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JD DRAMA PUBLISHING

Second Chances
Female Dramatic
By Stephanie Christensen

ISBN: 978-1-945916-14-4

Teresa [reminiscing a memory]: On that terrible day, I

remember clawing at the water like the salt and sea could
save me.

My voice screeched like shattered glass, but I could barely

hear it over the ringing of a thousand nonexistent buzzing
bees in my ears. My entire body was buzzing. The sound of
failing engines and the smell of sweat and death felt fresh,
but distant, as the ocean water corroded my senses.

Adrenaline is not what you think it’s going to feel like. It

feels like fear… personified.

My head went underwater. Sea water filled my mouth,

tangled my hair.

[Back to reality, talking to the audience] …You asked me

to explain this—to bring back a memory I had no intention
of letting resurface—but I swear to you, all I can feel is the
pain and terror. The crackling of a flaming airplane wing as
it crumbled under its own weight, submerging into the ocean.
It sank among the chaos, along with the people drowning
beside me.

And the only thing that I could think about after the airplane
crashed was Isabel.
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[meld/flashback. Teresa is drowning, after a major plane

crash. She is frantic, in the water]

“Help!” [choking on seawater] “Please! Please somebody

help me! Please God let me drown but save Isabel. I can’t—I
can’t have lost Isabel.”

INTRO

Teresa [present day, meeting audience for the first time]:

Hi! My name is Teresa—oh yes, you know that because of
my application. Thank you for seeing me. Can I get you
anything to drink? Water? Almond milk?

I think you might like to know that we are a completely

caffeine free household. So, no soda. No coffee.

…Unless you want some, then of course, of course I’ll get it

for you! No problem—

Sit? You want me to sit? Okay, I’ll sit.

[awkward silence]

I hope I don’t see nervous to you. As you know, I’ve been

through this process before. Believe it or not, I’m usually
really good at this. I don’t want to brag but I’ve always been
pretty good at persuading people. [pause] Oh! That sounded
like a threat. I swear that was not a threat. [strained laugh,
moves into an explanation] I read people. Their body
language, their eyes—most people don’t realize it, but even a
few casual words about the weather can reveal exactly the
type of person they are. I am particularly good at deciphering
these signals.
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I’ve lived here in Sedona, Arizona all of my life. Sedona is

home of the Red Rock—tourists come from all over to stare
at the mountains’ beauty. Consequently, Sedona also turned
into home of the tourist trap.

[Picks up card] See this? This is a tarot card, my most

powerful tool.

A lot of fake fortune tellers popped up around the Red Rock

in my childhood. And I LOVED them, always saving up my
money and sneaking away when I could. It drove my parents
mad! I mean, [rambling] if I were a parent—if you make me
a parent—I would never encourage that kind of rebellion. I
would support my kid’s dreams, of course. I would love and
care for them always. I would just be… [swallows down
emotions] very vigilant about their safety.

But, soon enough I began to frequent one Teller shop more

than the others. My favorite Teller, a woman named Jean
with knee-length greasy hair and abundant turquoise jewelry,
began to take me under her wing. She taught me the
difference between a tourist trap Teller and a true believer.
She became a mentor, showing me the importance of Tarot
cards, and enhancing my connection to the spiritual world
and omnipresent energies around me. I know most people
don’t believe in “more”, but becoming a Teller has connected
me to God, and to my loved ones on a supernatural level.
And it helps me seek peace in the hardest of times.

My abilities to predict have been a bit foggier since the

accident. [Quick recover] But, I’m all recovered now! And
I’m ready to be a good parent. [picks up papers] Here are
the last of my adoption papers. They include my home and
cell phone number, so you can contact me or my wife with
any questions or concerns.
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[Nods as if audience asked a question]

Yes. Yes, I have my DCS clearances and approved

background check in the state of Arizona.

[Pauses to listen]

Yes. I have been through the legal adoption process before.

[Pauses, looking stunned and sad at an insinuation by the

audience]

No… uh… [straining emotionally] I explained it all in my

letter with the application. As you may know, being in the
LGBTQ community can present some added obstacles to
trying to adopt a child. The first time around wasn’t easy.
But, my wife Andrea and I have been adamantly committed
to creating a family environment at home. We read all of the
parenting books possible before our first adoption. And truly,
we always think and make decisions as a team— [holds out
ring] we’ve been married for 14 years, coming up on 15 this
March.

