Setting is a small prison cell at Folsom prison. There are 2 beds. Billy sleeps…while Glen sits on the edge of his bed as the light come up.

BILLY: (waking up) The prodigal son returns.

GLEN: Sorry…I know you were enjoying being able to stretch out and all.

BILLY: I thought you’d moved out and found somebody else.

GLEN: Would I do that to you? Hey (looking at his unmade bed). Someone’s been sleeping in my bed!

BILLY: Mamma bear.

GLEN: You wish.

BILLY: Actually, I was so excited about having the option to do something different that I slept in your bed every other night you were gone.

GLEN: You could have made the bed at least before I came back.

BILLY: I lost track of time. How long were you gone this time?

GLEN: Twenty days is all. Easy.

BILLY: You enjoy going to the hole don’t you?

GLEN: Keeps the blood pumping. Anything new?

BILLY: They opened the museum.

GLEN: No shit. Takes ‘em a few hours to build a scaffold to hang a man….and about 10 years to build the damn museum. What they got in there?

BILLY: Not sure. The governor didn’t have my name on the guest list for the grand opening.

GLEN: That’s just ‘cause he don’t know you like I do. I bet Johnny gave something.

BILLY: You think so?

GLEN: Maybe a guitar. If I got out of here that’s where I’d go. Maybe they’d let me play the darn thing. Whadda you think?

BILLY: Glen…..Johnny Cash died while you were gone. Few days now.

GLEN: What? Don’t be messing with me now.

BILLY: I ain’t messing. 

GLEN: Well how’d he die?

BILLY: Just plum ran out of gas I heard. He died like a man’s supposed to. 

GLEN: How’d you hear? Maybe somebody’s messing.

BILLY: Jonesy told me. His old lady always brings him a newspaper and she read it to him. Read the very words.

GLEN: Jonesy wouldn’t be messing ‘about a thing like that.

BILLY: No…suppose not.

(Billy stands up and stares into space….trying to grasp this)

GLEN: You remember that day?

BILLY: Course I do. One of the few days I do remember ‘round here.

GLEN: (smiling…fondly) Walked in here like he owned the damn place.

BILLY: More like he built it.

GLEN: Looked like a preacher all dressed in the black. Damned head looked as big as that Mt Rushmore thing.

BILLY: Played at San Quentin too. Merle Haggard saw him there. Hey Glen…how come you never got famous like Merle Haggard?

GLEN: I believe Merle got released before he got famous there Billy boy.

BILLY: I guess that would help.

GLEN: Couldn’t hurt I reckon.

BILLY: Johnny almost turned your hair white that day…calling out your name. He done your song good too. Nobody ‘round here even knew you wrote anything.

GLEN: Ain’t no need to keep a resume ‘round here.

BILLY: You was just afraid…that’s all. No sin in that.

GLEN: I was alive that day I tell you. Alive. Johnny singled me out and all of a sudden it was like the walls fell down ‘round here. He looked right at me and he knew damn well what he’d done ‘cause he had this shit eatin’ grin on his face.

BILLY: Me and the boys were going wild I remember. You was just a kid. Never saw no one in Folsom blush before. But shit….now the man in black was your bodyguard. Nobody was gonna touch you in here.

GLEN: My bodyguard is dead now.

BILLY: Yea.

GLEN: You think they’dve let him come here if they knew the way he was like?

BILLY: I think they thought they was getting Glen Campbell or something. Hell…we’re all isolated in here. Not just us behind the bars. Don’t need to be smart to look after us….just mean is good enough.

GLEN: So you don’t think they knew?

BILLY: Shit no. Johnny was a dangerous man!

GLEN: Whooooeeee! Dangerous!

(they savor the moment for a bit)

BILLY: You remember Manson coming through here?

GLEN: Charlie? Sure. He was a little late though. If he'd heard Johnny in '68 instead of the damn Beatles things mighta turned out better for him.

BILLY: Johnny woulda cured him.

GLEN: Shit. Johnny moved that chair to the edge of the stage….with just his guitar…remember?

BILLY: Yea.

GLEN: Looked damn near 7 foot tall. Sweating like crazy…remember?

BILLY: Made the warden get him a drink of water!

GLEN: Damn…that’s right! The warden running errands. I remember Johnny saying the water ‘round here tasted like it ran off the back of someone’s boot.

BILLY: Glen Campbell wouldn’t have said that.

GLEN: Damn right. He woulda never had the guts to ask the damn warden for a glass of water! 

BILLY: Would have never gotten out of here alive.

(they both laugh)

BILLY: Tell me Glen…..you think you changed some since that day?

GLEN: Changed how?

BILLY: Dunno. Just asking. You were like a mouse then. 

GLEN: You mean I took more crap.

BILLY: Didn’t say that….

GLEN: You meant it though. Billy…..I’ve known you longer than anyone in my life. Even my Mom. So you ain’t got to say something straight out for me to understand it….(silence as Billy waits for more. He knows his man)…That’s the last song I ever wrote…you know that Billy? I figure…what’s the use right? I got to the top of the mountain. No need to be toiling in the valley anymore. Listening to Johnny Cash sing my song made me feel like….well it made me feel like before I was in here. I’d be chasing that feeling only a free man can get….and I used to get it by hurting others. But when you get in here….well….you can still get to hurting others….but the power of it is gone Billy. The rush is gone You know it. But it came back that day. I felt so strong I coulda went out in the yard and jumped that wall in a single bound. And I coulda licked any man that tried to stop me.

