Fun House (5 page)

“Then, technically,” says Ceepak, “he is not in violation of the State and Federal Steroid Control Acts.”

“Exactly,” says Mandrake. “You see why I rely on Miss Shapiro here? She’s not only got a hot bod, her brain ain’t half bad, either.”

Layla blushes. Tugs down on that Lycra tank top. It still doesn’t cover her belly button.

“Our intention with this subplot—” she says before Ceepak cuts her off.

“Subplot?”

“Sorry. TV talk. Sure, the show’s unscripted, but, well, we’re always looking for plot points. Conflict. Something to give each episode an arc and narrative drive.”

“Ms. Shapiro,” says Ceepak, “the criminal distributor of these illegal drugs is a person of great interest to the Sea Haven Police Department.”

“So let’s use the show to help you catch him!”

“Ma’am, with all due respect, this is a matter for law enforcement professionals.”

“So you don’t welcome the help of a concerned citizenry?” says Mandrake. “You need to be the Lone Ranger? Hunt the bad guy down all by yourself?”

“I did not mean to imply—”

Layla holds up a hand. “Hear me out, Officer Ceepak. Please?”

Ceepak crosses his arms across his chest to signify that he’ll listen. For a minute, anyway.

“We won’t run any of this footage from the steroid storyline, not even this confrontation between Paulie and Vinnie, until after you guys apprehend Skeletor.”

“We have your word on that?”

“Sure,” says Layla. “That’s the beauty of reality TV. We create our own timeline and continuity. We can cut out of the beer pong bit before the big Paulie–Vinnie blowup and recycle it back into the show later—after you have Skeletor behind bars and Paulie has redeemed himself on the steroid front. Maybe he goes up to Newark, talks to inner-city kids.…”

“Audiences love redemption scenes,” says Mandrake. “Even the Schnauzer on
Hot Dog
, the one who bit the Poodle on its pom-pom, even the Schnauzer had a redemption scene. Licked a sick Beagle’s ear.”

Ceepak sighs.

“Here’s what we do,” says Layla. “We lean on Paulie. Have him make contact with his drug dealer.”

“You’re assuming the illegal steroids are his?”

“Hey, that stunt he pulled on the Skee-Ball machine? Come on. That’s classic roid rage. Surely you guys figured that one out already.”

Ceepak has to nod because, to tell the truth, which he always does, we had.

“Okay. We tell Paulie that the only way out of this jam is for him to set up a meet with his dealer. When he does, I alert you and Danny. Give you the where and when. You take Skeletor off the street. Paulie repents. We fade to black and roll credits.”

Ceepak squints. “Would your cameras be filming this hypothetical drug deal?”

“Second unit only. We document the transaction so you can use it in court. Like those stings in airport hotel rooms the FBI is always running.”

“But you won’t use the footage on your program?”

“Not until Skeletor is safely behind bars, right, Marty?”

“Hmm?” Mandrake was distracted, picking through the grape bowl again.

“We don’t run anything on the steroid storyline without clearance from SHPD.”

“Definitely,” he says. “Of course not. No way.”

“You guys will save a ton of time if we play it this way,” Layla tells Ceepak. “I’m guessing Skeletor is off the street before we’re on the air next Thursday night.”

“It is highly doubtful that Skeletor, himself, will take the meet with Mr. Braciole.”

“Well, if he sends a flunky,” I say, trying to lend Layla a hand, “at least we’ll land the next fish up the line. We cut that fish a deal, he leads us up the food chain to an even bigger fish. Sooner or later, we’re reeling in Skeletor.”

Ceepak turns to Layla. “Encourage Mr. Braciole to contact his supplier.”

She smiles. “Come on. Let’s do it together!”

We hike out of the production trailer and head around the corner toward 102 Halibut Street.

“So, Danny?” says Layla, “you free between five and eight?”

“Huh?”

“We’re wrapping here at five. The crew has three hours to make the move to Morgan’s Surf and Turf. I don’t have to be on set till eight. Thought we could hang.”