Andrea’s at work today. She’s a nurse, and one of the most

loving and motherly people I’ve ever met. If only you could
meet her right now, you would know she is destined to be a
mother. When we first met, she walked into my Teller shop
and I only had five words for her. She asked me for her
future, I looked her in the eyes, and I said: “You’ll be
married very soon.” [blushes]

We discussed adopting a child about 9 years into our

marriage. She posed surrogacy, but we both agreed that there
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were already so many children in need of a home. And we

have so much love and acceptance that we want to give.

After the years of paperwork and background checks, we

finally met our beautiful daughter… Isabel.

[She takes a moment, resonating on her daughter with

love in her eyes. She reacts as if audience asked “and
she’s the child who you lost?”]

Yes… she’s the one who died.

[Flashback to the drowning, screaming in a panic]

“Isabel! Isabel! Please!”

[Meld to present]

I, uh… I can’t. That’s very difficult to talk about. Four years

doesn’t always seem like four years. Um, the whole plane
crash is still very fresh in my mind.

We were flying from Los Angeles to Japan. Andrea was

already in Tokyo, visiting her grandparents, so I spent days
convincing Isabel to be excited. She didn’t want to go, but
were going on our first international trip as a family. I forced
her to go. I promised her ice cream. I told her it’d be worth
it.

It just seems so unlucky. Who gets on a plane, watches

movies for 4 hours, and then plummets 50,000 feet out of the
sky?

It was all my fault. Isabel’s death was my fault. You people

worked so hard—you interrogated us for hours, you buried
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us in paperwork… you made sure that the insufficient

lesbian parents could pass every test possible before you
handed her over to us. And we deserved that! We deserved to
be tested to the greatest of our ability, to make sure we could
take care of that child.
Andrea could. Andrea was so good with Isabel, they never
had a fight in the year we had together. She didn’t get to say
goodbye to our baby.

I’m the one who had to look her in the eye as we were going
down.

I grabbed her mask. I grabbed her oxygen mask and I put it

on her. And I talked to her. I tried to calm her, and focus on
finding my balance among the turbulence, but eventually I
just started screaming. We were weeping, and I wrapped my
arms around her so tight, like a human shield, to protect this
little girl that I promised I would take care of.

She was my responsibility. I promised I would take care of

her.
I promised I would take care of…

[Hyperventilating, gasping for air—feeling like she was

once again drowning]

[Slowly composes herself, takes deep breaths]

After I was rescued and treated, the hospital put me on

sedatives to handle the trauma. They helped, a little. But they
didn’t help me when I had to tell Andrea that our little girl’s
last words were “I’m scared”.

I don’t know how she convinced me to re-submit an

application and contact you all. I’m not capable of any of
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this. I am a parent who survived, while somewhere no more

than 200 feet away from me, my child died. I lost Isabel.
What if I kill this one too?

[She wipes her tears, runny nose]

Please go. And just send Andrea a rejection letter. I don’t

want her to know that I’m not better.

[Teresa walks over to table and picks up stack of tarot

cards, turning over three side by side. She stares at them,
and then smiles sadly.]

I have three tarot cards here. Death, The Hanged Man, and
The Sun.

Death surrounds me. I feel it when I sleep. I feel it when I

wake up. I feel it when I pray for Isabel.

I drew The Hanged Man in reverse, which signifies

martyrdom, indecision, and delay. The card shows a figure
tied by the ankles to the Tree of Life, suspended in a
standstill of time. He is unable to move forward and has lost
faith in his ability to overcome life’s obstacles.

The card signifies that I am suspended in time. I am

suspended in a moment, in the ocean, with my arms empty
where they once cradled my child as we crashed.

And yet, there is The Sun. The tiniest ray of hope rising over
the Red Rock… the Sun represents a promise of a new
period of optimism after the darkest of nights. I wish for that
sun. To feel the warmth on my face; to finally be freed from
my guilt.
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I’ll find my sun. And when I do, I’ll call you, and I’ll be
ready to bring a child into my arms, and into my heart. I will.
When Isabel’s ready… in her spot in heaven, she’ll call to
me. And I’ll be ready too.

Stephanie Christensen is a speech and interpretation coach

for Desert Vista High School in Phoenix, Arizona. She
competed on the AIA Division I high school speech circuit
for four years and is currently a student at Arizona State
University. Her passion for creativity and imagination fuels
her love of the arts, especially interpretation, and inspires her
to write pieces for young adults in her spare time.

This script is for the buyer’s use only. Under copyright law
this selection is not to be copied by any process.

Second Chances is a work of fiction and published as a

single script by JD Drama Publishing in 2018.

WWW.JDDRAMAPUBLISHING.COM

JD DRAMA PUBLISHING
Copyright Stephanie Christensen 2018
ISBN: 978-1-945916-14-4