Broken Piano for President (34 page)

Run-Thru Windows, Leah says, put Healthy Wally’s on the map a few years back. Wally thinks with a little exercise and proper diet, we can turn this country back into a success. To encourage fitness, anyone who jogs through her restaurant while grabbing a bite receives an instant ten percent discount.

Leah claims Wally is expanding in a major way. Leah claims this woman wants to teach everyone a healthy lesson. Leah claims they are in an alliance with Health Watch International. Leah
claims
all this because Dayton is shy and wants her food to do the talking. She doesn’t appear on camera. Never grants interviews.

The shot fades and it’s commercial time again.

The same teenage girl from the newsmagazine, Summer, shows off her brace-face behind a clean red and white countertop. “Is this your first visit to Healthy Wally’s?” she says. There is an enormous red HW over her shoulder. “Well come on, silly,” she giggles. “Don’t be afraid to be healthy!”

The dining room is a tight pickle jar of smiling faces eating tofu dogs. “Here at Healthy Wally’s, we use all-natural foods to fill you up the healthy way,” Summer giggles again. “You know, the Wally way.”

Acres of salad. Mile-long coops of boneless, skinless grilled chicken. Woodstock proportions of tofu. These are the corners of Wally’s food pyramid. “So put down that fatty heart attack burger,” she says with a
come-on-in
wave. “And live a little—at Healthy Wally’s.”

Commercials for allergy medicine follow. Before they cut back to
Nightbeat,
there is another poorly planned Bust-A-Gut ad featuring a stressed out family finding togetherness through hamburgers.

Nightbeat
rolls ahead and talks about the possibility of a super volcano: an ocean of molten rock waiting to zit-pop America and bring another Dark Age. The city standing on this biblically large grenade is, oddly, the same city that houses the headquarters for Winters and Bust-A-Gut. But experts tell us it doesn’t matter which city it’s under, everyone in America will be dead. This new Dark Age is hanging out around the corner, smoking a cigarette, waiting to have a word with us.

In the last segment Sharon reviews the testimony of the Moscow Two. Clips are shown. Dimitri/Carl Janomi’s statement scrutinized. Experts weigh in with theories. Can this really be true? Winters Olde-Tyme Hamburgers calls these claims “deranged.” Why haven’t the murderers been captured? Nobody knows. Some experts think the Russians have fled the country. Some think the space terrorists are on their way to Winters’ corporate headquarters to get revenge. Some think it’s all a publicity stunt.

Okay, so everyone’s got problems.

This story is getting crowded with them. But hey, you and I are busy, too. So here’s a public service. Instead of rattling on for pages and pages of plot and feelings and blah blah, we’ll chop out the gristle and bone until all we have left is a meaty fillet. You guessed it: time for a montage.

Every montage needs a soundtrack, so here’s the musical setup—in Deshler’s, the Salvation Army band kicks into a shaky, booze-stinking march. The tuba player, breath piney with gin, nearly falls backwards.

Walking the stairs to Winters’ office, Deshler can’t decide if he is lucky to have a signed record contract or cursed.
This is my one chance to be an artist
, he thinks. He’s tired of waiting to hear from Hamler or Pandemic, so he pens a note on the back of his hand to phone Moral Compass Records.

The montage trumpets are woozy, the drums stomp.

Inside Winters’ humidor of an office, the entire upper crust stands, smiling. One executive fixes Dean a scotch, neat, without asking. “Deshler,” Double Harry says, forcing a rare grin. His teeth are coffee-stained under thin lips. “Can you forgive me? We,” he looks at the boss. “We know the truth now…your
girlfriend
told us.”

Sitting in a comfy chair, teeth grinding tight enough to shoot sparks, Dean waits for the deathblow. The catch.

“Dean,” Winters says with a mustache-faced smile. “Malinta told us the whole scoop. She explained that trick Bust-A-Gut pulled. And yeah,” his face grows serious, the folds in his neck shift. “It’s underhanded, having an imposter Deshler Dean appear on the news spreading lies. I mean, Harry and I’ve seen some slimeball maneuvers, but that about takes the bun. I was ready to cut you loose after that first
Nightbeat
. We were referring to you as
Eggs
.”

“Eggs?”

“As in, eggs Benedict,” Harry says.

“You know, Benedict Arnold. We were moving your office into the cafeteria. Gonna have you start making copies!” Winters erupts in a laugh that looks painful.

The march music is low now, rising slightly, getting more inspired with the
ooom-pa-pa
beat.

The room follows with similar laughs.

The soundtrack’s trombones pull a long slide.

