End Vision, page 28
As Robert thought about this, a knock came at the door. He glanced at R.D. “I know what I need to do,” said Robert. “See who is at the door.”
R.D. walked to the door. “Who is there?”
“It’s Cara.”
R.D. looked to Robert, who nodded. He opened the door and Cara entered the room.
She shut the door behind her, paused, then walked over to Robert and gave him a long, tight hug.
“I’ve seen what the media is saying,” said Cara, empathetically. “I am completely floored that someone would try to ruin you like this. What do you need me to do? What can I do for you, Robert?”
Robert thanked her and resumed pacing the room while R.D. stood motionless in front of the desk in the room’s center.
R.D. began, “We are weighing our options right now, Cara.”
“That is bullshit,” replied Cara. “There are no options to weigh. You make a statement that this is all bullshit, and you take the Celebrity Viewer and that leech of a human Brice Sharp to court.” Cara looked back and forth between the two men.
Robert stared down at the floor. Cara tried to look him in the eyes. “You guys… seriously? It is one article. Fucking stand up for yourself, Robert. I know we’ve had our differences in the past, but I’ve always respected you. I’ve watched you put your life into this company and try to do what you thought best, and I respect that. I’ve learned a lot from that. I’ve taken that and I’ve done what I thought was best, too. And so, what if we didn’t always see eye-to-eye? We still moved forward. So do that now for yourself. Do what is best for this company and fight for your image, Robert.”
Robert looked up and smiled. He suddenly appeared ten years older than he had a moment before. Deep wrinkles lined his face. His already-thinning hair was messy from his nervous rubbing of it, and the extent of his baldness revealed itself in all its glory. Cara saw the majority of his exposed scalp, oily and shiny, as if he were preparing for some kind of intensive surgery. He looked up from the floor. His smile was one of a man defeated. A man finished up. Cara saw this all at once and knew she had won. Robert wouldn’t fight. He couldn’t even see how to fight. She had surrounded him. All she had to do now was wait, and even the waiting was quicker than she had expected.
“I will be making a statement this evening. I am resigning my position as Head Coordinator of the Department of Vision.”
“Robert...No!” Cara pleaded. “This company needs you.”
“This company needs me as far away from it as I can get, Cara. This is the right thing to do — for the company and for my family. You might not want to admit it, but you know this.”
“Robert, there are other ways to handle the situation. You must see that there are other ways to handle this.”
“It’s true, Cara,” admitted R.D. “Either way, the Board is going to ask him to step down. They can’t operate effectively with an image crisis of this magnitude.”
Robert walked to Cara’s side and placed a hand on her shoulder.“This is the way,” he said confidently. “I’m going to need you to take over for me.”
“Robert…”
“Cara, you stood behind me when I came back here and took your job from you. I know that must have been difficult for you, but you never showed it, even when you were not in agreement with my vision for saving this company. But you did. You put on a face of support and you carried that to the rest of the team, and I am forever grateful to you for that. I will talk to the board today, and I will recommend that you take over.” Robert sighed, and Cara saw the weight of the moment fall from his shoulders. “I want you to call the team together and tell them I am sorry that I let them down. That I appreciate all their hard work on this project. That they can and will go on with this and make it a success without me.”
“Okay, Robert. I can do that for you,” she said. “What will you do now?”
“Now,” replied Robert, “Now I will go home and talk to my wife.” Robert scanned the office. He seemed to study all its little nooks and crannies. He looked out his window, out to the west and over the Pacific, out at the white-capped waves that rolled in from far off shore and broke steadily on the beaches below. “There is nothing left for me here,” he said. “I hope you don’t mind if I don’t clean out my office. This room holds nothing that I care to remember.”
“Of course not,” said Cara. “Go home. Get some rest. Comfort your wife. I can try to hold everything together here.”
