Dead Voices, page 13
Allen drove over the next morning to pick up his two Italians. When he saw Francesco’s black and blue face, he glared at me.
“No, no, it is not his fault,” Francesco said. “It was an accident. Marco has been a great host. Hasn’t he, Nick?”
Nick just gave a grunt.
Francesco put his sack in the trunk and gave me a big hug. “You must come and see me the next time you are in Italy,” he said. “I will show you around the Umbrian countryside at Cannara and we will look at the birds and see how they have perfect joy.”
He got into the back of the car.
I shook Nick’s hand and wished him luck on the show.
“To love Francesco is not enough,” he said with a cold stare.
Before I had time to respond, his stare suddenly changed into a cagey smile, as if he had to suppress more than he could reveal.
He got into the front seat. As they drove away, I gave out a long sigh of relief, as if a great weight had been lifted from my shoulders.
Johnny Reno Does Manhattan
After deplaning at the Newark airport with his backpack and walking stick, Johnny headed straight for the monorail which took him to the Amtrak station. From there it was a short ride into Penn Station where he bought a Metropass for his stay in New York in the middle of October. He was operating on a tight budget, after all, which had forced him to book a room at a derelict hotel in lower Midtown.
Not one person recognized him on the subway. He could’ve been totally invisible. These days, he well knew, one had to be on American TV or in the movies or hit it big in the music industry to achieve world-wide celebrity-status. Though he had been on the air for years, it was only a small renovation show on the Home Network in Canada, a show which had a miniscule rating in an already overloaded market. Plus, he had been syndicated in a few Canadian newspapers. But who in the States watched Canadian TV, let alone read Canadian newspapers? Who in the States knew about Canada period?
Yes, he was an unknown quantity in the biggest English-speaking market in the world, and he’d have to do something about that.
As Johnny regarded the other passengers, he ran his fingers over the intricate patterns he had made himself on his walking stick. It was rough and coarse, with no handle, a solid rod of maple that had a delicious resin-y odour and could be used for more than one function.
There was something to be said for anonymity, nay, even invisibility. He could go anywhere and not be hassled by autograph seekers, gawkers, and generally despicable media types who hounded the celebs beyond endurance. He didn’t have to put on his public face, could just be himself, and observe the world as any Joe Blow, which was all right with him, since he had to admit he didn’t exactly blend into the crowd.
He looked a little awkward, to say the least. Not exactly cutesy, let’s say, with his over-bite and preponderance of facial hair and whiskers. Nevertheless, he was wearing his colourful Hudson’s Bay jacket and a new pair of overalls, which gave him — he gathered, at least — the appearance of a hard-working and no-nonsense guy.
Johnny Reno, they called him, a name that was more than just an image. His show featured all types of renovations. They did structural carpentry, flooring, plumbing, and electrical wiring, repaired roofs and decks, installed skylights, windows and doors, along with dry-wall — in general did anything needed to improve the home, inside and outside. One time they had transformed an adjacent garage into a nursery room. His speciality, however, was wood.
He got off at 23rd and Eighth and walked the short distance to the Chelsea, where he quickly checked in. The place was old and run down. Casper had recommended it, saying a lot of famous people of the past had stayed here, including Mark Twain and Dylan Thomas and Popeye. He remembered it, however, solely for an old eighties movie of Sid and Nancy, who had drugged their way into oblivion. His room was spare, to say the least. It had an old TV set and no Internet connection. The lighting was so dim it was almost non-existent, creating a grainy darkness that suited his nocturnal instincts. Yes, the darkness reminded him of the inside of some of his lodgings back in Canada.
Since the AA Conference would start on Monday morning, he had the rest of Saturday and the whole of Sunday to explore Manhattan.
