When Freddy was twelve, his mother enrolled him in a summer computer course at the local post-secondary. He had excelled in mathematics + his teacher suggested that he explore the wonderful world of computer programming ÷ Freddy’s parents were in the midst of separating and did not want him clouding the discussions × Freddy didn’t much mind because, to him, a computer translated to computer games = Freddy was twelve and liked games.

The course began in late June, two hours per day, three days a week. It was called, “Introduction to Basic”. A redundant title, Freddy thought.

Though Freddy regarded the computer as a novelty, there had at that time been recent developments in the American Northwest of a personal computer operating system called DOS. It had been bought, repackaged and resold by a young bull named Bill Gates, who would eventually become the richest man in the Western hemisphere, despite (or perhaps because of) his SNAFU mentality.

The campus computer was a Cyber supercomputer; at the time, the third largest in the world (this was back when bigger, not smaller, meant better). The mainframe was contained in three large rooms in the center of the main campus building. Cables ran along corridor ceilings connecting terminals all over the campus to the mainframe. A floppy disk was 5″ square and actually was floppy. There were even card-punching terminals, as if anyone should be required to communicate via holes in a piece of cardstock. Could you imagine what that would do to the science of electioneering?

It was ancient to today’s technology; but in 1982, it was top of the line. Or so they were told.

Freddy’s class only lasted one month but, in that time, Freddy made the acquaintance of a computer hacker named Ogilvie. Ogilvie was maybe nineteen, but his unshaven face, messy hair, unstylish clothes and inferiority complex made him seem twenty-five. He never revealed his real age.

About a week before Freddy’s course was to end, he was at a vending machine in a low-traffic hallway, trying to buy a pastry that had been waiting to be bought for almost two weeks. He inserted two quarters, made his selection, nothing happened. Another two quarters, another selection, more nothing.

Ogilvie happened to be passing by and noticed the kid’s dilemma – hunger v. poverty.

“Why do you even bother?” he asked Freddy.

“Cause I’m hungry,” Freddy snapped back in frustration. Ogilvie stopped and approached.

“Listen, kid, you don’t need to put any money in it. Lemme see your arm.”

“What?”

“Lemme see your arm,” the hacker repeated, grabbing Freddy’s wrist and pulling at it to view his forearm. “Yeah, see,” he explained, “your arm is thin enough to reach up the slot and pull out whatever you want.”

Ogilvie glanced around to see no one else glancing around. “Try it.”

Freddy shrugged, “Okay.”

Freddy knelt down in front of the machine, slid his forearm into the slot where his two pastries should have been. “Now reach up,” Ogilvie instructed him. Freddy guided his hand up into the vending womb. “Can you feel the packaging?”

“Yeah.”

“Grab it and pull it down.”

Freddy followed the instructions and a Ho-Ho treat slid down into the slot at the bottom. Free. Newborn.

“It worked, it worked,” Freddy exclaimed.

“Shhh, keep it down,” Ogilvie told him, looking around suspiciously.

“I’m gonna get another one.” And he did. Two Ho-Ho’s, twins, sitting in the receptacle. “Do you want anything?” Freddy asked his new best friend.

“Yeah sure, grab me a Snickers.” And there it was… Snickers, à la carte.

This was only the beginning.

Mentor that he was, Ogilvie taught Freddy how to break into other students’ user accounts within the college computer system.

“Y’see, every student has an account on the mainframe where they store all their files. You can’t access the mainframe with an account and you can’t have an account without being enrolled as a student. Now, to access an account, you need the student’s user name and password.”

“Yeah, I know, so how do we get someone’s user name and password?”

“Easy, kid, totally easy. You go to the main terminal room, y’know the one by the atrium?”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“You dig through the garbage for hardcopies of a student’s terminal session. There’re ten terminals there that don’t have monitor screens; they can only display sessions in hardcopy, like typewriters. And some students are stupid. They enter their user name and password and it gets printed right on the paper and, when they’re done, they throw the paper they don’t need in the garbage, with their user name and password still printed on it for all the janitors to see. My dad was a janitor.”

Ogilvie took him to the main terminal room, dug through a large waste paper basket teeming with computer output and managed to find three such examples of user names and their corresponding passwords.

“See, I told ya.”

“What if someone finds out?”

“You don’t get found out if you know what you’re doing. The best place to hide is in Room L238 in the North Wing; there’re only eight terminals in that room and there’s hardly ever anyone in there… Trust me, kid, I haven’t been a student here for a year-and-a-half.”

And that’s how Freddy managed to continue using the computer after his summer student account had been deleted (purged was the word they used back then). July came and went, Freddy played computer games and ate free pastries while his parents worked out their separate ways, August, September. Then came October.

Freddy was on his fourth stolen student account; user name: Philip66. Philip66 had detected the presence of a hacker in his account and had notified the system administrator. His account was promptly shut down (purged) and he was given a new one. Freddy was locked out.

So he paid another visit to Ogilvie’s prized trash can. He hadn’t seen his hacking mentor in a few weeks but there he was, digging for more passwords. Freddy explained how he’d been shut down again by yet another purged account.

Ogilvie handed him a new user name and password from the bin and gave him some advice – inform the student user of your presence with a threat.

Freddy took it to heart and created a file called “readme” in his fifth stolen account. The “readme” file outlined how the student now had a hacker using his account for “peaceful purposes” and if he reported it to anybody, the hacker would “wipe out any existence of you at this shit-ass college.” Terrorism, for lack of a better word.

A few days later, in Room L238 in the North Wing of the campus, Ogilvie showed Freddy something he’d recently discovered. “Look at this,” he said, typing rapidly at a terminal, “I figured out how to break into the mainframe’s access control protocol. See this list?”

