go out. She might have got over Richards Justin in time, but probably not.
The friend of a friend pulled some strings and called in some favors, and so the plant where Candace worked secured the merchandising rights to the Colt Savage, Soldier of Fortune Action Pak. This consisted of a plastic Colt Savage doll, complete with weapons and action costumes, along with models of Black Blaze, his supersonic autogiro, and Red Lightning, the supercar. The merchandising package also included dolls of his mentor and regular assistants, as well as several notable villains and their sinister weaponry. The plant geared into maximum production to handle the anticipated rush of orders for the Christmas market.
Candace found herself sitting at the assembly line, watching thousands of plastic replicas of Richards Justin roll past her.
She just had to see Rick, but the guards at the gate had instructions not to admit her. He wouldn’t even talk to her over the phone or answer her letters. The way he must remember her, Candace couldn’t really blame him. It would be different now.
His birthday was coming up, and she knew he would be having a party. She wrote him several times, sent messages via old contacts, begging Rick to let her come. When the printed invitation finally came, she’d already bought him a present. Candace knew that her confidence had not been a mistake, and she took a day off work to get ready for their evening together.
The party had been going strong for some time when Candace arrived, and Rick was flying high on coke and champagne. He hugged her around the shoulders but didn’t kiss her, and half carried her over to where many of the guests were crowded around a projection television.
Ladies and gentlemen here she is—our leading lady, the versatile Miss Candi Thorne.
All eyes flicked from the screen to Candace, long enough for recognition. Then the cheers and applause burst out across the room. Rick had been amusing his guests with some of her films. Just now they were watching the one with the donkey.
Candace didn’t really remember how she managed to escape and find her way home.
She decided not to leave a note, and she was prying the blade out of Rick’s old razor when the idea began to form. The razor was crudded with dried lather and bits of Rick’s whiskers, and she wanted to get it clean before she used it on her wrists. A scene from another of her films, Voodoo Vixens, arose through the confusion of her thoughts. She set the razor aside carefully.
Candace made herself a cup of coffee and let the idea build in her head. She was dry-eyed now and quite calm—the hysterical energy that had driven her to suicide now directed her disordered thoughts toward another course of action.
She still had all of her mementos of Rick, and throughout the night she went over them, one by one, coolly and meticulously. She scraped all the bits of beard and skin from his razor, collected hair and dandruff from his brush and comb, pared away his toothbrush bristles for the minute residues of blood and plaque. She found a discarded handkerchief, stained from a coke-induced nosebleed, and from the mattress liner came residues of their former lovemaking. Old clothes yielded bits of hair, stains of body oils and perspiration. Candace searched the house relentlessly, finding fragments of his nails, his hair, anything at all that retained physical residues of Rick’s person.
The next day Candace called in sick. She spent the day browsing through Los Angeles’ numerous occult bookshops, made a few purchases, and called up one or two of the contacts she’d made filming Voodoo Vixens. It all seemed straightforward enough. Even those who rationalized it all admitted that it was a matter of belief. And children have the purest belief in magic.
Candace ground up all her bits and scrapings of Richards Justin. It came to quite a pile and reminded her of a bag of Mexican heroin.
Candace returned to work and waited for her chance. When no one was watching, she dumped her powdered residue into the plastic muck destined to become Colt Savage dolls. Then she said a prayer of sorts.
Beneath the Christmas tree, Joshua plays with his new Colt Savage doll. Pow! An electron cannon knocks Colt out of the sky, crashes him to the rocks below!
Jason pits Colt Savage against his model dinosaurs. Yahhh! The dinosaur stomps him!
David is racing Colt Savage in his car, Red Lightning. Ker-blam! Colt drives