The Little Sleep (22 page)

I say, “Oh, if you haven’t picked me a car already, can I get one that has a lot of distracting stuff going on inside?”

He doesn’t look up from his computer. He knows that won’t help him. “You mean like a CD player?”

I say, “That’s okay too, but I’m thinking more along the lines of a car that has a busy dashboard, tons of digital readings, lights, and blinking stuff.”

“You want to be distracted?”

“When you say it like that, it sounds a little silly, but yeah, that’d be swell.”

“I think we can accommodate you, Mr. Genevich.”

“You’re a pro’s pro, kid.”

I relax. I know I’m making a fool of myself, but the looming situation of me behind a steering wheel has me all hot and bothered. I know it’s irresponsible and dangerous, reckless, and selfish. Me behind the wheel of a car is putting Mr. and Mrs. Q. Public and their extended families in danger. But I’m doing it anyway. I can’t wait to drive again.

I’m done with Brill. Renting a car is the only way I’m going to get around without further endangering Ellen, and hopefully it’ll be less likely the goons will pick up my scent again. They know my condition, they’ve been following me around; they won’t be expecting me to rent a car.

I tell the kid I want the car for two days. He quotes me the price and terms. I cross my fingers and hope there’s enough room on my credit card. Then he says, “Will you be buying renter’s insurance for the vehicle?”

I laugh. Can’t remember the last time I laughed like this. This could be a problem. For many narcoleptics, laughter is a trigger for the Godzilla symptoms, the ones that flatten Tokyo. But I know
where I am and I know what I’m doing and I know where to go next. I feel damn good even if my contorted face reopens the cut along my nose.

I say, “Oh, yeah, kid. I’ll take as much insurance as you’ll give me. Then double the order.”

My car is blue and looks like a space car. Meet George Jetson.

The kid has to show me how to start the thing, as it has no ignition key. Insert the black keyless lock/alarm box into a portal in the dash, push another dash button, and we’re ready to go. Simple. The car is one of those gas-electric hybrids. At least I’ll be helping out the environment as I’m crashing into shit. Hopefully I don’t damage any wetlands or run over endangered owls or something similarly cute and near extinction.

Okay, I start the car up. My hands grip the wheel hard enough to remold the plastic, turn it into clay. White knuckles, dry mouth, the whole bit. I wonder what the air bag tastes like. Probably not marsh-mallow fluff.

I roll to the edge of the lot and onto the street, and I don’t hit anything, don’t pass out asleep, and the wheels don’t fall off, so I relax a little bit. I join the flow of traffic, become part of the mass, the great unending migration, the river of vehicles, everyone anonymous but for a set of numbers and letters on their plates. My foot is a little heavy on the brake pedal, otherwise I’m doing fine. If millions of privileged stunted American lunkheads can operate heavy machinery, I can too. Driving is the easy part. It’s staying awake that’ll take some doing.

Yeah, I’m an accident waiting to happen, but I should be all right on a short jaunt into town. This first trip is only to downtown Osterville. It’s the later excursion back to Southie that’ll be my gauntlet.

I’m driving at the speed limit. I check all my mirrors, creating a little rotation of left sideview, rearview, right sideview, while sprinkling in the eyes-on-the-road bit. The OCD pattern might lull me to sleep so I change it up, go from right to left. I forgot how much you have to look at while driving, the proverbial everywhere-at-once. It’s making me tired.

Of course, the roads are congested all of a sudden and out of nowhere. Did I run over a hive or something? Cars swarming and stopping and going and stopping. The town has been deader than the dinosaurs since I’ve been here, and all of a sudden it’s downtown LA.

No signs of the red car, or at least one particular red car and its goons. I should’ve asked for a car with tinted windows so nobody could see me. I wasn’t thinking. My windshield is a big bubble and I’m on display, behind glass; don’t break in case of emergency.

