The Big Bamboo (17 page)

The man’s expression changed. “That’s one of my favorite scenes of all time!”

“Mine, too!” said Serge. “I loved it so much I tried it the very next time I went to a diner, and you know what? I got the same reaction! That’s a sign of good writing.”

The businessman was chuckling now. “What’d you think of his performance in
Cuckoo’s Nest
?”

“Randall Patrick McMurphy. RPM. Revolutions Per Minute.”

“Never realized that,” said the businessman. “I’ll bet we like a lot of the same films.”

“See? We’re bonding through the magic of cinema!” said Serge. “We just met and it’s like we’re old friends! Can I come over to your house and grill?”

The man’s smile drooped.

“You’re right again,” said Serge. “I’m rushing things. Here, I want you to read something extremely personal.” He reached in his shirt pocket and pulled out a letter. “It’s from my dead granddad. Hey, where’d page two go? Must have dropped it. You’ll still get the gist.” He handed it to the businessman, who began reading. Halfway down, his jaw fell. He finished and handed it back to Serge. “Wow. That’s quite a story. I don’t know how I’d react if I was in your place.”

Serge took the letter back. “It’s all I’ve been able to think about. Well, not all. Stuff just jumps around in my head. Sometimes I can’t turn it off. You fly a lot? What do you think of the new security?”

“Makes me feel safer.”

“Me, too,” said Serge. “But it really put the pressure on last night.”

“Why’s that?”

“Figuring out how to get all my makeshift weapons through X-ray.” Serge leaned and whispered. “I’m armed to the teeth.”

The man’s eyes grew large.

“No, you got the wrong idea. I’m not some kind of nut. It’s for the terrorists.” Serge leaned again and lowered his voice. “We have to start thinking like they do. I mean, box cutters! Next time they’ll come up with something even more unexpected, so we have to depend on our imaginations to stay ahead.” Serge patted something inside his shirt. “Did you know you can kill someone instantly with a standard pocket comb? Very unpleasant. You don’t want to know. Just take comfort that if anyone starts lighting his shoe, row forty-two is covered.”

The businessman reached up and pressed a button on the overhead console.

Serge stretched his neck and looked around the passenger compartment. “I wonder who the air marshal is. It could be anyone…” Serge stopped and looked at the man. “Is it you?”

“Oh, no.”

“Because they’d never suspect with that stomach. You’d be perfect. And of course if it really was you, you’d have to say no, so I understand perfectly. I won’t make you uncomfortable by pressing the issue.” He grinned at the man.

The man nervously grinned back.

“So,” said Serge. “Is it you?”

A flight attendant arrived. She turned off the “assistance” light over the middle seat. “How can I help you?”

“We’re three fairly big guys,” said the businessman. “I was wondering if any other seats might be available.”

“I’m sorry, sir. The flight is completely full.”

The attendant walked away. Serge shook his head. “I’m surprised at you.”

“But I was just thinking that—”

Serge held a hand up for him to stop. “No need to explain. I guess I misjudged.” He reached in his shirt pocket and slowly removed a comb.

The businessman shielded his face with the leather organizer. “No! Please! Dear God!…”

Serge began combing his hair. “You are a very, very considerate human being. You saw me having trouble adjusting my legs. How thoughtful.”

The man cautiously lowered his organizer and peeked over the top.

“I really lucked out with my seat assignment, getting you and all,” said Serge. “These coast-to-coast flights are a regular weirdo sweepstakes.” Serge reached in the seat pocket and pulled out a tiny digital camcorder. He pointed it out the window and whispered from the side of his mouth: “Keep a lookout.”

“What for?” asked the businessman.

“This is an unapproved electronic device…Fuck ’em…”

A convertible Malibu drove along the coast in a light evening breeze.

“There’s the place,” said Pedro.

Ford turned off South Catalina Avenue and pulled up to a ten-thousand-square-foot beach house. Cars were being valeted by men in white robes. The gang found themselves in the kitchen. Candles everywhere. More white robes. A loud whirring noise: blender on puree, people tossing in organic vegetables and LSD.

Ford walked over to Pedro. “How come all these guys are wearing robes?”

“This is the headquarters for that cult. The one waiting for the seven-planet alignment.”

