Tammy, when we took
the play writing class
all those years ago
and I was assigned to read
one of the characters
in the two-person script you’d brought in,
I think I may have sabotaged your work.
It was unintentional.
I was sight-reading,
and thought
at the time
that I was actually presenting the lines
the way you meant them to be presented.

When you had your wealthy ingenue
find by sheer coincidence
her long-lost lover
behind the wheel of the cab
that she’d happened to hail in midtown,
I assumed that the aforementioned taxi driver
would be fully aware
of the Harry Chapin song
from which the plot was clearly cribbed.

As I read the lines
I kept waiting for some ironic identification
of the story that was being told,
that maybe they’d realize
they were characters in a song
or perhaps a fantasy
of some retarded twelve year old.
I assumed
at least
there would be
some kind of minimal twist
and not end with a happily ever after
as the couple gets together
and restarts the love
abandoned so many years ago.

But your one-act
ended the way you know it ended
and my self-aware
sarcastic read of the taxi driver
was totally inappropriate
and made your bad play seem
to the attendant audience
all the worse.

It didn’t occur to me
that you wouldn’t know the Chapin song
or that such a cliched tale
wouldn’t have some sort of script-flip.
I made you look bad
because I couldn’t imagine
your play would be so bad.

So:
sorry.
Luckily
I don’t believe you ever took
to play writing after that.
Oh – you did?
Really?
Why?