Waylaid on the Road to Riches
William Jeremy Gilbert II sat up in his futon, dimly wondering what day it was, where he had been sleeping, and who on earth could be calling him at such an ungodly hour. He glanced at his neon flamingo clock: 12:30.
Reaching over the assorted and multicolored carcasses of his stuffed animal bedmates, he withdrew the receiver from the phone.
"Hello?" He tried to sound as chipper as possible, but his deep and groggy voice betrayed the fact that he had just been shaken from deepest slumber.
"Christ, Will. . . aren't you out of bed yet?"
"Yeah," he mumbled, discreetly clearing his throat. "I'm up. I've been up. I just got out of the shower."
"Oh, the lies you tell," Laura sighed. "You were out boogying on the island all night, weren't you? Did you get caught in the rain? I got up to pee at 4:30 and saw no sign of you. Are you. . . alone?"
"Yes I am, you naughty girl. No Labor Day treats for me. Another lonely, unsatisfying send-off to summer. But Calvin and Bryant had the most fabulous--"
"Look, I can't chat. What are you doing with the rest of the day? Sleeping?"
"Well, I--"
"Turn on CNN or E! or something this afternoon."
"Why, is the world ending?"
"No. . .there's something afoot at Waterbury Publishing. Drama! Scandal! Simon is going to hold some big media circus."
"Don't tell me. . .he convinced Monica to write the sex manual."
"No. . .but that was funny. Nobody here knows what's going on, but there are reporters piled up outside. I saw Joan Rivers!"
"Now that's quality journalism," Will yawned.
"I'm serious! This is going to be big, big news!"
Will sighed. Laura had a keen, if not misguided sense that developments at her $26,000 a year position at Waterbury Publishing had a distinct and profound impact on their lives and the world at large.
"So, are you going to watch?" she asked.
"Uh, sure. I have to run some errands--"
"Just a sec." He heard Laura's hand cover the receiver, and the distant but insistent voice of Chad Bismarck, her exacting and incompetent supervisor. Chad was barking at Laura to get off the phone. The receiver was uncovered. "Gotta go, dear," she said pleasantly, but Will could hear the quiet but fierce hatred in her voice, "Just turn on the TV, okay?"
"Okay." She had already hung up.
Fully awakened by Laura's cryptic call, Will considered his day. He could go to the gym and work out. He could thumb through the newest issue of Backstage and look at all of the auditions he should be going to. He could go pick up his paycheck at Transylvania Station. He could be a slugabed and watch talk shows. He could watch the video of The History of American Cinema he had borrowed from Fern Findlay in 1996.
Or, maybe, he could just go back to sleep.
Will kicked off his Little Mermaid sheets in a half-hearted act of frustration. He was stuck. He was not living the glamorous life. He was waylaid on the road to riches. . .his job was a joke, he was broke, and his love life was D.O.A. He snickered to himself, bitterly.
Two years ago, Laura, fresh out of her Masters Program in Renaissance Literature, had convinced him to move to New York City from his relatively steady if not somewhat pointless existence in Chicago. He had traded his McJob as a singing waiter on the Spirit of Chicago for a job as a costumed character in a Dracula-themed midtown Manhattan tourist eatery. His nice apartment in the sometimes scary Chicago neighborhood of Rogers Park had been traded for a tiny but clean apartment in the characterless neighborhood of Astoria, Queens. Horror of horrors. . . Will and Laura didn't even have a 212 area code.
Laura, however, was convinced that good old-fashioned hard work, determination, and perseverance would sooner or later pay off, and the riches of the city would come pouring down upon them. But her Midwestern sense of loyalty and dedication had kept her chained to her dead-end Administrative Assistant job at Waterbury Publishing.
It was a trap, Will thought dully. The city was a trap. As much as he bitched and moaned about paying $700 a month for an apartment the size of his parents' upstate living room, he couldn't for the life of him imagine where else he would rather live.
He rolled out of bed, naked, and padded into the hallway, brushing aside the beaded curtain draped across his doorway. The merry tinkling of its multi-colored beads grated on his souring mood. Grabbing a granola bar from the kitchen table, he settled down onto the Jennifer convertible in the living room and clicked the television on.
