A rectangular oak table dominated the room. It was raw and unfinished with heavy legs and a half-dozen mismatched chairs of assorted woods upon which the Letter13 crew sat in silence and absorbed their surroundings. The general filth and clutter mirrored the outside yard area, but to an even greater degree of dishevelment confined within such a limited space. Piles of faded, yellow newspapers were stacked in every corner, and stuffed cardboard boxes heaped with every variety of discarded rummage imaginable lined the perimeters. A potpourri of refuse and rubbish—soiled rags and tin cans and plastic soda bottles—littered the floor in random mounds as if cast there as temporary waste sites to be combined for more permanent disposal elsewhere when the chambermaid saw fit. A skuzzy, stained bare mattress was flung in the rear by a natural stone fireplace blackened from soot, while a tattered, threadbare couch and a thrift-shop-quality ottoman parked next to an overturned crate passed for the living room furniture. Animal pelts and stuffed carcasses—from pheasants and skunks to foxes and deer heads—hung from the walls. It was a hoarder’s paradise.
Munyon stood over a stove stirring a metal pot and whistling a nursery rhyme song, an out-of-tune “Pop Goes The Weasel.” The kitchen area itself contained a slop sink that overflowed with grimy, crusted pans and chipped cups as well as a battered refrigerator with a wire coat hanger handle. A few hand-me-down lamps scattered about the interior were the lone light sources, and the makeshift curtains on the windows were made of burlap. To describe the ambience as rustic charm would be akin to calling a portable latrine “chic.”
A stack of shallow soup bowls balanced in his hands, Munyon approached the table and slid them across the surface like hockey pucks to each of his dinner guests, who scrambled to snatch them before they hurled off the edge.
“Comin’ up, the house specialty!” he announced.
Stan, Irv, Bryce, Keisha, and Dana shifted their dubious eyes back and forth among themselves as Munyon removed the battered pot from the burner and swirled the contents around, as though it was a potion so delicate that it needed to be handled with the utmost care lest it be ruined. He scooped out the brown, lumpy broth with a ladle and tipped a sizable amount into each of the five bowls.
Like his companions, Bryce stared with revulsion at the unknown slop. “Smells, uh…gamey.”
Munyon interpreted the comment as a compliment and was delighted. “Well, it should, whiner, it’s everybody’s favorite—squirrel stew!”
Every member of the Letter 13 team grimaced at the thought and sight of the odious gumbo they had just been served.
“Although I wouldn’t swear,” he continued, “that a chipmunk or two didn’t make it in there.” Munyon surveyed the table and couldn’t help but notice the lack of enthusiasm for his scrumptious fare. “Go on, dig in! It’s insultin’ to the chef if you don’t. And whiner, since I can tell you appreciate my fine cookin’, you get extras!” He ladled another portion into Bryce’s bowl. “There, right to the tippy top. Bono apetito, as they say in old Mexico!”
While Munyon stood watch like a Tower of London sentry guarding the Crown Jewels, the cautious crew dipped their spoons into the murky gunk. Each hesitated and squeezed their eyelids shut as they sipped a tiny amount and forced the glop down their gullets.
“Well?” Munyon boomed.
Stan realized from the expectant, upbeat tone of Munyon’s question that he wasn’t interested in hearing a harsh critique of his cuisine. There was just one right answer, and he hoped his response was convincing as he nodded with eager approval. “Mmmmmmm.”
The others followed suit and sounded like a choir warming up their vocal chords backstage. “Mmmmmmm.”
“I knew you’d like it!” Munyon erupted with such gusto, it was like his life had just been spared by their favorable reaction. “Now, there might be a hair or two swimming around in there, but don’t fret none. Just reach in and pick ’em right out like they was boogers. And I got plenty more left, so don’t go gittin’ shy ’bout second helpin’s.”
“If it’s so good,” Keisha asked, “why aren’t you eating it?”
“Had my fill when it was fresh. You’re gittin’ the leftovers,” Munyon noted, as if he was the captain of an ocean liner addressing the steerage class passengers.
