“But your product doesn’t solve anything. People just get worse until they can’t take it anymore.”
“It's not just fantasy. Perfection exists! They’ve talked to me. They can take me away from here.”
He looks so desperate and pathetic that he reminds me of me, back when I had isolated myself and put the catalog pages all over my walls. The pain of that time is still vivid. Matthew Weber is in his sixties, maybe seventies. People struggle to belong their whole goddamn lives. He’s rich and runs his own company, and his entire miserable life has led to this. I thought this would play out differently. I wanted him to suffer, but he’s already suffering.
Holding the blade to his neck, I look down at the catalog pages of happy models.
“You want to escape the pain. You want to escape into the Brief Pose catalog. Don’t you?”
“There's nothing left for me here. Just let me go.”
I ask JuanCarlos, “Can you see him?”
“Yes, that's the founder alright.”
“Is he dressed as Santa?”
“What?”
Okay. Not dressed as Santa. But at least he’s here. His fantasy centers on the catalog, just like mine did, before I finally faced my demons.
Darkness CREEPS forward and blots out JuanCarlos, Riley, and Clara. The angry abyss is coming for me. I don’t want to empathize with Weber. I want to hate him. I want him to pay for what he has done to us. I want it to be simple.
But it’s not simple.
The only light shines on Weber and me, and that light is fading and won’t last long.
He breaks down into quiet sobs.
“Put him out of his misery,” I hear JuanCarlos say from the dark, but I’m not sure if it’s his voice or a voice in my head. The founder caused me to become suicidal so that he could sell more clothes. Adam is dead. Tara is dead. Victor’s sister is in the hospital. People across the country are rioting and losing their minds. He will get away with all of it if I don’t do something.
With the idea of revenge burning inside, I lean in close.
In my mind’s eye, I see the subway and Dirty Santa on the landing with his coffee can of change. Santa stands next to the BRIEF POSE clothing advertisement. Even back then, Brief Pose was ever present. The Santa REACHES INTO the advertisement and shakes the model's hand.
Brief Pose.
Dirty Santa.
They are one and the same: agents of death.
I stab the knife into Matthew Weber's neck.
I look down at the catalog pages on the floor, not wanting to see my gruesome handiwork.
BLOOD splatters the pages. The fantasy, the perfect bodies, the playful smiles are speckled red. The blood pours down my arm, runs from my elbow, and pools onto the pages.
No. That’s not what I want.
In REVERSE, the blood pulls back off the pages, up along my hand, along the knife blade, and back into Matthew Weber's neck. The knife pulls out clean.
What good would killing him do? He’s already suffering. He wants to escape into the catalog. He’s alone and yearns for a place to belong. Killing him would be like killing myself.
His Santa suit SHIFTS into BP clothing and the darkness pulls away. All I can do is forgive him. He needs to be punished for what he did, but hating him would mean hating the vulnerable parts of myself, and that would mean I’ve learned nothing. I’m not that person anymore.
I'm calm, collected. No one has to die. “I've been there too. I've wanted to escape, but you have to face reality.” I fold the switchblade and put it into my pocket. “I'll sign your damn paper. Just make sure everyone gets the antidote. We all need to get better.”
My friends are more important than getting revenge. My life is more important than killing a stranger and going to jail.
I sign the paper.
Clara, with great satisfaction, goes up and handcuffs Weber. She must have had the handcuffs the whole time in preparation for this moment. “This is a citizen's arrest.”
“You all signed. None of you can testify. You can’t do this!”
“And yet…” Clara says with relish.
“I want my lawyer. You can’t do this! Let me go!”
I say to Riley, “Make sure Matthew gets out of here alive. He needs our help. There will be people out on the street who will want him dead. He deserves his day in court.”
Riley takes out his gun and nods, agreeing to be Matthew’s bodyguard.
This feels right. This is what justice looks like.
