“Excellent.” Ian placed the pillows gently down. “Get in. Feel the sense of the product.”
“How do you think we got here?” Cobb muttered.
“He’s thinking of the limo service we use,” Puppy interrupted. He had to nod three times before the reluctant White Grampas climbed into the coffins.
“Be careful with them, they’re top of the line,” Ms. Hayden shouted.
Ian’s leathery face squished together as he bounced in front of Hayden. “Go sit there.”
“I’m the client. I’m paying a great deal of money.”
“I’m the client. I have money. I can’t match my colors,” Ian mocked savagely. “In the seats. Now. Or I walk and then you’ve wasted my upfront fee.”
She glared.
“Is that a yes or a no?”
Adona gave Puppy a dirty look for hiring such a person at such a cost and joined Boccaccelli and Fisher.
“Thank you.” Ian bowed and leaned into the coffins, whispering. “How’s it feel?”
“I think I dozed,” Ty admitted.
“It’s a lovely product.”
“I wish my family woulda used this the first time around,” Mick said.
“These men are naturals.” Ian proclaimed happily. “Let’s get this voyage underway.”
Boccaccelli stepped shyly onto the field, coughing in different octaves until Ian raised an eyebrow.
“You are who again?”
“Boccaccelli, owner…”
“I know who you are,” Ian rasped, squirming into his director’s chair by the first base line. “Unlike thou, I’m not a moron. What do you want?”
He gestured into the Falcons’ dugout, where the team sat, stone-faced. “If the Hawks players are being used, so should my team.”
Puppy hurried over. “That’s because Ty and Mick are stars.”
“Because they play my team.”
“Because they’re my stars.” Fisher jumped onto the field.
“I’m not paying for more actors.” Hayden rushed into the fray.
They yelled at each other for another few minutes while Ian checked camera angles and Ty and Mick dozed in the coffins.
“Is everyone done?” Schrage screamed. They quieted. “Pardon, I must consult with the historian.” Ian beckoned Puppy near first base. “This seems a very sensitive issue.”
“Technically the two teams share everything.”
“Except me.”
“Yes. Sorry.”
“I am not changing my vision for your stupidity.”
“I wouldn’t ask you to.” Puppy smiled. “Just work them in somehow. No one’s smart enough to figure this out except you.”
“Cut the crap, girl.” Ian’s lower lip puffed up as he studied the expression-less Falcons. “Perhaps there’s a way. As long as you do not talk to me again. Ever.”
“Gladly.”
• • • •
MOOSHIE SWIVELED AROUND in the narrow dressing room, inspecting the tight red dress in the trio of mirrors. She patted her butt. “This look good?”
Zelda faked sudden attention. “Yes. Hot.”
“Want to generate a little more oomph on the hot?”
“Sensational.”
“But not fat? I was a size four once. Eight for a while after they retired me.” She popped her head out the door. “Darling, could I get the black and mauve in this cut, size six?”
“I was never a four.” Zelda clenched her fingers, wondering if they were swollen.
Beth entered with a grim air, the two dresses folded over her arm as if she were selling discount cancer treatments.
Mooshie glanced at the tag and darkened. “Honey, these are eights.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She took her scowl in Zelda’s direction. “I said six, didn’t I?”
Zelda shrugged, staying out of the way. No wonder Puppy recommended this dressmaker. Just his type. A pretty bitch.
“Eight’s best.” Beth didn’t smile nor engage in any basic retail procedures like pleasantries or deference or acting as if she cared about customers, other than a quick searching glance at Zelda’s butt.
Lopez put her foot onto the stool and tilted her head quizzically. She didn’t smile either. “Are you saying I’m an eight when I know I’m a six?”
“I can measure with my eyes.”
Zelda muffled a grin.
“How about just giving me what I want?” Mooshie snapped.
The woman shook her head. “I won’t sell wrong sizes. It’s my job to know what fits, not yours.”
Grandma’s Capitalism Reform Act of 2076 enshrining honesty in business was about ten years after Mooshie’s death, explaining her bewildered anger. “What if I go elsewhere?”
“You came here because of our reputation for quality. If you want to go elsewhere out of vanity, that’s your choice. Please let me know if I can serve you any other way.”
Mooshie stared at the closed door for a few moments. “That’s one nasty DDV.”
“DDV?”
“Deeply disappointed villager.” She smirked. “Ones who won’t budge from their sour position, who piss on the whole system. Used to be the whole damn DV. They had riots back in the early 60s at the start of the war. You know that?”
Zelda squeezed her swelling ankles and imagined blowing up and never fitting into anything. Oh, sorry ma’am, we just sold the last size fifty-six, but we have some tents out in the storage shed. She’ll be like a balloon that can’t fly. They’ll tie a rope around her neck and roll her up and down the hills. What happens the first time her belly falls over her belt at work? Good thing she’s already fat. No one notices fat girls having babies.
“Later they blamed the Miners and the revolt and the security needs. But it was the government who first herded people inside the DV communities, then threw tests down their throats. You get out if you score this highly on this test. Math, science, all psych-balanced, all rigged to keep a steady supply of cannon fodder against the Camels. Same old story about war, the rich decide, the poor die. Bat-shit crazy Grandma and her cronies wrapped all the crap in a bow and said it was Christmas. When there was one. You had to prove you belonged in the Family. Worthy, deserving.” Mooshie sneered. “All about blaming someone for the war going to hell when the people in the DVs, they just wanted to fight. They did fight. It was the Regs who screwed up. Who ran. Americans running. On the battlefield and in the war rooms.”
Mooshie paused for a breath. “That girl reminds me of my first wife Jen. Same insolent suck my butt look. I miss Jen. I think I loved her most
