1 Tower Road (Part 2)

Part Two in the Hookman's series of short stories.

Author’s Note:

Initially, the impetus to write “1255 Robert’s Cove Road” was a book on writing. In it, the author encouraged the readers to compose a brief story, and actually lays out the back story for you to begin with. I wrote the suggested six pages (a pretty short, short story) – and finished the assignment without feeling any real attachment to it. After my wife read it, however, she pretty much demanded that I go on (she said it was her favorite short story of mine!).

How could I refuse her?

I had wanted my second short story on this site to be an exercise in dialogue. “1255 RCR” didn’t have much talking in it, and to me, characters are made (or broken) by what they say. I wanted to practice by writing something that had a lot of speaking in it (a story of a disc jockey taking calls on a radio show). Since my wife is so… persuasive, I decided to bring my original idea into the Hookman’s series of stories. I’m sure it will be a challenge to do this, but I’m trying to create each story independent of the others, while being intertwined with each other at the same time. We’ll see what happens.

The places in the Hookman’s series are real. We live near the real Robert’s Cove, the real Ohlenforst Road, and the real Hookman’s grave site. My stories are just for fun, though some of them will be constructed around the urban legends surrounding Hookman’s.

From my front porch you can look out and see almost a dozen AM and FM towers, one (the old Channel 10/CBS tower) looms just a couple hundred yards from my house. I’ve looked up at it many a night and felt oddly inspired by its colossal height, wondering what it would be like to climb to the top. Never thought I’d be writing a story about it, though.

Well, here ya go babe: the second piece of the puzzle.

B.J.





1 Tower Road

He’d taken the guys out to Tower Road already. It was the same group of friends that decided that it would be fun (he couldn’t remember who’s bright idea it was) to take turns laying on the roof of his Escort, on their backs, while driving through a parking garage at night. Their eyes would play tricks on them as they got accustomed to seeing the ceiling of the garage whipping past them – it gave the false perception of being right-side-up, and flying. The coolest part of it was reaching the top floor of the garage, when the ceiling gave way to night sky.

Probably not a good idea for a first date, however. Looking up the tower was a better one. Plus, the tower site was nice and secluded – the perfect make-out spot.

He was driving north on Highway 13, and was about to turn right onto Robert’s Cove Road. He’d just gotten off work and met up with her uptown. They didn’t have time for a traditional dinner-and-a-movie date – all the restaurants in Pinkerton were closed and the nine o’clock feature was half over already; plus, they both had curfews.

“Okay, you have to close your eyes, we’re almost there.” He said.

“Huh?”

“Just trust me. You’ll get a kick out of this, I promise, but you’ve got to keep your eyes closed until we get there.”

“You better not be some sort of weird psycho, mister.”

He knew that his eyes were one of the things that got him this date in the first place, so he gave her the old puppy dogs. “Trust me.” then he laughed, “You’re gonna’ love it, just trust me.”
As he pulled the Escort onto the narrow gravel road, he checked to make sure that her eyes were still covered.

“Okay, we’re almost there. No peeking.”

She giggled, “Yes sir, no peeking.”

In Biology, she gave the vibe that she was a good natured person with a pretty sharp sense of humor. He wouldn’t have been quite as attracted to her if she didn’t laugh at at least some of his jokes, but eventually she surprised him with a few of her own. She was gorgeous to boot. As he looked down at her thin, tanned legs, a warm gush went through the pit of his stomach.

God, I hope she likes me.

He pulled to a stop twenty feet from the base of the tower. “Okay, you’re going to have to sit here for a second, I’m going to go around and open your door.”

She was giggling again, as the anticipation and awkwardness of the situation reached its near peak.

“Where ARE we?”

“You’ll see soon enough!”

He killed the engine, ran around and opened her door. The sound of crickets and a low electrical hum coming from the small building at the base of the tower filled the air. It wasn’t too hot either, which was odd for Louisiana in mid April. Just perfect.

“I’m getting scared! If you took me all this way just to scare me, I’m going to kill you… if I haven’t died already!” More giggles.

More goose bumps, too. As she got out of the car, she reached for him and put her arm on his shoulder, her other hand groped around and eventually found his hand.

“Okay, I want you to open your eyes and look down at the ground… just the ground right in front of your feet, okay?” Suddenly, he didn’t care if he got to make out with her – holding her hand like this was sending electricity up and down him. He just wanted her to like him, to enjoy the date, and most of all, to dig the tower thing.

He had gone on a couple of dates before, but never even thought to take them out to the tower. This one was special, though. He had a feeling she’d like it.