26.2
I exit out the front door, leaving Mathew Weber and Brief Pose behind. I need to find Victor and Marshal. I need to know they’re alright. They left me, but I’m sure they had their reasons. It has been crazy for everyone. I understand if they needed to protect themselves. In front of a stunning, surreal sunset, I cross the street, walking from Brief Pose to Mermaid Coffee Co.
Inside, to my relief, Marshall leans against the wall near a fire extinguisher. I stand next to him and watch a man in a lab coat inject people with the antidote. Some of the people getting injections are from Clara’s group of protesters.
“Is Matthew Weber dead?” Marshall asks.
“He's just one man,” I say. “Killing him wouldn't do us any good. The entire thing was approved by a board of directors. We need to take down the whole company.”
“And how are we gonna do that?”
I don’t have an answer. I’m hoping the epidemic caused by the pheromone will bring them down without any help from us, but rich executives have a habit of getting away with atrocities, even those on a global scale. It’s all too big to think about right now. I did my best.
Juliet and Fiona come out of the bathroom and run over and hug and kiss me on the cheek.
“You're okay!” Fiona says.
Their affection is welcome but embarrassing.
“The bugs are gone! And Juliet’s math final was canceled because of the riots, but they gave everyone an A!”
“I got an A!”
I laugh at their excitement. “Congratulations!”
Outside, Victor runs by. I almost call out to him, but he must’ve seen me, because he rushes back and comes inside. “You okay?” he says, out of breath.
With Juliet and Fiona hanging on me, I hold up my wrapped wrist. It stings. “If you hadn't been there in the desert, I would've been lost.” Victor bandaged me. I don’t know how I know this, but I do.
“The shot works! That means my sister will be okay too!”
He kisses me.
I'm surprised for a moment and then participate in the kiss. Juliet and Fiona giggle.
“Too forward?” he says.
“Just forward enough.” Over his shoulder, I notice movement on the street.
JuanCarlos, Riley, and Clara escort Weber toward the riot police. The founder has stopped protesting his capture; his head hung low. Riley, hyper-vigilant, still has his gun drawn.
“Riley looks so in charge,” Juliet says.
“So that’s Mathew Weber,” one of the protesters says. “He doesn’t look so tough.”
I have faith Weber will be punished for his crimes, along with the rest of the board. What can I say? I’m a newly born optimist.
“That bastard!” Marshall seizes the fire extinguisher, pushes past us, and runs out the door.
“What is he doing?!” I run after him.
He raises the fire extinguisher. He’s going to try and bash in Matthew’s skull!
To my horror, Riley points his gun at Marshall. “Stop, or I'll shoot!” But Marshal isn’t going to stop, not until Matthew Weber pays.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Brief Pose Exposed
27.1
“Stop!” I yell at Marshall, but he throws the fire extinguisher anyway.
The extinguisher flies over Weber’s head and SMASHES through the glass of a cell phone storefront. The whole pane shatters and CRASHES to the ground.
“Damn depth perception,” Marshall says.
&nb
sp; I grab him to make sure he doesn’t try anything else. Marshall doesn’t fight back and just stands there with my arms around him.
Riley re-holsters his gun. “Damn coot.”
He and Clara escort Weber down the street toward a mass of protesters that have filled the far intersection.
JuanCarlos stays behind and says to Marshall, “He isn't worth it. He’ll get what’s coming to him.”
I let Marshall go, reasonably confident he’s not going to do something stupid.
“The camera ran out of power,” I say, suddenly feeling a wave of guilt. I could’ve wrapped this all up in a nice little bow if I had had a bit more power in my video camera. “I failed. Because of me, he might get away with everything.”
“We don't need Weber's confession,” Victor says. “The BP board of directors was arrested. I was running here to tell you. I saw it on TV. It's all over the news. They turned themselves in.”
A SWAT team surrounds Clara, Riley, and Weber. The rest of us watch from a distance. From here, the interaction is difficult to make out. As they take Weber into custody and put him into the back of a van, I realize that’s what the SWAT team was here for, to capture the man responsible for all this, not protect him.
