Free Rock 'n' Roll by Tom Stoppard

college or take a chance on being found dead when his phone doesn’t answer—
because there are no other options.
    ESME I never thought of that.
    ALICE Sorted, then.
    Alice goes indoors, changes her mind and comes back and hugs Esme. They stay hugging for a while.
    ALICE (
cont.
) Mum.
    ESME ‘Only one bathroom.’
    ALICE Well.
    ESME If only you’d leave school when people are supposed to, you’d be old enough to be left, or go backpacking somewhere …
    ALICE No, Mum, take it slowly, I’d still be sixteen—waiting for my ‘O’ level results.
    ESME You know what I mean, stop showing me up. (
a dismissive kiss
) Look in on Grandpa, and don’t say anything, leave it to me.
    Alice goes back into the interior as Max enters with some difficulty, using crutches. Apart from the leg—he has broken the neck of the femur—he is in good shape for his age.
    ALICE I was coming to see you. If you’re looking for Mum, she’s outside.
    MAX What’s forty-three per cent of seventy-five?
    ALICE Same as seventy-five per cent of forty-three. Thirty-two and a quarter.
    MAX Thirty-two and a quarter!
    ALICE Would you like a cup of tea or anything?
    MAX I would. A small whisky. I can see this is going to work very well, you and Esme moving in.
    Alice freezes, then goes out. Esme realises Max has come in. She reacts to go indoors but Max, nimble on his crutches, reaches the frontier.
    ESME Pa … I said shout.
    MAX What are you doing in the dark?
    Max collapses, groaning, into a garden chair.
    ESME I came out to have a …
    MAX That bloody woman’s mandate is thirty-two and a quarter per cent!
    ESME We can go in.
    MAX I’ve just sat down, I’m not moving. Five more years of the haves having it over the have-nots, on a mandate of less than a third of the electorate.
    ESME Isn’t that good? You wouldn’t want
more
people on her side, would you?
    MAX I’d put you up against Socrates. Your lack of education has made you impregnable.
    ESME (
furious
) Go to hell, then, both of you!
    MAX What’s up?
    ESME If you don’t know, I’m not going to tell you. (
She averts a small weep.
) I’m sick of trying to please everyone and getting patronised for my pains.
    MAX Never.
    ESME Yes, you do. In fact I know about as many things as you do—more, probably—just not career things. I must have been tripping in the water meadows the day they did Socrates. The acid queen of Cambridge High, yeah, that was a joke … And now look.
    MAX Esme …
    She fails to avert the weep for a moment only.
    ESME It’s Alice leaving school before I was ready. I’m running out of uses.
    MAX Alice is a great achievement.
    ESME You’re doing it. Mum had me
on the sidel
    MAX Come and sit where I can reach.
    Esme scrapes her chair nearer. Max takes her hand.
    MAX (
cont.
) You’re not apologising for not being Eleanor, are you?
    ESME (
fiercely
) No!—I do three people’s work for charlady pay in a charity shop, even if I still get my sums wrong. But I’m not Eleanor and I’m not Nico either. Nico was with the Velvet Underground. The Velvet Underground was a rock band.
    MAX I recognised the semiotics.
    ESME She had long blonde hair. I had the hair without the band, and two ‘O’ levels to fall back on. I was grateful to get out of Clarendon Street into a grotty flat in the Milton Road Estate cooking Nigel’s dinner with Alice at my breast. The commune got a bit hierarchical.
    MAX (
interested
) Really? Tell me about that.
    ESME (
cross
) No. Stop making everything about
your
thing. I’m talking about, I don’t know, being the dog’s bollocks at Latin when I was thirteen—which I was. Well, I’ve done that now, so you can.
    MAX No, I’m justly rebuked. Yesterday, standing in the polling station … There was no one to vote for. No one. It’s not just you.
    ESME (
small laugh
) After the drama of