A How-to For Writers by Jean M. Goldstrom |
Table of Contents
Prolog: Out of your mind and into print - how?
Part 1: Those people You Remember
The Street Shooter and the Death Angel
All The News That Fits
Puparazzi
A Bridge to Baker Street
Dragon Girl Reporter
The Last Edition
Part II: Those Places You Remember
Blue White Man, Go Home
The Sheep Look Down To London Town
Full Moon Over Greyhund
Part III: Animal Friends
Catnap Tails for Kittens of All Ages
Part IV: Those Special Days You Remember
What The Animals Said
The Christmas Wish
Ghosts of Christmas Past
John Mark Meets His Deadline
This story was one of the first I sold when I finally got onto the knack of selling fiction. An added plus - it brought me not only a nice check but a couple of prizes. Enjoy!
The Street Shooter and the Death Angel
This happened that year the managing editor assigned me to write obituaries all day long, every day. The newsroom gang called me The Death Angel because I phoned so many undertakers for stiffs to write about. Of course I wasn't the Death Angel, but he came in a lot and used to take a load off his feet in that uncomfortable old oak chair beside my desk.
That chair was supposed to be uncomfortable. Otherwise people would sit there all day yammering about their deaddies. Oh, the Death Angel? Well, he wasn't The Death Angel. He was A Death Angel. There's a bunch of them. You don't suppose, do you, that just one angel could haul away to their rightful place all the beings that die in one day on the entire Earth?
Of course not. Like a newspaper, it's a team effort. So this kid was one of them, and I think he was kind of new on the job. He was a nice looking, blond, skinny kid in a faded denim jacket and blue jeans. He looked sort of like a bicycle messenger. You wouldn't look at him twice if you saw him on the street.
You think that's strange? What would be strange would be if you were lying on a sick bed and some character comes on like the Book of Revelations says, with the standard angel-type face like lightning and 12 wings. Yeah, I used to be religion editor at one time, which is another story. Anyway, if this lightning faced guy marched up to you and said, "Come on, it's time to go now," how's it gonna make you feel? Yeah, it's your time to die, but not of fright. They're picky about stuff like that.
But when somebody like this scrawny, nice kid eases up to people and says, "Um, well, uh, would you mind stepping over here, please?" most of them do it before they even give it a thought, and next thing they know, there they are in the next life. No muss, no fuss, no screeching.
Anyway, the angel kid told me, that's how it works. He told me a lot of other stuff, too. You know how it is in a newsroom, you have some time to kill between editions. And the gang that was working at the News-Post in those days, well, they were mostly old newspaper vets like me, and I had sure heard every one of their stories, and they had sure heard all of mine. So I kind of enjoyed giving the kid what you might call the benefit of some of my experience. And, of course, he gave me the benefit of some of his, although he said he really didn't have a lot of experience at the soul-collecting gig.
Still, he did okay. Whether it was old ladies and gents, or unwanted puppies and kittens, or sickness and accident victims or whatever, he got them headed off in the right direction without any fuss. And, when necessary, he would spell their name for me nice and slow so I could get it right for the obit.
But I knew there would be trouble that New Year's Eve when he came and plopped down in my chair and said, "I'm kind of worried. Tonight I've got to pick up The Shooter."
We had just finished the ten-star edition. That's the early afternoon one, and everyone was relaxing, but in a cautious kind of way. Since it was New Year's Eve, we all knew there were going to be a zillion car wrecks, and lots of dead and dismembered people. Now, nobody in the newsroom minds being busy. Give this bunch a World Series to cover and they're happy as a crowd of three-handed pickpockets at a millionaire's convention.
But nobody likes New Year's Eve car wrecks, with all those nice-looking young people all dressed up so pretty, except for the steering column coming out of their spine, or their faces mashed through the windshield. Writing up that stuff just doesn't give you a good feeling, especially if there's pictures with it.
And of course there would be pix, with The Shooter around. The Shooter is our oldest vet photographer. We call him The Street Shooter because one time a bunch of us were throwing the bull about changes in our business, of which there are plenty nowadays, like how the young college-educated photogs call themselves photo-journalists.
But he says, "I ain't no pho-to-jour-na-list, and I ain't never gonna be one. I'm just a street shooter, and it's what I'll always be," he grumped. Shoving someone aside who was leaning on his camera bag, he growled, "Get outta my way, I gotta make some pictures."
He made photo-journalist sound like a swear word, which some of the old photo vets thought it was. Anyway, it was kind of funny, and the nickname stuck.
Well, The Shooter and I had been talking about New Year's Eve, and how it was too bad nobody could do anything about all those deaddies before they smashed into each other. But for the moment what the kid Angel said drove that right out of my thoughts.
I kind of gulped. You can hang with the Death Angel a lot but still you don't think he's coming for one of your buds. But sometimes he does, like now.