After he had a quick wade in the rusty bathroom, he walked all the way up to Times Square and bought a lastminute seat to a Broadway Show that night. He sat in the plush old seats of the theatre being entertained by these human beings dressed as cats and singing their lungs out. The next day, after seeing the Trade Centre site, he visited MoMA and saw all the great art-works of the modern era, some of which he could only shake his head at. The whole Warhol thing was beyond him, for one. He could understand Duchamp doing what he did, turning a urinal upside down, but Warhol had just been a window-dresser, as far as he was concerned. A mamma’s boy who hung around with the rich and famous, like an obsequious mutt, snapping their pictures and appearing meta-blasé.
Which was all right with him, because he had to get his teeth into the postmodern and apocalyptic sensibility, in order to do his job adequately. It wasn’t just a matter of doing woodwork and renovating homes. He had to aid in the restoration of lives. On Tuesday he’d deliver his paper at the Conference and set their ears back, with his own take on the modern reno mind-set. Guests were coming from all over North America to attend this Colloquium. And it was out of bounds to the Pixar People. Strictly the old AA crowd.
Since Sunday was a pleasant overcast day, he decided to spend the afternoon in Central Park, wading in the pond, having his lunch, and spending a few hours at the Metropolitan Museum. Later he took the subway back and stopped at the Disney Store close to Times Square, where he could only hang his head in shame at the blatant commercialism.
By Monday morning he was ready for the Conference and some serious interchange with the other AA guests. He put on his signature tool belt over his overalls, with his Hudson Bay jacket, grabbed his walking stick, and took the subway up to Columbia University on the Upper West Side. Once he got away from Broadway and through the campus gate it was as if he were in a different world. Like an oasis of learning hidden in the desert of the city. The central square was filled with students lounging about, some on the grass, some on the surrounding walkways, and on the steps beside the iconic statue of Alma Mater.
After asking a few students, he found the venue of the conference in a large-sized auditorium in the School of the Arts. The place was filling up fast, with guests of all types and stripes streaming in. He spotted some of the old timers like Fritz and Felix, Tom and Jerry, Yogi and Alvin, as well as a few newer faces he didn’t know. As he was looking for a free seat, someone came up to him and gave him a big smile.
“If it isn’t Johnny Reno,” she said. “Aka, the Woodman.”
As he was trying to place her, he noticed she was a knockout, with the same overbite as him, but with smooth long-flowing dark hair, long lashes, and big beautiful eyes, emitting a wonderful scent that went right through him.
“I’m Candace Castor of Divine Interiors. The show that transforms any old place into a divine space.”
He had seen the show a few times. Candace met with the owners of a crappy interior — a basement rec room, a bedroom, a condo living room, whatever — and discussed their plans for the reno. Then she, with her skilled team of carpenters and electricians and handymen, would do the makeover. It was the familiar before and after thing, the typical template for all these shows. Which was all right with him, sure, but he was after bigger game.
“Yeah, I’ve seen you,” he said. “You’re an interior decorator, right?”
“Excuse me, but more of an architect of space and colour, the exterior display to the interior landscape. It’s a pleasure to meet the great Johnny Reno, the master-builder, the guy who can transform an eye-sore into an eyecandy.”
She had an aggressively charming aspect to her he found refreshing against his own dour and withdrawn disposition.
“C’mon, let’s find a seat before all the animals get in,” she said. “This space can use some work, I’ll tell you. Isn’t it just hideous?”
He hadn’t counted on meeting anyone else from Canada, but maybe this would be a godsend, get his focus off his paper, give him the requisite lightness of being to deliver it with aplomb instead of pedantic solemnity.
“Where’re you staying?” she said, after they found seats about half-way up.
He gave her the particulars. She herself was staying at a swanky hotel on Central Park South. An interior designer, after all, couldn’t stay in a pigsty, she said, casting an aspersion he didn’t find agreeable. As she went over her flight to JFK and problems with her luggage, he cased the venue. The acoustics were fairly good. A large screen came down automatically from the ceiling. A lectern was set up on the left side, along with a table and a mic in the middle. The speaker could use either position. The table had a computer and PowerPoint.
