Remedial English
By Evan SmithVincent Ryan is an extremely bright senior with a C average at the Cabrini Academy, a private school for boys in a medium-sized Southern city. He has been waiting for quite some time for one of his teachers, Sister Beatrice, to finish correcting papers and tell him why she has asked him to come to her office. This interior monologue opens the play.
VINCENT
Sister, I think it's very rude of you to keep me waiting like this. It's been fifteen minutes since you said, "I'll be finished in a minute," and unless I'm doing worse in algebra than I thought, you're off by fourteen minutes. Fourteen minutes may not seem like much to you - time moves pretty quickly after your hundredth birthday - but this is supposed to be my study hall. I have many important things to do during my study hall. I am developing a fascinating abstract pattern to fill the margins of my chemistry book. I'm right in the middle of Lake Wobegon Days, and I have almost finished my project of inserting the complete works of Judith Krantz into the library's card catalog. This is a school after all, Sister. You of all people shouldn't want to see me wasting my time.
What did I do to merit such treatment? Is it because of that little tiff we had in English yesterday? Sister, we all say things in the heat of argument which we later regret. I'm sorry I called T.S. Eliot a "social-climbing Yankee papist." I don't even remember what I meant by that!
Have you forgotten all the good times we have had together? Don't you remember Dramatic Literature when I was a sophomore? We read aloud to the class... I was Jean... you were Miss Julie...
Oh, good grief, please don't tell me you found the Sister Beatrice Virgin Vote! God, how could I explain that? But if you did find it, you should at least be pleased with the results! 58% of my music class said that they thought you were a virgin. Sister, you've got to understand, such a large part of my life is spent in your company, and yet I hardly know anything about you! You've got to expect a certain amount of healthy curiosity and speculation. Do you ever wish you hadn't become a nun? What would you have done instead? Do you have any regrets? Are you a...? Never any answers from this woman of mystery. Oh, well, take your time, Sister, I don't mind waiting...
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