A Lie Of The Mind: A Play in Three Acts

“BETH. Yore the dog. Yore the dog they send.

MIKE. I’m Mike. I’m your brother.

BETH. Mike the dog. (She spits in his face. Pause)

MIKE. I’m gonna stay with you now.

BETH. You gant take in me. You gant take me back.

MIKE. I’m not going to take you anywhere. We’ll stay right here until you’re all better.”

Though Mike is one of the more rational characters in the play, this scene points to a specific family structure. Beth calls him “the dog they send,” as though Mike is subservient to Baylor, and even in saying he will stay with Beth, Mike still emphasizes “until you’re all better.” Mike came to the hospital to get Beth and bring her home, which Beth recognizes as being moved from Jake’s possession to Baylor’s, with Mike as an errand boy between them.

“JAKE. Now. Why now? Why am I missing her now, Frankie? Why not then? When she was there? Why am I afraid I’m gonna’ lose her when she’s already gone? And this fear—this fear swarms through me—floods my whole body ‘til there’s nothing left. Nothing left of me. And then it turns—It turns to a fear for my whole life. Like my whole life is lost from losing her. Gone. That I’ll die like this. Lost. Just lost.

FRANKIE. It’s okay, Jake.”

Jake’s struggle is essentially a battle against becoming his father, who mistreated Lorraine and left her. Jake’s fear in this passage, while framed as a fear of losing Beth, is actually a fear of losing himself. When he says: “It turns to a fear for my whole life,” he is seeing how his marriage was a testament against the part of himself that is just like his father. In losing Beth, Jake can no longer distinguish himself from his father, which becomes the driving force in Jake’s conflict for the remainder of the play.

“BETH. NAAH! You gan’ stop my head. Nobody! Nobody stop my head. My head is me. Heez in me. You gan stop him in me. Nobody gan stop him in me.

MIKE. This guy tried to kill you! How can you still want a man who tried to kill you! What’s the matter with you! He’s the one who did this to you!

BETH. HEEZ MY HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAART!!!”

Beth’s outburst in this passage highlights her desire for self-determination, which is currently set against Mike’s desire to bring Beth away. She highlights her love for Jake, including saying that he is her “heart,” but this conversation is more so a reflection of why Beth married Jake in the first place: to get away from her family. In this way, the passage underscores The Collapse of the American Family. Mike’s confusion frames him as a rational character, but he does not understand why Beth would choose Jake, when her decision is more about not choosing Baylor and Mike.

“FRANKIE. He’s in big trouble, Mom.

LORRAINE. So what’s new? Name a day he wasn’t in trouble. He was trouble from day one. Fell on his damn head the second he was born. Slipped right through the doctor’s fingers. That’s where it all started. Back there. Had nothin’ to do with his upbringing.

SALLY. Mom, just listen to Frankie a second. He’s tryin’ to tell you somethin’.

LORRAINE. I am listenin’ but I’m not hearin’ no revelations! What’s the story hear? My boy’s sick. I’ll make him some soup. We’ll take him out to the Drive-In. Everything’s gonna’ be fine.”

As Lorraine enters the play, she sets up an early dynamic of denial and blame. She insists it was the doctors’ fault that Jake has troubles, which is further highlighted by denying that “his upbringing” played a role in his problems. The specific suggestion of soup and the Drive-In suggests that Lorraine does not want to understand the severity of the situation, highlighting how she is choosing to live in a delusion.

“BAYLOR. I gotta’ get those mules out to the fairgrounds. Now let’s go. We’re wastin’ our time here.

MIKE. Dad, wait a second. There’s no reason to get offended.

BAYLOR. I’m not offended! What the hell, I’m just a dumb rancher. What do I know? I don’t know the first damn thing about “brain damage.” They got specialists for that. Ain’t that right? They got boys back there with diplomas tall as a man. What am I supposed to know about it?

MIKE. If you can just wait—if you can just stay for an hour or so —

BAYLOR. I can’t wait. I got stock to feed. Now let’s go, Meg.”

