I’m just not very hungry.
Mom: Aiden?
Aiden: What?
Mom: did you like the cookies?
Aiden: they were alright.
Mom: they were too hard, weren’t they? You all didn’t like them.
Aiden: you are pathetic, you know that, mother? Your self-esteem is all wrapped up in your cookies. It’s absurd.
Mom: I just wanted to make something nice…
Aiden: (knocks over tray) bullshit.
Elie: Aiden!
Mom: Don’t use that word.
Aiden: Stop trying to win everyone’s affections with baked goods and shit. Try having a personality.
Dad: (not moving from couch) don’t disrespect your mother, Aiden.

ELIE’S FISH
Elie: I got a fish today. Did you see my fish?
Aiden: I hate fish.
Elie: I named him Martie.
Aiden: How do you even know it’s a him?
Elie: I don’t know.
Aiden: You are so stupid.
Elie: how do you tell?
Aiden: because everything you say is stupid.
Elie: No, I mean how do you tell if a fish is a boy or a girl?
Aiden: Oh. I don’t know either.
Elie: (laughs) then I guess you’re stupid, too.
(Aiden turns away and sighs)
Elie: I’m still going to call him Martie.

DOOMSAYER SCENE
Doomsayer: You, sir! Do you want to live?
Aiden: It depends. Is this going to be about Jesus?
D: No.
A: Well then, let’s hear it.
E: Let’s go, Aiden. This person is creepy.
A: Shut up, El.
D: We’re all going to die.
A: No kidding, dipshit. Anything else?
D: In 2012 the Mayan calendar ends.
A: (sacrasm) fascinating.
D: The Mayans are the most astronomically advanced of the ancient cultures. From studying the stars, they realized that this age will come to an end in the year 2012.
A: Mhm.
D: Every major religion has a prophecy about the end of the world. The end is near. Is it really so hard to believe?
A: Yes. If the world’s going to end, what are you doing out here anyway?
D: Warning unbelievers.
E: (tugging at his arm) come on, Aiden. Let’s go.
A: If the world’s gonna end, it’s gonna end and there isn’t a damn thing either of can do about it. As far as I’m concerned you’re going to die just the same. So go home. All you can do is what we all do: piss the days away and try not to get too bored while you’re waiting to die.
D: But the end is 2012. The Mayan calendar ends, I said. That’s why Galileo was exhiled. He discovered the truth. That’s what’s buried in Roswell, too. The truth.
A: (puts arm around Elie) we’re leaving.
(they walk off)
E: Aiden, do you really believe all that stuff?
A: Mayan calendar and all that shit? No. Who cares anyway. That guy’s probably a crack head or something.
E: No, I mean, what you said. About boredom and waiting to die.
A: Oh. I don’t know.

LAST SCENE
(Aiden picks up a lemon and sits next to Dad on couch)
Dad: Not leaving this weekend, huh?
Aiden: No.
Dad: Want to go to church?
Aiden: Not really.
Dad: Want to go to carhenge?
Aiden: I guess. (takes a bite out of a lemon)

Anyway, I’m meeting with my prof. in half an hour to talk about where this play is going. I’m not at the point yet where I feel like it’s all coming together. Right now, it’s mostly random chaos.

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Tags: characters, fiction, play, script, writing