Pop Quiz

by Tom Ryan

  “Come on,” he calls back again. “Might as well get it over with. Just close the door behind you.”

  I follow him into the apartment. In a small kitchenette, a bunch of takeout containers are stacked neatly on top of each other next to the sink. I walk down the hallway and end up in a small living room. The curtains are drawn. The furniture looks like it might have been really expensive when it was bought, but it hasn’t aged well. I could say the same about Seth. He looks weary, he’s carrying more than a few extra pounds and there’s a definite streak of gray in his hair.

  Seth drops into a chair and gestures toward the couch on the other side of a coffee table loaded with books and comics. After a second I take a seat.

  “What did you mean, get it over with?” I ask.

  “I mean the old ‘How am I supposed to channel my time on Pop Quiz into a satisfying career in show biz, O Mighty Oracle Seth March?’ bit,” he says.

  “What made you think that’s what I wanted to talk about?” I ask.

  He reaches down beside his chair and comes up with a half-empty giant bottle of soda, which he opens for a swig before answering.

  “Because it happens like clockwork, at least once a year. One of the charming and adorable ‘child actors’ sends me an email or arrives on my doorstep, worried because the season has ended, or they’ve been written out of the show, and they don’t know how they’re going to fill their days now that they’ve been ‘bitten by the showbiz bug.’ ”

  He passes the bottle across the coffee table toward me, and I shake my head no thanks.

  “So am I right?” he asks. “Are you hoping to figure out what makes a famous person tick?”

  “Not really,” I say.

  “Good!” he yells, half jumping out of his chair before dropping back down. “Because it’s…NOT WHAT IT’S CRACKED UP TO BE!”

  Whoa. I don’t know what to say, so I just sit there as he stares at me.

  “One day you think you’re going to be a famous TV star,” he says. “What you don’t realize is that you’re on a low-budget cable TV show. It’s not enough, guy! It’s just not enough!”

  “But you had two other shows,” I say.

  “Had,” he says. “Had two other shows. Now I’m washed up. I’m pitiful. I spend most of my time watching and rewatching old episodes of Pop Quiz. I’m like that aging high-school football player who obsesses about the team long after I’ve graduated high school.”

  “Aren’t you trying to act anymore?” I ask.

  He responds with a bitter laugh.

  “Try is the word of the day,” he says. “I did try. After the cop show dried up, I auditioned for everything my agent could get me. I resorted to commercials for laundry detergent, and eventually they disappeared too. Then my agent left me. She said I wasn’t viable anymore.”

  “That’s tough,” I say.

  “You’re telling me. I didn’t have another outlet, because I never went to school for anything. I barely graduated high school, to be honest. Been trying to write scripts, but that hasn’t gone well either. Every story I come up with leads back to Pop Quiz.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  “It doesn’t matter, kid,” he says, and he sinks into a gloomy silence.

  I wait for him to say something else. Eventually I have to speak. “Pop Quiz was canceled yesterday.”

  He nods. “Yeah, I saw that online. It had to come to an end someday. It’s just too bad they didn’t wrap it up properly. Instead it will be a bunch of loose ends. After nine years. What a shame.”

  I don’t know what I was expecting to learn from Seth March, but I definitely feel worse after meeting him than I did before.

  “You want my advice, kid? Forget about TV. You’re young. You’ve got your whole life ahead of you. Go out and find something else to love.”

  Twelve

  I take the bus home. There are three kids about eleven or twelve near the back, laughing and carrying on. One of them does a double take when I pass them on my way to grab a seat. He leans in and whispers something to his friends, and then they’re all taking turns turning around to look at me, then crouching together and whispering some more.

  Finally one of them gets up and walks back to me, ignoring the bus driver’s yell.

  “Are you Dane from Pop Quiz?” he asks.

  I nod. “The one and only.” I’m not really in the mood to chat with fans, but considering how much I want Pop Quiz to be saved, it probably makes sense.