“All right, now I’m going to point, and I want you to follow my finger, okay?” He had his arm around her now, and was pointing to a spot on the ground just a few feet in front of them.

She let loose a bray of delicious laughter. “Okay!” She took a deep breath, “Okay. Okay-Okay-Okay”. And she exploded into more laughter.

He was laughing too. “Are you ready?”

“Uh huh.”

“Here we go!”

He slowly raised his hand; her eyes followed his finger up, ever so slowly to the base of the tower.

“What the hell!” Her laughter drowned out the crickets and the generator shed. It was the only sound that mattered.

Slowly he pointed up, up, and up the tower – the sound of her laughter grew louder the higher her eyes climbed.

“OH - MY - GOD!”

And he knew that it worked.

“…it looks like it’s falling on me!”


She definitely digged the tower.

*******

The weight of the 1,200 foot tower was steadied by twenty-one steel cables thick as a man’s wrist. The red and white giant swayed considerably in the often violent, high-altitude winds, so inspections were scheduled every year to insure that each of the wire’s torque remained correct.

During the day, from KFMQ’s transmitter, the world below looked like a huge grid cast in hues of brown and green. At night, darkness swallowed everything, and the monolithic structure stood alone in the black expanse, red beacons pulsing their warning into the void. The KFMQ transmitter weighed half a ton and thrummed with electricity, as voltage pulled a signal from the receiver below up the enormous structure through tons of dense cable, and then burst the signal into every direction as far as the eye could see with a hundred thousand watts of force.

If radio waves where visible to the naked eye, the tower would appear to be a perpetual, gargantuan fountain.

*******

There was always a little shimmer of anticipation (and fright) right before pushing the red on-air button. He’d been doing this for over four years, but he somehow knew that the jitters would never totally go away. That night, however, there was a new reason for feeling anxious. This was the night that Freddie Winbush took over the radio station.

He put a blank tape into the small air-check cassette player which sat on top of the mixing board. The player was wired to start recording as soon as the microphone was turned on. Not all of the announcers air checked themselves, but Freddie always did.

“KFMQ… Your favorite soft rock hits from the 70’s, 80’s, and today. That was Elton John and Rocket Man. Coming up, we’ll hear from Celine Dion… and we’ll also be doing something a little bit different ladies and gentlemen.” For a couple of seconds he felt the gravity of what he was about to do. “I’ll be taking your calls in a segment I’d like to call, ‘Fuck You, Randi Marx’. So stay tuned, we’ll be right back.” He fired off the first commercial, put the system in ‘auto’, turned off the mic and took off his headset.

Not exactly what I had planned, but it’s a start.

”Well, this is it.” He spun around in his chair and walked to the door of the studio. All four phone lines lit up, and his stomach suddenly felt like it was full of live worms. “Come on Freddie. This is it. It’s time to put that bitch in her place.” After two month’s of planning, he knew exactly what he was going to do… he just didn’t want to sound nervous as he did it.

Freddie had relieved Chuck at ten o’clock. Usually, Chuck would stick around for ten or fifteen minutes to smoke a cigarette and shoot the shit before heading home, but it was Friday night and Little Chucky had a hot date.

He’s probably listening right now in his car, wondering what in the hell’s going on. The thought brought a smile to his face. He liked Chuck.

“You said you wanted some extra hours, Chuck-O. Well here ya go.”

He walked through the reception room, opened the front door, hung a cigarette from his lip, and yelled out to the empty street, “IT’S TIME FOR PIRATE RADIO, BABY!”

After four minutes of commercials, Celine was singing, and Freddie was puffing on his cigarette, pacing in front of the radio station. Pinkerton seemed deserted except for a few cars parked outside Larry’s Tavern two blocks down Main Street. Freddie’s Malibu was the only car in front of the station.

He took the cigarette out of his mouth and held it up at eye-level, then addressed it: “What am I doing out here? My radio station isn’t a smoke-free workplace. Not any more!” He grabbed the large aluminum ashtray which stood by the front door under one arm and carried it inside. After locking the door behind him, he went through the reception room, back into the studio and put the ashtray down next to his chair.

“Let’s get the show started.” He sat down and put on his headset.

“KFMQ… your favorite bubble gum crap from the seventies, eighties, and yada-yada-yada. Sorry to interrupt the music, but we’ve got a show to put on, and time’s wasting.”

The mixing board sitting in front of Freddie had a total of thirty-two channels. The sixteen slider knobs controlled the volume levels for the two studio mics, the computer, two back up CD players, a digital recorder, a number of satellite feeds, and the phone line. He slid the knob labeled "PHONE" up until it was equal with the slider labeled "MIC 1".