A list of numbers appeared on the screen – 02, 03, 07, 12, 13, 21, 29, 50, 52. “These are the terminals that are currently in use all over the campus. See, I’m 52; you’re 50.”

Freddy didn’t really understand what Ogilvie was talking about but whatever, “Yeah sure, I see.”

“Now watch this.” Ogilvie typed in “ENDSESSION/50” and hit the return key.

Suddenly, Freddy’s terminal shut down. Off, dead, powerless.

“Cool, huh?”

“Yeah, cool,” Freddy responded, turning his terminal back on and restarting the computer game he’d been playing.

About two hours later, around 8:30PM, Freddy was alone in L238. And he was curious. He tried to recall how Ogilvie had broken into the access control protocol (whatever that meant!). After several botched attempts, he was successful.

A list of number appeared on the screen – 02, 03, 07, 09, 13, 24, 50.

“Now how did he do it again?” Freddy asked himself. The dark green cursor blinked at him, as if to say, “The coast is clear.” BLINK – GO! BLINK – GO! BLINK – GO!

He typed in “ENDSESSION/02,03,07,09,13,24”. And without giving it a second thought, he lightly tapped the return key. The only number that remained on the screen was “50”. Him. 50.

“Cool,” he thought, unaware that with great power comes great responsibility. He returned to playing some game, bored, alone, and stupid for remaining at the scene of the cyber-crime. He was twelve, his only excuse.

Ten minutes later, a security guard entered the room, said, “Excuse me,” and typed something on Freddy’s terminal. A list of activities appeared on the screen – everything Freddy had done since Ogilvie had shut him down earlier in the day.

Freddy sat blank-faced as it dawned on him that he’d been caught. The guard escorted him to the Administrator’s office.

“This is him?” the Administrator asked the guard. “Are you sure?” He wore round glasses and tweed.

Outside the office were four professors pacing in anguish, sweating in frustration, cursing to themselves. The Administrator informed Freddy, “These professors outside my office were working on very important reports and when you shut them down, they lost all their work.”

“Maybe they should have saved their work at regular intervals,” Freddy retorted, thereby beginning the word on the street that one must save one’s work at regular intervals.

The Administrator had Freddy banned from the campus. “If we ever see you here again, you’ll be charged with trespassing. Good night.” He was the most polite Administrator ever.

The guard escorted Freddy to the nearest exit, across a campus lawn and down the path to the bus stop.

He never saw Ogilvie again.

“It amazes me,” Freddy thought to himself as he stood on his front porch, the December sun trying hard to keep Southern California mild and prosperous. He had opened his mailbox, removed the two pieces of correspondence there and, upon seeing the identities of the senders, voraciously ripped both their respective ends off and pulled out the papers inside each.

“It amazes me, life,” he thought as he read the letters. “Because life is a maze. You wander down this corridor, reach an intersection, where do you go? Which way? Go left, go right, go straight, go back. Can you go back? Whichever way upon which you decide, does it matter? You end up back at that intersection again, in the same space, with but a few more corridors to your name and character.”

These were no ordinary letters. They were shock blasts. Pure silent laughter.

The whole sequence of events began in 1966 before Freddy was even born. Freddy’s father had quit his upward-bound career as an insurance salesman to join the team at the only type of company worse than an insurance company – a pharmaceutical company.

Freddy didn’t like any company. He’d once read in the Oxford dictionary the following three definitions of the word “company”: group of actors etc.; subdivision of infantry battalion; body of persons combined for common (especially commercial) object. Liars, murderers and thieves. Companies.

Years later, looking back on his life as he lay upon his deathbed, Freddy’s father expressed remorse over having left the insurance trade. His time with the medicine peddlers hadn’t been all it was cracked up to be and, as many men do when mortality approaches, he sought absolution. He’d once had the Grail, he feared, and lost it.

After his father’s passing, his insurance policy began its long and winding road of adjustment, what with all the variables involved in DEATH.

A month or so before Freddy received those two letters and stood flabbergasted on his porch, he’d needed a new pair of shoes. His old Vans were worn and tattered and nobody wore skate-boarder sneakers anymore. In store after store along Melrose Avenue, he searched for the right pair of rubber souls. Every shoe looked the same – Adidas, Nike, Brooks. Freddy didn’t care for any of them; they all looked too new and without personality (or wrinkles).

Around the same time, Freddy’s new roommate, James, was rooting through the boxes of clothing with which he’d recently moved in. He found an old pair of shoes he hadn’t worn in a few years and showed them to Freddy.

“Do you want these?” he asked Freddy, holding up a pair of dull blue Puma sneakers.

Freddy looked at them and they became the lonely puppy hiding at the back of the cage in your local dog pound. He slipped them on; they were tight, a little too tight. But they looked perfect, sleek, cool. Like Mercury’s heels.

It would later occur to Freddy that though a certain shoe might be appealing, there are more important functions than aesthetics. In other words, sometimes that lonely puppy hiding at the back of the cage in your local dog pound will shit all over your rug.

A short while later, as Freddy was leaving his digs, as he was slipping down the three low steps to the sidewalk, his right foot landed rather askew. Without the preventative qualities of proper footwear, it twisted inward and Freddy’s own weight and gravitational momentum pulled him down, his ankle ligaments tightening and his ears hearing a noise that no ear enjoys hearing… Crackle.

As Freddy crumpled to the ground, the sky grew larger. It was that moment in a car accident that lasts longer than it should – in film, a freeze frame; in literature, a religious text. It was a stretched second that he was down; then he was back up in pain and immediacy, hopping back into the house, yelping to himself, “Ouch, ouch, oh man, bad pain, ouch. What have I done?!”

Freddy hopped to a chair as James emerged from the kitchen with a tuna salad sandwich, asking, “What’s going on?”

