"10000 Emerald Pools"

Jefferson is packing for a 5 month business trip. Maxine is sitting in the side chair, mostly contemplative. They never embrace and Jefferson doesn’t really ever look at Maxine as he’s folding clothes and adding to the suitcase.

Jefferson: Just wait. “I’ll make a living.” 

Maxine: Is that really what this trip is about? 

Jefferson: if I do this, we’re set up. Business will be great and we’ll want for nothing.

Maxine: It feels more like you’re “trying to get away.” You’re using “ten thousand fathoms” as your excuse to leave. 

Jefferson: You keep saying that. I’m not going off to leave. Nothing “can [ever] pull me away” from you.

Maxine: So I can expect you back?

Jefferson: Yes.

Maxine: You’re not leaving me?

Jefferson: “No way!” Why do you ask?

Maxine: The way you’ve been acting, what you’ve been saying makes feel like you’re pulling away. That our entire relationship is purely “under water.” Everything is extra heavy and muffled.

Jefferson: The amount of time I’m away will go by so fast. 

Maxine: It will feel that “time is standing still.”

Jefferson: I know this sounds campy, but “you’re the treasure.” My treasure. At work I’ll have to literally “dive down deeper still” in the sub and it’s only a matter of time before we’re reunited. “All I need is you. You’re all I need to breathe.”

Maxine: I hear you. that “all [you] need is [me],” but I can’t help to believe that. Wouldn’t it be easier to end before instead of after your trip?

Jefferson: I want you to know that “down to the bottom” of my heart there are “ten thousand emerald pools” of my love. “You’re all I need to breathe.”

There’s a heavy silence and lights dim.

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