“Alright, let’s get down to it, shall we? As promised, we’re doing a segment called ‘Fuck You Randi Marx’. Hello, who’s this?”

Freddie pressed the button for line one.

“Hello? Am I on the air?” – A woman’s voice.

“Why yes you are ma’am, and would you like to express your distaste for KFMQ’s own Randi Marx?”

“Well… no actually. Did I just heard you say the F-word?”

“Yes you did ma’am. You don't miss a beat, do you? Next caller, let’s go to line two. Hello, you’re on the air with Freddie Winbush, who’s this?”

“My name is Kevin.”

“Hi Kevin. Did you know that Randi Marx is an egotistical wench who would do just about anything to advance her pitiful career?”

“Dude, you are trippin! We’re all cracking up over here!”

Freddie could hear the sound of girls in the background laughing.

“Yes, I guess I am a little upset. Hey, thanks for the call.”

“Hello, you’re on the air with Freddie Winbush…”

Dead air.

“HELLO… you’re live on the air. Who’s this?”

A thin, elderly female voice spoke, “You shouldn’t be playing around with the Marx’s. That family is evil.”

“Woaw… finally. Ma’am, where are you calling from tonight?”

“You needn’t be stirring up trouble on a night like this.”

“Ma’am, did you know that I’ve never… NEVER received a raise in the four years that I’ve been at KFMQ?" Freddie took a deep pull on his cigarette and said through a cloud of smoke, "Yeah, I’d call that evil, wouldn’t you?”

“Son, you don’t know what you’re about to do. I’ve warned you.”

“Hello? Well, that was odd. We seem to have lost her. Back to the phone lines – Who’s this, you’re live on the air with Freddie Winbush.”

“I know Randi Marx. I’ve know her for years.”

“And what is your name, sir?” Freddie crushed his cigarette in the ashtray and fished another one out of his pack. This was getting good.

“I’d rather not say that.”

“Of course, of course… so how do you know Ms. Marx?” He searched around the panel for his lighter, but couldn’t find it.

“She was raised down the road from me.”

“And how has Randi Marx fucked up YOUR life, sir?

Silence.

“Sir, are you still there?”

Freddie was about to go to line three. He held his finger over the button. "Well I guess he doesn't have anything to - "

“She killed my daughter.”

Freddie had been planning this night with painstaking care. He had recorded every single ‘Randi and Jack in the Morning’ show on his cassette player at home for two months without missing a day, and had put together audio clips of what Randi said about him. Freddie was the butt of several of their glib, smarmy jokes, and all he wanted was to get back at her for their new segment that painted him as an untalented fool.

She had asked for him to air check himself (so that she could critique his on-air work) but, of course, all she really wanted was fresh fodder for her morning show. ‘Freddie in the Graveyard’ was a segment that chronicled the struggles of an inept overnight jock. It highlighted his every mistake, every mispronounced word, and portrayed him as a stuttering fool to the thousands of listeners who tuned in every morning. Each segment ended with the tag-line: “…and that is why we keep Freddie in the graveyard.”

His idea was genius. He wouldn’t just quit his job. He’d go out in a flash of brilliance, letting everyone know exactly what kind of a bitch Randi Marx was. He thought that opening up the phone lines might reveal that some of KFMQ’s listeners shared his opinion.

For some wise ass to call in and accuse her of murder wasn’t brilliant. It was distracting.

“All right sir, I like a good story as much as anybody, but I’m not joking around here. Randi Marx has tainted everything that was once good about working in radio. She turns me into a laughing stock every morning and expects me to play along. All I’m here to do is let KFMQ’s listeners know how much of a self-serving little wench she is.”

I'm not stuttering now am I, bitch?

“Gloria Zaunbrecher. Ask her if she remembers Gloria Zaunbrecher. Randi Marx was twelve years old when she and her sister killed my little Gloria.”

Freddie didn’t know what to do next. He had planned to play back some of Randi’s ‘Freddie in the Graveyard’ segments and have callers comment on how mean-spirited and cruel the woman was. Surely they would agree that the woman was a vicious egomaniac. So much planning and effort… so much to say; now, all he could think to do was get himself, and this weirdo, off the air.

“Well… I’ll have to ask her about, uh… your daughter, the next time I see her. We’ll be right back after these messages.”

He clicked off the mic, ripped off his headset and snatched up the phone.

“What are you trying to do, Buddy, steal my thunder?” He picked up the little caller ID box and examined it.