“Aw man, I think I broke my ankle,” Freddy replied, quickly and carefully removing the disagreeable shoe from his injured limb. Upon inspection of the ankle, neither Freddy nor James could see any break in the skin. There was a great deal of swelling, however.

“At least it’s not a compound,” James comforted.

“Y’know, in thirty years, I’ve never broken a bone in my body. This sucks.”

Freddy iced his ankle and kept it elevated. James left for fast food and a tensor bandage. After a burger, fries and much phone consultation with friends who had no medical qualifications whatsoever, Freddy decided to keep off his foot and wait a few days to see how things turned out.

In the meantime, he took James to see the L.A. Kings sleep through the first two periods of a game against the Detroit Red Wings. Freddy had scored some wicked seventh row seats in the corner and wasn’t going to let a little thing like an inability to walk prevent him from seeing some ice-bound roughhousing. He borrowed a pair of crutches from James, whose entire family consisted of surgeons and patients. They had plenty of crutches to go around. The hockey game finished 2-2 at the end of overtime.

Three days later, Freddy’s foot was bloated to nearly twice its size and was throbbing out of its tensor. It was tighter than the damn sneaker that facilitated the injury in the first place. And he was in pain.

“Jimmy, would you mind taking me to the hospital?”

“Yeah, sure, let’s go,” James replied like he was going to the beach.

It was a ten minute drive to the hospital, despite the horribly planned San Vicente Boulevard, one of the world’s most confusing streets.

Freddy checked in and filled out the necessary forms while James parked the car. The nurse behind the ER desk asked Freddy a few pertinent questions and shook her head when he told her that the accident had occurred three days previous.

“Are you shaking your head at me?”

She nodded.

“Because I took so long to come in?”

She nodded again and a volunteer in a smock with a British accent escorted Freddy through a set of automatic doors and down a hallway into another waiting room where he sat for fifteen minutes with an overweight middle-aged Mexican woman in spandex leggings whose eyes never darted away from a re-run of “Cheers” playing on the television braced to a corner of the ceiling.

Freddy sat there and addressed the fact that he’d given his real name and address in the forms he’d filled out. James had advised him to give a false name and address because, wouldn’t you know it, Freddy did not have insurance. Liars, murderers and thieves, he reminded himself. Freddy had given his real name and address because he thought it was the responsible thing to do.

A doctor came in on the late shift on a Sunday night. He examined Freddy’s foot and found it’s most sensitive point on the outside beneath his ankle. He sent for some X-ray’s and Freddy was escorted to a room where his genitals had to be protected with a large heavy mat filled with lead.

Freddy laid there wondering two things: “Who was the first guy to discover he needed to cover his balls when he did this?” and “Does this actually prevent premature prostate cancer?”

Back in the waiting room, he sat for another forty-five minutes and watched people in multicolor pastel smocks mill about, go get this, go do that, runners and production assistants all. Freddy watched a male nurse wrap a tensor around the Mexican lady’s ankle and she left tenuously skipping along on a set of crutches she did not know how to properly use.

Freddy shifted to another chair across from the TV and watched ten minutes of a “Wayans Bros” episode before the doctor returned to inform him that he had a chipped tibia, a little speck of white on one of the X-ray’s. Freddy was relieved to know that it was something – even nothing would have been something, would have answered the question,
“What’s wrong with my increasingly swollen foot?”

“You’ll need a walking cast for three of four weeks. I’ll give you the number of an orthopedist,” the doctor said, writing out his referral. “You should stay off your foot until you see him,” the doctor told him. “It was nice to meet you,” he added and departed to return a page.

The male nurse was back a moment later with another tensor which he wrapped around Freddy’s foot as he had the Mexican lady’s foot. Freddy left the ER with a chipped tibia, his X-ray’s and a referral to a specialist. He would be billed later.

Freddy crutched himself back out to James, in the waiting room, and followed him to where he’d parked the car.

The next day, Freddy called the orthopedist to which he’d been referred. This was the guy that was going to put his foot in a cast; this was the guy who was going to do him in, clear out his bank account. Though there was a bone chip floating around in the ether of his ankle, Freddy was hesitant.

He dialed the number he’d been given – Dr. Feldman.

“Hi, I was referred to Dr. Feldman. I have a chipped tibia and I’d like to come in and get a walking cast put on –”

“Okay, sir,” the receptionist cut him off, “who is your insurance provider?”

“I’ll be paying cash or credit card.”

“Okay, sir, I should tell you that there’s a three week waiting list for Dr. Feldman.”

“Three weeks?”

“Uh-huh, the soonest I could schedule you is –”

“No that’s alright. I think I need this done sooner than that.” Freddy quickly hung up and perused his limited options.

There was a free clinic in Hollywood about which James had spoken; but when Freddy called, all he got was an answering machine message outlining when the clinic was open and what injuries they repaired at which times. The message must’ve been five minutes long!

“Patients with psychiatric problems are to come to the clinic every second Tuesday between three and five.” Freddy wondered how many psychiatrically-disabled people had a sufficient grasp of the concept of time to figure out when every second Tuesday was. That road seemed problematic at best.

Freddy needed a guy. A doctor guy. A foot doctor guy. Someone who could wrap a pillow of love around his ankle that would hold together for the next month. He really needed to walk again. Immobility was not on his to-do list.

James proved to be helpful yet again. He referred Freddy to his family doctor – perhaps he would know the best course of action. Freddy hadn’t had a family doctor since he’d had a family. He called Dr. Kaplan immediately.

“Well I’m not really talented enough to give you the proper treatment,” Kaplan jokingly admitted. “But let me see who… Ah yes, Phil Emery. Give him a call; he’s an orthopedist.” He gave Dr. Emery’s phone number to Freddy.

