Ben Bova - The Starcrossed

Gloria put her napkin to her lips and for a wild instant Earnest thought she was going to devour it. But instead she wiped her mouth and then flapped the napkin in Earnest’s direction, saying:

“Greg… you don’t mind me calling you Greg, do you?”

Earnest hated being called Greg, but he said, “No, of course not.”

“All right, Greg, now listen. It has always been my policy to speak no evil of the people I like. I like Bernie Finger and I love this heavyweight champion you’ve got here…” She nodded in Dulaq’s direction. “And you’ve got a lovely new starlet She’s going to be a winner, I know. So, no matter how much I loathe Gabriel, I won’t breathe a word about the fight over the air.”

Earnest sighed. “Oh, thank you, Gloria.”

“Nothing to it. You are getting rid of the little creep, though, aren’t you?”

“Oh we certainly are,” Earnest assured her. “He’s on his way out. Never fear.”

Ron Gabriel, meanwhile, had arrived and let himself be led quietly to Les Montpelier’s booth. He didn’t see Gloria, Earnest, et. al. , mainly because he was wearing dark glasses and the restaurant’s twilight lighting level was quite dim. As it was, Gabriel had a little difficulty following the head waiter who showed him to the booth. He tripped over a step and bumped into a waitress on the way. He cursed at the step and made a date with the girl.

As he slid into the booth, he said, “I’m not eating anything. They just pumped me so full of antibiotics at the hospital that all I want to do is go, home and sleep. Let’s just talk business and skip the socializing.”

Before Montpelier could respond, Elton Good pulled a thick wad of notes from his jacket pocket.

“Very well, Mr. Gabriel. I like a man who speaks his mind. There are eighty-seven changes that need to be made in your script before its acceptable to FINC.”

“Eighty-seven?”

Good nodded smilingly. “Yes. And as you know, hehheh, without FINC’s mark of approval, your script cannot be shown on American television.”

“Eighty-motherloving-seven,” Gabriel moaned.

“Here’s the first of them,” said Good, peering at his notes in the dim lighting. His smile widened. “Ah, yes… when you have the character Rom standing behind the character Ben, who’s sitting at the command console, I believe…”

“That’s in the second scene,” Montpelier murmured.

“Yes. Rom puts his hand on Ben’s shoulder… that’s got to come out.”

“Huh? Why?”

Good’s smile turned tickening. “Can’t you see? It’s too suggestive. One man standing behind another man and then touching him on the shoulder! Children will be watching this show, after all!”

Gabriel looked across the table at Montpelier. Even though half the writer’s face was covered by dark glasses, Montpelier could read anguish and despair in his expression.

“I shorely do love my wife,” Connors was telling Brenda, between bites of steak. “But, well, hell, honey… I travel an awful lot. And I’m not exactly repulsive. When I see somethin’ I like, I don’t turn my back to it.”

“That’s understandable,” Brenda said. She toyed with her salad for a moment, then asked, “And what does your wife do while you’re away on all these business trips?”

He dropped his fork into his lap. “Whattaya mean?” Brenda widened her eyes. “I mean, does she fill in the time with volunteer work or social clubs or at the golf course? She doesn’t stay home with the children all the time, does she?”

Connors scowled at her. “No, I reckon she doesn’t. We belong to the country club. And she’s a voluntary librarian, over t’the school.”

“I see.”

He retrieved his fork and studied it for a moment, then changed the subject as he went back to the attack on his steak. “I wanted t’get yore opinion about how many TNT products we can use on the show? As props, I mean.”

“Well,” Brenda said, “the action’s supposed to be taking place seven hundred years in the future. I don’t think too many existing products will be in keeping with the scenario…”

Connors! face brightened. “They’ll still be usin’ wristwatches, won’t they? We make wristwatches. And pocket radios, calculators, all sorts of stuff.”

“Yes, but if they’re the same products that are being advertised during the commercial breaks, then the viewers will…”

“Well, spit, why not? The viewers’ll think that TNT’s stuff’s so good people’ll still be usin’ ’em seven hunnert years from now. That’s terrificl”

“I don’t know if that will work…”

“Shore it will. And I’ll tell yew somethin’ else, honey. I don’t want any shows about computers breakin’ down or goin’ crazy or any of that kinda stuff. We make computers that don’t break down or go crazy and we ain’t gonna sponsor any show that says otherwise.”

Brenda nodded. “I can understand that.”

“And where do you get your hair done?” Gloria Glory was asking Rita.

Earnest watched with growing concern as the two women chatted about clothes, hairdos, cosmetics, vitamins. Is Gloria probing Rita to find out about her real age? Does she know about Rita’s earlier life and her Vitaform Processing?

Across the table from him, Dulaq was demolishing a haunch of venison, using both hands to get at the meat.

If he had thumbs on his feet he’d use those, too , Earnest told himself with an inward wince of distaste.

Then he felt something odd. Something soft and tickly was rubbing against his left ankle. A cat? Not in a place like this. Don’t be absurd. There it was again, touching his ankle, just above his low-cut boots and below the cuff of his Fabulous Forties trousers.

He pulled his left foot back abruptly. It bumped into something. Glancing surreptitiously down to the floor, Earnest saw the heel of a woman’s shoe peeking out from under the tablecloth. A pink shoe. Gloria’s shoe. And the tickling, rubbing sensation started on his right ankle.

She’s playing toesies with me!

Earnest didn’t know what to do. One doesn’t rebuff the most powerful columnist in the business. Not if one wanted to remain in the business. Yet…

He frankly stared at Gloria’s face. She was still chatting with Rita, eyes focused—glowing, actually—on the beautiful starlet. But her toes were on Earnest’s ankle.

Suddenly his stomach heaved. He fought it down, manfully, but the thought of getting any closer to that mountain of female flesh distressed him terribly. She’s fat and ugly and… old! But what really churned his guts was the realization that whatever Gloria wanted, Gloria got. There were no exceptions to the rule; in her own powerful way, she was quite irresistible.

Maybe it’s Dulaq she’s after . How to let her know she had the wrong ankle? Earnest pondered the problem and decided that the best course of action was a cautious retreat.

Slowly he edged his right foot back toward the safety of his own chair, where his left foot cowered. He tried not to look directly at Gloria as he did so, but out of the corner of his eye he noticed a brief expression of disappointment cross her bloated face.

His feet tucked firmly under his chair, Earnest watched as Gloria squirmed slightly and seemed to sink a little lower in her seat. Dulaq chomped away on his venison, oblivious to everything else around him. If she’s made contact with him , Earnest raged to himself, he hasn’t even noticed it. He’ll ruin us all!

Rita was saying, “And I take all the megavitamins. Have you tried the new multiple complexes? They’re great for your complexion and they give you scads of energy…”