Days two and three
I slept like shit that night. At about quarter to five in the morning I woke up for the sixth or seventh time that night, and since I had to get up at five I thought fuck it and got up for the day. I fired up the first of several cigarettes and got to work rolling the days joints. I spent the next forty-five minutes enjoying a wake and bake while I watched the news and enjoyed some pop tarts, you know, the breakfast of champions.
It took barely more than a half an hour for me to drive to the dome that morning. Even with a quick stop at the Raba Food market.
“Two packs of Canadian Classic Silver king size.” I recited my addiction mantra to the young clerk. When I finally checked-in and got to good ol’ pillar forty-five, I found I had been assigned to the stage crew which would have me working the deck of the stage for rehearsals working side by side with Beatie and Rylynn. The two were working another shift after their overnight. I was happy to finally be working with someone I knew. I have never been overly comfortable dealing with new people.
The entire backstage area had been changed overnight. Gone where the mess of trucks and random forklifts and zoom booms (cherry pickers). It has all been replaced with a small village of tents complete with service roads for vehicles, medic stations and power distribution systems.
“Stage crew.” I heard Beatie yell from the edge of ring road. I walked over to her along with six or seven other shiny helmets.
“Hey, you my boss today?” I asked half kidding
“Bitch I'm always your boss.” she replied without hesitation “Follow me.” she yelled to the group of people right in front of her. We walked cautiously towards the large wooden ramp that lead to the stage deck.
“What are we doing today?” I asked.
“Rehearsals.”she said as she looked back at the short stretch of road behind us. “This way.” she said as she led us across the service road. Just ahead on the ground was a large piece of structural truss left over from the stage build. From the perspective of a metal fabricator it looked almost beautiful in its composition.
Standing in front of it was a young shiny helmet snapping pictures of the black steel component. Beatie started to laugh as we passed the kid.
“Look at that idiot, it’s just fucking truss.” she said
“Yeah no kidding.” I said as I slide my camera phone back into my pocket. Hey I'm not going to look like a douche unless I have to, and believe me I'll have many chances to do that.
Beatie led us up the ramp to the side of the stage and told us to chill there at the top. We all looked out at the large stage deck that is dressed in Indian art pieces. They all looked beautiful both in color and craftsmanship though the later was just an illusion. Everything was built like shit.
The stage was lit with bright red and gold beams of light, and a wash in an amber glow.
“Make a hole!” I heard someone yell.
We moved just in time for a group of young dancers to scurry through us and move into their positions on stage. They were wearing basic exercise clothing. I looked back a Beatie.
“Rehearsals?” I asked
“Yeah.” she said
“Smok’em if you gottem bud.” said the guy standing with her. “It’s gonna’ be a long day” he said kindly in his gruff voice. “Speaking of, shall we?” he said to Beatie and the two walked down the ramp.
I had no clue what I was supposed to do, but as it would turn out it wouldn’t matter. Mainly because the first day of rehearsals was just dancers figuring out their choreography, so there wasn’t much for the stage crew to do. For hours I just sat there and struggled to stay awake with the odd job here and there plus smoke breaks. Untill...
“WAKE UP!” Beatie said snapping me out of my stage side nap. “It’s time to get to work.”
I looked at my phone. “My battery fuckin’ died” I said “What time is it?”
“23:23” she said “Lets go.” We filed out on to the stage while I did the math in my head. 23. 23 minus 12 is....shit 11pm.
“What are we doing?” I asked
“Wheel those spice carts out of the way and off stage left.” she said the carts looked like old wooden street carts with two wooden wheels and long handles. As I grabbed the wooden handles my hand was stabbed by a splinter from the poorly made cart.
Then, when I lifted the cart topped with large piles of curry spices, the left handle broke and the cart hit the deck with a bang. One of the other stagehands ran over to help me get the thing off the stage and parked on the ramp just off to the side. I looked back to see Beatie pushing the last cart off the deck.
“Now what?” I asked
“Now you drive us home, we have a five am call time here.” she said.
So far this show biz thing was more boring than hard.
The Job For Which I Was Hired
My alarm went off at four a.m. jarring me out of another short sleep cycle. I slowly stood up, my muscles sore and straining against the hard wood floor I slept upon. Before my brain had finished it’s labored boot up sequence I quickly got my shit together and was in the car with Beatie, Rylynn and some random guy that slept at our place that night. I was putting my keys into the ignition of my Japanese jalopy, well I was trying to at least. In my half a sleep gaze I couldn’t-
“FIND THE HOLE BOY!” Beatie yelled jolting me. I looked at her both confused and annoyed. “Are you having trouble finding the hole?” she said further fucking with me.
