by Zac Thompson
Stageplay
Characters:
DIANE: a wealthy volunteer at a food bank; in her late 50s
ALMA: the food bank’s on-staff volunteer coordinator; in her mid-30s
Setting:
An upscale coffee shop
Time:
The present
Synopsis:
A food bank staffer meets with a wealthy volunteer who has her own ideas about the best ways to help those in need—whether they like it or not.
* * *
An upscale coffee shop. ALMA is seated at a table for two. In front of her are a mug and a thick manila envelope.
After a moment, DIANE comes in. She’s carrying two plates, each with a scone on it.
DIANE: I couldn’t decide whether you’d want a honey-fig-and-cinnamon scone or a glazed-pumpkin-and-walnut, so I just got both.
ALMA: Is one of them gluten-free by any chance?
DIANE: Oh, Alma. Don’t be ridiculous. Here.
DIANE puts the plates on the table in front of ALMA, who sweeps up the manila envelope just in time.
ALMA: You really didn’t have to get me anything.
DIANE: (Sitting) Oh think nothing of it. People are always telling me I’m generous to a fault. It’s my biggest flaw.
DIANE waits for ALMA to try a scone.
ALMA does not try a scone.
DIANE (Cont’d): I think we’ve gotten off on the wrong foot. Don’t you feel that? I felt it even before your little blowup last week.
ALMA: I’d love to clear the air about our miscommunication last week.
DIANE: I assume you know I’ve filed a complaint.
ALMA: Yes. I heard. I’ve spoken with Nancy.
DIANE: You really left me no choice. The way you were berating me in front of the other volunteers? Forbidding me from seeing Janelle anymore? It felt like bullying.
ALMA: Yes, about that word choice. You see, my bosses take things like quote-unquote “bullying” very seriously.
DIANE: So do I.
ALMA: Right, but like I say, it’s really more of a miscommunication. I’m hoping we can come to a better understanding without involving my supervisors.
DIANE: That’s fine by me. I didn’t file the complaint to get you in trouble. I was hoping this could be a teachable moment. For you.
ALMA: (At the same time DIANE says “For you.”)Maybe for both of us?
DIANE: Besides, I wanted to show you where I used to take Janelle. That’s the source of all the trouble, isn’t it? That I dared to form a friendship with one of the people we feed week in, week out? That I overstepped the sacred boundaries a food bank volunteer is supposed to maintain at all times? Or whatever it is you were saying last week during your little tirade? I wanted you to see that I wasn’t plotting some evil conspiracy against you with Janelle. It was just two friends having tea. Nothing sinister at all.
ALMA: I never thought you were plotting something sinister. But we do have our code of conduct for a reason. I know you got a copy of our volunteer handbook during your training, but I’ve brought another for your reference. I took the liberty of marking the specific policies you seem to have trouble with.
ALMA takes out the volunteer handbook from her manila envelope. The document is flagged with a multitude of brightly colored sticky page tabs.
ALMA (Cont’d): I think you’ll find the section on maintaining proper boundaries to be especially relevant.
ALMA turns to that part of the handbook.
ALMA (Cont’d): There’s some good stuff in here about not showing favoritism, about the inadvisability, from an insurance standpoint, of driving one of our food bank guests around in your car, and ooh! Here it is. Do you mind reading the part I’ve highlighted in green?
ALMA gives the open handbook across the table to DIANE, who takes it.
DIANE: (Reading) “Volunteers are strongly discouraged from providing food bank guests with financial assistance or gifts of any monetary value exceeding $25.”
Alma, just how expensive do you think a cup of tea has gotten these days?
ALMA: I’m not referring to the tea. You bought Janelle a brand-new, top-of-the-line cellphone. And I understand you offered to give her a car?
DIANE: Only a used one. I was getting a new car anyway so I thought she might want my old one.
ALMA: And you thought that was appropriate. Despite your training. Despite the code of conduct. Which you did sign an agreement to abide by. I have a copy of the agreement in here if you’d like to take a look.
ALMA brings out another document from the manila envelope.
DIANE: I thought this conversation was supposed to be informal. We’d drink tea and eat scones. Which you haven’t touched, by the way.