“Dr. Emery’s office,” the receptionist answered. Freddy explained the whole sordid story to her and made an appointment for two days later.

At 3:30pm on a Friday, Freddy and James found themselves in Beverly Hills at the orthopedic clinic. The building was a large six-floor glass structure that looked like every other building off of Wilshire Boulevard. Freddy walked on the crutches; James carried his X-ray’s.

In the lobby, the floor was black marble; there was no security guard, merely an office directory on the mirrored wall, two elevator doors and another door that led to the stairway. Emery’s office was on the fourth floor. Freddy thought it odd to have an orthopedist’s office on any floor other than the first. James pressed the button for the lift.

One of the elevator doors opened and off got a bleach-blonde woman with really high heels which gave her an Amazonian stature, a really short skirt which was hardly there and really fake breasts which were a gift from her plastic surgeon boyfriend on the sixth floor. She was exactly the type of girl so many people believe Los Angeles is teaming with – Marilyn Monrobots.

Freddy and James raised their eyebrows simultaneously then got on the elevator she had vacated. Up they went to the fourth floor.

Freddy checked in with the receptionist and waited but a few minutes before his name was called and he was escorted into a small examination room that overlooked a park and parking lot. As instructed, he removed both shoes and socks.

Dr. Phil Emery entered a moment later. He was a fossil of a man, in his sixties or maybe even his seventies, with hair as thin as thread and a face of meandering wrinkles that reminded Freddy of the Badlands of South Dakota. He was friendly and handled Freddy’s ankle like Ferdinand Magellan toying with a compass. He inspected the X-ray’s for a moment then gave Freddy the most wonderful news.

“Ah, it’s just a sprain.”

Dumbfounded, Freddy said, “What?”

“Well it’ll hurt but you’ve just gotta walk it off.”

“So I shouldn’t stay off it?”

“No, that’s the worst thing you can do. The more you use it, the sooner it’ll heal. Should take a few months.”

“So I don’t have a chipped tibia?”

“No. You’ve got a bad sprain. I’d say just take it easy; don’t go playing soccer.”

“I don’t play soccer.”

“Then you’ve got nothing to worry about.”

“What about the X-ray? What about that little speck under my ankle?”

“Ahh it’s nothing. Just a little speck on the X-ray.”

Freddy tried walking. A jolt of stiff pain shot through the tender foot which had been left unused for a week.

“I know it feels like you shouldn’t walk on it,” Dr. Emery said. “But that’s just your nerves telling your brain that they’re shot. Don’t believe your nerves and you’ll be fine.”

Freddy took a few steps, despite the odd sensations below his knee. He had it back. He had the old movement. He could walk, slowly for now.

“When I walk out of here,” he said to Emery, “I’m gonna be yelling, “I’m healed! I’m healed!””

“Emery,” Emery said, “Don’t forget to say Dr. Emery.”

Freddy limped out of the examination room and back into the waiting room. James was surprised to see him so mobile. Freddy paid Dr. Emery with a check – a measly $140, highly reasonable for sweet peace of mind.

Over the following weeks, the full capacity of Freddy’s foot returned. His right ankle would never again be symmetrical with his left ankle, but his balance had been restored. Or so he thought.

In truth, his balance would not be restored until he stood on his front porch holding two pieces of correspondence.

His father’s insurance benefits finally came through, after so many years bouncing around databases and filing cabinets. Freddy’s brother mailed him a check for his share of the final amount – $2610.17.

Freddy received that check the same day that he received his bill from the hospital. The hospital bill was an incredulous $2468.05. Almost twenty-five hundred dollars for a misdiagnosis, an improper treatment and a bad referral.

He held both letters in his hand. A check for $2610.17 and a bill for $2468.05. He did the math in his head, adding Dr. Emery’s $140, and realized that the difference was $2.12.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, the lord giveth and the lord taketh away, blah blah blah,” he told himself.

Freddy was sick to death of ironic perception and butterflies.

“Gracias, padre,” he said to the clouds and went back in his house, wondering on what he would spend $2.12.

The silver Beemer wound its way through the mid-week evening traffic of Sunset Boulevard, past the theme bars and shaded rubberneckers, past the tattoo shops and peeler joints, past the superstores and boutiques, past the parking lots, their attendants, their cars. Past the wafer-thin girls crossing the street.

Resting his fingers on the top of the steering wheel, Max drove the borrowed vehicle with insouciant ease. Seemingly impenetrable black shades rested calmly across the bridge of his nose as he scanned into the traffic and descending sun. He was thinking about someone.

Slouched in the passenger seat, Freddy squinted from the brilliant shine. He silently recounted to himself the events of the day. Not that anything uncommon had happened. He merely had the occasional bout of short-term memory loss. He glanced at his wrist to see that he had forgotten to accessorize himself with a timepiece.

“What time is it?” Freddy asked.

Max glanced at his watch and said glumly, “7:30.”

Freddy detected his friend’s pathetic tone. “What’s wrong?”

“Aww there’s this girl,” replied Max, as if such a curt explanation were enough. With Max, there was never just one girl. Not that anyone kept a count. Everytime their conversation found itself on the subject, Max would introduce several new names that Freddy had never before heard. There were always new names – Mia, Marcia, Alicia, Felicia, Laetitia.

So Freddy had to ask, “What girl?”

“Siobhan. She’s a model.” The only reason Max qualified her with an occupation – and he always did this – was to give her a personal context. Max only dated models.

“What’s the problem?” asked his friend, anticipating the variation on a theme. Still squinting.

“Well I met her three months ago at some party,” Max began, shifting gears. “I got her number and I put it on my desk with all my other little pieces of paper and I never got around to calling her. You know, it was just one of those slips of paper on my desk. I finally found it again a couple days ago.”

