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The Tango Cat was a Hollywood dive bar that could hardly claim the address, although the adjective fit like a glove. Steven Segar chose the cleanest of the empty tables, tested the chair to make sure it would support his weight, and sat down. Album covers, scuffed and worn, adorned the walls, along with signed photos of the musicians who had paid the bar a visit. None of them had been framed.
“Can I get you anything, sir?” A young bottle blonde with a spray tan and the biggest eyelashes Segar had ever seen, approached. Her name tag read KYRSTIN. Even her name was full-on Southern California.
“No, not yet. Still waiting for my friend.” He stumbled over the last word.
Smiling, the girl gave a nod and then froze. Her eyes narrowed, and she pressed a red lacquered fingernail thoughtfully to her chin. “Say, haven’t I seen you before?” She pursed her lips, the strain of deep thought reflected in her brown eyes.
Here we go, he thought. After three decades in the film industry, he had come to expect it. He rocked back in his chair, rested his arms on his belly, and smiled.
“Yes?” He wondered if she’d want an autograph. People seldom wanted autographs these days, just selfies.
Her eyes went wide. “I remember! You’re Bekki’s granddad. You sat at the bar on her first day of work and kept ordering mixed drinks that didn’t exist. You were so funny!”
“No,” Segar said flatly. “I don’t have grandchildren.”
“Oh. Sorry. You look just like him. I think it’s the...” Her voice trailed off as she cupped her hand over her belly. “The belt buckle,” she said hurriedly. “He had one just like that.”
“Oh, Clint Eastwood gave this to me. We did a film together a while back.”
“Clint Eastwood? The guy who did the films with the orangutan? My dad loves him. Anyway, just give me a shout when your friend gets here. What does he look like? I’ll keep an eye out for him.”
“He’s tall and skinny with long, stringy hair and overlarge teeth. He prefers military-style camouflage clothing, but he never served.”
“Sounds like an interesting fellow,” Kyrstin said, inching away.
“Don’t forget my cowboy hat, even though I’m not a cowboy.” A tall, angular man stepped around the waitress and dropped his hat onto the table. “Stevie here thinks you have to hail from the Southwest in order to wear one of these.” The man flashed a too-white smile. “I grew up on a dairy farm. I think that makes me a ‘cow boy’ but it pisses him off to no end. Icing on the cake.”
He wasn’t wrong. Everything about Terry Gold pissed Segar off.
“All right, then,” Kyrstin said. “Can I start you guys off with some drinks?”
“I’m sure Stevie would like something pretentious,” the tall man said. “Do you have anything with Tibetan gonad berries?”
“Goji berries,” Segar corrected. “I’ll have one of your local craft beers. Your choice. Bring me a chilled glass, but I’ll pour it myself. And Terry here will have something pedestrian. Your cheapest light beer will do. You might consider saying ‘dilly dilly’ when you bring it out.”
“Light beer on draft is great, and I’ll have an order of cheese fries,” the man called Terry said.
“I’m sorry, but we don’t have cheese fries on the menu,” Kyrstin said.
Gold smirked. “Do you have cheeseburgers and fries on the menu?”
She nodded. Her brow knotted in puzzlement.
“Then I’ll take an order of fries, and throw a couple slices of cheese on them while they’re still nice and hot.” Terry gave her a wink. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. I’m a generous tipper.”
“Fries and two slices of cheese. I’ll have it right out.”
“That’s disgusting,” Segar said as the girl walked away. “You should try eating healthy. I can send you a copy of my diet regimen, not that I have any reason to wish you to live longer.”
Gold laced his fingers behind his neck, rocked back in his chair, and propped his feet on the table. “Oh, Seagull, I have missed you.”
Segar tried to maintain his calm exterior, but the nickname, juvenile as it was, always seemed to get a reaction out of him. He was certain it was a thinly veiled jibe at the size of his nose, though Gold denied it.
The two had hated each other for practically their entire careers. When Terry Gold had been a young, popular rocker, he’d provided the soundtrack for one of Segar’s first action films. His price had been a supporting role in the film. It had been a disaster. Besides being a terrible actor, Gold had a lousy work ethic and took pleasure in needling his fellow cast members at every turn. What some actors called their “method,” Gold called “pretentiousness” or worse, and had made it his mission to cut people down to size where and when he deemed it necessary. It had been a nightmare. By the end, security had to be on hand every time the two men shared a scene.
“I wish I could say the same, Nugget. I’m surprised you don’t have a semi-automatic rifle slung across your back. Getting soft in your old age?”
Chuckling, Gold took his feet off the table, let his chair fall back onto all four legs, and scooted up to the table. “I’m carrying concealed,” he said softly. “But you know I don’t have a permit for this state, so I’ll trust you not to rat me out. You’re a douche, Segar, but you were never a rat.”
“Never fear. Your secret is safe with me.”
“I’m amazed you don’t carry,” Gold said. “Famous guy like you, people might think you’ve got money. You must make at least a couple of bucks off your B-movie action flicks. So what if they go direct to the WalMart clearance bin?”
“At least I’m still distributed. You’re down to selling your music off your website and at county fairs. You must feel right at home performing in those rodeo arenas.” Segar smiled, knowing he’d scored a point. “Besides, I don’t need a weapon, as you very well know.”
Gold took a toothpick, thick with lint, out of his breast pocket and stuck it in the corner of his mouth.
“Hey, I charted on iTunes, bitch. Amazon, too!” He waggled his eyebrows. “But how about we discuss your famous martial arts career? Ray Rogain sent me an interesting video. Want to see it?”
