SS 18: Shark Skin Suite: A Novel (12 page)

“You got it.” Serge held his wristwatch toward Quim and tapped the face. “You’re still almost sure to rupture him, but will it be in time? The tube in your mouth allows you to breathe and pray. Or maybe the paralytic will wear off and you can get those elbows working on the snake’s insides to tilt the odds in your favor . . . But don’t wait too long because it’ll be digesting you the whole time. If you think getting pruny in the bathtub is bad . . .”

“Serge,” said Coleman. “Will that tube really allow him to stay alive and awake while the snake sucks him in? Yuck.”

“But if he makes it, think of the stories on his TV appearances! Another great weirdness headline for Florida!” Serge helped Coleman to his feet, and they stepped out of the tent. Before releasing the flap, Serge turned one last time. “Well, Quim, that’s about it. But never forget: There’s always hope.”

Coleman belched. “Or the mosquitoes could sober up.”

“He’s right again,” said Serge. “A double bonus round. It’s your lucky day!”

A few minutes passed before Quim heard the sound of a Ford Cobra driving away and a tiny motor turning on. His transfixed eyes watched the drawstring on the sleeping bag slowly pull wide. A forked reptilian tongue twitched out the opening. The snake patiently slithered from the bag. Quim felt something on the top of his scalp. Then down to his forehead. Then down farther as goo dripped in the top of his eyes.

It went dark.

Chapter
SEVENTEEN

THE NEXT DAY

A
nother trailer park. This one called Paradise Lakes. Brook looked at the tab on the next file:
Cooder Ratch
. They pulled up to a manufactured home with a Confederate flag in the window and a sign on the door illustrated by a gun: F
ORGET T
HE
D
OG,
B
EWARE OF
O
WNER
. This time it was Shelby who took a deep breath before knocking.

The door opened and a shirtless man flicked a cigarette butt outside. “When do I get paid?”

“The trial hasn’t started yet.”

“Fucking lawyers.” Cooder led them inside a trailer decorated with empty bottles. He grabbed a full one from the fridge, popped the cap and fell into a couch. “What do you guys want?”

“We need to go over your testimony—”

“I already told you: They screwed me in the ass!”

“We might want to soften that just a bit for court,” said Shelby.

“Are you a faggot?” said Cooder.

“What did you just say?” Shelby started getting up.

Brook jumped to her feet first. “Mr. Ratch, you want to know when you get paid? The better question is how much, and I have some good news!”

“Really? . . .”

The Toyota Camry headed back on the Sawgrass Expressway. Shelby repeatedly hit gas and brake and swerved as traffic whizzed around. “Is someone playing a joke on us? These are the new named plaintiffs who are supposed to
help
our case?”

“It’s your buddies at the law firm who added them,” said Brook.

“I know, I know,” said Shelby. “That was the jury consultant’s idea.”

Three sports cars whipped in front of the Toyota in an impromptu street race, forcing Shelby to ease off and reestablish distance.

“So what’s the deal with the consultant?” said Brook. “He actually thinks these are good witnesses? Especially that last asshole?”

“Says it’s all a matter of timing.” Shelby fell back several more car lengths. “We’re supposed to call Ruthy first and get the jury to start hating the defense attorney when they grill her on cross. Then we call Cooder, who in theory will act as proxy for the jurors’ rage against their lawyers and strike a chord with certain blue-collar elements, at least according to his focus groups.”

“Is this consultant any good?” asked Brook.

“We pay him like he is.”

Shelby hit the brakes and dropped behind the newest cars in his lane.

Brook shook her head. “You were right about these drivers. If you don’t stay right on the next guy’s bumper, they keep cutting in until it feels like we’re backing up to the last exit.”

“Just have to let it roll off you,” said Shelby. “That’s life in general: Can’t let jerks dictate your emotions.”

“You make it sound like nothing bothers you.”

“It doesn’t.”

“Then what about Cooder back there?”

“I think this is our exit.”

MIAMI

The lawyers left for lunch and the courtroom became quiet. In one of the back rows, a young newspaper reporter gathered his notes and opened a cell phone.

