TWENTY-EIGHT
One thing was for sure, whatever happened tonight. Win lose or draw. This would be Father Shane Ross’ first and final show. The young priest sat in his trailer which was situated at the centre of the production village set off way in the back of the field which was home to the show.
He was transfixed by a large framed photograph which hung on the opposite wall by the door. It was a classic grainy bigfoot style photograph, just out of focus, a shadowy figure to the far left of frame as if caught at the last moment as the taker swung their lens back at a hint of movement in their peripheral vision.
But the image which fair radiated malice to Ross’ over sensitive state wasn’t of the famed yet elusive sasquatch. This was no creature of legend, at least not to those like Ross who had seen its kind in the flesh before. No this thing was all too real and all too close. Mister Minx, the demon in demon time.
It was a publicity shot of the monster which like most of the shots in the show itself could just about be explained away as an illusion, little more than a blur of movement captured by the photographer mid-action, and most likely in the very house he would soon be walking into live on the internet and in front of God only knew how many adoring fans. And armed with what, faith? A second hand bible and crucifix provided by the show.
Ross had caught a glimpse of the house as he was driven across the field and over to his own personal plush trailer. The star of the show. Well perhaps co-star, Minx was the real star here.
Just seeing the house through the back tinted window of the limo they had laid on for him had been enough to chill the blood in his veins.
His constant companion, the normally stoic security guard and driver had seen him crane his neck as they passed and had asked him for the third time since they had set off from the hotel if he was sure he still wanted to go through with this.
No he wasn’t, but he would do just the same.
Ross had tried to place the man’s accent. Eastern European he thought but couldn’t decide if it was Russian or somewhere a little further west.
The man’s demeanour had changed so dramatically since this morning that Ross had guessed what was coming, even before his other constant companion Susan Rodriguez had come in the hotel suite to tell him the news that tonight was indeed going to be the night of the show.
The woman had fussed around Ross making sure he had everything he needed. She went through how the day and evening would pan out. His vestments, bible and crucifix would be waiting for him in the trailer they had hired for him, which was as they spoke being driven to the show’s secret location.
She had assured him it was a top of the range model favoured by pop and movie stars alike and that his every need would be catered for in the lead up to the show.
She had barely left him alone until it had finally been time to go. Then she had disappeared a moment before the driver entered his suite with the look of a prison officer about to escort a condemned man to the gallows.
Ross stood and walked over to the trailer’s large window and hitched the curtain aside to peer outside. He started in shock. It had been bright sunshine when he had arrived but now dusk had well and truly taken a hold of the Spanish sky.
The area outside was lit with several lights hanging from overhead cables which stretched like a spider’s web from poles spaced out around the area’s perimeter.
He could see a large white brightly lit canvas marquee at the other end. The front was tied back so he could see inside.
It seemed to be the production’s make up and costume tent. He could see several people milling around carrying costumes and cases. Four long trestle tables dominated the tent at which were seated a group of woman all scantily clad in their underwear whilst people buzzed around them, applying zombie make-up prodding and teasing their spiky hair.
Two women wheeled a large clothes rail in to the tent followed by a young man with a clip board and wearing a headset. The two women began handing out the tatty looking costumes whilst the young male production assistant tried desperately to concentrate on whatever he was supposed to be saying to them surrounded as he was by barely dressed females. So these were the famous demonettes Ross mused.
As he watched, four of them got to their feet and began going through what he imagined was their routine for the show. Two others, still dressed in their underwear, grabbed black pom-poms off a table and joined in.
Another older woman dressed in jeans and a loose man’s shirt took a piece of paper from the production assistant and shooed him away. She then began clapping out a beat which they danced to, he couldn’t hear her but it was clear she was the choreographer barking out instructions to the dancers.
Under any other circumstance it would have been a wonderfully erotic scene, even for a catholic priest. (After all he wasn’t dead yet.) But instead, or indeed despite this, the sense of foreboding he had been feeling since arriving gave way to one of melancholy as he watched.
He was wondering if any of them knew all of this was actually real, when an old fashioned hearse drawn by two jet black horses moved slowly passed his window. Ross let out a short sharp laugh. And he wasn’t sure what was the more surreal. The fact that a horse drawn hearse had passed by or that it didn’t seem out of place at all.