RJ Decker Rides Again

"Genome," Amy said, from somewhere deep in my brain, near my left ear. There was something different in her voice. Not the usual imperious sniff. Something sweeter, closer to caring. "Sit down. Put the coffee away. This is not a casual tête-à-tête."

"I'm already sitting."

"Sit down further."

I knew something was different, not wrong exactly; maybe something was right for a change. It was disorienting. Amy doesn't do sweet. She does withering commentary and the occasional threat to leave me for a more competent host brain. This new tone felt like watching a hurricane pause to hold a door open for you.

So when she went quiet and serious, I set my mug down and gave her my full attention, the way you'd give full attention to a smoke detector that's just started blaring at 3 a.m.

"I have the RJ Decker schedule," she said. "The real one. Not a rumor from a man at a bar who smells like Jamaican rum. Not a Facebook post from a restaurant that closed for lunch. The actual, published, filed-with-the-city, printed-in-WWAY-News schedule."

I felt the way archaeologists must feel when they finally find the tomb instead of another sandal.

The Target

"Next Tuesday," she began reading the schedule, in the clipped, official tone of someone about to announce a lottery winner, "September 15th, from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m., RJ Decker is filming exterior and interior house scenes on South Churchill Drive. Two cast members. Eighty-five crew members. Fifty extras. That is not a skeleton crew. That is a small, well-funded army descending on a residential neighborhood with the confidence of people who have already filed all the correct paperwork."

She gave me a look and waited for my reply, but I was still busy doing the math on eighty-five crew members and wondering if any of them needed a very enthusiastic, if professionally unqualified, assistant.

"Eighty-five crew members, Genome," Amy said. "Do you understand what that means?"

"It means a lot of people will ask me to move."

"It means we cannot possibly fail. Even you, with your singular gift for wandering into the wrong parking lot and interviewing a production assistant's dumpster, cannot miss eighty-five people and fifty extras standing around a house on Churchill Drive. This is the easiest assignment we have ever been given. This is a lay-up. This is Amy handing you the ball directly under the basket and stepping back so you can dunk it."

"I've never dunked anything in my life."

"Exactly my point."

"Maybe a few doughnuts."

"That," she said, "is genuinely the most athletic thing about you, and I say that with love."

The Logistics

I'll admit Amy did her homework, and by "Amy did her homework" I mean I read the article twice, and she supervised, pacing back and forth behind my eyeballs and occasionally tapping an imaginary clipboard.

Equipment parking runs along Churchill between Gillette and Knightsbridge, and along Knollwood Road between Churchill and Gillette, which is, Amy points out, an unusually generous amount of real estate for a production to hand a wandering blogger a map to.

Five police officers are scheduled to manage traffic for the full stretch of the day, which is either five more officers than my track record deserves or exactly the right number to keep me on the correct side of a barricade. A generator and lighting rig are planned for the equipment area, though the paperwork is very clear: there are no special effects. Nobody is blowing anything up on Churchill Drive next Tuesday, which, frankly, takes some of the pressure off, since "things exploded" has never once been the reason one of my outings went sideways. 

That honor belongs entirely to me.

If Tuesday gets rained out, the city's backup dates are Wednesday the 16th and Thursday the 17th. Prep happens the day before filming, and wrap activities are scheduled for the day after, which means this isn't a single, fragile window; we actually have three days of potential filming. This is a production with a cushion, a contingency plan, and, apparently, more organizational competence than I have ever brought to any Tuesday in memory, including the Tuesdays when I had nothing else planned at all.

Amy's Pep Talk, Such As It Is

"I need you to understand something," Amy said, and here her voice took on the tone she usually reserves for warning me about parallel parking. "We have chased ferrets. We have interviewed dumpsters. We have driven to Half Hell, twice, in one afternoon, which I remind you is a geographic and emotional impossibility that you somehow achieved. We have been mistaken for civilians, escorted, redirected, and once handed a popsicle out of what I can only assume was pity."

"The popsicle was kindness, Amy."

"The popsicle was a witness statement waiting to happen. My point is this: none of that was a real opportunity, but this is a real opportunity. A confirmed address. A confirmed time. A confirmed eighty-five human beings who cannot all hide from you at once, short of some kind of elaborate flash mob dispersal drill they haven't budgeted for."

Genome, if you find a way to screw up Churchill Drive, I want you to know that I will not be riding along in your limbic system for a while. I will be finding somewhere quieter to live. Possibly in a Cocker Spaniel's head. I'm not saying I'll vacate your consciousness permanently; I'm only saying maybe."

"That's dark, Amy, even for you."

"I contain multitudes. Also a very detailed exit strategy."

"If you must get away for a bit, you couldn't do better than inside a Cocker Spaniel's brain. I spent a good deal of my own formative years inside one."

The Plan, Such As It Is

"Alright," she said, "we know what we're doing. There shouldn't be any hiccups. Have any questions?"

I shook my head vigorously but not with any real certainty; I thought it best to save my questions for Tuesday.

"Here's what we will NOT do, under any circumstances: Park in the equipment zone. Wander into the Independence Mall base camp pretending to be an associate producer. Ask anyone if Scott Speedman is in the building." (I've been told, repeatedly, that this question does not land the way I want it to. I remain convinced it's a delivery issue.)

"We arrive early," Amy said. "We stay outside the barricades. We are polite to the police officers, all five of them, and you do not, under any circumstances, try the 'act like you belong here' trick again."

"That trick worked at The Waterfront."

"That trick worked once, Genome, the way a coin lands on its edge once in a thousand flips. We are not basing a strategy on the coin's edge. We are especially not basing a strategy on the coin's edge when the coin in question is you."

She's right, though I'd rather eat a magic 8-ball than admit it to her directly. This is, by any honest measure, the best-documented, most logistically generous opportunity The Circular Journey has ever had. A confirmed address. A confirmed army of eighty-five. Barricades that exist specifically to tell me where to stand instead of where I've already wandered.

Of course, we know from bitter, well-documented experience that things never work out as planned. History is not on our side. Half Hell is not on our side. The city of Wilmington's excellent record-keeping is on our side, which is new, and frankly a little suspicious.

So later this week, I'll let you know how it all goes down. I just hope it doesn't turn out to be another cautionary tale. Wish us luck, and if you live anywhere near Knollwood and Hillsboro next Tuesday, save me a spot on the curb. Preferably one with a clear sightline and no dumpsters to block the view.