  “Oh man, that’s so great,” he says. I can tell he’s really excited. He turns back to his friends and gives them a thumbs-up. “It’s him!”

  He turns back to me. “Can you do us a favor?”

  The bus driver yells again for the kid to sit down. He slides into the seat in front of me and turns around to face me.

  “What kind of favor?” I ask.

  “My friends and I are doing a video for our Insta, and we were hoping you’d help us out,” he says.

  “Your Insta?” I repeat.

  “Yeah, our Instagram account. We make little videos.”

  “Yeah,” I say. “I know what Instagram is. But what do you use to shoot the video?”

  He looks at me like I’m dense. “We all have phones! Anyway, will you please help us? Nobody will believe that we met you!”

  “What do you want me to do?” I ask.

  “We don’t know yet, but we’ll figure it out. It’ll be easy—I promise.”

  I raise my eyebrows. “Sorry, dude,” I say. “I don’t think I have the time.”

  “Awww, c’mon!” he says. “Please?”

  He looks so eager and excited that I can’t bring myself to say no.

  “Okay,” I say. “Let’s do it.”

  The bus stops a couple of blocks later, and we all get off. There’s a park across the street, and they lead me there, chattering the whole way about how exciting it is to have a “real star” in their new video.

  It takes them about five minutes to set up their shot. I’m amazed they’re able to work so quickly. I’m used to being primped and prodded by hair and makeup, waiting for the lights and cameras to be just so, and getting a bunch of instructions from Bill. This little production, by contrast, is quick and snappy—they huddle quickly and come up with an idea. One of them grabs a bag of chips out of his backpack and climbs up a tree. Then they tell me to start walking toward the tree. Where is this going?

  The premise, if you can call it that, is that I am out for a walk in the park. I stop and take a seat under the tree, then rub my belly and frown before saying, “I’m hungry.” The kid in the tree drops the chips, and I grab them, rip open the bag with a big grin and shove some of the chips into my mouth. “Mmmmm, bark!” I say with chips falling out of my mouth.

  He wasn’t lying—it really is quick. The whole thing takes about fifteen minutes, tops, including a wide shot, a close-up of me and a shot of the chips falling out of the tree.

  “Thanks a lot, man,” the kids say when we’re done.

  “No problem,” I tell them. “It was fun!”

  “I bet this will make us a few bucks for sure!” says one of them.

  “Really?” I ask. “You make money? How do you manage that?”

  “With our FundZone account,” says another kid. “We have a link to our FundZone page on our Insta account. We do crazy challenges and stuff. If, like, twenty people support us, we do a dare or something stupid.”

  “And people do that?” I ask.

  He shrugs. “Sure. It isn’t much, like a hundred bucks a month, but it helps us buy software and props for our videos and stuff.”

  He plays with his phone for a second, and then my own phone buzzes. I pull it out of my pocket and see that he’s followed me on Instagram.

  “That was quick,” I say. Then I notice their account information. “Wow. You guys actually have almost ten thousand follow
ers? That’s kind of amazing.”

  “Yeah, we’ve been doing it for a few months now. It’s no big deal. Some people have way more followers than that.”

  “Still,” I say. “That’s pretty cool. It’s kind of like WowKids.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” he replies. “Those guys are kind of professional though. Most of our friends just like the Instagram and Snapchat videos, because they’re shorter and you can share them around and stuff.”

  I shake my head. I’m having a hard time keeping up. When did I get left behind?

  “We take it seriously,” says the third kid.

  “I’m sure you do,” I say.

  The kids thank me again, and before I know it, they’re gone.

  I walk the last few blocks home, and as I’m opening the front door, my phone dings with another notification. I’ve been tagged in a post.

  I open the link and am watching the video when my mom enters from the kitchen.

  “What are you looking at?” she asks.

  “It’s just this weird video some kids I met on the bus made.” I hold the phone up for her to look at and play it again. It’s actually pretty funny, and the two of us laugh, then watch it again. Every time I refresh it, I see that more people have watched and the “likes” count has gone up.

