by Mike McCrary
Hovering over the room like some smirking joke that can’t wait to unleash the punch line. Letting my two-million-dollar idea do laps around their heads before finally settling in, taking root, digging deep into their minds like a relentless virus. They look to one another. Everyone except for Choke. He still keeps his cold-ass eyes on me, of course. What did I expect from this cat? A personality overhaul? Too much to ask. I can, however, almost see the questions forming in the minds of the others.
It’s all in the eyes. The faces. I’m reading them like seeing a skilled actor who can express a page worth of dialogue with a single look. I can see through the windows of their souls. The questions. Perched on the tips of their tongues waiting for permission to dive.
Where’s the two million?
How do we get our grubby paws on it?
What does he mean, film us?
I measure the pulse of the room, waiting for the right moment.
Harry begins to speak.
I cut him off. “The cash is in a safe location. A place only I can access.”
Harry tries to speak again, and again I cut him off. “I’m sure it goes without saying I need to be alive and well in order to get the money. As for the money you already lifted from me? That hundred grand? Consider it a good-faith down payment. A taste. You can take it, kill me, and live happily ever after. You can go that way, sure. Bet you already discussed it. But if you do, you will never get paid. Not truly paid. Not with real money.”
I shut up.
Press Pause.
Playing them like Page working a Les Paul Standard Tobacco Sunburst.
Harry begins to speak then stops, waiting for me to stop him. I don’t. I let him go on, my raised eyebrows inviting his contribution to the conversation.
“What do you mean, film us?” he asks.
“Yeah, no shit,” Boone chirps in. “Not really interested in creating something to watch later in a courtroom.”
“Difficult to enjoy money in prison,” adds Ruby.
They look to Choke.
Nothing. He writes something down on the spiral. At least he’s not eyeballing me.
“We can do it a variety of ways. I can distort your faces and voices,” I say.
“You mean like on 60 Minutes with corporate whistle-blowers?” asks Harry.
“Yes, something like that.”
“Make us all sound like Darth Vader?” asks Boone.
“Sure. If you like.”
“I like,” he says, as if he were four.
There are more looks around the room. Choke writes down more, then tears the piece of paper from his spiral and hands it down the row. Harry and Boone don’t even look at it; they know where it goes and it goes to Ruby. She takes the paper and immediately begins working her calculator. Flipping through some other papers she has stowed at the back of her spiral. Removing paper clips, shifting the order of brightly colored Post-it notes, thumbing through pages—she’s got some form of system over there. From here it looks like Excel sheets and—wait, is that a fucking bubble chart? She looks back and forth between the papers, comparing notes and numbers while jotting new notes down on the paper Choke sent over to her.
Choke taps Boone on the knee then thumbs behind him, motioning toward the kitchen. Boone gets up without a word, obeying his marching orders and heading to the fridge. Boone takes out a jug of milk and pulls a metal can of something from a cabinet. The door almost comes off in his hand. Getting a better view, it’s clear the metal can has a cartoonish large bunny on it. It’s fucking Strawberry Quik. I watch Boone take out a glass from the cabinet then mix the milk with pink powder, spinning it with a spoon. After a tap of the spoon on the rim, he opens up a shelf under the sink and removes a bottle Jose Cuervo. He pours a long shot of the Gold into the still-swirling pink milk. He again gives it a good stir then plops a straw in. I glance over to Choke.
Eyes on me.
Boone hands Choke his pink drink then takes his seat. All of this happened without a single syllable uttered in the way of instruction or thanks. As if this was something that was simply understood. As if it’s done like this all the time—a thumb toward the kitchen, no more required.
Nothing particularly wrong with it, I guess, just damn odd.
Ruby looks up from her math assignment and hands the paper back down the row to Choke. Once it reaches his hands, Choke allows his stare to migrate from me to the paper, but only for a moment. He scans Ruby’s work, sets his drink down, writes something on the paper, and hands it back down the line before getting back to his beverage.
