Jake stepped warily back from Lisa"s desk and nervously brushed a fall of wheat-colored hair off his broad brow. "My G.o.d, Lisa, you don"t have to be such a frightening b.i.t.c.h with me!
I"m already scared every morning when I walk through the door of this madhouse! Anyway, I was just trying to do my job."
Lisa visibly composed herself, her stormy expression ceding to a professional mask of good-natured calm. She forced out an apology that evidently tasted sour. "I"m sorry. But these vendors drive me nuts. Our whole business relies on them, and they"re nothing but a bunch of sleazy a.s.swipes. Balloons, stuffed animals, flowers, wreaths, banners, candles, suncatchers-you"d think the people who sold such things would be nice, maybe New Ageypeople. But they"re not. You know who the most up-front guys are? The construction guys. Not enough manners to fill a thimble, but if they can"t deliver a wall, they let you know right away.
They don"t string you along like these other p.r.i.c.ks."
"Be that as it may, dear, you"ve got something a tad more crucial to worry about now." Jake flourished the newspaper in a less aggressive manner, and Lisa took it from him. Folded back to the business section, the paper glibly offered its salient headline: WEEPING WALLS TO FACE FIRST COMPEt.i.tOR.
Lisa scanned the article with growing rage that wiped away her mask once again. Reaching the end, she exclaimed, "Those sc.u.m-sucking b.a.s.t.a.r.ds! They"ve ripped off all our trademark features. "Sadness Fences," my sweet white a.s.s! Even their name"s actionable. Our lawyers will be all over them like ticks on a Connecticut camper by this afternoon."
Jake took the paper back. "I don"t know, Lisa. I get a bad feeling over this one. Did you see who"s backing them?"
"TimWarDisVia. So what? You"re scared of a conglomerate whose name sounds like a neurological disease?"
"That"s a lot of money and power to go up against-"
"I don"t give a f.u.c.k! We have legal precedence on our side. I invented this whole concept five years ago. Everyone knows that. Before me and Weeping Walls, this industry didn"t even exist. Grief was left to f.u.c.king amateurs!"
"Granted. But you had to expect compet.i.tion sooner or later."
"Maybe you"re right. Maybe we"ve been getting complacent. This could be good for us. Get us to kick things up a notch."
"How?"
"I don"t know. But I"ll think of something. Meanwhile, I"ve got to keep all the plates spinning. What"s next on my schedule?"
Jake consulted his Palm Pilot XII. "There"s a new wall going up right here in town an hour from now. Did you want to attend the opening ceremonies?"
"What"s the occasion?"
"Employee shooting yesterday at the downtown post office."
"That"s handy. How many dead?"
"Three."
"Sure, I"ll go. With that low number of deaths the media coverage should be thin. I don"t think I could handle the stress from the aftermath of a full-scale ma.s.sacre today. Plus, it"s nearby, and I haven"t been to one of our openings in a month, since that schoolyard slaughter."
"We could certainly plan your appearances better if we could only remove the random factor from our business-"
Lisa stood up, smoothing her skirt. "No need for you to be cynical, too, Jake. I"ve got that angle completely covered."
Following his superior out of her office, Jake asked, "What"s Danny doing these days?"
Lisa sighed. "Same as always. Sacrificing himself for his art. It gets mighty old, Jake."
"Is he making any money yet?"
"Not so you could notice."
"Any luck convincing him to come to work here?""Not likely. He swears he"d kill himself first. He"d have to get pretty desperate. Or else I"d have to offer him some unbelievable deal."
"You two are such opposites, I"m amazed you"re still together."
"I am a pistol in the sack, honey. And Danny"s hung more impressively than Abe Lincoln"s a.s.sa.s.sins."
"Oh, I don"t doubt any of that for one blessed minute, sugar."
"Could I hear from the kazoos again, please?"
Danny Simmons, his gangly limbs poised awkwardly as if he were only minding them temporarily until their real owner returned, sat in the front row of the shabby theater, directing his motley troupe on the bare stage. He addressed a quartet of actors situated stage left, clad like harlequins, and standing with kazoos poised at their lips. Before the kazoo-players could comply with the polite request, however, Danny was interrupted by a large-bosomed young woman, hair colored like autumn acorns, seated several rows back.
