Gravity’s Volkswagen

Ten

Another day. I woke early and I didn’t even want to get up. And having got up I certainly didn’t want to leave my trailer and have to face people. I wondered if there was a possibility of slinking away and never being seen again. But then Josh Martin was pounding at my door, and I opened it up and we looked at each other awkwardly and both said, “Sorry,” simultaneously, though I did think that mine sounded a little more heartfelt than his.

“I’m stressed,” he said.

“I was really stupid,” I said. “My first time on a movie set and all that.”

He grunted, twitched his shoulders and said, “Anyway, I’ve got a job for you.”

Being given a job was obviously better than being fired from a job I didn’t have, though I couldn’t imagine what job he was going to give me. For a delirious moment I wondered if one of the actors had fallen ill, or indeed been fired, and that I was required to step into the breach and perform as a Volkswagen survivor. It would have been far more than delirious: I can’t act at all, and I know it, but that doesn’t stop me fantasising. Fortunately, for everyone, all the cast remained in good health and employment.

“Here,” he said, and he shoved a brown paper bag into my hand.

“Thanks,” I said automatically and I teased open the mouth of the bag to see that it contained a small fistful of banknotes.

“It’s not for you,” Josh Martin said. “I thought that while you’re here you should do something useful. A new face might help. Take this money to the freak show. Buy us some silence.”

“All right,” I said.

“Here’s what you do. You go over there. You ask for somebody called Leezza. That’s with two ees and two zees. You put it right in her hand. She’ll do the rest.”

It didn’t sound like too difficult a job; or at least it didn’t until he added, “And be careful. Leezza’s the only one of them you can trust. Don’t let anybody else touch it. Definitely don’t let that bastard Motorhead Phil get anywhere near it. And don’t get robbed. Don’t get mugged. Don’t swap if for any magic beans.”

I said I’d do my damnedest not to. I didn’t know how much money was in the bag and I didn’t try to count it, but it didn’t look like a great deal and it fitted easily enough into my jeans pocket. Silence may have been a rare commodity in those parts but it didn’t appear to be a particularly expensive one.

I hoped I might borrow the bike I’d seen Cadence using but it wasn’t offered, so I set off on foot for the speedway gate, the one where I’d encountered the depressive Barry, and to where I’d returned him. He was still right there: that was no big surprise. And it wasn’t any more of a surprise when he beckoned to me again. I had every reason to believe he wanted another push to the diner. I hoped it wouldn’t come to that, but I had to talk to him, or someone, if for no other reason than I wanted him to tell me where, and indeed who, Leezza was. He was delighted to do it. The mere mention of Leezza seemed to brighten his whole day.

He pointed out a young woman sitting cross-legged on the ground a short distance away. She looked a lot less freakish than the rest of the people around the speedway. She was fresh faced, scrubbed-looking, and had no visible body modifications. She wore glasses, and had a short shaggy crop of blonde hair, and even though she was wearing camouflage pants and combat boots she still had the air of a librarian who’d dressed for a rough day among the stacks.

I was surprised to see she was sitting there cradling a laptop, tapping in information and scrutinising the screen intently. Everyone else I’d seen from the freak show had been involved in wholly manual, analogue activities. Leezza’s back was resting against a vehicle of some sort. I couldn’t tell what it was since it was shrouded under a blue tarp, but it looked too long and low to be a Beetle.

“I’m here to give you this,” I said, and I held out the bag of money.

She was slow to look up from whatever was on the screen of the laptop.

“Do you know anything about trajectory physics?” she asked.

“Sorry, no,” I said.

She looked me over and satisfied herself that I was indeed a man who wouldn’t know anything about trajectory physics. She held out her hand and took the bag of money.

“What happened to Cadence?”

“Nothing. They just decided to put me to work. I’m Ian.”

She didn’t seem any more interested in knowing who I was than Barry had been. And a part of me felt like protesting, insisting on my status, pointing out that I wasn’t just some drone or lackey or gofer, that I was actually the author. But again I reckoned that might come over as showing off or, more likely, pathetic, like I was trying too hard to impress, and to be honest I had my doubts about whether literary authorship would actually be impressive to a woman who was concerning herself with trajectory physics.

“Well, thanks, I guess,” she said.

“It’s OK,” I said in return.

“I’m not really sure it is,” she said. “It seems, I dunno, kind of grasping. Still, needs must.”

“It’s all right, it’s not my money,” I said.

That wasn’t quite enough to put her mind at rest.

“Think of it as sponsorship of the arts,” she said.

“OK,” I said, though I couldn’t see that it made any difference how I thought of it. Her eyes turned back to her computer screen.

“So that’s it?” I said.

“Pretty much.”

I had a certain curiosity about the mechanism by which handing money over here produced silence over there, but it was the least of things I didn’t understand about film-making, and I didn’t want to pry. I didn’t want to over-complicate matters: I didn’t want to fuck up. And apparently I didn’t. Silence was duly produced. I’d had a small success, and one that was appreciated. They had me going over there with money several more times that day. I can’t say that, in any sense, I got to know Leezza in the course of these visits, but we did establish a comfortable and friendly working relationship; the kind that giving money to people often results in.

On the third or fourth visit Leezza said to me, “That was a nice thing you did yesterday. Pushing Ishmael to the diner.”

“Ishmael?”

“Yeah, that’s Barry’s name, but he doesn’t always like people to call him that. Anyway, it was decent of you.”

“I didn’t think I could say no.”

“Some would have.”

“If I’d had a car I’d have given him a jump start.”

“Wouldn’t have done any good. That car of his needs more than that. Every guy in this place has tried to get that damn Beetle running and if anybody could, it’d be one of these guys, believe me.”

“I see,” I said.

“And you know, they’ve offered to saw the top off the car so he could climb out, but he won’t have it. Says the car’s got sentimental value, says it’s a part of him. So that’s why somebody has to help him get to the diner. Once in a while some of the guys will be going down there anyway and one of ‘em’ll throw a rope round the front bumper and haul him down, but that gets weary pretty fast. Lot of the guys won’t do it any more. They say he got himself into it, he should get himself out of it.”

“I suppose,” I said, “if they just left him where he was he wouldn’t be able to eat and then he’d lose weight and he’d slim down and then he would be able to get out of the Beetle.”

“That’d be plain cruel,” she said. “You’re not a cruel man, are you?”

“No,” I said, “I’m not.”

“You should come over tonight,” she said.

“Should I?” I asked. It wasn’t an invitation that I expected or even understood.

“It’s opening night. Our first night.”

I looked at her blankly.

“We’re a famous automotive freak show,” she said. “Tonight’s the opening night of our new production. There might be a few glitches, but that’ll make it even more interesting. Starts at eight. I’ll put you on the comp list.”

“Really? Thanks.”

“Sure. Just so long as you give Barry another push to and from the diner.”