Wife of Bath's Tale -- Revised Circa 2014
What are the deepest, darkest, sensual secrets of young women?
In this play, 18-year-old Jim, his older sister Erica and his mother, Ellen, share a home just a few miles from the Pacific Ocean in Santa Barbara, California. Jim lives in a cozy guest house in back of the main house. It has skylights, a full kitchen and bath, a private deck in back (with a view of the neighbor's back yard), and a bedroom that has posters of volleyball players, track athletes and surfers, many of them gorgeous women. He is strikingly handsome, wears his blond hair long, has blue eyes and strong tanned body from playing soccer, surfing, and weight-lifting. He graduated a month ago and is planning to attend a nearby community college in the fall -- with a major in communications.
Erica is a junior at a university in northern California, and comes home for the summer to help Ellen run the coffee shop that the family has owned for fifteen years. Erica is tall, beautiful, very bright, and is majoring in civil engineering. Her career goal is to graduate next spring and find an engineering-related job with a California company. She and her mom are very close, and they both worry that Jim will not succeed in college because of his obsession for sports, workouts, and women.
Erica is more like a sister than a daughter to Ellen, who, in her mid-forties, is lovely, youthful, charming and a smart businesswoman. Ellen's husband was killed in a hunting accident five years ago. She has staffed her coffee shop with attractive, friendly and bright young students, and it is very profitable.
Act One / Scene One: Jim has a part-time summer job at a surfboard and beach clothing shop in Goleta, and following his shift, he surfs before coming home around four o'clock. On a warm August Tuesday Jim was on his deck watching the neighbor girl, Debbi, a sexy teen, who that day had her bikini top off. Jim's libido was firing on all cylinders. He was friends with Debbi, and they even kissed, once, but on this day he invited her up to his deck, and the kissing quickly turned to serious sex. Jim was so eager and assertive, and he had fantasized so often about seducing her, he never thought about Debbi's age. She was 16, and in California, having sex with a minor is statutory rape.
Act One / Scene Two: Jim's sister stumbled upon the love-making pair by accident; she was bringing Jim's mail, but as she entered the small cottage she heard the passion sounds and peeked onto the deck to witness her brother and the underage neighbor girl going at it. Later she confronted her brother:
"Jim I am shocked and outraged that you are having sex with a minor. Are you planning on getting her pregnant? How crazy is that? I'm going to bust you, Jim, big time."
"Oh come on Erica, she's almost eighteen and I'm not getting her pregnant."
"Jim, she's sixteen. I know her mother. It's called rape, statutory rape, even if she is cooperative, you're a rapist. And here's what I'm going to do…"
Erica told Jim that she will tell Debbi's mother that Jim is raping her daughter, and Jim could be arrested -- unless Jim meets certain conditions. They are: a) Jim must approach at least twelve young women he doesn't know in the mall, asking them their deepest, darkest sensual secrets and fantasies; b) if he finds one that will share deep dark sexy secrets, he must bring her to his house and introduce her to Erica, and the woman he brings has to hear Erica explain that she found her brother having sex with a 16-year-old, and she has to share her fantasies with Jim in front of Erica; and c) Jim must agree to stop seeing Debbi, who by now is knocking on Jim's door daily wanting more romance.
Act Two / Scene One: Jim walks the mall and introduces himself to girls he thinks might be open about their personal fantasies. One by one they turn away from him quickly, rejecting his request. The fifth woman he approaches actually slaps him across the face. The sixth female he approaches is friendly and cooperative, but suddenly her father comes out of a sports store and says, "Honey let's go have lunch" and whisks his daughter away without even recognizing that Jim is talking to her. After being turned down by 11 women, all of them at least cute if not foxy, he approaches the 12th woman, Barbara, who eagerly listens to Jim's request. Unfortunately for Jim, she is huge and unsightly; in fact she is morbidly obese. Her face is puffy and covered with pimples, her hair looks like it hasn't been washed in a month, and she has onion breath. At the food court she orders a double chocolate sundae.
"I will tell you some very sexy fantasies I have, how often I use my vibrator -- a very big dildo -- and I will even show you how I do it, but you have to promise me something."
"What do I have to promise?" Jim asked, remembering that he could be arrested if his sister tells the neighbor that he has been having sex with daughter Debbi. "Is this about money? If it is, I can get the money you need…"
"No, nothing about money," Barbara answered. "But you have to agree to grant me two wishes, if I go along with your scheme. Okay?" "Okay," Jim quickly agreed.
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