Roger Explains to Delia Why
Her Marriage Will Never Work
(August 1977)(Roger is in his apartment when the doorbell rings, repeatedly, a tell-tale sign that it is Delia. Sure enough, he opens the door, and there she is.)
DELIA: (walking right in) I'm sorry, I know I should have called first, but I went over to the hospital and they said that you wouldn't be there until around noon, so I just came straight over here.
ROGER: (grinning) You don't have to call. If I'm busy, I just won't answer the door.
DELIA: Roger, please don't make jokes! I'm very, very mad!
ROGER: That makes you a lot more attractive. Alright, I won't even offer you a cup of coffee, unless you ask for it. (sits down) Fire away.
DELIA: Okay. I know you feel that Faith isn't interested in Pat anymore...
ROGER: That's not what I said. I said that, in my opinion, she had no designs on Pat.
DELIA: Well, maybe I'm not smart enough to know the difference between having designs and being interested! All I know is, she's spending an awful lot of time with Pat, and it is driving me crazy!!!
ROGER: You know that they're both concerned about the Nieves boy.
DELIA: Faith is concerned about Pat, and she's doing everything she can to help him! She's helped him already. She had tests run on Angel and they showed that he's not as bad as everybody thought he was. She took them to the medical board and she saved Pat's job. Now, how do you think that makes me feel!
ROGER: I assume it made you happy that Pat wasn't fired.
DELIA: Yes, it made me very happy, but how do you think I feel about her saving his job?
ROGER: Alright, Delia, I can see how that got you slightly upset...
DELIA: Slightly upset? Would you stop making jokes? I am very, very serious about this!
ROGER: Perhaps if you paid half as much attention to me as you did Pat...
DELIA: I'm paying attention to you. I mean, I'm here, aren't I? Roger, I'm going half out of my mind! You've gotta help me! Please?
ROGER: Alright, I'm sorry, just ask old Uncle Roger.
DELIA: Okay, I'll explain everything. Faith is being very sweet to Pat, and she's doing this for him and she's doing that for him, and they're spending an awful lot of time together at the hospital, and I'm at home, waiting! So I thought, well, what if I was working at the hospital also, and I was helping Paddy out?
ROGER: (nods) I can see the logic in that.
DELIA: Yeah, well, then I got this wonderful idea: Well, what about if I was working at the hospital? And I figured that, since the House Association is very, very interested in his case, well maybe I could be a volunteer for the House Association.
ROGER: For the House Association?
DELIA: Yeah, and I could do something for Paddy.
ROGER: I'm not quite sure what you could accomplish.
DELIA: Well that's just the point! I can't accomplish anything, because I went to see Clem - I know how close he is with the House Association - but he was awful to me!
ROGER: Clem was?
DELIA: Yeah, Clem was! He said, a husband and wife working together, it would be very distracting, but yet an ex-fiance, she can work around him as much as she wants to! So, he said, if I want to volunteer for something, I should volunteer for the blood bank.
ROGER: I can see Clem's point of view, Dee.
DELIA: Roger, you don't seem to understand something - the blood bank is in the basement of the other building!
ROGER: That's right, it is.
DELIA: So now, uh, Clem just arranged the whole thing, and I gotta go to work tomorrow, and I'm gonna be working in the other building! I'm gonna be a thousand miles away from the two of them!
ROGER: Look, Dee, how did you see yourself?
DELIA: (shakes her head) I don't know - what are you talking about?
ROGER: Were you Joan of Ark, rallying the House Association in combat with the medical board, making them surrender and restore Pat to his rightful position?
DELIA: Yeah, yeah, something like that.
ROGER: Or were you thinking of the House Association as a base, and you could better understand the power structure of the hospital, and you could convince the medical board to remove the letter of reprimand from Pat's file?
DELIA: I don't know. The only thing I know is, Faith is helping Paddy a little too much. Now, I'm on the outside. I want to be on the inside.
ROGER: You could move mountains, too.
DELIA: (furious) Are you making fun of me again?
ROGER: No, no, it's just that I understand what it feels like to love somebody and feel them slipping through your fingers.
DELIA: I'm sorry, it's just that I don't want that to happen to Paddy and me.
ROGER: But it will, and for none of the reasons that you're thinking.
DELIA: I don't understand what you mean?
ROGER: It's never gonna work for you and Pat, honey. I'm going to tell you why.
(pause)
DELIA: I thought you were going to tell me?
ROGER: Alright, Dee, if I ask you some questions, will you be completely honest with me?
DELIA: (nods) Okay.
