THE WOMAN STILL LIVED TO DIE FOR THE SPORT
On Friday morning I met with Brent and Bolero for breakfast before making the rounds of the Exhibitors to see if any more funding would be available for distribution. I also realized that there was a possible sync problem with the film and the video transfer. Since I had pawned my TV/VCR I hadn’t had open access to the final product. I had checked everything up until the last prints and transfer and then counted on the professional film processing lab. Something had appeared wrong during the transfer, but the button pusher simply pushed a few buttons and said that it was okay. Because of my lack of experience, I believed him. I fucked up. Everyone had already been paid. The content and production was there. Most of the money had gone to Post production and I would have to deal with those matters back East. I sat by the pool and drank beer which was offered at a poolside hospitality suite. The Boss and a man named Moses visited with women sunbathing by the pool. I remembered Moses from the meeting in Philadelphia the previous year. He was the Boss’s friend and worked for Baxter Hyland International, one of the four pharmaceutical companies involved in the blood products contamination of the 80’s. I had spoken to him a few times over the past year and also other people from Baxter to no avail. Baxter had initiated the 600 million dollar settlement offer which was in the process of being modified and accepted. Hyland had been one of the first companies to market concentrated clotting factor back in the late 60s, partly through the urging of King Doctor Brinkhaus. I saw an opening. I made it a point to walk over and say hello to the Boss and Moses before they left the poolside. They were both wearing dark blue suits. I needed a funder for a second screening.
I showered and changed clothes in Brad and Bolero’s room and returned to the Exhibition hall for the last Friday session. I spoke with a Hawaiian/Asian guy who was a CEO of a major homecare company that I had been courting for a year and a half. He was leaving for Las Vegas and said he would think about it. That did me no good at the moment. I saw Moses and convinced him that the film touched the bases but didn’t point fingers. We needed a funder for a screening. We needed a funder for distribution.
“It’s a public relations coup,” I told him.
“I’ll see what I can do,” he said.
There was only one more Exhibitor Session left for Saturday and I needed to give the word to the office to arrange for the projection equipment ahead of time. I saw Moses with other suits in front of the Baxter-Hyland booth with less than a half hour remaining for the Friday session.. I stood in a circle of Corporate Suits, naked and enthusiastic and sincere, so I did the Tango–First in one direction, then to the other, like a court jester that didn’t know when to quit.
“Just the facts, Ma’am,” I sang. Of course, there were no women there. “No whining! The only wine is poured into a glass.” I chanted. “Nam Myoho Renge Kyo…”
They said, “Yes.”
I spread the word quickly about the Screening to be held in the back of the Exhibition Hall the next morning and the fact that it was being funded by Baxter-Hyland. I was a major nuisance without a name tag. Moses collared me and asked that Baxter’s name not be used as the funder for the screening. Moses was covering his ass since the suits hadn’t seen the film yet.
Brent and Bolero had a dinner engagement with Centeon, Brent’s new employer. I didn’t want to hang out in the compound longer than was necessary to conduct business. I really didn’t have anywhere to crash. I was rest stopped and trunked out. I had approached several people about a place to crash and came up empty. I drove over to San Diego acting as a taxi service for the Boss’s secretary who was hosting a dinner for chosen people. Her husband had been a hemophiliac who had died of AIDS and she had become one of the Boss’s key personnel. She was running late and the lobby was packed with people waiting to escape. I got her to her restaurant as the shuttle van pulled up with her group and she raced in the door to be there to greet them without them knowing she was late. Her being a family member of the hemophilia community, this must have been a surprise to the guests, her being there on time–at least before they arrived. I didn’t have any invitations from anyone since I was basically a gate crasher with a film. I did my exploring over at the beach and watched the full moon being eaten by the Pacific Ocean, then found my way back to the Gas Lamp District for a little staking out of the area since Brent and Bolero had expressed an interest in navigating the area at some future point in time. I exhausted myself with walking and drove eastward out of San Diego, past the Resort Compound and to a lookout point on the Mountain. There were several people parked there, presumably couples watching the stars, engaged in intelligent conversation about astronomy and our relationship as a human element in the universe. I reclined in the trunk again, slightly half-baked, crusted over and slept.