Line One
B. Zaunbrecher – 789-3248

”Are you still there mister?”

“The Marx family is a pack of lunatics, boy. You’d do well not to trifle with them, especially on a night like tonight.”

“What does that mean, 'on a night like tonight'? What are you people trying to pull?”

“What are YOU trying to pull, boy? What that Marx girl has done to you is nothing compared to what she’s capable of doing.” And he hung up.

“Shit.”

What the hell’s going on here?

He stared at the ID box and watched as the name B. Zaunbrecher vanished from the little window. Almost immediately, another name appeared:

Line 2
R. Marx 789-2248

“Shit!” Freddie dropped the little plastic box as if it had bitten him.

He had expected her to call all along… wanted her to, in fact. He had even planned to have a little chat with her live on the air. Freddie was going to tear into her and really lay all her shit bare before the late night listeners of KFMQ. This phone call was supposed to be the highlight of the evening, but now he was…

…Terrified?

It’s probably true. Wouldn’t surprise me one bit. Crazy bitch would break the neck of a kitten just to record the sound of it… would probably find that hilarious.

“Shit. I’ve come this far…” His fingers came upon the small Bic lighter he had been looking for.

“I can’t back down now.” He put on the headset, lit his cigarette, and hit the on-air button.

"KFMQ… Shit folks. I uh… don’t know what to say here. It seems that our very own Randi Marx is a little more… sinister than even I could have imagined." Freddie looked down at the phone lines blinking persistently.

He could feel the presence of all the listeners, the same way a stage performer feels the eyes of the audience. He imagined them calling their freinds, telling them to tune in to KFMQ.

A sudden realization came to Freddie. Even though things hadn’t gone according to plan, this was even better. She’s going to have to explain away this man’s strange accusations to her listeners! He swam in the sudden euphoria of an unexpected victory.

She’s gonna’ have to squirm her way out of this one on the air.

“Well… as chance would have it, we happen to have Ms. Randi Marx on the phone right now.”

Freddie pushed the button for line two.

“Hello, Randi, so glad you could join us. What do you have to say for yourself?”

*******

They sat on the hood of his Escort, enjoying the coolness of the night. Occasionally, she would look up the tower and laugh.

“Where’d you get the idea to come out here and do that?”

“Boredom I guess. When you have nothing better to do, you use your imagination.”

She hopped off the car and stood in front of him, taking his hands into hers, “Well, I’m glad you used your imagination tonight. It’s been a wonderful little date.”

A loud whirring noise burst into the air, somewhere behind them; a giant ripping noise that quickly approached.

Over his shoulder, she strained to see what was coming at them, and as it suddenly sprang into view, she could barely distinguish what it was.

A huge serpentine cable, dancing in the air.

He jumped off the car and pulled her down into a crouch beside him. He screamed, “What the hell is that?”

*******

Her voice was soft and sexy to the extreme, with an unnatural throaty timbre that always annoyed him.

A radio voice.

“You need your medication, don’t you Freddie?”

He was curious to see what angle she would use, and wasn’t surprised.

“Yeah, and you need electroshock therapy, bitch.”

“I just want you to know that I’m not going to fire you for this little outburst. You’re sick, Freddie, and we’re going to get you the medical care that you need.”

*******

The cable whipped above the little Escort and writhed in mid air for a moment before tangling itself around the tower.

“We’ve got to get out of here!” She screamed.

He had her by the back of the neck and was pushing her down into the grass. After the cable swept past them, he shouted, “This things gonna fall! Let’s go! Let’s go!”

*******

“Who’s Gloria Zaunbrecher, Randi? I think a lot of people out there want to know if you and your sister really killed a little girl when you were twelve years-” and his tongue suddenly felt cemented to the top of his mouth.

“I think you’ve said enough for one night, Freddie.”

*******

He opened her door and pushed her into the car, and heard a loud ping in front of him, far off into the darkness. The whooshing, tearing sound rushed toward him again, and he jumped inside, on top of her.

“The tower’s going to come down! Oh my God, it’s about to fall on us!” He screamed.

As the silver cable came into view it thrashed about over the Escort for a moment, then collided with the tower. A loud groaning sound filled the air, and sparks began to pour out of the little generator shed, uprooting the ground between the tin building and the tower in a straight line, as electricity climbed furiously out of the ground, up the tower.

*******

“You’re off the air you little shit.”

Freddie was paralyzed behind the microphone; every word in his mind was trapped behind a thick tongue as mute as a piece of rubber. He shot up out of the chair, sending it crashing into the carpeted wall behind him. Images of Randi’s face hung before him as he tried to remove the earphones from his head.

