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2 THE TEXT ON THE DRIVE HOME THE TEXT ON THE DRIVE HOME A Ten Minute Dramatic Monologue By Bradley Walton SYNOPSIS: The school musical opens tomorrow, and the lead performer is driving home from her final dress rehearsal. Anticipating acceptance at a prestigious arts college in New York, her future seems bright. That is until The Text On The Drive Home. CAST OF CHARACTERS (1 either; gender flexible) NARRATOR (m/f)... A talented but cocky senior playing the role of either Sky Masterson or Miss Adelaide in a production of Guys and Dolls at a county high school. SETTING: Bare stage. COSTUMES: Spring school clothes. Cell Phone (optional) PROPS AUTHOR NOTES: Texting and driving is stupid and it kills people. There s really no more to be said.
BRADLEY WALTON 3 AT RISE: The NARRATOR, may have an optional cell phone for a prop. NARRATOR: I m driving home from musical practice at 10 PM and the county roads are pretty much deserted. My school is doing Guys and Dolls and I m playing Sky Masterson. (Or Miss Adelaide.) It s my senior year and I finally finally landed a lead role. And I am nailing it. The show opens tomorrow and it s going to be amazing. I don t think I ve ever been this excited about something. I so much want to act for a living, and I m praying that I get accepted to the arts college in New York. That letter should be coming any day now. I m sure I ll get in. I can almost feel it. But the wait is killing me. The down side of being in musical is that dress rehearsals have been running from right after school until late into the evening. A bunch of the drama parents have been cooking for us, so dinner hasn t been an issue. If anything, I think I ve gained weight this week. But my grades are definitely taking a beating I m going to have to play catch-up in most of my classes. And I have to wait all day before I can check the mail. My mom works evenings, so we ve been coming home about the same time. Tonight, I m actually getting home a little earlier than usual rehearsal went really well. They say that s a bad sign, but nah. There s no way the show will be anything but great. I m driving past an abandoned gray Toyota pulled off the side of the road when my phone buzzes with a text. I slow down the car a little, reach for my phone, and lift it up level with the top of the steering wheel. I m not going to be an idiot and take my eyes completely off the road. A couple of kids at another school were killed in a texting and driving accident last year. I refuse to be that person. I glance at the phone. Mom got off work early and she s home. There s an envelope from the school in New York. She s figuring I m still at rehearsal and asking if I want her to open it. I m only ten minutes from home, and I really want to open that envelope myself. I can be patient. I will be patient. My resolve lasts about five seconds. I slow the car down long enough to text back, OPEN IT! And then the waiting begins.
4 THE TEXT ON THE DRIVE HOME I hold the phone in my right hand and steer with my left. My eyes keep darting to the screen. How long has it been now? One minute? Two? Mom s had time to open the envelope and read the letter. Why is she taking so long? Then the phone lights up and buzzes. My left hand tightens on the steering wheel and I push down on the gas pedal, the acceleration of the car mirroring my rush of adrenaline. I check the message. It s one word in all caps followed by a row of exclamation marks: ACCEPTED!!!!!!!!!!!. My face isn t wide enough for my grin. I fist pump the air with the phone in my hand, then look at the message again. Accepted. Life is perfect. The car jolts and I hear a noise somewhere between a thump and a crunch. My stomach twists into a knot. What happened? What did I just hit? I have no idea. I was looking at the phone. Stupid. I can t believe I did that. Please let it have been a deer. Some kind of wild animal. It wasn t a person. It couldn t have been a person. Nobody s going to be out walking on a county road at 10 PM. Should I go back and look? Just to be sure? But what if it s an animal and it s hurt but not dead? What do I do? If it s a deer, I guess I call the police. If it s a dog or something, do I take it to the 24-hour emergency vet? That s fifteen miles away. How would I pay for that? It s not my fault if some animal wandered out into the road. I have no responsibility here. I don t. Only I do. I should go back and look. I turn the car around, praying I don t find anything. That whatever I hit had enough life left in it to crawl away and die on its own, so I can go home and forget this ever happened. But I m not that lucky.
BRADLEY WALTON 5 The first thing I see is something blue a tennis shoe two tennis shoes a pair of legs jutting onto the pavement from the side of the road. One of them is twisted in a way that that a leg shouldn t twist. I stop the car. This can t be happening. My phone buzzes, but I ignore it. I wish I could go back in time and smash the phone into a thousand pieces so this would never have happened. I slowly get out of my car and walk toward the legs. The rest of the body comes into view. It s some guy, probably in his thirties. He s bleeding. A lot. But I can t tell where the blood is coming from. He s got on jeans and a gray hoodie horrible clothes to be wearing out on the road after dark. Nothing reflective or bright. Except except for a white baseball cap lying a few feet away. Why didn t I see that? I was looking at my phone, that s why. I need to call 911. But I think if I do, I ll wind up in jail and not be able to perform in the musical. The show will be canceled. Everybody will hate me and I ll miss my big moment in high school. It s a horrible, stupid, petty thought. But I can t help it. What about college? Will they revoke my acceptance in New York because of this? Will I have a criminal record? Everything was so perfect just a couple of minutes ago. How could it have gone so wrong so fast? DO I look at the man lying on the ground bleeding maybe dying maybe already dead. How could he be so stupid? Walking at night in dark clothes, except for his hat? Just his hat? How could he ruin my life? I don t even know the guy. I should leave him. This is his fault. He deserves this. There are no traffic cameras out here. No one would have to know it was me. I could do it. I ought to do it. NOT COPY
6 THE TEXT ON THE DRIVE HOME I have to make a choice now before someone else comes along. So I do. I turn away from the man on the ground and start walking back to the car. That s when I realize my right headlight is out. Broken. I d been so busy freaking out that I hadn t noticed before. And it s not just the headlight. There s a huge dent in that corner. I can t keep this to myself. I m going to have to explain to my mom that something happened. There s no choice. I stare at my car and remember the abandoned Toyota. The man I hit...the Toyota was probably his. That s why his clothes were so dark. He wasn t planning to go for a walk his car had broken down. The second I passed that Toyota, I should ve started paying more attention to the road and ignored my phone. I thought I was smart. I thought I was careful. I was wrong. And now goodbye, future. I lift up my phone to dial 911 and see a text message from my mom. It says, Congratulations. I m proud of you. No, mom if you knew, you wouldn t be. I was going to walk away from this and try to pretend it didn t happen. I was going to leave somebody for dead. And the only reason I decided not to do that was because my car was damaged and I knew that I didn t have a choice. The only consolation I would ve been able to offer myself in the end was that I owned up to my horrible, stupid mistake. That I did the right thing for the right reason. Now I ll never have that one small comfort. I want to throw up. But I hold myself together enough to call 911. I tell them what happened. I hang up. And I wait. The phone buzzes. It s another text from my mom. It says, Drive safe. THE END
BRADLEY WALTON 7 NOTES
8 THE TEXT ON THE DRIVE HOME NOTES