Session 3 Transcript

 MARI: Previously in Session 2

 KACEY: Lori? How are feeling? This group not freaking you out too much?

 LORI: No. I’m grateful, I gotta say. Just knowing I was coming back here really got me through the week. I mean – I didn’t small anyone else so maybe it’s just over for me – but I’m glad to just be with you all, so. Thanks.

 KACEY: Were you tempted?

 LORI: What do you mean?

 KACEY: Like, did you look at someone and think “I could shrink you.”

 LORI: No.

 KACEY: Really?

 LORI: No. Yeah. No, I did. I forgot about it. I was on the subway and this guy was taking up so much space on the seats – like three people’s worth and he was just looking at his phone but it was so annoying, I did think, “Someone should shrink you” but then the train pulled into the station and he went out so the moment passed.

 KACEY: And it does help to note these sort of events.

 LEILA: Honestly, the keeping a log is my favorite tool for dealing with the Defense.

 MARI: It would be, you organizing freak.

 LEILA: Can’t help it. Filing systems give me peace.

 MARI: You are such a VIRGO!

 LEILA: I know. I know. You want me to come organize your closet?

 Theme music begins

 JACKI: Recorded live at Jalopy Theatre in Brooklyn

Messenger Theatre Company presents

The Defense

 Theme music fades

 This is SESSION 3

 MARI: And then she asked me if the lace was working for me!

 LORI: Unreal.

 KACEY: How’s everyone week been?

 LEILA: Excellent.

 MARI: Not sure how to answer.

 LORI: Uh. Weird.

 KACEY: It sounds like you two might have something to share.

 MARI: Uh. Yeah. I guess we do.

 KACEY: Well.

 MARI: I’m just embarrassed.

 KACEY: You? Why?

 MARI: Well – because I’m supposed to be like, the mentor here for our new member and I was not the best role model the other day.

 KACEY: We’re all just doing our best. All the time. Sometimes it is easier than others.

 MARI: Sure. Yeah.

 KACEY: We’d love to learn from your experience if you feel up to sharing it.

 MARI: Damn it.

 KACEY: You’re not required.

 MARI: I know. It’s just – okay. Lori came along to our brunch on Sunday and we were all having a really nice time. We’re laughing a lot. Bloody Marys are flowing. We’re…I don’t know…laughing about hash browns. When behind us, this table of douchebags starts mocking us laughing. Like imitating it.

 LORI: Like – har har har.

 MARI: It was really irritating and kind of …middle school?

 LORI: It was very middle school.

 MARI: Yeah. Har har har. So I turned around and told them to cool it.

 LORI: She was amazing. It was like – “Cool it fellas” and she gave them a look that would have shut me up for a thousand years.

 MARI: Yeah – but it did not work that way on them.

 LORI: No, no, it did not.

 MARI: One of them started saying “Cool it fellas” and the other one started pretending he was Lori, like sitting like her, looking shocked, etc.

 LORI: That’s when I went blank.

 MARI: And so did I.

 KACEY: Did you both use the Defense?

 MARI: Turns out. Yes.

 LORI: It would appear so.

 MARI: But the funny thing was -

 LORI: Funny peculiar not funny ha ha.

 MARI: Yeah – it might get funny later but yeah right now it really was just funny peculiar – the funny thing was – the guy who’d been making fun of Lori was a pile of ash.

 LORI: And the one who’d been mocking Mari was very small.

 MARI: It’s like we switched Defenses.  Like, I was the smallifier and Lori became an ash maker.

 LEILA: Wow.

 BRIA: That’s crazy.

 KACEY: I don’t think that’s it.

 MARI: No?

 KACEY: Nope.

 MARI: Then what happened?

 KACEY: I think your Defenses acted on behalf of one another.

 MARI: Huh, wha?

KACEY: You both blacked out, yes? So neither of you saw your defenses kick in.

 LORI: That’s right.

 KACEY: So I think your defenses acted on behalf of the other – like mama bears defending their cubs.

 LORI: So I smalled Mari’s threat and she ashed mine.

 KACEY: That’s my guess, yes.

 MARI: That’s new.

 KACEY: It is for us, yes. there have been other instances. They call it the Bystander Defense. Because certainly, your defense might kick in when you witness anyone in need of it. Has anyone done that?

 BRIA: I did, yeah. In fact, in the beginning that’s mostly what I did. Back before I got a handle on the toggle.

 KACEY: Bystander Defense is really interesting – because almost everyone feels better about using their Defense on behalf of someone else. And almost everyone is more likely to use it in the early stages of owning their Defense.

LEILA: This makes no sense.

