Chapter 2
Tom sat on the couch with a beer in his left hand, a joint of fine reefer in his right, and a nice buzz started in his brain. He passed the joint to Alice, snuggled next to him, reflecting that at times like these it was hard to imagine feeling any better. There was something about smoking a joint after a good day of jumping that was better than at any other time - except possibly after a particularly fine time with Alice.
There were a dozen jumpers in the room, sitting on the floor or standing in knots, animatedly reliving the experiences of the day. If he tried, he could pick up bits and pieces of three or four conversations he would have liked to hear, all going on at once.
The only flaw in his picture of utopia was the nagging concern in the back of his mind that his money was running out. He'd planned and budgeted the money he'd saved working all winter into an entire summer of carefree jumping. But just as the chill winds adding a bite to the air in the mornings signaled that the summer weather was beginning to turn, the approaching end of the prime jumping season marked the time of year when his finances were about played out and needing attention. Three more weeks of jumping would wipe him out, and he needed to start looking for a winter job before that.
Well, he could worry about that tomorrow. Tonight he would party and push everything but jumping out of his mind. Worries and regrets always seemed capable of claiming more than enough of his time and attention, but the good times needed all the help they could get. He was in too good a mood this evening to let the outside world spoil it. He kissed Alice on the cheek and returned his attention to the conversation on the other end of the couch.
"...so when Dave and I got out the door after the screwed-up exit, you guys were way down there," continued Mike on the end of the couch. "I spent most of the jump just tracking down to the star, and I really had to hum it to get there when I did.
"Anyway, I got down to the star at about four grand, and knew I had to get in fast or it was going to break for altitude. It was an eight man at that point, fairly stable but slowly rotating to the right. Well, I picked out my slot and I'm kinda' sliding sideways trying to match the rotation of the star as I make my approach. Now I don't say I got in clean, but I did get in.
"Dave was right behind me on the track down, and had even less time than me to get in before the star broke, so he rushed his approach. Almost got in too, except he got twisted in the slot and ended up with his legs in my burble. When he half fell on me, I'd just gotten in myself, and that side of the star was still rocking from my entrance, so I just sank out.
"I tried to let go and back out from under the star, but it was too late. John and Sue, on either side of me, got sucked into the burble, and the rest of the star just funneled in behind them. The rest was sheer madness. They'd held the star past 3500 for Mike to get in, so everyone in the funnel was trying to get out into clear air to track away and open - and I was the one on the bottom. What a scramble!
"I'm watching my altimeter and looking at the ground, 'cause I can't open until the last guy's off my back. Mike's the last guy, and he splits just as my altimeter is passing two grand. I figure if I gotta track for clearance I'm gonna be humming it down pretty low by the time I'm open. But I look up and there's clear air above me! Everybody tracked away for once, and the usual vertical stack of canopies aren't there! Nobody just dumped out of the star. Well I couldn't hardly believe it, but I didn't waste any time sitting up and dumping my main. I got open about 1600 - cutting it a whole bunch closer than I like.”
Mike's account was interrupted by the door opening, and the sound of coughing as the interloper was enveloped in clouds of escaping smoke. "Jeeze, I can't hardly see across the room!" complained the disembodied voice in the haze. "You guys smoking or just burning piles of of the stuff in the middle of the room? Never mind, I don't want to know. There's a phone call for Jack Danforth. He in here?"
Jack got up out of the corner where he'd been engaged in a heated argument over the relative merits of pods versus bags for deploying ram-air parachutes. "Yeah I'm here," he answered, picking his way carefully across the floor. "Be right with ya'."
Tom's attention returned to the conversation around him, and was in the process of describing one of his jumps when he noticed the door open and Jack step half way into the room, motioning urgently for him step out into the hall. For a moment Tom was torn between wanting to hear the rest of Mike's account and wanting to know what Jack was so excited about, but finally gave in to his curiosity.