"Danny, I"ve forgotten my cue."
The mild-faced skinny director turned slowly in his seat and said, "You come in when Lester says-"The planet"s dying!"-Carol."
"He"s going to call me by my real name? I thought I was playing Gaia."
A long-suffering look washed over Danny"s lagomorphic features "No, Carol. He"ll only say, "The planet"s dying!" "
"And then I stand up and face the audience-"
"Correct."
"-and rip open my shirt-"
"Right."
"-and I say-I say-"
"Your line is "Gaia lactates no more for cuckoos born of horninid greed!" "
Carol"s painful expression mimicked that of a pressure-racked semifi-nalist in a nationally televised sixth-grade spelling bee. " "Gaia lacks t.i.ts for greedy-" Oh, Danny, it"s no use!"
"Carol, just calm down. You have another two whole days to practice. I"m sure you"ll be fine."
"I"ve got the shirt-ripping part down pat. Do you want to see?" The males on stage leaned forward eagerly. Danny yelled, "No, no, don"t!" but he was much too late.
The rehearsal didn"t resume for a confused fifteen minutes spent chasing popped shirt b.u.t.tons and draping blankets solicitously around Carol"s chilly shoulders.
Hardly had the drama-script and music by Danny Simmons, directed and produced by Danny Simmons-gotten once more well under way when another interruption intervened.
One of the set-building crew rocketed onstage, hammer in her hand. "Hey, Danny, there"s a guy from the electric company fooling around outside at the meter!"
At that instant, the theater was plunged into darkness. Yelps and shrieks filled the musty air.
Feet scuffled in panic across the boards, and the sound of a body tumbling down the three stairs leading from the stage was succeeded by grunts and curses.
Eventually Danny Simmons and his troupe found themselves all out in the daylit lobby.
There awaited the theater"s landlord, a short irascible fellow who resembled a gnome sired by Rumpelstiltskin on one of Cinderella"s ugly stepsisters."Haul a.s.s out of here, you losers. Your freeloading days are over." Danny fought back tears of frustration. "But Mr. Semple, we open on Friday! We"ll pay all the back rent with the first night"s receipts!"
"Not likely, pal. I finally caught a rehearsal of this lamebrained farce yesterday. I was sitting in the back for the whole d.a.m.n incomprehensible five acts. No one"s going to lay down a plugged nickel to see this s.h.i.t-" Semple paused to ogle the straining safety pin that labored to hold Carol"s shirtfront closed. "You do have a couple of good a.s.sets, but you can"t count on them for everything. No, I figure it"s better to cut my losses right now. Clear this place immediately so"s I can padlock it, and my boys will pile your stuff on the sidewalk."
Defeated, the spiritless actors began to shuffle out of the building, and Danny shamefacedly followed them. Out on the sidewalk, he turned to face the confusingly abstract poster for their show hanging by the ticket office: GAIA"S DAY OFF PRESENTED BY THE DERRIDADAJSTS.
The sight of the poster seemed to hearten him. He turned to rally his friends.
"Gang, I won"t let these fat-cat b.a.s.t.a.r.ds break us up! Whatever it takes, I vow the Derridadaists will go on!"
"I am so glad," Carol offered cheerfully, "that I have some extra time to practice my speech!"
"All mourners wearing an official wristband may now step forward." Dewlapped Governor Wittlestoop, suited in enough expensive charcoal wool fabric to clothe a dozen orphans, despite the hot September sunlight beating down, backed away from the microphone and lowered his fat rump onto a creaking folding chair barely up to sustaining its load. Next to the governor on the hastily erected platform sat Lisa Dutch, knees clamped together, legs primly crossed at the ankles in what Jake Pasha-lingering now obediently close by-often referred to as "the boardroom virgin" pose.