R.D. opened the door and Robert moved toward it. He stopped and turned, scanning the room one last time, a room that had been his entire life. “I’m sorry,” he said. Cara couldn’t tell to whom he spoke — to the room, to her, to R.D.? “Good luck.” Or maybe he was apologizing to himself. He turned and walked out. R.D. followed him and shut the door.
Cara walked to the loveseat at the room’s back wall and removed a throw pillow that rested on the cushions. She paced the room, hugging the pillow tight to her breast. She paced this way for a minute or two, gripping the pillow tightly, squeezing with everything she had. She breathed heavily. Her body shook. She made her way to the room’s desk and the Italian leather swivel chair that sat empty behind it. She sat down and rocked back and forth in the chair, still clutching the pillow with her left hand. Her right hand descended slowly and slid beneath her skirt. She reclined and placed her spiked heels onto the desktop. Rocking faster and faster, she shoved her face into the softness of the pillow and screamed.
The Statement
Andrew came to consciousness in episodes that faded in and out. Now men crowded amongst the bar stools, smoking and shouting drink orders across the long wooden bar (Coors Light, Miller Light, Bud Light) over the sound of Top 40 or the random high-pitched twang of old country music that filled the foggy, ethereal space that was The Fractured Spoke.
In and out of the episodes he came. To his immediate front, resting firmly on the light brown bar top, was a half-full metal bucket of Lone Star beer — the fourth of the night split between himself and Patrick — and a row of empty shot glasses.
They had driven the yellow Kia here three hours prior, immediately after Andrew heard from Shelly that Robert Morris had stepped down as Head Coordinator for the Department of Vision. Cara, who had called Patrick, had pulled the plug on the rodeo project.
“What time did she say it’d be on again?” yelled Andrew over the sound of Acquired Taste playing from the jukebox.
“She said to watch for it on the six o’clock news,” replied Patrick.
“That’s in jus’ a few minutes.”
“I’m honestly surprised you can still tell time, honey. I’m not sure if I still can or not.” Patrick squinted his left eye and brought his left wrist up to his right eye. “I can’t see anything!” he screamed.
“That’s cause yah got your sleeve over it, yuh fag...Here.” Andrew reached over and rolled up the turquoise denim cuff of Patrick’s brand new pearl snap shirt he had purchased at Rojo Grande’s gift shop when Andrew was at his grandfather’s. “Now try.”
Patrick laughed. “You’re right,” he said. “Eight minutes to lift off.” They took long pulls from their Lone Stars. “I don’t know why you have to call me the F-word, though.”
“Look at you. You look like a gay cowboy.”
“I am a gay cowboy, honey.”
“Well, you look ridiculous. Gay or not, that isn’t how anyone dresses.”
Patrick did look ridiculous, out of place amongst the other hard-drinking blue-denim-collar patrons of The Fractured Spoke who had gathered here this early Monday evening over their own buckets, shooting pool and chain smoking, gathered at tables with friends. Or sitting alone, silent, picking slowly at labels loosened from the sweating beer bottles. From top to bottom, Patrick wore a black felt cowboy hat, a sterling silver longhorn bolo-tie, the turquoise denim pearl snap shirt tucked into white denim Levis that were held in place by a custom leather belt with a large silver belt buckle. On his feet he wore light brown, full-quill ostrich skin cowboy boots.
“Somebody must dress like this, or they wouldn’t sell these clothes,” countered Patrick. He drank more from his Lone Star and stared at the television over the bar that played on mute while an ad featuring Catie Carmon and a group of her friends shopped on Rodeo Drive. “So what did Shelly have to say about everything?” Patrick asked.
The news of Robert’s predicament combined with the show’s cancellation had come as a shock, and they hadn’t really spoken of it since.
“She didn’t know much, really,” said Andrew. “She seemed taken aback herself. She said that Robert was pulled out of a meeting by R.D. They all read the article and were pretty much freaking out. She said Cara left, came back, said that Robert was out and that she was takin’ back over as the Head Coordinator.”
“Just like that?”
Andrew nodded. “Then she scraped the project.” He snapped his fingers. “Jus’ like that…”
They both drank.
