The Bright Spot Read online

  But my audience already looked deep into tragedy. This dark mood couldn’t be about the surveillance, since Mr. Henry had told only me. Even if they knew, it shouldn’t come as too big a shock to anyone. This was America. Spying on each other was practically a patriotic duty. We should be proud we were serving our country by offering up our lives for the cause—whatever abstraction we were taking on this week: the War on Cynicism! No. Something worse than a few drones had them looking like this. I decided my news should wait until I found out what was going on.

  Maybe something had happened to the crew. Better paid than the talent, they lived at a nicer place out on the loop. They’d been having such a high old time on location, they didn’t know where they were half the time. Their latest toy was a bit of recreational nonsense called Déjàviewer that gave the user déjà vu experiences every ten minutes or so. They could easily have gotten into some kind of trouble.

  Then I realized what the trouble was—or who.

  “Where’s the asshole?” I asked.

  “Ah, Nick,” Stan said, as he usually did when I said anything disparaging about our costar. He never disagreed. He just didn’t think I should say it.

  “He’s in the hospital,” Gary said. “Somebody’s husband finally beat the holy crap out of him. Knocked all his teeth out. Unfortunately, he’ll live. But there goes the fucking show.”

  “It was somebody’s son,” Brenda quietly corrected. “Her thirteen-year-old son.” Her terminal sat beside her on the AC, I noticed, in case we needed any additional information in our grief.

  “Jesus fucking Christ!” Gary said.

  “Most unfortunate occurrence,” Wally/Patriot concurred.

  “And our numbers were doing so well—up another sixteen percent last week,” Brenda said sadly, with finality, a statistician’s postmortem. She held her hand at a tilt to demonstrate the hopeful graph cut off in its prime, let it fall to her lap like Icarus.

  You take your dog for a walk, and look what happens. They already had the show on a slab, and I was just in time for the wake. Not so fast. Kill a still-had-a-shot-at-being-successful show for this? This was nothing. I’d seen a whole lot worse than this. Hell, Lu and I were in way worse trouble than this! We needed this show.

  “I don’t see the problem,” I said. “Write around him. Shift the focus to Stan and Dee. How are those numbers doing, Brenda?”

  “They’re strong,” she said noncommittally. Was that a snuffle? She liked to remain a neutral source of information, part of some sort of number crunchers’ Hippocratic oath. “Growing,” she added. From Brenda that amounted to editorializing.

  Everybody liked watching Stan and Dee.

  Dee’s Galatea, as her character had evolved, was an Indian Princess who oozed pouty-lipped greatcheekbones nobility. She’d gone to the same language school the Asian Patriot had, apparently, and spoke fluent Tonto, but in spite of that handicap, immediately became a popular character, and not just for the reasons you might think. She consistently “contributed to feelings of empowerment” in the high eighties among our cornerstone female adolescent audience. But she also did surprisingly well with adult women, who responded to her self-confidence and sexual aggressiveness. And males, well, there’d never been any question about those numbers.

  Not that any of that mattered so much as that Dee and Stan had chemistry to burn. Everybody wanted to see them together. It didn’t matter if she could act, or if her lines sounded like Yoda on the reservation. She just had to put her lips together and say “How.” Stan had always been the most popular character in the show, and even his numbers went up when he smiled at Dee. Smiling wasn’t something he got to do a whole lot of rescuing Billy from fanged groundhogs or alien sportscasters— whatever wacky adversary Wally had dreamed up for the week.

  It was a turn-on watching Dee and Stan together, no doubt about it, but it wasn’t just that. The two of them getting together, doing the ancient dance, made you feel something like hope. And who didn’t want that?

  Lately Galatea had been attempting to woo BG away from the cause of Revolution as a bad deal for the Indians, poised as they were to cut a pretty good treaty with the British Crown. When last we saw them, Stan and Dee shared one hot kiss that left the Big Guy reeling. Thus far, naturally, both Billy and the Big Guy had been solidly in the patriot camp. Washington, Jefferson, Henry—that crowd. It was time to shake things up. Might as well go all the way.

