(Beat.)
JACKIE: . . . Anything you need to say?
VERONICA: ’Bout what?
JACKIE: You don’t need to say nothin’?
VERONICA: Jackie—
JACKIE: —Don’t “Jackie” me, okay? I’m calm, I’m civil, I’m polite.
VERONICA: . . . And?
JACKIE: You know my mother gave us this bed, right?
VERONICA: If you got something to say, why donchu just leave your fuckin’ mother out of it and say what you gotta say.
JACKIE: The hat: it ain’t mine.
VERONICA: So? It’s prolly your friend’s. Or your fuckin’ sponsor’s. Or whoever the fuck else comes up here sometimes—that old man down the hall you always got coming the fuck by. I don’t know.
JACKIE: You don’t know?
VERONICA: You know what? Go fuck yourself. I don’t know what your problem is, and I don’t know why you’re buggin’ the fuck out over a hat could belong to anybody—
JACKIE: —You’re right.
VERONICA: I know I’m fuckin’ right—
JACKIE: Fuck the hat.
VERONICA: Fuck the hat?
JACKIE: Dass what I said. Fuck the hat.
VERONICA: Good. Fuck it.
JACKIE: Dass right: the hat, fuck it!
VERONICA: Okay then.
JACKIE: That hat: dass a hat I got no interest in.
VERONICA: How about my apology now? You got any interest in that?
JACKIE: The bed.
VERONICA: The bed what?
JACKIE: Aqua Velva and dick. Why the bed smells like Aqua Velva and dick? Huh?! Why?!
VERONICA: Jackie—
JACKIE: —Stay away from me!
VERONICA: You’re crazy, you know that?
JACKIE: I’m crazy? Yo, head of the bed: Aqua Velva! Mid-bed: fuckin’ dick! Here. Smell it. Smell that shit and tell me it ain’t dick!
VERONICA: You’re acting fuckin’ retarded—
JACKIE: Maybe I am retarded! Maybe I’m fuckin’, you know—like the guy from the bodega who sits on the milk crate and asks you if you like Batman and Ritz crackers every fuckin’ day! Maybe I’m that fuckin’ guy!
VERONICA: You actin’ like that guy—
JACKIE: —’Cuz I’m trying very hard not to leap to conclusions, Veronica, but I’m a bit—I don’t know—unable to figure the fuck out why this bed—my mother’s fuckin’ bed—
VERONICA: —Again with your fuckin’ mother—
JACKIE: —You watch your mouth about my mother—
VERONICA: Watch my mouth about your mother? No. YOU watch my mouth about your mother! Fuck your mother! Okay? Fuck your fuckin’ bitch-ass mother, and her bitch-ass big-deal secondhand bed, and fuck her bitch-ass son, okay?! If your mother—rest in peace—was here right now, I’d strap on a fuckin’ dildo and fuck the two of youse right in your little faggot-ass, les-bionic asses, you little fuckin’ bitch—okay?! “Over, the end, don’t like you no more!” Get the fuck out!
(Veronica goes to the table, does a line of blow.)
JACKIE: My sponsor told me you were a little fuckin’ whore and I didn’t believe him!
VERONICA: Fuck your sponsor!
JACKIE: I told him, “Nah, man, we got a special thing going down between us”—
VERONICA: Why don’t you go down on your fuckin’ sponsor, okay?
JACKIE: He said, “You can’t live with an active user”—
VERONICA: —Hey! I don’t hear this shit!
JACKIE: Who was it?
VERONICA: Go lick your sponsor’s fuckin’ balls, bitch.
JACKIE: You know what? You wanna flip the script on me like a textbook fuckin’ cokehead alcoholic streetwalkin’ skank-ass trick, dass fine—but I strongly suggest that you don’t underestimate my capacity for violence!
(Veronica grabs a vodka bottle and breaks off its end.)
VERONICA: You wanna play? Try me!
JACKIE: I’ll fuckin’ kill you. You think I won’t kill you ’cuz I’m a nice guy, but believe me, I don’t give a fuck about nothin’ right now and I will end your life like you just ended mines!
VERONICA: You stay away from me!
JACKIE: Or what? You gonna hit me with that?
VERONICA: Back the fuck off, bitch! I don’t play that doormat punching-bag shit—
JACKIE: —Who was it? Just tell me who, dass all I wanna know!
VERONICA: Who was who?! There wasn’t no “who,” ’cuz no one did nothin’ over here, and you’re out your mind playin’ fuckin’ Sherlock Holmes ’cuz I don’t know why!
(Beat. Jackie starts dressing.)
Whaddya doing?
(Silence.)
Jackie, whaddya doing?
(Silence. Jackie takes a liquor bottle out of the microwave.)
Whaddya doing? Whaddya—gonna drink? A little misunderstanding happens because you’re fuckin’ stupid, and now you’re gonna pick up a drink and get your ass violated back upstate and ruin everything ’cuz you’re a jealous maniac with no leg to stand on?
JACKIE: It was that motherfuckah downstairs, wasn’t it?! That motherfuckah with the hat! He always wearing a hat, and now, suddenly, I got an unidentified fuckin’ hat sitting on my breakfast table!
VERONICA: Jackie, don’t get this twisted ’cuz I personally don’t care what you do, but, if you want my advice, put down the bottle, go to a fuckin’ meeting or something, meet up with that “sponsor” or whatever.
JACKIE: You so lucky I don’t hit women.
VERONICA: Yeah right, I’m a four-leaf clover, let’s go down to the casino and win a million bucks—
JACKIE:
