Echo Chamber
(a play in 5 acts)
DRAMATIS PERSONAE:
GABBY--’Gift of Gab’ talkshow host and vlogger, resident of Lame Deer
SUSAN PLUMLEE--resident of Benteen, professor of geology at Montana State, Billings
RAY--her husband, attorney at Drake & Plumlee Law Firm, Billings
SHERIDAN--their oldest daughter at U of M, Missoula
CAM and TAMMY--their twin daughters, attending Hardin high school
MARGUERITE--resident of Billings
MAX--her 5-year-old son
JERILYN--Walmart employee
TRAVIS--Walmart employee
CURT CHANDLER--Walmart manager
RANDY--Walmart security
ELMER--nursing home resident in Billings
DESERET--nursing home resident in Billings
BERENICE--nursing home resident in Billings
LAWRENCE--nursing home resident in Billings
HARVEY DRAKE--attorney at Drake & Plumlee Law Firm
JENNIFER BARTON--legal aide at Drake & Plumlee Law Firm
MARY--secretary at Drake & Plumlee Law Firm
Ii: Unincorporated Benteen, Montana
Iii: Billings, inside Walmart
Iiii: At a Billings nursing home
Iiv: Drake & Plumlee Law Firm, downtown Billings
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Ii: Unincorporated Benteen, Montana. RAY opens his garage door with a slap to the wall and gets into the driver’s seat of a Ford Fusion. His daughter TAMMY follows to the back seat, passenger side. RAY turns the ignition key halfway and the jingle to KHDN transitions from news headlines to ‘Gift of Gab’ and its theme music fading in.
‘There’s a song on the radio,
(radio craves to ring your bell)
It’s the same song you used to know,
(hurts like heaven, warms like hell)
And you really wouldn’t pick it if you wanted to
but as long as you’re doing what you gotta do
on the freeway---you’re ok, singin’ free
on the freeway---even if you say:
That song hurts--that song hurts,
We sing it loud and strong, loud and strong
That song hurts--that song hurts,
I wonder what went wrong with that song
Far away…’
SUSAN: (stepping into the garage while shouting into the house) Cam, c’mon--you know Dad wants to be on the road by now.
TAMMY: (from the backseat) Tell her to bring my phone--it’s on my charger.
SUSAN: O, for God-- (louder back into the house) And get Tammy’s phone!
RAY: You don’t need it everyday, you know, especially if there’s one between you two--
TAMMY: Don’t economize us, Daddy--that whole ‘two for the price of one’ thing gets awfully old--
RAY: I didn’t mean it that way--
SUSAN: (getting into the passenger seat) Which way?
TAMMY: Dad thinks Cam’s phone suffices for both of us, ’cause, y’know, the twin package.
RAY: Not to tune you out, but… (turning up the volume) Gab’s on the air
GABBY: ‘And as ever I’ll remind my friends out there, drive carefully: I always got my two hands on the wheel and manage this live-stream through wireless hook-ups and a button at my thumb. Thinking of getting some of those Google glasses--iGlasses, I guess they call them, for proper confusion--something my grandma might understand, well, she’d say ‘specs’ instead of eyeglasses. Wonder if the Google team thought of that: ‘iSpecs’. Dibs on that trademark--you heard it here first’
SUSAN: She’s exhausting. Must we?
RAY: She’s stream-of-consciousness. I honestly doubt she speculated on the marketing of iGlasses before she said it.
SUSAN: And that makes her worth listening to?
RAY: Well, think about it: the things we buy into have a prescribed identity, probably conceived by marketing departments that have all kinds of tactics to try on us.
SUSAN: Us lab-rats.
RAY: Or us pioneers, depending.
GABBY: ‘Just a way of saying, don’t try this at home--home on the road, so to speak--if you don’t have the right apparatus. Montana highways are fast and free, but no place for handsets to fiddle with. I even saw one of our famous--maybe infamous--little white crosses in a side of the ditch where the weeds hadn’t come up yet, and it had a lanyard around it--you know, like the necklace-things we attach plastic badges to--only on this lanyard was, you can guess, a mobile phone. I’m not a fan of personalizing those memorials too much--’
TAMMY: The world’s a little preachy this morning.