 KACEY: You don’t think so?

 LEILA: I mean – The Defense is triggered when we’re under threat, yeah? So why would it happen when someone ELSE is under threat?

 KACEY: Empathy, Leila. Highly developed empathy and identification. There are some theories that we tend to have unusually high empathic levels. So when we see someone being victimized, it’s like it’s happening to us, as if we were watching ourselves and so the Defense leaps into action.

 MARI: This makes so much more sense than what we were thinking.

LORI: So much more sense!

MARI: We were like, “We’re contagious!

 LORI: Or – we thought maybe it was like Freaky Friday where instead of switching bodies we just switched defenses.

 KACEY: I mean. I suppose it might be possible – but I’ve literally never heard of such a thing. I mean, you two are special but the likelihood of your stumbling upon an entirely new pattern is really slim.

 LEILA: Not to mention that it’s not a very logical pattern.

 KACEY: How do you mean?

 LEILA: Well – I feel like each of our Defenses are uniquely ours – like, just parts of our personality.

 MARI: Yeah. Yeah. I see that. No – this whole Bystander thing is exactly what happened, now that I think about it. Because I was definitely a whole lot madder about the guy teasing Lori than I was about the dude making fun of me. Like a lot madder.
KACEY: And you feel like you’re a mentor for Lori, too – so you have an added motivation for invoking your Defense on her behalf.

 LORI: And I think if it had been just me, I’d have just expected to be made fun of, you know? But Mari feels like – my teacher, you know? I won’t let anyone talk bad about my teachers.

 KACEY: This feels like a cut and dried Bystander case. Well done, you two – you brought us a whole new thing to consider.

 MARI: Aw shucks, it was nothing.

 LORI: It was quite a day, I will say that.

 BRIA: I am curious about one thing.

MARI: Shoot.

 BRIA: Well – you were with your friends.

 MARI: Yeah.

 BRIA:  How did they respond?

 MARI: It was so wild – but I think what happened was – they blacked out, too. Like, they missed EVERYTHING.

 BRIA: How so?

 MARI: Well – when I…I don’t know…returned? I saw the ash pile and the little shouting man first and then I saw Lori blinking and looking at them and me. And then I got very nervous about what my friends might be thinking in that moment and so I looked over at them, and they were blinking, too. They were all just sort of looking around, confused.

 LORI: That’s when I leaned down to the little guy and told him to run – which he did, I’m grateful to say. And when I stood back up, one of Mari’s friends was saying something like, “You guys, I’m sorry. I think I just spaced out big time. What were you just talking about?”

 MARI: And the others were like, “Yes, that’s funny. I spaced out, too. What WERE we talking about?”

 LORI: And that’s when Mari said, “Oh, I think it was something about muffins.”

 MARI: Not my best work.

 LORI: And they were all like, “Muffins?! No wonder I spaced out! Why were we talking about muffins?”

 MARI: And then we did actually talk about muffins and it was as if the whole thing didn’t even happen.

 BRIA: Wow. Kacey – is this a thing?

 KACEY: Muffins? Definitely a thing.

 BRIA: No no not the muffins. Though I do feel like the existence of a corn muffin is a little bit questionable.

 KACEY: You meant the group black out, I’m guessing.

 BRIA: Yeah. I guess so. I don’t know what to call it. But, like, is that part of our Defense? And is there a way I can control it?

 KACEY: Honestly – from what I’m hearing, it’s not well documented yet. We know it happens a lot or else surely we’d all be hearing about the Defense in the news all the time. So I think it’s actually very common and you just rarely see it because while it’s in play, you are in your own darkened corner or busy with the Defense. I suspect that Mari’s friends got an extra dose of black out because there were two Defenses at work.

 BRIA: Right. Because I’ve never noticed anything like that.

 KACEY: I also think that Mari’s relationship with this group of friends is a factor. They are connected, already and it is much easier for connected people to be impacted by a kind of – psychic event. I don’t like that as a phrase but I can’t think of another way to say it.

 LORI: Maybe it’s a kind of Defense for the collective? Like – the group supercharges the Defense and loses awareness along with it.

 KACEY: Is that what it felt like?

 LORI: It did actually. And I walked away with an interesting muffin recipe!

 MARI: Oh lord.  These muffins. I will never live down this muffin thing.

 KACEY: I mean. Muffins are very compelling.

 LEILA: Someone posted a thing about pancake muffins recently and I was captivated. Has anyone ever had a pancake muffin?

 LORI: Is it, like, a muffin in a pancake from?

 LEILA: I’m not sure – but it appears be a pancake in a muffin form.

