But doesn’t life have a way of stacking events into ironies? When we left, we were the Kings of Anarchy. When we returned, we were impostors to the throne.
But we never changed, folks. We never altered a thing. It’s the same James. The same John. And, mostly, it’s the same goddamn equipment.
You’ve got us rattled here, people. You’re making our dreams chaotic. We’re having historic nightmares—
Almost time, John-boy.
Now, the way I hear it, not only are you doubting the O’Z, but you’re fighting among yourselves. I hear a little schism brewed up back at the ranch while we were on tour. Little bird tells me that some internal dissension is on the wax. I hear from the underground vine that some of the charter members who want “jam for the sake of jam” are butting heads with a cadre of liberation-technology greenhorns.
Time, Johnno.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let’s not forget, people, that all the biggies, from Rome on down, tend to collapse from within. I’d like to say, “What the O’Zebedees have joined let no sibling savaging put asunder.” But your future is not up to us. We could end up back on the road by tomorrow. One phone call could have us highway bound. We’re commentators, not progenitors. You built up your family yourselves. And you can tear it apart from within if that’s what you want to do. I know that right now it may seem like there’s no solution to your dilemmas. That petty jealousies have turned into momentous ideologies. Simple squabbles into complex campaigns. All I can advise is to find an arbiter and latch onto any common ground, even the most craggy. Because if you sever the blood knots and burn down the family home, you walk alone. And what happened once will happen again. Your subgroups will divide into more subgroups. Community cancer, folks. Until each is just a group of one. And then you’ll divide within yourself, within your heart.
Look, it’s James again. One arm wants to carry on the tradition unchanged, keep things pure and on a completely artistic and comedic and symbolic level. The other arm wants to start lobbing bombs at antennas, injecting viruses into the stations’ mainframes. I agree that those are pretty divergent goals. But you’ve got to look inward, find the common vein that flows back toward the brain. Now we’ve really got to run.
Okay, we’ve got to cut out. Listen, where I come from we used to have this trick. It went like this — when you lose faith, act like you still have it and it will come back. Don’t try to figure the logic of that. Just give us a break here, huh?
C’mon, Juan, I’m cutting the signal.
Okay, okay. Flash to the orphaned entrepreneur. Something’s rotten in Denmark. Our sources say to watch your step. Things aren’t what they seem. Wish we could get more specific, but we’re just giving it as we get it and—
John, for Christ sake.
All right already. We’re out of here. You’ve got our future in your ears, friends. Believe in us as the one, true O’Zebedee Brothers Outlaw Network or be prepared for our demise.
The Choice is always yours.
Hic Calix.
23
Ronnie has just started to doze when the alarm goes off. Flynn comes bolt upright with a surge of panic. Ronnie lowers the volume on the clock radio with one hand and with the other eases Flynn back down onto the pillows.
“Just the alarm,” she says in her most soothing voice. “I’ve got to shower. I’m on in an hour.”
Flynn watches her slide out of bed. “You could call in sick.”
She stops in the doorway, turns back to him, covers her breasts with her arms, watches him roll his eyes.
“You want Ray Todd on the air for the rest of the night? We can’t do that to the city.”
“You’re too public-spirited. Makes for a lousy hedonist.”
“Yeah, well, even hedonists need a paycheck.”
“Move in with me,” Flynn says. “We’ll set up a remote at my place. You can broadcast from the bed. Give the show a real edge.”
“I think the show has enough of an edge already.”
She turns and heads for the shower and yells back, “You want to join me in here?”
He swings his legs off the mattress and says, “And on top of everything else she’s a mind reader.”
Ronnie has one of those yellow plastic waterproof radios hanging by a black plastic strap from the neck of the shower nozzle. As Flynn climbs into the tub, she turns on WQSG. Flynn moves in and hugs her around the waist and they step under the spray of water. Ronnie takes an orange bar of soap from the dish and hands it over her shoulder to Flynn and he goes to work on her back. She closes her eyes, points her face up at the jet of water, and listens to the radio. Ray Todd is in standard form.
Hello, Quinsigamond, and welcome back to our final hour of City Soapbox. I am your host, of course, Raymond Todd, and God willing, we may just make it through an entire program without being assaulted and knocked into limbo by the lawless degenerates who’ve been trying so desperately to grab some headlines the past few weeks. If you’ve just joined us, please be advised that we’re not taking any calls for the next thirty minutes. This is a memorial segment of sorts, an interview taped shortly before the tragic and violent demise of Father Andre Todorov. As will soon become apparent to you, I am not a supporter or follower of the late Father Todorov. At best, I would have to call him a sadly misguided figure, bamboozled by a misreading of history and an excessive ego. I’m afraid his horrid death cannot and will not alter my assessment. I broadcast this interview simply as a glaring warning, a piercingly clear example of the apocalyptic dangers inherent in the humanistic ideology. Whether the savage animals who hideously murdered this confused man will ever be apprehended matters very little in the end. Because, and hear me now, they are a minute manifestation of the coming evils. How ironic that Father Todorov contributed to the plague that caused his own demise. How pathetic. If the engineer will roll the tape, let’s listen to the sounds of our own doom.
There’s a second of air hiss and then a mechanical-sounding run of musical scales.
… My guest in the studio tonight is himself no stranger to local headlines. If you’ve been following the series of Spy articles over the past year or so, you’re certainly familiar with Father Andre Todorov, associate pastor of St. Brendan’s Cathedral in the heart of downtown. In the year since Father Todorov has been installed in his position at the cathedral, he’s been relentless in his well-publicized dedication to what he calls “social action with the emphasis on action.” The good father is the founder of the Calvary Peace Coalition and the Assisi Shelter down on LaBran Avenue. But the past few month have seen Father Todorov turn his energies to the growing gang problem that’s descended on our city. Before the break, Father, you’d begun to correct some of my misconceptions about the gang menace. Let’s explore the facts a bit, as I like to say. How many established gangs are there currently in the city?
That’s difficult to say, Ray. We know, of course, about the top two. The Granada Street Popes, mainly from the Colombian community. And their growing rival, the Angkor Hyenas, comprised of Cambodian refugees. There are certainly three other smaller clubs that have emerged on the borders of Bangkok Park.
And they are?
The Tonton Loas, who seem to have a strong Haitian tradition, the Castlebar Road Boys, who define themselves as an Irish fraternal organization, and the Sal Mineos—
The Pecci family’s errand boys.
Please, Mr. Todd—
’Scuse me, Father. Can you tell us, which have you had the most contact with?
I am equally available to all the rival factions. We’re not here tonight to provoke any group by negating their importance in the overall peace.