The Road Narrows As You Go (14 page)

Her editor ran through a list of to-dos that included a complete set of eight-by-tens of each character in three-sixty rotation. Can do?

Can do.

Gabby hung up to take another call, then a moment later called back breathless. Wendy, you are not going to believe this. Frank says Mattel wants to license
Strays
toys.

Frank called you again?

Yes. Mattel. What did I say about a whale? Wendy, I'm vibrating. Do you know how much was at stake here? Our careers, our futures. Every paper that's turned down your strip is going to think again, those dumb bastards. We're going to see a flood of subscriptions come in when word gets around Mattel is behind you. All Shepherd Media's newspapers will fall in line. I'm giddy. There's going to be kids who get Buck for their birthday.

Is Frank going to call me?

He said he would like to call you, that is, if you want him to call you. Because this is great news, but he said he respects the privacy of the artist, is what he said. Those were his words.

Oh. I see. Okay. Tell him
not
to call me. I'll call him, Wendy said. Rachael! Wendy shouted, then jumped up on the seat of the kitchen nook and pointed to us all. Twyla! Mark! Patrick! You're all hired. Then she leaped down and out of the kitchen in two strides, spilling art supplies as
she went whooping into the living room. She fell on top of Jonjay who was until a moment ago asleep on the chesterfield. Let's go for drinks, on me.

Wha— It's ten in the morning.

Celebration breakfast.

Drinks this early makes me an alcoholic but okay, said Jonjay as he scratched his chest under his shirt and picked up the tail end of a joint rolled the night before and tried to light it with a Bic out of fluid. Let's go somewhere with greasy food and a view, he said, flicking, and eventually threw the lighter across the room. Who's going to tell me what we're celebrating?

Frank got me a deal with Mattel toys.

Wow, said Jonjay, slapping his cheeks. That is the weirdest wakeup call.

Twyla thought she should get in touch with Frank right away. And be like, wow, you just turned my characters into toys, wow, that's so amazing,
thank you
, Twyla said as she put on her high purple boots and took down a bicycle to ride. This is exciting, right? You're about to get your own fucking toys.

What's Frank doing in the toy business? said Jonjay. He's making some kind of a play, isn't he? What's his deal with all these moves? Why is he all of a sudden so interested in your comic?

Let's talk about it over eggs and beer, said Wendy and followed Jonjay as far as the bathroom door, which slammed in her face. I'll call him later, she said. Let's go out and spend some of my jackpot.

That was the one time we all went out for breakfast and got hammered. Now we remember running upstairs and inviting Biz to come along and Manila being there, too, but we could be mistaken, it's hard to imagine there was ever a day when Manila could go out in public without a throng of men closing in around her. We ate dozens of eggs that morning to celebrate, eggs in every style, heaps of hashbrowns, platefuls of bacon, stacks of pancakes and waffles, along with eleven pitchers of beer.

Wendy got excited talking about her ideas for a Christmas special. No one has done a Christmas cartoon that's meant to air in the summertime, but why not, the season is wide open and the Christmas spirit is supposed to be all year round. Imagine this: Buck overhears some kids talking about the meaning of Christmas, and he gets the idea to host a Christmas party of his own for the rest of the stray animals in the vacant lot. But he doesn't know Christmas is on December twenty-fifth, and it's summertime. So there's scenes of the animals all going and finding presents for each other, making presents, wrapping them up with ribbon and bows, and they meet up for Buck's party on the night of. He's trimmed the tree and the fence, set the flat tire up, and is dressed like Santa. Francis pins the star on the top of the Christmas tree. Everything is ready. But that sourpuss Murphy comes and breaks the bad news. Christmas is in December. Not for another six months. This is when Buck gets to give a speech about the true meaning of Christmas. Then fireworks go off. It's not Christmas, but by chance it is the Fourth of July.

It's ultra-American, said Jonjay, and swallowed half a pancake.

What the hell, forget cartoons, said Biz angrily, that's a damn crass distraction from your real focus. Do that shit in your comic strip instead. Biz Aziz shook her head. You're obsessed with expansion.

