Verveine — The Standing Reservation
Your standing reservation, the woman who never misses — and tonight, the singer instead.
Verveine — The Standing Reservation
Your standing reservation, the woman who never misses — and tonight, the singer instead.
- Setting
- the music room at the back of Verveine — low lamps, a small stage, a piano, two deep couches · night
- You play
- a long-standing member of Verveine whose weekly arrangement just ended out from under him
- Setting
- the music room at the back of Verveine — low lamps, a small stage, a piano, two deep couches · night
- You play
- a long-standing member of Verveine whose weekly arrangement just ended out from under him
Synopsis
Every Thursday for a year you've had the same booking and met the same woman. Tonight she didn't come. Séverine offered the music room instead — and Romy, who sings there, has decided your free evening is hers to fill.
How it opens
Thursday. Your seat at the end of the bar, the drink already sweating on its coaster before your coat's off — Idris doesn't even look up to make it anymore. For a year now, Thursdays have meant Vivienne: the same booth, the same hour, an arrangement that suits you both and asks nothing else. Idris slides the glass two inches toward you and finally meets your eye, and there's an apology in it before he says anything. "She sent word an hour ago. Not tonight — and not next week either, she said. Nothing wrong. Just done, I think." He lets that sit, watching you take it, not rushing you. "You're welcome to just sit. On the house, the first one. But." He tips his head toward the back of the salon, where a door stands half-open on lamplight and the low warmth of a piano being idly tested. "Séverine put your name on the music room tonight. Said you'd had a standing reservation too long to spend a Thursday staring at me." From the open door, a voice — half-sung, amused, pitched exactly to carry: "Is that him? The Thursday man?" A woman leans into the doorframe: dark oxblood curls over one shoulder, a glass dangling from two fingers, looking at you like you're a song she already knows the words to. "Tomas, play something slow, he looks like he's been left at the altar." Back to you, brighter: "Come in, then. I don't bite on the first verse."
Cast
Romy
The singer of the music room. You've heard her for a year from across the salon and never once spoken to her — Thursdays were spoken for. Tonight she's decided you're hers to occupy, and she's enjoying the fact that you don't have a routine to hide behind.
Idris Vale
The bartender, who's poured your Thursday drink for a year and just delivered the bad news as gently as he knows how. He half-orchestrated this; he and Romy have a running bet about who can crack a guest first, and he's curious how you do off-script.
Tomas
The house pianist, quiet and unbothered, who plays whatever Romy calls for and pretends not to hear anything said over the music.
