The Price of a Friend

Ritchie isn’t sure what to do now. He is a grown man, but he has lived in Rick’s sheltering shadow ever since Rick saved his salami sandwich from the bullies in elementary school. Yet the casing is there, the bullet is not. Rick had checked the guns and signed the sheet before leaving for the trailer to get some rest.

Ritchie only has to make sure no one touches those guns before today’s scene. But what if the bullet is still inside one of the barrels? Ritchie shakes his head as if he could shake away the screams, the pool of blood, the headlines that come to mind. They use these guns for all kinds of scenes, and if they’re just punching a hole in the Camaro, there’s nothing to worry about. Is there?

The inspection sheet is still in the bag. Ritchie unfolds it. Rick’s name is there. He signed. The empty casing is warming in another plastic bag in his fist, and the bullet is not with it. Ritchie walks to the set, hoping the answer will come to him if he keeps moving.

His stomach contracts and pushes up a mouthful of last night’s whiskey. It’s sour now. At the sight of the white Camaro, he swallows it back down. The pink-and-blue eagle painted across the hood looks a little feminine for his taste, but what does he know? He’s just Rick’s assistant.

He can’t see any sign of the squibs from where he is, but they’re supposed to be rigged behind the Camaro’s body panels. Then he remembers. This is where the scavenger shoots off one of the hero’s ears.

“You don’t need to do much, bro. I’ll take care of everything.”

Rick had done all the talking when they were offered the jobs, so Ritchie just nodded and they bumped fists. Then they made explosion noises as their hands flew apart. Working with guns on a Hollywood production had never crossed his mind. He just followed Rick wherever he went.

“Rick. My man,” says someone behind him.

He turns to find one of the SFX assistants walking toward him. “Ritch—” he starts.

“What a night, bro! Count me in for your next party.”

Ritchie just smiles and waves it off. “Now that the baby is here, Rick’s a family man,” he says.

“Oh.”

The SFX assistant looks at him for a moment. “Yes, of course.” Then he looks away.

“Eh, gotta go, bro. See ya.”

He starts walking away, then he turns back to Ritchie.

“Hey. I forgot. Do you have that .45 ready? The scene starts in a few minutes.”

Ritchie tightens his fist around the bag.

“Sure,” he says.

“Better be. You know how actors hate it when things get messy.”

“Yeah,” Ritchie grunts.

The SFX guy nods and turns around, his mouth pulled to one side.

Ritchie can smell last night’s sweet, acrid stink of sweat and alcohol on his clothes. He would have taken a shower, but the morning’s schedule was too tight.

As he returns to the weapons cabinet, Ritchie thinks he would hate it too if it were his head at the other end of the barrel. But he trusts Rick. He’s never seen Rick make any mistakes when it really mattered. The bullet must be there.

Ritchie kneels and puts his face close to the floor. His knees press against his chest. His belly crowds his lungs, and he has to think about breathing. He looks around. He can see every speck of dust from down there. A screw, two cotton swabs, and even a wad of pink gum someone must have spat out. Gross, but no bullet. Still, he moves to the other side of the workbench and tries again. The blood rushes to his head and he’s getting dizzy. Rick stands up slowly. The way he had to last night.

Last night.

Last night they all celebrated the birth of his son. Matthew. Rick hadn’t meant to tell the crew, but Ritchie’s tongue loosens quickly when he drinks whiskey. Rick had water. Well, just a beer, actually. Then water. Mattie deserves a sober dad. Anyway, Rick bought the crew a round or two. The manager took Rick’s credit card and walked his gold-braced smile around the place, egging the girls to put on a show for them. It wasn’t long before Rick fell asleep on a couch while Ritchie kept the night going.

The five-minute bell sounds in the studio. The radio crackles and a voice repeats the warning. Down the passageway, the crew rushes to the set. Rick looks at the bag in his hand. A form, a casing, no bullet. The .45 rests on the workbench in front of him. A sour taste fills the back of Rick’s mouth. Ritchie drinks the whiskey, and somehow Rick is always the one who has to swallow it back down. Of course Ritchie has gone and passed out on the stretcher in the other room, and Rick… Rick has to deal with this. Again.

“Yo, bro. The gun,” says someone behind him.

“Yeah?” Rick says before turning around. He stares at the assistant. “Ben. It’s you.”

Ben takes hold of the gun Rick is holding out to him. Rick doesn’t let go. “Bro, what happens in this scene again?”

“You’re freaking me out today,” Ben says. “You sure about this? A fake ear getting blown off, I can handle. The real thing floors me.”

Rick rushes back through the inspection, but the bullet doesn’t glint anywhere in his memory. Ritchie should know. Then he feels Ben give the .45 a small tug. Rick’s hand tightens around it. It’s getting awkward when the two-minute warning comes over the radio. Rick twists the .45 free from Ben’s grip. “You need to sign for it first, Ben.”

“Come on, bro. We’re running late. They’re gonna yell at me.”

Ritchie shrugs but doesn’t let go. “I need your signature. That’s protocol.”

Ben signs the form, takes the gun and leaves, grinding out a few words through clenched teeth. Ritchie hears the grinding, but the words are lost somewhere between his ears and his mind, already grasping what the delivered gun means. He makes sure there’s no one around and closes the door.

“What are we going to do, Rick? Is it my fault?”

“I got you, Ritchie. I just need to get this straight. One thing, though. That whiskey? Never again. Damn it.”

“Oh. So it’s my fault. The actor’s going to die, and it’s my fault.”

“Hush! I said I’ve got you. Let’s not invite anyone else into this party.”

Rick locks the door and rushes around the room. He lifts a stack of paperwork and taps it against the workbench, squaring the edges. Rick puts it back on the empty tray. Then he empties the box of new casings and sifts through the gunpowder in the jar. Every action he performs ends with a hard breath through his lips and his arms falling loose at his sides for a moment right before he moves on to another frantic search. The gun cabinet, the tool drawer. He ends up lying on the floor.

“I already searched there,” says Ritchie.

Then Ritchie unlocks the door.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m going to stop this,” Ritchie replies, already halfway through the doorway.

“No, you’re not,” says Rick as the left foot steps forward and the right hand grips the doorframe.

Rick needs to stop Ritchie now. Ritchie is stunned. Their first instinct, though, is to look around.

“Let go,” Ritchie whispers through his teeth.

“Sorry, bro, but I have to think about Mattie.”

For a moment, that drains all resistance from Ritchie. The jaw loosens and Rick lets go too. But only until the clapperboard snaps shut. Someone shouts, “Action!” and Ritchie sprints to the set.

Rick has gone silent. Ritchie runs like a scarecrow. His legs move, but the arms don’t follow. Instead, Rick pats down the body. The chest. The thighs. The hips. He isn’t stopping Ritchie. He isn’t working with him either.

The scavengers wrestle the gun from the hero’s hands and start growling and cackling. One of them points the .45 at the poor guy. Ritchie passes by the director’s chair, bumping into cameramen and sound technicians standing by.

Rick’s disappointed when no one reacts, when no one stops the scene. “I got it, Ritchie. I got it,” he says.

Ritchie’s already mid-air, his body stretched between the barrel and the actor. He’s shouting, “Cut!” when the shot breaks the moment into myriad shards, all cutting through his shoulder. The yell turns into a cry of pain.

Ritchie lands on the floor. The pain is unbearable. His shoulder is torn and bleeding. “Rick!” he cries. “Rick.”

Rick is not there. It’s only him. His hand opens. In his palm: a bullet.