A Note from an Old Acquaintance

by Bill Walker

What the hell, he thought. I could use some of that. Clicking the READ button, he stared at the screen, his hands curling into fists, knuckles whitening. A dry, dead taste formed in his mouth, and his guts felt as if they were falling through the floor.

  There were only seven words, the last three written in bold seventy-two point caps, forcing him to scroll down to read them all:

  WE HAD A DEAL. LEAVE HER ALONE!

  Ruby.

  Anger flared, washing away the guilt and focusing his mind into razor-sharp clarity.

  “Not this time, you son-of-a-bitch. Not this time.”

  1991

  6

  “CAN WE TRY IT the way we did it a few minutes ago?” the client asked, her voice taking on an exasperated edge. She glanced at her watch, shaking her head.

  Brian nodded. “Sure, no problem. Just give me a minute.” He knew how the woman felt. The lines on her freckled brow had deepened. They’d been editing the spot for the last five hours and had become stuck on one short, maddening five-second sequence, going back and forth between two versions of it over and over again. He knew exactly how she felt. For that matter he wasn’t at all sure how much of his own patience was left. Then there was the master tape itself. If they went on much longer, the wear and tear caused by her indecision would render it useless. Checking his time code log, he typed in a set of commands, his fingers flying over the keys. Two of the three Sony U-Matic 3/4” decks containing the selected shots rewound to the beginning of the sequence. The third deck, with the master edit, stood poised.

  The client leaned forward peering over her wire-framed glasses, and squinted at the monitor, her frizzy shoulder-length brown hair falling into her angular face. She brushed it back with an annoyed flick of her hand, and began chewing on her nails. Brian noted they were already gnawed to the quick.

  “Ready?” Brian asked.

  She sighed and nodded. He pressed the ENTER button. The Sony decks whirred and the sequence played itself out, the computer previewing the edits.

  The thirty-second spot featured the elderly CEO of a local chain of convenience stores making a surprise visit to a store and finding it in a shambles. The punch line was the revelation that the store belonged to one of his competitors, prompting the old man’s last immortal line: “Oh...keep up the good work.”

  It was a cute, but flawed concept that only served to point out that perhaps the old guy really wasn’t as on-the-ball as he first appeared. Thank God the photography was great, at least.

  The woman nodded. “You know, I think that’s the best we’re going to do. Old Henry’s not exactly Clio Award material, is he?”

  Brian laughed. “No, but I think that’s a part of his charm.”

  The woman grinned back, just as the door to the edit suite flew open with a quiet whoosh. Brian’s partner, Bob Nolan strolled in. He wore his typical lopsided grin, his boyish face belying a keen intelligence and a sharp eye for framing the perfect shot.

  “How’s my ace editor treating you, Helen?” he said, flopping himself down into one of the black director’s chairs scattered about the suite.

  “Very well, in spite of my demanding ways,” she said, shooting an amused glance at Brian.

  Bob’s thick eyebrows shot up. “Oh, really? Does that mean we get to double his rate?”

  “Not on your life. My budget won’t allow it.”

  They all laughed. Bob turned to Brian. “Everything work out?”

  “Everything cuts great. It’s just that Henry....” Brian left the rest unspoken. Bob rolled his eyes, no doubt recalling the nightmare on the set with the old CEO forgetting his lines for nearly every take, prompting Bob to order the dialogue placed on cue cards. The problem was, unlike professionals, the old duffer couldn’t mask the fact that he was reading the lines, making him appear stiff and wooden.

  They all watched a preview of the final edit and everyone agreed that it was the best that could be done. The client left fifteen minutes later with a VHS copy of the spot stuffed into her scuffed Louis Vuitton bag, promising to let them know if her client, the CEO, wanted any changes.

  Brian turned to his partner when the front door slammed shut. “You weren’t joking about doubling my rate, were you?” he asked.

  “Hell, no. That woman’s been busting my chops since day one about her budget.” He sighed in disgust. “That spot should have been cut in half the time. I shot it so it would go together like a paint-by-numbers picture for a four-year-old. And what does she do? Wastes your time going over the same shots for three hours!”