Baylor’s deflection in this passage is thinly veiled, as he tries to emphasize his work despite Mike’s insistence on helping Beth. Even as Baylor claims he is “not offended,” he promptly frames himself as a “dumb rancher” in the presence of “specialists” and “boys back there with diplomas,” making it clear that he feels inferior. Rather than listen to Mike or the doctors, which would undermine his authority, he deflects to an area in which he can claim expertise, exposing his fragility.

“JAKE. What code?

LORRAINE. Oh, I can’t remember them now. There was lots of ‘em. It was so many years ago. He’d make ‘em all up.

JAKE. Why’d he use a code?

LORRAINE. He said it was because they didn’t want him to reveal his location.

JAKE. Did you believe him?

LORRAINE. Yeah. Why shouldn’t I of?

JAKE. Maybe he was lyin’.

LORRAINE. Why would he do that?

JAKE. So you wouldn’t know what he was up to. That’s why. Why do you think men lie to women?

LORRAINE. That was back when we were in love.

JAKE. Oh.”

The odd conflict in this passage highlights The Fragmentation of Memory and Identity. It shows the contrast between Lorraine saying she knows her husband made up the codes and her later statement that she believed he was telling the truth. Jake exposes his similarity to his father, here, by undermining Lorraine’s story and pointing out that her husband was probably lying to her. Lorraine’s comment at the end of this passage draws a parallel to Beth and Jake, between whom love has acted as a panacea for domestic abuse and tension.

“LORRAINE. No. He was no hero. Got hit by a truck. Drunk as a snake out in the middle of the highway. Truck blew up and he went with it. You already know that. (Jake leaps to his feet but stays by the bed.)

JAKE. DON’T TELL ME I ALREADY KNOW SOMETHIN’ I DON’T KNOW! DON’T TELL ME THAT! HOW COULD I KNOW SOMETHIN’ THAT I DON’T KNOW? (Pause. They stare at each other.)

LORRAINE. (Quietly.) Because you were there, Jake. You were right there with him when it happened.”

Up to this point, Jake’s father is framed as an important military figure, but Lorraine dispels that illusion by insisting that he was “no hero.” This shift in tone provides a hint to Jake’s selective memory issues. He does not remember his father’s death because it contradicts the way he wants to remember his father, even though he was present for the event. Jake’s anger reveals the intensity of his desire to live in this delusion, leading him to lash out when his memory is challenged.

“BETH. You don’ know. Only love. Good. You. Mother. You. Always love. Always. (To Mike.) But he lies to me. Like I’m gone. Not here. Lies and tellz me iz for love. Iz not for love! Iz pride!

MIKE. Okay. Okay, I’ll tell you exactly the truth. I’ll tell you. You wanna’ know? It was Jake’s brother. Okay? That’s who it was. Jake’s little lousy brother.

BETH. Jake?

MIKE. HIS BROTHER! NOT JAKE! HIS BROTHER!

MEG. Mike!

MIKE. (To Meg.) Well, goddamnit! She wants to know the truth. She says—‘tell me the truth, you’re lying to me.’ I tell her the truth and she turns it into a lie. I’m sick and tired of this shit.”

Beth’s concept of family and relationships is changing, and this passage highlights her understanding of the different roles in her family. She sees how Meg is “Always love” and does not hurt her, whereas Mike, like Baylor, tries to control her. Mike is angry because he feels he is only lying to protect Beth, but his dishonesty is the source of her confusion. He claims Beth “turns [the truth] into a lie,” but she would not need to do that if he only told her the truth.

“MEG. The brain. They say the brain heals itself just like the skin. Isn’t that amazing? It just keeps healing itself. That’s what they told us at the hospital.

BETH. What brain?

MEG. Your brain, honey.

BETH. Where? In me.

MIKE. In your head. The brain in your head. Inside your skull.

BETH. Iz hiding in there?

MEG. No, I wouldn’t say that exactly. The brain can’t hide/

BETH. Iz in there like a turtle? Like a shell?

MEG. Not really. It’s—what does a brain look like, Mike?

MIKE. I don’t know what it looks like. It’s grey. That’s about all I know about it.

MEG. Yes. It’s a grey thing. Kind of like a snail, isn’t it, Mike? It’s kind of curled around itself like a big snail.”

