The Exorcism

Time: December 2006

So I've been living with this woman named Vera for the past month and a half. She's really amazing and all and I'm really happy to have gotten to know her so well, but, well, the truth is, I'm ready for her to move out. I just want my "me" time again, and this apartment is way too small for the both of us.

You see, she just saw her first love Floyd for the first time in two years after he'd left her for a woman my Mom would describe as "fast." She's all bent outta shape over seeing him again, and although she's tried to cover her feelings and act all thick-skined and stuff, it's obvious that that man wripped her heart right in two. It's hard living with her, though, because, honestly, her drama is stirring up all sorts of old feelings in me. Feelings about the past that I thought I'd left behind, that I guess just lay sleeping in a place deep, deep inside me. But living with Vera has made the past come to the present, anxious to get out and be dealt with once and for all.

As part of my second year Meisner class, I was cast as "Vera" in a scene from the play Seven Guitars by August Wilson. I feel so blessed to have been introduced to this character and I've done my best to honor her and Mr. Wilson by breathing my breath into her and inhabiting the role as best as I know how. But, I'm not going to lie. It's been hard. My heart breaks every time I read the scene, every time I rehearse with my partner Jerry "Floyd" Baxtron Jr., every time I perform. It hurts like heartbreak hurts and I'm been carrying around Vera's sadness and my own for the past six weeks, so much so that it's hard to distinguish the two. So, Vera, we've performed together for the last time, and now it's time to let you go. It's been real. I'll always remember you, I'll always carry a piece of you with me, 'cause you reawakened in me that which I didn't know dwelt deep inside. But now it's time to go. One last cry, one last wail, one last time, so I can just be...

(Deep sigh...) I lay my head on the pillow, I close my eyes. Not to sleep, just to be. And in the stillness, it comes to me. An idea, like a butterfly on the tip of my nose that will fly away unless I cup it in my hands. I cup it in my hands. I take pen to paper and I write. One monologue. Two. Three. Nine. "The Interview" I call it. Nine people. Nine truths. Pen down. Head down. Sleep comes.