Two men from Security came into the room then. They must have been waiting outside the door listening for their cue, which most likely was Felix shouting. He kicks himself now for having been so predictable.
Tony must’ve rehearsed the Security guys beforehand: he was nothing if not efficient. They stood to either side of Felix, one black, one brown, their muscled arms crossed, their expressions impenetrable. They were new hires: Felix didn’t know them. More to the point, they didn’t know Felix and would therefore have no loyalty. More of Tony’s handiwork.
“This is unnecessary,” Felix said, but by that time Tony was well beyond feeling the need to reply. He gave a small shrug, a nod—the shrug of power, the nod of power—and Felix was escorted, politely but firmly, out to the parking lot, a hand of iron hovering beside each of his elbows.
There was a stack of cardboard boxes beside his car. His red car, a Mustang convertible he’d bought second-hand in a fit of mid-life defiance, back when he’d still been feeling sporty. Back before Miranda and then no Miranda. It had been rusting even then, and had since rusted more. He’d been planning to trade it in, get another car, a more somber car. So much for that plan: he hadn’t opened the severance envelope, but he already knew it would contain the bare minimum.
Not enough for splurges, such as semi-new cars.
It was drizzling. The Security men helped Felix load the cardboard boxes into his rusting Mustang. They didn’t say anything and neither did Felix, because what was there to say?
The boxes were sodden. What was in them? Papers, memorabilia, who knew?
At that moment Felix didn’t give a rat’s ass. He contemplated a grand gesture, such as dumping everything out onto the parking lot and setting fire to it, but with what? Gasoline would be needed, or some kind of explosive, neither of which he had, and anyway why give Tony any more ammunition? (Fire
department called, police summoned, Felix hauled off in chains gibbering and screaming, then charged with arson and creating a disturbance. Psychiatric expert brought in, paid by Tony. Diagnosis given. See? Tony would say to the Board. Paranoid. Psychotic. Thank heavens we were able to divest ourselves of him in time, before he went postal right at the theatre.) As the three of them were stuffing the last of the soggy boxes into Felix’s car, a lone, plump figure came trundling across the parking lot. It was Lonnie Gordon, Chairman of the Festival Board, holding an umbrella over his sparsely tufted, wattled head and carrying a plastic bag, some kind of stick, and what looked like an armful of skunks topped by a dead white cat.
The treacherous old geezer. Felix did not deign to glance at him.
Shuffle shuffle, waddle waddle, splish splash through the puddles, up came fat Lonnie, wheezing like a walrus. “I’m really sorry, Felix,” he said when he was
level with the back of the car.
“In a pig’s ear,” said Felix.
“It wasn’t me,” Lonnie said dolefully. “I was outvoted.”
“Horse pookey,” said Felix. The stick was his fox-head cane; the dead cat was his false Prospero beard; the skunk item, he saw now, was his magic garment.
What would have been his magic garment. It was damp, the fur bedraggled. Its many plastic animal eyes gazed beadily out at him through the fur, its many tails drooped. In the gray light of day it looked stupid. But onstage, finished, interwoven with foliage, spray-painted with gold accents, highlighted with sequins, it would have been splendid.
“I’m unhappy you feel like that,” said Lonnie. “I thought you might want to have these.” He thrust the cape, the beard, and the walking stick at Felix, who kept his hands by his sides and simply glared. There was an awkward moment.
Lonnie was truly distressed: he was a sentimental old coot, he cried at the end of tragedies. “Please,” he said. “As a memento. After all your work.” He held out the items again. The black security guard took them from him and crammed them in on top of the boxes.
“You needn’t have bothered,” said Felix.
“And this,” said Lonnie, holding out the plastic bag. “It’s your script. For The Tempest. With your notes. I took the liberty of looking at…it would have been wonderful,” he went on, his voice quavering. “Maybe this will come in handy sometime.”
“You’re hallucinating,” said Felix. “You and that cesspool, Tony, have ruined my career, and you know it. You might as well have taken me out and shot me.”
This was an exaggeration, but it was also a relief for Felix to be able to rub someone else’s nose in his own misery. Someone with a soft heart and a weak spine and therefore susceptible to nose-rubbing, unlike Tony.
“Oh, I’m sure everything will work out for you,” said Lonnie. “After all, such creativity, such talent…There must be a lot of, well, other places…A new start…”
“Other places?” said Felix. “I’m fifty, for cripes’ sake. Past the sell-by date for new starts, wouldn’t you say?”
Lonnie gulped. “I do see what you…We’ll be moving a vote of thanks to you at the next Board meeting, and there’s a proposal for a statue, you know, like, a bust, or maybe a fountain, in your name…”
Creativity. Talent. The two most overused words in the business, Felix thought bitterly. And the three most useless things in the world: a priest’s cock, a nun’s tits, and a heartfelt vote of thanks. “Stuff your bust,” he said. But then he relented. “Thanks, Lonnie,” he said. “I realize you mean well.” He stuck out his hand. Lonnie shook it.
Was that actually a tear, rolling down the too-red cheek? Was that a quiver of the jowl? Lonnie should watch his ass with Tony at the helm, thought Felix.
Especially if he keeps displaying such blubbery compunction. Tony would have no qualms; he’d crush any opposition, punish any hesitation, surround himself with thugs, lop off the deadwood.
“Any time you need a recommendation,” said Lonnie. “I’d be happy to…or… I understand there’s a…maybe after a rest…You’ve been working too hard, ever since your, your terribly sad, I was so sorry, it’s way been too much, no one should have to…”
Lonnie had been at the funeral; at both funerals, Nadia’s first. He’d been very upset about Miranda. He’d thrown a little bouquet of pink tea roses into the tiny grave, rather theatrically Felix had thought at the time, though he’d appreciated the gesture. Then Lonnie had broken down entirely, hiccupping into a white handkerchief as big as a tablecloth.
Tony had been at the funeral too, the sneaky rat, in a dark tie and a mourning face, though he must have been perfecting his coup even then.
“Thanks,” said Felix again, cutting Lonnie short. “I’ll be fine. And thanks,” he said to the two Security men. “You’ve been helpful. I appreciate it.”
“Drive safe, Mr. Phillips,” said one of them.
“Yeah,” said the other. “We’re just doin’ our job.” It was an apology of sorts.
They probably knew what it was like to get fired.
Then Felix climbed into his unsatisfactory car and drove out of the parking lot, into the rest of his life.