Jack took him to a quiet corner of the deserted packing house, conspiratorially refusing to answer any questions until they were completely alone. "All right, we can talk here," he stated, double checking to make sure no one was around. "Listen, I know you're getting a little tight for money. That call was from a friend of mine with a real bucks up proposition. Now you don't know this guy, but I've been doing some stuff for him lately. You might've been wondering where I've been getting all the money I've been throwing around lately. It's easy work, and the pay is fantastic - not to mention the fringe benefits!"
"You been dealing again?" questioned Tom. “Because if you are, you can count me out. I thought you learned your lesson last time."
"Yeah, I learned a lot last time," replied Jack venomously. "Mostly I learned to pick better business partners. That last deal would never have gone down if that bimbo hadn't been such an idiot. But that's in the past, and the people I'm working with now are real professionals. They've got the whole trip down pat, and they keep everything tidy - that is until tonight."
"Listen Tom, I haven't told you about what I've been doing 'cause I knew you wouldn't approve. I wouldn't be telling you now if I didn't think you'd be interested in what I got to say. Don't know all the details 'cause we were talking over the phone, but I think I got it pieced together. I'm sure there won't be any dealing involved, and we only see one guy. We do it right and we'll be back here in a couple days with enough money to jump for a year - and no way for the heat to trace the action back to us. What do you say? You interested? Can't tell you any more until you declare yourself in."
Tom's first impulse was to turn and run away, screaming "No!" at the top of his lungs as he put as much distance as possible between Jack and himself. He had unpleasant memories of a previous episode when he yielded to the allure of easy money and the excitement of rebelling against authority. It seemed so easy at first. He enjoyed smoking reefer, and buying smoke in bulk in order to sell off the excess to his friends for a small profit seemed such a harmless yet beneficial activity - both for his bank account and the party supplies of his friends.
He gave his customers a good deal, and his clientele expanded as friends told friends. He started moving larger quantities - selling whole pounds to dealers from farther away. As his circle of customers expanded outside his close friends, he found less savory types showing up wanting to buy. One of the sleaziest came back to his house late at night. The burglar was spotted by a passing patrol car leaving with the stolen stash. The police didn't even try to catch the burglar, preferring to assign a dozen officers to ransacking Tom's house “investigating” the break-in until they found a couple joints the thief had missed. His friendly little business got real nasty when the cops and lawyers got involved. He lost his money and property, but once he was cleaned out, the cops seemed to lose interest and dropped the charges.
But Jack held his arm, whispering urgently in his ear "Stop and think about it for a minute! Easy money! No dealing! I promise! The guy's paying for short notice and discretion. We just do the work and we're out of it completely. You won't want to tell anybody about it, but the job's nothing that'll hurt your conscience."
After a moment Tom's dread of looking for a winter job returned, spurred by Jack's promise of enough money to jump for a year with just a few day's work. Knowing in his heart that he might be putting his own neck in the noose, he replied cautiously, "Ok, I'll listen to the rest to the deal. If it sounds good to me I'll throw in. If it sounds like your usual scams, I'm not making any commitment. I just barely missed getting put away on the last one, and I'm still paying my lawyer. I'm not taking any more unnecessary chances."
"Yeah, all right, I can hear where you're coming from, and I second what you're saying. I'm no more eager to end up in the slammer than you are. But this setup's different. Here's how it is. I admit that the people I know are into dealing powders - cocaine mostly. But they got a good system worked out. Problem is, the plane bringing in a hundred pound shipment lost an engine and went down out in the boonies."
"As of right now, nobody but my people know about the crash. But it's only a matter of time before everybody - including the feds - find out about it. My people want to get their stuff back before anyone else gets wise to it. That's where we come in. There's no roads or open areas near the crash site, and it'd take at least a couple days for hikers to get there. The plan is for two jumpers to drop in, grab the stuff, and hike out. We meet my people at the nearest road and give them the stuff. They give us fourty grand and a lift to the nearest phone. After that we're home free. Just call Alice to come and pick up her rich boyfriend. What do you say? Sounds too easy to pass up if you ask me. Problem is we gotta get started first thing tomorrow at the latest."
