Hurricane Punch
Page 13
Next Week: Pimp My Dogma
Tom set the page down and manufactured a smile. “Shows promise. How about I keep your résumé on file in case anything opens up?”
“That means, ‘No, I’m going to throw it away as soon as I get these bozos out the door.’” Serge pumped his eyebrows. “See? I don’t need experience to be a good journalist. I can spot bullshit over the horizon. We get the job?”
“I can’t make a decision until I’ve interviewed all the applicants.”
“Let you in on a little secret,” said Serge. “We went to the Times and Tribune first. But don’t think you were our last choice. More like saving the best. And they weren’t nearly as polite. Actually, they threw us out. I learned there’s a secret button they can press….”
Four bulky security guards arrived in the doorway.
Serge looked back at the men, then the editor. “You must have a secret button, too…. Hey, let go of my arm!…”
The guards rushed them down to the ground floor and out the back of the building. They added a final, insulting shove because of unrelated personal issues.
Serge stumbled and caught his balance, but Coleman sprawled into shrubs framing the corporate sign. He got up and pulled sand spurs from his palms. “That could have gone better.”
“I didn’t realize how hard it was to become a syndicated columnist.” Serge produced a scrap of paper from his pocket and crossed something off.
“What do we do now?”
“Work our way down my list.” He tapped a spot on the page. “Next-best thing to being a syndicated columnist.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
TAMPA
Five minutes before midnight. McSwirley was drenched in the perspiration of dread. He had trouble commanding his legs to move down a dark, remote hiking trail in Hillsborough River State Park.
A nearby bush: “Jeff, it’s me, Mahoney. I’m right here. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
Silent commandos in black uniforms and face paint filled the woods. Tactical rifles swept the perimeter with night-vision scopes.
Jeff continued walking like a child just learning to. Bushes rustled alongside.
“This doesn’t make sense,” said Jeff. “He has to know the police will be waiting.”
“I told you he was getting sloppy,” said Mahoney.
“Darn it,” said Jeff.
“What is it? What’s the matter?”
“My camcorder battery’s almost dead. Better turn it off and save the last few minutes.”
“Forget the camcorder,” said Mahoney. “You need to stay on your toes. Serge may be getting sloppy, but he’s still Serge.”
McSwirley came to a trailhead. He checked the Xerox with the killer’s instructions: right at fork, forty paces. He began counting. “One, two, three…”
Bushes rustled. Night scopes panned. “…Thirty-eight, thirty-nine, forty.” The reporter stopped and looked around, straining his eyes against the darkness. He suddenly jumped.
“What is it?” whispered Mahoney.
“My cell phone’s vibrating.” He pulled it from his pocket. “Hello?…Uh-huh….”
Mahoney leaned his head toward a pinhole microphone on the shoulder of his camouflaged jumpsuit. “Condor’s getting an incoming call. You picking up anything?”
A half mile away, two police technicians with headphones sat in a black, windowless van down one of the park’s ser vice roads. They glanced at each other. “Condor? What’s this guy’s problem?” One of them looked over at a green oscilloscope. It was flatlining. He picked up his own microphone. “Negative. ‘Condor’ must be in a dead spot.”
“Roger. Tell the units something’s going down.”
“That’s a big ten-four, Mongoose.” The van guys cracked up.
“Jeff,” whispered Mahoney. “What’s happening?”
Jeff waved for him to shut up and held the phone closer. “Yes, I’m still listening…. But that’s not the plan we agreed—” He stopped and returned the cell to his pocket.
The bushes: “What’d he say?”
“Changed locations,” said Jeff. “Quarter mile from the next fork. Then he hung up.”
“Trying to get surveillance to reveal themselves,” said Mahoney. “Not as sloppy as I thought.”
“I guess that’s it.” Jeff started walking.
“Where are you going?”
“Back.”
“No, we’re going to the new location,” said Mahoney.
“You just said—”
“You’ll still have me,” said Mahoney. “And maybe a couple of the snipers if they can flank.”
“But I’m scared.”
“We don’t have much time. Let’s get moving.” Mahoney led the way, quickly rustling unseen along the side of the trail.
Jeff suddenly realized he was alone. “Don’t leave me!” He ran to catch up.
Twenty minutes later they were waiting at the new rendezvous point.
“Jeff,” whispered Mahoney. “Everything okay?”
“I want to go home.”
“Just a little longer.”
The reporter checked his watch. “He’s late.”
“They always are,” whispered Mahoney. “Serial killing makes you run behind schedule. Or he might already be here, watching us right now to make sure you came alone. Act like you’re not whispering to me.”
