Margot and the Bed Bug Man

MARGOT (late 20s, early 30s)

PHIL (late 20s, early 30s)

A New York studio apartment. 

The present.

(MARGOT stands alone in her studio apartment. She is surrounded by bulging garbage bags, which are tied and sealed with excessive duct tape. She surveys her surroundings wearily, then convulses, smacking her forearm and scrutinizing it before blossoming into a full-blown tantrum, which includes shedding her shirt. In its wake, her intercom buzzes.)

MARGOT

(at the intercom, not in it)

WHAT! 

(shuffling over and pressing the button)

Hi.

VOICE

You have a visitor… um… Phil?

MARGOT

(into intercom)

It’s about time.

(MARGOT puts her shirt back on. There is a knock at the door. MARGOT opens it and regards the knocker, whom we don’t see.)

MAN’S VOICE

You Margot?

           

(MARGOT doesn’t respond.)

This Apartment J?

MARGOT

Where is your equipment.

MAN’S VOICE

You gonna let me in?

MARGOT

I was told you would be in plain clothes.

MAN’S VOICE

This look like a uniform to you?

(PHIL enters. He is wearing all black and there are various chains hanging from his body, his clothes, his orifices. Some of these involve spikes. Perhaps he is wearing a dog collar. His arms are covered in tattoos. He is rolling a distinctly feminine suitcase. It is no bigger than a piece of standard carry-on luggage, ideally smaller.)

MARGOT

My appointment was at two.

(PHIL does not acknowledge this.)

MARGOT

It’s four thirty.

PHIL

Traffic in Queens. So, uh, what am I treating. 

MARGOT

Everywhere. Everywhere, everywhere, everywhere, everywhere!

(handing him a piece of paper)

The numbers correspond to numbers on the bags.

PHIL

(referring to the list)

You got those crazy shoes with the toes!

 MARGOT

Do they live in those?

PHIL

You wear those to work?

MARGOT

No.

PHIL

You work?

MARGOT

… yeah,  should we get started? I have to be somewhere in… Do we even have time at this point or should I just reschedule? Ugh, then they have an extra day to reproduce. Let’s just… can you finish in an hour and a half?

PHIL

What’s the rush?

MARGOT

Is that enough time or not?

PHIL

Depends what you want sprayed. Just those bags? Sure.

MARGOT

Spray? I thought this was steam.

PHIL

I spray the steam.

MARGOT

Everything in these bags, and those. You can steam books right? That guy Jason told me you can steam books.

PHIL

Yeah, yeah.

MARGOT

Ninety minutes is enough.

PHIL

Big plans?

MARGOT

I have a date.

PHIL

Do my best.

MARGOT

Great.

PHIL

(casually checking out her bookshelf)

You read all these?

MARGOT

Most of them.

PHIL

Damn. Smarty pants.

(MARGOT, fidgeting, suddenly darts over to his bag unzips it and reaches inside.)

PHIL

What the fuck do you think you’re doing!

MARGOT

I have bed bugs!

PHIL

You and a million other people, sweetheart.

MARGOT

I’m paying you to do something about it!

PHIL

I am!

MARGOT

You’re walking around!

PHIL

I got here three seconds ago!

MARGOT

And everyone in my building probably thinks I’m buying drugs from you!

PHIL

It's just a suitcase!

MARGOT

LOOK AT YOU!

PHIL

(casually beginning to assemble a small steamer)

Apartment J got her panties all twisted. You got a fredgie or something?

MARGOT

My PANTIES are not twisted. My PANTIES are in bag five and waiting to be steamed. What's a fredgie.

(PHIL illustrates a front wedgie. MARGOT cringes. PHIL finishes assembling the steamer and approaches the first bag. He rips a messy hole in it and plunges the nose of the steamer inside. As it buzzes, he punches and pokes it around haphazardly.)

MARGOT

How is that working?

PHIL

Heat kills the bugs. What’s his name.

MARGOT

I forgot. It’s a blind date. You aren’t even doing it systematically—you’re just poking—

PHIL

(interrupting)

Heat. Kills. The bugs.

MARGOT

I read that it has to make direct contact.

PHIL

Lady, I may look like your drug dealer, but I got a fucking degree in entomology from Cornell and have been doing this shit since I was sixteen, alright, so trust me on this one. Go… read one of your fifteen thousand books or something.

(Beat.)

MARGOT

My brother went to Cornell.

PHIL

He do this for a living, too?

MARGOT

He runs a tutoring company.

PHIL

Ladida. Real academic family.

MARGOT

I haven’t read all those books.

PHIL

Just the one about how I’m supposed to do my job, right.

(PHIL finishes one bag and moves to the next, ripping another messy hole in the plastic and repeating the sloppy procedure.)

PHIL

How much does he make now?

MARGOT

A lot.

