CHRISTOPHER

(Mopping) I’m using a manual.

BELLA

Oh.

CHRISTOPHER

(Mopping) A mid-century Corona. Recently refurbished.

BELLA

By the way, not knowing what’s going to happen is a good thing. If your protagonist is leading you then you’ll likely stay ahead of your reader.

CHRISTOPHER

Thank you.

BELLA

You’re welcome.

(To the audience) He finishes mopping and asks if he can come talk to me again tomorrow.

CHRISTOPHER

I promise I’ll go through the online departmental catbox. I mean calendar.

BELLA

(To the audience) The day after that he returns yet again.

I thank him for following proper procedure.

CHRISTOPHER

Yeah, no one else had signed up so I requested two blocks of time. I hope that’s cool. I mean, if you get tired of me just say so and I can go like wander campus and get mentally prepared for the big football game coming up with Harvard this weekend. Stockpile the coldcuts. Get my face painted. Do some steroids. Headbutt random campus bulletin boards, etcetera, etcetera.

(Christopher’s gaze travels over to the photograph.)

Has she gotten smaller?

BELLA

I believe she’s the same size she was yesterday.

CHRISTOPHER

I keep expecting it to snow.

BELLA

Oh, in the photo—

CHRISTOPHER

Yeah. I have this weird feeling that if I come back tomorrow the field will be covered. With snow. Like twenty inches. But no footprints. The woman’s just there. As if the field imagined her.

BELLA

Do you think it would be a better image?

CHRISTOPHER

Maybe not better. But somehow more inevitable.

(Beat. He sits.)

So, the young Yale student and Shane make it to New York City. They detrain at Grand Central and take the subway down to the East Village.

They walk through Washington Square Park and go to Arturo’s Pizza on the corner of Thompson and Houston, where they take in the live jazz and share a pepperoni pizza and a pitcher of beer.

The student covers the check.

It soon becomes clear to the student that Shane never had any intention of meeting a girl, or anyone else for that matter.

And after Arturo’s, the student invites Shane to stay with him at the St. Marks Hotel.

BELLA

Oh. Interesting. How many beds are there?

CHRISTOPHER

Just one.

BELLA

King?

CHRISTOPHER

Queen. More like a full, actually. And the room sort of smells like a breakfast burrito. It’s awkward.

BELLA

Is the student a homosexual?

CHRISTOPHER

He’s not a homosexual.

BELLA

Are you sure?

CHRISTOPHER

He likes girls. He’s never been particularly good with them, meaning he’s not like some legendary cocksman or anything like that, but he’s definitely into the opposite sex and all of their parts and smells.

BELLA

What about Shane?

CHRISTOPHER

I don’t know.

BELLA

Good. Keep going.

CHRISTOPHER

Shane accepts his invitation.

BELLA

To stay with him.

CHRISTOPHER

At the St. Marks Hotel, yeah.

At one point, while walking toward the East Village, Shane produces a cell phone, dials a number, and speaks to someone. But the student gets the keen sense that there isn’t anyone on the other end; that Shane is performing a one-sided conversation.