Upon awakening alive and comfortable in a cushy bed, linen sheets, the whole nine yards, Lucy murmured, “Ouch. My head hurts.” Then she heard the cries of seagulls above the soft call of the surf. She opened her eyes. She lay atop the covers on her hotel room bed, her hotel bathrobe draped over her body. Terry sat on one side, Marcia on the other, both looking concerned. Warm sunset light angled in the open doors, and a faint breeze swayed the white curtains. “Jesus, what happened? What time is it? How did I get here?”
“It’s almost five o’clock,” Terry said. “You’ve been out for like six or seven hours.”
“Out? What do you mean, out? I was in the water, and–Oh my God, what happened? What happened to Sandra?”
Terry and Marcia exchanged glances. “I was able to get to you, Lucy,” said Marcia. “But not her. I was paddling back out and both you and Sandra had wiped out. It was insane out there. I was closer to you and you were going under after that wave threw you over the falls so I came after you. I think Sandra must have gotten hit by her board because she was face-down in the water like she was unconscious. Those poor fools on the wave runner tried to get to her, and instead, they got snatched up by that giant wave and crashed right down on top of her.”
“People think she may have already drowned,” said Terry. “But it looked like the collision fractured her skull as well. It was a total disaster. The wave runner guys barely made it to the beach alive, and they lost a ten thousand dollar camera and the wave runner. They got them both back when the waves finally backed down and the tide went out this afternoon but both are completely ruined, and the camera guy broke his arm.”
“Jesus Christ,” Lucy whispered. “God, thanks for saving my ass, Marcia. I don’t know what happened out there, but–”
“You shouldn’t have been out in that surf, Luce,” Terry said. “It was too big.”
“But what about the contest? What happened to the contest?”
“That crazy fuck Bobby insisted that they keep going,” Terry said. “First Marcia hauled you onto your board and somehow she got the two of you in by riding this giant wall of whitewater sideways on the longboard, then we dragged you up on the beach, and after a few seconds of mouth-to-mouth you woke up, tossed about a quart of saltwater, took a deep breath, and looked at me. God I was so happy to see you open your eyes I cried. Jesus, Lucy, that was way too close.”
“Then you looked at me,” said Marcia. “And said ‘what the hell happened?’ and passed back out. But you were breathing normally so we laid you down in the shade and Terry sat with you to make sure you were OK. Then Martina brought Sandra in like five minutes later, and Bobby and Dario scooped her up and wrapped her in a towel and Townsend volunteered to take her away to the hospital in Puerto Vallarta but a couple of us saw her, and her head looked really bad. Like smashed in. I swear to God to me it looked like she was dead, Lucy. I don’t know, but…” her voice quavered. Then she took a deep breath and went on. “Dario’s her fucking boyfriend, and he saw her too, and he didn’t even want to go to the hospital.”
She hesitated. “But he’s a heartless bastard and I think your friend Bobby’s a Hollywood psycho so after we got both of you onto the beach, I couldn’t believe it, Bobby was like, on with the show. We didn’t know what to say or do at that point, to tell the truth I was kind of in shock, but anyways me and Martina paddled back out like trained dogs and got some more waves. Since Bev wasn’t quite at our level, at least in those big waves, me and Martina made the finals.
“Then Henrietta and Moki Sue took the second heat over Charlene and Erica, no problem, no accidents, no weird shit. Then we all sat on the beach for half an hour not saying a word.”
Teresa cut in: “Bobby and Judy and the X Dames people were walking around all solemn, playing up how the drama of the contest had been heightened by the “accident” and shit, I mean they were just feeding off the tragedy like jackals, Lucy, it was disgusting. And I know that’s exactly what he wants us to do with whatever the fuck else we write, too. I tell you I’m ready to walk.”
Marcia said, “Anyways me and the other girls were all too freaked out to do anything except what they told us, I swear to God we were numb and dumb—so then the four of us went back into the waves for the final.”
“And Marcia simply kicked ass,” Terry said. “She won hands down.”
“You won? That’s great!”
“Fuck it. It isn’t great at all. Not with what happened to Sandra.”
“But still, as they say, the show must go on.”
“I guess. Yeah. Right,” said Marcia. “The show. Fuck the show.”
“Well, think of the 25 grand, and art school, and…”
“It’s blood money, Lucy.”
“Come on, Marcia, don’t say that. You didn’t do anything…”
“Other than save Lucy’s life, win the contest, and prove yourself a major heroine, girl,” said Terry. “Me and Lucy were ready to spank your bottom after you dragged that horndog panther back here last night, but now you’re like, queen of the X Dames.”
“Queen of the Dead’s more like it,” said Marcia. “God, I still can’t believe what happened.” Tears came into her eyes. “It was so surreal and scary. One minute it’s a great contest, I was in a total groove, just dominating out there, and the next minute it’s a nightmare at sea.”
“Hey,” said Lucy. “Be quiet a minute. I need to think.” She sat up in bed, then put a hand to her forehead. “Oi, my head hurts. But some things are coming back to me now.” She looked around. “Did you my camera too?”
“I did. It’s in your bag.”
“Good job. Thanks.” She stopped. “Now what I’m wondering is why would I pass out again for six hours if I was unconscious for like one or two minutes, or whatever, and then you brought me back. Is that normal?”
“What do you mean, normal?” Terry asked. “There’s nothing normal about almost drowning, Luce.”