“Then why’d they let us in?”

“Rush week.”

Ford wandered conversation to conversation until he was out back, leaning against the railing of a sun-bleached observation deck. To his left, a man in a white robe chanted and played the sitar. To his right, another robed man pumped a keg. The man skimmed the foam off the top of a plastic cup and handed it to Ford. “Have you ever given any thought to joining a fraternal organization with strong community ties?”

“I’m not joining any cult,” said Ford.

“Oh, no. We’re not a cult.”

“I read about you guys in the paper. Mind control…”

“Catholic Church started those rumors. They play hardball with upstarts. You want to talk about a
cult
.”

“What about the castration?”

The man began pumping the keg again. “Press always gets hung up on that, like it’s the only thing we do. Ever read about the stretch of highway we clean up every summer?”

“No.”

“That’s my point. You need to enroll in our trial plan. Two weeks, no strings. Judge for yourself.”

“How far in is the castration?”

“You’re fixating,” said the man. “Open your mind…”

Pedro walked by with his own cup of draft, talking to someone else in a white robe. “…so the carpenter files down the bolts on the drawbridge…”

Ford looked over the brochures he’d just been handed. The robed man began pumping the keg again. “It’s a tiered payment structure. You live in the house and get the meal plan, but there’s a discount if you don’t want breakfast. Some of the guys like to sleep in…”

Mark ran over with a cell phone. “Dallas just called. We gotta go.”

Holmby Hills.

“What’s wrong with everyone at this party?” asked Ford.

“What do you mean?” said Pedro.

“They’re all gloomy.”

“That’s because the host doesn’t let anyone do drugs in his house.”

“Why’s that?”

“He’s a dealer.”

Wonderland Avenue.

Ford stuck his head through the twin front doors. “Holy cow. Who lives here?”

“Professional stage parents,” said Pedro. “Two kids in prime time.”

The place was the most jammin’ yet. Competing stereos on full volume in every room: Gwen Stefani bleeding into Chili Peppers. Open drug use. Casualties everywhere. A gun discharged into the ceiling.

“What’s the party for?” asked Ford.

“She’s pregnant again. Baby shower.”

Ford noticed something across the room: Mel Glick heading up the stairs with a blonde over his shoulders in a fireman’s carry. Ian was right behind, toting a medical bag and Polaroid camera.

“Why doesn’t anyone do anything?”

“Because they know what’s going on,” said Pedro.

“What’s going on?”

“A transaction.”

They went out on the balcony. Ford was struck again by the view.

“…The City of Angels, lonely as I am…”

He repeated his mistake of looking down over the railing. He stumbled back.

“What’s the matter?” asked Pedro.

Ford blinked a few times. “I can’t believe they build ’em like this. Each one’s higher and scarier.”

“You should see the Chemosphere House around the corner. Not even attached to the mountain. On top of a single pole.”

“There was a place like that in
Body Double,”
said Ford. “Craig Wasson peeped on Melanie Griffith with a telescope.”

“That’s the same house.”

A loud rumble shook the building.

Ford looked up at a blinking red light. The belly of a giant jetliner roared directly overhead on its final descent into LAX.

Serge was glued to the window. Singing.

“Comin’ into Los Angel-eeeeeez…bringin’ in a couple of keeeeeez…”

He turned to the businessman. “Don’t worry. The only keys I carry fit in doorknobs.”

The businessman tried to read a magazine.

Serge leaned over his tray table. A map of the United States lay across it. The map had a dotted red line across the country from Tampa to the Arizona-California border. Serge uncapped a Magic Marker and made sound effects as he added five more dashes to the coast. “Almost there.” He capped the pen. “Remember me telling you over New Mexico about the wings that sheared off that cargo jet from rivet stress? I think we’ll make it.”

Coleman tapped the businessman on his left arm and held out a miniature bottle of vodka. “Want some?”

“No thanks.”

Serge tapped the businessman on the right arm. “Just remembered: Most crashes occur within five minutes of takeoff and landing, so we’re not out of the woods yet. Best thing to do is get your mind off the smell of jet fuel. Remember that amateur video of the fiery, pinwheel crash down the runway in Sioux City? Don’t picture it. That’s how I cope. Just keep telling myself: ‘Think happy thoughts. Teddy bears, fairies, gumdrops’…”

The businessman felt a tap on his left arm. Coleman pointed at a half-full vodka on the middle tray. “Are you gonna finish yours?”