  “It wasn’t her fault, Bob. Henry—”

  “Forget Henry. She couldn’t make up her mind. That’s our money she’s wasting.”

  The phone rang and Bob snatched up the earpiece, his jaw clenching.

  “Newbury Productions....” He listened, slouching back in the chair. “Hey, man, how’s it going? I’m glad to hear that. Here? Everything’s great, just great.... What’s that? No kidding? Sure, Debbie and I would love to come. Wouldn’t miss it.... All right, you too.”

  Bob held out the phone.

  “Who is it?” Brian mouthed silently.

  “Nick Simon.”

  Brian smiled and took the phone. Nick was an old friend, a graphic designer who’d helped Bob and Brian establish their business right after they’d graduated from film school. In fact, they now inhabited the very office space once occupied by Nick’s company, Wunderkind Graphics, before he moved to larger, more prestigious digs.

  “Hiya, Nick, long time no speak. What’s up?”

  The voice on the other end coughed. “My balls—from the highest yardarm,” he wheezed. Nick suffered from chronic asthma and always sounded as if he were on the verge of a coughing jag. “But that’s beside the point. Cassie and I are renting out the Metropolis for a little shindig on Valentine’s Day, seven PM; and we want you to come.”

  “That’s in two days!”

  “I know it’s a little last minute, but what can I tell you, I’m a spontaneous guy. What do you say? You up for a little partying? From what I’ve heard, you guys could use it.”

  As always, Nick’s gossip was deadly accurate. Since the first of the year, Newbury Productions had been cranking full tilt. Now, nearly six weeks later, the juggernaut had picked up steam, promising a year that could be their most profitable yet.

  “I’d love to Nick, but...I don’t know. I’m not much of a party guy, if you know what I mean. And I’ve got a real backlog of work, here.”

  Bob rolled his eyes again, his lopsided grin returning.

  “Bullshit,” Nick said. “I want to see you there, or I’m gonna send Rocco and Freddie to persuade youse.” His hoarse laugh turned into a wheeze. This was an in-joke between the three of them, the mythical Rocco and Freddie being two Mafioso characters from an aborted feature film Bob and Brian shot while still in college.

  “Okay, okay,” Brian said, “I’ll come.”

  “That’s the ticket,” Nick said. “Besides you never know, you might meet a real babe, for a change.”

  “Just what I need.”

  Nick ignored the sarcasm, turning serious. “Listen, Brian. You know I’ve always liked you. You’re like a little brother to me. Just give me the word and I’ll set you up with a real sweetie-pie. Least I can do.”

  “I appreciate that.”

  “Forget about it. I’ll see you mugs at the club day after tomorrow. And by the way, the drinks are on me. Hah!”

  Brian hung up the phone and shook his head. “The man’s incorrigible.”

  “He try to set you up again?” Bob asked, grinning.

  “Yeah.”

  “He’s got a point. You’ve turned yourself into a hermit.”

  “And I suppose you and Debbie have someone in mind?”

  “I don’t, but Debbie might. I can ask her—”

  Brian held up his hand. “Please...don’t. Look, I know it’s been over a year since Julie turned me inside out, but I’d rather things just happen as they will. Is that
okay?”

  Bob shrugged. “Okay by me. As far as Thursday, how about Deb and I swing by and pick you up?”

  “That’s fine.”

  Bob left the suite and Brian spent the next hour cleaning the heads on the Sony decks and prepping the suite for the next day’s session: a music video by a hot local rock band. At least that would be fun. He’d seen the band a couple of times and liked their music.

  Outside, the traffic on Newbury Street stood gridlocked, horns blaring, exhaust fumes sending thick white plumes skyward. The temperature had plummeted to twenty degrees and a freezing wind blew in off the Charles, cutting through Brian’s thin leather jacket like a razor. Shivering, he locked the front door and crossed the street to Bauer Wines, where he picked up a six-pack of Samuel Adams, gossiped a moment with Howie, one of the owners, then hurried the half mile to his apartment at the corner of Fairfield and Beacon Streets.