“I know, I know, but still.” She paused. “So where did they end up taking Sandra?”
“To the hospital in PV.”
“Have they declared a cause of death?”
They both shrugged. “Not to us,” said Terry. “In fact I can’t say–at least not for sure–that she’s dead. But we’ve been here keeping an eye on you since Marcia got her photo and video op collecting her prop winner’s check from Judy and Bobby, who both smiled for the camera while Marcia looked like she was at a funeral.”
“Well I was, kind of, wasn’t I?” Marcia said.
“Yeah. You were,” Terry said succinctly. “Then it was lunchtime. We weren’t even remotely hungry so we borrowed a car and hauled you up here and haven’t heard anything from anybody since.”
“Poor Sandra,” Lucy said. “She was a sweetheart, wasn’t she? I mean, kinda tough, but really goodhearted. She just wanted to hang down here and spread the surf gospel. God damn.” Lucy’s eyes welled with tears. She wiped them with the edge of her bedsheet, and focused her still wavery brain: “Hey, listen, now that I’m up and OK, let’s see if we can find out if they said yet how she died—and I’d like to see if we can get them to do a blood test on her, OK?”
“Whoa, Lucy, slow down. A blood test? Why?” asked Terry. “She drowned and got her head bashed in. Take your choice.”
“Hey, you saved my ass and dragged me out of the water and woke me up and then I pass out for six hours. So what’s up with that?” She looked at Marcia.
“What?”
“Sound like drugs to you?”
“Drugs? What do you mean, do you think I drugged her–and you?”
“No, not you, of course not. But maybe somebody did.”
“But why?” Terry said. “What would be the point of–” It dawned on her. “What, one of the other competitors?”
“Moki Sue?” Marcia said. “No way. She was totally bummed out. That’s half the reason I won. After what happened she could hardly paddle out, much less surf the way she needed to, to beat me. Same with Martina. As for me, I was pissed that they even continued with the contest, and I guess it’s lucky for me that when I surf mad I surf really well. Comes from fighting the crowds at Malibu and Topanga, where you have to battle for every wave.”
Lucy looked at her. “Listen, Marcia, I don’t know how you surf when you’re mad but I can tell you that I got a bunch of images of that first wave you got, when you did the aerial 360, and that was one spectacular maneuver, I have to say.”
“Hey, thanks, Lucy. I’ve been working on that move but I never did it in a wave that big before. I don’t know how I pulled it off.”
“I’m pretty sure they got it on video, too,” said Terry. “I could hear the judges barking about something totally awesome not long after the heat started.”
“Video. Footage!” cried Lucy. “That’s it! We need to look at footage. From last night. From this morning. All of it. Every inch.”
“For what?” Terry said. “Luce, Bobby’s got all that stuff in the can already. He’s scheduled a breakfast meet for 9 am tomorrow. Probably going to pack it in I would guess. What else can he do once everybody knows Sandra’s died? If he wants to go on with the show he’s got his episode, but it seems to me it would be in seriously bad taste.”
“Bad taste? This is television we’re talking about here! Do you really think he’s going to cancel the show because of–”
“A death in the first week of shooting?! What else can he possibly do?”
Lucy looked at her. “You said it yourself, Ter. The guy’s a sleaze. And we’re talking about The Industry. This isn’t going to stop him. If anything it’ll inspire him to greater heights of sleaze.”
Five minutes into the breakfast meeting the next day, Terry flashed a ‘You sure got that right’ look at Lucy. Then they returned their attention to Bobby Schamberg, on his feet at the head of the long oval table, struggling to look gravely compassionate in light of the fact that he had just officially announced Sandra’s death, by drowning and traumatic head injuries, to the entire cast and crew of X Dames, Episode One. Although the resemblance hadn’t occurred to Lucy before that moment, the combination of false compassion and fake sincerity transparently layered atop shallow, selfish, scheming thoughtlessness made him look very much like one ex-president George W. Bush.
Lucy and Terry had taken a taxi to Bobby’s house the night before. They had interrupted his intimate frolic involving two Canadian sisters and Henrietta; they had also interrupted a similar bit of business, it seemed, involving other characters, for even as they insisted to Bobby that he get his butt out of his overladen bed and let them have a look at the tape of the entire day’s events, out of the corner of her eye through a window Lucy saw Judy Leggett and Ruben Dario skulking down a path towards the sea.
And then they’d watched the videotapes.
Things became subtly clear, at least to Lucy’s suspicious eyes, as she viewed assorted fragments of unedited tape from the pre-contest breakfast on the verandah. First, Judy Leggett casually steered Sandra down to the end of the table, so that she ended up seated next to Lucy. Then Judy Leggett and Ruben Dario ran the waiters, keeping the food and drink coming, and at one point, a waiter with a pot was about to pour coffee for Lucy and Sandra when Judy sharply called him back. He went to her side, she spoke a few words to him, and then he returned to the kitchen, leaving the coffee pot on the table. Judy glanced around, picked up the coffee pot, and moved it out of sight under the lip of the table for just a few seconds. Then she put it back on the table. A moment later the same waiter came to the table, picked up the pot, and proceeded to head straight to the end of the table to pour coffee for Lucy and Sandra.
Lucy had kept her mouth shut, watching that tape. Then they’d watched some more tape, of the contest, and there was nothing odd to be seen. Later, she’d told Teresa what she thought. Teresa, who had watched with her, hadn’t even noticed any of the business with the coffee pot.
