Jeanine Tesori
“Don’t try to quote to me…”
[FATHER, spoken]
Don't try to quote to me from the Book of Suffering. 

[YOUNG VI, spoken]
You don't know anything about it!

[FATHER, spoken]
I know its every page by heart!

[VIOLET, spoken]
I'd like to see you try this face on before you dare speak to me of suffering. 

[FATHER, spoken]
What is it you want to hear?

[VIOLET, spoken]
You know what I want to hear!

[FATHER, spoken]
That it was all my fault? Is that what you want me to say? Alright then. It was all my fault. I'm sorry, and there's an end to it. 

[VIOLET, spoken]
There is no end to it. Not for me. 

[FATHER, spoken]
Just tell me what you want, damn you. I will do it; I will say it. What does it take?
[VIOLET, spoken]
The last twelve years of my life? Can you get those back for me? Can you take back all the frightened looks from little girls, the jeers their brothers flung at me, the words of Christian sympathy their parents spat in my face like boiling oil?

[FATHER, spoken]
You think the accident didn't leave its mark on me?

[VIOLET, spoken]
Not out for everyone to see and be sickened by!

[FATHER, spoken]
What else could I have done? The accident happened, I couldn't undo that. I got you to the doctor as fast as I could. 

[VIOLET, spoken]
Yeah, a doctor who'd been out drinking and who sewed me up like a pair of old shoes. And then you waited five years too long to try and make it right. 

[FATHER, spoken]
But you know why…

[VIOLET, spoken]
You know what I think? You did it on purpose. You were afraid I'd leave if I were pretty, so you took care of that. You made damn sure no one else would come within a mile of me.