Brewster ended his call with an abrupt, “Get it done, now!” and he slipped his phone back into his pocket. “Sorry about that. The sponsors are getting restless. They want concessions. They don’t like our trending.” His face clouded. “Me either. That’s why we want you back. Celia thinks she can improve ratings with what she’s got right now. But she can’t. We need more talent. Despite what she believes, we need some compassion. We need you.”
Rick didn’t answer. Simply nodded and stared at the wall above Brewster’s head. He held the cards right now. But damned if he knew how to play them.
Brewster went on. “If you come back, we’ll reinstate you at your current salary, and give you a small ‘re-signing’ bonus. And I’ll talk with Celia about giving you some additional breathing space. Get her off your back. But Rick, most importantly, you need to think about the bigger picture. With you back, our ratings will climb. Then we can get our satellite deal. And once we get the cash, I don’t care what you do. You can take your millions, retire, and garden all damn day long, for all I care.”
“Would I report directly to Marty?”
Brewster leaned back, put his arm up across the back of the couch. Looked at the coffee table for a minute. Raised his head and met Rick’s eyes. “Let me be frank. You owe me, Jennings. I brought you here after you were down and pretty near out. I saved your career. Without me, you’d be playing country music on some AM station in the desert for a bunch of jackrabbits. I gave you a second chance, and now I’m asking you to give me one.”
Rick nodded and started to speak, but Brewster’s phone rang again. “Christ! We’d better get going. Fires to put out, all day long. Would you mind telling Celia it’s time to go? And Rick, think about what we’ve discussed. Time is running short.” He stood and pulled the phone out again, already yakking as he walked to the door.
T
HE
B
ELLY
U
P
was always busy at lunch. Burgers, sandwiches, salads. Chili. Homemade soups. Decent food and cold beer made up for the consistently lackluster service. Too many people trying to scarf down lunch at the same time. After Brewster’s and Celia’s visit, Rick had asked Winn to meet him there for lunch. Rick wasn’t under any time constraints today, and, these days, Winn pretty much did as he pleased. Today they were sitting in the newer, brighter section.
“We’ve missed you, buddy.” Winn curled his fingers around his mug of beer. Trailed a fingertip through the condensation.
“Yeah, right.”
“Hey, with you gone, the inmates are running the asylum. And Celia is fueling the fire. I give the
Circus
two weeks—at most—before it self-destructs. And with it, our big fat satellite deal.” Winn shook his head slowly. Somberly. “Oh well, I can always do voice-overs, I guess.”
Rick glanced around the restaurant, hoping to spot their server. They’d ordered their burgers a half hour ago. “They asked me to come back.”
“No shit?” Winn’s face lit up.
“None whatsoever.” Rick kept his expression neutral.
“Who? Marty?”
“No. Brewster himself. And his little marionette-girl. Both of them.”
“Nice to be wanted.” Winn smirked. “Did they beg?”
“A little. Gave me the ‘For the good of the team’ line. I tried not to laugh out loud.” Rick saw their server heading toward them carrying a couple of plates. He leaned back to make room, then watched as she passed by on her way to a table farther in the back. The aroma of greasy French fries wafting by made his mouth water.
“So? Should I organize a welcome back party?”
“I don’t know. Barb said I should go back. Said radio is my life. In my blood. I gotta tell you, I haven’t missed it this past week.”
“I’d like to quit too. But…” Winn said. He took a long draw on his beer, leaving only an inch or so of amber liquid. His arched his neck, scanning the room for the waitress.
Winn sounded wistful, but Rick knew—for a fact—Winn would be completely rudderless without his news job. The grass is always greener. Or, as Winn himself liked to say, the wattage is always higher at another station.
“Shit. Where’s our wench? I’m thirsty.” Winn swirled his remaining beer around, then emptied the mug in one gulp.
“What would you do?” Rick asked.
“You mean, would I come back?” Winn faced Rick, glassy-eyed. “I’d have never left in the first place. I’m a big talker, but I’d work there for free. Radio is
my
life. Especially now.”
When the beer started to flow, Winn always brought up his late wife. Rick didn’t want to go there now. “Pretend you’re in my shoes. Would you come back?”