“I saw your name on the list of speakers,” she was saying, taking out her program. “Canada’s own Johnny Reno is going to give the Americans a piece of their own wood.”
“Please. It’s not such a big deal. They probably won’t even pay that much attention.”
“C’mon, I don’t wanna hear that Canadian inferiority stuff. You’re Johnny Reno, the Woodman. You can re-do anything. Why, you’re an iconic image, for god’s sake.”
“Sure, a big fish in a little pond.”
“There you go.” She shook her head and gave out a laugh. “You gotta be more positive, Johnny. We’re in the Big Apple now. We’re all winners here.”
A big wheel at the university, some assistant to the President, came out and opened the proceedings. He was in an expensive suit and groomed to perfection. The university was at the forefront of research in so many fields, he said, it had won as many pennants as the Yankees. The audience groaned. He mentioned physics and the Higgs Boson, with a list of achievements in the fields of Math and Psychology and the philosophy of jurisprudence. Finally he mentioned the School of the Arts and the Sundance. A university couldn’t survive on the serious sciences alone, he said. It had to have some art and lightness of being. And it was so proud, he said, to sponsor this Colloquium, one in which such world-renowned artists and Tooners and celluloid celebs had distinguished themselves in their field.
Candace jabbed him in the ribs and gave him a big smile.
The first speaker walked up to the stage and stood at the lectern with his sheaf of papers. He was in a blue sail- or jacket and a white hat, easily recognizable in his signature attire. What most people didn’t know, however, was that he was an ornithologist on the side, a guy who had tracked every manner of rare species from the Amazon to the Gobi. Johnny had seen a few of his movies and docs. Wherever he went, he never failed to get into disputes and arguments and scrapes with about everyone he met, including his own family.
“Hello,” he said. “My name is Don and I’m an AA.”
The audience stood up and gave him a standing ovation. Don politely bowed and raised his four-fingered hand for silence. Today he was going to speak about the effects of global warming on bird migrations, he said.
The only problem, as Johnny and the rest of the audience saw immediately, was that Don wasn’t easy to follow. His mouth, being large and flat, made him slur his words so much they came out in a rasp rather than anything resembling precise speech. Johnny tuned his ears as much as possible to make out the gist of Don’s paper. The first part was definitely about bird migrations and how they were affected by climate change. Some birds, for example, followed their ancestral migratory patterns, some adapted, and some ran into a brick wall. Many of the lakes and ponds and marshes had simply evaporated. How long would it take for them to lose many species which fed on insects and the like? Would it cause plagues? And more to the point, Don said, many of the birds were starting to be affected by video games, a phenomenon which was causing them to lose their instinctive radar during their migratory paths.
Johnny wasn’t sure if he had heard right.
Video games, Don said, were sapping the life blood of the newer generation. His own son, for example, was so into video games he had lost all sense of radar reality. One day, he’d catch him pretending he was a terrorist, shooting up a whole city. The next day he’d be an ancient knight in armour battling evil dragons. And worse of all, he could be a Navy Seal in full battle dress, with a huge assault rifle, fighting the enemy in foreign states. And every time he tried to get him to go out and enjoy the outdoors, go for a dip in the pond, like, c’mon, that’s what they were supposed to do, his son would raise a ruckus. You’d never think such a cute kid with his beanie hat and big blue eyes could be transformed into a vidiot. Why, if he were lost he’d never find his way home. It was a shame, Don said. A quacking shame.
At the beginning of the Q & A, however, the friendly antagonist and cutely whiskered feline, Sly, begged to disagree with Don about bird migrations in general and the effects of video games on the young. Having studied the bird species very carefully himself, being an aficionado and lifelong predator, he knew not a few caged feather-brains, who, though they looked all innocent and helpless, could make his life a living hell. A deep frown appeared over Don’s brow and a spirited dispute followed. Sly wasn’t exactly a model of precise diction himself, being an egregious lisper. It was like listening to a couple of debaters with speech impediments.