 BRIA: That sounds delicious.

 KACEY: You see? Very compelling. Honestly – it occurs to me that this might be a very useful thing to have in our back pockets should we find ourselves in a situation like Mari did.

 LEILA: What do you mean?

 KACEY: Let’s say you come to and find that those around you are also coming to and if anyone asks what you’d been talking about before –

 LEILA: Muffins.

 BRIA: Muffins.

 MARI: I guess I’m a genius.

 KACEY: I guess you are. I mean – muffins are a great choice because they’re completely innocuous but also a little bit of a surprise. I mean, depending on the group. In a room full of bakers it would be perfectly normal but it’s kind of a funny word and it’s common enough that everyone might have something to say about them.

 MARI: Genius. Genius. I am a genius.

 KACEY: Totally. I also think just having something to draw from in a moment of blankness or confusion is really important. Just having something ready to go.

 LORI: Yeah – I was drawing a total blank. I was trying to think of what we had actually been talking about before the guys started bothering us and my mind was like – a desert. There was NOTHING but “pile of ash, pile of ash, pile of ash” and “Can I turn men into ash now?”

 KACEY: That’s very logical and exactly demonstrates why having muffins in your back pocket is a good idea.

 MARI: Not literally, though.

 KACEY: No, not literally. That would make for some really squishy sitting.

LEILA: Ew.

 KACEY: Yeah – but it occurs to me that another advantage of saying “muffins” is that it’s entirely believable and also just boring enough that almost anyone would assume they just tuned out when you were talking about it before. Like everyone at your brunch must have thought. “Oh muffins? I guess that’s why I don’t remember. I must have tuned out for a minute.” Muffins is just right thing.

 MARI: Yay for muffins!

 KACEY: Yay for muffins, indeed. Now – did either of you have anything else you wanted to discuss about this incident?

 MARI: No, I’m just relieved we didn’t Freaky Friday our Defenses.

 LORI: Me, too. I was really worried about it. But – no, that’s it. I don’t have other things about it. I did write some stuff down in a notebook, like you suggested so…that’s happening.

 KACEY: Good. Good. Leila? Bria? Either of you have anything you want to say this week?

 LEILA: The men of this fair city remain un-crushed by my Defense this week. And I was not even tempted.

 KACEY: Wow. Good job men of this city!

 BRIA: Yeah, I gotta echo that sentiment. It was the same for me this week. Everyone was on relatively good behavior. Well – except for the guys at your brunch spot. RIP.

 LEILA: What made everyone so well behaved out there this week?

 KACEY: No idea. Maybe some planet aligned with some star of good behavior?

 LEILA: It was very nice.

 BRIA: Agreed. I don’t know the last time I didn’t at least feel tempted.

 MARI: I know I can’t do this – but somedays I just want to go out with a big roll of gold stars and give them to everyone who’s behaving themselves. And if they’re dicks about it, I’ll take it right back. And if they’re super dicks about it…well. Pile of ash.

 BRIA: You can’t go out hunting, Mari.

 MARI: I wouldn’t be hunting! I’d be giving out gold stars! Positive reinforcement.

 LEILA: You know it would bring all the dicks to the yard.

 MARI: I don’t know.

LEILA: Come on. You know every other dude would be like, “Where’s my star? Why didn’t I get a star, sweetheart? Come here and give me a star.”

 MARI: Oh lord. You’re right. There goes that fantasy.

 LEILA: Sorry.

 MARI: Well – you saved me the price of a bunch of gold stars so…thank you.

 LEILA: You bet. Can I get a star, though? Don’t you think I deserve a star?

 MARI: Ha! Good one.

 LEILA: Come on, sweetheart. Give me a star.

 MARI: That’s scary now.

KACEY: So. Anyone else have anything they need to say before we break for the day?

 LEILA: I’m good.

BRIA: Me, too.

 LORI: So I am.

 MARI: I am also good.

 KACEY: Okay. Let’s do our affirmation and call it a day. I am safe but I’m not safe for everyone.

Theme music begins

 JACKI:

The Defense is a production of Messenger Theatre Company.

 It is performed by Marcella Adams as Leila, Amber Jessie as Mari, Cosmic Kitty as Bria, Kristen Vaughan as Kacey and Toni Watterson as Lori.

 The writer/director is Emily Rainbow Davis.

Sound Design by Matt Powell

Sound Engineering by Daniel Massey

Sound Assistance by Angela Santillo

 Stage Management by Ella Lieberman

 The Producer is Melvin Yen.

 The Defense theme is by Scott Ethier.

 I’m Jacki Jing

 I am safe but I’m not safe for everyone.