Dialogue Assignment

#4 A scene in which no character speaks more than three words in each line of dialogue.

(I thought this would be a lot easier than it turned out to be. I used a busy restaurant as a setting – and, usually, we don’t have time for long sentences. But 3 words makes it a little tougher. I’m not sure how well I like this now that I’ve read it over, though. I think it could be better.)

“Hey, Linda?” Angela’s head was poking partially through the pass-through window of the waitress station. I had to stop cooking to look at her.

“Yes?” I didn’t have the time for her dysfunctional game of 20 Questions tonight.

“Got a question,” she said once she saw I was making eye contact.

“Got an answer.” I moved away from the window and back to the meals I was preparing.

“Linda?”

“What?”

“Are you mad?”

“That’s the question?” I was plating food and putting it in the window to be served.

“No.” Angela shrank back from the window.

“Wheel, please.” Jamie deftly hung another ticket on the ticket wheel as she strode by. I noticed Angela still standing in the window.

“Am I done?”

“Are you serious?” The restaurant teemed with people and this girl thought she was going home.

“This sucks!” I whirl around to see my cook, Jerry, covered in fish fry breading. It seemed he was the victim of his own unfortunate accident.

“That’s awesome!” I couldn’t hold back my laughter. He started to brush himself off, but realized it was futile.

“Comin’ in” Sammy flung open the door to the kitchen, a tray full of dirty dishes in her hand.

“Crap!” Mike couldn’t move fast enough and his bobbling of several plates and glasses proved fruitless.

“Language,” I reminded him.

“Sorry,” he whispered. The sound of shattering glass brought the night to a standstill momentarily.

“Fumble!” Danny yelled from the back prep area. Laughter reverberated throughout the restaurant.

“Organized chaos.” I shook my head as Jerry handed me more plates of food for the window. I heard a mop bucket rolling toward me and a splash.

“Flood” Mike jumped out of the way as Danny tipped over the mop bucket.

“You’re kidding me,” I dared not ask what else would happen.

“Seating fifteen.” Sammy passed by the window.

“A fifteen-top?” Jerry now had pancake batter and, perhaps salsa on his apron with the fish fry breading.

“No sweat,” I laughed just to look at him.

“This is crazy,” was all he could say.

“Need plates. Now!” We had food coming up and nothing to put it on.

“Careful,” Danny caught Mike before there was another mishap.

Jerry and I worked on the large order that came in, selling all of our tickets back to the servers within 20 minutes.

“And… we’re good.” Jerry put the last plate in the window and seemed pleased with our ticket times, although his kitchen was trashed.

“Thank God,” I added. We’d survived the dinner rush for another night.

#7

“Where’ve you been?” She stood in the doorway, arms crossed, a scowl on her face.

“I was just out with some of the guys.” She turned away as he passed her in the doorway.

“Get back here. We’re going to talk about this.”

“That’s all we ever do is talk, which means you talk, and I listen. I’ve had enough.”

“Well, maybe I’ve had enough, Fred. Did you ever think of that? You come home late, no explanations, just some shit about you were out with your buddies. How long do you think I’m going to believe that? Do you think I’m stupid.”

“No, but I guess I must be to put up with your bitching every night.” Fred slammed his fist on the kitchen table.

Wilma closed the front door and stormed into the kitchen. “You think you can just waltz in here any time of the day or night without a valid reason for being late?”

“Wilma, lower your voice. The kids will hear you.”

“I don’t give a good Goddamn if the entire block hears me. I’ve had enough, Fred. I’ve had enough. You think I don’t know what’s going on? Honestly?”

“I just try to get out of here and have a little fun once in a while, and you have to go ape-shit on me. Why the hell do you think I don’t come home? Would you want to come home to this shit every day?”

“You know what I come home to? I come home to three kids who all need help with their homework. I come home to a sink full of dishes and a dirty house. I come home to a dog that needs to be walked and cared for and no one but me does all of that shit, Fred. That’s what I come home to. What if I decided to just not come home because I didn’t want to deal with all of that? What would you do then?”

“You know what, screw you, Wilma!” Fred threw a small box on the table and stomped down the hall. Wilma heard the bedroom door slam shut as it had every night for the last three months. She didn’t know how much more of this she could handle.

Her attention turned to the small box Fred had thrown on the table. It was obviously some kind of jewelry. She opened it to find a diamond ring much more beautiful than Fred could ever afford. She looked down the hall at the closed door. She stood silently in the kitchen as the street lights came on. They shined down onto this beautiful ring. She remembered back to when she and Fred were happy. It wasn’t that long ago.

With tears in her eyes she shuffled down the hall to the bedroom.

“Fred?”

“Door’s open.”

“I’m so sorry, Honey. What’s gotten into us?”

“If you really want to know where I’ve been these past few months, I’ve been working a second job. I wanted to get you the wedding ring that I’ve been promising for fifteen years.”

Wilma stared blankly back at him. She vaguely remembered their anniversary this morning as she was getting the kids ready for school but, she figured, if Fred wouldn’t acknowledge it, then neither would she.

“You did this all for me?” Her voice was barely audible.

“Now I don’t know if I should have.” Fred had tears in his eyes, too. “I thought we trusted each other, Wilma. I really thought we did.”

“I thought we did too, Honey. But put yourself in my position. At least three or four nights a week you come home late and say you’re tired and go straight to bed.”

“I guess I could have handled it differently, Babe. I just didn’t know how. You, of all people, know how thick I can be.” He tested his smile for the first time in months.

“Please, Honey. Just quit that other job.”

“I just did.”