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(Somewhere that looks like nowhere. ROXANNE lies center, awakening right when the lights come up, as though from a nightmare or one of those shocks where your body thinks you’re falling. She gets up and looks around)
ROXANNE: Huh. I thought it would look different.
(She wanders across the stage, taking it all in. MYLES enters, facing away from her. They back into each other and jump back in shock.)
ROXANNE: AAH!
MYLES: Oh, my goodness, I’m so—oh!
ROXANNE: Oh. It’s you.
MYLES: I didn’t think I’d see you here.
ROXANNE: I didn’t think you’d be anywhere. I guess this is where people like us end up.
(beat)
MYLES: How is it going? Was it going. I don’t know. I haven’t seen you since the, uh—
ROXANNE: The satanic ritual.
MYLES: Ah.
(beat)
MYLES: I forgive you, by the way.
ROXANNE: (overlapping) There has to be more to this.
(She pushes past him and charges off.)
MYLES There’s nothing that way, I already checked.
ROXANNE: Is there anything anywhere?
MYLES: I don’t know. I don’t even know where I started. How long has it been since I died?
ROXANNE: A year? Maybe more.
MYLES: Damn.
ROXANNE: Duncan is very successful. He was about to go on tour with a big orchestra.
MYLES: Really?
ROXANNE: Yes.
MYLES: Wow. I never would have guessed that my hands could do that.
ROXANNE: And it is because you never guessed it that you never would. You didn’t deserve your talent because you have no imagination. At least now it’s being put to use.
(beat)
MYLES: I could see you all down there. For a little while.
ROXANNE: Oh great. Just great. It’s No Exit.
MYLES: I’m sorry?
ROXANNE: And you call yourself an artist. No Exit? The play? By Sartre?
MYLES: Theatre was never really my wheelhouse.
ROXANNE: UGH! Men can’t do anything themselves! No Exit is a play about three people in Hell. Their punishment was to be with each other forever. Much like how being with you appears to be MY punishment. And one aspect of Hell was that they could see their loved ones back on Earth. At least, until they moved on.
MYLES: Interesting. Do you think you could see them?
ROXANNE: No.
MYLES: You didn’t even try.
ROXANNE: Absolutely not.
MYLES: I could see Paula for a week, I think. And if I tried, I could hear her.
ROXANNE: Don’t. I do not want to speak of that vile woman.
MYLES: My wife is not vile. She—
(Roxanne raises her hand, a threat. Myles heeds it.)
MYLES: What about my daughter? What happened to her?
ROXANNE: She’s dead.
MYLES: You always did have a dark sense of humor.
ROXANNE: I’m not kidding. She’s dead. I killed her.
MYLES: What?
ROXANNE: Duncan told me to kill her and I did. The doctor called it a seizure. It was very sad.
MYLES: …Wh—
ROXANNE: He figured a child would be too inconvenient She would have limited the opportunities he took.
MYLES: But if she’s dead… where is she?
ROXANNE: Well, her soul remained IN her body when she died, so I can only assume she’s somewhere nicer than this.
MYLES: Hold on. Are you saying someone performed the ritual on you?
ROXANNE: I guess I am.
MYLES: This is fantastic!
ROXANNE: How the Hell is it—
MYLES: Now you understand what it feels like. Right? Was it like a painful dream for you too?
ROXANNE: It was like my skin was being ripped off.
MYLES: Yes! And you can’t scream or even open your mouth because you’re unconscious. But something is different. There's a shift you almost don’t notice, and now your body isn’t yours and you’re dying.
ROXANNE: For me it was a lot less subtle, but sure.
MYLES: What was it like? Dying, I mean. For me, it was like… every second stretched out into eternity. Like my mind knew it didn’t have long. I could feel every system failing. And then… Nothing. And then this. Shit, it feels good to just talk about it with someone, you know? I’ve been alone for so long I thought I wouldn’t know how to form the words.
ROXANNE: This is Hell, not therapy, and I am not your nurse.
MYLES: I know.
ROXANNE: I need to get out of here. I need to get back. He’s going to notice I’m not there. He has to notice. That wench is nothing like me.
MYLES: Wench?
ROXANNE: Some 30 year old waste of space is out there wearing my skin and she does NOT have my sculptural skills! Duncan will be able to know that it is not me!
MYLES: She didn’t seem to care.
ROXANNE: Who?
MYLES: Paula. My wife. She seemed happier without me. She could tell I’d changed, but she liked it.
ROXANNE: Because your face finally had some light in its eyes.
MYLES: I had light.
ROXANNE: You were a music journalist. Cataloguing the achievements of other musicians. Every day, you got up and looked into a mirror showing who you could have been if you hadn’t given up.
MYLES: I never gave up.
ROXANNE: That is exactly what you did! You were classically trained! You let such a puny thing as no one liking your music stop you from performing it. If you lack the hunger, you will starve. And you were starving. Duncan and I put you out of your misery, but you were dead when we first laid eyes on you.
MYLES: Really? I was dead? Because I didn’t become a Satanist like you two? Didn’t sell my soul to the devil and spend my time on immortality? Maybe I should have relived my youth by taking advantage of young women?
ROXANNE: No one took advantage of me.
MYLES: You’re right. That’s inaccurate. Duncan groomed you.
ROXANNE: Take that back.
MYLES: Roxanne. I reported on the music industry. I know I may be naïve –
ROXANNE: May be?
MYLES: – but I’m not an idiot. I had suspicions and I ignored them because I liked you two.
ROXANNE: You thought you knew my husband, but you didn’t know shit.
MYLES: I didn’t. And how well do you know him? How long have you been together? How long did you think you had with him before he replaced you with a younger model?