Bryce poked his spoon at the flotsam and jetsam bobbing in the pool of goop. “How leftover…exactly?”
Munyon shrugged. “Week or two. Give or take.”
The entire crew began to cough and choke as they reeled back in their chairs away from the bowls as though they had just discovered they contained raw plutonium.
“Don’t worry none, though. Won’t go bad for another day or two—unlessin’ I miscalculated.” Munyon paused to ponder the possibility, but for no more than a moment. Then he laughed as though the consequences of eating rancid, spoiled vittles were a minor trifle. “Never was much good with numbers. Anyhow, just throw in some salt and mix it all around if it’s tastin’ a bit overripe.” He dipped a wad of fingers into his homemade hodgepodge and sampled like it was a sweet, creamy pudding. “Woulda been perfect if I didn’t forget to throw in a few more grubs. So shoot me. Ha-ha!”
As the group contemplated some of the more unpleasant, visceral aspects of a potential food poisoning, Munyon returned the pot to the stove and wiped his soiled hand across his overalls. “Gotta head out now, gather up some firewood. Bones can get mighty chilled up here at night.”
He proceeded to the door and cracked it open. “Yummy ain’t it? Been meanin’ to cook me some opossum, too. Smart little buggers though.” He sighed and shook his head as if he was on the verge of bagging a white rhino when the trail went cold. “All right. Just keep on chowin’ down. Clean them plates up good!”
Within seconds after Munyon departed and closed the door behind him, the race was on. Each and every member of the Letter 13 team grabbed their bowls, sprang from their seats and bolted for the stove. They jostled and elbowed one another like shoppers at a Black Friday sale to be the first to dump the toxic goulash back into the pot from where it was hatched.
Bryce spat away any remaining morsels that lingered on his tongue. “Yuck!”
“Think he’ll notice?” Dana said, as she emptied her bowl.
“Who cares. Let’s get out of here. Now’s our chance!” Bryce said, as he scrubbed his lips with the sleeve of his coat and headed toward the door.
Stan, however, beat him there. He stretched out his arms as he backed against the doorknob and blocked the one way out. “Whoa, whoa. Not so fast. Why do you want to leave?”
“Why? Have you gone completely mental? Who do you think is on the Chef Grody’s menu tomorrow?” Bryce spun around and appealed to the others. “We’re next week’s leftovers!”
“You don’t know that,” Stan said, his voice level and controlled.
Bryce fired back. “Between us there’s enough fresh meat to last the old coot through next winter!”
“Anthropophagy,” Irv declared, as if it was such a common word in everyone’s vocabulary that no further explanation was necessary.
But Irv’s unexpected and esoteric intrusion discombobulated Bryce, like a loud sneeze in the middle of an opera singer’s aria. “What? In English, please
professor?”
“You’re talking about anthropophagy…cannibalism,” he elaborated, in his usual self-possessed way. “Humans eating human flesh.”
Bryce grimaced and clutched his upper torso as though a frigid Antarctic wind had just blown in. “Sometimes I really hate you, Irv.”
Irv continued to enlighten his rapt audience. “Actually, researchers have found that people were more likely to eat someone they were attracted to than not.”
“A-HA!” Bryce blurted, as he thrust his fist upward in some sort of victory power salute.
Keisha charged at him and yanked his arm back down. “What are you A-HA-ing about?” Keisha roared. “Easy for you to say. He had his beak down my neck, not yours!”
As Bryce inspected his fingernails to avoid Keisha??
?s scowl, Dana slammed her bowl down on the table and stomped over to confront her brother. “Well, I want to leave, too. He’s stinky and a creepo!”
“That doesn’t make him a homicidal maniac,” Stan pointed out.
Bryce scooted next to Dana as they double-teamed Stan. “Uh, hello? He’s a hermit living alone in the woods by the name of Munyon Munyon for god sakes. What other proof do you need!”
“And he drools!” Dana added.
Bryce motioned toward the animal trophies mounted around them. “What about these? Not exactly a stamp collection, Stan!” He pointed at one massive head in particular, with thick black fur, a broad skull, and deep muzzle. “Take a look at this one. It would probably eat all of us alive just for a snack!”