Oh, geez, I thought. The Shooter. I knew he had a bad ticker. Who doesn't, at our age? But he wouldn't listen when the Chief Photographer tried to assign him to steady darkroom duty just to keep him from knocking himself out on the streets.
The Shooter said he had been shooting for more than 40 years and he wasn't going to stop now, just because some kid told him to go mix chemicals. Referring to the Chief Photographer, he growled, "I taught that kid all he knows, but I sure didn't teach him all I know." And then he would sling his worn camera bag over his shoulder and push his way out of the photo department toward his beloved streets, fast, as if he wanted to get ahead of anyone trying to stop him.
Well, I thought, I guess the Shooter is going to have to listen to a kid, now. I mean, when the angel kid tells you it's time, it's time. Right?
Hah. How little I knew. I was just opening my file cabinet to get out the Shooter's obituary. We all have an obit in there, usually one that we wrote ourselves, so that the paper will have something on hand that properly glorifies, or, um, whitewashes, our career if or when we croak unexpectedly. Well, one of the great pastimes in the newsroom is rewriting your own or somebody else's obit. But just about then the Shooter himself came stomping out of the photo department with a frown on his face and a camera hanging around his neck, followed by the kid, who looked a bit puzzled and frustrated.
The Shooter headed straight for my desk. "What the hell is this all about?" he growled, pushing a pile of clippings away from the corner of my desk so he could sit on it. I keep that pile of clips there because otherwise people love to sit on that corner. Nobody ever sits in that lousy chair except the bereaved and the angel kid.
"What's what?" I asked, playing dumb, an act I have perfected over the years.
"You couldn't make your quota today, right?" the Shooter snarled, while polishing the view window of his camera with a soft, white handkerchief and peering through it at the ceiling light. "So you sent the kid after me, to make an easy bust, right?"
"I did not!" I said. Then I realized something. "Hey, how come you can see him? Nobody else can, except us, uh, death professionals."
"Death professionals?" The Shooter laughed so hard I thought he was going to croak right there. Then, quickly, he was serious. "I get paid to look at stuff," the Shooter said. "Once in a while I see stuff," he added, continuing to squinting through the viewer. "You would be surprised what I see through this thing. Anyway, if this is your idea, call it off. I haven't got time to play with the kid. There's a bunch of shots I need to get yet."
"Shots you need?" I said, stupidly, thinking of the night's work. "For what?"
"For me, before I croak, you moron," the Shooter said, in what was for him kind of an affectionate fashion. Then he swung off the desk toward the photo department. I must admit, the Shooter moved pretty well for an old wreck.
Still, when the angel kid says it's time, it's time. At least so I thought, but I was willing to be proved wrong. The Shooter was heading back toward the darkroom, with the kid trailing behind him trying to look both polite and determined, when the Shooter turned around and sort of barked at him, "Hey!"
The kid pulled a quick stop so he didn't ram the old geezer, and said, "Huh?"
"I'm not goin' nowhere without my last wish," the Shooter firmly intoned, sounding like the most reasonable man in the world.
The kid's eyebrows rose.
"You ain't been in this business long, Kid, if you never heard of the dying man's last wish. It's kind of sacred. Go ask your fellow, ah, death professional," he said, frowning a knowing glance at me.
Of course The Shooter and I have covered for each other so many times it has kind of become second nature, even when you don't know what the scam is. "Of course," I said, solemnly, as the kid looked my way. "It's kind of traditional. When somebody's getting shot or hung or fried, they get a last wish. It usually has to do with food," I added helpfully.
"This is not about food," The Shooter growled, as the kid looked back at him. "It's my last wish, and I'm gonna have it before I go anywhere."
"Well, uh," the Kid said, hesitantly, "what is your last wish?"
"I wish," The Shooter said, a pleasant smile brightening his face, "to shoot the beginning."
"The beginning of what?" asked the kid.
"Of everything."
"Oh," the kid said. "That." He paused a minute, as if thinking, or listening. Then he smiled. "You better get some more film."
Was he calling The Shooter's bluff? I couldn't tell. The old coot smiled back at the kid. "I don't need to get more film, sonny. I have always got more film. Just wait 'till I get my bag."
While The Shooter occupied a couple of split seconds dashing back to the photo department to grab his battered camera bag, the kid sat down and relaxed in that torturous old wooden chair. He looked perfectly comfortable, which is one way you could tell he was not of this earth.
"Last wish, huh?" the kid said, looking at me intently, raising just one eyebrow this time.
"Oh, yeah, sure," I said. "You never heard of that?"
"Well, I'm kind of new. I haven't heard of everything."
Just then The Shooter came charging out of the photo department, putting on his coat and hanging his bag over his shoulder both at the same time, a trick I have never seen done by a college-educated photo-journalist, at least not yet.
"Don't stand around wasting time," The Shooter snapped at the kid.
