A series of mini-dramas based on public conversations, as overheard and rewritten by local playwright/director Aurora Stewart de Peña.

Overheard in line for a teller at the RBC at Queen’s Quay and Spadina

Georgina is in her early twenties, with loose jogging shorts and a T-shirt featuring large block letters that say NYLON. She talks into an Android phone while waiting in line for a teller.

Georgina: And I was sick, like real sick. I was, like, throwing up on the floor. I was, like, shaking.

So I called her and I was like “You have to come in for me,” I’m like, sick, I was like, “You have to come in for me, I’m so sick.”

There was, like, no way I could have served tables, I, like, couldn’t get off the couch. I was, like, beached. It was pathetic. You saw me.

And because it’s fucking Friday night, she won’t do it. Like, what are you doing? You’re on call. You have to come in if we need you, you can’t, like, make plans!

Or you can, whatever, but you have to be willing to break them. Like don’t sign up for any balls or anything. Like, don’t go to any coronations.

And, like, I don’t know.

It’s like she doesn’t even want to work with us. Like, she’s just so irresponsible, she doesn’t care. She never fucking re-fills the ketchups, she never re-fills the sugars, she never re-fills the fucking salts or the peppers and she’s rude.

I come in, I’m like, [smiling and tilting head to one side] “Hi! Hey!” and she’s like, [dropping shoulders forward, turning corners of mouth down] “Hello.” She doesn’t even make eye contact.

So yeah, I had to, like, come in. And of course they sent me home, I practically vomited all over the cutlery, like I couldn’t be there, I wasn’t faking it.

So, like, I told Alicia that we were missing money from the till on Tuesday.

I did.

I know, it’s terrible. Her ass is fired.

I know, but she deserves it.

Come on, you think so too!

____

Aurora Stewart de Peña is half of the theatre company Birdtown & Swanville (the other half is Nika Mistruzzi). You can follow her on Twitter at @Aurorahhh.

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