Segar tensed, felt his cheeks burning. Rogain was part of the new generation of what Segar termed “hybrid celebrities.” Moderately famous in several disparate corners of the entertainment world, the cumulative effect making them a major player. In his role as a commentator, Rogain was well-connected in the martial arts community, and very well might have gotten a copy of the video in question.
“Not really.” He tried to keep his tone casual, but already, cracks were forming in the bubble of serenity with which he’d surrounded himself upon entering.
Gold laughed. “Relax, Seagull. I’m not going to show anyone. The last thing anyone wants to see is their favorite action hero getting choked out by a seventy-year-old judo instructor.”
“Sixty,” Segar corrected.
“Did you ever manage to get that yellow stain out of your gi?” Gold threw back his head and cackled. “I guess that foolproof escape you always bragged about wasn’t so foolproof after all.”
“The guy had been treated for testicular cancer.” Segar swallowed the bile rising in his throat. “He had them removed, so...”
Gold was racked with an onset of silent laughter. His shoulder heaved and he struggled to catch his breath. “You mean,” he huffed, hand pressed to his chest, “that all this time,” another gulp of air, “it was just grabbing them by the...”
“By the nuggets,” Segar finished. That cut down on the laughter a little bit. Gold hated the nickname Nugget. Segar found that odd. The man had named his son Platinum Record. What was so bad about Terry Nugget when you had a Platinum R. Gold in the family? “I had some other options for escape,” he explained, “but I didn’t want to hurt the old man.”
Kyrstin returned with their drinks. Gold caught his breath, wiped the corners of his eyes with his napkin.
“Your fries will be out in a minute,” Kyrstin said.
“Cheese fries,” Gold corrected.
She rolled her eyes, let out an impatient sigh, and hurried away.
“You know she’s going to spit in your food, don’t you?”
Gold shrugged. “She probably just got into some bad avocados.”
Segar laughed and hated himself for it.
Gold took two large gulps, let out a wet belch, and patted himself on the chest. “That hits the spot.”
Segar sipped his beer, savored the taste. It was bitter with just the right hint of citrus. He held it in his mouth for a few seconds, swallowed, and took another drink.
Their opening salvos exhausted, the men sat there drinking in silence until Kyrstin returned with Gold’s version of cheese fries. He offered one to Segar, a wicked sparkle in his eye.
“I’m not hungry,” Segar said, “especially not for that. Now, why did you insist on meeting with me?”
“I’m dipping my toe into television. Reality television to be precise. And I want you to partner with me.”
Segar's lips moved but surprise rendered him mute. How could the man even think they could work together?
Gold mistook his silence for interest and kept talking. “I was thinking back on our... rivalry, and I came up with the idea for a show that will put our shared interests and best attributes on display. It’ll be a contest. Not that gladiator and Spartan crap.”
“I hate that stuff,” Segar said. “Those things are for gymnasts and gym rats. There’s no real-world application. If a bad hombre accosts you in a dark alley, you won’t be making your escape Tarzan-style over a swimming pool and onto a spinning platform.”
“Why are you always going up dark alleys, Segar? What is that about?” Gold chuckled, took another drink. “But seriously, I agree with you. If you’re out in the wilderness and a bear attacks.” He spread his hands as if the rest were obvious.
Segar found himself intrigued. The chance to best Terry Gold was hard to pass up. “What is the contest? And there better not be a companion soundtrack.”
“No, nothing like that.” Gold waved a fry at him. “I want to make it something where neither of us has much advantage. I mean, I’ll always be a notch above you thanks to good genes, but there’s nothing we can do about that.”
Segar folded his arms and waited, his drink forgotten. He didn’t want to appear too interested.
“A couple of interests you and I share,” Gold went on, “are the outdoors, and unsolved mysteries. I know this dude, total bookworm, message board trawler, deep dive into newspaper archives kind of guy. Finds all sorts of bits and pieces that never made it onto the web in any form. He has uncovered a mystery that he believes can be solved. He’s collected enough clues to point us in the right direction. We each take a small team and a camera guy and head off in the wilderness. We keep it super simple to hold costs down.”
“So, this is ‘searching for lost treasure’ series? Along the way we talk about the mystery, throw in local color, that sort of thing?”
“It’s that with added layers. You and I are outdoorsmen. We’ll talk about survival skills, about ecology, respect for nature. So many audiences we can target.”
“I’m more than an outdoorsman. I’m a warrior and a poet. I’m spirit brother to the wolf and...”
“Come on, Segar, are you interested or not?”
Segar nodded. He doubted they’d actually find any lost treasure, but the idea was solid, even if it was hatched from the addled mind of Terry Gold. “What does the winner get?”
“Bragging rights and a donation in his name to the charity of his choice. Makes us look better that way.” Gold had finished off the cheese and now drowned his remaining fries in ketchup. “The rest of the proceeds we split right down the middle. I’ve already started pitching it.” He removed a folded sheet of paper from his pocket and slid it across the table. “That’s the first official offer, but we’ve got strong interest from at least three other parties.”
Segar unfolded the paper and his eyebrows shot up. It wasn’t box office hit money, but for this sort of program it was a solid offer. And he liked the concept. It wasn’t something demeaning, like living in a shared house, or taking a road trip together. This was a challenge. A contest of skills and intelligence. He’d like to see one of these YouTube celebrities or hipsters with man buns take on a challenge like this.
“I hate to admit this,” Gold went on, “but I literally can’t do this without you. If it’s not a contest between the two of us, nobody’s interested.”
He had pressed the right button. Segar drained his beer in three gulps, folded the paper and tucked it into his pocket.
“All right, Gold. I will resurrect your dead career. You’ll be my Lazarus.”
They shook hands. Gold leaned in so close Segar could smell the cheap beer on his breath.
“I cannot wait to kick your ass on a streaming network.”