One of the things I immediately liked about Layla Shapiro when we met under less-than-ideal conditions was how bold and ballsy she acted in a high-stress situation.

Right now? Not so much.

I mean, Ceepak is walking with us. Ballsy Shapiro? She could care less.

“I’m not sure.” I turn to Ceepak. “Boss?”

“I anticipate we’ll also stand down when the cast is confined to quarters. I, too, need to attend to a few personal matters on the home front.”

I nod. I figure one of the personal matters is calling a certain sheriff’s office up in Ohio to see how soon he can take their chief-of-detectives job. I can tell: John Ceepak is not having a very sunny or funderful day in Sea Haven today.

We climb up the world-famous Fun House steps and hit the deck. The beer pong glasses—filled with flat Budweiser, balls, and bugs—sit on the picnic table, fermenting in the sun.

“This way,” says Layla, sliding open the patio door.

We wade into the living room. It smells like my dirty clothes-basket during the sweaty months.

“Where’s Paulie?” Layla asks Soozy K, who is even shorter than she looks on TV.

“Who the fuck cares?”

I’m thinking these kids need to carry personal bleep boxes.

“The cameras are off, Susan,” says Layla.

“So? My heart is breaking here,” she says with a tanned hip thrust. “I thought, being on this journey together, me and Paulie had made a connection, you know?”

“Sorry, hon. This ain’t
The Bachelorette
. Where is he?”

“Upstairs. With Mike.”

“Thanks.”

We follow Layla up a hallway littered with empties: beer bottles, vodka bottles, pizza boxes, chicken buckets, hoagie wrappers.

“Guess the maid took the day off,” she jokes.

We’re not laughing. If we did, we wouldn’t be able to breathe through our mouths to fight off the stench of B.O. mixed with Axe body spray.

Now we’re ascending a very steep set of steps. Littered with underwear, socks, and clothing items I don’t recognize. We can hear Mike and Paulie shouting at each other.

“You’re gonna blow it for me, bro,” screams Mike. “My dad’s setting up this endorsement deal. My own Ab Ball infomercial.”

“So?”

“So you do this shit, everybody will think I’m doing it, too, and I can kiss my infomercial deal—”

We enter the cramped attic bedroom.

Conversation ceases. It has a way of doing that whenever two armed cops step into a room.

“Hey, Layla,” mumbles Paulie.

“Hey,” echoes Mike.

They sound like what they really are: two scared kids barely out of high school.

Layla plants her hands on her hips. “Paulie?”

“Yeah?”

“I need you to call your drug dealer.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The steroids.”

“They’re not mine.”

“Yes, they are.”

“I swear—”

“Look, Paulie. If you help these gentlemen,” she gestures toward Ceepak and me, “they might let you off the hook.”

“What?”

“Did you know that simple possession of anabolic steroids is a federal offense, punishable by up to one year in prison and/or a minimum fine of one thousand dollars?”

I glance over at Ceepak. He can’t help but grin to hear Layla parrot him so perfectly.

“Remember where Marty found you?” she continues.

“Yeah,” mumbles Paulie.

“You want to go back to your mother’s basement when you get out of jail?”

Paulie curls a lip. Shakes his head.

“Okay. Here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to call your dealer. Set up a meet.”

“I didn’t go lookin’ for the shit,” says Paulie. “Dude hit me up first.”

“How so?” asks Ceepak.

“I was at the local gym. Beach Bods.”

“Go on.”

“He came up to me. Skinny dude. He’s all like ‘I love your show, man,’ and ‘You got a pretty good bod, man, but science could make you buffer.’ Shit like that.”

“Paul?” says Layla.

“Yeah.”

“I want you to contact this guy.”

“Okay.”

“Set up a buy.”

“Okay.”

“Then tell me where and when.”

“These guys gonna be there for the meet?” He gestures toward Ceepak and me.

“Is that a problem, Paulie?”