ROGER: (nods) First question: Let's say you're walking down the sidewalk, and you find a manilla paycheck envelope on the sidewalk with $100 in it. Now what would you do - turn it into the police, or keep it?
DELIA: (ponders) Did anyone see me find it?
ROGER: No.
DELIA: I think I would keep it. Is that the right answer?
ROGER: (holds up his hand) Just wait and I'll explain. Second question: Let's say there's something you want - you really want badly, a beautiful bracelet - and it costs ten dollars. Now, you have a choice: You can have that ten dollars and buy that bracelet today, or wait a week and get twenty dollars. Which would you choose?
DELIA: If I waited a week, would I risk losing that bracelet?
ROGER: Not at all.
DELIA: I think I would take the ten dollars and I would buy the bracelet, because I really don't like to wait for anything.
ROGER: (grins) You are wonderful!
DELIA: Good, was that the right answer?
ROGER: Just wait. Third and final question: Let's say you bought this beautiful old house that had been really run down. Now, would you work to restore that house to its original beauty - the way it was when it was built - or would you just fix up the places that needed fixing, put on a coat of paint, and live in it like that?
DELIA: Uhmm, I know this sounds awful, but it would be very difficult to strip all that paint off, so I think, maybe if I just put on a new coat of paint, the place would look great, I'm sure.
ROGER: (nods) Thank you for being honest, Dee. I think you've helped me prove my point.
DELIA: How?
ROGER: Alright, let's look at your basic values: Number one, you do not worry about being honest - you would take the hundred dollars, as long as no one saw you.
(Delia does not like where this is going at all, but he keeps going.)
ROGER: You don't like delaying gratification. You'd go out and buy the bracelet instead of waiting a week and getting an extra ten dollars. Third, you don't like hard work. You'd be perfectly happy with slapping on a coat of paint and living in a beautiful old house just like that.
DELIA: Okay, okay, so what does that prove?
ROGER: It proves, essentially, you are a selfish, self-serving person. You don't care for those old-fashioned traditions and virtues. Whereas Pat, on the other hand, like the other Ryans, do believe in those values: honesty, hard work, delaying gratification, sharing with others who have less than they do. Don't you see, Dee? No matter what happens between you and Pat, you're like oil and water.
DELIA: Wait! You're twisting everything I have said! Now, you're saying things that I never meant to say! I know it.
ROGER: Look, honey, Pat is tainted by the Ryan morality, and you'll never accept that.
DELIA: That's a terrible thing to say to me!
ROGER: It's not terrible! What's terrible? I too am untainted by morality! You made the right choices, and the same choices I would have made. Why wait a week when you could have something today? You might be dead or something better might come along.
DELIA: Oh, so you're saying you're as bad as I am?
ROGER: I'm saying we're two of a kind! The happiest times you've had in years was when we were together.
DELIA: (shaking her head) No.
ROGER: Yes, Dee. And you know that those were the happiest times for me.
DELIA: No, I don't know that. See, I know I could be a good person, I just have to get all the things that I need.
ROGER: Delia, that's not true.
DELIA: Oh, yeah, it is true! See, I know if I got all the things I need I could be the kind of person Paddy wants me to be!
ROGER: An old-fashioned girl with traditional values?
DELIA: (nods) Yeah. Yeah, sure, I could change. I mean, anybody can change. What I have to do now is I have to get out of the blood bank and I have to get to work for the House Association so I can concentrate on Pat. I know that's it.
ROGER: So, that's all you want from me - a way to get out of the blood bank?
DELIA: Roger, that's everything to me!
ROGER: Okay, Delia, there is a way, only...
DELIA: Only what?
ROGER: Well, it's a little selfish and immoral.
DELIA: Okay, what is it?
ROGER: Okay, what's the first thing you think of, when you think of the blood bank?
DELIA: Blood?
ROGER: The very substance that makes you faint!
DELIA: I do?
ROGER: (grinning) Of course you do! Lie there, moaning for Paddy.
DELIA: (the wheels turning) Oh, I see. So, if I faint at the sight of blood, then they might not want someone like me working there. Is that it?
ROGER: I shouldn't think they would.
DELIA: And then if I just fainted, then Pat would have to come running in and see if I'm okay.
ROGER: And possibly convince Clem that you should work for the House Association.
DELIA: Sometimes you are really a genius.
ROGER: I just don't like to postpone gratification.
(He takes her hand and she gets uncomfortable.)
DELIA: Yeah, well, I know, but I've got to get over to the blood bank. If you hear about somebody fainting, it's me. Don't worry.
(She opens the door and starts to leave.)
ROGER: But I do worry about you, Dee.
(She waves goodbye and he closes the door, frustrated.)
ROGER: And I don't know why...