“What’d Cara say to you?”
“Nothing, really,” Patrick said. She said to watch for the official statement tonight. She apologized that she had sent us all the way out here for nothing, but said that the rodeo was over. She got us on the first flight out of here Wednesday morning. So we can still go out and ride with your granddad tomorrow, if you’d like.”
“Yah, I’d like to see him again before we leave.” He drank. A man tried to squeeze in between his and Patrick’s stools to saddle up at the bar and order drinks, but after looking at Patrick, thought better of it and scanned the area for a new location from which to flag down the female bartender. “You don’t have to come if you don’t want.”
“No. I’d like to. I’d like to see it since I’m out here… I’ve never been on a horse before.”
“It’ll be something,” said Andrew, scanning the room for a bartender. “We should get another round of shots before this thing starts.”
Patrick agreed, and they set to the task of gaining the bartender’s attention, leaning forward on the bar and trying to initiate eye contact. She finally came over.
“Another round of shots?” she asked, her eyes noting the half full bucket.
“Yes ma’am,” lisped Patrick.
“Can we also get that t.v. turned to channel 5?” asked Andrew.
“Sweetie,” she replied. “Ain’t no way ya’ll gonna hear anything over all this music.”
“Could you turn off the music for a second?” asked Andrew. “There is something we really need to see.”
“No.”
Patrick laughed and slapped the top of the bar. “I like you, honey!”
“I like you too, sweetheart. Anything besides the shots?”
“Would you please turn on the captions for us, at least?” asked Patrick.
“I can do that for y’all,” she said.
“Thanks, honey.”
The waitress left. Patrick winked at Andrew. The waitress set the television to ‘closed caption’ and began pouring two shots of Jose Silver. The music in the room now switched from Top 40 to ZZ Top. Andrew and Patrick sat silently, sipping from their Lone Stars. The loud crack of a pool rack breaking sounded like a bull whip. The smoke in the room hung heavy and low, like a fog. Andrew sipped and burped up some of his beer, wiped his mouth, and rinsed with another sip of Lone Star. Patrick loosened and tightened his bolo tie, as if playing with a yoyo. The waitress returned with the shots and set them in front of them.
“Same tab?” she asked.
“Some Tamb.” Andrew giggled, shaking his head. He stared at the shot. He felt as if he were in a room-sized fish tank. Everything came in and out of focus and moved in slow motion. He reached for the shot like a feverish man reaching for medicine. Slow. Deliberate.
Patrick took his shot in hand and raised it. “What should we cheers to?” he asked.
Before Andrew could answer, the 6 o'clock news began. Two news anchors — one male, one female — appeared stoically on the screen over the liquor bottles resting on the bar’s dusty shelves. A banner at the bottom of the screen read Breaking News. The anchors mouthed unheard words. The patrons of the Fractured Spoke smoked, drank, shot pool, laughed, and yelled wildly as Andrew and Patrick watched the human shells onscreen mouth words. Andrew read the encoded words as they appeared (sometimes too soon, sometimes at a lag) on the screen. His and Patrick’s arms remained extended, holding the Cuervo Silver shots in a sort of Nazi salute toward the screen. Robert Morris’s image flashed onto the screen’s upper right corner and remained there as the news anchors spoke mutely to the room like ventriloquist dummies for the hard of hearing. Shady goings on behind the scenes in Hollywood. Stay tuned for a statement after this commercial break.
Patrick turned to Andrew, “Here it comes,” he said.
Andrew nodded. “Here it comes.”
“What’s the toast?” asked Patrick.
“Does there need to be a reason to toast? Can’t we just drink to drink? Shit is coming apart. I’m just ready for the whole thing to be over and done with. Forget it ever happened in the first place.”
“To forgetting,” said Patrick.
“Yah. O.K. To forgetting.”