Traffic stretches the ride out to fifteen minutes before I penetrate the downtown area. There’s Ellen’s photography studio/antiques store. The antiques side is dark. During the off-season, she only opens on Fridays and weekends. There are lights on in her studio, though, so she’s still here. Not sure if that’s a good thing or bad thing. I take a left onto a one-lane strip of pavement that runs between Ellen’s building and the clothing boutique next door, and I tuck me and my rental behind the building. There’s no public parking back here, only Ellen’s car, a Dumpster, and the back doors.

I get out and try the antiques shop first. There are two large wooden doors that when open serve as a mini-bay for larger deliveries. The doors are loose and bang around in the frame as I yank on them, but they’re locked. Damn. It’s where I need to go and I don’t have any keys.

Door number 2, then, the one I wanted to avoid. Up three wooden stairs to a small landing and a single door, a composite and newer than the antique doors, which is how nature intended. That’s locked too. I’m not walking around out front on the off-chance the goons do a drive-by. I ring the bell. It doesn’t ring. It buzzes like I just gave the wrong answer to the hundred-dollar question.

Footsteps approach the door and I panic. Ellen can’t know that I drove here. I’m parked behind the Dumpster, my shiny space car in plain view. Crap. I try to fill the doorway with my bulk, but Ellen will be half a step above me, elevated. The door opens.

Ellen’s wearing her clown pants again. She says, “Hey. What are you doing back here?”

I yawn and stretch my arms over my head, trying to block her view. For once, me being tired is schtick. I say, “I don’t know. There
was a lot of traffic out front and Brill came back here to drop me off. He’s kind of a surly guy.”

“Stop it. He’s a sweetheart.” Ellen is whispering and throwing looks over her shoulder. “I’ve got a client and I’m in the middle of a shoot. Go around front.”

I say, “Come on, I’m here, my knees have rusted up, and I’m dead tired. Let me in. Your client won’t even notice me limp through.” I lay it on thick but leave out the pretty please.

She says, “Yeah, right,” but steps aside, holds the door open, and adds, “Just be quick.”

“Like a bunny,” I say. I shimmy inside the door, crowding her space purposefully so she has a harder time seeing over me and into the lot. I compress and crumple her clown pants. It’s not easy being a clown.

She says, “What the hell is that car doing back here?”

My hands go into my pockets. Instead of balls of lint and thread, maybe I’ll find a plausible excuse. I say, “Oh, some guy asked if he could park there real quick. Said he was just returning something next door. I told him it was fine.” Lame story, but should be good enough for now.

Ellen lets out an exasperated sigh. “If he’s not out in five minutes, I’m calling a tow truck. I can’t have people parking back here.” She’s all talk. She’ll forget about the car as soon as the door is shut. I bet.

Ellen leads me through a small back hallway and into the studio. The background overlay is a desert and tumbleweeds, huge ones, bigger than my car. A little kid is dressed up as a cowboy with hat, vest, chaps, six-shooters, spurs, the whole bit. He must’ve just heard
the saddest campfire song ever because he’s bawling his eyes out while rocking on a plastic horse.

Those UFO-sized photographer spot lamps are everywhere, warming the kid up like he’s a fast-food burger that’s been sitting out since the joint opened. I don’t blame him for being a little cranky.

His mom yaks on her cell phone, sniping at someone, wears sunglasses and lip gloss shinier than mica, and has a purse bigger than Ellen’s mural tumbleweed. It ain’t the OK Corral in here.

I say, “Sorry to interrupt. As you were.”

The little kid jumps at the sound of my voice, cries harder, and rocks the wooden pony faster, like he’s trying to make a break for it.

I say, “Remember the Alamo, kid.”

Ellen apologizes, puts on a happy face like it’s part of her professional garb, something that hangs on a coatrack after work is over. She ducks behind her camera. “Come on, Danny boy, you can smile for me, right? Look at my pants!”

Yikes. I’m out of the studio, door closed behind me, and into her nondescript reception area. Ellen has a desk with a phone, computer, printer, and a buzzer. Next to that is a door to the antiques store. That’s locked too. The doorknob turns but there’s a dead bolt about chest high. I need me some keys. Don’t want to have to see the clown pants and cowboy-tantrum show again. I go behind her desk and let my fingers do the walking through her drawers. I find a ring of ten or so keys.

