The Con Season

by Cesare, Adam

  Instead of getting caught in a lie, Marcus scrunched his face into what he hoped was a mix of confusion and interest while allowing Teeks to continue talking. He could tell from the guy’s posture and sudden intake of breath that he was about to get an elevator pitch.

  “We’re creating an immersive experience, trying to tap into the hardcore market in a way that most conventions can’t do anymore. The Walking Dead is the most popular show on television. This shit isn’t niche anymore and the old-school fans, the ones with disposable income, are looking for something different.”

  “True, true,” Marcus said, nodding his head. His back and ass were starting to get chilly from the cool wafting off the dairy cabinet.

  “In the email I had talked about a three thousand dollar advance. What if I made it four?”

  “And what would I have to do? If I’m not going to be signing and taking pictures,” Marcus said, the words coming out before he thought them through.

  Fuck. Teeks hadn’t said anything about not charging for autographs and photo ops, he was remembering that detail from the email he’d ignored. Twice.

  Teeks gave a tiny shark smile, but didn’t look distressed. “Consider it more like a role in a film than attending a convention. You’ll be asked to act briefly. Only there’s no way for things to get fucked up and be called back for reshoots,” Teeks laughed like he’d made a joke with several layers. There was only one that Marcus could parse: that the guy wanted to look and sound like a showbiz insider. “To be quite honest, Marcus: we’ve already got our star guest lined-up. Anyone else would just be…”

  Marcus bristled, he didn’t mean to but he did, perhaps it was the freeze falling off the refrigerated yogurt shelf. Teeks caught this change in attitude.

  “All we need now is some cannon fodder,” Teeks said. “What do you say?”

  Chapter Seven

  An overdose of nervous energy worked miracles for Toby Givens. Clarissa should have been threatening to fire him every six months for the length of her career, the same way that it was good to periodically clear out your temporary internet files so your computer didn’t slow down.

  Back in May, after she’d returned from the bathroom, he’d used the expensive plane wifi to secure her gigs. Then after they’d landed, using more small bills from the cashbox to pay the taxi, Clarissa didn’t get a full eight hours of sleep before being awoken by phone call from Toby that he had booked her even more work.

  Where was this fire when she was slowly going broke?

  In the days after learning that he’d been scamming her—a soft-hearted scam, but a scam—it occurred to Clarissa that Toby could have just as easily been lying about this new work. Even once she saw that cash was coming in, there was no way of telling that Toby wasn’t putting all his personal belongings up on Craigslist and eBay in order to get the money. Then she realized that she didn’t much care. He’d lied about how she’d hit poverty row, he could lie about how she was working her way back to solvency, as long as the money was green.

  Toby’s hustle was admirable and never much flagged in the three months it took to receive a reminder about Blood Camp Con. The convention that—oh yeah—Clarissa had signed herself up for on the flight. It may have been after three vodkas, but her agreement was still legally binding. Probably.

  “They want to know where to send the check,” Toby said, fixing his glasses the way he did when he was anxious or annoyed, one of his many fidgety tells. “Did you do any research into these guys at all?”

  “You mean on the plane? Before or after I was told that you’d lost my life savings? No, I must not have been thinking.”

  Toby scrunched up his face, making his man-baby features even more prominent.

  “Give them an address. If they send us five grand and the check doesn’t bounce, we go and do it. Can’t be any worse than signing at the pro wrestling convention,” Clarissa said.

  As part of a more “aggressive” convention presence, Toby had extended their touring to include smaller shows and ancillary markets that had the potential for ‘fanbase spillover.’

  “That wrestling thing was an honest mistake,” Toby said.

  “It was at an Elks Lodge!”

  That ended the argument. Toby told them where to send the advance and a week later Clarissa was endorsing a check from MTY Productions for five thousand dollars.

  Two months later they were landing, a flight attendant welcoming them to Hebron, Kentucky.

  “Kentucky?” Clarissa asked, shortly after touchdown.