The next morning I drove through the check point which was set up to look for illegals and plant life, said my name, “Duda”, and caught up with Brent and Bolero for coffee before taking a morning dip in the pool. There was still a little running around to do to get a payment voucher from Baxter-Hyland for the projection equipment. But they hadn’t changed their minds despite my continued usage of their name as funding the screening, qualifying things by telling everyone not to tell anyone. The screen and projector were set up in the rear of the hall and the projectionist disappeared so I ran the thing several times during the final session, cringing each time I saw the little mistakes, knowing I had work to do back East in Rockville with the lab and Vienna with Dominic Bono the cutter and Nelson Funk at Rodel Audio..
After the session, Brent, Bolero and I cruised over to the Gas Lamp District for beers, and hand-rolled cigars. The only remaining event was the Ball and I was looking forward to my annual dance with Laureen. I had also lined up several other possible dancing partners including Agnes Ofgod and her entourage of Christians. We returned to the Resort with quite a bag on and I was allowed to bathe and change clothes for the Dance. Since the room was on the other side of the compound from where the dance was being held, I gave Brent and Bolero a ride over and without much thought, locked the keys in the car. This was not a good omen. After several attempts with a clothes hanger, then calls to the front desk and several false starts with the janitorial staff, I contacted a locksmith and they agreed to hop over and pop the lock for twenty-five bucks. I drank scotch quickly and found Laureen for a dance, then Agnes Ofgod, and everyone did that macaroni dance that the Democrats loved so much. After the Ball, we emptied all of my luggage, with the exception of a towel and cutoffs, from the trunk of the car into Brent and Bolero’s room, flipped down the back seat, stuck Brent between Agnes Ofgod and The gorgeous redhead Woman with their feet in the trunk, back to back with Bolero, Chelsea and another HIV positive hemophiliac named Lamarr in the back seat. Joan of Art sat in the other bucket seat up front with me. All of the women had been married to hemophiliacs who had been infected with HIV because of the contamination of the blood supply. There were eight adults in the Cavalier. I was the driver of an authentic AIDS mobile and I was a regular blood donor.
We drove over to the Beach with Brad and the Christian women telling dirty jokes in the trunk. I had explored enough that I was able to take the most direct route to the Beach without getting very lost. Joan, Chelsea and Agnes Ofgod had all lost their husbands to AIDS, Woman’s husband was still living but home with the kids. She wanted to go for a swim in the ocean. The Moon was full. I discreetly slipped on my cutoffs and we all walked on the beach at the edge of the ocean. Woman removed her dress.
“Let’s go,” I said.
“I have AIDS,” she said.
“Don’t stop,” I said, taking her hand. We ran for the breakers without thought or hesitation. It was a pleasant Southern California October night. We were salt in the ocean, a dance in the night, goose bumps on the edge. She dried quickly as the others watched and I stood there with a broken heart. She was thirty two years old, bright shiny blue eyes with a few tear drop freckles, and she had been infected with HIV because dark blue suited corporations, government agencies and the National Hemophilia Foundation saw the early warning signs of contaminated blood products as an odds thing, as though it were a sporting contest with profits valued over human lives. We all found a bar and the bouncer almost didn’t let Woman in for her youthful appearance and lack of ID, but the other seven of us convinced them. I held hands with Woman and looked in her eyes. I went to kiss her and she said, no, she had never cheated on her husband. They had been high school sweethearts. He also had full blown AIDS, both were on treatments, and she was having a good day. I wanted her right there.
I drove the AIDS mobile back to the resort and dropped off my valuable cargo before heading back to the mountain for a nights rest in the trunk. In the morning I hit Brad up for a couple hundred dollars for gas money for the ride back–Met Woman and walked her to breakfast, then headed up the coast to see if a plasma company was still collecting blood in the skid row section of downtown LA.