Fences
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14
| August Wilson |
- 65 -
BONO She loves you, Troy. Rose loves you.
TROY You saying I don't measure up. That's what you trying to say. I don't measure up cause I'm seeing this other gal. I know what you trying to
say.
BONO I know what Rose means to you, Troy. I'm just trying to say I don't want to see you mess up.
TROY Yeah, I appreciate that, Bono. If you was messing around on Lucille I'd be telling you the same thing.
BONO Well, that's all I got to say. I just say that because I love you both.
TROY Hell, you know me ... I wasn't out there looking for nothing. You can't find a better woman than Rose. I know that. But seems like this
woman just stuck onto me where I can't shake her loose. I done wrestled with it, tried to throw her off me . . . but she just stuck on tighter. Now she’s
stuck on for good.
BONO You's in control . . . that's what you tell me all the time. You responsible for what you do.
TROY I ain’t ducking the responsibility of it. As long as it sets right in my heart . . . then I'm okay. Cause that's all I listen to. It’ll tell me right from
wrong every time. And I ain't talking about doing Rose no bad turn. I love Rose. She done carried me a long ways and I love and respect her for that.
BONO I know you do. That's why I don't want to see you hurt her. But what you gonna do when she find out? What you got then? If you try and
juggle both of them . . . sooner or later you gonna drop one of them. That's common sense.
TROY Yeah, I hear what you saying, Bono. I been trying to figure a way to work it out.
- 66 -
BONO Work it out right, Troy. I don’t want to be getting all up between you and Rose's business ... but work it so it come out right.
TROY Aw hell, I get all up between you and Lucille's business. When you gonna get that woman that refrigerator she been wanting? Don't tell me
you ain't got no money now. I know who your banker is. Mellon don't need that money bad as Lucille want that refrigerator. I'll tell you that.
BONO Tell you what I'll do . . . when you finish building this fence for Rose . . . I'll buy Lucille that refrigerator.
TROY You done stuck your foot in your mouth now!
( TROY grabs up a board and begins to saw. BONO starts to walk out the yard.) Hey, nigger . . . where you going?
BONO I'm going home. I know you don't expect me to help you now. I'm protecting my money. I wanna see you put that fence up by yourself. That's
what I want to see. You'll be here another six months without me.
TROY Nigger, you ain't right.
BONO When it comes to my money ... I'm right as fireworks on the Fourth of July.
TROY Alright, we gonna see now. You better get out your bankbook.
(BONO exits , and TROY continues to work. ROSE enters from the house.)
ROSE What they say down there? What's happening with Gabe?
TROY I went down there and got him out. Cost me fifty dollars. Say he was disturbing the peace. Judge set up a
- 67 -
hearing for him in three weeks. Say to show cause why he shouldn't be re-committed.
ROSE What was he doing that cause them to arrest him?
TROY Some kids was teasing him and he run them off home. Say he was howling and carrying on. Some folks seen him and called the police.
That’s all it was.
ROSE Well, what’s you say? What’d you tell the judge?
TROY Told him I'd look after him. It didn't make no sense to recommit the man. He stuck out his big greasy palm and told me to give him fifty dollars
and take him on home.
ROSE Where’s he at now? Where'd he go off to?
TROY He's gone on about his business. He don't need nobody to hold his hand.
ROSE Well, I don't know. Seem like that would be the best place for him if they did put him into the hospital. I know what you're gonna say. But
that’s what I think would be best.
TROY The man done had his life ruined fighting for what? And they wanna take and lock him up. Let him be free. He don't bother nobody.
ROSE Well, everybody got their own way of looking at it I guess. Come on and get your lunch. I got a bowl of lima beans and some cornbread in the
oven. Come on get something to eat. Ain't no sense you fretting over Gabe.
(ROSE turns to go into the house.)
TROY Rose ... got something to tell you.
ROSE Well, come on . . . wait till I get this food on the table.
- 68 -
TROY Rose!
(She stops and turns around.) I don't know how to say this.
(Pause.) I can't explain it none. It just sort of grows on you till it gets out of hand. It starts out like a little bush . . . and the next think you know it’s a
whole forest.
ROSE Troy . . . what is you talking about?
TROY I'm talking, woman, let me talk. I'm trying to find a way to tell you ... I'm gonna be a daddy. I'm gonna be somebody's daddy.
ROSE Troy . . . you're not telling me this? You're gonna be . . . what?
TROY Rose . . . now . . . see . . .
ROSE You telling me you gonna be somebody's daddy? You telling your wife this?
(GABRIEL enters from the street. He carries a rose in his hand.)
GABRIEL Hey, Troy! Hey, Rose!
ROSE I have to wait eighteen years to hear something like this.
GABRIEL Hey, Rose ... I got a flower for you.
(He hands it to her.) That's a rose. Same rose like you is.
ROSE Thanks, Gabe.
GABRIEL Troy, you ain't mad at me is you? Them bad mens come and put me away. You ain't mad at me is you?
TROY Naw, Gabe, I ain't mad at you.
- 69 -
ROSE Eighteen years and you wanna come with this.
GABRIEL
(Takes a quarter out of his pocket.) See what I got? Got a brand new quarter.
TROY Rose . . . it's just . . .