She thought Wendy paid a secret price every time she cashed a cheque that wasn't directly for work she produced with her own hands, her integrity—and integrity was not easy to buy back once it was sold. Everything for Biz was about integrity or corruption, and very little in the world could stand up to her lofty ideals. She lived by them. George Clinton, Pedro Bell, and Cal Schenkel did, too. Jonjay lived by her ideals. And so should all of us, including Wendy. Biz also knew the perfect funk record to go with this moment of decision, Hick owned it, she was going to find it when we got back to the manor. The blues might know the sorrows of humanity, but funk knew its paradoxes. Because what Biz wanted to say to Wendy was that she didn't think she should sign either deal. She didn't
need plastic validation for her art. Toys are a form of exploitation—you wake up one day and realize you're not in charge of your own ideas. You turned into a factory, your characters are commodities, your readers are consumers, and fans are fetishists.

I know, Biz, but what am I supposed to do? This is my autobiography, Wendy said, my whole life is wrapped up in cartoons and comics. Thing is, when I was a kid I wanted a Snoopy toy so badly I stole one from the Kmart. I slept next to that Snoopy in my bed even after I dropped out of high school. In high school I updated my Barbie with a new stolen wardrobe every season. It's too late now for me to take up principles, said Wendy. I never thought about that stuff you California punks take for granted, hating capitalism and supply and demand. When I heard the news my first thought was of the stolen Snoopy in my bed, not Jello's lyrics or any underground. Before I could read I knew who all the
Peanuts
characters were from the toys.

There's a way to earn what Frank just waved in your face and not give anyone a cut.

Watch out, said Jonjay, taking some of the bacon off Manila's plate. Frank thinks only of himself.

What's wrong with a cut? My syndicate takes a cut.

Yeah, said Biz, a big cut. They own your comic.

The way of Biz is a hard ethos to live by, said Wendy.

Shit, said Biz and sat back in her booth and stretched out with pride.

Mere mortals surrender, said Wendy and bowed her head to Biz.

Don't listen to Biz, said Twyla, looking around at us. None of us want to look for other jobs.

Wendy sucked back the gargly remains of eggs scrambled. Excuse me while I kiss the sky. She stood up from the booth and made for the ladies' room.

Frank's cellular number was on the back of a card in her purse and instead of needing the ladies' room, she called him from a payphone next
to the bathrooms, across from the cigarette vending machine and a claw game full of stuffed animals.

It's me, mister, guess what? I'm looking at winning myself a Smurf, she said and bumped her head against the phonebox a couple of times. Her finger danced next to the plastic tongue that would hang up the call. What are you doing? she asked him.

See? What did I say? He recognized her voice. I
told
you I want the same things as you, Frank purred. Allow me to invite you down to my offices, meet my raunchy but well-intentioned staff of salesmen, and sign these two very exciting inaugural contracts in person? I know everyone wants to meet you as much as I'd like to see you. Gabby told me to wait for your call. Not easy for me, since I love phones so much.

Too lazy to come to San Jose. Too shy to meet your freaks. Too wise to your ways, buddy. Just courier. I prefer UPS brown vans. The vans look so good, that earthy brown, those classic headlamps.

I'll talk to them about a licence if you like them so much. Come to the office. My staff are about to get rich thanks to your strip, so you should meet them, meet the army that sees your adorable comic as the tip of the sword in our economic revolution.

You're an hour minimum if there's smooth traffic. I'm too squirrelly for congestion. The farthest south I drive is Daly City.

F-f-f-f-funn-ee gir-rl.

Are you talking to me on your super-shoe again? The echoes sound underwater cavernous.

Yes, I'm on my Motorola. I'm seated at my desk in front of three computer screens, he said. My all-black X-shaped longtable. My generals surround me on all sides. And you must visit just to see how I decorate an office. Nothing like the stuffy banks back east or the Hexen home office.

I can't hear you. Too bubbly.

This gizmo's the breakthrough of our day, Wendy. Forget the imperfect signal. You want your own?

No nukes for me. You look crazy carrying that microwave brick next to your face. Much too cumbersome for a single lady.