  “How about BG goes to Galatea’s village for a powwow?” I suggested. “Get the Native American angle on the Revolution. Then let BG and the Princess explore her world for a while, do what comes naturally.”

  Everyone looked at me like I was crazy, and then, naturally enough, at Wally. Crazy was his department.

  “What befalls most unfortunate Billy while BG in teepee?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. Kidnapped by wolves, cabin boy for Captain Hook, real live boy turns into wooden android—you’ll think of something. Let him deal with it for a change. Just write him out, once and for all. Brenda, how have Billy’s numbers been lately?”

  “They have been slipping,” she said judiciously.

  “Slipping like an avalanche. Any lower and ‘see more of Billy’ will be a negative number. Put Dee and Stan in a wigwam, and nobody’s going to be asking ‘Where’s Billy?’ ”

  “I think it was the Algonquins who had wigwams,” Brenda said.

  “A motel, then. This is Billy and the Big Guy. We’re not known for our attention to realistic detail. Come on, guys, you know I’m right.”

  “What about Victor and the She-Creature?” Gary asked. “What are they supposed to be doing all this time with no Billy? They’re supposed to be his ... his what do you call it ... nemesis, right? Don’t they need him?”

  “Don’t worry about them. Villains can always find plenty to do. Right, Wally?”

  Wally nodded sagely, nodding Buck’s head in sync. “Villains wait for good men passing. Wise men go other way.”

  “Wally, could you please put a lid on the mysterious-Orient crap for a minute?” Gary said. “You’re starting to make sense, and I’m trying to think here. What about the nice angle?” he asked me. “Remember what happened to that Heart of the Congo thing.”

  “Darkness, and trust me, I’ll never forget. But it’s time to dump nice. I turned to Brenda. “At this point, how dependent are we on the educational feeds anyway?”

  “Under thirty and falling.”

  I spread my palms. “Look at Lucky. Do you think they were doing the edgy stuff they’re doing now way back when they were a lowly edvirt? It’s time to kill the kid. Besides, if you want to talk educational, that is what happens in the novel.”

  “He’s right,” Brenda said. “That could help bolster the ed numbers. They usually get a positive nudge from upping the FLS—sorry, Fidelity to Literary Source— rating.”

  “And with Buck, we’ve got cute covered,” I pointed out. “The kid’s just taking up space. What is it now? Five tedious minutes an episode? He has maybe ten lines— not counting ‘Help, BG! Help!’—when he bothers to learn them.”

  “But his name’s in the fucking title,” Gary objected.

  “We can’t change it?”

  There was no chorus of dissent. Everyone imagined Billy banished. A few eyebrows went up. Lips pursed.

  “Okay. So what’s the gimmick?” Gary finally asked. It was an important question. He wouldn’t ask it unless he was ready to let go of the old gimmick. What choice did he have, really? Where would he find another William, and why would he want to?

  I said it slow and hammy the way they like, my hands in the air to evoke a marquee, though none of us was old enough to remember seeing a real movie marquee: “BG and the Indian Nation.”

  “That’s what the creature in the novel wanted,” Brenda said enthusiastically. “To go live like an Indian in America—with a mate.” Everyone looked at her, and she scrunched up a shoulder, embarrassed. Damn, she had read the whole novel, or Cliffs Not
es at least. That explained her uncharacteristic lack of impartiality. I had at least one ally.

  “And remember how this thing got started,” I said, pressing my advantage. “Kids wanted the creature to get an even break, a life. What do we do? We stick him with Mr. Nice and his endless sacrifices—some helpless kid who needs saving week in and week out and has the emotional range of a daisy. What kind of life is that? We can get beyond that. We’re just starting to get somewhere. Why quit now? What have we got to lose?”

  Not a thing, they all agreed. The more they talked about it, losing Billy sounded truly swell, as Billy himself might say.

  Wally could hardly wait to start writing now that we had a new gimmick. He’d brought his card table down to Virginia. He set it up wherever the fancy struck and weather and cops permitted. He was a regular by the women’s tennis courts at William and Mary until asked to move along. “Let’s go to Jamestown,” he said. “They have Indian stuff down there.”