Lisa patted the governor"s hand. Maintaining her frozen official expression of soberly condoling vicarious grief, she murmured, "Did you get the latest envelope okay?"
Similarly covert, Wittlestoop replied, "It"s already in the bank." "Good. Because I seem to be facing some new challenges, and I don"t want to have to worry about protecting my a.s.s in my own backyard."
"Nothing to fear. Weeping Walls has been awfully good to this state, and the state will respond in kind."
"Since when did you and the state become synonymous?" "I believe it was at the start of my fifth term. By the way, I admired your anecdote today about the relatives you lost in the Oklahoma City bombing and how that inspired you years later to found your company.
You had the crowd in tears. Tell me confidentially-any of that horses.h.i.t true?"
"Only the part about me having relatives."
Notes of dirgelike cla.s.sical music sprinkled the air. Among the groundlings, a wavery line had formed: those members of the sniffling audience with the requisite wristbands had arrayed themselves in an orderly fashion across the post office parking lot where the memorial service for the recently slain was being held. The head of the line terminated at a row of large black plastic bins much like oversize composters. Beside the bins stood several employees fromWeeping Walls, looking in their black habiliments like postmodern undertakers, save for the bright red WW logo st.i.tched in Gothic cursive on their coats.
Now the first mourner was silently and gently urged by a solicitous yet controlling Weeping Walls employee to make her choice of sympathy-token. The mourner, a red-eyed widow, selected a bouquet of daisies from one of a score of water buckets held on a waist-high iron stand. The Weeping Walls usher now led the woman expeditiously toward the wall itself.
Erected only hours ago, the fresh planks of the official Weeping Wall, branded subtly with the WW logo, still emanated a piney freshness. At regular intervals staples secured dangling plastic ties similar to a policeman"s instant handcuffs or an electrician"s cable-bundling straps.
The usher brought the first woman and her bouquet to the leftmost, uppermost tie, and helped her secure the flowers with a racheting plastic zip. Then he led the sobbing woman away as efficiently as an Oscar-ceremonies handler, rejoining his fellow workers to process another person.
Once the mechanized ritual was under way, it proceeded as smoothly as a robotic j.a.panese a.s.sembly line. From the bins mourners plucked various tokens of their public grief: pastel teddy bears, miniature sports gear emblazoned with the logos of all the major franchises, religious icons from a dozen faiths, sentimental greeting cards inscribed with such all-purpose designations as "Beloved Son" and "Dearest Daughter." One by one, the bereaved friends, neighbors and relatives-anyone, really, who had paid the appropriate fee to Weeping Walls (family discounts available)-placed their stereotyped fetishes on the official wall and returned to their seats.
Under the cheerful sun, Lisa watched the whole affair with traces of pride and glee struggling to break through her artificial funereal demeanor like blackbirds out of a pie. Then her attention was snagged by an anomalous audience member: some nerdy guy scribbling notes with a stylus on his PDA.
Lisa leaned toward Governor Wittlestoop. "See the guy taking notes? Is he a local reporter I don"t recognize?"
Wittlestoop squinted. "No. And he"s not accredited national media either. I"ve never seen him before."
Lisa got determinedly to her feet. All eyes were focused on the ceremony, and no one noticed her swift descent from the stage. Coming up behind the scribbler, Lisa remained practically invisible. She seated herself behind the suspicious fellow and craned for a view over his shoulder.
The screen of the man"s handy machine was scrolling his notes as he entered them: Offer more choices of victim memorial. Favorite foods of dec"d? Finger food only. Maybe cookies? Call SnackWell"s. Sadness Fences line of candy?
Her face savage, Lisa stood. She grabbed the man"s folding chair and tipped him out of it.
He stumbled forward, caught himself, and turned to face Lisa with a frightened look.
"You f.u.c.king little spy! Give me that!" Lisa grappled with the man for his PDA, but he held tight. Empty chairs tumbled like jackstraws as they struggled. Suddenly Lisa relinquished her grip. The spy straightened up, smiling and seemingly victorious. Lisa c.o.c.ked her well-muscled, Nautilus-toned arm and socked him across the jaw. The guy went down.Chaos was now in full sway, screams and shouts and frenzied dashes for cover, as if the post office shooter himself had suddenly returned. Lisa spiked the PDA with the heel of her pump and ground it into the asphalt.