ALMA: I’m just trying to explain how giving one of our guests a car—even a used one—violates our $25 gift limit. I’m hoping we can agree on that point.
DIANE: All right, so I splurged a little. That’s the kind of thing I do for a friend. And heaven knows Janelle could use one of those. She doesn’t have the best situation at home, you know. That husband of hers? Ron? Have you ever met a Ron who wasn’t just complete garbage?
ALMA: You’re giving our other guests the impression that they don’t deserve equal treatment. Surely you don’t want them to feel that way, do you?
DIANE: Of course not. I feel deeply sorry for all of them. But I can’t help it: I do see something special in Janelle. Most of the others are so beaten down by life it’s like they’re ghosts of themselves, haunting themselves.
ALMA: A lot of our guests are experiencing difficult circumstances, but that doesn’t mean—
DIANE: Let’s face it: it’s a lower ring of Dante’s “Inferno” in there most of the time. But Janelle is different. She has something behind the eyes. A spark. I think I could help her if you’d only let me.
ALMA: I admire your dedication. I do. But, you know, there are a lot of other ways you can support our important work while taking less of a hands-on—
DIANE: You mean money. You’re going to let me continue giving you money. How generous of you.
ALMA: There are administrative tasks that need doing, there’s our annual gala—
DIANE: So envelope stuffing, party planning, check writing—that’s all I’m good for.
ALMA: What I’m saying is that you can remain a part of our community.
DIANE: What you’re saying is that you are banishing me.
ALMA: No, Diane. I have merely—we, the other staffers and I, have simply relieved you of face-to-face interactions with our guests for a while.
DIANE: This feels like retaliation for my outspokenness when it comes to advocating for the needy.
ALMA: There has been no quote-unquote “retaliation.” I have simply followed the organization’s protocol for when a volunteer has crossed a line with one of our guests.
DIANE: “Crossed a line”? You make me sound like a child molester. Janelle is an adult. I simply gave her a phone. She didn’t take the car, okay? No one got hurt. Quite the opposite.
ALMA: Actually, there have been ramifications.
ALMA pulls more papers from her envelope.
DIANE: Back into the envelope. Are we going to need a notary public?
ALMA: (Looking through the papers) One of your fellow volunteers sent me an email objecting to Janelle receiving preferential treatment. Another reported food bank visitors asking why they haven’t gotten any free electronic devices. I myself overheard a guest criticizing Janelle, saying she, quote, “Doesn’t need a food bank when she has a personal ATM,” unquote. The ATM would be you.
DIANE: Yes, I get it.
ALMA: There are other examples. You’re free to look through my notes. I’ve taken the precaution of redacting names and other confidential information.
ALMA extends the papers to DIANE, who does not take them.
DIANE: Is this what you do with your time? Scribble your little notes about rule violations and banking puns? Meanwhile, I am trying to help someone who literally has nothing.
ALMA: Actually, I’ve met with Janelle also to discuss this situation.
DIANE: So you’ll take action on the important issue of Janelle’s cell phone coverage, but when it comes to improving her nightmare of a life—I’m pretty sure that husband of hers hits her. Why doesn’t someone do something about that?
ALMA: It so happens that Janelle is the one who requested the meeting with me, not the other way around. She had some concerns. About you.
DIANE: What about me?
ALMA: She wanted to ask about our volunteer schedule so she could start arranging her visits for days when you’re not at the food bank.
DIANE: Excuse me? Why would she do that?
ALMA: She said the attention she receives from you was starting to make her feel uncomfortable.
DIANE: Oh, Alma, now you’re just making things up.
ALMA: (Looking through her papers) I documented the conversation in my notes. Here it is. Janelle said, quote, “I feel sorry for Diane but it’s just too much pressure. It seems like she’s trying to buy a friend, and I’m not for sale.” Unquote. I know that’s probably difficult to hear.
DIANE: Not really. Because that’s just your biased account. I hate to break it to you, but not everyone considers your notes to be holy scripture.
ALMA: She returned the phone, Diane.
ALMA overturns the envelope so that the phone drops onto the table.
ALMA (Cont’d): I told her I’d give it back to you since the two of you won’t be seeing one another anymore.