“They'll take us next,” Juliet says. Most of the group has emerged from the café.
“What do you think they'll do to us?” Fiona says. “We haven’t done anything wrong.”
“They'll give us decontamination showers.” Victor is only guessing, but it makes sense. We probably still have the pheromone on us. There will be a quarantine process and lots of tests and screenings.
“We’re guinea pigs in a new wave of psychological conditioning,” I say with exaggerated drama. “With implications unknown.”
“That’s fine.” Marshall smells his own armpit. “I could use a shower.”
A news helicopter circles overhead.
Down on the ground, protesters have filled the streets in a huge mass of unrest and protest signs.
They tear down a Brief Pose billboard.
I smile. BP is over with. Victor kissed me. We’re going to be okay. Even Juliet passed her math class. I continue to smile, my EYES not quite sane. I don't realize it, but I’ve lost myself in my fantasy. The antidote has worked through my system, naturalizing the more harmful effects of the pheromone, but it takes time for the escapism to lose its psychological hold.
Later I see the BP security footage and find out what actually happened when I confronted Matthew Weber, but for the time being, I’m content watching the imaginary protesters overthrowing capitalism.
“I get a happy ending,” I say, and an imaginary Victor says, “Of course you do.”
27.2
On a single computer screen, TWO BLACK AND WHITE SECURITY FEEDS run side by side, each with a different angle of the checkout section. The feeds reveal what really happened:
At the beginning of the footage, Weber and I are alone in the checkout section. Matthew is dressed in BP clothing with his back to the sales counter. I have the snap-off blade utility knife up to his neck.
“But it's not just fantasy. Perfection exists! They’ve talked to me. They can take me away from here.” The video is subtitled, as the audio is less than stellar.
I look down, the blade still at Matthew Weber's neck. At the time I thought I had borrowed the switchblade from JuanCarlos, but in reality, it was the snap-off blade utility knife that I had left behind after slicing my wrist.
“You want to escape the pain,” I say. “You want to escape into the Brief Pose catalog.”
“There's nothing left for me here. Just let me go.”
I look over, thinking I see Riley, JuanCarlos, and Clara, but in reality, there is no one here besides Weber and me. The three of them have already left the building to wait for me in the coffee shop across the street.
“Can you see him? Is he dressed as Santa?”
Weber, seeing me talk to myself, breaks down. He is clearly afraid for his life.
Good call on his part.
I lean in close and STAB him in the neck. I pull the blade back out. I thought I’d imagined stabbing him, but clearly, I did it in cold blood. It’s all caught on the security footage, plain as day.
His hands go to his throat to stop the gush of blood.
“I've been there too,” I say, absurdly calm as he gags. “I've wanted to escape, but you have to face reality.”
I push him aside, not seeing that he’s bleeding out. He coughs blood and tries to stand still.
“I'll sign your damn paper. Just make sure everyone gets the antidote. We all need to get better.”
I sign the papers on the counter as he slouches onto the floor.
A SWAT TEAM rushes in and handcuffs me. I don't even see that they’re there.
The two black and white security feeds that run side by side change to DIFFERENT CAMERA FEEDS that show the SWAT TEAM as they split up to search the store: the men’s section, the women’s section, the front entrance, and then Abigail and Bram with their hands up.
The feeds return to the original two of the checkout section.
The TEAM LEADER speaks into a walkie-talkie: “Weber is down. Requesting medical assistance immediately.”
“We made a deal,” I say.
MEDICAL RESPONDERS enter the frame and insert a tube into Weber's neck. While this is happening, Abigail and Bram are pulled through the checkout section in wrist-ties.
I’m lost in my own version of events, not willing to see that I stabbed a man in the neck, and say to the officer restraining me, “Make sure Matthew gets out of here alive.”
The officer pulls me away, out of frame.
The medical responders take Weber out on a stretcher.
The Team Leader looks around and then says into his walkie-talkie, “The situation is contained. I repeat, the situation is contained.”
