In your benevolence, hear the Martyr’s plea for your undivided attention.
Starring Sarah Whitehouse as Elwer, the Martyr (she/them)
With additional voices from the season 1 cast
Your undivided attention
I Need A Miracle, season 1, episode 11 of 12
Written and created by Matt Boothman
Directed by Robert Valentine
Music by Katharine Seaton
Sound design by Sarah Buchynski
Casting by Fiona Thraille
Recorded at Jukebox Studios
Broadcast assistance from Teresa Milewski
Cover art by Dionysis Livanis
Produced by Sarah Golding of Wireless Theatre for Foggy Outline
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If you enjoyed this episode, in your benevolence, I entreat you to:
Transcript
Delicate synth and violin music plays; mysterious, calm but slightly haunting.
ANNOUNCER 1:
Foggy Outline presents: I Need A Miracle. Produced by Wireless Theatre.
Your undivided attention. Written by Matt Boothman. Performed by Sarah Whitehouse.
The music ends.
A murmur of many pleading voices, overlapping indistinguishably.
Out of the murmur, a single voice breaks through.
THE MARTYR:
In your benevolence, will you hear me?
The murmurs die away. THE MARTYR is in a garden lush with the sounds of birds and insects.
They give a little laugh, hardly more than an emphatic breath out.
THE MARTYR:
This is a miracle in itself, isn’t it?
(sighs) We shouldn’t really need anything more than this. The fact you’d spare even a thought for me. For any of us. Maybe that should be miracle enough.
THE MARTYR takes a deep breath.
THE MARTYR:
I imagine … I mean, there must be so many other people crying out to you right this second. You must be dividing your attention … however many ways. But even having just this sliver dedicated to me … I feel bathed in it. My whole entire being…
(blissful) …immersed.
In among all the things we ask you for, has anyone ever taken the time to tell you how it feels?
What it’s like to have your attention, or … even just a bit of it?
It’s…
It’s warm like summer sun. But not blinding or burning. Like the buttery summer evening sunlight only poets believe in. Waves of it. Streaming through me. Warming me from inside. Making my whole being glow. It’s fresh like an autumn breeze. It wakes me up, makes me realise I wasn’t fully awake, that there was a level I hadn’t reached, where I can see more, smell more – it spritzes my sluggish thoughts with an icy spray so they spring into awareness, of the world, of myself, of … what I want.
It’s vast, but also safe. Like being cupped in a great hand.
THE MARTYR dithers.
THE MARTYR:
There is something I want to ask you for. Of course you must know that already. Oh, I’m sorry. Just this should be enough, really. It’s not that important. But then I’m not important, really, and well. You’re still listening. You.
And it’s not important, and I’m not important … but it would make me feel important, I think. I don’t really know I suppose. That might be why. It’s just…
She lets out a tense breath and draws a fresh one.
THE MARTYR:
I feel like I spend my whole life in people’s peripheral vision.
I’m always the thing distracting them from the thing they actually want to attend to. We’re a big family and … I like being around lots of people. And I don’t even love the spotlight, really, but just once…
I actually can’t remember the last time anyone fully looked me in the eyes. Always half an eye on something else.
It’s probably selfish. But … it would be a weird thing to ask another person for. Uh, not you, though. In your benevolence, it doesn’t feel so weird, asking you.
I want–
(testing each word carefully) I think I would like to know how it would feel to have your undivided attention, just for a moment.
I just started wondering about it one morning and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. There’s this … emptiness in me, that I’ve been feeling for a long time, without knowing what it was. Then … oh. I realised what was lacking. And now I can feel it getting bigger, and hungrier ,every time someone’s eyes drift away from me, or they start calling over to someone else while I’m trying to say something.
But it’s not growing now, this hollow feeling. Not while I’m cupped in your hand, speaking in your ear. And I have this wild thought, that just the briefest moment of your full attention would – top me all the way back up.
It’s definitely selfish. You have all these responsibilities and all these people wanting your attention and all these things to keep track of. I know that wanting all your attention on me means taking it away from everyone else, everything else. Even though … it would just be for a moment.
But I can’t stop thinking about it. How different it might feel to this. Whether it would be brighter. Hotter. Whether it would feel invasive? Or just like this but – more. Infinitely more. Infinitely safe. To be completely heard, entirely regarded … wholly known?
I think about whether I’d be able to feel what you think of me. Whether it would feel like being judged. Or like being appreciated.
I–
It could be too much for me.
Do you … divide your attention because there’s always so many of us asking for it?
It doesn’t seem fair to you.
Or is it to protect us, because none of us could stand the heat of your full attention?
If you give me what I’m asking for, will I just be annihilated?
I’ve actually been thinking a lot about that possibility. I want you to know, I’ve thought about it and I do understand what I’m asking for. I understand what might happen and I’m still asking you for this. I think it would be worth it. To know that just for a moment, the rest of your world disappeared, and I was all of it.
She lets out a short laugh at herself.
THE MARTYR:
I said it was selfish. Just for a moment. Forget everyone else, everything else, just for a moment. Let everything else be, and just – be – with me. Just us. Seeing, and being seen.
Whatever it means, I want it. I need it.
Maybe it’s not for me to say…
But I might be destroyed in the next moment, or at least have a completely life-changing experience, so I’m going to say it:
Maybe you need it too?
Stop spreading so thin and focus just for a moment. You’re not like us – I know that. But I know everyone needs that sometimes.
A murmur of indistinguishable voices begins to swell up over THE MARTYR’s voice.
THE MARTYR:
In your benevolence, thank you for hearing me out. Whatever your answer is, I’ll be here.
All the voices gradually fade away.
ANNOUNCER 2:
I Need A Miracle is a Foggy Outline podcast produced by Wireless Theatre. Directed by Robert Valentine. Produced by Sarah Golding. Casting by Fiona Thraille. Broadcast assistance by Teresa Milewski. Music by Katharine Seaton. Sound design by Sarah Buchynski. Recorded by Stephen H. at Jukebox Studios. Find more audio gold at wirelesstheatrecompany.co.uk and foggyoutline.com.
Thank you for listening.