“Take it.”

“Thanks.”

A tap on his right arm.

“I can see the control tower! We just have to clear this last freeway…Three hundred feet, two hundred…You be Mozart. I’m Joan of Arc…‘Holy shit, Mozart! Get me out of this fucking thing!’…”

The jet touched down and taxied to the gate. Passengers got up en masse, unlatching overhead bins. Serge refilled his carry-on from the seat pockets.

The businessman wasn’t moving.

“Smart call,” said Serge. “Why compete with the insanity? Just relax till everyone’s off and stroll out at your leisure. I would, but we have appointments…”

The businessman remained still as the rest of the passengers emptied out the front of the plane, Serge and Coleman bringing up the rear. A receiving line of cheerful pilots and flight attendants thanked each of them. Coleman tripped over the lip of the pressure door and tumbled into the accordion arm. The staff winced. Then Serge came by, shaking hands hard, profusely thanking them for heroics in the face of the unthinkable.

Finally, they were gone.

The businessman flipped open a cell phone and hit some numbers. “Hello?…Yes, we just landed…No, don’t intercept. Fall back to loose surveillance…Because I saw the first page of the letter…Hold on to your hat—you’re not going to believe this…”

Avis rental lot. Recent coat of shiny black tar and highly reflective orange markings. Just after two A.M. Inside: a single reservationist with no work and someone mopping outside the restrooms.

A courtesy bus pulled up. Two red-eye clients went inside. The empty bus headed back to the terminal.

It was dead again. The lot was in the landing pattern. These were the strange hours that were totally silent or deafening. Serge unfolded the first page of his grandfather’s letter. There were ten digits in a different-color ink across the bottom. He placed the page on top of a pay phone next to the bus shelter.

Across the street sat a Ramada Inn. Each floor above the first had a balcony. On the top floor, a tall woman in a blue windbreaker stood at a railing with high-power binoculars, overlooking rental car row. She observed someone in a bright tropical shirt next to the Avis shelter, sticking coins in a pay phone.

Serge held the receiver to his head and punched numbers. He watched the two people at the reservation counter, an exhausted business traveler who couldn’t get an upgrade and some idiot with a surfboard. The phone began ringing. Serge covered one ear as a 747 roared overhead.

On the Ramada balcony, a cell phone began ringing. The woman with binoculars answered. “Hello?…Serge?…Yeah, we’re still on. A half hour…You got something to write with?…Nineteen-eleven West Olive…There’ll be a message waiting for you at the counter…”

Turbine thrust drowned out the conversation. Serge covered his ear again and looked up at a DC-9 clearing the lot and touching down on the other side of the fence. “…See you there.”

The woman hung up and raised her binoculars again, following Serge across the parking lot to rental slot 28.

Serge threw his bags in the trunk of a red Chrysler Sebring convertible with fifty-two miles on the odometer. Coleman was already in the passenger seat. Another roar overhead.

The woman on the Ramada balcony followed the Chrysler as it drove across the lot.

Another balcony two floors below, another set of binoculars. They belonged to a man in a dark suit and thin, dark tie. He was on the phone. “Unit two, you’re on…”

“We’re rolling.”

The balcony man watched the convertible race out the Avis gate and into traffic. His binoculars panned back to the rental lot, picking up a black Grand Marquis going the same direction. The Marquis made a left and caught the Chrysler at a red light.

The woman on the top floor of the Ramada dialed her phone again. “Just spotted a black Grand Marquis. Looks like they brought backup…. That’s right, a double cross…Go to Plan B.”

A balmy wind blew through Serge’s hair as he turned east on Manchester Avenue. Coleman was bent down, trying to light a joint. Serge bent down with him, sticking his iPod in a special cradle to transmit through the car radio.

One block back, the Grand Marquis followed in the same lane at the same speed. “What the hell’s he doing?” said the driver. “They’re all over the road.”

Serge’s head popped back up. “And now the moment we’ve waited for all our lives!”