Beth’s fixation on her brain becomes a motif as the play progresses, beginning in this passage. Mike and Meg cannot sufficiently explain what the brain is or what it looks like, which is critical to understanding how all the characters in the play struggle to understand themselves and each other. The imagery of the brain as a “grey snail” in the skull emphasizes the ambiguity of psychology, evoking a brain that is indeterminate and hidden.

“MEG. Well, why take the risk of her getting hurt. She can’t make coffee.

BAYLOR. That’s right. ‘Why take the risk?’ Why take the risk of her getting better. Why not just let her stay the same?

MEG. She is getting better.

BAYLOR. Nah. We’ll be right back in the same boat we were in with your mother. Another invalid. House full a’ invalids. I’ll be the only one left in this joint that can function.

MEG. Well, you’re never around anyway.

BAYLOR. I’m around. I’m around plenty. But I’ll tell ya’ one thing—I’m not gonna’ be caretaker of a nursing home here. I got better things to do.

MEG. Like shooting men.”

The contradiction in Baylor’s argument highlights the collapse of the American family with his character as a father and husband. At the same time that he insists on Beth and Meg doing things, he claims that he does everything for them. Meg notes how this framing does not match reality, since Baylor is never “around,” which Baylor uses as a way to say that he will not be around if he needs to take care of Beth. In other words, Baylor is using Beth’s illness as an excuse to continue distancing himself from his family, while insisting that he was not already distancing himself.

“JAKE. (Rapid speech.) I don’t worry anymore where anybody is. I don’t think about that. Anybody can move wherever they want. I just try to keep track of my own movements these days. That’s enough. Have you ever tried that? To follow yourself around? Like a spy. You can wind up anywhere. It’s amazing. Like, just now I caught myself shaving. I was right over there. Shaving my face. I didn’t know I was doing that until just now. It’s kinda’ scary ya’ know.

SALLY. Scary?

JAKE. Yeah. I mean there’s a possibility that you could do something that you didn’t even know about. You could be somewhere that you couldn’t even remember being. Has that ever happened to you?

SALLY. No.”

Jake’s analysis of his own situation points to a serious dissociation from himself, reflecting the theme of the fragmentation of memory and identity. His paranoia undermines his claim that he does not worry about what other people are doing, while his revelation that he is doing things that he did not know he was doing deflects responsibility for his actions. Sally and Lorraine both claim that Jake is pretending to be unwell, and Jake could be using this dissociation as a way to excuse himself for his violence.

“LORRAINE. (Moves to Sally.) Why can’t you just leave! Why can’t you just get your fanny out in the wide world and find yourself somethin’ to do. Stop mopin’ around here getting; everybody’s dander up.

SALLY. Where do you want me to wind up, Mom? Somewhere down the road?

LORRAINE. You’ll find somethin’. Everybody finds somethin’ sooner or later.

SALLY. Like what?

LORRAINE. A town or somethin’.

SALLY. What town?

LORRAINE. I don’t know what town! There’s lots of towns around. This is a country full a’ towns. There’s a town for everybody. Always has been. If there’s no town, then start one of your own. My Granddaddy started a town on a Mesquite stump. He just hung his hat on it and a whole town sprang up.

SALLY. That was a whole other time.”

The difference between Lorraine’s insistence that Jake stay at home and her insistence that Sally leave points to a gendered distinction between the children. Lorraine sees Sally as an independent person who should find her own family to care for, while Jake is still a child that gives Lorraine a sense of purpose. The suggestion that Sally literally found a new town highlights how Lorraine has not truly thought about what Sally needs as one of her children.

“BETH. Maybe they’ll have to cut your leg off.

FRANKIE. (Sits up fast again.) What? Who do you mean?

BETH. Maybe, cut. Like me. Cut me. Cut you out. Like me. See? (She bends her head forward and pulls the hair up on the back of her neck to show Frankie a nonexistent scar. Frankie looks at the place on her head that she’s showing him. Showing Frankie back of her head.) See? Tracks. Knife tracks.

FRANKIE. (Looking at her head.) What? There’s nothing there. There’s no scar there.

BETH. (She straightens her head again.) No brain. Cut me out. Cut. Brain. Cut.”