“Oh.” I said forcing a fake smile and laugh. “Yeah, it’s been a while.” I said, and it had been. I finally got the key in and turned the car on bringing with it the thunderous roar of last nights full volume radio I left on. We all jumped out of our seats as Nickelback blasted out of my car's speakers till, I reached down and turned the radio knob to the left, it’s gentle click bringing silence.
“That sucked.” I said
“No shit.” Rylynn said.
“And it was fucking Nickelback.” I said annoyed
“I assumed that’s what you meant when you said, that sucked.” Beatie said
I shook my head and opened my eyes wide. “Man, you look like shit.” she said, her voice muffled by the joint she was lighting. She took a deep haul off the dubie “Doctor.” Beatie continued “This man needs weed and coffee stat!”
I took the joint and took a few quick puffs. “Sounds about right to me” I said as we pulled out of the underground garage and started the journey to work. The day started like the others. We went to the loading dock to check-in and get our crew assignments for the day.
To my happy surprise it wasn’t The Legend. This time it was a very welcoming woman in her early thirties.
“Hey sup.” Beatie said
“Hey.” The woman said with a smile and an heir of familiarity. “How are you?”
“Fuckin’ tired but ready to get it done.” Beatie said.
“Cool you’re on the back-stage crew.” she said
“Sweet.” Beatie said.
The woman than turned her attention to me. “Name?”
“Uh, Conner” I said.
She scanned the massive list of names taped to the table between us. “Oh, you’re one of my red-carpet fork ops.” She said “Go to central control and sign out keys, forks are parked outside at the top of the ramp. When you're ready, drive to the side walk by gate seven, there will be another fork there. You’ll see him, tall guy, bright orange fork.”
I stared at her absorbing the info “Where is central control?” I asked
“Around the corner.” she said with slight irritation and her demeanor began to shift.
“Where all the golf carts are parked.” Beatie said “I'm going that way.
“Thanks.” I said to the woman as B led me away.
“That was Femes.” Beatie said. “She is pretty cool.”
After a quick trip to the security office (aka central control) and a hike up the steep ramp of the loading dock I was at street level. It was bathed in the golden light of the early morning sun. I looked up at the CN tower, it’s awesome shadow almost turned the downtown core into a sort of sun dial. The light was visible in the humid atmosphere of pre-rush hour downtown. It was silent but for the smooth hum of the Gardiner Expressway behind me. Across the street, against the massive back drop of the Skydome was a tiny orange fork lift parked right below a sign the read “GATE 7”.
I looked back at the line of fork lifts and found a matching orange Toyota lift, and looked back at the fork parked under the gate seven sign. A tall skinny man sat inside of it. The sun occasionally reflecting off his glasses as he looked in my general direction
“I guess that’s that place.” I said to myself.
I climbed into me industrial forklift, put my bag behind my seat, fired up a cigarette and I was on my way. I pulled out of the parking lot and drove past the loading dock ramp and straight towards the stadium. I listened to the clang of my forks echo off the buildings making the normal busy street seem like a ghost town.
When I crossed the street, I jumped the curb and headed west towards my fork lift brethren.
“Hey.” I said as I pulled up to him.
“How’s it goin’.” the middle-aged man said to me
We quickly introduced ourselves, his name was Gary. We shook hands and spent the next four hours getting to know each other as the calm downtown street slowly came to life. Tour buses, taxis and lost tourists gave energy to the concrete jungle.
Now, we didn’t get into any deep philosophical discussions. No, our talk was a little more basic. Where you from? How long you been driving fork? Check out the ass on that one, that sort of thing. Until finally after almost five hours, our truck showed. We cranked over our engines, popped the E-brake, raise our forks a touch and we got to work. We drove, about ten feet.
You see, we realized why they wanted this truck unloaded at five in the morning. Its long delay means that we have to unload big set pieces and big ass skids of wall flats on sidewalks flooded with people.
“This is fucking cute.” Gary said as he puffed away on his smoke.
But we made it happen. We unloaded the truck, got these flats over to the soon to be red carpet area and parked. Something I learned that day is that people, are fucking idiots. The amount of times we would be driving along with these big loads and people would make eye contact with us, just to walk right in front of us, forcing a quick stop and the load on our forks to wave back and forth. After our heart rates and blood pressure returned to normal Gary went for lunch and I went back to good ol’ stand by.
As I sat and waited for Gary to come back from his break, I just watched all the people in silence. Most of them confused by the presence of a fork lift in the middle of the large side walk and big row of flats going in.
“HEY GET BACK TO WORK!” Gary yelled, scaring the ever-loving shit out of me. I jolted up and realized I had dozed off.
“Oh shit.” I said rubbing my eyes with one hand while I checked the time with the other.