A cat scampers into the room.
Ruby receives the paper.
Cat’s a beaut too. Three legs. Patches of fur missing. One eye stitched shut.
Ruby gives the paper a look, taps a few buttons on her calculator, thinks, taps some more, writes something in the air, licks her lips, wrinkles her nose, finally looks to Choke. “Yes. No. Yes. Depends. Yes. Fuck no. Fuck yes. No. Not a bad idea. Yes. A strong maybe on the last one.” All as if she were rattling off the answers to a pop quiz.
Choke nods.
The feline mess jumps into Choke’s lap. As he strokes the cat, it begins to purr its patchy ass off. Choke stares at me as he sucks down his strawberry beverage, his fish-face taking in large swallows. I watch his stubble-covered Adam’s apple move with each gulp.
Boone whispers to Harry.
Gulp.
Ruby is trying to get my attention.
Gulp.
Harry whispers to Boone. They alternate pointing at me.
Choke’s straw takes in nothing but air.
Boone and Harry giggle like deranged children.
Ruby blows me a kiss.
Fucked-up cat purrs.
Choke continues to eyeball the hell out of me.
Who are these people?
43
“It’s a Pink Rabbit.”
That’s what Ruby tells me. She’s explaining what Choke was drinking.
Nodding, I give the impression that I understand. The truth is I don’t understand. I don’t understand anything that is happening. Only thing I know is I need to get these people to buy into my bullshit without me taking on too much of theirs. That might be impossible, but I’d like to give it a try and, oh yeah, also, I would like to make it to the other side of this adventure alive.
“Can we do this?” I ask.
Nothing.
I think about that not-talking-first thing the producer told me. Fucked that up, again. Or did I? I can’t remember if I spoke first or when this all really started. Does the clock start when we first met or when we sat down? I guess technically it would be when we conceptualized a deal of some sort. So that would put us at a few minutes ago, but there was that whole Pink Rabbit thing. I don’t fucking know, but if the past is any guide to the future, then I’m guessing I’m fucked on this.
“Any questions?” I ask.
Choke motions to Harry.
Harry picks up my bags, hauls them over to me, and drops them at my feet. He gives me a pat on the head before he sits back down. Ruby looks to Choke, who nods back to her.
“Show us this equipment of yours and what you think you’re going to do with it,” she says.
“If it looks legit…,” Harry adds.
“And looks like you won’t fuck us up…,” Boone chimes in.
“Then you’ve got a deal and maybe…,” back to Ruby.
“Just maybe…,” says Harry.
“We won’t execute you,” says Choke.
Now I’m silent. Stunned. I can’t believe I did it.
I’m in.
Game on.
And for my efforts, I won the opportunity to travel with a band of crazy people documenting their illegal acts of violence and wanton destruction, all while they are constantly going to be trying to determine the best, most efficient way of killing me and taking my money.
Congratulations, Jasper.
You won the room.
44
I want
to do a brief but effective presentation of the gear and what it can do.
They’ve been kind enough to let me loose from the chair and the ties that bind.
Running through all the cameras and the various mounts, I show them, one by one, all the ways I can rig a GoPro to my person to capture the moments without slowing them down. I think they thought I was going to chase after them circa Cops with a big, hulking camera. The gear I picked out can be placed almost anywhere.
I demonstrate the mount that fits on my cap.
On my chest.
On a helmet.
A dashboard.
A standard tripod for the interview/human-interest moments—this part surprisingly tickled the interest of Choke. Showed off the bendy, worm-like mount I can work to hold in awkward places. It’s very versatile and capable of capturing odd angles and impossible situations.
Mounts for the barrel of a gun.
Outside the window of a car.
Car grill.