The next speaker drew an even bigger ovation. He was about the oddest looking creature Johnny had ever seen, a guy with large eyes over two huge buck teeth on a yellow shell-shaped head that was a ringer for the gas station logo. His huge round head fitted into floral shorts from which emerged two skinny legs with black shoes. With his big toothy grin, he looked like an overgrown kid who could lick the world.
“I’m Sam,” he said, “and I’m an AA.”
“Isn’t he a riot?” Candace said.
Sam’s paper was about the cynicism and overall meanspiritedness that had infiltrated the market in the past decade. In a recent movie, he said, a cuddly-looking teddy bear that was supposed to be a blankie for a kid had morphed into a dirty-mouthed and drug-addled sex-fiend for the adult market. In a popular TV show, a family dog, an animal that was the archetypical friend and loyal companion to hominids, was portrayed with even more vices than its owners. In one episode he had taken to drink. In another he had lusted after his owner’s wife. And those were just a few examples of how animal loyalty and wholesomeness was degenerating into animal vice. What was the world coming to? In a voice that was pre-pubescent and yet full of worldly wisdom, he said he was overcome with profound sadness at times when he saw other AA members being ridiculed and misused just for a gag or two.
“It’s incumbent upon us,” Sam said, “to uphold the morals of the planet in general. We’re supposed to be the moral exemplars, aren’t we? If we don’t do it right, how will our audiences ever learn? Whatta you say, folks?”
“Right on, Sammy!” Candace yelled out, raising her fist.
Similar outbursts of approval came from the audience. Johnny could only smile.
“Because I gotta tell you, folks,” Sam said, “I don’t know how much more the oceans can take. The polar icecaps are melting, the waters are getting more and more toxic, and aquatic life is becoming extinct as we speak. I don’t have to tell you that Mother Nature works on a fine balance of interconnecting pieces. Take away one piece and the whole thing falls.”
“It takes a village, right?” someone yelled out from the audience, causing a ripple of uneasy laughter.
Sam stopped his train of thought, brought his four-fingered hand up to his crustaceous temple and gave the suggestion some serious consideration. Everyone in the audience was on the edge of their seats.
“This is no time for levity, folks,” he said. “I’ve been around long enough to know that times are changing. Marine life is in deep danger. The beaches have become veritable graveyards. Mark my words, in the not too distant future no beach will be safe for anyone, let alone the ones like us who make them a home.”
He went on to show some slides on his PowerPoint of oil spills and oil-drilling disasters, with the beaches covered in black slime, the birds and fish struggling in the cesspit of oil, the death and destruction for miles and miles. No one was laughing then.
“It’s up to us,” Sam said into the mic, “to raise the consciousness of the kids out there. They’ll listen to us if we spread the message in the right way. It’s just not a commercial thing anymore. We have to be more ecologically conscious, even to the point of being eco-saboteurs. The kids are the only ones who can change things around.”
His serious demeanour never left his face as he picked up the mic, stepped onto the middle of the stage in front of the screen, and nodded to the sound man on his right. The theatre was filled with the pounding beat of We Are the World.
And as he sang we are the world, we are the children, a number of ushers rushed up the theatre steps and distributed BBQ lighters. The theatre lights were dimmed. Johnny took his and pulled the trigger. Soon the people in the audience were swaying back and forth with the lighters raised above their heads and singing along with Sam.
Johnny couldn’t deny that he was moved. It was a truly inspirational moment. All the conference members seemed joined as one in their commitment to the lives of those they served, the kids of the future. Every so often the voice of a noted Tooner would rise above the others and give his or her rendition of the popular song. Johnny could make out the familiar voices of the great Tooners from yesteryear. And then, about halfway through, one distinct voice rose above the others. Everyone knew that voice. It was unmistakable. And when the spotlight shone on the Big M himself — the rodent who had started it all, the cutest rodent you’d ever want to see, with the big black ears, the pert nose, the wide gin, and the white gloves — the audience went wild.
