Found People To Love

ACT I

Hi! This is written in script format; I thought it would be cool because our characters are Shakespeare nerds... Anyway we as readers deserved a happy ending and here's one take on that. It'll be five acts, one act every week, posted on the weekends (if I remember).

Scene 1: The Mark Family Guest Room

[The shades are drawn lopsidedly. Light from the cloudy afternoon casts weak light on a clearly inhabited room: the bed is unmade, and meager items of clothing, including several pairs of worn jeans and three crisply folded button-down shirts are folded neatly into an open set of drawers.]

[OLIVER stands in the middle of his room, looking lost and unhappy. He wears a rumpled T-shirt and jeans, as if he hasn't changed since he woke up, though it's already afternoon. One hand holds a phone to his ear, the other hangs empty and unmoving by his side.]

OLIVER: [into the phone] You're sure he didn't—didn't leave you anything?

ALEXANDER: [through the phone] Yeah I'm fucking sure. I was sure the last five times you asked, too.

OLIVER: Sorry.

ALEXANDER: [sighs. Does not acknowledge the apology.] You need to let it rest, alright? Pip's been worried about you, apparently you've also been asking her if James—

[OLIVER sucks in an audible breath. ALEXANDER pauses.]

ALEXANDER: [resolute] Whether James left her a personal note. Moderate lamentation is the right of the dead, excessive grief the enemy to the living.

OLIVER: [sharp] Excessive grief? It's been two weeks for me, Alex. I didn't have five years, like you.

[ALEXANDER is silent for a beat. The barb sits in the air. Alone in his room, OLIVER, looking shaken, slumps on the edge of his bed.]

ALEXANDER: I'm sorry we didn't tell you. You were his Juliet, you know? We thought, if you knew he'd—he'd drunk the poison...

OLIVER: [grim] O happy dagger, / This is thy sheath. There rust and let me die.

ALEXANDER: [soft] Yeah.

OLIVER: I wouldn't have.

ALEXANDER: You confessed for him. Ten years, Oliver.

OLIVER: I know.

[In a practiced way that suggests he repeats this motion often, OLIVER pulls a folded piece of paper out from his jeans pocket. Phone still in one hand, he unfolds it clumsily with one hand and stares uncomprehendingly at it.]

ALEXANDER: Oliver?

OLIVER: [preoccupied with his own thoughts] Yeah?

ALEXANDER: I'm... It's good you're finally out. Everyone missed you—things weren't the same. They weren't ever going to be the same, not after Richard, but, you know... [hesitating] My worthy Lord / Your noble friends do lack you.

OLIVER: [still preoccupied] Yeah.

ALEXANDER: [pauses] If we can help out, you'll call.

OLIVER: [absent] Yeah, thanks. And for helping me move home, thanks.

ALEXANDER: [careful, detecting OLIVER's distraction] Yeah. Yeah, of course. Didn't have anything better to do, King Lear just finished, so.

OLIVER: [suddenly more attentive] You were in a Shakespeare play?

ALEXANDER: What else?

OLIVER: I can't believe I didn't ask if you were doing Shakespeare again. That's, uh. That's great.