  Cincinnati’s airport wasn’t in Ohio, which was news to Clarissa but didn’t seem to surprise Toby.

  “Northern Kentucky, but Cincinnati is right over the bridge on the other side of the river. Don’t you remember geography class?” Toby asked. He’d been her only representation and one of her only friends for fifteen years and still Toby was full of geeky, sobering surprises. His knowledge pool was as vast and deep as it was useless.

  “Geography class? Do schools even offer that, or was it some kind of club you belonged to?” Clarissa said, walking up the air gate towards the terminal. “I didn’t even know Ohio bordered fucking Kentucky.”

  This last part drew angry stares from the people in front of and behind them. A mother with a child at her hip dragging a rolling suitcase muttered “real nice” under her breath.

  That was right. Some of these people lived in Kentucky.

  Clarissa and Toby worked their way past the gate kiosks, following signs for ground transportation. The entire time Toby stared into his phone, occasionally tripped up by the sudden appearance or disappearance of moving walkways.

  “Where are we headed?” Clarissa asked. They had no checked baggage, which was a nice change of pace. No reason to check baggage when they didn’t need to bring her banner or 8x10s.

  “The email said that we would be met at the—”

  “Nevermind,” Clarissa said, pointing to the bottom of the escalator where a young woman held out a handwritten sign reading: “Ms. Lee”.

  Clarissa watched the metal stairs feed into the teeth ahead of them. When riding escalators she was constantly aware of the machinery underfoot. At least she’d been vigilant ever since she was once killed by one in a film.

  Looking up after stepping up, Clarissa could see that their chauffeur was not just a young woman but a very young woman. Young enough that she may not have been their chauffeur. It was possible that she wasn’t old enough to drive.

  As Clarissa wheeled her suitcase off the last step, the girl began to wave. The girl watched Clarissa approach, the corners of her mouth ending in two dimples, each one deep enough to swallow a Buick. She had straight dirty blonde hair pulled back in a simple ponytail. Her face wasn’t plain, but it was a face that could have benefited from some light makeup.

  “We see you,” Clarissa said to her, not trying to be rude, but finding herself a little embarrassed to have such an eager welcoming party.

  Toby followed, the three of them forming a tight triangle that everyone disembarking the escalator had to maneuver around.

  “Welcome to Kentucky, Ms. Lee,” the young girl said, her voice high and young, matching her face and stature. The voice was not only sweet and chipper, it was without trace of an accent, at least none that Clarissa could pick up on.

  Clarissa Lee hadn’t come to Hollywood on a Trailways bus with nothing but a hatbox full of dreams. She didn’t start out as a drop-dead gorgeous but down-on-her-luck waitress discovered by a studio head.

  No, Clarissa Lee had been raised in Pasadena, and had known from a young age that she would be entering the industry when she finished high school. If she kept her grades up, maybe auditioning for commercial work before then.

  Her “left coast” life notwithstanding, she knew on a theoretical level that she should not prejudge anyone from the middle of the country. Having starred in enough movies where Griffith Park had doubled for Appalachia, she didn’t fear the country like a city girl should. She knew that th
e killer redneck was a Hollywood construction. But still, she had expected the person who picked them up to at least have an accent.

  “Y’all have any other luggage?” The girl asked. Ah, there it was: y’all. Prejudice balance restored.

  “No, this is it,” Toby said, the girl looking in his direction for the first time. Toby put his hand out. “Toby Givens. I’m Ms. Lee’s manager.”

  The girl hesitated a moment, her mind doing some kind of calculation, allowing for a variable, then she shook his hand. “Kimberly Yost. I’m one of the Production Assistants for the Con.”

  That was interesting, calling the convention volunteers P.A.s. Clarissa had never encountered that before.