“You love the business. I know you do. What you don’t like is the Boss Bitch. And all the chuckleheads’ bullshit. Even though the Rhino was abrasive, he had some standards. Not like Tin Snips and Tummy.” Winn glanced around, making sure no one was eavesdropping, like he was about to deliver the secret bombing codes to end World War II. “Why don’t you get a job at a different station?”
“I signed a no-compete when I came here, and Barb doesn’t want to move. Says it’s not fair to Livvy.”
“So there’s your answer. Come back. I mean, after all these years of putting up with shit from P.D.s, haven’t you figured out a way to deal with it?” Winn winked.
Their server arrived and set down their lunches.
Enjoy
. Winn ordered another Amstel. Rick picked up his burger, sunk his teeth into it. If it were a few degrees warmer, it would be ice cold. He contemplated sending it back, but decided he didn’t want to wait another forty minutes. He put it down and started on the fries. Inexplicably, they were piping hot. Winn had already wolfed down half of his burger.
“Yours warm?”
“Not even close. But I’m hungry and I can’t drink on an empty stomach.” He kept on chomping. “Where were we? Oh yeah, your job. If you need more persuading, here it is. Two words: Barb and Livvy. They’re counting on you.”
“You’re right, I know. I don’t really have a choice, do I?”
Winn shook his head. “Something else, too. You have to come back for the good of society.” He paused, letting his pronouncement hang.
“I’m not following you. Most people would say society would be better off without talk radio.” Rick pushed his plate away. His appetite had disappeared.
“First Time. You’re the jock he seems to trust. Maybe you can reel him in. Keep him from killing anyone else. And you have to get our own house back in order. After that shit with the chicken contest and the psychic, who knows what those dimwits will do next. You have to come back. People’s lives are at stake. Ours included.”
R
ICK DIDN’T LIKE
to talk about himself. Not because he was too modest; it was because the topic of Rick Jennings bored him. But first he’d gone to Winn asking for his advice, and now it was Barb’s turn. Maybe he wouldn’t have to talk about himself for another ten years, if he were lucky.
Barb spoke too fast, with too many bubbles in her voice. Rick could tell she was straining to act cool. Didn’t want to scare him off with her relief. She seemed unaware of her “tell” and Rick didn’t let on. Didn’t want to embarrass her.
“Well, if you think it’s what you want, then I support you.” She took a plate from the counter, rinsed it off, and set it in the upper rack of the dishwasher, next to the others. They’d put Livvy down for bed early and had a late dinner, just the two of them. Now she was filling the dishwasher while he helped. “You know I just want you to be happy.”
Rick handed her a Pyrex baking dish, encrusted with the remains of baked chicken. “I know you do. That’s what I want, too.” He watched her scrape off the bottom of the dish with a knife. Bits of food flew into the sink, mixing with the dirty water to create a primordial soup.
“They want you back. Maybe they’ll keep their word. Make things better. Rein in Celia.” She bent over and wedged the baking dish between the powder-blue nylon tines of the lower rack. “You’ll see. Things’ll be better.”
Little Miss Sunshine. Barb was always good for a pick-me-up. Maybe she’d be right about this. “You really think so?”
“I do. I really do. And I know you’ll be happier. Hanging around the house is killing you. I mean, if you ‘fix’ many more appliances, we’ll go broke.”
Hearing the hopeful tone of her voice, Rick knew his decision had been made. “Okay. It’s settled. I’m going back.”
Barb beamed, then threw her arms around him, wet hands caressing the back of his neck.
“Okay. Easy, now.”
She stepped back, eyes moist. Returned to her post at the sink and turned the water back on.
“I’ll call Brewster in the morning.” Rick knew it would tick Celia off, but if Brewster was going to be true to his word, Rick thought he should deal directly with the man at the top. Celia could stew all she wanted; bringing him back had been Brewster’s idea.
“Good for you. I think it’s the best thing. No more moping around.” She rinsed a glass and put it into the dishwasher with a clink.
It was funny how things worked. Since he walked out, Rick hadn’t given much thought at all to the show. Now that he’d decided to go back, his mind jumped ahead. What would his first day back be like? What would he talk about? “Had lunch with Winn today. He said Detective Adams came by the station. Spoke to our lawyer. He wants us to quit talking about First Time.”