ROSE Ain't nothing you can say, Troy. Ain't no way of explaining that.
GABRIEL Fellow that give me this quarter had a whole mess of them. I'm gonna keep this quarter till it stop shining.
ROSE Gabe, go on in the house there. I got some watermelon in the frigidaire. Go on and get you a piece.
GABRIEL Say, Rose . . . you know I was chasing hell-hounds and them bad mens come and get me and take me away. Troy helped me. He come
down there and told them they better let me go before he beat them up. Yeah, he did!
ROSE You go on and get you a piece of watermelon, Gabe. Them bad mens is gone now.
GABRIEL Okay, Rose . . . gonna get me some watermelon. The kind with the stripes on it.
( GABRIEL exits into the house.)
ROSE Why, Troy? Why? After all these years to come dragging this in to me now. It don't make no sense at your age. I could have expected this
ten or fifteen years ago, but not now.
TROY Age ain't got nothing to do with it, Rose.
ROSE I done tried to be everything a wife should be. Everything a wife could be. Been married eighteen years and I got to live to see the day you
tell me you been seeing another woman and done fathered a child by her.
- 70 -
And you know I ain't never wanted no half nothing in my family. My whole family is half. Everybody got different fathers and mothers ... my two
sisters and my brother. Can't hardly tell who’s who. Can't never sit down and talk about Papa and Mama. It’s your papa and your mama and my papa
and my mama . . .
TROY Rose . . . stop it now.
ROSE I ain’t never wanted that for none of my children. And now you wanna drag your behind in here and tell me something like this.
TROY You ought to know. It’s time for you to know.
ROSE Well, I don't want to know, goddamn it!
TROY I can't just make it go away. It's done now. I can't wish the circumstance of the thing away.
ROSE And you don't want to either. Maybe you want to wish me and my boy away. Maybe that’s what you want? Well, you can't wish us away. I’ve
got eighteen years of my life invested in you. You ought to have stayed upstairs in my bed where you belong.
TROY Rose . . . now listen to me ... we can get a handle on this thing. We can talk this out . . . come to an understanding.
ROSE All of a sudden it's "we." Where was "we" at when you was down there rolling around with some godforsaken woman? "We" should have
come to an understanding before you started making a damn fool of yourself. You're a day late and a dollar short when it comes to an understanding
with me.
TROY It’s just . . . She gives me a different idea ... a different understanding about myself. I can step out of this
- 71 -
house and get away from the pressures and problems ... be a different man. I ain't got to wonder how I'm gonna pay the bills or get the roof fixed. I
can just be a part of myself that I ain't never been.
ROSE What I want to know ... is do you plan to continue seeing her. That's all you can say to me.
TROY I can sit up in her house and laugh. Do you understand what I'm saying. I can laugh out loud . . . and it feels good. It reaches all the way
down to the bottom of my shoes.
(Pause.) Rose, I can't give that up.
ROSE Maybe you ought to go on and stay down there with her . . . if she a better woman than me.
TROY It ain't about nobody being a better woman or nothing. Rose, you ain’t the blame. A man couldn't ask for no woman to be a better wife than
you've been. I’m responsible for it. I done locked myself into a pattern trying to take care of you all that I forgot about myself.
ROSE What the hell was I there for? That was my job, not somebody else's.
TROY Rose, I done tried all my life to live decent ... to live a clean . . . hard . . . useful life. I tried to be a good husband to you. In every way I knew
how. Maybe I come into the world backwards, I don't know. But . . . you born with two strikes on you before you come to the plate. You got to guard it
closely . . . always looking for the curve-ball on the inside corner. You can't afford to let none get past you. You can’t afford a call strike. If you going
down . . . you going down swinging. Everything lined up against you. What you gonna do. I fooled them, Rose. I bunted. When I found you and Cory
and a
- 72 -
halfway decent job ... I was safe. Couldn't nothing touch me. I wasn't gonna strike out no more. I wasn't going back to the penitentiary. I wasn't
gonna lay in the streets with a bottle of wine. I was safe. I had me a family. A job. I wasn't gonna get that last strike. I was on first looking for one of
them boys to knock me in. To get me home.
ROSE You should have stayed in my bed, Troy.
TROY Then when I saw that gal . . . she firmed up my backbone. And I got to thinking that if I tried ... I just might be able to steal second. Do you
understand after eighteen years I wanted to steal second.
ROSE You should have held me tight. You should have grabbed me and held on.
TROY I stood on first base for eighteen years and I thought . . . well, goddamn it ... go on for it!
ROSE We're not talking about baseball! We're talking about you going off to lay in bed with another woman . . . and then bring it home to me. That's
what we're talking about. We ain't talking about no baseball.
TROY Rose, you're not listening to me. I'm trying the best I can to explain it to you. It's not easy for me to admit that I been standing in the same
place for eighteen years.
ROSE I been standing with you! I been right here with you, Troy. I got a life too. I gave eighteen years of my life to stand in the same spot with you.
Don't you think I ever wanted other things? Don't you think I had dreams and hopes? What about my life? What about me. Don't you think it ever
crossed my mind to want to know other men? That I wanted to lay up somewhere and forget
| Kỳ Trước | Kỳ Sau |
Ý Kiến Bạn Ðọc