Freddy opened the glovebox and dug through the pink papers, AA batteries, fresh fuses, pens and pennies for a cheap pair of spare sunglasses, to no avail. “So did you call her?” he asked, repeatedly slamming the box closed until the latch caught.

“Of course I called her,” Max retorted quickly. “I called her last night.”

“And?”

“She was pissed off it took me three months to call… So I said, ‘Lemme make it up to you. I’ll take you out for drinks.’ She said, ‘Great, call me tomorrow, late afternoon.’ I said, ‘Great.'”

A smile grew across Freddy’s face – he knew Max had made an error somewhere in the process. It would take some delving. As always, he first assumed the most obvious, “You didn’t call her, did you?”

“Yeah I called her! Of course I called her!” Max deflected the notion that he would be so insensitive as to neglect Siobhan a second time. But he could not leave it at that. His innocence was paramount; he could not be wrong. Someone else had to take the fall. “I called her half-an-hour ago. She wasn’t home!”

What did he say? thought Freddy. Could that be it? “You called her half-an-hour ago?” Freddy asked him.

“Yeah!”

“At 7PM?”

“Yes!”

And there it was, the monkeywrench in the works. Freddy spoke. He spoke with care and hush, barely audible, in a voice that carried with it the knowledge that there are some mistakes that all men make, little faults that crack wide our plans for fulfillment. Freddy spoke these words: “2 hours late.”

Max did not respond immediately. He mulled over the sudden snap in the atmosphere; had the barometric pressure changed inside the car. What was Freddy talking about? he thought. “What are you talking about?” Max asked.

“Late afternoon is 3 to 5,” replied Freddy with certitude.

Max glanced curiously at Freddy before entering a deep curve in the winding road that always made Max feel like Richard Petty or Charlie Sheen. This time, he felt like plain old Max.

Freddy explained, “Late afternoon is 3 to 5. Then you got evening, 5 to 7. Then late evening – 7 to 9. 9 to 12 is night. Then you got late night, 12 to 4. Then early morning – 4 to 6. 6 to 9 is morning. 9 to 12 – late morning. 12 to 1 is noon. 1 to 3 is early afternoon. Then 3 to 5 again – late afternoon. You were two hours late.”

Max was silent for a moment; the only sound was the increasing whir of the engine as the car came out of one curve, into a quick gulley and back up over to the left. Across the recently repaved tar, through a corridor of wealthy taxpayers, their walls of trees and property values, they sped. Past bastards in better cars and suckers in worse.

Max had it. He had the rationalization. It had only taken him 2 seconds but this was it. “It’s alright,” he lied. “I’m just testing her.”

Freddy didn’t get it. “You’re testing her?”

“Yeah.”

“What are you testing?”

Max thought for a moment and had an answer for that too, “The relationship.”

“The relationship?!”

“Yeah.

“What relationship?” demanded Freddy firmly. “You met her once, got her number, finally talked to her three months later and now you have a relationship?!”

“I don’t want any negative emotions going on,” Max ruled. “I want to get rid of that stuff right off the top.”

“What emotions?!” yelled Freddy in utter frustration with Max’s delusion. “You can barely say you know her!”

“No, the way she looked at me at that party. She wants me.” Everybody wanted Max; he was the life of the party.

“Is that why she didn’t call you for three months either?”

“No, see, she was testing me too.”

“What?!”

“But I showed her.”

Freddy could not speak. Even if he could have, he would not have known what to say. The words would not have made sense. All he could do was make a few strange hand movements to express the overloaded circuits in his brain. He shook his hands slowly in front of him, tapped himself on the forehead, slapped his thigh a few times.

Having convinced himself of his own lie, Max shook his head, and scoffed, “Women.”

“No!” screamed Freddy. “You!”

And that’s all he could say. That was the end of that. There would be a new name a few weeks later. She would be a model. And Freddy would live vicariously again. Until then, he squinted in the sunshine.

This was written in October 1997 after a long day’s journey along the eastern and northern rims of Lake Huron.

Room 01
of the Canadian Motor Hotel
is my destination.
The landscape outside the rental car
is conifer and pine
scattered about a rocky contour.

The overcast sky, its cloud dipping low,
seems a part of the ground.
Native reservations abound,
in more ways than 1.
Every 3 to 5 minutes
down the 2-lane blacktop
there appears, at the side of the route,
a grocery store, gas station,
motel or house
that has been either mercilessly gutted
or responsibly boarded-up.
Occasionally,
there is a piece of heavy machinery
in the front lot.

Some houses have snow plow accessories
in their yard.
But there is not yet any snow.
The locals must endure
not only the cold of winter
but also
the anticipation of the impending cold of winter.
It is a modern wasteland.

Somone has sprayed graffiti across
the blasted side of the Canadian Shield,
“I love nature.”

Quarries of muck become empty aluminum sheds.
The greens and reds of Autumn
must contend with forgotten rust.
Curves and hills
over aged deposits
of hard cracked rock.
Small shallow lakes,
each with a small island 50 feet from shore.
Each island with a small 1-bedroom house,
an occupant never seen,
making them all the more mysterious.

Towns Communities Farms
Bigwood Whitefish Iron Bridge
Forgettable uninspiring names,
as only small places can have.

Upon arrival, I notice that
The Canadian Motor Hotel
shares the cost of its matchpacks
with the nearby Super 8 motel.
“Two great hotels,” the flap reads.
The Super 8 has a fax number;
the Canadian Motor Hotel does not.
But it does have
Room 01.
I check in.

8 quarters in hand,
I make a beeline for the vending machine.
A buck for a ginger ale,
I insert 4 quarters and select.
Nothing happens…
select again…
nothing…
select root beer…
nothing happens…
but I hear myself sigh.
I insert 4 more quarters…
Ginger ale button, nothing.