They tapped shot glasses and drank in a quick jerk, their faces contorting. Andrew spun sideways on his barstool and released a thick string of spit onto the floor. When he looked up again, Patrick’s face appeared to be in intense pain. His cheeks bunched up at his eye sockets and his mouth hung agape.
“No more of those,” said Patrick.
Andrew let his mouth fill with drool and swallowed it down in a big gulps, over and over, until he had regained control of his system. The jukebox switched from ZZ Top to The Velvet Underground’s “Pale Blue Eyes.”
Patrick patted Andrew on the back and scanned the room. “Hey, looks like there is some taste in here after all,” he said.
Andrew pointed toward the television. “It’s on.”
The music played over the broadcast.
The broadcast appeared silently on the screen.
INT. VerMas Media Group Press Room - Santa Monica, CA - 12/11 (Evening)
A lone wooden podium stands stage center in front of a light blue curtain. From stage left, R.D. walks toward the wooden podium. He holds a sheet of paper in his left hand. R.D. wears a crisp black suit, a white shirt, and a red tie. His salt and pepper hair is parted left to right. Upon reaching the podium, he places the paper on the podium’s top. He stares down at the paper. He takes a deep breath. He exhales and looks squarely into the camera and out the television screen at his audience. R.D clears his throat and reads from an off-screen teleprompter situated directly behind the camera. R.D.’s mouth and face move and contort. As his image mouths the words, blocks of text appear on the screen in closed caption.
R.D. (On screen)
Good evening. My name is Robert Dorsett, attorney for the VerMas Department of Vision. I am here tonight to read the statement of Mr. Robert Morris, Head Coordinator of the Department of Vision for the VerMas Media Group.
A ticker tape runs across the bottom of the screen listing the accusations against Robert Morris.
R.D.
I came of age in a time and a place in which the culture differed from today. It has been brought to my attention that I have behaved in a way that could be seen as disrespectful to women or, in a way that could be viewed as an abuse of Power. This was not my intention. I want to say that every relationship I’ve had was, in my mind, consensual. This is in no way an excuse for my behavior. I see now that actions that I saw as victimless were not so. I apologize to those women who thought they didn’t have a choice. My actions were my own. They do not represent the VerMas Corporation or its employees. I will now step down as the Head Coordinator for the Department of Vision to distance myself and my actions from this great company and begin to attempt to make things right with my family. I pass the position of Head Coordinator to Miss Cara Carson, who is a strong and determined woman who will bring this company great things. It has been my pleasure over the years to work with such a great group of people and, to my co-workers, the public, and my family, I am truly sorry for how things turned out. I am sorry I let you down.
R.D. turns from the podium and leaves the way he came.
CUT: To the NEWSCASTERS.
Andrew and Patrick sat silently and pulled from their beers. There was nothing to say. Andrew soaked in the statement, let it seep into his pores. All around him, people laughed and drank. The statement meant nothing to them, outside the fact that some guy across the country in Hollywood got busted for doing something wrong.
Lou Reed trailed off from the jukebox. More Acquired Taste.
What was tonight for these patrons but a Monday night, the start of yet another long week. Another day, another dollar, another beer, another shot at happiness that always remained just out of reach.
A woman in her early forties began hollering and dancing at the round laminate faux-wood table behind them. A man of a similar age with white drywall spackle covering his clothes and forearms helped the woman onto the tabletop where she danced atop the wobbly table while the Fractured Spoke’s other drunken patrons hooped and hollar’d and shouted words of encouragement. Her friends shook their heads and laughed. The woman stood tall and held up her drink. The room shouted. ‘Woooooo,’ she yelled. ‘Yaaaaahhhhh,’ the room yelled back. Every single person in the bar held their drinks up to hers in a toast to forgetting, Andrew and Patrick included, and when she drank, the room drank, too. The music continued. Through clouds of multicolored smoke illuminated by the Fractured Spoke’s fluorescent lighting, Andrew watched her dance and twirl on the tabletop. His head grew lighter and lighter. His vision faded in and out. The party rolled on; it seemed it would never end.