PHIL

I could take a page from the Ladida family.

MARGOT

I’m not Ladida.  

PHIL

How much do you make.

(MARGOT doesn’t respond.)

PHIL

I make 20 bucks an hour. Your turn.

(MARGOT says nothing.)

PHIL

I see. You got a trust fund or something?

MARGOT

That’s rude.

PHIL

Only Ladida people say that.

MARGOT

Sorry I don’t have a piercing in my face.

PHIL

(moving on to the third bag)

You don’t want people to know the bed bug man came, this is a great disguise. So they think you’re buying drugs. You’re not. If I were your drug dealer, I’d dress like an exterminator.

MARGOT

Carter. I just remembered, his name is Carter.

PHIL

Jesus.

MARGOT

Shut up.

PHIL

You gonna tell me what your job is or not?

MARGOT

I’m studying to be a psychotherapist.

PHIL

I didn’t know they let psychos be therapists.

MARGOT

Hilarious.

PHIL

Serious? You’re a shrink.

MARGOT

Yes, I’m serious.

PHIL

You’re gonna make a shit ton.

MARGOT

Probably more than twenty bucks an hour, does that make me a snob?

PHIL

That doesn’t.

(PHIL moves to the fourth bag.)

MARGOT

Are you certain that was long enough in that one?

PHIL

You got student loans?

MARGOT

Yes.

PHIL

How much?

MARGOT

What is with you and money?

PHIL

Government paid back my loans on condition if there’s ever like, some friggin’ huge terrorist attack with insects I’ll work for free.

MARGOT

Huh.

PHIL

Yeah, or if some Senator gets bed bugs or some shit, I might get called. Who knows.

(MARGOT peers into one of the bags PHIL has “treated.”)

PHIL

Don’t put your hand in there it’s still—

MARGOT

Ow!

PHIL

—hot.

MARGOT

Sorry.

PHIL

Now I’m working for this punk Jason, doesn’t pay me shit.

MARGOT

Right. Jason.

PHIL

Doesn’t know a beetle from a bed bug. Twenty-two year old with a trust fund.

MARGOT

So start your own business.

PHIL

Okay.

MARGOT

You’re obviously educated and bitter about not making what you’re worth, so quit whining and start your own business for God’s sake. Jeez.

PHIL

I been thinkin’ of that actually.

MARGOT

Now has got to be a good time—good market.

PHIL

Bugs all over this damn city.

MARGOT

No shortage of demand.

PHIL

Mmm.

MARGOT

But you haven’t.

PHIL

Mmm.

MARGOT

You’re lazy.

PHIL

Is that a professional term?

MARGOT

If it’s an accurate one.

PHIL

(moving to the fifth bag, amused, to himself)

“Jeez.”

MARGOT

Okay, uh, books… should I get them down?

(pulling a frame out from where it is buried under stacks of books)

Also, this.

PHIL

I don’t think I should steam your college diploma.

MARGOT

They can live in frames.

PHIL

But it’s—

MARGOT

STEAM MY DIPLOMA. 

(PHIL’S phone rings.)

PHIL

(into phone)

What. Yeah, almost.

(to MARGOT)

Jason wants to talk to you.

(MARGOT takes the phone from PHIL, who turns his back to her and pretends to steam her diploma.)

MARGOT

This is Margot. Yes, fine, but I just want to confirm the 60-Day Guarantee… I read 60… You can’t just change it to 30… No it’s not, you think I’m an idiot? The life cycle is 5-8 weeks—

(to PHIL)

He says to come back in 60 days if I need you.

(listening, then)

For no charge because you were two hours late.

           

PHIL

‘Cause he double booked me!

MARGOT

(thrusting phone at PHIL)

So stand up to him!

(PHIL shrugs. Places her diploma somewhere on display—on a shelf, or hanging on an unused peg on the wall. MARGOT watches him.)

MARGOT

(into phone)

He says he quits.

(PHIL lunges for the phone, but MARGOT evades him.)

He’s starting his own business. I’m his first client.

(second thought)

And I hope you get bed bugs!

(final thought)

If you don’t have them, yet!

(MARGOT hangs up and tosses him the phone.)

PHIL

You’ve got a real therapeutic touch.

MARGOT

I saw you.

PHIL

What?

MARGOT

You didn’t steam it.

(PHIL shrugs.)

MARGOT

How much do I owe. Jason was charging $250.

PHIL

How about dinner?

MARGOT

Don’t be an idiot.

PHIL

Wow. Okay, not dinner.

MARGOT

You’re starting a business. Finish the books.

(MARGOT dials a number on her phone.)

MARGOT

(into phone)

Carter? Hi, this is Margot, Winston’s sister… how are you! Not great, I seem to have come down with some kind of bug…

(to PHIL)

We’ll discuss your rate over dinner.