  Housed in what was once the basement kitchen of a French-style mansion built in the late 1880s, it boasted floor space of just under a thousand square feet, with ten-foot ceilings, two seven-foot windows facing the carriage house, a walk-in closet, a delightfully archaic bathroom with a claw-foot tub and a kitchen larger than some of the places he’d lived in while a student.

  It felt like home the moment he’d first walked into it.

  The mail was the usual mix of bills and throw-aways, except for the envelope marked: The Hendricks Agency. He opened it, feeling the usual mix of excitement and dread.

  Dear Mr. Weller:

  Thank you so much for sending us your novel, The Normandy Conspiracy. We thought it was tautly written and shows a great eye for detail. Unfortunately, we do not feel we have enough enthusiasm for the material to sell it in today’s very competitive market. We wish you the best of luck in your writing career.

  Sincerely,

  Jan Hendricks

  Except for a few alternate word choices, the letter could have stood in for countless others. He knew, because he’d kept them all. And while it bothered him on a gut level, his search for an agent had gone on far too long to let one more rejection get him down. He had the book out to five other agents, and would send it out to five more if those didn’t pan out. One day, one of them would bite. If not with this book, then with the one he’d just started.

  Later, while he ate a quick spaghetti dinner, along with his third beer, his mind wandered back to Nick and his offer to set him up on a date. On one level it repelled him, on another...well...he was a healthy male. And to be honest, Nick had really good taste; and dating someone with no strings attached might be refreshing. No complications, just good hot, sweaty sex.

  Julie, his last serious relationship, had driven him crazy with her neuroses. One minute she was a temptress, wanting all sorts of kinky things in bed, the next she acted as if he were the plague. He’d been madly in love with her and thought she’d felt the same way. It came like a hammer-blow when she’d dumped him for another man, a man he viewed as nothing more than a milquetoast. After months of introspection and a few sessions with a sympathetic therapist, he’d come to realize that Julie was afraid of true intimacy. Scared to death of it, in fact. The irony was that she was a therapy-junky, loved to air her dirty laundry for all to hear; yet when push came to shove she ran for the cover of a “safe” man she could control.

  The one amusing thing about all this was that every time he ran into Julie and her new boyfriend (far more frequently than he wanted), she went out of her way to let Brian know that she and “Chip” had “not made love yet.” Poor Chip must have been embarrassed as hell, though he pretended not to show it. But one thing Brian knew without a shred of doubt: Chip was over the moon for her, and as soon as she realized this she would break his heart—like so much cheap dishware.

  After cleaning up from dinner, he decided to put in some time on the new book. He chugged the last of the six Sam Adams and placed the bottles into the growing pyramid of empty six-packs in the corner of the kitchen. Next came the inevitable pot of coffee and his old Royal typewriter from out of the closet. It was going to be a long night...and he knew he was going to love every moment of it.

  7

  THE INTERCOM BUZZER RANG at 6:30. Brian struggled into his plain white t-shirt, while pressing the talk button. “Just finishing up. I’ll be right out.”

  “No sweat, we found a space right in front.” Bob said, his voice sounding robotic through the tiny speaker.

  Turning away from his front door, Brian scrambled to pull on his pants. Nick had called the office earlier in the day to let them know that the party had a “Grease” theme: leather jackets, chains, jeans, and lots of hair pomade. It was another last-minute “masterstroke” that had Bob rolling his eyes.

  Typical Nick.

  The only thing Brian owned that fit the bill was a pair of tight-legged black jeans he’d never worn, some Western style boots and a newly-purchased black leather motorcycle jacket, the same style as worn by Marlon Brando in The Wild Ones. Shiny and stiff, it squeaked whenever he made a move in it.

  Zipping up the jacket, he turned up the collar and glanced at his image in the mirror. He had to admit it did make him look a bit dangerous. The hair was where he drew the line, however. His was so baby-fine, he would have looked like a wet Pekingese if he’d tried to pomade it. He gave himself a thumbs-up, a final spritz of Halston Z-14 and was out the door.

  Bob’s car, a three-year-old gray Honda Accord, idled at the curb. Brian slipped into the back seat, grateful to be out of the biting cold. The motorcycle jacket squeaked loudly and Bob eyed him in the rearview. With a sinking sensation Brian saw that neither Bob nor his wife, Debbie, were dressed in anything resembling Fifties attire.