BILLY: Long time ago. You can’t take on Folsom one on one. You’ll lose…and you know it.

GLEN: Shit….don’t I know it.

BILLY: And besides…..Johnny is gonna watch over you. He’s got some time now.

GLEN: (smiles at the thought….then continues) Funny thing……a few days ago…..I ain’t sure……but I was in the hole and a cockroach crawled out from under the toilet. It went moving across the floor just like we do…’cause time doesn’t really matter when it’s all you got. And you know Billy…..I’d have killed you for looking cross eyed at me 40 years ago…..but I let that cockroach live. Why you think I did that?

BILLY: Maybe you’re just a better man now.

GLEN: But how can this place make you a better man? I guess that’s what I’m going on about.

BILLY: There’s gotta be something worthwhile in here or else Johnny wouldn’t have come. Think of it that way.

GLEN: I swear to you Billy he didn’t want to leave here.

BILLY: I know it.

GLEN: Johnny had his troubled too you know. The pills…and the fighting. I know he saw himself looking out over that crowd. And I don’t know…..but I think he liked what he saw. It was like we could reach into each other’s heads and pull out the eyes. He could see what we could see….and we could see the outside….where he come from. I swear when he was singing I didn’t feel like no prisoner no more. 

BILLY: How’d he manage to get a hold of your song anyway?

GLEN: You remember that chaplain we had here back in them days….Minkus I think his name was?

BILLY: Yea….yea….I remember him.

GLEN: Well….turns out he’s got a friend who knows Johnny….and the night before the show here he finds out where John is staying and brings him a copy of this song that I sung for him one time. Sneaky bastard taped me and I never knew it. Sang it in the chapel after confession one day and he kept telling me to sing louder ‘cause God couldn’t hear. Can’t trust a preacher Billy….that’s a fact. And the preacher sits me right in the front too…which I thought was strange since me and God never got along too good…but I was glad ‘cause I was about 5 feet from the stage. I didn’t know what Johnny was planning..and when he called my name he asked me to stand up and he shook my hand. Big old callused hands too…..nothing soft about ‘em.

BILLY: When we got the news that he died everybody kept coming to me asking…"Glen know yet? Glen know yet?" I guess everybody worrying ‘bout how you’d take it.

GLEN: We ain’t never got a chance to see him again. I reckon he got old…maybe even had that black hair get all white on him. Maybe bunched up some. But we ain’t like the rest of ‘em Billy. We saw the man in black…..and when I try to picture him in that coffin…it’s the face of the man who shook my hand that I see lying there…all peaceful like. And when I hear him in my head…..I don’t hear no raspy old voice….I hear the man that asked the warden for a glass of water.

BILLY: Can’t look through his eyes no more though if he’s dead.

GLEN: Tell me Billy…..you ever hear that whistle that he be singing about?

BILLY: Folsom Prison Blues you mean?

GLEN: Yea….you remember the song?

BILLY: Sure.

(Glen starts drumming on his leg…..and starts singing the first verse….then jumps to the last….and Billy joins in)

GLEN: That whistle doesn’t remind me where I’ve been anymore. Trains can take you someplace else….but they can also bring you where you are. Ahh Billy, this is where we belong. For what we done….this is as good as we can expect. Shit….everything’s passing on. When Johnny Cash dies…that’s the end of something isn’t it?

BILLY: If he ain’t out there…..then I want no part of it (laughs)

GLEN: Damn right. 

BILLY: Well….maybe just long enough to get me a woman and then I’ll come right back.

GLEN: Don’t think Johnny would object to that.

BILLY: Jonesy told me something else while you were gone too.

GLEN: Yea?

BILLY: He said he was mopping up down in the hole when you were getting your hour in the yard….and he saw some words scrawled into the wall. Said they looked fresh too.

GLEN: Yea…you ask Jonesy what they said?

BILLY: Well I would see….but he’s doesn't read too good….so it wouldn’t do me much good. He told me it looked to him like old Glen was writing songs down there.

GLEN: Did he?

BILLY: That’s what Jonesy said….and I don’t think he’d lie about something like that.

GLEN: No, I reckon he wouldn’t at that.

(Glen starts to sing….quietly at first….then with more confidence)

BILLY: Tell me he ain’t looking after you now.

GLEN: You ain’t gonna tell anyone are you?

BILLY: Nah. I’ll let Johnny tell ‘em.

GLEN: (looking towards the cell window) Morning soon.

BILLY: You were expecting something else?

GLEN: ‘Round here? Go back to sleep Billy.

BILLY: I’m glad you’re back Billy. Missed you.

GLEN: Billy….you the same person now you was when you came in here?

BILLY: Person only got one soul Glen. Can’t cut it in half.

GLEN: That means you can still do the things you done.

BILLY: All of us can still do the things we done Glen. That’s why some of us are in here….and the rest are out there.

GLEN: I’ll see you in the morning.

BILLY: I’ll be here.
 

Lights. The End.