“Little sleepy their princess?” he quipped to me as he pulled himself into his machine.
“Yeah.” I replied “I have been sleeping like shit.”
“Well you’re in luck.” he said as he put one foot on the dash and settled in his seat “Boss lady says you’re cut.”
“Really?” I said
“Yup, they said to send you home.” he pulled out two cigarettes and lit them, handing one to me.
“Thanks.” I said
“So, go home and cuddle up and get some sleep there sunshine.” Gary said as his gaze scanned the busy street.
“I wish.” I said “I'm sleeping on a hardwood floor.’
‘Oh.” he said as though the smoke he inhaled extinguished the sting of my words. “I’ve been there, pissed off wife?” he asked
“Pissed off life.” I said as I hopped out of the Fork lift. “Have a good one bud.” I said. As I turned to walk away I heard Gary yell “WHISKEY!”
“What?”
“To sleep.” he said “Whiskey always works from me.”
“Yeah.” I said as I turned to continue to my car “Me too.”
When I got home Rylynn, Beatie and another guy where sitting in the living room passing around a bong.
“Hey man” Rylynn said as I turned to close the door.
“Hey.” I replied half dead.
“How goes it?” Beatie asked.
“Pretty good.” I paused after I sat down by bag “Did a lot of waiting.” I proceeded to violently kick off my boot.
“Yeah, that seems to be how this gig goes.” The guy said
“I'm beginning,” I struggled to get my other boot off. “To realize that!” I said, punctuating my word sharply as my foot broke free of my boot's death grip.
“This is Cody.” Rylynn said.
Cody stood up, reaching out to shake my hand. He was young, twenty-one tops.
“Nice to meet you.” I said
“So did you crash your fork?” Rylynn asked
I snapped back in the dumbest sounding voice I could manage “No, I no crash sword truck.”
“Oh, you’re a fork op.?” Cody asked
“Yeah.”
“I'm a rigger there.” he said.
“Oh yeah.” I said, with no idea what that meant.
“He walks the beams in the roof and hangs the show.” Rylynn said.
“Oh, that’s pretty cool.” I said. To be completely honest, I only knew what a beam walker was, but as for what “hanging the show” really meant, at the time, I was totally fuckin’ clueless.
“You should come down to the Brooklyn with us.” Beatie said
“First rounds on me.” Cody added, sweetening the deal.
“The Brooklyn?” I said inquisitively.
“Yeah, this chill bar over on queen west.” Rylynn said
“Nah, I'm beat but thanks anyway.” I said
“PUSSY!” and already half-drunk Beatie proclaimed
“It’s been a crazy week, I'm just going to chill tonight.” I said
“Yeah one drink.” Cody said. Before I could speak up Rylynn did so for me.
“No no no.” She said shaking her head. She admired her well-groomed nail as she tucked her legs under her. “no no no no no no.” she continued. “You don’t talk Jae into a drink, It’s a bad idea.”
“Five no’s level bad eh?” Beatie said with a slight laugh.
“I counted six.” I said. I lifted my hand and pulled back the sleeve of my shirt to reveal the Frankenstein like scar on my wrist.
“Last time Rylynn asked five times.” I said “Till I finally said yes on the sixth.”
“Now.” Rylynn said “I just say no six times for him.” she paused. “I’ll be honest, I don’t count.”
"I know counting is a tough task for a girl like you." I said
"I know counting is a tough task for a girl like you." I said
“Really? Damn.” Cody said leaning forward as if begging for the story.
"Yeah she's kind of dumb." I said
"Fuck you." Rylynn replied with class.
Me and Rylynn looked at each other and pondered our response for a moment.
“Yeah.” I continued “I said 'no' a bunch.” I picked up my bag “But Rylynn wouldn’t give up. Long story short.” I said as I started to head down the hall to my room. “I got drunk and fell.”
“That doesn’t sound so bad.” Cody said
“Off a bridge, you fell off of a bridge.” Rylynn added with a laugh.
“Damn.” Cody and Beatie said in unison
“Hey that was just the first time.” I said
“DAMN!” Cody and Beatie exclaimed, again in unison.
“And?” Rylynn said.
I stopped in the hall momentarily. “And a couple months later, after I got my cast off and swore off booze, Rylynn talked me into a Halloween party. But this time I hammered back a two six of rum and slipped on some wet leaves, shattered my wrist and boom, a steel plate and a cool scar.”
Beatie poked her head around the corner and a devilish grin came upon her face. “Third times a charm their buddy.”
“Good night.” I said, closing the door to a tempting night of shenanigans.
I went to bed on a wood floor again that night, but a joint help usher me into a good nights sleep.
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