With a bright smile and a "See you later," to me, the kid was gone. So was The Shooter.
Then things got kind of busy in the newsroom. There was a police raid on an illegal gambling game in the mayor's garage. There was a sighting of Elvis changing a tire on the road outside of town. We got a couple calls about aliens, and a couple calls from aliens. The Clergy Association called to demand coverage of the Community Combined Watch Night Worship Service and Social Frolic and how come we never reported any good news. In other words, it was the usual New Year's Eve combined zoo, circus and flea rodeo.
Meanwhile, The Shooter and the kid popped in a couple of times. They were just checking the film, The Shooter said. Light was pretty strange out there at the beginning of the cosmos. He wanted to be sure it was registering okay, he said. Couldn't trust the meter for something this big, he said.
I began to wonder. What was he actually doing? What was the kid doing? Were they really shooting The Beginning? One little 35 mm camera, even with The Shooter's encyclopedic collection of lenses? Nah, it couldn't be.
I was taking info over the phone from one of the police reporters about a bunch of very routine fender benders when the managing editor yelled over at me, "Where's The Shooter? I need to send him out to the mayor's garage."
"He was here a couple of minutes ago," I responded, with reasonable truthfulness. "He went into the photo department."
"Like hell he did," the managing editor snarled. "Quit covering for him. Nobody's seen him all evening since he was bulling with you right after supper."
"He was here," I insisted. "He was in the darkroom." But the managing editor turned away to yell into one of the phones at somebody else, which meant he would forget about me for a while.
Just then, to my surprise, The Shooter actually did come out of the Photo Department. He was waving a strip of still-wet 35 mm film in his hand, and slapped it down on my desk.
"There! Chew on that, Death Professional!" he crowed, and I had never heard that note of triumph, maybe even of joy, in his voice before. "The kid's great. He got me right in the front row.
"Haven't got time to make prints right now, and I think these first ones are a little light. But then I got the hang of it, and nobody has ever, ever seen anything like this stuff, ever."
But the kid interrupted him. "Sir, we've really got to go now, okay?"
"Kid, I ain't done yet. I gotta get just one more."
I looked at the ceiling. When anybody from Photo says, "Just one more," you look around for a comfortable chair, and maybe open up your lunch, because you are going to be there for a while.
Even the kid was wise to that one, because he started shaking his head. But The Shooter interrupted him. "Kid, this one is the most important one of all. When you shoot a piece of art, there's always a bunch of bozos that ain't gonna get the message. But at least you can show them the guy that did it so they'll know he's for real, and the whole deal is for real. That's the shot I gotta get now. Okay?"
The kid looked doubtful.
"The Author, Kid. The Artist," The Shooter urged, and now there was a pleading tone in his voice. "That's the shot I need. That's what's gonna make all this hang together. You gotta check and see if it's okay? Go ahead. It'll be okay. You'll see."
The kid looked off thoughtfully into the middle distance for a long moment, with his head cocked upward. Finally, he smiled. Then he moved toward the newsroom door, and motioned The Shooter to follow.
The Shooter gave me a wink and the thumbs up sign. "Authors, artists," he said, "there's not a one that doesn't love getting their mug shot." And he was out the door after the kid.
Pretty soon the dawn of the newest New Year's Day began to break reddishly in the east. The managing editor told somebody from rewrite to go ahead with that "Safe Start for the New Year" story they had been working on, the one about no fatals anywhere in our area over this New Year's Eve. It would make a good top story for the New Year's Day early editions.
Then one of the guys from circulation came running into the newsroom to tell us somebody found The Shooter dead in the street outside the building and who should they call. They asked me, and I explained that guys like him don't have families. They have cameras.
Later, I picked up the negatives The Shooter had left on my desk. They were dry now. I held them up to the light. They were solid black. Even with my limited ability to read a negative, I knew that meant the light had completely overwhelmed the film. I was picturing how much light that must have been, an unimaginable amount of light, because of course the Shooter would have stopped the aperture down to nothing. I was picturing The Shooter grinning happily and firing away, shot after shot, roll after roll. These first few might have been kind of light-struck, but I bet the rest were beauts. And I was wondering how long the Author would hold still for "just one more."
Sure, I was going to miss The Shooter big time. But I had to laugh to myself, just a little, at him and the kid, and wonder who scammed who the most and the best. For my money, it was about a draw.
But I sure would have liked to have seen those pix that he shot, when they ran. Ran where? Well, in whatever kind of newspapers they have in Heaven, I suppose. Oh, sure, we've kicked that one around in the newsroom, about whether they have newspapers in Heaven. The consensus is, of course they do. Otherwise, it would be Hell.
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Note: When typing a newspaper story, reporters always put the triple x at the end of the story, so the editor will know that is the end, there aren't any more pages to this story. I've found the "thirty" symbol, as it's called, useful in showing the end of a story.
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