RAY: Well, she’s got a point: you’re not a driver yet--
TAMMY: Should be.
CAM: (getting in) Should be what?
SUSAN: Driving without distraction. And, I’d say that pertains to audial distractions, too.
RAY: (pulling out of the garage and pushing the garage door button) Are you conflating radio with handset phones?
GABBY: ‘I had heard--and would be interested in your’all having heard it and possibly weighing in--that there is some chatter in Helena to legislate those crosses away altogether. Giving the state a bad rap, or billboarding the wrong kind of message, or presuming the crash victim would want it, especially if in their lives they had no great regard for a Christian cross. The issue, if it is one (not that politics decides), is practical--maintaining the roadsides--and philosophical--probing our patterns of life and the beyond. I personally think that’
SUSAN: Are you not distracted with your mortality?
RAY: Not in the least. I’m invigorated by it. Say, on Sister!
SUSAN: And notice our offspring have tuned her out. Earbuds in at 7:08am, out for Spanish class, back in for math, P.E.? girls what’s the policy in P.E.?
CAM: (when tapped on the knee) Huh?
SUSAN: Do they let you have earbuds in for P.E.?
CAM: We don’t have P.E. anymore, Mom. That ended in 9th grade. But no, nobody wants that much iso.
SUSAN: Isolation?
CAM: What else?
RAY: Isotopes?
SUSAN: The danger of radioactivity?
CAM: The danger of being preachy.
RAY: That’s odd. Tammy just said that, I’m sure before you got into the car. Or am I mistaking? (tapping Tammy on the knee) Did you say that ‘preachy’ thing before Cam heard it?
TAMMY: (confused) What? I don’t know what you’re talking about.
SUSAN: Remember commenting on the ‘Gift of Gab’ lady telling us not to multitask when driving.
TAMMY: Yeah, ok.
CAM: Then they’re asking me about P.E. and isolation, and Dad said something about radioactivity.
RAY: Isotopes. I was making a joke.
CAM: So I joked about being preachy.
TAMMY: And you’re waking me up for this? I get up a half-hour earlier than need be for your drive to Billings, so let me snooze. I trust you won’t crash.
RAY: Wait, were you listening to that little white crosses bit? What are you able to hear with those things on?
SUSAN: Maybe they’re listening to the same station.
GABBY: ‘And I think that takes us to a first caller, which, as ever, I need to trust is on topic and family-friendly. I only have a couple options at my thumb, but one of them is a delay button that, thankfully, I don’t need to press too often…’
Iii: Billings, inside Walmart. MARGUERITE rolls a rather filled shopping cart slowly down the aisles, MAX tugging at what he can of her tightly wrapped, oversized sweatshirt. The store is relatively empty, but a soft buzz of voices could be discerned if MARGUERITE and MAX stopped to listen. Instead, their voices add to general din.
MAX: Tell me, Momma, what else can I get?
MARGUERITE: What’s going on with all your fetching? Why you want to help so much today?
MAX: I like finding the stuff.
MARGUERITE: We’re almost full--no more stuff to find. Except maybe cutlets for dinner tonight.
MAX: I can get ’em.
MARGUERITE: No, you really can’t. Butcher wouldn’t like that. Hey, you can get a couple gallons of milk--you know where they are?
MAX: Yes, over there
MARGUERITE: Two won’t be too heavy?
MAX: Mom (scampering off), I’m strong!
MARGUERITE: (rolling her eyes) My little Hulk.
TRAVIS: (stocking shelves halfway down the aisle) Hogan?
MARGUERITE: More like the big green guy.
TRAVIS: Incredible?
MARGUERITE: Yeah, sometimes at least. Isn’t he the one that turns into the Hulk?
TRAVIS: So does Hulk Hogan, probably. They’re all cartoon characters.
MARGUERITE: Ha! meant to represent us.
TRAVIS: (bobbing his head in consideration, still stocking shelves) Who would you be?
MARGUERITE: Me? Not so many options. Especially for the supersized…
TRAVIS: I’m with you there. I mean,...we got Santa and Mrs Claus in our corner--
MARGUERITE: Jabba the Hutt.
TRAVIS: No, I heard that too many times in grade school. I like the Hulk.
MARGUERITE: Hogan?