But the one that gets the most attention by far is the mouth mount. It allows me to place a camera more or less in my mouth, biting down on a plastic bit to hold it in place. This gives the audience the perspective of really being me. Face and eye level, not at the chest or a worm’s-eye view of the action. It really puts you in there, I find, even more than the helmet or off the brim of a baseball cap. I let them play around a little bit with the stuff. Let them get comfortable with it all. Do not want any surprises out there in the wild. Nothing to keep them from doing what they do.
I look through the bag.
“Where’s my phone?” I ask.
“Can I put one on my gun?” asks Harry.
“Yeah, I want do that too,” says Boone.
“Do you have my phone?” I ask again.
I hear Lucy’s message in my head. The message I haven’t heard in days. It provides an odd yet comforting soundtrack between my ears. Did she leave a new one? I’m losing track.
Nobody answers me. Not sure they even heard me. They’re too busy digging through my bags. All except Choke, who is still sitting and petting that weird cat. I notice he has a fresh Pink Rabbit in hand.
“Is this to strap to your head?” asks Ruby, holding up a camera strap.
“Yes,” I say. “Do you have my phone?”
She shakes her head, trying it on.
“Who has my phone?”
Still nobody answers.
“Come on. I need to know where my phone is.”
I feel my face getting hot.
“Tell me.”
Harry looks through my hard drives.
“I just want to know.”
Boone tries to mount a camera at dick level.
“Where?” I press.
Boone chases Ruby, trying to fuck her with the camera. Ruby pushes him away with a giggle.
“Where. Is. My. Fucking. Phone? You merry little band of assholes,” I say. I scream it, actually.
They stop.
Turn.
Now all are looking right at me. More shocked than anything. I hear Choke’s straw reach the open air, making that sucking sound. He holds my phone in his free hand and sets down the empty pink-coated glass. The cat jumps from his lap as Choke gets up and walks toward me. He waves the phone at me.
“Here it is,” Choke says, seeming a little tipsy. Sloshing his syllables around, he says, “And you will not get it back. You don’t need it. You don’t have nobody to call. Nobody to talk to but us.” A buzzed pause, then, “You understand, correct?”
“When we’re done, I need that back. I get that back, in one piece, or you don’t get the money.” I’m not drunk or buzzed, so the fact that demand came from my lips shocks even me.
Choke cocks his head as if I just asked him to do calculus.
Really need to focus on containing my inner monologue during the coming days.
“Is that an addendum to this deal of ours?” he asks.
“It’s a request. Out of respect of our new relationship,” I say, hoping that peace pipe–sounding bullshit will work.
Choke retains his eye-lock with me then breaks, whipping his head around as he walks away. I look to the rest of the crew. They don’t bother with eye contact.
Our first fight.
Not the last, I’m sure.
I know I handled that the wrong way. I can’t let the real world get in the way of this. I cannot allow my emotions, my personal baggage, to fall into the mix of this thing. My feelings can and will be used against me. Can’t let Lucy in.
The window behind Boone explodes.
45
Boone dives.
Everybody dives.
Everybody but me.
Shattered glass blows into the cabin. The world has hit slow-mo. Shards bounce across the floor, tumbling like thousands of tiny dice thrown. My film’s cast seems to know what to do. They don’t hesitate. They move. Fast. Burning purely on a mix of instinct and insanity.
The door thuds.
I’m a statue.
Somebody wants in.
Boone rolls across the floor, grabbing a handgun, then springs up. Ruby has the shotgun. Harry, an assault rifle.
Another window bursts.
Lights go out.
Door thuds. Harder. Louder. Again and again, each time swelling with intensity.
Somebody wants in bad.
Want to do my trick. Need to do my trick. Mind needs to escape. Wants to exit this place. Needs to find a hole in the universe.
Choke launches to his feet, diving, taking me down to the floor as gunfire pops. Muzzles flash quick bursts from the dark outside. Bullets whiz-cut the air above me. My face skip-bounces off the floor.
Front door smashes in.