“Hell, no. This skinny dude? He’s trouble, man. Has psycho eyes. Wore one of those floppy camouflage hats.”

Ceepak pulls a notepad and pen out of his shirt pocket.

“Can you tell us anything else?”

“You mean like his name?”

“Yeah,” I say. “A name would be good.”

“It’s even freakier than the hat. Dude calls himself ‘Skeletor,’ like the old cartoon. How whacked is that?”

6

I’
M SURE
C
EEPAK CAN
’
T BELIEVE OUR GOOD FORTUNE
.

By doing like Layla suggested, we’re saving all sorts of time.

We kick Mike Tomasino out of the attic bedroom. Boom—Paulie calls his local druggist. Skeletor answers on the second ring. He’s happy to hear from The Thing. Caught the show last night.

They chat about that for a minute.

“So, I need a refill,” says Paulie.

He nods at us. Gives us a big thumbs up. Skeletor will meet Paulie Braciole in the parking lot of Morgan’s Surf and Turf at 8:30
P.M.,
right before the cameras start rolling inside the restaurant for the etiquette challenge.

Skeletor is such a fan of the show, he wants to visit the set.

The slippery drug dealer, the man who has evaded local, state, and federal authorities for at least two years, will be bringing Paulie some fresh steroids and a “This Is The Thing You Want” T-shirt so Paulie can autograph it for him.

“You handled that quite well,” Ceepak says to Paulie when the phone call ends.

“Thanks, man. Can I go downstairs now?” he asks Layla. “I need to hit the tanning bed.”

“Go,” she says. Paulie hurries down the steps. I think the tanning beds are parked down in the garage since none of the kids in the house is allowed to have a car. Drunks stumbling up and down the beach and boardwalk make for funny TV; drunks driving cars, not so much.

“Danny?” says Ceepak when Paulie is out of the room.

“Yeah?”

“Meet me at Morgan’s at twenty-hundred hours.”

That would be 8
P.M.
Thirty minutes before the “buy-and-bust.”

“Wear street clothes. Conceal your sidearm.”

“We’re working this thing undercover?”

“Roger that.”

“Do you think ‘sidearms’ are really necessary?” asks Layla.

“Yes, ma’am. The last time Officer Boyle and I were close to Skeletor, we were almost cremated while still alive.”

Layla nods. I think she gets it. She may work in reality TV. But Ceepak and I have to work in the real world, where really bad people have all sorts of real weapons.

Before leaving the Fun House, Ceepak radios the desk sergeant to finalize the “enhanced security” detail schedule. Mrs. Rence will fax it over to Layla in the production office.

Everybody’s happy, including Gus Davis, who’ll be working the first shift with Alex Smitten, covering the kids while they’re inside Morgan’s Surf & Turf, one of the classiest restaurants on the island. Gus loves Morgan’s World Famous Crab Pie—a melted cheese-covered concoction of lumpy crabmeat congealed in a cream sauce the consistency of half-melted butter. I figure, at age 66, Gus still has one artery left to clog.

Ceepak has also arranged additional armed backup for when the Skeletor deal goes down at twenty-thirty hours (that’s 8:30, outside the military time zone). Unmarked SHPD patrol cars, two of them, will be parked on the side streets near the restaurant. Ceepak and I, wearing our best beach-bum gear, will be stationed in my Jeep, a few feet away from the spot in the parking lot that Paulie set up as the rendezvous point for his drug transaction/T-shirt signing.

Ceepak and I will both be packing Glock 31.357’s, our brand new, official SHPD service weapons. According to the catalog, these semi-automatics are “characterized by extremely high muzzle velocity and superior precision even at medium range.” I like the Glock because it’s light and because I’ve already won a few ribbons (not to mention a couple friendly wagers) with it down at the firing range.

We can only assume that Skeletor will be packing whatever lethal sidearms have made the New Jersey Skeevy Drug Dealer Association’s approved weapons list this year.