TRAVIS: And the green guy, coming ’round the bend.
MAX: These, Momma? With the blue tops.
MARGUERITE: Yes, honey, they’ll do. There weren’t any pink tops?
MAX: I didn’t see. I can go back--
MARGUERITE: No, we’re good. But what’s up with all this helping?
TRAVIS: I smell a Christmas list…
MARGUERITE: Is that it? But we’re months away from that.
TRAVIS: Just weeks away from stocking Black Friday.
MAX: What’s that?
MARGUERITE: Never you mind. Time goes too fast around here. And I don’t believe in lists of who’s naughty and nice. I like, Max, that you’re just naturally nice.
MAX: I did see a car over here I’d like…
TRAVIS: (mouthing towards MARGUERITE) ‘probably be gone by Black Friday!’
MARGUERITE: A car!
MAX: A remote-control. With fire coming out.
MARGUERITE: That sounds dangerous.
TRAVIS: Pretend fire, I bet.
MAX: Can you come and look.
MARGUERITE: (rolling her eyes while mustering momentum to push the cart) I don’t feel like a Mrs Claus today…
TRAVIS: Just like at Macy’s--doesn’t hurt to look!
MARGUERITE: No Macy’s in Billings, thank goodness.
TRAVIS: Matter of time, probably.
MAX: (pulling the cart to travel the three aisles more quickly) It’s really cool, Momma, and like he said, the flames are just pretend. And I’ll take good care of it and share--
MARGUERITE: With me? I don’t want to play with cars on fire--
MAX: With Daddy then, when he comes back--it could be a present for him!
MARGUERITE: (receiving the big box Max has thrust in her arms) He’ll want smaller present than this. And less expensive.
MAX: How spensive?
MARGUERITE: Half this much. Do you know half of sixty dollars?
MAX: Um..
MARGUERITE: Even half’s too much. Put it back--the cart’s too full already.
MAX: I won’t! You’re not being fair.
MARGUERITE: Fair or not, put it back. As I said, there’s no naughty or nice in my book, but if Christmas will have it, we’ll see.
MAX: You’re trying to trick me.
MARGUERITE: (stretching to put the box on the top-most shelf) I’m not trying to trick you. We’ll keep it up there out of sight of other little boys, so it’s more likely to be there by…Black Friday. Now stay with the cart as I have to go back to what I was meaning to get before this detour.
MAX: (pouting, under his breath) You like other stuff more than me.
MAX waits until his mother waddles around the aisle and then climbs up between the cart and the shelves to reach the remote-control car. He stands upright in the baby-seat part of the cart to push the box further into the top shelf, hiding it behind some smaller items. As he steps onto the cart’s handle for a final stretch, the cart flips a wheelie and rockets MAX downward with such force that he craters through the linoleum and what has become a crumbling hole in the concrete. Whatever cry might have begun sinks as quickly into the sudden abyss. The general din of the store’s atmosphere covers up the incident. MARGUERITE appears minutes later with four jars of spaghetti sauce balanced in her hands. She sees the upturned cart and stops, nonplussed. Then, running toward what she can’t believe is the hole, she drops the jars and screams.
MARGUERITE: Max! Where are you? What’s going on?
TRAVIS: (rounding the corner casually at first, assuming only a child’s mischief) Can I help? Wait, what happened here?
MARGUERITE: What happened here?! Your store swallowed up my boy! Max, are you down there?
TRAVIS: Are you kidding? What… Um--
MARGUERITE: Max! Oh, my God! It’s just darkness! What’s down there?
TRAVIS: I gotta get a flashlight--stay calm! Ah, Jeri, stay here with this woman, I’m going for Randy.
JERILYN: (perplexed, then sliding to MARGUERITE’s side) We’re here. Settle down. Who’s--
MARGUERITE: (hovering over as if vomiting into a toilet) Max!!
JERILYN: Your boy’s down there?
RANDY: (running well ahead of TRAVIS, who has to call him back to the aisle he’d only half described to him) Move aside, ladies. I need to see what’s going on. (shining a flashlight on what now shows Max’s sprawled body about 15 feet below, face down, in an otherwise barren basement). Travis, call Curt and get the basement door unlocked. I’m going to try to skinny through this.