“ . . . Got the whole story. Prosecution rested. Looks like defendants will have to take the stand if they want a fighting chance. I’m thinking Metro front, maybe one-A, twenty inches . . . Could you repeat that last part? . . . Come back to the office immediately? But all the important testimony is this afternoon . . . Another mandatory meeting? . . . Larry, this is one of the biggest corruption cases in the state, millions in no-bid contracts and municipal-bond underwriting. Half the city council might go to jail . . . I know it’s complicated—that’s why it’s essential we explain it . . . I disagree. The readers won’t be bored once they understand the facts and how it undermines the very foundation— . . . What do you mean ‘that doesn’t sell ads’? Look, can I just skip this one meeting? We’re having them every day now and getting scooped left and right . . . Uh, yes I like getting a paycheck. I’ll be there . . .”

The reporter had five years of deep research reporting under his belt and an untucked shirt. His tie was loosened and, like his collar, sported tiny gnarls of fraying polyester. His byline read: Reevis X. Tome. Reevis thought that including the
X
was stupid, but his publisher insisted because it lent an air of integrity. His middle name was Paul.

Reevis reluctantly returned to his Datsun and caught the I-95 ramp north. He worked for one of the big South Florida papers, like the
Miami Herald
,
Fort Lauderdale Sun Sentinel
and
Palm Beach Post,
but not one of those. They were all currently locked in a fierce newspaper war. Except not against one another. Against the future. Everything was now the Internet. And the Internet had just announced, courtesy of Yahoo, the top ten most endangered jobs in the nation. And coming in at number two with a bullet was—drum roll—“newspaper reporter.” Courteously, the article suggested alternative thriving jobs for each of the enumerated declining vocations. In the case of print reporters: Public relations was tomorrow’s land of rainbows and Skittles. Reevis shuddered at the thought. To anyone with newspaper ink in their blood, this was like telling a Navy SEAL to become a birthday party clown.

It was inevitable. Newspapers, TV, radio and websites everywhere were furiously consolidating into mega-media conglomerates. News was heading in a fresh direction, and that direction was toward a plantation. The owners and top execs saw their compensation rocket, and top television anchors in each market signed guaranteed contracts in the upper six figures. Everyone else was told these were tough times. To save the companies from bankruptcy, they would have to absorb salary cuts, take unpaid furloughs and work harder. Reporters began shooting their own photos, photographers had to write stories, and both were required to appear on camera at ribbon cuttings and propane explosions, speaking into microphones as naturally as if they had just received involuntary sex reassignments.

Oh, but it gets better: the pedigree of the latest owners. News outlets used to be acquired by other media companies, or someone with at least a whiff of journalism background. Now the buying was done by venture capitalists, land consortiums, commodity traders and petrochemical distributors. Reevis’s newspaper was bought by a thermometer factory.

The paper’s hardened journalists had remained in denial about their profession’s erosion, until a single watershed moment. The chief of photography went to his new managing editor, who had previously managed the entire southeast region fixing windshield cracks. The photo chief dropped stacks of pictures on the desk to illustrate the drastic difference in quality between his staff’s efforts and those of conscripts from the news department. “They’re just horrible! And not just exposure or f-stop, but chopping off legs and whole heads, and this last pile has one or more fingers over the lens to varying degrees.”

The managing editor studied the images a moment before picking up the phone for security. “You’re right, it’s bad, but . . .”

The photo editor jerked his arm away from the guards escorting him out the front entrance. “I can leave on my own. Fuck you.”

The editor’s quote, in its entirety, went word-of-mouth viral, becoming the catchphrase of every frontline spear-carrier. Then, on a Tuesday, someone stayed late in the newsroom after the night shift had put the last edition of the paper to bed. The lights were off. In the dim glow from the hallway, the company’s new mission statement hung proudly atop the front wall:

To enhance our community’s aggregate through multi-platform metrics of media synergy catalyzing integrated outcomes of macro-disciplines toward inclusive methodology paradigms generating positive algorithms of unwavering commitment to our children, the flag and God.

The next morning, reporters and editors filed in, stopped briefly, then took their seats and stared at computer screens as if nothing was different, grinning inside. Toward the front of the room, the publisher shouted at maintenance workers on ladders vainly trying to remove a roll of shelf paper glued over the sign with a new mission statement, courtesy of the managing editor’s departing remarks to the photo chief:

It’s bad, but it’s good enough.