  “That’s over a century and a half earlier,” Brenda pointed out.

  “No it’s not. I saw it on a map. It’s just down the road.”

  Who could argue with logic like that? Wally and Brenda traded a look of affectionate annoyance that for the first time made it plausible to me they’d once been lovers. In the celebratory mood of the moment, they might even be contemplating a revival.

  Everyone simmered with enthusiasm. Dee and Stan—all of us, in fact—were delighted Dee’s fledgling career and their hot romance would continue.

  Gary was sold the minute I reminded him Lucky had dumped the ed feeds long ago. It was time to take it to the next level, he said, to take a decisive step. Enough of this poised crap.

  Brenda suggested that—with the FLS up and the Native American cultural studies tie-in—we might even boost our ed numbers at the same time that we achieved greater mainstreaming.

  “Main stream run deep,” Wally observed.

  With a name change, I pointed out, we might get some fresh reviews—certain to be kinder without the insufferable Billy in the cast.

  Meanwhile, Lu watched the whole thing, never saying a word, smiling like the sphinx. She knew something was up. She figured I’d tell her everything when we were alone.

  Everyone was so pleased a new plotline awaited us in the morning instead of unemployment, they hardly minded when I broke the news we had to move to another motel tonight. I explained quietly that William had made a pass at one of Mr. Henry’s daughters, and he had asked us to leave.

  After an awkward moment of silence, Stan said, “There’s a Venezuelan place on Second, the other side of CW, that’s got king-size beds for the same price.” Gary called and secured rooms. He even talked the guy into a group discount once he heard we were with the virtual company in town doing BG. We had at least achieved local fame.

  Everyone scattered to pack, and Lu and I were finally alone. As I closed the door, she smiled at me from the bed and clapped. “Another amazing performance by my favorite actor.”

  “Another interesting facet?”

  “No, I’ve seen it before. I just forget it’s there until it wakes up and springs into action. When you say the show must go on, you’re not just fucking around. We were this close to looking for work. Even Wally was ready to pack it in. Your pitch was a thing of beauty, worthy of You-Know-Who.”

  That’s what she’d taken to calling the Bright Spot. She knew better than to say Bright Spot—that was strictly for my use—so now it was You-Know-Who. She’d rented every turkey he’d ever been in—the ones you could still find. She couldn’t resist telling me how good he was. Last week he was even brilliant. The bastard was like that guy in Halloween —he wouldn’t just lie down and die.

  “Why, thank you, ma’am.” I lay down on the bed beside her.

  “So, what’s really going on?” she asked. “You walked in the door with the troubles of the world on your shoulders, not to mention pine needles all over your back. You been rolling around in the woods with someone?” She touched my cheek where the gag stuffer had scratched me with her nails, an accident I’m sure. Nobody wanted to hurt me—just spirit me away. I reeked of perfume my grandmother might’ve worn if I’d had one. “So, what’s the real story, Nick? Mr. Henry’s daughters are too young for William. He doesn’t look twice at women under thirty.”

  Lucky for me I had no plans to lie to her. “Mr. Henry has some experience with being watched, apparently, and doesn’t like it. This morning he zapped a bunch of drones that have been following us around, probably since we’ve been here. He figures he’ll be safer if we stay somewhere else. He’s probably right.”

  “Oh my God,” she said.

  “It gets worse. When he zapped the drones, the feds thought we did it and were about to make a big move— meet up with Dumfries for whatever—so they sent an agent round to recruit me to their cause and see what he could get out of me. It was the limo driver when we did the diner scene, all dressed up and talking proper. He thought I knew more than I do, and I was trying to par-lay that into getting out of him where Dumfries is, when a half-dozen old vets—tourists on their way to the Palace—showed up running ’ware, broke his neck, killed him. Then they grabbed me and tried to carry me off. They were doing a pretty good job of it. If it hadn’t been for Buck raising a ruckus and drawing a crowd, I’d be gone.”

  It took her a beat or two. It was a lot to process. “Jesus.” She wrapped her arms around me and held me close. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine. A tiny scratch.”