Digital cameras had converged on Lisa from the start of the fight and continued to feed images of her reddened face and disarrayed hair to various news outlets. The Governor"s entourage of state troopers finally descended on Lisa and her victim. The spy had regained his feet and, nursing his jaw, sought revenge.
"Arrest her, officers! She a.s.saulted me for no reason!"
The troopers turned to Governor Wittlestoop for direction. The Governor nodded his head at the spy, and the troopers dragged him off.
Lisa sought desperately to explain her actions to the appalled crowd and the invisible media audience. "He was, he was-"
Jake had joined her, and, under pretext of comforting her, whispered close to her ear. Lisa brightened.
"He was a Satanist!"
"TimWarDisVia continues to deny all allegations of Satanic activity by any of its subsidiaries or their employees. Nevertheless, several senators are insisting on a full investigation-"
The well-coiffed CNN talking head inhabiting the small all-purpose monitor on the kitchen counter appeared primed to drone on all night But Lisa moused him out of existence with her left hand and then carried the dark amber drink in her right hand up to her plum-glossed lips.
"Nice save, Leese."
Danny stood by the sink, peeling potatoes. He sought to create one single long peel from each, and was generally succeeding.
Lisa drained her gla.s.s. "Thanks, but I can"t take all the credit. Jake doesn"t know it yet, but he"s in for a fat bonus."
Danny sighed. "The productions I could mount if only I had an a.s.sistant as competent as Jake! The kind of people who will work like dogs week after week for no pay generally don"t come equipped with a lot of, ah-call it smarts? But of course, that"s all moot now, with the death of our show."
Lisa refilled her gla.s.s from a bottle of Scotch, spritzed it, and added fresh rocks before turning to Danny. "I might have made a nice recovery today, but this move will hardly stop Sadness Fences from trying to eat my lunch. It"s only a temporary embarra.s.sment for them. And I just can"t figure out yet how to undercut them! Oh, s.h.i.t-let"s talk about your day again, I"m sick of mine. Tell me once more why you won"t just take a loan from me to pay off your debts?"
Danny paused from rinsing vegetables to sip from a small gla.s.s of white wine. "We agreed that the loan you made to us last year so that we could stage Motherfoucaults! would be the last. If the Derridadaists can"t find other backers interested in avant-garde theater, then I"m just running a vanity operation. And I don"t want that."
"What are you going to do now?"
"Finish making our supper. After that, I simply don"t know. I want to keep the troupe together, but not at the expense of my artistic pride."
Lisa kicked off her shoes. "Artistic pride! Tell me about it! That"s what hurts me the worst,you know-that these Sadness Fences b.a.s.t.a.r.ds are b.u.g.g.e.ring my brainchild."
"A disturbing image, Leese, however apt. Do you want mesclun or spinach in your salad?"
"Spinach. Gotta keep the old punching arm in shape."
After supper, the big flatscreen in the den displayed Entertainment Hourly to the couch-cushioned, cuddling Danny and Lisa.
Seated at his minimalist desk, hair and teeth Platonically perfect, as if fashioned by s.p.a.ce aliens as a probe, the determinedly somber yet oddly effusive host launched into a report of the latest hourly sensation.
"Jax Backman led his own jazz funeral today through the streets of Celebration, Florida.
Diagnosed last month with that nasty new in-curable strain of terminal oral herpes, the plucky hornman quickly opted to go out in style. Taking advantage of last year"s Supreme Court decision in Flynt versus United States Government legalizing a.s.sisted suicide and other forms of voluntary euthanasia, Backman received a special, slow-acting lethal injection at the start of the cortege"s route. Propped up in his coffin, he was able to enjoy nearly the whole procession, which included innumerable celebrity mourners. TimWarDisVia even lent out their animatronic Louis Armstrong to lead the solemn yet oddly joyous wake."