“I doubt it, Bryce,” Irv chimed in. “That’s a Newfoundland.”
“Who cares what the thing’s called. It’s a beast and so is Munyon!” Bryce proclaimed.
“It’s a dog,” Irv asserted.
Bryce froze as if Irv just tossed a wet washcloth in his face. “Huh?”
“A Newfoundland is a dog, a big one, a hundred and fifty pounds or so,” Irv explained. “Originally from eastern Canada. The native dogs and wolves there were crossed with dogs the Vikings brought over a thousand years ago. The Newfs pulled nets for fisherman and hauled logs for lumbermen.”
“Eeee-uuuu! He stuffed a dog?” Dana said, repulsed by the notion of canine taxidermy.
“Precisely my point!” Bryce huffed.
Stan raised his hands to his chest, palms out, in a defensive posture. “Okay, I admit he’s a little eccentric.”
“Eccentric? You think?” Bryce bellowed. “The sicko even kills poor little chipmunks. Alvin, Simon, Theodore!
“Yeah, well this isn’t a cartoon. The sicko also catches those poor little chipmunks,” Stan countered. “How far do you think we’d get out there in the middle of the night?”
No response. The Letter 13 team was silent. Not even a twitch as they took under consideration the somewhat tenuous logic of Stan’s position. He was confident that cooler heads would prevail and accept his argument that it made more sense to remain as Munyon’s guests rather than become his prey. But he needed to convince his troops to stay for another reason as well, a more personal one. This would require Stan to persuade them that what meant so much to him was also in their own best interests. Accomplishing this task would call upon another set of skills—perhaps the most important one of all—that every successful director possessed: those of a salesman. Someone so deft, so nimble, so gifted an orator that he could peddle sand to nomads in the Sahara, and ice-making gizmos to Eskimos. Stan understood that he had a less-than-desirable idea to sell, too, but that handicap went with the territory, and he accepted it. He knew directing was all about the art of manipulation—not just the cast in front of the cameras, but the crew behind them as well. Each and every person under his command must be stroked, cajoled, and coaxed into believing in the product they were being asked to create; that their participation was vital, their actions had a worthwhile purpose, and their efforts mattered; that the director’s intent was firm and clear with a valid rationale behind requests that could often seem at first glance to be capricious or even absurd. It wasn’t unlike a platoon sergeant in combat ordering his squad to assault a hillside swarming with enemy machine-gun nests. They trusted their leader’s judgment, respected his authority, and supported the goals of the mission, so they followed his orders. Of course, Stan didn’t have the threat of dereliction of duty and a military court martial on his side if one of his soldiers balked. However, he did have the one thing no salesman worth his bonus ever left home without: tenacity.
Stan eased away from the door and paused to study the eyes of each of his team members as he made his way past them. He saw the uncertainty, felt the apprehension, understood the need to find a safe port to escape the storm they sailed into. Most of all, he sensed how Bryce and Dana’s negativity could infect his allies Irv and Keisha with the same urge to flee. Time was of the essence. For Stan, departure was not an option, not at that moment anyway. There was work yet to be done. But for his cast and crew to hang around much longer, they would need a darn good reason and he was prepared to give them one.
Stan drifted toward a side wall before executing a sudden, dramatic pivot to address his troops. “Don’t you guys get it? Don’t you see? What we have here is an opportunity,” he said, with the fervor of a desperate race track gambler with a hot tip on a long shot.
“Yeah, for the geezer to stock his fridge,” scoffed Dana.
Stan pointed at Dana like a kindergarten teacher sentencing an unruly student to a timeout in the corner. “Wrong. For an indoor location for Letter 13!”