10 seconds later
I’m at the front desk.
The 30-something man in K-Mart-bought sweater
unnecessary moustache
and haircut uncut in twenty years
informs me that the vending machine
does not accept
QUARTERS.
It occurs to me that in 27 years on this planet
I have never heard of a vending machine
which does not accept
QUARTERS.
He fills out a slip of paper,
“$2 – pop machine”, and I sign it.
He hands me a $2 coin
and I return to the machine.

The $2 coin, or Toonie,
a recent addition to the system’s currency,
does not fit into the slot of the vending machine.
My thoughts turn to the front desk clerk
and the many people like him
whom I have encountered before.
I return to Room 01, soda-less.

Of the 13 available channels on the television,
5 have wearied reception,
3 have low social castes arguing, seeking attention,
1 allows home shopping,
1 allows public access,
2 are French,
and 1 scrolls the TV programs
which are available on the 13 channels
AND
the TV programs which are unavailable to me
on the 48 other channels in the local cable system.
“Rhinestone Cowboy” plays tragically
over the listings.
I do not even get The Weather Channel!
The lack of a tropical report prevents
any Caribbean fantasies.
I do not even know the temperature beyond the door
10 feet from my feet!!!

All I can do
is try to romanticize it all
and look forward
to the journey back home tomorrow…
through Michigan,
where Jesus saves.

The freeway wound through neighborhoods of broken dreams, its border walls brightened by the mid-afternoon sun which burned through the haze of exhaust perennially consuming the Los Angeles basin. Palm trees stood tall, their arms bouncing gently in the air. A non-fatal car accident had brought the northbound traffic on the 405 to a stand still – thousands of imports, hogs and pickups sat in line for the two-lane conduit past the crash.

A mile back, in an S.U.V., perched the Producer, frowning as he looked out ahead of him. Within the air-conditioned environment of his bastardized Land Rover, all he could hear were the cries of the woman on the other end of the carphone — speakerphone, “ON”.

The Producer sighed.

“Did you hear what I said?” asked the tragic young woman on the speaker.

“Yes, yes,” the Producer quickly responded, “Listen to me, I don’t know why you’re reacting like this. You’re perfect for the role and, ah –”

“But Peter said I didn’t have the depth.”

The Producer rolled his eyes and inched the vehicle forward the few feet the traffic would allow. “Forget what Peter said,” he calmly reassured her. “He’s the director – he’s only one cog in the wheel. And lemme tell you, it’s a pretty big wheel. If I say you get another shot at it, then you get another shot at it. You’re a Playboy playmate for crying out loud!”

BEEP-BEEP went the carphone, interrupting the Producer’s advocation. “Donna, stay on the line,” he told her. “I’ve got another call.”

The Producer tapped the “CHANNEL” key on the pad, initiating his next problem.

“Yeah?” the Producer began.

“Ira?” came the quiet squeak of another young woman.

“Hello! Who is this?” asked the Producer.

“It’s Lisa,” came the emotive reply.

“Lisa, hi, how are you?” The Producer remembered her from the party the other night in that suite at the Marmont.

“I’m terrible. I’m so terrible,” she burst forth with a hiccup.

“What’s wrong?” asked the Producer, though he had always preferred to know what’s right. Sushi, for instance, was always right.

“Everything!” she responded, her voice cracking like a log split by a French-Canadian lumberjack named Gaston. “I auditioned for Peter and I thought it went really well, y’know, but when I asked him, he said — he said — he said that I didn’t stand a chance in Hell. What does that even mean?!”

“Look, Lisa,” the Producer said, inching his vehicle forward. “He’s just the director –”

“I’m talented,” she shrieked.

“I know you are, Lisa,” he tried to calm her. “I wouldn’t be talking to you otherwise.”

Meanwhile…

Meanwhile, the Director emerged from behind the old oak wet bar on the bottom floor of his home nestled in a corner of the Hollywood Hills. In the gruff middle-aged taskmaster’s right hand was a double scotch on the rocks, not an uncommon sight at 3PM on a Tuesday. In his left hand was a sleek black cordless phone. He casually tapped in a number as he crossed his office/den to the leather chair and rosewood desk by the window.

The Director placed his glass of booze down on a cork coaster, reclined back in his chair and finished dialing. A busy signal. The Director pressed a series of numbers and listened again.

The computerized voice of a woman crackled through the connection, “The line is busy. You will be notified by special ringing when the line is free. Please hang up now.”

The Director pressed the “END” button and put the phone down on his desk. He sipped his scotch and looked out the window at the glorious flora which filled the canyon. He spied someone on a deck several hundred yards away. From beside his desk, he lifted a pair of Bushnell’s. He put them to his sockets and squinted to see the white bikini-clad sunbather.

“Hello,” he whispered to himself, “Back for more, are you?”

The phone chirped from the desktop. The Director remained glued to his subject. Another chirp from the phone. He laid the binoculars down on the desk and shook his head in amazement at the firmness of the hotchie mama across the way.

After a third ring of the phone, the Director picked it up.

“Ira?” he immediately asked.

“No, it’s Steve,” came the disappointing voice. The Director had been playing cat-and-mouse with Steve, the Writer, since the blue pages and they were already on to the goldenrods.

“What the Hell have you done to my script?” asked the Writer. It was not the first time the Director had been asked that question.

As is usually the case with members of the trade, the Writer went on to answer his own question. “You’ve totally rewritten the ending,” he explained. “Instead of an insane asylum, the main character ends up operating a midway ride at a county fair.”

“What’s the problem?” asked the Director, without much concern for the answer.

“She’s an insane mass murderer,” iterated the Writer. “Insane mass murderers end up in insane asylums!”