They stare at the device while DIANE absorbs this new information. Suddenly, DIANE picks up the phone and peers closely at it as if determining whether it’s the actual phone she gave. Convinced, she slams it down on the table.
DIANE: This doesn’t make sense. Janelle needed a new phone. I know she needed a new phone. She told me so.
ALMA: Maybe she thought accepting it came with certain strings?
DIANE: Well, of all the ungrateful … I suppose it’s true what they say about no good deed going unpunished. I was only trying to help.
ALMA: We do have resources you could have pointed Janelle toward, contacts in social services—
DIANE: Oh right, because social workers are famously effective when it comes to improving horrible lives.
ALMA: Our mission is to feed people, Diane. Not save them. We can’t imagine what they’re going through.
DIANE: Speak for yourself.
ALMA: No matter how good our intentions, we should never presume to—
DIANE: Do you know why I got started volunteering at the food bank in the first place?
ALMA: It was through your church, wasn’t it?
DIANE: It was my son. Matthew.
ALMA: Oh? Young people do have such a strong social conscience these days. My daughter, she’s only 11 and already—
DIANE: He’s dead.
ALMA: (Brought up short) Oh. I’m sorry. I didn’t know that.
DIANE: He got into drugs during college. Alongside his horrible girlfriend. In fact, I suspect she led the way. Stringy-haired thing. Must have weighed about eleven pounds. I never got what he saw in her. And then she ruined his life. Well, ended his life.
ALMA: You mean she … ?
DIANE: No, she didn’t literally kill him, Alma. He died of an overdose.
ALMA: That’s terrible. I am so sorry. I can’t imagine.
DIANE: No, you can’t. We had lost touch with him by then. We cut off contact, as a matter of fact. At a certain point, he only came to visit when he ran out of money and wanted to steal from us, and everyone said that with an addict you have to set boundaries and stick to them. Kind of like what you were saying before.
ALMA: I didn’t mean … I was talking about a different kind of boundaries. When it comes to family, it’s not—it’s a different—
DIANE: I know, Alma. (Pause) You haven’t touched your scone.
ALMA breaks off a piece, doesn’t eat it.
DIANE (Cont’d): Anyway, that’s what we did. We cut off contact.
ALMA: That must have been … I’m sorry.
DIANE: The stringy-haired girlfriend cleaned up her act and went to rehab and it stuck. Can you believe that? She’s the one who got Matthew into trouble in the first place, yet he’s the one who couldn’t get out. I heard she got married and got a job. Isn’t that just infuriating? That she can wreck so many lives and then go off scot-free and live in the suburbs?
ALMA: I’m sorry.
DIANE: You keep saying that.
ALMA: But I am. I’m sure that was …
DIANE: He was homeless at the end. We didn’t know that, of course. We didn’t know anything because we had cut off contact. But we found out later. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised. But I was. He was born with everything and ended with nothing. And something about that gets to me. The thought that he was cold or hungry and had nowhere to go and no one to take care of him—that thought causes me actual physical pain, do you understand? So when you say we can’t imagine what these people are going through, that simply isn’t true. With Matthew I can absolutely imagine his suffering. I can’t STOP imagining it.
ALMA: And so that’s why you volunteer. To give back to others who might be experiencing something similar. I think that’s a beautiful way to honor your son’s life.
DIANE: You think writing checks and throwing banquets for other rich people honors my son’s life?
ALMA: I think however you support the work of our organization—and the life-sustaining services we provide—I think all of that’s worthwhile.
DIANE: And I am telling you it’s not enough. I want to make an actual difference in someone’s life. Maybe not Janelle’s, if she doesn’t want to be helped. But someone who needs me. And all this tiptoeing around and being appropriate and setting boundaries and sticking to them—none of that works, Alma. It didn’t work with Matthew and it won’t work with Janelle. Someone has to intervene at some point. Someone has to DO something, whether it crosses a boundary or not.
I only wish Matthew had had someone like me—someone who was willing to step in like I have stepped in with Janelle. The way I should have … I only wish Matthew had … I only wish I had … Someone has to need me. There has to be SOMEone who needs me …
She trails off, having become uncharacteristically bewildered.