  “It’s amazing,” says my mother as she begins to pull stuff out of the fridge. “The technology that exists today is almost unbelievable.”

  I’m barely listening. I’ve just had another idea.

  Thirteen

  “I just don’t see how this would work,” says Anais. “Remember what Bill said about production costs?”

  I’ve asked Anais and Satri to meet me at the Tim Hortons near the park so I could lay out my idea.

  “Yeah,” says Satri. “It seems like kind of a stretch. We’d need a lot more money than those kids on the bus make.”

  “That’s true,” I say, “but think about it. Those kids don’t have a fan base the way Pop Quiz does. Between all the actors on the show right now, we have thousands of followers. If you add the people who used to be on the show, it’s probably more like tens of thousands! Bill said the main reason we can’t produce any more episodes is there isn’t enough money. This way, we could solve that problem.”

  “You think those people will just give us money?” asks Satri.

  I shrug. “I don’t know. But don’t you think it’s worth a shot? Besides, they’re not giving the money to us. They’re giving it to Pop Quiz. There’s a difference. So many people have been talking online about how sad they are that the show is ending. This is their chance to help save it!”

  Satri considers this. “I love it,” he says finally. I could hug him.

  We both look at Anais. She’s chewing on her bottom lip, and I can tell she’s thinking it over seriously. “So do you think we should go to Bill with this idea?” she asks.

  “Not yet,” I say. “This time we should have an airtight plan.” I glance past them at the door. “And here comes the guy who’s going to help us come up with one.”

  They twist in their seats in time to see Seth March enter the coffee shop and head toward us. They turn back to me, amazed.

  “What the heck?” says Satri.

  “It’s a long story,” I say. “I’ll tell you later.”

  “Jeez, Aiden,” says Seth as he reaches our table. “It’s like you multiplied or something. One popular young star was hard enough to handle. I didn’t realize I’d have to talk to so many of you.”

  “I’m a big fan, Mr. March,” says Satri, standing and leaning over the table to offer Seth a fist. Seth awkwardly bumps it, then sits down next to Anais.

  “Hi, Penny. I’m Seth.”

  Anais looks a bit pink. “It’s Anais. It’s so great to meet you.”

  “Right, Anais, sorry. So tell me, kids,” he says. “What’s going to happen in the final season at Cherry Lane? Any major love stories? Any kids getting busted by the cops or involved with some unsavory friends?”

  He leans forward, obviously genuine in his interest. I let Satri and Anais fill him in on the stories and plots we’ve spent the last few weeks filming, trying not to squirm when Satri goes into excruciating detail about the blossoming love story between Dane and Penny. Finally, Seth sits back in his chair and sighs.

  “Sounds like a good season,” he says. “Too bad there was no warning about the cancellation. Otherwise they could have spent some time coming up with a killer script to end the show in style.”

  “Actually, that’s why we want to talk to you,” I say.

  Seth smiles. “I figured something was up. So hit me.”

  I explain what I learned about crowdfunding and how we hope to use our popularity to raise some money.

  “Enough money for another season?” he asks.

  “Not a whole season,” I say. “A two-hour movie special.”

  “A very special Pop Quiz episode,” says Seth. His tone is mildly sarcastic, but I can tell from his face that he’s intrigued by the idea.

  “Think about it,” says Satri. “We get all the biggest names that were ever on the show to help out. Ronald Blitz, Colleen and Desiree Washington, Farouk Aboumanian—everyone.”

  “How do you propose to do that?” he asks. “Most of them aren’t even in the biz anymore. Come to think of it, I don’t think any of those guys you named are.”

  “Isn’t that incentive enough?” asks Anais. “Don’t you think that a lot of them would love the chance to come back and revisit their Pop Quiz glory?”

  Seth takes a sip of his coffee. “You might be right,” he says. “To tell you the truth, I doubt any of us have had half as much fun since we worked on that crazy show.”

  “You loved it, didn’t you?” I ask.