Precious time passed. An owl hooted. “He’s not going to show—”
A twig snapped. Their eyes swung to the other side of the trail. A dark form appeared.
“Jeff! Behind you! Watch out!” Mahoney leaped from concealment, brandishing one of those heavy metal flashlights. He swung with all his strength.
The form thudded to the ground.
Jeff looked down at the motionless person sprawled across the trail. “Is he dead?”
“Just cold-cocked him.” Mahoney bent over. “So Serge has taken to wearing disguises. Let’s get this thing off your head and see what you look like now.”
Mahoney pulled the top off the disguise. He jumped back. “It’s not Serge!”
“What’s he doing here?” said Jeff.
“You know him?”
Jeff nodded and got out his camcorder.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
THE NEXT MORNING
Serge and Coleman sat across from each other with sharpened number-two pencils. Serge raced through his employment application. He reached the end and signed boldly. Coleman was still at the top of his own form, tongue out the corner of his mouth in concentration, printing his name. He was almost able to stay inside the boxes. He held it up to Serge and smiled. “How’s that?”
“Coleman, your name doesn’t have a 3 in it.”
“Where?” Coleman turned the page around. “The e goes the other way?”
“Most of the time. Why don’t you let me finish it for you?”
Coleman slid the page across the table. “Thanks. That was too much pressure.”
Serge licked the tip of his pencil and whipped through Coleman’s form in record time. He got up and went looking for The Man.
Soon they were seated again, this time in a cramped office that doubled as some kind of storage. Actually, that seemed like the primary function. A man in a white, short-sleeved dress shirt and thin black tie sat behind a cluttered desk and reviewed their applications. He scratched his chin. “You sure you’re in the right place?”
“Definitely,” said Serge. “I was this close to being a syndicated columnist, but it’s all who you know. I told my partner, Coleman, that this was the next-best thing. Does your insurance cover substance abuse?”
The man raised his eyes over the top of the forms.
“Not us,” said Serge. He made quote marks in the air with his fingers. “‘Hypothetically.’ We have a friend who’s trying to straighten his life out, but he’s not trying very hard. Can barely spell his name anymore.”
“Who’s that?” asked Coleman.
Serge elbowed him.
The man went back to the forms. “We would prefer he complete a program first.”
“Of course,” said Serge. “I understand perfectly. OSHA regulations. The last thing you need is some new guy ripped out of his skull and burning down the building with everyone inside, horrible screaming, pounding on illegally locked exit doors: ‘For the love of God, let us out! The skin’s flaking off my body!’ Who needs it?”
The man placed the applications in the middle of his desk and shrugged. “I still don’t get it. You’re the most overqualified applicants I’ve ever seen. Why would a pair of tenured college professors want to work here?”
“The economy,” said Serge. “Everyone’s taking a beating out there. It’s summer recess, so we thought we’d pick up a little extra scratch. My psychiatrist says I need structure.”
“You’re under psychiatric care?”
“Everyone at the university is. It’s a career move. You’re supposed to talk about it at the cocktail parties. Ever work in academia?”
“No.”
“Don’t start. Total snake pit. Everything’s publish or perish. And you should see what gets published! Quasi Oligarchies and the Keynesian Feminist: Recipe for Orgasm or Armageddon?”
“It’s your decision.” The man began marking up a time sheet. “You can start this afternoon if you’d like.”
Serge jumped up. “You’re kidding!”
“We can wait till tomorrow if you have plans.”
“No,” said Serge. “I mean, I was just imagining a more complex process. The convening of a collegial body, vigorous debate, behind-the-scenes deal making, a protracted series of secret ballots while we wait outside for the puff of white smoke.”
“To work here?”
Serge ran around the desk and hugged the man off his feet. “Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!” He put the man down. “Coleman, did you hear that? We have jobs!”
“Poop.”
They headed out of the room. Serge turned in the doorway. “We’ll be the best employees this place has ever seen. You won’t be sorry!”
The man smiled politely and went back to his time sheet. “The jury’s still out.”
NICK SHAVERS
“Everyone has a role to play.”
That’s what they said about the New Journalism, and it was never more true than in the case of Nick Shavers. He definitely had a role. It kept changing.
You haven’t heard about Nick yet, at least by name, but he’s been around.
Nick was a pioneer and, later, one of the first casualties of a virulent industry movement that swept to prominence in the late twentieth century. Convergence. Media conglomerates were already in an acquisition frenzy, so why not pool information? The problem began when they also started pooling personnel: TV stars writing stories, newspaper reporters appearing on air, and everyone scooping themselves on the Web.