It was a commercial for Protensive, the new, anti-hair loss pill which was apparently lethal to pregnant women, menstruating teenagers, and all children under the age of three. Groaning softly, and running his hands through his thinning chesnut locks, Will switched to the Newschannel 4 midday news. Sue Simmons, the pretty anchorwoman, flashed him a smile:
". . . where moments ago, flamboyant media mogul Simon Waterbury announced the release of his bizarre new novel, Sooner Than Never. Waterbury, known for his high-profile publicity stunts and his celebrity tell-all biographies, has apparently authored a book which combines the Powerball Lottery and an old-fashioned treasure hunt. We go now live to Roseanna Scotto at Waterbury Publishing on Sixth Avenue."
The screen was filled with a wild-eyed Roseanna, whose hair looked vaguely Medusa-like in the crisp, early autumn wind. "Thanks, Sue," she smiled, brushing an errant strand from her face. "Simon Waterbury, best known for his network-saving publicity stunts and questionable dealings with the literary and Hollywood communities, has started off an absolute craze here in midtown, and across the country." She held up a slim, red book with gold leaf printing on the cover. "Buried somewhere inside this new novel, Sooner Than Never, are clues leading to a location somewhere in the US, where the eccentric Waterbury has hidden a strongbox containing $500,000,000. The money is up for grabs, to whomever can find it first."
Will's jaw gaped. The camera cut to a tape of Simon Waterbury, sitting in a high-backed chair in the conference room at Waterbury Publishing, looking for all the world like Richard Attenborough in Jurassic Park. Behind him was the icily beautiful face of his assistant, Vesper Shillington. Beside him was Thaddeus, his ever-present and lethargic Rottweiler, which was the size of a small, slobbery pony. Simon spoke.
"It's a game, really. It's a game for grown-ups that will surpass the Rubik's Cube and the silly Titanic movie and the stock market fluctuations. It's not about greed, in my mind. . .it's about hard work, and brains, and cagey, cunning, hard work. And it could be anywhere," he smiled and rather dramatically looked straight into the camera, "even in your own backyard."
Roseanna the reporter popped onto the screen again. "Would-be treasure hunters are in a race against the clock, though. Waterbury claims that if the cash isn't found by midnight on December 31, 1999, it will all be donated to his favorite charity, the American Yard Art Museum in Pound, Virginia. Back to you, Linda."
Will didn't wait to hear Linda's take on Sooner Than Never. He was on his feet, aghast, mesmerized, thrilled. It all so appealed to his sense of drama. "Charlie Bucket," he screamed to the Crate and Barrel tsotchkes around him, "it's time to find your golden ticket!!!"
He seized the phone and dialed Laura at work. He was greeted by those three amazingly high tones and "We're sorry, all circuits are busy. Please try your call again later."
He threw on a pair of shorts, a t-shirt, and an old Yankees hat, and fairly sprinted down the street to the Astoria B. Dalton. They had already sold out their measly fifty copies of Sooner Than Never. So, Will went home and waited.
At 4:30, the phone rang again. It was Laura. "It's bedlam around here," she said breathlessly. Apparently, the Super Crowns in Seattle started selling the book before the press conference, and---"
"Do you have a copy?" Will demanded.
"Yeah, we each got a copy. Employees of Waterbury aren't excluded. I think this is all just a--" Chad began ranting in the background. "Gotta go. I'll be home late."
The line went dead.
By nightfall, Sooner Than Never was the leading story on every major network. Dateline devoted the entire show to Simon Waterbury's antics. CNN revealed that a group of linguistic students from Arizona State University had already begun picking the book apart, line by line. Fern Findlay called Will to tell him she was preparing to spend the night waiting for the Union Square Barnes and Noble to reopen with its new stock of the book, and she had 200 people waiting with her. Larry King and Neve Campbell chatted amiably about the book selling 500,000 copies in LA in one day. David Letterman offered up a Top Ten list of elusive locations for Waterbury's cash, concluding with, "Number One: In Janet Reno's brassiere!"
It was bigger than Rubik's Cube. Or Titanic, for that matter. Will dug a tattered United States map out of his desk, and began staring at it intently.
Sometime after midnight, the door to their apartment swung open, and a disheveled Laura dragged in, kicking off her Payless pumps as she came.
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