SALVAGE by Joanne Hayden - Tiny Plays for a Brighter Future

Ten Tiny Plays, consisting of just 600 words, have been shortlisted as part of the Tiny Plays for a Brighter Future challenge, a partnership between ESB and Fishamble: The New Play Company, which was launched in February 2021. The challenge invited writers to imagine what a brighter energy future means to them, and to capture that in a 600-word play. Over 350 submissions were received, and the shortlisted plays were selected by an independent panel of judges. 
​

Salvage by Joanne Hayden
 
​
Ma      Feels like we’re mitching, doesn’t it? The beach in the middle of the week. You all right? Leave your crutch on the rug and I’ll take your runners off for you, let the sand between your toes.

Ali       I can take them off myself, Ma. Stop fussing.

Ma      Manage?

Ali       Dammit.

Ma      There. Better? You’re doing great, love. You’ve been taking my tonic?

Ali       Even more vile than usual. Yes, I’m taking it.

Ma      You’ll be jiving in no time. Back to taxi mum – ferrying the twins all over.

Ali       Teenage Terrors.

Ma      Girls that age have to fight their mothers. They’ll hit twenty and get sense. You’ll end up the best of friends. Just look at us. Why’re you laughing? Isn’t this lovely? Gulls in full voice.

Ali       Full racket.

Ma      See the wagtails chasing the flies? And the dunes are doing better since we cleared the buckthorn.

Ali       Who’s we? The knit-your-own-brown-rice brigade?

Ma      My fellow volunteers and I, Ali. Allotment pals. The buckthorn was taking over, pushing out the native flowers and grasses. We cleared it last spring.

Ali       Sorry. I know I’m grumpy.

Ma      Your leg set you back.

Ali       Stupid fall. Stupid timing. Just as I was getting used to him being gone.

Ma      Takes a while. Separation’s hard.

Ali       You bounced back.

Ma      I put on a good show.

Ali       We came here a lot the summer Dad left.

Ma      We did. It helped us both. The swims. The picnics.

Ali       Everyone else with their ham and cheese rolls. Us with our hummus and mung bean bread. No, you’re right, it did help. We’d sit here like just this. On clear days, I’d stare at the horizon, the sea a bit darker than the sky, both pure blue and nothing else there except the line between them you could barely see. I’d sit, watching, in a trance of blue and imagine sailing around the world. Can’t do it now. The view’s destroyed by those ugly yokes.

Ma      The turbines.

Ali       Blades cutting up the landscape. Why did they have to put them there?

Ma      I like watching them. They remind me of how we’re turning all the time, circling the sun. You, me, the twins, everyone else, nearly eight billion of us, dying, birthing, being born, falling in love, getting hurt.

Ali       Reminds me of how people wreck everything.

Ma      And build out of the wreckage. After wars and plagues and hurricanes. Break-ups. Blazing rows with your mother cause she wouldn’t buy you a pair of skyscraper shoes for your sixteenth birthday.

Ali       The gladiator pumps.

Ma      It’s your neck you would’ve broken in those.

Ali       I ran away.

Ma      You came back. We have to have hope, Ali.

Ali       They should’ve put them somewhere else.

Ma      There’s loads of wind here. It’s clean. We don’t have to dig down for it. We don’t need to destroy anything.

Ali       Except natural beauty.

Ma      Sometimes it’s about changing the way we look at things. Little things. Big things. The sun and sea and wind are abundant. All that energy. Just waiting to be harnessed.

Ali       Wish I could harness some of yours.

Ma      There’s a spare togs for you in the bag. 

Ali       Have you lost it, Ma? I’ve a broken leg.

Ma      You can link me, bring your crutch. A gentle dunking is all. Be a turning point for you.  

Ali       If I fall or drown--

Ma      No one’s falling or drowning on my watch.

Ali       Am I actually saying yes?

Ma      We’ll have a picnic after. Goji berry bars.

Ali       Can’t wait.
 

Joanne Hayden is a writer and arts journalist. Her fiction has been shortlisted for the Francis MacManus award, broadcast on RTÉ radio and published in literary journals including Crannóg and Banshee. She has an MA in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia. She lives in Dublin.
Twitter: @trumpetandbell

Read more Tiny Plays for a Brighter Future