- by Tara Maya
Scenes from a Writer’s Marriage
* * *
INT. WRITER’S HOME OFFICE.
The room shows a mess born of obsession — papers, books, notebooks, pens and six computers; and neglect — clean laundary still unfolded in baskets, toddler toys abandoned in parade formations on the floor. Every available wall is lined with books: writing books (Characters and Viewpoint), historical books, (A History of the Plantagenets) and fiction (The Simirillian). It’s possible there’s a baby crawling on the floor somewhere, but hard to tell because of the mess.
WRITER’S HUSBAND: Â We can’t pay the bills this month.
WRITER:Â Um. [Beat] Do you have a plan?
WRITER’S HUSBAND: My plan was for you to sell a book.
WRITER: Oh. [Beat] You do realize that even if I sold a book this exact second, it wouldn’t make money for like, another two years.
WRITER’S HUSBAND: Yeah. I know. My plan was for you to sell a book two years ago.
[Beat.]
WRITER: I’m working on it.
WRITER’S HUSBAND: Yeah, but you’re working on it in your way.
WRITER: What’s “my” way?
WRTIER’S HUSBAND: You keep re-writing it.
WRITER: Only because it still sucks.
WRITER’S HUSBAND: You’ve been re-writing it for twenty years.
WRITER: Not twenty! Only… [Writer visibly struggles to count on fingers] like, ten.
WRITER’S HUSBAND: Even if you sold your book for a million dollars, divide that by ten years, and you’re still making less than you could at a real job.
WRITER: What if I sold a book for 4.8 million? Audrey Niffenegger just spent six years writing a book she sold for 4.8 million dollars. Of course, before that, she wrote a bestseller, The Time Traveller’s Wife.
WRITER’S HUSBAND: I’d be happy if you just sold a book for one million.
WRITER: I’d be happy if I just sold a book for one thousand! [laughs]
WRITER’S HUSBAND: I’d be happy if you just sold a book for one million.