“We just want to have a face-to-face,” Double Harry says, taking off his hat. Things are bald up there. “Just to straighten all the kinks. Make sure the exec team is on the same page. Bust-A-Gut’ll never admit it, but Malinta said she couldn’t see this happen to you. Said she wanted to be a good person. Sweet girl.”

“Yeah,” he gasps. She is a sweet girl, Dean realizes. Though he’s realized it for a long while, he’s just been trying to shove it beyond his thoughts. Deshler hasn’t wanted to admit how strongly he’s come to depend on Malinta.

Is it love? Dean wouldn’t know. But a solid guess would say—maybe.

“We’re not going public with this info, either. Winters Olde-Tyme Hamburgers is taking the high road.”

Roland pipes in: “That’s what Dad would have wanted, God rest his soul.”

Electric blanket warmth wraps around Dean. He feels safe now. This is, at the very least, a Get Out of Jail Free card.

“A wise man once said,
enough of this bologna, let’s get down to the fried chicken
. Did you see the Flu Burger prototype? Delicious, huh?” Winters chuckles.

“We have it in fifteen test markets right now. It’s fast-tracked. I’ve got our people wining and dining the FDA. Those assholes’ll approve everything, no problem,” says Harry. “We know that Bust-A-Gut launched its new mozzarella sandwich this week, too. We shouldn’t have much lag time. If there’s one thing we learned from the Christopher Winters commercial mess it’s that we have to strike while the iron’s hot. We’re shooting the ads right now. Rush job.”

The background music pulls in the reins and whispers over our hero’s voice.

“It’s blue,” Deshler says. The room is staring, watching, listening. Everyone wants to know what he has to say.

“You’re welcome.”

“It’s blue.”

“Great, huh? That came from a hundred hours of focus groups. People believe blue represents purity and royalty. Makes us the king, I guess. We tried red, green, and even gray. But no dice.”

“We also learned.” Winters adjusts his seat and tightens his back. “This Healthy Wally’s place is the real deal, too. They’re partnering with those assholes at Health Watch. Nobody has any confirmations, but we’re thinking they might have a lot to do with our other publicity snafus. Those guys have a hard-on for hamburgers.”

The room and soundtrack both drop to morgue silent. The ice in someone’s glass grows warm and cracks—
tink
.

“Speaking of bad publicity.” Winters bangs his hand solid on the desk. “Let’s get down to big business. Obviously, the Space Burger campaign is a cold duck. God…” His top lip sucks in and his knuckles pop. “If you would have told me three weeks ago, when those pinkos landed, that
this
would happen. Heh…I would have retired.”

Deshler hasn’t had time to watch the news. He sips a thimbleful of scotch and waits for people to stop eyeballing him.

The montage band is apparently back from a smoke break or something. They’re getting rowdy and loud. Cymbals and snares and saxes rev engines.

“Our chief intelligence officer, Tony Archibold, is personally heading a team that will,” Winters clears his throat, “
eliminate
this publicity. Until that point, we deny everything.” Ordering the death of his son brings back a familiar tumor in Winters’ throat.

The band leader starts swinging his baton a little harder and the Salvation Army brass section sways again.

A no-name exec from the back of the room pipes in her two cents: “We can deny, sir. But is this true and how much did we really know?”

“That’s a good question, Tammy,” Winters says, shuffling through the papers at his desk. “We,” the CEO snorts and clears his throat once more and adjusts the flower in a ketchup-red lapel. “We don’t know anything, right Harry? This is a shock to the company…and we’ll be taking the high road on it, as well.”

“There’s nothing we can do now, what’s happened has happened,” Double Harry assures. “Let’s just focus on a successful public relations recovery.” With that, the meeting adjourns.

Dean, with his neck safely out of another noose, starts to hustle. Not only did he keep his job, he gets to play the victim. Our hero seems to be even more important than before. People want his thoughts. It’s nice to be wanted. Once again, being an artist fades further from his brain until it’s a speck on the horizon.

Now that all the talking is over, the Salvation Army band really rips into it. They’re out of tune and full of horn honking. It’s the perfect soundtrack for a Cliff Drinker.

• Dean sucks at the business end of a red wine bottle while hurling himself into data from the test markets.
  

• He slowly dips his finger in the cough medicine ketchup with a sour face.
  

• He drinks more.
  

• Malinta comes in and out with smiles and kissing and shared meals. They hold hands, they whisper.
  

• Here, he tastes the blue jelly again with less horrible results.
  

• There’s a scene with Deshler and a man talking over Indian food. Some would say he looks like a science geek troll. The man holds up the
  Broken Piano for President
  cassette and kisses it. They shake hands.