Waiting Room
by Melanie White
SCENE: A very humble hospital waiting room with seven chairs total, three each facing each other with a coffee table in the middle separating them. The table has a few magazines on it, along with several sections of newspaper spread out, with parts on a couple of chairs and on the floor. There is also a small table slightly separated from the chairs with an old-fashioned dial phone and a chair beside it. There is one door center stage that leads into the room from off-stage. There are two big “No Smoking” signs on each of the walls stage right and stage left.)
MANUEL, dressed in faded jeans and a worn shirt, is sprawled out asleep in one of the chairs. he has his feet up on the coffee table and part of the newspaper over his head to block out the light. He is snoring slightly. GUADALUPE, dressed in warm ups and carrying a hospital gown over her arm, along with a doctor’s mask in her hand, enters and walks quickly over to him, jerking the newspaper off his head, which wakes him up and startles him.
MANUEL: (disoriented) What – what – where am I?
GUADALUPE: The hospital. How could you sleep at a time like this?
MANUEL: I’m tired. It’s the middle of the night.
GUADALUPE: So? It’s still no time for sleeping.
MANUEL: Is she done yet? Can we go home now?
GUADALUPE: You make it sound like Marcia’s having her wisdom teeth out or something. She’s having a baby.
MANUEL: So what is it? A boy or a girl?
GUADALUPE: She hasn’t had it yet.
MANUEL: (looks at his watch) We’ve been here all this time, and she isn’t done yet?
GUADALUPE: We haven’t been here that long – only a couple of hours.
MANUEL: That’s two hours I could have been home asleep in my comfortable bed.
GUADALUPE: You’re so selfish. You only think about your own comfort. Don’t you even care that your daughter is in there about to have your grandchild?
MANUEL: Sure I care. No fifteen-year-old daughter of mine should be having a baby, especially not without a husband.
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