EMILY: You’re right, I can’t. I remember you never talked about how Zeke was in bed.
MARSHA: That was something else, I wasn’t as close to you then, darling. I was willing to tell anyone who would listen.
EMILY: No, when we were close, when we got close again, you didn’t want to talk about it.
MARSHA: When I was seeing Zeke, you were very sick.
EMILY: How sick was I?
MARSHA: I couldn’t talk to you, man.
EMILY: Could you talk to me woman?
MARSHA: Woman to woman, one to one.
EMILY: You couldn’t talk to me? But you were calling me and making sure I was okay when you were with Zeke and making spaghetti sauce. His children were there, you were spreading the tablecloths for them.
MARSHA: So I called you, so what? You never knew the depths of what was happening to me…. What’s on this? Just butter? Great. Do you like cabbage?
EMILY: Adore it. I didn’t even know you liked it.
MARSHA: It’s underplayed.
EMILY: Definitely. And fantastically healthy, that’s what I like about it.
MARSHA: It is?
EMILY: Oh God, it’s the healthiest thing in the world. You know it’s interesting, I can’t get over the relationship of three human beings, you, Vinnie and me. The only three people I know who I really think might possibly be able to do something together. What can you do in three? Take a trip or something like that?
MARSHA: I don’t know if we could.
EMILY: I don’t either. We’re all so difficult.
MARSHA: I’m much more comfortable alone with either one of you. I don’t really like it in three.
EMILY: Really? I love being with you and Vincie. But then you’re always more comfortable in twos.
MARSHA: I really am. Are you finished with the eating?
EMILY: No, I have to have a little more cabbage. You know I just realized something about Vinnie. With certain exceptions, Vinnie surrounds himself with inferior people.
MARSHA: The exceptions being me, Nico and you?
EMILY: Yeah, he has very ineffectual friends that he completely dominates.
MARSHA: I would say that there are three major relationships in Vinnie’s life. Do you know who they are?
EMILY: His analyst aside, right?
MARSHA: Yeah.
EMILY: You and Nico. I’m putting myself aside also, because I’m too recent.
MARSHA: Yeah, now what’s the third key relationship? Do you know?
EMILY: Would I know? Should I know?
MARSHA: Yes.
EMILY: It’s not an ex-lover?
MARSHA: It is.
EMILY: Then it’s Clem?
MARSHA: Right, Clem is still one of his key relationships. He has so much love-hate left for Clem, Clem calls him on the phone and no matter what happens, he’s shaken up for three days — by Clem’s successes, Clem’s failures, every action of Clem’s is fantastically important to him. He might even be more important than Nico or me in the effect on his life. You know Clem thinks of himself as one of the great sado-masochists of our time.
EMILY: You mean as a Genet?
MARSHA: Yeah, he has a real Genet image of himself. He’s got in a way a very criminal mentality, he’s very death oriented. He picks up these rough truck-driver types and they have ménages à any number you can mention.
EMILY: He seems very vain.
MARSHA: Very vain, very bright, and he’s funny, he’s talented.
EMILY: Is he good?
MARSHA: You mean is he a good person? I don’t know. He’s vulnerable.
EMILY: Vinnie’s very vulnerable too.
MARSHA: I don’t want to get into Vinnie for the moment.
EMILY: But does he want to get into you? The one thing I don’t understand is his relationship with Nico. You don’t either, do you?
MARSHA: No.
EMILY: I just don’t get it, Marsha, so help me God. Listen, have you seen anyone out here so far who’s available?
MARSHA: No one.
EMILY: If I find out about an interesting-sounding party tonight, are you interested in going?
MARSHA: What about Vinnie? Did he say he was coming over?
EMILY: No, I think he wants to be alone with his Nico before the weekend guests arrive. Look, Marshie, we’re two beautiful women and we have to start making inroads.
4. EMILY’S PROBLEMS ARE DISCUSSED ON THE BEACH
EMILY: I have multiple involvements and I think I always will. But I don’t really want to discuss it.
VINCENT: Do you feel any of them have come to fruition?
EMILY: No.
VINCENT: That’s the point. I don’t mind multiple involvements if a couple of them are fulfilled. My whole point is that you expend all your creative energies on your love objects.
EMILY: You think so?
VINCENT: I know so.
EMILY: Let’s discuss it. Tell me about my love objects and tell me why Michael Christy’s a waste of time.
VINCENT: He’s a waste of time, my dear, because he doesn’t love you. He’s just a sexual interest.
EMILY: No, he’s a love interest, he’s not a sexual interest.
VINCENT: He is a sexual interest, because your only relationship with him is sexual.
EMILY: You are insane!
VINCENT: Are you going to tell me it’s a talking, caring, affectionate relationship?
EMILY: When we’re together, it certainly is.
VINCENT: Then why do you both have to get immediately drunk every time?
EMILY: That’s not because it’s sexual, it’s because it’s emotional.
VINCENT: It’s because neither of you can relate emotionally. You always pick people, situations, which cannot give you any sort of return. You pick twisted trees to nourish, instead of giving your fertilizer to new young ones.
EMILY: Wait a second. What about Philippe Rocheau? Philippe Rocheau on the surface, at least on certain levels, is a very feeling, emotional kind of person, although he’s not really. My picking him was not because I’m afraid to give and afraid to love.
VINCENT: That was five years ago, I don’t know about that. I’m talking about now.
MARSHA: We know about now, let’s talk about the future.
VINCENT: All right, let’s talk about her future. How do you see yourself in the future? The future, you know, is what you’re doing about the present.
EMILY: Of course the future’s the present.
VINCENT: The future is like the next word I’m going to say, which then immediately becomes the past. There is no present, only the future and the past. Marshie, you’re getting a terrible sunburn. I would cover it up.
MARSHA: I have nothing to cover it with.
VINCENT: Take off your bathing suit and cover it with that.
EMILY: You know you criticize me, but you don’t understand certain things in my background. Do you know my father had an entire library of Indian philosophy, life after death? My father was a fantastic moral, spiritual person who wrote letters to the Pope which were printed in The New York Times and everything else. My sister thinks my father was a hero.
VINCENT: I’ve heard all that before.
MARSHA: So have I.
EMILY: But you must understand where it all comes from.
VINCENT: All right, so that’s where it all comes from. Does that mean you have to hold on to it forever?
EMILY: Okay, what am I supposed to believe?
MARSHA: Just that there is good and bad in people.
EMILY: Don’t you think I believe that? That’s the most simple-minded thing I ever heard in my life.
MARSHA: But you don’t believe it in a realistic way. You think they’re all good, they’re pure, they’re deep, they’re this, they’re that. You don’t basically believe that either Zeke or Michael could be anything but good and pure and sweet.