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AT A CONVENTION by
Jack Duffe CAST OF CHARACTERS JOSH:
Early-20s
anime geek dressed as an easily-recognizable character. KIM:
Josh’s girlfriend,
enough of a geek to go with him to an anime convention. Also costumed. SCENE SETTING:
A messy
hotel room. AT RISE:
JOSH
runs in with a large box in a larger plastic bag. JOSH All right! I
can’t
believe I found one of these for so cheap!
(stroking the bag lovingly) Ooh, this’ll
take hours
to put together back home. (Offstage,
the sound of an unlocking and opening door. KIM walks in, annoyed.) KIM Hey, Josh, thanks a
lot for locking me out! JOSH Oh, the doors lock
themselves? KIM Yes!
(JOSH fawns over the box in the bag.) JOSH Sorry Kim, I was
just a bit eager to get this beauty to a safe place. What’s
wrong with that? KIM You still haven’t showed me what it is. I bet it cost a fortune -- let me see. JOSH
(hugging it) No! It’s too
precious! KIM Okay then, can I at
least see that picture of the Naruto cosplay group you took? JOSH Anything for you,
hon. (JOSH
lets go of the bag and takes a digital camera from his pocket. KIM
grabs the
bag.) JOSH HEY! (KIM
plays keep-away as best she can.) KIM It cost hundreds,
didn’t it? You’re poor enough already! JOSH But I need it for my
collection! Hey! (KIM
pulls the box out of the bag. It’s a model kit of one of the
Gundam-series
mobile suits – any big one will do. Change Josh’s
dialogue to reflect it.) KIM Whoa! JOSH Happy now?
(KIM hits him over the head with the box.) JOSH Careful, you might
break a piece! KIM A couple of these
things could’ve paid for this hotel room! I can’t
believe you! JOSH Hey, do you know how
hard it is to find a Perfect Grade Wing Zero Custom? Pretty hard,
that’s how
hard! KIM You could have
bought it online at any time. JOSH Yeah but buying
things that way just isn’t the same! The experience of
stalking the wilderness
of the dealer’s room for one’s quarry, seeing it
gleaming in the distance,
plucking it down like a piece of fruit and buying it with cash money is
like nothing
else in the world, and this is the one time of the year when it can be
done. We’re
not usually even close to
merchandise
like this back home! KIM You’re
hopeless. (KIM
tosses the box on the bed. JOSH dives to the box and cuddles it.) JOSH You should really be
more careful! This isn’t just any splurge item.
KIM Uh-huh. So if I were
to buy that Escaflowne animation cel I liked, you wouldn’t
have anything to say
about it.
(JOSH hops off the bed.) JOSH That’s
completely
different! You’d be buying it because it looks pretty, but I
buy model kits
because. . .it’s the creative effort I buy, not just the
thing itself. KIM It took creative
effort to paint that cel. JOSH Well yeah, but
that’s
just 2-D! KIM Then how can you
justify that Shoji Kawamori artbook, huh? Everything in there is just 2-D. JOSH But those are 2-D
representations of 3-D things!
(KIM stares at him a second.) KIM . . .Yes, like every drawing is? JOSH Well, wait,
that’s
not what I mean. KIM I think you mean I
just don’t “understand” your favorites. (JOSH
moves around the room as he speaks, highlighting his points with
gesturing.) JOSH Exactly! You
don’t
appreciate the bond between a man and his mecha. The symphony of moving
parts,
the massive human-piloted robot suits dueling each other against the
backdrop
of deepest international politics and human emotion in a world where
technology
threatens to drain that very fighting spirit from humanity!
It’s completely
different from your petite little flowers-in-the-foreground and
bubbles-in-the-background cute magical girly-stuff. KIM Utena could kick
your ass and you know it. But that’s beside the point. Just
how much did you
pay for your precious little model kit anyway?
(JOSH turns away and scratches his neck.) JOSH . . .Just a hundred. KIM What?! JOSH But listen --
listen! Remember that time when we were out shopping and I complained
that you
bought too much stuff and you said that it wasn’t about how
much you spent, it
was how much you saved? KIM
(balling fist) Yes. . . JOSH Well I’ll have
you
know this little model kit has an average price of a hundred fifty in
the
dealer’s room! I checked every single booth that had one, all
the while
thinking, “Kim really had a point back then. If I buy it at
this price I’ll
have saved half what I spent on it!” KIM Really? JOSH Uh, yeah, of course! KIM Oh, Josh, I thought
you weren’t listening back then. If this is the start of you
applying some common
sense to your buying habits, I don’t mind. (KIM
walks over and kisses him.) KIM But you sir are
going to let me help you build that thing. JOSH
(surprised) You. . .really want
to help? KIM Escaflowne’s a
mecha
too, and I’m kinda curious about other styles. What better
way to learn than
building one? (JOSH
smiles wide, kisses KIM back and escorts her out.) JOSH Now that I’ve
dropped this off, want to come with me to the Art Room? I went by there
earlier
– somebody carved a life-size Zaku head out of wood! KIM Oh really? I’d
love
to see it. (pause) What’s a Zaku,
again? THE
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