You remember the form. I ask about your husband, you ask about my wife.
EMMA Yes, of course. How is your wife?
JERRY All right.
Pause.
EMMA Sam must be . . . tall.
JERRY He is tall. Quite tall. Does a lot of running. He’s a long distance runner. He wants to be a zoologist.
EMMA No, really? Good. And Sarah?
JERRY She’s ten.
EMMA God. I suppose she must be.
JERRY Yes, she must be.
Pause.
Ned’s five, isn’t he?
EMMA You remember.
JERRY Well, I would remember that.
Pause.
EMMA Yes.
Pause.
You’re all right, though?
JERRY Oh . . . yes, sure.
Pause.
EMMA Ever think of me?
JERRY I don’t need to think of you.
EMMA Oh?
JERRY I don’t need to think of you.
Pause.
Anyway I’m all right. How are you?
EMMA Fine, really. All right.
JERRY You’re looking very pretty.
EMMA Really? Thank you. I’m glad to see you.
JERRY So am I. I mean to see you.
EMMA You think of me sometimes?
JERRY I think ofyou sometimes.
Pause.
I saw Charlotte the other day.
EMMA No? Where? She didn’t mention it.
JERRY She didn’t see me. In the street.
EMMA But you haven’t seen her for years.
JERRY I recognised her.
EMMA How could you? How could you know?
JERRY I did.
EMMA What did she look like?
JERRY You.
EMMA No, what did you think of her, really?
JERRY I thought she was lovely.
EMMA Yes. She’s very . . . She’s smashing. She’s thirteen.
Pause.
Do you remember that time . . . oh God it was . . . when you picked her up and threw her up and caught her?
JERRY She was very light.
EMMA She remembers that, you know.
JERRY Really?
EMMA Mmnn. Being thrown up.
JERRY What a memory.
Pause.
She doesn’t know . . . about us, does she?
EMMA Of course not. She just remembers you, as an old friend.
JERRY That’s right.
Pause.
Yes, everyone was there that day, standing around, your husband, my wife, all the kids, I remember.
EMMA What day?
JERRY When I threw her up. It was in your kitchen.
EMMA It was in your kitchen.
Silence.
JERRY Darling.
EMMA Don’t say that.
Pause.
It all . . .
JERRY Seems such a long time ago.
EMMA Does it?
JERRY Same again?
He takes the glasses, goes to the bar. She sits still. He returns, with the drinks, sits.
EMMA I thought of you the other day.
Pause.
I was driving through Kilburn. Suddenly I saw where I was. I just stopped, and then I turned down Kinsale Drive and drove into Wessex Grove. I drove past the house and then stopped about fifty yards further on, like we used to do, do you remember?
JERRY Yes.
EMMA People were coming out of the house. They walked up the road.
JERRY What sort of people?
EMMA Oh . . . young people. Then I got out of the car and went up the steps. I looked at the bells, you know, the names on the bells. I looked for our name.
Pause.
JERRY Green.
Pause.
Couldn’t see it, eh?
EMMA No.
JERRY That’s because we’re not there any more. We haven’t been there for years.
EMMA No we haven’t.
Pause.
JERRY I hear you’re seeing a bit of Casey.
EMMA What?
JERRY Casey. I just heard you were . . . seeing a bit of him.
EMMA Where did you hear that?
JERRY Oh . . . people . . . talking.
EMMA Christ.
JERRY The funny thing was that the only thing I really felt was irritation, I mean irritation that nobody gossiped about us like that, in the old days. I nearly said, now look, she may be having the occasional drink with Casey, who cares, but she and I had an affair for seven years and none of you bastards had the faintest idea it was happening.
Pause.