JERILYN: Head first? It’s a big drop.
MARGUERITE: O, my baby--you’ve killed him!
RANDY: No, Ma’am--stay strong. We’re going to save your boy. His name is--
JERILYN: (answering for MARGUERITE, inconsolable) He’s Max. Be careful, Randy.
RANDY: (head and one shoulder into the hole) Max! ax! ax!
CURT: (running again ahead of TRAVIS) How in hell?
MARGUERITE: You’ve killed him!
CURT: I--uh, don’t--
JERILYN: Mr Chandler, is someone opening the basement door.
CURT: (through his teeth) I don’t know where this door would be--
MARGUERITE: What?!
CURT: We’re well away from the loading dock, and there is only a small underground area over there. I just don’t--
MARGUERITE: You don’t know your own store? Someone call the cops. An ambulance!
JERILYN: (springing up) I’m on the ambulance.
TRAVIS: Also call the fire department--right, Mr Chandler?
MARGUERITE: Yes, goddamit! Don’t hesitate!
CURT: I’m new to this facility, but we’ll get to your boy--
TRAVIS: --there’s gotta be a door from the loading docks.
CURT: I’ll run to see. Randy, can’t you squeeze in? Randy?
TRAVIS: Shit, his ribcage looks pressed in--Randy? Hey, grab his leg--
CURT: Jesus, Travis, do you know what you’re doing?
TRAVIS: Grab his leg, boss! He’s gotta get some air!
MARGUERITE: G-ge- (collapsing fully in a faint)
TRAVIS: Randy, brace yourself, and... (grabbing like a piledriver) Heave!
Iiii: At a Billings nursing home. ELMER and DESERET sit at adjacent tables full of puzzle pieces. BERENICE and LAWRENCE sit between them, not involved with either hunt but occasionally checking progress.
DESERET: You ain’t gluing you ’complishments yet, are you Elmer?
LAWRENCE: Elmer’s glue.
ELMER: That joke never gets new, Larry, and no, Deseret, I don’t have enough done to fix in place forever.
DESERET: Why you always want to fix these dang things in place forever? Did you do that in kindergarten?
ELMER: Never went to kindergarten.
BERENICE: Straight to college, him!
ELMER: I’ve always been an engineer. I could take anything apart and put it back together--
LAWRENCE: So why don’t you dismantle these puzzles when they’re done?
ELMER: Because last I looked, only me and Deseret do these puzzles, and me only the ones she did first or doesn’t wanna do. If you wanted to do one, well, you could join in with me or do one and dismantle, then give it to me. But once I’ve put it to perfection, I’d like to enjoy it like one of those paintings over there, hanging on the wall.
BERENICE: Puzzles are a piece of art?
ELMER: Some more than others, just like any art.
DESERET: So, with that logic, Elmer, the 5-star chef who makes an artful entre should shellac the plate instead of serve it.
ELMER: Chefs aren’t artists. They’ve got their craft--there’s a difference.
DESERET: I believe in the beauty of the moment: good meals, a piece that finally gets found--
LAWRENCE: an unexpected visit--
ELMER: a freezing of the time. I believe it’s beautiful to put the last piece in, polish it with the long-suffering rest, promise to keep the community whole and share that intended picture with the world. I got twenty-four grandkids who all got a picture or two from these hands.
BERENICE: You could do like my grandkids do and take a photo with a phone.
ELMER: That’s not the same, not the process or the texture of the end product.
DESERET: Well, I respect that explanation, and I don’t think you’re an egotist longing for some legacy, but I rather like the mystery of how art comes and goes.
LAWRENCE: It’s not just an egotist who wants a legacy--we all do.
DESERET: Sure we do, but through a pastime like making puzzles?
BERENICE: I think it’s keeping you sharp. Had I the eyesight left, I’d do the same. But I’m pretty perceptive in other ways, and caring--that’s legacy enough for me.
ELMER: Listen, I didn’t bring up ego. I just like what I do and don’t want to see it undone. Call it nostalgia: I hold on to the things that I like.
An ambulance passes by with its distinct siren, followed by several fire trucks with theirs.
LAWRENCE: (raising his finger like a weathervane) The Doppler effect… Means they’re not coming for us.
DESERET: So that’s comforting?
