Mary: “It wasn’t you…it was the idea of you.”Fay, Mary’s inner voice: The dialogues she had practiced in her head while she was alone finally broke the surface. It all started with an innocent crush, but isn’t that how all the stories go…
Jake: “I didn’t call you.”
Mary: “No, you didn’t.”
Fay: She stared blankly at him, wondering why she was still there.
Jake: “I wanted to call, but…”
Matt, Jake’s inner voice: He hesitated, looked into the nearby mirror, his reflection catching unflattering light from the florescent bulbs above.
Mary: “You don’t have to explain…”
Matt: He looks up. The crease in his brow slowly disappears.
Fay: He smiles, that warm smile that makes the butterflies appear. She speak.
Mary: “Look, when I first met you, I felt like I had known you forever. The books we’ve read, the places we’ve been…it was like, I don’t know, like you were a long lost high school friend who had known me for years.”
Matt: He sits, listening intently.
Fay: His gaze pierces hers. He wants her to continue.
Mary: ” So I thought, ok, I’ll take a chance. A risk. Something I wasn’t used to, and it helped that you weren’t here when I left you that letter. It was easier. In a way, I was cheating Cupid. I left you a letter, and in doing so, left the ball in your court.”
Matt: He wants to say something, but the words escape him.
Fay: Luckily for him, she is on a roll.
Mary: “When you didn’t call, I wasn’t crushed. I was proud of myself for taking a risk. If that was the only thing I got out of it, then so be it.”
Matt: He balks…
Fay: …and then smirks. He speaks.
Jake: “I want you to know that getting that letter from you meant the world to me. It was exactly what I needed at the exact moment in time. That letter was so me, that it scared me that a virtual stranger like you could know me so well as to write a letter so eloquent as that. It was as if the stars or gods or whatever cosmic force brought us together, as PBS channel as that sounds.”
Fay: He sighs, a heavy sigh.
Jake: “I just got out of a long relationship that was exhausting and I don’t think I can go through that again.”
Fay: He looks at her for a reaction, and when she doesn’t give him one, he continues.
Jake: “But I love your company, and you and I have so much in common, and I just feel like we can be really good friends.”
Fay: He spits this out like it would solve everything.
Matt: After an eternal pause, she says…
Mary: “We all have baggage. It’s just how we chose to carry it that makes us who we are.”
Fay: He smiles.
Matt: She smiles. A moment passes. He shifts uncomfortably on his feet.
Fay: She stares at him. He picks his head up, penetrating her eyes, and it hits her.
Matt: She picks up her things and hands him back the letter.
Mary: “It wasn’t you, it was the idea of you.”
Fay: She hears the wheels turning in his head…
Matt: …but the sound of her heels on the pavement drown them out.
