AREA 47

SECTION 89:

COURTNEY, Chapter 58

Byron Reed walked away.  Courty wasn’t here, either.  Just three people in this “Gilligan’s Island” swimming pool, and a group of guys hanging around by the changing rooms.  One of the girls was Lauren, but Reed did not recognize her.  And to Lauren, everything was a wonderful dreamy blur without her contacts, which she always removed to swim.

As he walked down the rock cavern hallway, he was seen.

“Byron Reed!” the exasperated servant girl called.

She came over to him.

“Byron Reed,” the girl said again, “I’ve been looking all over for you!  Griff is waiting in his apartment.  Do you still want to play Risk?”

“What I want is to find Courty.”

“We’ll find her,” the girl said confidently.  “But if you want to play, I have to get you there now.  Otherwise the game will start without you.”

Reed yawned, and considered.  He had a killer work-load tomorrow.  A meeting with his tax attorneys——shelters to shaft the IRS——and a second meeting with Reed Audio vice presidents concerning restructuring the company.  Location video work-footage with Vlad for two upcoming Byron Reed music-videos.  Evening studio-time with Terrence Washington, producing and playing on Terry’s solo jag-rock album.  Then there would be all the minutiae.  The picky, bullshit details that he hadn’t figured out how to delegate yet.  It added up to hours every day of interruptions.  When at Reed Audio, he couldn’t go twenty minutes without receiving a problem phone call from one of his SoundSyncs.  And vice versa.  His business was growing and changing too fast for him to set up an automatic system that would function without him.  He wanted to be able to completely turn his back on the business end of things, and concentrate on the music, but it was getting harder and harder just to find time for the music.  He had practically promised Donna that he would get back to Studio L sometime tonight after the Grammys to show her how to interface the Fairlight IV with the Synclavier sound effects bank.  She would be scoring sound effects for the new Feldman movie without access to the best sounds.  Would be?  She was scoring it now!  Reed was letting her down.  She was working the graveyard shift without the tools to do the job right.

And now what did he want to do?  He was split about mid-way down the middle.  He wanted to find Courty, get the hell out of this mall, take her home and thank her brains out for coming to see him.  But he also sort of wanted to play Risk with Griff, who was reputed to be one of the best players in Southern California.  It was juvenile behavior, almost all his friends told him, but damn it, he liked to play boardgames.  If he was ever going to play Risk with Giles Griffin, it would have to be now, tonight.

“Are you sure Courty’s still here?” Reed asked.

“She’s here, and we’ll find her and get your message to her; but if you want to play Risk with Griff, I have to take you there Right Now!”

“Is my car here?  She has the keys; maybe she left and gave up on me.”

“I’ll have it checked out, but——”

“Don’t you have a central paging system or something?”

“We used to have one, but Griff got irritated at it one day and had it removed. So——”

“Sounds like my kinda guy.  An intercom paging system in my own home would drive me nuts in about two minutes.  ’Course, this whole place would drive me nuts.”

“Mr. Reed, please, do you want to play, or not?!”

“All right.  Lead on.”

|

October 1993 was one nerve-wracked female, and it had little to do with the time of the month.  It was the time of the night!

Shoehorned into this scrappy LA Bizarro dorm room with the zoo crew: secondhand swinging-singles, precoital potty mouths, parasexuals & panty-stretchers, nymphomaniacs & nudomaniacs . . . the Sportsman pornzine elite.  It was rough on every luscious morsel of Miss Cornstalk from Oskaloosa, Iowa, who was trying to become citified with her new Courty-cut hairstyle.  Lucy’s long honeydew legs had stayed in Legs Angeles for the promotional opportunities; and her freckled blossomy breasts & traffic-stopping red hair had put in many appearances at otherwise staid computer conventions, stolid swap meets, and other stodgy events where a Sidekick’s presence would erect attendance and raise interest.  She had to be up, dressed, and out of there at 5:45am in the MORNING (!) or she would miss her flight to Reno, Nevada, where a redhead Sidekick was urgently required.

But Red had no idea California people could be so RUDE!  With one roommate away, and another sleeping over in Reseda, Red thought that a good night’s sleep would be a breeze.

Wrong!

The fastlane hick-quenchers had the good ol’ girl outnumbered 3:1 and outflanked on both sides of her bed: a male security officer at the door, and two female security officers inside her room, Flashlights In Her Eyes, all of them yapping away on walkie-talkies to guards elsewhere in the building!  Red sat on her bed, actually shaking in frustration, almost in tears, getting angrier and angrier, HATING Courty more every time her name was mentioned!

Jabberwocky walkie-talkie gibberish.

“Unit-64, Courty is not, repeat not in Lauren Chase’s dorm room.  Have you checked Byron Reed’s car?”

“The valets are checking now, but none of them remembers seeing Courty leave.”

“We still have Courty listed as here at the Front Gate.”

“25, have you finished your circuit of the West Wing?  Is Courty there?”

“Negative.”

“It’s confirmed: Courty was in the Third Dining Room eating pizza, one hour ago.  We have several witnesses.  Courty left with a mixed group out the East Walkway.”

“Unit-31.  Dispatch.”

“31, go.”

“31, check out the recreational areas again; Courty could be in a corner playing a videogame or in one of the lounges.”

“10-4.”

“Christ, you don’t think she’s bisexual, do you??  I am not authorizing a room-by-room search of this dorm!”

“I don’t think she’s bi, I think she’s Buff.”

“Oh, cute.  Cute, Robert.  Courty probably just went swimming or something.  31, check the pools when you’re finished with the recreational circuit.”

“This seems to be Courty’s purse here.  Lucy Harrison knows only that Courty left with some girls to go eat.”

“Robert, stay over until we find her.  Molly, you wait here, don’t you go off duty yet, either.  Courty may return here for her purse.”

“OUTSIDE!” Lucy screamed.  “WAIT OUTSIDE!  I NEED MY SLEEP!  GET OUT!  DON’T BOTHER ME ANYMORE!  GET OUT!  NOW!!”

The Sportsman security people were surprised into silence by this outburst from the tame, timid redhead from the nothing State . . . What was it?  Ohio?

“Of course, dear, we’re leaving.”

“AND DON’T CALL ME DEAR!!”

“Come on, let’s let Miss Bumpkin get her beauty sleep.”

“GET OUT!!”

COURTNEY, Chapter 59
 

Copyright 2005 Area 47