ALMA: (Delicately) You know, Diane, it’s possible that you got into this work a little too soon after Matthew … after your tragedy.
DIANE: (Instantly defensive) Excuse me? What is that supposed to mean?
ALMA: Nothing. Only that … those resources I mentioned earlier, they might be useful for you, too. In case you’d like to talk to someone about processing some of this grief.
DIANE fixes ALMA with a cold, hard stare.
DIANE: You don’t know the first thing about it. My grief. You said yourself you can’t imagine. That’s one of the rare times when I’ve agreed with you completely.
ALMA: I didn’t mean to overstep—
DIANE: Are you going to reinstate me at the food bank? That’s really all I need to hear from you.
ALMA: Reinstate you? Diane, I just finished explaining why I don’t think having face-to-face interactions with our guests is a good fit for you right now. But the other opportunities I mentioned remain—
DIANE: I am not interested in the other opportunities you mentioned. Which leaves us where? Do I have to escalate my complaint against you?
ALMA: I wish you wouldn’t do that.
DIANE: Yes, I know. The complaint really must have you frightened. Why else would you meet with me like this, outside of the proper channels? Especially since you’re usually such a stickler for the proper channels. It couldn’t have anything to do with the food bank’s budgetary problems and the staffing cuts that would likely result from the loss of another major donor such as myself, now could it?
ALMA: I was hoping we could work something out.
DIANE: I also know this isn’t the first time a volunteer has filed a complaint against you.
ALMA: (Taken aback) Who told you about that?
DIANE: I met with the woman who filed the complaint. I don’t have an envelope full of papers to back this up, but I believe you called her, quote, “an entitled rich lady”? Unquote?
ALMA: That was a private conversation.
DIANE: Thank goodness you didn’t announce it publicly.
ALMA: No, I mean I was having a private conversation with someone else when I made the … comment.
DIANE: When you described your volunteers as entitled rich ladies.
ALMA: Not all of them. Just one. And she overheard. It had been a difficult day and I was letting off steam and— Anyway, there’s no excuse. I behaved poorly and I regret that. But it has been dealt with.
DIANE: It suggests a pattern, though, doesn’t it? In the way you treat certain volunteers? Those in certain elevated socioeconomic brackets against whom you nurse some kind of grudge?
ALMA: It was a completely different set of circumstances.
DIANE: Maybe. But that’s what you think of me, too, isn’t it? That I’m an entitled rich lady?
ALMA: I never said that!
DIANE: Not this time. You didn’t have to. The disdain just radiates off you. You won’t even eat the scone I bought for you.
ALMA: (Growing frustrated) You and this scone. I have Celiac disease, okay? I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to hurt your feelings. But gluten makes me sick.
DIANE: You work at a food bank, but you’ll let food go to waste as long as it means you can thwart my generosity. What’s it like to be so petty?
ALMA: I have a genuine medical condition. I’m not sure you’re understanding that.
DIANE: And here’s what I don’t think you understand about us entitled rich ladies: We are the lifeblood of charitable organizations. Without us, virtually no acts of philanthropy take place in this godforsaken world. None that matter, anyway. And so we will not be patronized. We will not be intimidated. We will not be stopped. We want to help. And we will get what we want.
ALMA: So … what are you saying?
DIANE: Take the generous gift I gave you out of the kindness of my heart.
ALMA: But I told you: the Celiac, I’ll get …
DIANE slowly pushes one of the plates closer to ALMA, pushing anything in its way—the phone, the papers—to the floor.
ALMA (Cont’d): Please, Diane. I know you’re angry with me. But this is silly. I don’t see how my getting sick will—
DIANE: Eat the scone, Alma. Eat both scones. I’ll wait.
ALMA is at a loss.
DIANE waits.
END.
Zac Thompson is a playwright and travel journalist. His work has appeared on stages, in literary journals, and in the Chicago Reader, Village Voice, and Frommer’s, where he is managing editor. Originally from Springdale, Arkansas, he now lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with his husband, Frank, and their dog, Lucy. Follow Zac online at indirectobjects.blog or @zeekaytee.