“Have you ever seen a midway ride operator at a county fair?” postulated the Director.

“That’s not the point,” argued the Writer, not truly knowing whether there’d been a point. He continued, “As far as I’m concerned, this rewrite is completely unacceptable and if this is the movie you’re going to make,” he demanded, “I don’t want my name in the credits.”

The Director picked up his binoculars again and returned his gaze to the sexy young thang on the other end of the lens.

“Peter?”

“Uh-huh,” groaned the Director.

“Did you hear what I said?”

“Yup,” concurred the Director, unwilling to play ball with the high-maintenance scribe.

“And?!”

BEEP-BEEP is the only response the Writer heard as he paced around the Ikea decor – Bachelorossen to be precise – in the high-ceiling living room of the two-bedroom apartment on Beachwood Drive which he shared with one of those roly-poly actors from TV commercials.

“Aw Christ, hold on,” muttered the frustrated Writer to the barely present Director, “I’ve got another call.”

The Writer clipped down on the lever of his rotary dialosaurus, dipping down into the waters of ancient telecommunications only to come back up for…

“Hello?” he began.

“Is this Steven Shedbit?” asked a sultry velvet voice.

The Writer was taken aback, his most regular reaction to the providence of a sexy-sounding woman uttering his name. It couldn’t possibly be a collection agency.

“Yes. This is, this is heem,” he mumbled the words.

“Hi,” she said invitingly, “This is Penny Gingerbimbo. I’m going to be playing Jezebel from your script.”

The Actress. Ever since the Writer had read a biography of Arthur Miller, he had lusted for the Actress on every production in which he’d taken part. “Conquest-by-word”, he called it. But there was still the matter of the Director on the other line. Art! Art must be maintained above sex drive!

“Penny, yes. Listen, Penny, I’m on the other –” He didn’t get that far.

“I was reading through your script — great script,” the Actress interjected, “and I noticed that there’s an awful lot of swearing…” The Writer knew what was coming. “… and I was thinking…” The Actress always took a moment after saying this, before continuing with, “Maybe she could be a little friendlier.”

For the Writer, the answer was simple. He’d read the how-to’s and taken several courses in script structure, standard character arc, the 37 basic dramatic situations. He knew the archetype better than anyone, having spent much money on the real thing.

“She’s a hooker.”

“What?”

“The character of Jezebel is a whore.”

“Oh.”

There was a pause – his was of undying patience, hers of confusion.

“I thought she was a nun.”

“She has sex with men under the pretense of sex-for-money then she kills them,” said the Writer, preparing to name off plot points one, two and three.

Oh…

“Oh, I guess nuns don’t do that,” said the Actress as she reclined on her cushioned patio chair, bathing in the yellow rays which fell to her deck. Bug-eyed shades concealed her peepers from the harsh sunlight while a skimpy white bathing suit revealed her pre-fab body to the same.

From the earpiece of her Nokia came the noise — BEEP-BEEP.

“Oh Steven,” she said, “There’s another call. Hold please.”

She pressed the “CHANNEL” button and continued like the good secretery she once was.

“Hello, this is Penny.”

A nasal middle-aged voice entered the earpiece of the Actress’ cellphone.

“Hello, is this…” A paper flapped in the background, then, “Penny Gingerbimbo?”

“Yes. This is Penny,” she repeated, already wanting to get back to the Writer and the direction of her arc.

“Hi, Penny, this is Sidney Vine,” he introduced himself. “I’m the Executive-in-Charge-of-Production on ‘Killer Hooker Fury’.”

The Actress thought, “Writer? What writer?”

“Oh hello, Mr. Vine.” She did not know how important the man on the other end of the line truly was, but she knew enough. For instance, she knew his title had four hyphens. She knew he was ‘studio’, all the way, to the max.

“Please,” he instructed her, “call me Sidney.”

“Okay, Sidney.”

“Great. Penny, I’m calling to congratulate you on getting the part of Jezebel.”

“Oh, yes, thank you, Sidney.”

“And… well, to be blunt, I think we should get together for drinks. Maybe discuss your role.”

Meanwhile, back in the bumper-to-bumper parking lot improperly named the San Diego Freeway, the Producer had finally calmed down one of his crying women.

“The role involves nudity, y’know? And I think –”

“I do nudity. I’ve done tons of nudity!” the woman revealed, though it was hardly a revelation.

“Lisa,” he cut to the chase, “as far as I’m concerned, you’re the only one who can pull this role off. Let me talk to my people and we’ll set up another meeting, okay?”

“Okay, I guess.”

“Alright. I’ve got to go now, I’ve got traffic all around me, travelling at a very high rate of speed,” he said, inching his vehicle forward at 2MPH and returning to the first P.Y.T. crying to him over the carphone.

“Donna?”

She was gone; nothing but a dial tone. The Producer clicked off the phone.

Temporarily deflated, with traffic at a dead stop, the Producer glanced out the passenger window at the knoll beside him. A recent work of graffiti had been sprayed on the border wall. It took the Producer a moment to translate the stylized font of the message which read, “Cova Yo Ass” [sic].

It took a moment to sink in but the Producer was soon dialing a number on the carphone.

The reflection of a mirror…

The reflection of a mirror in a bathroom reflecting the reflection of the mirror opposite it reflected in the mirror of a bathroom. Atop the clean smooth marble surface of the counter around the sink sat a soap pumper, a small bowl of mints, a condom dispenser and a think pile of aspiring actress’ photographs from which one could browse while conducting one’s business. The hand towels hanging by the door were emblazoned with the initials “S.J.V.”. Sitting on the toilet, his slacks crumpled to his ankles, was the Executive-in-Charge-of-Production, conducting his business with the Actress on his phone headset while he conducted his business on the head. He was looking at her headshot in his southpaw.

