Free L.A. Success by Lonnie Raines Page A

it!”
    “What are you working on, Eddy?” asked
USC-Shirt Jake, but it didn't sound like a question.
    “Oh, you'd like to know, wouldn't
you? I'll never tell you!” he answered, and hunched up closer to his screen to
prevent us from seeing anything.
    “We know what you're writing, and we
want you to stop,” said Scarf-Guy Al. “Stand up, stretch your legs a little
bit, grab another coffee—I'm buying—and get back to work.”
    “You have no idea what I'm writing!
It'll be the biggest film of all time!” he said. Then he leaned back and stared
off into the distance. “Imagine an enormous, environmentally friendly luxury
cruise liner, sailing inexorably toward a tragic destiny, upon which a friendly
race of twelve-foot tall, blue, cat-like people vacation peacefully, all of
which have humanoid sexual organs that you will guiltily try to sneak peeks of
throughout the movie. Suddenly, an American Army spacecraft lands on the deck
of the ship. Their mission: infiltrate the vacationing blue cats with advanced
cat clones in order to turn the giant, doomed ship into an oil platform and
drill for rare natural resources beneath the sea—resources that seem
unnecessary based on the level of technology they have clearly acquired to be
able to make the clones, but hey, you'll be too busy trying to look under the
loincloths to make that deduction. One man resists and is accepted by the cat
people before the ship slams into a floating sea rock and sinks, killing
everybody except the cat woman who had been getting it on with the good human.”
    “Damn it Eddy! You told us about
'The Titavatar' when you lost it last week. You don't have permission to use
those characters. Stop it now!” said Hat-Guy Leonard.
    Eddy seemed to come out of his
trance. He looked down at his screen.
    “My God, what have I been doing?” He
erased the document and then stood up to go get a little air.
    “At least we caught him early,” said
Scarf-Guy Al. He looked over at me. “I once cracked like that and started
writing a movie about an ambitious wookie groomer, who, when confronted by an
intergalactic conflict, decides to move to a neutral country and open a salon.
It was a musical. I finished half of if before the guys realized I had cracked
and stopped me.” He shook his head and went back to work.

 
    20
    Gertie came out of her office about
a half an hour later. I watched her as she made her way over to her car. It was
a yellow '78 Eldorado Biarritz, one of those old boats that, even though it was
the size of a house, only had two doors. It had sweet white-wall tires. It was
going to be easy to follow.
    I ran over to my car and got in. I
pulled around to her side of the parking lot and caught a glimpse of her making
an illegal turn onto Venice Boulevard. She was heading out west. I turned east
and then, when I was sure no cops were around, swung a Uey. I had lost sight of
her, but I had no trouble catching up in Dennis' powerful Charger.
    She drove like a maniac. Sometimes
she sped up for no reason, and then after I matched her speed, she'd slow down
suddenly and I'd have to slam on my breaks to avoid hitting her. I got the impression
that she was looking for something in the glove compartment or trying to find a
station on the radio, because the Eldorado kept jerking to the left and right,
and would even slowly drift into the oncoming lane once in a while. But one
good thing about the way she was driving was that I could be sure she wasn't
looking around to see if she was being followed.
    She continued until she arrived at
her house, a nice little place in Venice on the corner of Dell Avenue and
Sherman Canal. She pulled into her garage and parked. I drove by, pretending to
be just another tourist gawking at the houses on the canals. I got a good look
at her place and was happy to see that there was nothing blocking the windows.
Most of the canal houses have small lawns, so the owners plant a lot of trees
to give them some privacy.