  Although Kim was wearing a camp counselor’s baseball T-shirt and “retro” shorts that rode high on her stomach and short on her ass, Clarissa could tell that she was normally one of those black T-shirted goth girls. The kind of girls who wore chokers instead of necklaces and tortured their hair with cheap, off-beat dye jobs. Kimberly was in need of a little girlish guidance if she was going to present herself as appropriately professional, but Clarissa wasn’t going to end up being the mentor to give it to her. She decided that much right now.

  “It’s very nice to meet you, Kim. Do you think we can go to the car now?” Clarissa asked, taking a glance up at the annoyed faces leaving the escalator they were blocking.

  Kimberly’s eyes fuzzed and her megawatt smile flickered, but only for a moment.

  “Oh, of course. Mr. Teeks wanted me to make sure all your baggage was accounted for, to introduce myself, and then to bring you out to campus,” Kim said, mostly to herself it seemed. It was like she was going back over a mental list. The girl didn’t strike Clarissa as dumb, but she was carrying that ‘first day on the job’ shellshock that Clarissa had seen hundreds of times on the faces of similar kids. There were worse ways these nerves could have manifested themselves. At least Kimberly was talking and smiling, not shutting down. Clarissa tried to remember ever caring that much about a job. She knew that if Kimberly continued in this business long enough—and in the entertainment hotbed of Kentucky how couldn’t she?—that enthusiasm would be drummed out of her. Likely with great haste.

  Kimberly’s disillusionment could begin on the ride to “campus,” wherever the fuck that was. Who knew if Clarissa, fabulous Hollywood movie star, would live up to the standard that Kim had already built in her mind? Clarissa Lee caught herself saying or thinking something jaded on a daily basis, but most days she reminded herself that she wasn’t “jaded,” just experienced.

  Clarissa thought of the pain in her lower-back, how grumpy air travel made her for most of the day, and calculated that it wouldn’t be long until she said or did something unpleasant to Kim. She would try her best not to, though.

  “You lead the way, Kim!” Clarissa smiled, allowing the girl to take the handle of her suitcase from Toby as she skipped—literally skipped—away toward arrivals parking.

  They reached the loading and unloading zone and Kim asked them to wait while she disappeared into a nearby lot, speedwalking.

  “She seems eager,” Clarissa said. Toby looked up from his phone.

  “Yes. Very. Sorry, I’m just going back and forth on this,” Toby said, indicating a chain of emails. There were things that Toby got himself very worked up about that ended up having very little influence on his own life and even less impact on Clarissa’s career.

  Their limousine arrived a moment later. It was an early two thousands Ford sedan with a nasty ding in the fender and a dark blue matte paint job instead of the traditional black.

  Although Kimberly, short and petite, was clearly the frailest among them, Toby did not offer to help her heft the luggage into the trunk. Either he didn’t want to steal the thunder of a job well done or he simply didn’t care and was finding whatever he was reading on his phone to be of supreme interest.

  “I was told by Mr. Teeks to keep discussion to a minimum, but I’ve got to say that I am such a fan,” Kimberly said, resting the second suitcase above the spare tire and trying to wrestle it into position so the trunk could close.

  Clarissa wasn’t sure if there would be makeup or hair appliances provided, so she’d packed a few essentials, along with her own dryer and straightener.

  “You can call me Clarissa. And I appreciate that, Kim,” Clarissa said. To this Kim’s face reacted with a mix of pride and revulsion, as if to say that she’d never stop calling her Ms. Lee. “About how far a drive is it, uh, to campus?”

  Kimberly slammed the trunk shut and Clarissa tried not to wince at the resulting crunch. They’re just things. Conair builds their hair irons like brick shithouses, don’t yell at the girl. She seems fragile. Kimberly could very well be with her all weekend, and keeping the girl happy had a real bearing on Clarissa’s comfort level.

  “If traffic is okay, we should be there in two hours, tops,” Kimberly said, her tone giving the impression that Clarissa knew where they were going, knew anything at all about this trip and con besides the fact that there was ten thousand dollars in it for her. Well, five thousand dollars. That advance check had already been spent.

