Things are going swimmingly well at my new public country club named Culver Middle School. I have an English teacher named Debbie Z. who will become my mentor. I quickly come to feel that she understands me. I tell her all about my studio adventures and she says “it sounds fun.”
Maureen has Debbie for typing class, later in the day. What a blessing!… I quickly find out that I already know the work! This school is almost two years behind St. Augustine. The nuns I’ve had already covered all of this!
Bless their hearts. They made me smart… at Catholic school.
I will take advantage of my good fortune as the school year moves forward.
Tonight, Jimmy, Danny and I, go onto the MGM lot to do a reconnaissance mission. We call it Boots on the Ground intelligence. We work hand in hand with call sheets when I can get ‘em, but they’re not always at my disposal. So, while the guards make their rounds, we perform our own daily check ins, just to see what activities are being set up and what new stuff has appeared. I’m stilll walking with a handful of stiches and a mindful of paranoia, leftover from my last visit. I can still hear Al’s voice “I’m gonna get you!”…Like on a tape loop.
The man hired specifically to capture me is on patrol this evening. And it is rapidly turning to dusk. We see a big blonde Sasquatch type individual crammed inside the red Bronco, as we peer down from some windows on New York Street. He drives slowly, looking around, and taking it all in. This is the same fool that we peppered with lemons a short time back. But, I would rather deal with him than Mr. Black.
As we work our way back through New York Street, our intentions are to go up to the fort we have, at Boystown. This is the place Maureen helped to decorate and construct, back on the 4th of July. It has become a regular destination for trespassers who know of its existence, like an oasis in the desert.
The studio fence is a long distance from both the main NY St., called 5th Ave., and the Boystown fort. These structures reside in the middle of this humongous backlot. As we scurry door to door, and building to building, we misjudge our safe moment. Just as we step out, Barner turns the corner and stares us down…
We freeze like three deer in the headlights. Make that four deer… the three of us and George, himself. He stares back from inside the jeep. Suddenly, he steers in the opposite direction and speeds up… away from us!
Well, that was weird. Without giving it a moment’s thought, we take advantange of this opportunity, by running the rest of the way down New York Street, through the forest, over the little footbridge, across Tarzan’s lake, and across the dirt road that circles Boystown. We catch our breath in the front door entrance to this large university-type building.
Dr John says it best in his song- Right Place Wrong Time
No truer words… Dr John. You say you are a doctor, thats always handy around here.
It’s here that we make urgent decisions. We all speculate… Is he getting reinforcements? Danny thinks he can run for it and decides take off, while Jimmy and I decide to climb up this maze and hide up in our fort. Jimmy and I go upwards as Danny goes outwards.
We get to the top and what do you know? As we peek over the edge, we see the Bronco leading a convoy…
This convoy includes six CCPD police cars, followed by an electric cart with that man, Al Black, frantically taking up the rear position of this procession. Like a black and white parade…
Well, at least they don’t know where we are!
We can see almost the entire lot from up here, and we see Danny get captured instantly… that didn’t take long! This is Culver High’s Football star running back! That’s the best ya got, Danny ?
The police have him cuffed and face down. He talks briefly to officers as he is loaded up in one of the many squad cars and driven away. We see him staring upwards as he explains himself. “He’s ratting us out!…We quickly realize!”
Well, the next thing you hear is a police mega-phone with both my name and Jimmy’s name being belched out. Our complete names! They never even knew our names and now they have the complete name. And maybe even our addresses and what we had for breakfast! The officers want us to give up and they know we are up here… thanks to a squealing Danny!
Threats include: “YOU WILL HAVE TO DRY CLEAN OUR UNIFORMS IF YOU DON’T SURRENDER NOW!”
We reject that option and realize… our fort will be discovered by this army of law enforcement...You would think we just robbed a bank with all this fuss!
We need to come up with an ad-lib plan… immediately.
Stay tuned for part two.
Phantom of the Backlots 