If you don't want a free space-age telephone, that's fine, but all this money of yours
will
need a bank account pronto. Make up a clever company name for yourself that isn't obvious, not
Strays
, and I'll help you open a limited liability for your basic transactions with Hexen Diamond Mistral. For now I recommend you bank with my friend Douglas Chimney at Solus First National Savings & Loans. Solus have branches all over the Bay Area and are part of a network of S&Ls I work with who honour each other's clients, ideal for travel.

Look, you whale, I gotta go, she said and hung up on him.

Back at our booth another pitcher of beer had arrived as Wendy returned to her seat, and Twyla was curious to know, even if no one else was, what Frank had said.

Oh, you jerks, you saw me call him? Shit. He said congratulations and you better go open a bank account.

Wendy downed her beer in a gulp, there was only a gulp left, slammed the empty pint glass back on the table, and declared this the best day of her life.

There was another time on that drunken breakfast Wendy got up from the table to use the payphone. The call only took a couple of minutes. This time we overheard her say, Hello, hi, Mom? It's me.

Melmoth LLC was the name she chose after she gnawed over the possibilities for a few days, flipped open half the books on the shelves in the manor, waiting for a word or a phrase to jump out at her. Melmoth did, because in the story this Jewish character had no home, was a traveller, like her characters. Like her mind, a wanderer, Melmoth had no beginning or end. Frank thought Melmoth was just fine and he didn't ask her how she chose it. He set the whole thing up. His pleasure. All in a day's work, he said. He helped open this kind of company all the time to protect his
clients' assets and save them taxes. Fair to say his division opened dozens of LLCs a day doing business. An LLC was also a fast and easy way for Frank to move money between shareholders and keep separate a single investor's various income streams. The paperwork took him three days and she had to sign a few documents he sent over by UPS before she could open her bank account. He asked that she keep his name out of any contracts and gave her the wire number of another unnamed LLC to use instead. In the meantime Frank fast-tracked her green card so by the end of summer she would be American, friend to the IRS.

A few days later she took the papers for Melmoth LLC down to the main branch of Solus First National S&L, located on a commercial strip in the North Beach and across from the Clown Alley all-night hamburger diner. Wendy felt hungry after a cheeseburger so she ordered a second. And onion rings, a milkshake, and a slice of blueberry pie à la mode. She loved a good burger shack. Burgers might be one of those perfect foods, and played a central role in Wendy's diet; she ate on par with the American average of five burgers a week. Her booth at Clown Alley faced the entrance to Solus First National. It was an imposing limestone structure with solid oak front doors recessed into the shadows of three-storey stone columns of the Doric order. She took the last of her chocolate milkshake and waddled over.

The interior was well appointed with a massive crystal chandelier above the tellers, middle-aged guards in black suits, English oak panelling on all the walls, and in a vitrine was a bronze statue of a horse from the age of Pliny.

The handsome manager, Douglas Chimney, wore his thick, well-oiled hair parted from the nape up, gold cufflinks sparkled at the cuffs of his white silk shirt under a three-piece banker's suit in a lint-free navy blue, and a solid gold chain attached to a pocketwatch stretched across the grainsack of his stomach. He greeted his new client with a warm obedience that showed his good grooming, opened the gate for her and led
her through. For she was no ordinary new client but one whose business came highly recommended to him by Frank Fleecen. And with a brief but imperious glance at his row of tellers and the line waiting to be served by them, asked Wendy to come and sit in his corner office where they could talk in private.

The bank manager decorated his expansive office with leather upholstery and more dark wood walls, balanced by stained glass windows, a decorative collection of gold-edged hardcovers, brass fittings on all the lights, alligator-skin accessories on his desk, and what must have been a fortune in rare antiquities: a bronze helmet, a chiselled stone fragment, and other exquisite objects lined the rest of the shelves, encased in glass boxes and jars.

Douglas stretched out of his chair and let the belly press against the edge of his massive wood desk as he listened with pleasure while Wendy introduced herself and told him Frank recommended this bank above all the others.

A friend of Frank Fleecen's is a friend of mine. So what can Solus First National do for you, young lady?