Guess and check, and eventually the right key. I don’t turn on the lights, as the store’s bay window is large and I could easily be seen from outside. The afternoon is dying, but there’s enough light in here that I can see where I’m going.

The antiques store is packed tight with weekend treasures: wooden barrels filled with barely recognizable tools that might’ve come from the dawn of the Bronze Age, or at least the 1940s; home and lawn furniture; kitschy lamps, one shaped like a hula girl with the shade as the grass skirt; fishing gear; a shelf full of dusty hardcover books; tin advertising placards. Piles of useless junk everywhere. If it’s old, it’s in here somewhere. I never understood the appeal of antiques. Some things are meant to be thrown away and forgotten.

The photography and film stuff has its own corner in the rear of the store. There’s a display counter with three projectors under glass. Short stacks of film reels separate the projectors. Nice presentation. No price tags, but the specs and names of the projectors are written on pieces of masking tape that are stuck to the counters. The curling and peeling tape is in much worse condition than the projectors, which look to be mint.

All right. I assume the film is 8 millimeter, but I’m not exactly sure what projector I need to play it, and even if I had the right projector I don’t know how to use it. I need Ellen’s help. Again.

Out of the dusty store and back into the reception area, I stick my head inside the studio. Glamour Mom is still on the phone, talking directly to a Prada handbag maybe. The kid continues to wail. Ellen dances some crazed jig that pendulums back and forth behind her tripod. She makes odd noises with her mouth. A professional at work.

I say, “Hey, Bozo. I need your expertise for a second.”

Under normal circumstances (maybe these are her normal circumstances, I don’t know), I’d assume she’d be pissed at me for
interrupting. She mumbles something under her breath that I don’t quite hear, but it might be
Thank Christ.

Ellen has to say, “Excuse me,” three times before the woman puts down her phone. “Maybe we should try something else. I don’t think Danny likes being a cowboy. Why don’t we change him, let him pick something else out of that bin over there, and I’ll be right back?”

The brat has worked her over pretty good, softened her up, and hopefully made her head mushy enough so she can’t add one and one together. I need to take advantage and throw stuff at her quick.

Ellen has only one foot in the reception area and I’m sticking the film canister in her face. I say, “I just need a little help. This is eight-millimeter film, right? Or super eight? Or something else?”

Ellen blinks a few times, clearly stunned after trying to wrangle Danny the Kid into an image. She says, “Let me see.”

I open the can and let a six-inch tail grow from the spool. She reaches for it. I say, “Don’t get your grubby fingerprints on it.”

“I need to see the damn thing if I’m going to tell you what it is.” I give it to her, ready to snatch it back out of her hands should she hold it up to the light and see something bad. “This isn’t super eight, it’s too dark. Eight millimeter.” She gives it back, yawns, and stretches. “My back is killing me. Where’d you get that?”

I don’t answer. I say, “I need a projector. I need to watch this. Got anything I can borrow?”

“Yeah, I have projectors. Silent or sound?”

“I don’t know. Do you have one that plays both?”

I take her by the arm and lead her into the store. She doesn’t turn on the lights. What a good clown.

Small key goes into small lock, and the glass slides open to the left. “This one will play your movie, sound or no sound. It’s easy to use too.”

I read the tape: Eumig Mark-S Zoom 8mm magnetic sound projector.

She picks it up, shuts the glass case, and rests it on the counter. It’s a mini-robot out of a 1950s sci-fi flick, only the earth isn’t standing still.

She says, “Let me finish up the shoot and I can set up the projector in here. I’ve got a screen in the closet.”

“No, I can’t watch it here. This film, it’s for a client. Just need to make sure what’s in the can is the real deal, that it’s what I think it is. No one else but me can see it.”

“Why? Where did you get it?”

“Sorry. Secrets of state. I can’t tell you.”

“Wait. What client? How have you had any contact with a client since we’ve been down here?”