  “Oh, great, I’m probably going to be the only one dressed like this. I’ll look like a fool.”

  “No more than you usually do,” Debbie said, giggling.

  “Thanks,” he said, grimacing. The jacket squeaked again.

  “Actually,” she said, “I think you look kind of cute. Doesn’t he look, cute, Sweetie?”

  “Very cute,” Bob said, smirking.

  They pulled out into traffic a moment later. The ride to the Metropolis Club was a little less than a mile straight down Beacon Street, through Kenmore Square now choked with crowds of restless college students hitting the clubs and bars, up Brookline Avenue and over the Pike, with an immediate left onto Lansdowne.

  The club occupied a long two-story cinderblock building crouched in the shadow of Fenway Park’s titanic green carcass. The only indicator the building housed anything other than non-descript industrial space was the large blue neon “M” mounted above the thick polished stainless-steel doors.

  Amazingly, they found a space near the other end of the street and walked back to the club, joining a small crowd poised outside the vault-like doors. A tall muscular bouncer dressed in black, holding a stainless steel clipboard, turned some of the people away as they approached.

  “Private party, ladies and gents. Invitation only,” the bouncer said, moving to bar the door. “You can’t enter, if you’re not on the list.”

  Several couples groaned their displeasure and left.

  A moment later, when the three of them reached the head of the line, the bouncer eyed them, his thick brows arching inquisitively.

  “Bob Nolan and guest,” Bob said.

  The bouncer consulted the list on his clipboard and nodded toward the door.

  Brian gave his name and watched the big man flip through several pages. Brian did some quick math in his head. At roughly fifty names per page, that meant at least three hundred invitees. Nick had to be spending a bloody fortune. I’m in the wrong business, Brian mused.

  “You’re cool. Go on in,” the bouncer said finally.

  Brian eased through the steel door and found his friends standing in an impromptu receiving line in the reception area. The room was easily twenty by twenty feet with black walls, charcoal-gray carpeting, and stainless-steel sconces shooting white-hot beams
of light upward toward the fifteen-foot ceiling. Watching over all of this was a twice life-size replica of “Maria” the sexy Metropolis robotrix, her metallic curves gleaming. He could hear music thumping through the walls, the beat shaking the floor.

  Nick and his partner, Cassie Bailey, stood at the head of the line greeting their guests. To Brian’s relief, both Nick and Cassie wore clothing similar to his own. In fact, except for the cowboy boots Brian wore, Nick could have been his clone. The similarity ended there, however. Nick stood a hair over five-foot-seven, had dark unruly hair poised like a crag over a lean face that bore more than a passing resemblance to Matthew Broderick.

  Cassie, taller by a good two inches, wore a battered russet-brown bomber jacket two sizes too small—which did little to hide her ample figure—and skin-tight jeans rolled to just below the knees, exposing shapely calves and sockless feet shod in bright-red high-top sneakers. Her dark brown hair, always in disarray when working, was now sleeked back into a greasy pompadour, completing the haughty biker moll look.

  She sidled up to Brian and enveloped him a hug that lasted a little too long.

  “You gonna save a dance for me, Honey?” She spoke this into his ear in a breathless whisper.

  She pulled away, her black eyes flashing. It was obvious she’d had a few too many already, though she’d made it crystal clear in past encounters that she had a thing for him. And while Brian was flattered, she just wasn’t his type. It wasn’t anything physical he could put his finger on, either, as she was fairly attractive. She certainly filled out her jeans well enough. No, it was more her overt predatory nature—fueled by an undercurrent of desperation—that made him uneasy.

  Brian managed a smile and was about to answer when she slunk away, distracted by another guest. He breathed an inward sigh of relief and moved over to Nick, who was hugging a tall brunette dressed in a poodle skirt and matching sweater.

  Nick spotted him and grabbed his hand in a vise-like grip, a toothy grin creasing his gaunt face. “Hey, kiddo, you made it. I was laying money down that you were gonna chump out on me.”