From my view on the floor, I can only see boots storming in. Big boots. Big boots caked with mud. They resemble the ones I’ve seen before, ones that used to shine like mirrors. Despite Choke being on top of me, I still see the guns. There are three men, maybe more, outside. Two have shotguns, and the other one has an assault rifle of some sort. Room-clearing tools.
Pops of gunfire outside.
There’s at least one more man out there.
Harry’s head explodes like a melon. His body slumps to the floor in a lifeless mess of pulp.
Choke flies off me, raging toward one of the Boot Boys.
Harry’s half face lands inches from mine.
Pale blue dot.
It’s only a pale blue dot.
We are meaningless, floating nothing-people in a vast sea of darkness. Only meat sacks riding on the pale blue dot, none of this matters.
It’s not working.
This little mental masturbation exercise can’t sway my consciousness from what my eyes are telling me, and those eyes are screaming back into my brainpan, Harry is missing half of his fucking head.
Ruby blasts a Glock point-blank into the throat of one of the Boot Boys.
Choke bull-rushes another with amazing aggression-fueled energy. He drops to the floor with a burst of speed, sliding inches under a shotgun blast.
What am I doing?
Choke comes up, slamming his palm under the chin of the Boot Boy then snaps his neck.
Get out of your head, Jasper.
Boone grabs a 12-gauge and blasts into the darkness, holding off the fire from outside.
It’s all happening, man. Here and now, motherfucker.
Choke has separated the remaining Boot Boy from his assault rifle, snapping his knee with a stomp of his foot.
This is the movie, Jasper.
I look to my bag. Scrambling, crab crawling, I reach my gear. It’s scattered around because of the little show-and-tell session we had earlier. I grab what I can—no time for cool mounts and shit, I just need a camera—and snatch up a GoPro. Whipping around, I’m able to capture Ruby sliding to Harry’s side. Her face is contorted by pain, frozen in a scream, a silent one. Red, swollen, watery eyes wide as plates. Her emotions are cut wide open. Raw. Scooped out with an ice cream scoop.
&n
bsp; I get low for a new angle. Bullets still rip the air and gouge the walls. I’m getting all of Ruby. All of her hurt. Recording all of her pain. She looks to me, staring into the lens of my camera. Her face goes slack. She sniffs and blows me a kiss.
No idea what to do with that.
Boone keeps blasting out into the night. I angle to get him in the background behind Ruby. Pops of return fire continue, but at a noticeably less pounding pace. No idea if Boone got one or not, but he’s holding them back. Whoever them is.
Ruby jumps up, charging toward Choke and the battered pile of the Boot Boy. He’s still alive, but not for long, I can only assume. Ruby and Choke share a glance.
Choke steps back.
Ruby steps in.
Working for it, I find a better shot.
Ruby looks into the eyes of the Boot Boy. He’s scared but won’t give her the satisfaction. Boot Boy says, “I’m not telling you a fucking thing, cunt.”
“You are absolutely correct, sir,” she says. Ruby plants her foot on his throat, pushing down, never losing eye contact even when his eyes bulge and his body thrashes. He fights to push her foot free. It’s not working. She braces herself, holding onto the sink with one hand for balance. She pushes down harder and harder. Spit flies. His face flushes crimson. What’s more terrifying is Ruby’s face.
Expressionless.
Stone.
As if watching mindless television, doing dishes, or pardon the expression, stepping on a bug. What’s causing my stomach to get a big twist of anxiety is the fact she wants to keep looking into his eyes. She’s actually turning, leaning her head to match his twists and thrashes just so she can stay on his eyes. She doesn’t want to miss a single moment of this.
When Ruby has finally had enough, she puts all of her weight on her one foot, lifting her other foot off the ground. There’s an unnerving snap. A violent jerk of his body, then motionlessness.
Not sure what this says about me as a human, but I can’t help what I feel about getting it all on film. I try not to, but I can’t help but feel happy about it. Repulsed, but happy.
Right now, this is more than I could have hoped for.
I’ll worry about the therapy later.
46