Barb shut the water off, dried her hands on a dishtowel. “You should.”
“We couldn’t if we wanted to. Not as long as we let people call in. And if we cut off the phone lines and talked about something else, our ratings would plummet. We wouldn’t stay afloat for a week.”
“You could run Best Of episodes for a while.”
“I don’t think so. Celia wouldn’t go for that. Bad ratings.”
Barb reached out for Rick’s hand, then embraced him. “He scares me. Killing some innocent guy. Calling you up to brag about it.” Rick felt her shudder, sensed concern underneath. “Do you think you’re in any danger?” Barb asked.
“Me? No way. He tries anything with me, I’ll use my secret special move on him. The one I learned when I trained with the Company in Zookistan, back in the eighties.” He moved his mouth closer to Barb’s ear and adopted a vague foreign accent. “You remember ze move, don’t you?” A throaty whisper.
A smile grew on Barb’s face. “Maybe you should remind me.”
“Vell, first I do zis.” Rick slid his hand down Barb’s back until he found the bottom of her sweater, then he snaked his hand inside. Brought it up along her smooth skin until his fingers closed around her bra strap. “Zen, I do zis.” He unhooked her bra. “And now…”
With both hands, he carefully removed her sweater. Then the bra.
“Ah, I remember the move now,” Barb said. “And I like it. One thing, though. Don’t try it on the killer. He might not be so appreciative.”
A
NOTHER BRISK AFTERNOON
. But there was plenty of electricity in the air to keep the chill off Rick. To celebrate his return to the airwaves, Celia decided to take the
Afternoon Circus
on the road for a live remote. “On the road” was relative; the show had only moved a couple of miles to broadcast from Major Francis Park.
They’d set up an elevated stage next to the spot where J.T. had discovered the arm in the trashcan. The original trashcan had been replaced with another standard-issue park trashcan and had been roped off, like a little shrine. The collection of memorials had grown, too. There must have been seventy or eighty candles, poems, drawings, and stuffed animals heaped against the green can’s metal sides.
The stage supported a table and a few chairs. All the requisite electronics were in place. Frankie Polchous, the engineer, had wired the stage so they could take phone calls—just like in-studio. A WTLK backdrop, featuring a collage of
Circus
posters, had been set up across the back of the stage, helping to screen the wind. A few banks of klieg lights had been erected, enough to throw light on the stage and the first few rows of the audience. They hadn’t had much time to plan the event, but they’d managed to pull it together.
Rick stood by himself, off to one side, on the fringes of the giant crowd. He’d started taking a rough census, but had given up when his estimate reached nine hundred. And the throng was growing. Men and women, bundled up against the cold, packed side-by-side. Some were eating, some were drinking. More than some, if Rick knew his listeners. Many held homemade signs.
Welcome Back, Ringmaster
.
Last Time, Killer
?
Peace, Now, Dammit!
He’d even seen a few warped individuals carrying plastic mannequin arms. What had he agreed to, coming back? Did he seriously think things would be better? Or had it been a gigantic case of wishful thinking? The smiling faces of Barb and Livvy floated in his mind. Little EssEss made an appearance, too.
The scene reminded Rick of the documentaries he’d seen about Woodstock. People—hippies—for as far as the eye could see. Psyched for some great music, a real counter-culture experience. On second thought, maybe there really wasn’t much of a similarity. No historian on the planet would consider this live remote broadcast of the
Afternoon Circus
to be a cultural experience of any type.
Rick turned the collar of his coat up and sipped his Dunkin’ Donuts coffee from a Styrofoam cup. In the shadows, he wasn’t too worried about somebody spotting him. That was one of the great things about radio—most people didn’t know what he looked like. To the casual observer, he was just another listener who’d come out to support the
Circus
. Of course, it was the “special” fans like the Nazi Hunter he’d have to watch out for.
A couple of police officers strolled by. Detective Adams had been around earlier when they’d been setting up, trying again to dissuade Celia. She’d been polite but held firm. To Rick, it didn’t seem like Adams had been trying very hard. Maybe he was just smart enough to realize when he was battering his head against a stone wall. In addition to the uniforms, Rick knew Adams would have some men out, undercover, in case First Time decided to try something in person. The odds were slim, but they didn’t have much else to go on.