CHAPTER 15
Cosmic Tumblers
           

Kyle and Virgil spent the better part of the next couple of days putting together the ads that would roll out as the campaign for St. Aggies. There used to be a time when it would take a couple of weeks. The acceleration of deadlines can’t be blamed on technology as much as a client’s desire to get the message out asap so as to combat the competitor’s rapid response and so on. Like health care and politics, it was a vicious circle often made worse by more people and more money.
     Much to Kyle’s dismay, there was no time for a photo shoot, which left him with a collection of stock images featuring chubby people that had to be photoshopped into stock images of the Caribbean. The island shots wouldn’t even be of their island, but instead various shots of the Grand Cayman’s and Jamaica.
     Like compressed timelines, advertising didn’t used to be this way, cobbling together images and passing them off as moments. Used to be that you’d fly to a great locale with great hotels and shoot images that were passed off as moments. You had a per diem. A rental car. Lonely photo assistants a long way from home. You drank too much, ate too much and sometimes did a little work.
     Occasionally the copywriter got to tag along.
     “This sucks,” Kyle said to Virgil.
     It was late afternoon as Kyle and Virgil toiled away in The HQ (“The Trang” was a last minute name entry in honor of Apocalypse Now, but felt too poserish. The HQ rolled off the tongue easy).
     “What? You don’t like the lines?” Virgil asked, referring to his copy.
     “Not that. It sucks using stock. When’s the last time we got to go to a cool location shoot?”
     Virgil looked around the hut, then out the window at the swaying palm trees that framed the green surf. He decided to let Kyle rant on.
     “We think up the ideas, then rush to our computers to execute them,” Kyle continued. “There’s no craft anymore. No thinking about objects or locations or sets or which shooter’s available to give you that right look. There’s no budget. There’s no time. Now it’s rapid turnarounds – and forget hand drawn comps – clients expect digital ideas fleshed out to near completion on the first round.”
     “Which is good for you since you can’t draw,” Virgil said.
     “And then they gotta take the almost completed digital comp,” Kyle said, ignoring or not hearing Virgil, “and shop it up and down the aisle to get consensus on how they should feel about it. That is, if they don’t focus group it first.”
     “Motherfuckers,” Virgil said, clicking to the TMZ website for a little celeb gossip.
     “Those. Mother. Fuckers,” Kyle repeated slowly. “And by time it comes back to you, it’s been chopped up more times than a FEMA operating budget until every last ounce of your soul seeps onto the dirty floor of the sweatshop you toil in. And for what?”
     “There oughta be a law,” Virgil said, finding a juicy tidbit about Ann Coulter’s supposed secret tranny operation.
     “For got-damn sure there ought to be a law.”
     “Why don’t you go for a walk along the shore and maybe take it out on a beached whale? There’s a baseball bat near the door,” Virgil said, keeping his eyes on his laptop screen. Virgil knew that when Kyle got into one of his rants, there was no point in agreeing or defending. It was just…well Virgil didn’t know exactly what it was. Only that Kyle needed to do it.
     “Why don’t you go talk to Matilija about the campaign?” Virgil said. “After you go for a stroll on the beach.”
     Kyle stood up and looked out the window.
     “Think she’d go for a guy like me?” Kyle asked.
     “Rough trade like you?....she might,” Virgil said.
     “They always say they want funny and smart…” Kyle trailed off.
     Kyle headed for the door, grabbing the worn Louisville Slugger on his way out.