LAWRENCE: Not on the grand scheme of things, I guess you can say. Somebody out there is in trouble…
BERENICE: ‘Never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.’
ELMER: High school English class?
BERENICE: Yes, and kindergarten, too!
Iiv: Drake & Plumlee Law Firm, downtown Billings. RAY sets down the receiver on his desk phone and reverse sighs, with arms up and behind his head. Quickly, with the expiration of that sigh, he brings his hands to a schedule book on his left and slide through of loose briefings on his right.
RAY: (calling to an adjoining office) Mary, could you see if Jennifer is available for a minute, and then I’ve got to respond to an ambulance call.
MARY: (off-stage) Sure. Harvey, too?
RAY: No, not necessarily. Gotta see what we’ve got. (speed-dialing on his cellphone) Hey, busy? Ok, just got a minute. A weird call from Walmart about a kid who went through the floor. Hope it won’t cost me the afternoon, but just might. What is your own situation? Can you maybe stay an hour longer? Well, I wouldn’t want to either, but… Hold on (acknowledging JENNIFER, coming into his office) yeah, I’ll have more in a few minutes. When does your lecture start? Ok, I’ll update before then. Bye.
JENNIFER: (noting his scramble) Should I get my jacket?
RAY: Can you get away right now? It would help a ton.
JENNIFER: Yeah, see you at the elevator.
RAY: Mary, I may not be back, but nothing else today is pressing.
MARY: Ok. This one seems more than pressing.
RAY: A bit earth-shaking, maybe. A kid fell through a hole in the floor at Walmart.
MARY: At Rimrock?
RAY: Holy shit, I didn’t ask. I assumed the Heights. Can you trace back that call I just got? Then call me to confirm--I’m sure you’ll get it before I’m out of the garage.
He meets JENNIFER at the elevator and floats between filling her in and handling a spike of phone calls, some on his handset and others on the carphone, a la GABBY.
JENNIFER: So you’re thinking of the medical situation first--
RAY: naturally--that’s gotta be the first thing to follow--
JENNIFER: then the tort and structural side--
RAY: that may require one of us to stay on site, which--come on, Mary, tell me which way to drive--may need to anticipate police cordons. Anecdotals and protocols, observed and broken, need to be recorded fast and furious, so I hope your phone is charged and recording space abundant--
JENNIFER: Always good, as that goes.
RAY: I’m never sure myself--I didn’t cut my teeth on these newfangled things (ringing, as if on cue); yes, Mary, the Heights? Thanks a million, as ever. (to JENNIFER) Little ironic that Walmart in the Heights is sinking to a new low.
JENNIFER: Sinking or has sunk? How many instances are we talking here?
RAY: Just this one, to my knowledge. Have you heard of any other sinkholes in that store?
JENNIFER: Not to sound snooty, but I don’t go to such stores.
RAY: China sweatshops?
JENNIFER: That’s a vast abbreviation, but sure. More to local consciousness, I hate their health insurance shenanigans--
RAY: You’ll interview with objectivity, I trust?
JENNIFER: You trust or you don’t trust?
RAY: You’re not that long on our team, Ms Barton.
JENNIFER: (drawing out the insinuation, and deciding to play with it) Yeah, I’m a new legal aide Harvey hired and you affirmed… and a policy on Walmart’s policy hasn’t yet come up… yet… and I’m supposed to…
RAY: Ok, I get you. And I would have hired you faster than Harvey, probably.
JENNIFER: Based on my good looks, of course.
RAY: Let’s not cross too many lines on an ambulance chase, shall we. And (seeing who’s calling on his screen) case in point. (answering) Hi Susan, just driving to Walmart north, as it turns out. Yeah, I thought it was Rimrock at first, but… So, I’m here with Jennifer who’ll probably split the reception--I just don’t know yet if I go to St Vincent, Clinic, or stay at site… You’re saying it would be easier to stay at site?... Or more interesting for you. Well, I’m not sure how to filter that hypothetically, I mean… yes, a sudden hole through the proverbial bedrock. Probably not yet a field trip… No, I didn’t mean to sound condescending--the opposite, really… I think--remains to be seen--a kid falling through a hole in the floor should be a compelling study of your field and architecture and surveying… Wait, I got another call coming in-- give this an hour, at least, I’ll try my best to get us home on schedule. (blowing out before taking the next)
JENNIFER: Want me to drive.