Though Beth’s examination of Frankie’s leg indicates he may have an infection, the focus of this passage highlights how Beth is looking at her own situation. She thinks Mike and Baylor cut out her brain, but the lack of scar encourages the audience to think of this claim as more abstract. Instead of physically removing her brain, Beth is saying that she has been conditioned to accept and seek masculinity like Baylor and Mike’s, which led her to marry Jake. During recovery, Beth is realizing how she does not need to be the person Jake, Baylor, and Mike want her to be.

“FRANKIE. (Clawing his way up onto sofa, to Mike.) Look—look—You want me outa’ here, right? Everybody wants me outa’ here? I don’t belong here, right? I’m not a part of your family. I’m an enemy to you? Isn’t that right? I am willing to go. Now. I’m ready. I’m ready to go now! Just get me outa’ here whatever way you can. I’ll do whatever’s necessary. I’ll pay you. Just get me outa’ here! (Mike smiles and stares at Frankie, puts his gloves back on, picks up his rifle. Beth crosses slowly over to Frankie. Frankie collapses, exhausted on sofa.)

BETH. (Beside Frankie now, she pats him softly on his head.) Your whole life can turn around. Upside down. In a flash. Sudden. Don’t worry. Don’t worry now. This whole world can disappear. Everything you know can go. You won’t even recognize your own hands.”

Frankie begs to leave Baylor’s house, and he accurately says he “don’t belong here,” since he is essentially intruding on another family’s drama. Mike’s smile foreshadows the idea that Frankie, having entered this new family, can no longer leave it. Beth furthers this idea by saying Frankie’s life can “turn around,” implying that Frankie is now a fixture in this home, rather than his own. However, Beth is also looking at her own experience and how she moved from her home to Jake and back home again.

“SALLY. What’sa matter, Jake?

JAKE. (Staring.) There’s this thing—This thing in my head. (Sally raises up slowly on one elbow in the bed and stares at him. He whispers now.) This thing that the next moment—the moment right after this one will—blow up. Explode with a voice. A scream from a voice I don’t know. Or a voice I knew once but now it’s changed. It doesn’t know me either. Now. It used to but not now. I’ve scared it into something else. Another form. A whole other person who doesn’t see me any more. Who doesn’t even remember that we knew each other once. I’ve gotta’ see her again, Sally. (Suddenly Beth screams from out of the darkness, L.)

BETH. (In dark.) JAAAAAAAAAAAAAAKE!”

Jake’s explanation of his feelings is ambiguous, even though the scene ends with Beth calling out to Jake. This suggests the theme of the fragmentation of memory and identity. The voice that is going to explode in his head could be his own, since he is feeling separated from himself; it could be his father’s, since he is struggling to confront the memory of his father and the similarities between them; or it could be Beth’s, as the scene indicates. In either case, Jake is struggling to identify himself and his desires, which he decides must be contained in a reunion with Beth.

“SALLY. Their eyes changed. Something in their eyes. Like animals. Like the way an animal looks for the weakness in another animal. They started poking at each other’s weakness. Stabbing. Just a little bit at a time. Like the way that rooster used to do. That rooster we had that went around looking the tiniest speck of blood on a hen or a chick and then he’d start pecking away at it. And the more he pecked at it the more excited he got until finally he just killed it.

LORRAINE. Yead, we had to boil that one. Tough son of a gun.

SALLY. They locked into each other like there was nobody else in the bar. At first it was all about sports. About which one of them could throw a hardball faster. Which one could take the toughest hit in football. Which one could run the fastest and the longest. That was the one they decided would be the big test. They decided to prove it to each other once and for all. So they downed a couple more Tequilas and crashed out through the doors of the place into the street.”

Sally compares Jake and his father to a rooster pecking hens and chicks, which creates a framework of dominance and submission in their relationship. Though they discuss sports, Sally knows that they are looking for ways to dominate each other. Lorraine’s note that they had to kill the rooster who behaved this way highlights why Jake killed his father, as well as how Jake will continue to use violence to dominate others if given the chance. Later, this scene emphasizes how Mike, in dominating Jake, establishes himself as equally animalistic.