He walks off towards the back of the store, leaving the room empty.
Nothing happens for a long moment as the footage continues to show the empty checkout section.
The LEFT FEED changes to a feed of the stockroom. Tara's body is on the floor. On the counter is Abigail's open laptop with a wire snaking out into the next room. The Team Leader enters the frame. He sees the body and then notices the open laptop. He touches the cord.
“Shit. Someone's feeding the security footage onto the net.” He holds the walkie-talkie to his mouth. “The situation is not contained. I repeat, not contained. Damn it!”
He pulls the cord and the feeds CUT TO BLACK.
The two feeds cut to an earlier scene with the same two angles of the checkout section as before. In this footage, Weber talks to me and incriminates his whole company:
“There were a few deaths in the beginning, but... The board gave the go ahead; it wasn't just me.”
The two feeds freeze, rewind, and then play again.
“There were a few deaths in the beginning, but... The board gave the go ahead; it wasn't just me.”
All this black and white footage has played out on a WEBSITE entitled “Brief Pose Exposed.” Next to the monitor displaying the site is a large jar of pickles.
We continue to pull out to reveal Marshall sitting at the computer in a room that resembles an art studio. On the other side of the room, Victor adds paint to a painting of a desert dotted with mannequins. Other scenes from my fantasies cover canvases that fill the studio.
SUPERIMPOSE: “One Year And Nine Months Later…”
Marshall forks a pickle and eats it. “The original site is back up,” he says. “Not even a court order can keep it down for long.”
Victor looks to him. “Does it matter?”
“I'm sure a lot of people out there haven't seen it yet. Besides, it should stand for posterity. In case the film doesn’t get picked up.”
Victor adds more paint. “I still can't believe the bastard survived getting stabbed in the throat.”
“If he hadn't, I would've been screwed,” I say from a recline
r across the room.
I have my digital video camera and a well-trimmed beard that I’ve been cultivating as a sort of disguise. The world knows my clean-shaven face all too well, and they’ll know it even better if our documentary, Brief Pose Exposed, gets distribution. I’m hoping if it gets into Sundance, a distributor will help us fund a better sound mix. Currently, it’s passable, but far from ideal. Some time at Skywalker Ranch would be greatly appreciated.
On the VIEWFINDER SCREEN: Marshall surfs the net on his desktop, which I use for editing. I pan, scanning the room. Victor looks like he’s almost done with his painting.
This art studio is also our main living space and always smells of oil paint, solvents, and paint thinner. It’s part of a partially remodeled warehouse we’re renting for dirt cheap. Which is good, because my odd jobs editing indie films don’t pay squat, when they pay at all, and rent across the city has been skyrocketing.
“There were fewer mannequins,” I say. “And the sky was bluer.”
Marshall turns back to the computer. “You do realize art therapy doesn't work secondhand.”
“Hey, I find criticizing other people’s work very therapeutic. And the sun is too low.”
“That's funny,” Victor says, “I find kicking your ass therapeutic, so lay off. It's my art!”
“Inspired by my trauma!” I say with mock outrage. “Fine.” I put down the camera and stand. “I’ll leave you to it; I've got a date.”
“Guy or girl?” Victor asks without looking at me.
“Wouldn't you like to know?”
“Don't do anything I wouldn't do.”
Just to be an ass, I say, “I’m fairly confident I’ll be doing something that you wouldn’t do.”
That gets his attention.
“So it is a girl.” He sees that I’m not going to explain and goes back to adding more blue to the sky. “Fine, as long as it doesn’t violate your parole.”
He always does that! “It's not a parole!”
“Sorry, mental health evaluation period.”
“I need one of those,” Marshall says as he types. I think he’s addicted to the Internet. When he’s not working at the clinic, he’s posting on Facebook or Twitter 24/7. He has become Internet famous from everything that’s happened. I prefer to live in the real world.
“Oh, by the way, my sister is coming over for dinner tomorrow night.”