Champion of the Obscure - Scene

                   O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!
                   Is it not monstrous that this player here,
                   But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
                   Could force his soul so to his own conceit,
                   For all her working -

         Damn!  That's wrong!  All right, again -

                   O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!
                   Is it not monstrous that this player here,
                   But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
                   Could force his soul so to his own conceit,
                   That, from her working -

         Ha!  I've got you, you bastard!

                                         - all his visage wann'd,
                   Tears in his eyes, distraction in his aspect,
                   A broken voice, and his whole function suiting
                   With forms to his conceit?
                   That, from her working all his visage wanned -

         You're repeating yourself again, you cocksucker!  You ass!  Well, congratulations!  At least you got it right both times.

         Sutton lay on his bed, staring up at the ceiling.  He had no difficulty falling asleep each night, but he definitely had a problem when he woke around three-thirty.  It happened almost every night and it would usually be a couple of hours before he could doze off again, if he was that lucky.  Depression, diagnosed Westerman.  Too much sleep during the day, diagnosed Sutton.

         When he was being sensible, he'd turn on the light and read, but most of the time he lay listening to the sounds of the house and of the elements outside.  In a couple of months, at least he'd have the pulsing rhythm of the crickets for company in this nocturnal prison.  Then again, it wasn't so bad, now.  The worst had been the long nights when he'd been suffering from the D.T.'s.  The claustrophobia of the huge spiders' webs sticking to his skin, blinding his eyes, enshrouding him, suffocating him.  His throat would be raw in the mornings, but he couldn't remember screaming.

         Sutton searched in the fog for the line.  It was there, just out of his reach.  He'd looked up this speech only yesterday.  It couldn't have evaporated that quickly.  He'd played Hamlet for eighty-two performances on Broadway.  What the hell was wrong?  He'd read all that shit Eric had presented to him about alcohol dissolving the temporal lobe - the memory.  He'd been off the bottle for two years, three months and twenty-seven - no, twenty-eight days.  Things should have improved, not deteriorated - or at least they should have stayed the same.

         Maybe he'd try another speech or another play.  Yes, that would be a better idea - another play.  He'd give that old son of a bitch Iago a try.  Iago was a role Sutton had relished sinking his teeth into right up to the gums.  "A moral pyromaniac," some critic had called him.  Iago had to be the ultimate villain.  He was so deliciously devious, so devilishly dishonest, that audiences hated his guts, and what better starting point for an actor.

                   That Cassio loves her, I do well believe it;
                   That she loves him, 'tis apt, and of great credit:
                   The Moor - howbeit that I endure him not -
                   Is of a constant, loving, noble nature;
                   And I dare think he'll prove to Desdemona
                   A most dear husband.  Now, I do love her too;
                   Not out of absolute lust, - though -

         Sutton struggled.  He was stretching into the fog, brushing the shapeless words with his fingertips.

                   Not out of absolute lust, - though - though -

         Fuuuuuuuuuuuck!  Fuck me!  Come on, you ulcerated asshole!  I'll back up a bit.  That'll help.

                                         Now, I do love her too;
                   Not out of absolute lust, - though peradventure -

         Yes!

                   I stand accountant for as great a sin, -
                   But partly led to diet my revenge - revenge - revenge -

         God damn it!

         Sutton thumped his fist against the mattress.

                               - to diet my revenge,
                   For that I do suspect the lusty Moor
                   Hath leapt into my seat:  the thought whereof
                   Doth, like a poisonous mineral, gnaw my inwards;

         Yes!  Yes!  Yes!  I'm on a roll now!  Nothing can stop me now!

                   And nothing can or shall content my soul
                   Till I am even'd with him, wife for wife;
                   Or failing so -

         Augh!  No!  I spoke too soon!  I've jinxed it!

         Sutton squeezed his brow and concentrated.  The fog had become too thick.

         Come on!  Come on!  Come on!  This is no good.  Oh shit, I'll never sleep now.  If I just get this line, I promise I'll go right to sleep.  Just let me get this one line!  It's there - it has to be.  Iago's never deserted me yet!  I swear I knew it the last time!  I swear!  Just let me have this one line.  Just this once!

         Please.