Happy Birthday, Wanda June Page #8

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Blackout.

SCENE FOUR:

MUSIC indicates happiness, innocence, and weightlessness.

Spotlight comes up on WANDA JUNE, a lisping eight-year-old

in a starched party dress. She is as cute as Shirley Temple.

WANDA JUNE:

Hello. I am Wanda June. Today was

going to be my birthday, but I was

hit by an ice-cream truck before I

could have my party. I am dead now.

I am in Heaven. That is why my

parents did not pick up the cake at

the bakery. I am not mad at the

ice-cream truck driver, even though

he was drunk when he hit me. It didn't

hurt much. It wasn't even as bad as the

sting of a bumblebee. I am really

happy here! It's so much fun. I

am glad the driver was drunk. If

he hadn't been, I might not have

got to Heaven for years and years

and years. I would have had to go

to high school first, and then

beauty college. I would have had

to get married and have babies and

everything. Now I can just play

and play and play. Any time I want

any pink cotton candy I can have

some. Everybody up here is happy--

the animals and the dead soldiers

and people who went to the electric

chair and everything. They're all

glad for whatever sent them here.

Nobody is mad. We're all too busy

playing shuffleboard. So if you

think of killing somebody, don't

worry about it. Just go ahead and

do it. Whoever you do it to should

kiss you for doing it. The

soldiers up here just love the

shrapnel and the tanks and the

bayonets and the dum dums that let

them play shuffleboard all the

time--and drink beer.

Spotlight begins to dim and carnival music on a steam

calliope begins to intrude, until, at the end of the speech,

WANDA JUNE is drowned out and the stage is black.

WANDA JUNE:

We have merry-go-rounds that don't

cost anything to ride on. We have

Ferris wheels. We have Little

League and girls' basketball.

There's a drum and bugle corps

anybody can join. For people who

like golf, there is a par-three

golf course and a driving range,

with never any waiting. If you

just want to sit and loaf, why

that's all right, too. Gourmet

specialties are cooked to your

order and served at any time of

night or day...

Sudden silence.

WOODY WOODPECKER VOICE

Ha ha ha ha ha!

(pistol shot)

You got me, pal.

Silence.

Spotlight comes up on LOOSELEAF HARPER, who wears the

clothes he will wear in the next scene--new sports clothes,

a shirt open at the neck. As always, he is friendly and

embarrassed.

LOOSELEAF:

When Penelope asked me to say

something about dropping the bomb

on Nagasaki, I didn't give a very

good answer, I guess. It's a very

complicated question. Jesus--you

know? You have to explain what

it's like to be in the Air Force

and how they give you your orders

and all that. What it feels like

to be in a plane, what the world

looks like down there. After I got

home from the war, the minister of

my church asked me if I would speak

to a scout troop that met in the

church basement. So I did. They

met on Thursday nights. I used to

belong to that troop. I never made

Eagle Scout. But you know

something? It's a very strange

kind of kid that makes Eagle Scout.

They always seem so lonesome, like

they'd worked real hard to get a

job nobody else cares about. They

get a whole bunch of merit badges.

That's how you get to be an Eagle

Scout. I don't think I had over

five or six merit badges. The only

one I remember is Public Health.

That was a b*tch. The Boy Scout

Manual said I was supposed to find

out what my town did about sewage.

Jesus, they just dumped it all in

Sugar Creek.

(laughs idiotically)

Sugar Creek! That was a long time

ago, but it's all coming back to me

now. There was another merit badge

you could get for roller skating.

There used to be a roller rink at a

bend in Sugar Creek, up above where

the sewage went in. I got in a

fight there one time. I had on

roller skates, and the guy I was

fighting had on basketball shoes.

He had a tremendous advantage over

me. He was a little guy, but he

beat the sh*t out of me. I had to

laugh like hell. Don't ever fight

a guy when you've got on roller

skates.

(silence)

Jesus--I remember my mother used to

make me chew bananas for a full

minute before I swallowed--so I

wouldn't get sick. Makes you

wonder what else your parents told

you that wasn't true.

Blackout.

SCENE FIVE:

SPOTLIGHT comes up on HAROLD. He sits on the front seat of

an imaginary car. The seat is covered with zebra skin.

HAROLD:

The night I met Penelope, I had no

beard--so imagine me, if you can,

without a beard. Actually, I

wasn't as good-looking then as I am

now. And, if anything, me health

has improved. At any rate--I had

just come home from Kenya--to

discover that my third wife,

Mildred, like the two before her,

had become a drunken bum. In my

experience, alcoholism is far more

prevalent among women than men. So

I got into my automobile--

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