Week 13, Day 89 - "Stella on Tuesdays"

“Stella on Tuesdays”
Written by Joe Janes
4/17/09
89 of 365

CAST
Roy, 20s
Bud, 20s
Stella, 20s

(Lights up on Roy, a tall skinny man with a goatee, standing behind the counter of a coffee shop, reading a paperback book. Bud, in business casual office attire, enters. He looks around and avoids eye contact with Roy.)

ROY

Can I help you?

BUD

No. That’s okay.

(Pause)

ROY

You have to buy some coffee or something. You can’t just stand around.

BUD

Is Stella here?

ROY

She’s on break.

BUD

Oh. (Looks at watch) I’ll wait, then.

ROY

You can’t just wait. You have to buy something. No loitering.

BUD

Fine. A cup of coffee. Black. For here.

(Roy gets him a cup.)

BUD (continuing)

I’m not a loiterer. I have a purpose.

(Roy shrugs)

ROY

$1.75

BUD

Here. (Hands him two bucks.) Keep the change.

(Stella enters from the back of the shop.)

STELLA

I’m back, Roy.

(Bud sees her and turns his back away from her. He quickly downs the hot coffee as best he can while burning his mouth and throat and making muffled sounds appropriate to such actions. Roy and Stella watch him. When he’s done, Bud turns to face them.)

ROY

I’m going to go on my break. Good luck with lover boy.

(He exits.)

STELLA

Hi, Bud.

BUD

Hi, Stella.

STELLA

What can I get for you today?

BUD

Oh, uh, just a refill.

(She gets him a refill as Bud watches her nervously.)

STELLA

Here you go. Fifty cents.

BUD (handing her a dollar)

Keep the change.

(Pause)

STELLA

Can I get you anything else?

BUD

Well, I was wondering-

STELLA

Yes?

(A desk bell ring is heard and lights shift to something more romantic. Bud rips open his shirt revealing a “Wrath of Kahn”-like chest. Stella’s hair blows in a breeze.)

BUD

Stella, I come her every Tuesday on my afternoon break from work just to see you.

STELLA

Just to see me, Bud.

BUD

Your green eyes and that green apron haunt my soul throughout the week. I long to taste the full caffeinated impact of your lips.

STELLA

Oh, Bud. No cream or sugar?

BUD

I like my women like I like my coffee. Draped in velvet and lying across my four-poster bed. And possibly a horse is involved.

(Desk bell rings. Lights turn to normal. Bud quickly buttons up his shirt.)

STELLA

Can I get you anything else?

BUD

Well, I was wondering-

STELLA

Yes?

(Desk bell rings and lights shift. Stella comes out from behind the counter taking revealing she’s wearing fishnet stockings.)

STELLA (continuing)

Get down on your knees, scum. What do you want in your coffee?

BUD

You, Mistress Stella, you!

STELLA

Lick my Doc Martens.

(He does so. The desk bell rings and they return to their original positions as lights shift back to normal.)

STELLA

Can I get you anything else?

BUD

Well, I was wondering-

STELLA

Yes?

(Desk bell rings, lights shift, they haven’t moved.)

BUD

I just want to tell you the truth. I don’t know why, but I think about you all the time. Your smile, your voice, and, yes, I’ll say it, even your magnificent ass. Life is short. Too short not to navigate life’s waters with my impulses. My urges. For instance, my urge to press that coffee stained bosom-loaded polo shirt against my chest. My urge to see what’s under that green apron of yours. I want to tamp down your espresso pod and pour my frothy steamed milk over the top.

STELLA (breathy and hot)

As a barista, I must tell you, that last sentence didn’t make sense.

(Desk bell rings, lights go back to normal.)

STELLA

Can I get you anything else?

BUD

Well, I was wondering-

STELLA

Yes?

BUD

I was wondering if you’d like to go out some time.

STELLA

What’s the point?

BUD

The point?

STELLA

Does it matter? Does it really matter? We’ll both be dead soon.

BUD

We will?

STELLA

Sure.

BUD

When?

STELLA

Maybe 40 years. 50, if we’re lucky.

BUD

That doesn’t seem so soon.

STELLA

It doesn’t now. It will on the other end. You’ll wonder where the time went. My point is there is no point. It doesn’t matter if we go out on a date. It doesn’t matter if we kiss. It doesn’t matter if we marry, copulate, procreate or just recreate till our bodies crumble. In the big scheme of things, it doesn’t make a difference. The universe doesn’t care. The universe is decidedly unabashedly unaffected by what happens here, right now, in this moment.

BUD

It if doesn’t matter, can’t we just get together because we want to?

STELLA

That’s the only reason there is,

BUD

Our we really having this conversation?

STELLA

Yes.

BUD

Do you want to go out with me?

STELLA

Yes. Just not for coffee.

BUD

Dinner?

STELLA

I get off at six.

BUD

Okay, then. I’ll see you at six.

(He exits. Roy returns, reading his book.)

ROY

Lover boy finally ask you out?

STELLA

Yeah.

ROY

You say yes?

STELLA

Yeah.

ROY

Think it will go anywhere?

STELLA (nonchalantly)

No.

(Lights fade as Stella wipes down the counter.)