A Sketch by Jean-Pierre Martinez
Two characters arrive.
Jo – Do you have news about him?
Nic – He’s dead.
Jo – Damn. So it wasn’t so benign after all. I didn’t know you could die from laugher.
Nic – Actually, he died from exhaustion. He was overcome with laughter from morning till night. And even at night. He couldn’t sleep. It was his heart that gave out. He didn’t get to enjoy his sick leave for long.
Jo – And the doctors couldn’t do anything to save him?
Nic – They tried everything to make him stop laughing. They even took him to the theatre. But the disease was already too advanced…
A faint fire alarm is heard. A third person arrives, panicked and in their underwear.
Mat – There’s a fire on the ground floor!
Jo – A fire?
Mat – I work on the first floor but I went up to the seventh for… Anyway, I decided to take refuge on the top floor. By the time the fire spreads up here, maybe they’ll come rescue us by helicopter.
Nic – You watch too much TV…
Mat – Oh my God, I left all my files in my office! Considering how badly the company is doing, with the stock price plummeting…
Jo – Well, if we all get burned alive…
Nic – If you want, we can have your company’s logo engraved on your tombstone with the inscription “Died for the financial system.”
Mat – You’re right… If we make it out of this, I swear, I won’t take all this so seriously anymore… After all, you only live once!
Jo – Except for cats, which have nine lives…
Nic glances at their phone to read the text message they just received.
Nic – I just got a text from a colleague who works on the first floor.
Mat – Have the firefighters been alerted?
Nic – It’s just a fire drill.
Mat (making the sign of the cross) – Thank God…
Jo – Yes… We can almost call it a miracle…
Mat – I need to get back right away. My boss will wonder where I’ve gone.
Mat leaves.
Nic – We’re quickly caught up by daily life…
Jo – Yes.
Nic – We should have rebelled as soon as we were in daycare.
Jo – Yes… But we kept our mouths shut.
Nic – Then it continued with school.
Jo – We realized we were already bored full-time, but we thought it would get better once we finished our studies.
Nic – And then we started working and thought it would get better when we retired.
Jo – And that’s when they abolished pensions.
They start to leave.
Nic – By the way, what do you think of the newcomer?
Jo – The newcomer?
Nic – Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed her…
They leave. A character arrives alone.
Ben – It wasn’t a fire drill. It was me. I tried to discreetly smoke a joint in the bathroom. Just like when I was in middle school. But back then, the only smoke detector was the lunch lady… Now, the lunch lady is Big Brother, with sensors everywhere. That’s where we’re at. We still have to hide to smoke. At our age.
He lights up the joint and smokes.
Ben – What a mess… I wasn’t expecting to win the lottery, you know? I don’t play. And besides, winning the lottery… It’s really just a matter of chance. Something you didn’t do anything to earn. Just a little push from fate. Just a bit of luck. Enough to make life a little easier… Not too much, so you can still think: Okay, I got a bit of luck, but I still deserved it. But luck doesn’t exist. There are no miracles. Or maybe I had my chance, and I didn’t seize it. So I smoke. To see life in pink. Piaf also took a lot of things, right? But she managed to turn “La Vie en Rose” into a hit…
Another character arrives.
Ben (offering his joint) – Want some?
Charlie – Thanks, I’ve quit. (Starts vaping) What do you do?
Ben – Oh, various things. But overall, I’d say I’m mostly in a mess. And you?
Charlie – I’m… Well, I was an accountant. My boss just caught me with his secretary in the office restrooms.
Ben – Is it prohibited by your company’s internal regulations to sleep with the boss’s secretary?
Charlie – Only if the boss is already sleeping with his secretary.
Ben – I see. Priority right. So, you’re fired.
Charlie – Without notice. I have to clear out my desk by tonight.
Ben – And what are you going to do?
Charlie – You know what? I think this firing is an opportunity for me.
Ben – Oh, really? So, you’re the positive-thinking type…
Charlie – I would never have had the courage to resign. I’m going to start my own business.
Ben – An accounting firm, then.
Charlie – When you get out of prison, you don’t dream of becoming a guard. No, I’m going to open a restaurant. I don’t know why, but I’ve always wanted to run a restaurant. Even though I don’t know how to cook.
Ben – Oh, I see. Still, it can help when you want to get into the restaurant business…
Charlie – Are you in the restaurant business?
Ben – No, IT.
Charlie – I’m going to need a chef… Do you know how to cook?
Ben – I can make pasta.
Charlie – We could open an Italian restaurant.
Ben – Where are you going to set up this restaurant?
Charlie – In the South… If you’re going to do it… You know the song. If I have to end up in poverty, it’ll be less painful in the sun.
Ben – And, when you open a restaurant, at least you’re sure you’ll never starve.
The other prepares to leave.
Charlie – Alright, I’m going to pack up all my office stuff into a box, just like in American TV shows, and then I’m leaving.
Ben – I’ll come down with you…
Charlie – To the South?
Ben – No, to the elevator, to start with.
They exit.
Black.
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A sketch from the collection Nicotine
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