It was obvious from the elevated eyebrows that his proposal caught the team off-guard. Stan, however, wasn’t a bit taken aback by their reactions. In fact, he counted on the element of surprise to knock them off balance. Now he had their full attention. They were distracted from the notion that abandoning the shack was the lone alternative available. At the very least, he had jimmied open their minds enough to consider another possibility, his possibility. Sure, it was self-serving, but so what? All directors were selfish to a degree. They had to be. It was the nature of the beast and spoke to the very essence of the profession. A director had to protect his interests and more often than not this required a one-track mind: keep the project moving forward. Allow nothing to deter the process. Above all, no matter what, finish at all cost. The stakes were high—future assignments and entire careers depended on the outcome. Because the director was considered the author of the film and its driving force, his personal reputation was on the line. He could overcome bad reviews or box office failures. But to not steer a film through to conclusion meant that the director could not be trusted. That he lacked the will and resolve to endure the grueling marathon that movie productions were. The worst possible ending for any film was to never reach the end. Stan vowed, one way or another, he would make sure, at the very least, Letter 13 would wrap on his terms.
He began to stroll around the shack, gazing at his surroundings as if wandering through the Louvre. Stan was awestruck, a kid with a pocketful of quarters in a candy store. It even smelled right. There was a feral decay in the air, a fetid stink, like that of animal remains decomposing. Or perhaps it was the essence of a cesspool. Maybe a compost heap. What it reminded him of, however, didn’t matter. In his mind, the putrid odor was an added bonus that would provide an edge to the performances of his actors. Not only would they be repulsed by what they could see, but inhale it as well, and the effects of being immersed in this reality would be reflected in what Stan captured with his camera. It was an atmosphere he could never imagine existed, let alone ever recreate. Securing an indoor location on a limited budget—or almost no budget in the case of Letter 13—almost always relied on the goodwill of family, friends, and neighbors who donated space for a movie crew to shoot a scene or two. Anything more exotic than a cookie-cutter house or perhaps an office, maybe even a restaurant or bar, was a rarity. Stumbling upon such a unique interior, in Stan’s mind, was like that famous tomb raider Howard Carter unearthing King Tut’s vast riches.
Stan reached up and stroked the spiky fur of a raccoon hanging above. No, he thought, to steal off into the woods without taking advantage of this rare gem of a setting would be as shortsighted as a miner plucking a gold nugget from a muddy river bank, but rejecting it because he didn’t want to make the effort to wash it off. “I mean, look at this place. It’s perfect.”
“For a bloodbath,” Bryce muttered.
“For Howie and Zoe to hide from the evil forces,” Stan rebutted and motioned with his arms like he was parting the Red Sea. “It’s like a gift from the gods of cinema!”
“Yeah, well not to tick off the gods, but I say we take a vote,” suggested Bryce, undercutting Stan’s euphoria.
“You can’t,” Stan protested.
Dana was quick to cast her ballot. “I am so
out of here!”
Stan shook his head. “It is a well-established precedent that the director has the only vote on a film set, only to be overridden by the producer, which—hellooooo—would also be—ta-dum—moi.”
Bryce ignored Stan like an auctioneer at Sotheby’s snubbing a bid from a bum. “Thank-you, Dana. That makes two of us. Irv, what say thee?”
Stan hopped onto a chair next to the dining table and glared down at Bryce and Dana. “I say no voting, that’s what I say!”
“What’s the matter, Stan, afraid you might lose?” Bryce said, in his most saccharine timbre of voice.
“No, Bryce. I’m afraid you’re making a big mistake.”
Bryce dismissed Stan with a swish of his wrist. “The only mistake is sticking around this pig sty. You’re overruled. Let’s get on with it. Irv?”
Stan knew there was nothing to be gained by prolonging the argument. At this point, he could not prevent the vote from running its course. That much was clear. It reminded him of Sir Isaac’s Newton’s law of physics about a body in motion staying that way unless something got in its way. Stan had no intention of being that something. Not yet anyway. He would regroup for a final stand if necessary. Figure out then a way to seize back the momentum from Bryce and his boot-licking acolyte, Dana. In the meantime, he stood by a helpless observer and watched Irv, who, as was his standard operating procedure, prefaced his response with a prolonged period of rapt deliberation. As Irv concentrated, Stan tried to come to grips with the undeniable fact that his control of the situation had wriggled from his grasp faster than a ferret out of a grease pit. The fate of Letter 13 now hung on by the thinnest of twine—the whims of a mercurial electorate. All he could hope for now was a final tally in his favor to quell the rebellion and restore order—his order.