  He nods, smiling. “We all did. Think about it. It was just the craziest thing to have a TV show land in our laps. But I guess I don’t need to tell you guys that.”

  I look at Anais and Satri, and I know they’re thinking the same thing I am.

  “We just want a chance to wrap it up the way it deserves to be wrapped up,” says Anais.

  “But we couldn’t even consider pursuing it without getting the cooperation of the one and only TicTac Tucker,” says Satri.

  For once Satri’s over-the-top approach is just the right thing. Seth smiles and pulls out a small pad of paper and a pen from his jacket pocket.

  “Okay,” he says. “Here’s how this should work. If we want a FundZone page to be successful, we need it to be flashy and exciting. That means getting as many cast members involved as possible from the start. I can get in touch with some of them.”

  “I can take care of the ones we know,” says Anais.

  “Great,” says Seth. “And we need to figure out how to get the word out about our page.”

  “What about making a video?” says Satri. “Something short and funny like the ones the kids on the bus make.”

  “Great idea,” says Seth.

  “Can you make that happen?” I ask Satri.

  “Absolutely,” says Satri. “It’ll be fun!”

  “There’s one other thing,” I say. “We’re going to need a script.” I look at Seth. “Do you think you’re up to it?”

  His eyes widen, and a slow grin creeps across his face.

  “I was born for it,” he says.

  “What about you, Aiden?” asks Anais.

  “I’m going to make sure we still have a place to shoot,” I say.

  Fourteen

  It’s only been a couple of weeks since the show wrapped, yet all signs of Cherry Hill High School have disappeared.

  But Diana Parker, aka Celeste Montgomery, is sitting on the school steps, texting. Even doing something as simple as staring at her phone, Diana appears poised and confident. She looks up and gives me a little wave.

  “What are you doing here?” I ask.

 
“I’m not really sure,” she says. “I guess I just wanted one last chance to visit the old school. Kind of silly. It’s not the same after production ends.”

  “You can say that again,” I say. We look up at the front doors. I know we’re both thinking the same thing, that we might not ever get to walk through them in character again, cameras pointed at us.

  “I heard that you’re going to LA. For auditions,” I say. “Is it true?”

  “It was true,” says Diana. She slides her phone into the pocket of her shorts and stands up. “I canceled the trip though.”

  “Why?”

  “To tell you the truth,” she says, “I’m not sure I want to act anymore. It’s been a lot of fun, but I think I’d really like to be a doctor.”

  “A doctor?” I say. “Wow.”

  “I like science,” she says. “And I want to help people. But we’ll see. I’m trying to keep my options open.”

  “That’s cool,” I say. “I think you would have been a hit in LA though. I bet you would have landed a big agent. We would have said we knew you way back when.”

  Diana laughs. “Doubtful. Thanks though.”

  A car pulls up beside the sidewalk. “There’s my ride,” she says. “I’ll see you around. Enjoy the rest of your summer!”

  She begins to walk toward the car.

  “Diana,” I call after her. She turns around. “I know you say you’re done with acting, but do you think you still might have one more gig in you?”

  She smiles. “I think I could manage to make one more appearance.”

  The school is pretty much empty. The camera equipment that used to line the hallways has been carted away. Everything is glossy and clean and smells like lemons.

  I walk down the hallway and push through the swinging door into the gym. The sets have been taken down and trucked away, and the craft-services table is a distant memory. The only sign that this was ever a TV production studio is Bill’s table and chair, still in the middle of the stage, a wastepaper basket overflowing with paper sitting next to it.

  But there’s no sign of Bill.

  “I don’t have the heart to clean it up yet,” says a voice. I turn to see that Trevor has come in behind me. “Poor Bill,” he continues. “The cancellation has been tough on everyone, but he’s been hit especially hard. Pop Quiz has been his life for the past six years. He’s been coming in and sitting at the desk every morning, just staring at his computer screen and occasionally scribbling down ideas and then throwing them away.”