At least that’s how the mergers worked in concept. But after all the spot-welding was done, the results looked more like an abstract sculpture with no moving parts. The only apparent benefit was cost savings. It was judged a smashing success.
Nick Shavers was one of the most recognized faces in the central Florida market, where he’d enjoyed a long, steady run as midday anchor at Florida Cable News, just a heartbeat from the prime-time anchor slot that was the obvious career progression in his mind alone.
Nick’s problem lay in a universally denied but well-known secret of television news: age discrimination. Shavers was the best argument in its favor. As they say, certain people grow old gracefully. But there was something a little too Vegas in the way Nick went about it. His rug was too dark, dentures too white, lapels too lounge-act. He came off like one of those guys in a late-night infomercial for a sports book offering the guaranteed LSU lock. In fact, that’s how Nick moonlighted until the station told him it wasn’t dignified for a future prime-time anchor.
“Okay,” said Nick. “When do I get the position?”
“Be patient. Your time’s coming.”
He was patient. The station moved into Gladstone Tower. They came to see him.
“We’ve got good news.”
“Prime time?”
“Better.”
They explained what they had in mind. It didn’t sound better. He’d leave the anchor desk and return to the street for live remotes. Then he’d race back to the building and write stories for Tampa Bay Today.
“But I don’t know how to write.”
“That’s what editors are for.” The station’s director glanced around and lowered his voice like it was just between him and Nick. “You know, those anchors who are convergence-ready will be most attractive for advancement. This is the future.”
“Why me?”
“You’re the best candidate.” Because the future was unknown, and Nick was expendable.
And that’s how Nick ended up back on the beat. It wasn’t so bad once he got there. People began recognizing him from TV. “Hey, Nick!” “What are you doing out here?” “Did you bang the boss’s wife?” He nodded and waved cheerfully. “Thank you. Thank you very much….” The recognition awakened something in Nick, and it showed in his work. He tackled every assignment with the same fresh zeal before rushing back to write articles that hit the copy desk like sacks of rotten fruit.
“What the hell’s this?” asked an editor.
“My downtown-redevelopment story.”
“It’s unreadable.”
“That’s what they said you were here for.”
“‘Irregardless’ isn’t a word.”
“It isn’t?”
The editors resigned themselves and rolled up sleeves. Nick watched over their shoulders as they unconvicted suspects and fixed names of major streets.
“‘Penultimate’ doesn’t mean the ultra-ultimate.”
“It doesn’t?”
The editors grumbled to higher-ups. It wasn’t just Nick. It was all the TV personalities. Their stories took more time to fix than if the paper’s regular reporters had written them in the first place. Then there was the big increase in corrections: “Please disregard Tuesday’s ‘Home Tips.’ The described wood-stripping method releases a fatal vapor.”
But it worked the other way, too. TV management was livid. Print reporters didn’t translate to the small screen. Stiff, caught in headlights, out of their element, like watching a painfully obvious transvestite trying to pass. Except transvestites know how to dress. The countless reshoots and extra time in the editing room was killing them. “This can’t go on!”
The suits responded that it would, indeed, go on. The respective editors were instructed to do whatever it took to make it work. So they hired more staff to handle the increased efficiency.
Corporate bean counters noticed the hemorrhaging bottom line and passed up the word. An urgent all-hands memo came back down: Unconverge!
But it was too late. The inbreeding had already fucked up the bloodlines. Some freakish journalism hillbillies were wandering around. Like Nick.
They pulled him off the street. But his old midday anchor chair now held a buxom Florida State intern. The TV station told the newspaper they could keep him.
“We don’t want him.”
“Neither do we.”
“But he can’t write.”
“So make him an editor.”
Nick was put in charge of seven reporters, who promptly ambushed the maximum editor.
“He’s screwing up all our stories!”
“It can’t be that bad.”
“He’s inserting errors! Did you see my story on the gulf ’s natural-gas reserves?”
“No.”
“He changed all the references from ‘gas’ to ‘gasoline.’”
The reporters were backed up by other editors until it was mutiny. The Gladstone people had no choice. They called in the management of WPPT-FM.
“But we don’t want him.”
“Everyone has a role to play.”
“Does he know anything about radio?”
“He won’t have to do radio. Marketing came up with an idea. Shirley, tell them….”
The radio people didn’t like the idea.
They called Shavers in for a talk.
He didn’t like the idea.