When Irv did at long last arrive at his decision, the words he chose were succinct and emphatic. “One of him. Five of us. I like my odds indoors.”
Bryce stared at Irv in disbelief, like the seventeenth-century pope when Galileo refused to change his mind that the earth revolved around the sun, not the other way around as the church believed. Heresy aside, Bryce managed to maintain his composure and hid his disappointment well, although Stan did notice the normal slack in his jaw tighten, suggesting some serious molar clenching going on inside his mouth. But by the time his attention turned to Keisha, Bryce had plastered on his gooiest—albeit as fake as a spray tan—smile as he attempted to woo her with a syrupy pitch for her support.
“Keisha, Keisha, Keisha…my dear friend and acting partner extraordinaire, it appears that you are the deciding vote.” He dropped to his knees and clutched her hands as if he was a smitten suitor taking hold of them as a prelude to a proposal of marriage. “Now, my lovely, I don’t want you to feel any pressure, just take a few moments to decide. No need to hurry. In the end, I know you’ll do the right thing. So. Tell us. Whenever you’re ready, of course. What’s it going to be?”
Stan could sense that Keisha saw right through Bryce’s crock of bunk, and her answer was swift, delivered in her typical pull-no-punches fashion. “Just another dirty old man to me,” she said with a shrug, as if encounters with mongrels of Munyon’s ilk were an everyday occurrence for her.
Like an embattled pugilist who couldn’t get off the canvas, Bryce slumped over, signaling his acknowledgement of defeat, a TKO in the final round. Stan bounded off the chair and slapped him on the back, more of a spontaneous gesture of his relief than to rub-in the results. “Seems like you’re outvoted, Bryce,” he said, not a hint of gloating in his voice, despite the elation he felt. There was no need to alienate his lead actor any further. He was wounded enough. Build bridges, not barriers, Stan thought.
Bryce looked like someone who had just sucked down a tablespoon of vinegar. He pounded the floor in frustration, not once, but several times, as the finality of the verdict sunk in and he was forced to concede victory to the opposition. “Aaaaaaaw…okay. But don’t say I didn’t warn you!”
“If you’re right, none of us will be around to say anything,” Stan admitted. “But, since we’re staying, first thing we should do is put our bowls back. Make everything look normal so Munyon doesn’t get suspicious. Then we’ll get started on Letter 13 again.”
As the group meandered in the direction of the table, Dana angled instead for the door and opened it. “Well, my bowl is already there, so I’m going to the bathroom before the dingbat comes back with a hacksaw,” she declared.
Stan chuckled, amused by his sister’s botched attempt to reference a horror movie staple. “Don’t you mean chainsaw?”
At first confused by the question, then annoyed—and embarrassed—that her brother had the gall to correct her, Dana lashed out. “Whatever!”
Stan clapped his hands twice in rapid succession in the manner of a harried maitre d’ summoning a busboy to clear the appetizer plates to make room for the entrée servings. “Well make it quick because we’ve got scenes to shoot.”
Keisha dropped her bowl onto the table then rifled through a backpack before extracting a flashlight. “Hold up, Dana. I gotta take a squat, too,” Keisha confessed, as she joined Dana waiting in the doorway.
As his sister was about to depart, Stan called to her. “Hey, Dana. Check this out!”
When she glanced back, Stan pretended to hold a chainsaw and shook his entire body in a mad frenzy as if the imaginary power tool was vibrating out of control and rattling him to his core. “GRRRRRRRR!” he roared, mimicking the grind of the machine’s motor.
Dana shot him the kind of spiteful look her older brother was sure to recognize, since he had been the recipient of the exact same one on so many previous occasions. Stan understood, for all intents and purposes, it suggested her greatest wish in life at that particular moment was that he would just drop dead. She whirled around and exited with Keisha, the buzz of the chainsaw replaced by the director’s belly laughs trailing them into the night.
Chapter 10