“LORRAINE. It’s you that wants to undermine this entire family! Drag us down one by one until there’s no one left but you.

SALLY. I’m just sick of coverin’ up for him. I’m sick to death of covering everything up. I’m sick of being locked up in this room. In our own house. Look at this room. What’re we doin’ in here? This was Jake’s room when he was a kid. What’re we doin’ in this room now? What’re we supposed to be hiding from? (Long pause. Lorraine stands there staring at Sally then slowly turns her head up and stares at the model planes.)

LORRAINE. (Staring at planes.) I know one thing for sure. All these airplanes have gotta’ go. All these airplanes are comin’ down. Every last one of ‘em. All the junk in this house that they left behind for me to save. It’s all goin’.”

At first, Lorraine tries to blame Sally, since she does not want to accept that Jake, like her husband, has failed her. However, Sally’s complaint of “coverin’” for the men in the family resonates with Lorraine’s experience of tracking her husband, which prompts her to realize that she and Sally have both been used by the men of the family. The first target of Lorraine’s anger toward the men is the collection of airplanes, which represent both masculinity and an ideal past that does not exist. By removing the planes, Lorraine and Sally are renouncing Jake, Frankie, and their father.

“MEG. I’m afraid to leave her alone though.

BAYLOR. Stop bein’ afraid! Yer afraid a’ this—Yer afraid a’ that. You spend all yer time bein’ afraid. Why don’t ya’ just save all that fear up for when the real thing comes along.

MEG. What’s that? (Pause.)

BAYLOR. Well, we’re not gonna’ last forever, are we, Meg. Have ya’ ever given that any thought? One a’ these days our parts are gonna’ give out on us and that’ll be it. Now that’s somethin’ to be afraid of.

MEG. I’m not afraid a’ that. I don’t care one way or the other about that. I’m afraid for my daughter. She’s disappearing on us.”

Baylor continues to deflect from the issues at hand, insisting that the only thing to fear is eventual death. This fear is not rooted in the present conflicts, and though Meg is a scattered character, she maintains her focus on Beth, who needs help in the present. As with the issue of leaving home, Baylor does not want to confront his issues, and he uses death, in this instance, as a way to avoid dealing with all the conflicts that happen before death.

“MEG. All these women put a curse on you and now you’re stuck. You’re chained to us forever. Isn’t that the way it is?

BAYLOR. Yeah! Yeah! That’s exactly the way it is. You got that right. I could be up in the wild country huntin’ Antelope. I could be raising a string a’ pack mules back up in there. Doin’ somethin’ useful. But no, I gotta’ play nursemaid to a bunch a’ feeble-minded women down here in civilization who can’t take care a’ themselves. I gotta’ waste my days away makin’ sure they eat and have a roof over their heads and a nice warm place to go crazy in.

MEG. Nobody’s crazy, Baylor. Except you. Why don’t you just go. Why don’t you just go off and live the way you want to live. We’ll take care of ourselves. We always have. (Meg turns to go.)

BAYLOR. Wait a second! (Meg stops, turns to him. Pause.) Come and reach me my socks for me. I can’t bend over.”

Meg directly confronts Baylor’s deflection in this passage, exposing how his self-pity is unfounded. Baylor’s fantasy of hunting is rooted in a desire to flee his life, rather than any genuine desire to accomplish something. Meg calls him crazy, which highlights how Meg’s own scattered behavior, while odd, is still grounded in reality, while Baylor’s anger and resentment are figments of his own imaginary conflicts. The fact that Baylor then needs Meg to get his socks emphasizes how Baylor’s delusion of independence is unrealistic.

“BAYLOR. I sit out there for weeks on end, freezin’ my tail off and come up empty. He gets two in one day. Life is not fair. (Meg moves slowly toward Baylor.)

MEG. Maybe we could have the wedding here, Baylor. That would be nice, wouldn’t it? Soon as the weather thaws.

FRANKIE. (To Meg.) She’s married to my brother! She’s already married! You were there at the wedding. Don’t you remember?

MEG. (To Baylor.) We could have it up on the high meadow. That would be beautiful. Just like the old times.

