CASS: Mark—Cassandra. (Pause.) Hey, is Bob Cornfield—is that you, Bob? It’s Cass, buddy. Mark, Mark Cassandra. Cass. (Pause.) I know, but this ain’t the time to be joking—if you know me say you know me, because I don’t know if anybody knows me or even where I am. (Pause.) I don’t know where I am. (Pause.) Look, Bob, listen to me. I was asleep. I woke up. There’s a gun beside me with bullets missing. I think there’s bullet holes in my shirt. Here’s the situation. I don’t know where I am. And there’s nine ounces of I think it’s skag, man, all lined up in a row real pretty on my windowsill where everybody can just walk idly by like it’s the Museum of Heroin. (Pause.) I flushed it! I’m flushing it! Or I guess it’s coke—my tongue is numb. (He proceeds to finish the flushing operation while dragging the phone around and talking.) Well, it’s a pretty good room. It’s not bad. At least there’s a phone. (Pauses to take two big snorts of the powder before flushing the last of it.) I don’t know! Probably the stuff was here when I got here! It must’ve been! (Pause.) What—hey—what maids? They open the door, they reach in and dip the ash off their cigarette and they’re gone, they don’t notice. I used to live with a chick who cleaned rooms, you remember Jeannie, Jeannie, Jeannie, Jeannie Bailey? (He glances into the bathroom.) Okay, the towels, yeah, they’re fresh towels. (Pause.) Well, perhaps they didn’t wish to disturb the drugs and weapons of the former occupant, Bob. (Pause—pause—pause—he’s cut off each time he takes a breath to speak.) All right. (He lets the phone dangle. Pause. Then:) You still there, Bob? All right. This situation is the outcome of shit that has been done. And I admit whatever was done must’ve involved me. (Pause.) Last thing I remember I was in a casino in Tonopah. I was on the bus, it was like a rest stop so you can nip in real quick and lose your life savings and get a sandwich. I had one quarter left. I put it in a slot—bang, I hit for five bucks. My last quarter! Can you believe that! Life can—(Pause.) I went to the bar. I ordered a sandwich. I ordered a drink—hey, what day is it? (Pause.) Tequila. (Pause.) I DON’T KNOW WHERE I AM! I think maybe I’ve been taken away! Like if I look out the window there’ll be nothing out there but outer space! (Pause.) No, I did, I looked out both sides, there’s like a dirt field and an interstate, and the other side is a swimming pool and rooms with blue doors with motherfucker!—cocksucker!—sonofabitch cunt fuck you whore! and words like that scratched all over ’em…

He opens the curtains—the MAN is still there—both start—he shuts the curtains fast.

It’s probably still Tonopah. But it might be Zimbabwe. I’m a long ways from Ukiah, especially if I’m hitching, that’s for sure. I mean I’d have to hitch down Route Eighty, I figure, over to Route Five, and go—I’d have to find Route Eighty. I’d have to find out where here is. Where I am. So therefore—if I had the price of a bus ride, and something to eat on—Hey! Yer my sponsor! (Pause.) Well, I will come see you, when I (click!)—get there…(He thumbs the button down, holds the receiver, looks at it:) Look…I have done something. I did something…(Pause. Hangs up, holding phone in his lap.) “Whenever anyone, anywhere, reaches out for help, I want the hand of Alcoholics Anonymous to always be there. And for that, I am responsible.”