“Nobody badmouths my family...”

Her voice shook inside his head and reverberated there, as his mind tried to grasp the meaning of her words. She loosed a cackling, maniacal laugh which seemed to fuse her own voice with a myriad of others.

Freddie backed away frantically from the mixing board – the black coiled wire which connected his headset to it stretched, but wouldn’t come out. He tried to scream, but couldn't.

“Something from the earth... and something from the soul of man.” The voices tore like shards of glass across his mind.

“Something from the earth... and something from the soul of man.”

He wound the black chord around his wrist and yanked on the wire. He felt a sharp tingle of electricity pass through the chord as he did. It held firm inside the mixing board.

“Something from the earth... and something from the soul of man.” The voices seared into his mind; the mad cacophony burning into his thoughts like salt poured onto a slug. Somehow Freddie sensed that these voices knew him; could reach inside of him, and were digging madly into the fiber of his soul.

“Run away to the calling... at the grave find your home.”

“Run away to the calling... at the grave find your home.”

Freddie lingered at the doorway of the studio, unable to move. The headset felt like it was fused to his skull... he couldn't make it budge. He thrust himself backwards, out into the hallway, crashed upon the far wall, and slid down to the floor.

“Run away to the calling... at the grave find your home.” Freddie’s voice had returned. It was trembling and brittle, but was the only voice he could hear.

"Run away to the calling... at the grave find your home."

His eyes swam across the thin blue carpet, past the threshold of the studio and picked up the silver glint of the headphone’s plug lying on the ground.

“Run away to the calling... at the grave find your home.” Freddie pulled off the headset and heaved it down the hall. He ran out through the reception area, out the front door, and jumped into the Malubu.

He drove off into the night.

*******

He slid the key into the ignition and brought the Escort to life.

“Hurry! Hurry! Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!” Her screams blended with the sound of grating steel and electrical current in a sick nightmare sonata. She could only see the base of the tower from inside the car, so she wrenched her face up against the window to try to glimpse which way the looming giant was going to fall.

He reversed out of the grass, back onto the gravel road. It was too narrow to turn around on, so he was forced to speed down the road backwards. The car’s engine whined loudly as the transmission worked frantically under the strain. He looked over his shoulder then back at the tower repeatedly as he fought to keep the little car between the two ditches on either side of it.

The tower came into full view.

The top third of the structure began to sway wildly and was coming loose from the rest of the tower.

“Oh my God, it’s coming apart… hurry!” She shrieked into the windshield.

The top piece of the tower which was breaking loose appeared to be falling well short of the car. As the Escort sped backwards, he made coarse adjustments to keep the car on the road; it lurched back and forth with each correction.

“Chuck! Look at it!”

The bottom two-thirds of the tower began to sway toward them and the top piece which first appeared to be falling safely away from the rest of the tower was now being hurled down at them.

His foot was jammed against the accelerator, but the car wasn’t going fast enough. He was mesmerized by the falling tower; his eyes felt glued to the collapsing behemoth. He couldn’t comprehend what he was seeing.

“Chuck, watch out!”

The Escort veered off of the narrow gravel road and grated to a halt as it slid down into the ditch.

"Oh... shit," he said.

He shielded his face with one arm and extended the other across her body as the tower plummeted to the earth.

He looked over to her and saw that her gaze was now glued to the tower.

She moaned, “OH – MY – GOD… it’s falling on us.”

The sound of the pieces of tower crashing into the ground reached his ears before the topmost portion of the tower finally fell. The tower had collapsed under its own weight, and huge fragments of it where slamming down all around them. The huge mast which extended out of the top of the tower smashed into the gravel road fifteen feet away from the car.

And suddenly, there was silence.

For several moments both of them sat, waiting for there to be more, but it was over.

He broke the quiet. “Are we alive?”

More silence.

She finally found her voice. “I can’t believe what I just saw.”

*******

Freddie Winbush drove all the way up Main Street, which eventually turned into Highway 13 North. The radio was on, but only the white noise of static could be heard through the Malibu’s speakers.

“Run away to the calling..." he muttered under the radio's hollow din, "at the grave find your home.”

He passed a green highway sign which read:

EUNICE 12
ROBERT'S COVE next right

Freddie somehow knew to turn there, and he drove on into the uncommon coolness of the Louisiana night. A rush of anticipation flowed up out of his stomach and began to warm him, despite the fear and incredulity he still felt shimmering around inside him. There was nothing to fear.

He was going home, after all.