Reevis checked his watch as he exited the interstate. He’d made good time from the courthouse. The Datsun raced a few short blocks and pulled into the company parking lot, which used to be free but was now deducted from each paycheck, whether employees used it or not.

Reevis raced through the lobby of the rechristened crystal news complex and caught the elevator for the fifth-floor auditorium. The meeting was about to start, just a few stragglers like Reevis looking for seats. He found one in the back row, where he always liked to sit, with the cynical old guard of journalism from the days of typewriters and indoor smoking. Though Reevis had a half decade of experience, nobody ever believed him. It had nothing to do with professionalism or performance; it was that cherub face. For him, shaving was an affectation. Whenever Reevis showed up to interview, someone always did the math:
You need a college degree to be a journalist, so he has to be at least twenty-one. Unless I heard him wrong on the phone and he’s from one of the high school papers.

And now, if one looked at the mostly veteran occupants of the auditorium’s back row:
One of these things is not like the others.

But the old gang roundly accepted Reevis, if for no other reason than he had still gone to journalism school long after it was well known to be economic suicide.

“What’s this meeting about?” asked Reevis.

“Same as all the others,” said a crusty crime reporter named Danning. “Pull us away from writing stories to tell us we’re not writing enough stories.”

The publisher climbed the steps to the stage, where the new ownership group stood in the wings. His most important contribution to the paper’s top chair was a publisher’s name—E. Strunkend White—and he moved among the well-wishers, shaking hands and making small talk with the only people in the room who didn’t have ticking deadline clocks between their ears.

The back row squirmed and checked their wrists.

Reevis leaned forward and looked down the row. “Anything good happen today while I was out?”

Danning elbowed a thirty-year city-hall beat reporter named Mazerek. “Tell him about Chelsea.”

“What about Chelsea?” asked Reevis. Chelsea Lane was the second-most-popular TV anchor from Miami to West Palm, rumored to have received a 27 percent pay bump since the last Nielsens, meaning she now made three times more than the entire last row combined.

“A thing of pure beauty,” said Mazerek. “You know how ever since we merged with the TV station, she has to strut through the middle of the newsroom five times a day? Talking super loud so we all know we’re in her presence? She comes through again this morning, shouting away, yada, and the rest of us are thinking, ‘How much attention do you need? You’re already
on TV.
’ ”

Danning elbowed him again. “You’re burying the lead.”

“Oh, right,” said Mazerek. “Then in the middle of yodeling through the room, something gets caught on one of her ridiculous high heels—and she takes a world-class header!”

“No!” said Reevis.

“I shit you not!” said Mazerek. “But the best part is it wasn’t one of those neat, graceful falls. It started with a half trip, which made her think she could correct it and not go down, so she’s moving faster and faster, trying to get her feet back under her. Finally, after stumbling a good twenty feet, she goes flying with her arms out like she’s sliding into second base. Of course nobody helps her up. And she gets to her knees and looks around, and everyone just continues typing and making phone calls like nothing happened, which makes her think we’re all laughing at her inside . . .”

“We were,” said a seasoned investigative reporter named Bilko.

“Anything else?” asked Reevis.

“After Chelsea left, someone found a piece of chalk and drew a crime-scene outline where she went splat, limbs bent at crazy angles,” said Mazerek. “And someone else drew skid marks leading up to the site of the crash.”

“Wish I could have been there,” said Reevis.

“How’s the photography coming?” asked Danning, tilting his head at a cynical angle. “Still in the car?”

Reevis sighed. “Nobody’s noticed yet.”

“What are you guys talking about?” asked Mazerek.

“You’ll love this,” said Danning. “Ever since our esteemed managing editor put the kibosh on photo quality, our boy here refuses to get out of the car.”

“I’m not following,” said Bilko.

“It’s a matter of principle,” said Reevis.

Danning put a hand on the junior reporter’s shoulder. “He’s taking a stand. All his photos will be shot from his driver’s seat until someone catches on, but I don’t think they’re going to.”

“What about mug shots?” asked Mazerek.

“From the car, too,” said Danning. “He lures them out of their building with some medical excuse.”