  Kim walked around the side of the car and opened the back door, then walked back to the curb to open the other side. The procedure was overly formal and a rental car shuttle beeped at her as she entered the street. Kim gave a small curtsy as she opened the second door, beckoning Clarissa to take a seat.

  Toby looked up from his phone, seemed to regard the open doors as a kind of puzzle, then walked around to the far side of the car instead of sliding in with Clarissa.

  “Are we all in?” Kimberly asked. Clarissa nodded and the girl closed the door for her.

  From the parking lot, Clarissa could see what she assumed was the Cincinnati skyline in the distance. Kimberly pulled the car around the airport’s terminals and parking structures and, instead of following the signs for the city, she took the highway south and drove deeper into Kentucky.

  Well, that partially answered that.

  Chapter Eight

  Keith “Lumbra” Goldman—with a bag over his head, in the process of being transferred to who knew where—lay in the back of Rory’s van and tried to think about his options.

  Thinking was hard. Keith couldn’t see but he guessed that Rory was driving. The stereo was tuned to Rory’s particular mix of horrorcore rap. Which, if one weren’t initiated, sounds a whole lot like a drum machine laid over someone speed-reading Jeffrey Dahmer’s grocery list. Keith would have called the music torture, if he weren’t so recently familiar with actual torture.

  Trying to fixate on something else helped to take his mind off the pain in his nose, which had begun to heal only to be knocked open by Rory during his latest beating. The wound burned and Keith was beginning to worry that it would never close and he would be whistling every time he exhaled for the rest of his life.

  Not that “the rest of his life” seemed like it would be all that long an expanse of time.

  So, in the back of the van, he thought about his options.

  The three options were: beat them, join them, or run.

  “Beat them” would include finding a way free of his restraints, acquiring or improvising a weapon, getting the drop on both Teeks and Rory and then finally subduing his captors (both the brains and the brawn). As much as Keith would like to flatter himself and say that he considered that an actual possibility, fighting back had been off the table from the start. Not only was Keith injured, dehydrated, and in a deep, life-scarring shock, but before any of this he had been a coward and a weakling, even at peak health.

  Even if he weren’t a weakling, he couldn’t breathe without searing pain, his range of motion was extremely limited, and Rory was a monster. No. “Beat them” was out.

  Run. Run seemed like the best option, but the opportunity hadn’t presented itself yet, and there was still that nagging question of “Run to where?”

  There were Ohio license plates on both Teeks’ car and Rory�
��s van, so he was probably in Ohio. There was nothing but woods outside of the house and garage, so there was no way of knowing for sure. Keith remembered every horror movie he’d ever seen. Not that they were meant to be how-to manuals, but not many of them had ended with the victim successfully running away through the woods.

  With a similar level of shame that he’d nixed on fighting his kidnappers, Keith gave up on running.

  He let his mind linger on the “join them” route. For all Rory and Teeks knew, Keith had already made the choice to join by collaborating with them to create Rory’s costume, along with a few other mechanical gags they needed fabricated.

  The normal-looking one, Teeks, seemed to have a fairly extensive base of knowledge about this stuff, even had Photoshop and CAD design skills. But Teeks was a busy man, constantly on his computer or talking to his girl on the phone. Keith guessed what Michael Teeks’ needed from a “professional” like himself was less about lacking expertise and more about needing an extra pair of hands to help with the work. Not that Keith’d been given much of a choice, but he had put up no resistance. He’d been living and working alongside his captors for months now. It was possible that he’d already gone native without realizing it. Was that Stockholm syndrome or was that something else? Even at his most cogent it was hard for Keith to think.

  There was no way of telling how long he’d been undergoing his brainwashing. Obviously, Keith didn’t have a computer or phone out in the freestanding garage where he slept and tinkered. Additionally, the garage’s 1995 Bud Light promotional calendar only helped him keep track of the days and didn’t account for the hazy period of time he spent concussed when he first arrived.