*****

     Woman and Dog decided what they needed was a day off from capping Zombies. Living in the Caribbean jungle could take its toll on a person, let alone hunting undead. Though they lived in the very heart of the island, they didn’t take much time to bask in it. Always on the run, hiding, sneaking, crawling.
     Woman woke up this fine morning and said to Dog,
     “Let’s try this lazing on the beach thing.”
     Dog shrugged.
     Woman packed a picnic of honeydew and Prosciutto confiscated from the cabana bar near one of the smaller pools at the hotel. She also got her hands on a bottle of Hugo Porcas Tobago Rum.
     “Let’s try that spot near the curly cue shaped reef,” Woman said. “It’s private enough.”
     It’s just what she needed, Woman thought to herself as they made their way down to the isolated spot of beach surrounded by a horseshoe shape of vegetation. Cutting through the jungle with little effort, Dog’s squeaky-wheeled harness blending in with the jungle sounds, they soon found themselves on the beach. It was a pristine, untouched spot. The green water crashing onto the bright tan sand. The blue sky dotted with bilious clouds. A light breeze. Woman inhaled deeply, then looking down at Dog, she showed a smile borne out of innocent pleasure. A beautiful day at the beach.
     Woman unfurled a white room blanket and set her backpack down on it.
     “You want out of that thing for a while?” she asked Dog, pointing at his wheeled harness.
     Dog’s eyes went wide as he nodded yes.
     “Yeah, let’s get you a little more comfortable,” Woman said, undoing the nylon straps that clung around Dog’s torso. She carefully lifted Dog out of the harness, taking note of the foam that filled in the bite on Dog’s lower back. Living in the elements had turned the foam stiff and brittle.
     “Think you’re due for a little body work,” Woman said.
     Dog heaved a sigh, looking out at the water.
     “Just put you anywhere on the blanket?”
     Dog nodded.
     Woman placed Dog at the front of the blanket facing the water. Dog closed his eyes slowly, feeling the release of pressure from the harness and the gentle breeze that wafted over the parts of him that still had feeling.
     “So the first thing vacationers do is take a dip,” Woman said, unbuttoning her faded red safari shirt. “Then some rum and sun.”
     Dog licked his chops.
     A minute later, Woman stood, naked, up to her ankles in the surf. She couldn’t remember the last time she felt so unencumbered. But not enough so that she didn’t take a moment to scan the water and the treeline behind her. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, Woman ran into the surf, diving into a swell, coming up feeling the sun’s warmth on her face.
     Feeling the weight of hunting zombies slide off her shoulders, Woman floated on her back, admiring the single white cloud that hung above her set against the deep blue sky. While Woman floated on her back, Kyle Whitman found a path out of the jungle growth that dumped him onto the horseshoe shaped alcove. He was sweaty and dirty from burrowing his way through the jungle thicket and immensely relieved to find himself back near the shore. That’s the last time he’d take a walk to think shit over, he thought to himself.
     Removing his damp t-shirt and dropping the Louisville Slugger, Kyle made his way to the water, stopping in his tracks when he finally noticed Dog on the blanket, staring at him.
     “Hey pootchie,” Kyle said kneeling down with his hand extended. He scanned the beach quickly, seeing nobody. “Hey boy.”
     “Lllleave NOW!” Dog said.
     Kyle tilted his head to one side. He could’ve sworn the dog’s yipping sounded like…something.
     “GO! NOW!” Dog barked.
     “What’s that boy?” Kyle said, starting to feel a chill down the back of his neck. “Your squeaky bark actually sounds like – “
     “GO! NOW! DIPSHIT!” Dog barked.
     “Okay, this is fucking weird. Sounds like you called me,” Kyle stood up, “a dipshit,” Kyle said, thinking he drank too many beers back at The HQ.
     Without warning, Kyle felt something crash into his legs sending him toppling over face first into the sand. A foot came down in the middle of his back followed by something small and solid pressed into the back of his head.
     “He did call you a dipshit,” a woman’s voice said behind him. “And he’s an excellent judge of character.”
     “What breed of dog is he?” Kyle asked, mouth half filled with sand.
     Normally when coming into contact with a talking dog then being thrust face down in the sand with a gun pointed at your head, the first concern isn’t usually what breed of dog was talking to you. That Kyle chose to ask this question first found a way of intriguing Woman sufficiently enough to ease up a bit. She took her foot off Kyle’s back.
     “Turn around, but remain sitting,” Woman said, taking a step back.
     So Kyle did as instructed and was met by a soaking wet, completely naked woman pointing a gun at his head. He hardly noticed the gun.
     “What are you doing on my beach?” Woman asked.
     Kyle smiled, looking up at her.
     “I’ve come to ask for your hand in marriage,” Kyle said.
     “Ohhhhh pleeease,” Dog softly growled.
     Woman wanted to grin at this, but didn’t want to show any signs of easing off.
     “Are you here alone?” Woman asked.
     “I am,” Kyle answered.
     “I’ve seen you around,” Woman said. “You hang out in that Quonset hut with your dead friend.”
     “Why yes…yes I do,” Kyle said, his confidence growing.
     “So I ask you again. What are you doing on my beach?”
     “Well, honestly, I was thinking about women,” Kyle said. “And I’d like to take a moment to thank Barbara Eden, the patron saint of wish fulfillment, for providing for me at this time.”
     Woman glanced at Dog, who rolled his eyes and rested his chin on his crossed paws.
     “It seems we have a problem,” Woman said. “My anonymity brings me the power to do the things I need to do on this island. And I need to keep doing them. Having you stumble across my path creates a chink in the armor.”
     What Woman didn’t say was that she was worried for her life, yet it was wonderful to talk with someone who seemed in possession of intelligence, wit, and maybe a hint of charm, which Dog, in his stoicism, lacked. Furthermore, the conversation, albeit brief, made her feel like a woman and that is something she hadn’t felt in nearly two years.
     “So here’s what I’m thinking,” Woman said, just before she raised the butt of her rifle and smashed it into Kyle’s forehead rendering him unconscious.