  She rocked me like a baby. “We’ve got to get you out of here.”

  I imagined myself bundled up in the chenille bedspread, whisked away from danger, safe in her arms, laid in the bulrushes.... No. I didn’t like the end of that story.

  “I thought you couldn’t leave the board,” I said.

  She drew back and looked at me. “You can’t, but you can make a tactical retreat. You don’t hang around and get yourself killed.”

  “Retreat to where? You think we’re going to give the slip to guys with billion-dollar flies? Find someplace where no one’s ever run ’ware? Besides, those old vets weren’t trying to kill me. They had every chance to kill me and didn’t. They were collecting me. They were all in the same unit in the war. They were reactivated somehow, given new orders.”

  “They killed the limo driver.”

  “Exactly. In seconds. Because he stood in the way of taking me, or he was about to start shooting them, or because he was a cop. But they didn’t kill me.”

  “They may try again.”

  “He. He may try again. I’m sure it’s Dumfries. Agent Limo as much as said he’s around here. Isn’t that why we came down here, to find Dumfries?”

  “Yes, but ... What does he want with you?”

  “I don’t know, but as long as everybody’s watching everybody, we’ll be okay. We’re safer in the spotlight, until we can figure this thing out.”

  Bad choice of metaphors. She tilted her head to the left, narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “This isn’t about the show, is it?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Jesus! It is ! It’s about the show. You can’t quit it as long as it’s got a shot. No matter what. You won’t run for your life as long as the numbers are on the way up. You’d rather stay put and die than miss a shot.”

  W-e-e-e-ll ... I wouldn’t put it quite that way. “What if it is about the show? Does that surprise you? It’s my dominant facet, you might say. It’s billboard-size: CAREER OBSESSED. That’s how I got to be so fucking brilliant. It’s who I am. Am I not supposed to have a life so I can save it? For what? What do I trade in next—you and me?”

  Her eyes met mine. “Never,” she said quietly, and I pulled her into my arms. “I worry all the time,” she said, kissing my cheek as she spoke. “They’re not coming after me. They’re coming after you, Nick. I’m so afraid of losing you.”

  Her body shook with crying as I held her, rocking her in my arms now. “We’ll be okay,” I as
sured her. “I promise you. Besides, you heard the man, we’re doing a whole new thing. We’re going to Jamestown. They’ll look for us here, but we’ll be a century and a half down the road. ‘Which when did they go, George? Which when did they go?’ ”

  I got a laugh mixed with the tears, but I didn’t push my luck. After a while, she said, “I guess we need to pack, huh?”

  “I’m going to call Clinton real quick, see if he’s found out anything for me. I’ll use the phone at the Dunkin’ Donuts. Mr. Henry’s got enough trouble as it is.”

  “I’ll pack. It shouldn’t take long. Everything’s dirty. And baby? Promise me you’ll be careful.”

  I kissed her and promised her I would. For now anyway. I had a feeling I was running low on careful time.

  Clinton picked up immediately. I made a little small talk, invited him to the wedding in the spring, gave whoever was listening time to wake up and pay attention, before settling down to business. “What else did you find out about Lenore Chapell?” I asked.

  He sighed with frustration. “Not much really. She was probably the best they had, top of her class everywhere she went. Everything else is just rumor. Her name has been suggested as one of the possible members of an ultrasecret unit field-testing experimental ’ware in the Sinai. It crashed and left a dozen soldiers wandering around the desert with total amnesia. Some of them were supposedly never found. First the military denied it ever happened, then said that everyone involved was accounted for, so you figure it out. One version of the story has her surfacing in the underground, real pissed off, offering her services to bringing down the ’ware. Some say she was part of a plot to infect workware with a fatal virus. This would’ve been when Edmund Kennemeyer was getting a lot of press. Only problem is, those plots were rumored every other week back then, and nothing ever came of them. Whether Lenore Chapell was involved in any of them is pure speculation. Her official death is certainly vague enough to be a phony, but that doesn’t mean it is. It just makes her a rumor magnet.”