RAY: You’re kind, but that would be a Chinese fire drill--sort of against your worldview?
JENNIFER: I got a multilayered world view.
RAY: (answering his handset) Yeah, hi Harv. Mary told you that… ok… Well, depends. I got this from a Walmart employee and reliability there is hit-and-miss. On the other hand… yes,... I agree. This one screams our attention. I could have waited for the mother to be able to express herself, but frankly, I’m not sure she is our wellspring…. No, of course she’s going to be primary between Jennifer and myself, but what I’m saying is… right,... that’s what I’m saying: we might have bigger fish to fry from this employee to the very top of the food chain, so to speak…. I don’t know, if you got time, maybe come down as well. We’ll have police and probably media on the scene, and that will stretch me and Jen too thin…. Yeah,... I agree… so, maybe see you… Bye.
JENNIFER: ‘Jen and I’, grammatically.
RAY: That means you’ll be stretched before me?
JENNIFER: I agree with what I think I’ve eavesdropped, that we’ll have to handle the victims first, then nature of the tort, then media.
RAY: You forgot police.
JENNIFER: I don’t see them as the story.
RAY: We’re not journalists--the story is immaterial.
JENNIFER: Unless the cops don’t do their job--and before them, we gotta see that Walmart hasn’t done their job--I can’t see why we’d pay much attention to their presence.
RAY: So why the media, then? They’re even more remote.
JENNIFER: Well, unless this is a test, you should be able to tell me that, and why you and Harvey agreed that mattered.
RAY: Ok, let’s call this a test. Go:
JENNIFER: In less than a half-mile. Ok: media will exploit this as a weirdo story that serves two big purposes: something in Billings happened--go figure!--and as much a headline story as any stupid thing in D.C.; then, because it’s the kind of human interest story that would cap the half-hour, the makings of a class action suit would strike the imagination.
RAY: Which one’s bigger?
JENNIFER: For us? the latter. One hole in Walmart is the invitation for a proverbial ‘hero of Haarlem’--we being that little Dutch boy--and the rest, in the eventual crumbling of Walmart, is history.
RAY: I hear too much bias again.
JENNIFER: (considering for a few moments) So, let me out at the next traffic light.
RAY: What?
JENNIFER: I answered your test and, to my mind, passed. If not in your mind, I’ll quit and find another job.
RAY: You’re joking?
JENNIFER: No. I won’t play powerball, whether working for Walmart or Drake & Plumlee.
RAY: (driving through a long yellow light) You’re not making an equivalency there!
JENNIFER: Not unless you are first. I’m the guy you--or Harvey--hired for this kind of run, and if you feel I’m not ‘the guy’ for it, then…
RAY: (fumbling with an incoming call) Wait, um… Hello? Yes,.. this is… Ok, that’s rather.. No, I’m not in a position to alter my present course. But I think you’ll get… yes, I know it’s urgent… that’s why I think you’ll get--oh, shit… sorry, I’m driving--can I hand this to my assistant, Jennifer Barton, who will… (giving the phone to JENNIFER) Please, say ‘call Harvey’ and give that number…
JENNIFER: Hello? This is Jennifer Barton. Yes… yes… I understand from what I was able to overhear. I’m instructed to have you call Harvey Drake at… ok, you know how to contact him. You’ll keep in contact here, too. Well, as long as you understand we’re responding to an equally urgent call, and… Yes… So, call Harvey, yes. Good… Good luck. (handing back the phone) So there’s your class action: a sinkhole at Mystic Park.
RAY: Gobbled up a biker?
JENNIFER: only his bike, it seems.
RAY: Emotions run amok.
JENNIFER: For bikers or lawyers?
RAY: If Billings is sinking in several places, (parking the car in front of Walmart) I don’t think it will matter whose shit’s more or less together.
JENNIFER: That’s rather crude.
RAY: Pardon. I’m rather frayed today… (watching almost impassively as the idling ambulance with closed doors instantly speed away as another ambulance, seemingly on cue, comes screeching to the very vacancy) Or, suddenly, afraid.
End of Act I
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