FRANKIE. I AM NOT GETTING’ MARRIED TO MY BROTHER’S WIFE! (Mike comes running up porch steps into house carrying deer rifle.)

MIKE. (As he enters.) I got him! I got him! He’s right out there in the shed. I got him good.”

This passage begins the final sequence in which Baylor, Meg, Mike, Frankie, Jake, and Beth are all talking about different things, ignoring each other and the obvious issues between them. While Baylor discusses hunting, Mike enters and announces that he caught Jake. Meg is talking about Beth and Frankie getting married, ignoring Frankie’s protests. Everyone in this scene is living in a delusion of normality, except Frankie, who continues to try to get out of this situation rather than accepting his role in Beth’s fantasy. These disparate discussions literally display the fragmentation of the family.

“LORRAINE. No, no. We’ll just stay for a little visit. Save on motel bills. (Pause as they continue their respective activities.)

SALLY. Who were these people?

LORRAINE. What people?

SALLY. The uh—Skelligs?

LORRAINE. Relatives. Ancestors. I don’t know.

SALLY. Maybe they’re all dead.

LORRAINE. People don’t just all die. They don’t just all up and die at once unless it’s a catastrophe or somethin’. Someone’s always left behind to carry on. There’s always at least one straggler left behind. Now we’ll just ask around until we find out who that is. We’ll track him down. And then we’ll introduce ourselves. It’s not gonna’ be that difficult a task.”

In this passage, it is clear that Lorraine has shed her delusion of family but merely adopted another fantasy in its place. However, her insistence on the resilience of family adds a tone of hope to the play, which is otherwise rooted in dysfunction and fragmentation. Lorraine and Sally will survive, Jake will go somewhere, Mike will find another home, and their families will continue to exist, even if they are separated.

“MIKE. (Pulling back on flag.) Ho! Ho, now! (Jake stops.) That’s it. (Jake stays in one place on his knees as Mike comes up beside him and takes the flag out of his mouth and rolls it up in a ball around his rifle. Now and then, he pats Jake on the head, like he would an old horse. Jake is silent. He has deep bruises around his eyes and jaw. His knees are bleeding and the knuckles on both hands. He’s in the same costume as end of Act II. Removing flag, patting Jake.) Ata’ boy. You’re gonna’ do just fine. Pretty soon we can take you right out into the woods. Drag some timber. You’ll like that.”

Just as Sally compares Jake and his father to an aggressive rooster, Mike now dominates Jake the same way Jake dominated his father. The use of the flag as reins adds a tone of nationalism to this scene, but the critical dynamic between Mike and Jake is that Mike has established control over Jake. Jake is bruised and bleeding, showing that Mike had to physically beat Jake into submission, and the implication that Mike is going to keep Jake as a work animal adds a tone of permanence to the situation. Nonetheless, Mike is only deflecting his resentment of Baylor, whom he cannot dominate, onto Jake, perpetuating a cycle of control and suffering.

“MIKE. So it doesn’t make any difference, is that it? None of it makes any difference? My sister can get her brains knocked out and it doesn’t make a goddamn bit a’ difference to anyone in this family! All you care about is a flag? (He points out toward Jake.) It was him who was wearin’ it! He’s the traitor, not me! I’m the one who’s loyal to this family! I’m the only one.

BAYLOR. (Approaching chair, disoriented.) What’s happened to my blanket now?

MIKE. Doesn’t anybody recognize that we’ve been betrayed? From the inside out. He married into this family and he deceived us all. He deceived her! He lied to her! He told her he loved her! (Short pauses as Baylor stands by the chair searching for his blanket, still with flag, oblivious to everything else.)

BAYLOR. (Looking behind chair for blanket.) How do things disappear around here?”

As the final scene continues, Mike realizes the futility of his efforts. In his attempt to earn a place in his family beyond, as Beth calls him, “the dog they send,” he failed to realize the desperation with which his family holds onto the status quo. Baylor hardly acknowledges Mike throughout the play, and he ignores Mike entirely here, focusing on his blanket instead. Mike tries to blame Jake for the problems in the family, but this assertion is undermined by Baylor’s behavior, indicating that the family’s issues began long before the events of the play.