ROXANNE: I am not replaceable. And neither are you. Not to him. Thanks to Duncan, the name Myles Clarkson will be known and loved by millions.
MYLES: But they won’t know ME. And he doesn’t know you.
ROXANNE: No, YOU don’t know me. I am a master of the dark arts! Duncan needs me to transfer his soul to new vessels.
MYLES: Evidently, he doesn’t anymore.
ROXANNE: What do you mean by that?
MYLES: Well, you’re here. Did Duncan tell someone to—
ROXANNE: He wouldn’t dream of doing this to me.
MYLES: Then who did?
ROXANNE: Who do you think?
MYLES: I don’t know. Another satanist? Someone who didn’t like Duncan? One of your exes?
ROXANNE: You WISH. Paula is the one who killed me.
MYLES: No.
ROXANNE: She did. She stole my body, and she plunged the knife into her own wrists. I awoke just in time to bleed to death in her bathtub.
MYLES: But… why?
ROXANNE: Use your brain, if you even have one! Why would your wife wish to impersonate me?
MYLES: To get revenge on Duncan?
ROXANNE: To STEAL my husband! To keep him for herself!
MYLES: That doesn’t make any sense. If she knows about the ritual, doesn’t she know he isn’t me?
ROXANNE: Oh, she knows.
MYLES: Then, then… why?
ROXANNE: I told you before. She likes him more than she loved you.
MYLES: How? He’s evil!
ROXANNE: You were the replaceable one to her. I saw how madly, violently, she wanted your face. Your hands. Your voice. She wanted all of it enough to give up her body and name. The only thing she didn’t miss, it seemed, was you.
MYLES: My god…
ROXANNE: I think God, if he does exist, is laughing at you.
MYLES: And not you?
ROXANNE: Of course not. Because I am going to get out of here. Duncan will summon me back. Any minute.
MYLES: How do you know?
ROXANNE: I just do! I know my husband!
MYLES: Then try to find him.
ROXANNE: I will not.
MYLES: Go on. Try. If he’s looking for you, you might see each other.
ROXANNE: I can’t, if it means seeing that bitch again.
MYLES: Please?
ROXANNE: No.
MYLES: But aren’t you curious? Don’t you want to know if he fell for it? You’re right. Paula is nothing like you. She wouldn’t be able to keep up this ruse.
ROXANNE: How then? Where do I look?
MYLES: Just look… Out.
(She looks out at the audience and cranes her neck, and squints her eyes.)
MYLES: And, I dunno, clench.
ROXANNE: Clench what?
MYLES: Just clench something. Go tense.
ROXANNE: Wait wait wait! It’s working! I can see him!
MYLES: Would you look at that! I can see him too!
ROXANNE: It’s my home! I miss it already! Oh, my love, it’s me You don’t need to pace around! I’m here!
MYLES: Look, the door is opening. And there you are!
ROXANNE: That is still not me. Look at how she walks! So performed. So stiff.
MYLES: That’s how you walk.
ROXANNE: No it isn’t.
MYLES: It kind of is.
ROXANNE: Shut up. Are they hugging?
MYLES: Yes they are.
ROXANNE: What are they saying? What are they saying?
MYLES: She asked if he liked her new perfume. And he said “I hate it. It reminds us of our… little housewife?”
ROXANNE: But—she’s not—she’s CLEARLY not—
MYLES: And now they’re going in for a—
ROXANNE: NO!
(Roxanne falls to her knees and bawls.)
MYLES: It’s fading now. I can’t see them anymore. And there’s this feeling in the pit of my stomach that we aren’t going to see them again.
(Roxanne doesn’t respond)
MYLES: They looked so happy together.
ROXANNE: Sartre was wrong. Hell is not other people. Hell is you.
MYLES: I’m sorry, Roxanne. I guess we were both replaceable to someone.
ROXANNE: I have got to get out of here.
(She rises and looks around the stage. She searches behind the curtains, under chairs. She wanders backstage and runs along the wall. After a good bit of this, she comes back.)
MYLES: No luck?
ROXANNE: No shit.
(beat)
ROXANNE: I’ll find the way out, and there is a way out. If anyone can, it is me. In the play, the door opens. They have a way out! And like fools, they don’t take it. The door closes, and they are left with each other. I won’t make that mistake. I will live again. And when I do, Paula Clarkson will hope for Hell to be kinder than me.
MYLES: And I hope it works out for you.
ROXANNE: Why? Why don’t you hate me?
MYLES: Because it’s not your fault.
ROXANNE: It is. I killed you.
MYLES: Who cares? We’re in the same boat now. I know what you’re going through, when it comes to being left by someone who has your face.
ROXANNE: You couldn’t possibly begin to understand me.
MYLES: I know that you’d do anything for some clay right now.
ROXANNE: Lucky guess.
MYLES: No. You’re a sculptor and you can’t do it anymore. And it’s killing you. I know. I’d give my left foot to have a piano again.
ROXANNE: I do miss the music of a piano.
MYLES: I do too. I didn’t stop playing it just because I didn’t pursue it professionally. I didn’t stop loving it.
ROXANNE: No, I suppose not.
(beat. When the silence becomes unbearable, Myles begins to hum a tune. It is old fashioned, morbid, and just so corny.)
ROXANNE: What’s that song?
MYLES: I forgot the name. But Paula loved it.
ROXANNE: It sounds like a song Duncan used to play. They must be dancing to it right now. Holding each other in our hands.
MYLES: Well, why should they have all the fun?
(He offers a hand. She looks up at it. She feels like she shouldn’t take it but she does. They slow dance while he hums and stares into space, trying to picture someone else. She joins in on the tune, and the lights fade)