“Are you familiar with the Beverly Hills Hotel?” he asked her.

There was a knock at one of the executive bathroom’s two doors. The more accessible door. The Executive gently cupped the mouthpiece of the headset in his fist before barking, “Dammit, Bernie, I’m on the f’cking phone!”

From behind the door came the shellshocked voice of his assistant. “Sir, you have a call from Ira Gray on line two.”

“Tell him I’ll call him back,” shouted the Executive.

“He said it’s an emergency, sir,” said the muffled assistant.

“Hold on!” the Executive ordered with extreme prejudice then calmly returned to the Actress in the palm of his hand. “Penny, will you stay on the line? I have to take this call.”

“Sure,” she said, displaying immediate loyalty, “I’ll be here.”

The Executive leaned forward and pressed the “Line 2” button on the cordless waistpack clipped to the belt around his ankles.

“Ira, I’m in a meeting,” lied the Executive. “And we’re in pre-production. What could possibly be the emergency?”

“No biggie,” responded the Producer through the phoneline. “Sidney, listen, if anybody asks, we’re still casting for Jezebel.”

“What are you talking about? We finished this morning,” the Executive reminded him.

“I know, I know. But if anybody asks, we still are.”

“Who’s going to ask?” asked the Executive.

“Nobody,” the Producer assured him. “But if anybody does, then ‘Yes, we are still casting.'”

The Executive dropped the Actress’ headshot on the marble floor and scratched his head. “Ira, I’ve got Penny Gingerbimbo on the other line,” he told the Producer.

At the exact same moment, the Director was still sitting in his leather chair looking through his binocs at the attractive subject (who had recently been getting the attention of many men). She too had a phone to her ear.

“Who are you talking to?” asked the Director, to her, to himself, to the silence at the other end of his own cordless phone. Then, a click, and…

“Peter?” asked the Writer, returning to the Director, impatient with the Actress’ absence.

“Uh-huh,” replied the Director, the lens never leaving his eyes.

“I’ve got Penny Gingerbimbo on the other line and now SHE’S trying to rewrite my script!” the Writer complained to ears which had long been deaf to talk of integrity. Instead, the Director expressed jealousy.

“Why the Hell is she talking to you? Hang up on her. Now!”

Then came a long BEEP.

“Steve, hang up on her and come back to me, hold on,” the Director told him, then clicked a button on the phone, taking him over to his second line.

The computerized voice of a woman crackled to the Director, “The line has become free. Your call is being placed.” The line began to ring.

Back in traffic…

Back in traffic, the Producer explained the emergency to the Executive in a logline. “There’s still two more actresses I need to see,” he said into his carphone as he slowly glided past two crunched cars, an ambulance, three police cruisers and six towtrucks hustling for action on the 405.

“But we’ve already cast Penny,” the Executive reminded him, again.

And another BEEP-BEEP from his speakerphone caught the Producer’s attention. The LED display read “Caller Unknown”.

“I know, I know. Just hold on a second.”

The Producer clipped the Executive before he could continue and blindly took his next incoming call.

“Yes?”

“Ira, it’s Peter,” began the Director.

Fortuity at last! thought the Producer. “Peter, great!” he exclaimed. “Listen, if anybody asks, we’re still casting for Jezebel.”

“I cast Penny Gingerbimbo this morning.”

“I know that!” uttered the Producer, becoming more frustrated with the world. “But if anybody asks, we’re still casting.”

“Jesus, Ira!” The Director complained, “I’ve got Steve Shedbit whining about script changes, now you’re telling me we’re still casting… I’m trying to remain calm!”

Executive outweighs Director, thought the Producer. “Peter, I’ve got Sidney Vine on the other line. Give me two seconds.”

“Wait, Ira –” was all the Director could get out before the Producer returned to the Executive.

“Sidney?… Sidney?” asked the Producer as he accelerated out of the traffic jam, free again.

Of course, by this time, the Executive had returned to the Actress. “Penny?” asked the Executive from atop the warm padded cushion of the toilet seat.

But he’d missed her by a moment. Needing to talk to someone – anyone – about her role, the Actress had returned to the Writer she’d had on hold. “Steven?” asked the Actress, her skin toning in the sun.

There was no response from the Writer who was on his other line, waiting for the Director to return to his call. “Peter! Peter! Come back and talk to me, Peter!” he said to himself, helpless.

And for one moment in time, one brief but ubiquitous moment, a sound could be heard eminating from every office, every loft, every apartment and home, every warehouse, production house, soundstage, photo studio, every agency and law firm in the City of Angels. The sound of a sigh, a release of air aimed to relieve the tension of everyday life. The defeated gasp of desperation. For one moment, everyone in Los Angeles was frozen in stasis. Suspended from a phonepole or satellite dish. On hold.

With the phone still glued to his ear, the Director slouched back in his chair. He took a sip of his scotch and shook the ice around. “I should move to France,” he told himself. “They’d respect me in France.”

The Producer sped northbound, past the Getty and upward through the Sepulveda Pass. He glanced at himself in the rear-view mirror and affirmed to his reflection, “All you’re asking for is two Playmates at once. Is that so much? You can do this.”

The Executive pulled on the last bit of an already-empty roll of toilet paper. “Bernie!” he screamed to his dim assistant, “Bring me some fucking toilet paper!!!”

“These people know nothing about art,” the Writer warned himself as he took a fresh hit of kind bud from the honeybear bong he’d been given by a friend who was an animator on The Simpson’s.

The Actress flipped through several pages of the Writer’s script. As she skimmed over one key scene, it finally and graciously dawned on her. “Oh yeah,” she said aloud, “she is a whore.”

Originally performed as a comedy sketch, The Rivoli, Toronto, 1997