"That's real short notice," protested Tom. "I mean, this thing doesn't sound like the sort of job I had in mind - and I promised myself when the lawyers got me out of the last one that I wouldn't take any more chances chasing after easy money. I'm not looking forward to working a straight job over the winter, but at least I'll still be around for jumping next summer."
"Hey, I know I'm laying some pretty heavy stuff on you here, and you'll need some time to think it over," soothed Jack. "But time is the whole problem. We gotta move quick on this or not at all. The way I see it, there's no risks to the deal as it sits now, but the risks increase as time goes on. What could be better? We make one quick jump, grab the stuff, go for a hike in the woods, and we're rich. You're never gonna find another deal like this one. Somebody's gonna do it if you don't, you know. Think about it. You can either spend a couple days with me hiking in the woods, or you can spend another winter like the last one shoveling shit and sweeping floors. Wouldn't be much question in my mind."
"Yeah, you make it sound so simple and easy," replied Tom. "But that's the way it sounded the last time too. Tell you what, how much time do I have to think about it?"
"Couple hours. If you bow out I gotta have time to find somebody else."
"All right, let me think about it. I'll let you know in a couple hours. Leave me alone until then."
"Ok," replied Jack turning away. "I can't believe you're not just grabbing the chance right off - but 'cause I owe you a couple, I'll wait 'till nine. Then I gotta know one way or the other."
Tom watched Jack walk out of the packing house, leaving him alone in the quiet. He stood for a moment, amazed at the sudden turn of events. Even while part of his mind was screaming out in fear of the possibilities for mischances, another part was beginning to stir with interest. He could feel a twinge of excitement as he contemplated the risks and rewards. There was a certain element of danger and intrigue about illegal activities, an added zest and verve that made the whole world seem more alive.
He could remember the heady days when pounds of reefer were exchanged for outrageous amounts of money in the friendly atmosphere of his house in LA. The stream of people who flowed through his living room shared a feeling of being part of a huge conspiracy. All the way from the mountainside pot fields of Colombia to that room in LA., and on to uncountable smokers around the country, there was a long train of people who would otherwise be strangers, cooperating to move mountains of a good smoke half way around the planet to the eager consumers. The sense of danger only heightened the thrill - until the law came busting through the door. Then the dream turned into a nightmare.
As he considered Jack's offer, Tom absentmindedly walked over to where he'd piled his gear after his last jump of the day. He often found the ritual of packing his parachute a pleasant diversion when his mind was struggling with a difficult problem. He carried the whole bundle over to a clear area of floor. Dropping the canopy, he carried the containers over to a hook attached to the wall. He straightened the harness and containers, and clipped the leg strap buckles to the hook. Working his way up the risers to the connector links, he sorted the suspension line from the front right hand corner of the canopy out of the tangle. Following the line, pushing any tangles in front of him and over the top of the canopy, he soon had one corner clear. Following the seam in the fabric, he pulled the entire nose of the ram-air section by section out of the pile. A couple of shakes slid any crossing lines off the fabric, straightening out the tangles in the process. Flapping the fabric like a bed sheet to align the layers, he settled the almost-orderly stack of nylon fabric down on the floor. Pulling the suspension lines tight from the top of the canopy, he straightened each cell, stretching the wing out with the nose to his right, and tail to his left, stacking the cells one on top of the next.
As Tom's hands glided over the smooth material, he marveled at how close to the truth the joke about all skydivers having a nylon fetish came. He could especially appreciate packing when he was a little stoned, getting off on the feel of the material. That something so light and thin could be so strong never failed to amaze. Playing his eyes over the stretched out canopy, his mind followed the lines of stress along the seams and strips of support tape, picturing the form that looked so soft and limp on the floor and yet was so hard and rigid in the air.
As he knelt by the nose of the canopy and "S" folded the fabric into a neat stack about a foot wide, his mind wandered back to Jack's offer. It did seem to be just the kind of offer he couldn't refuse. He'd been dreading the kind of job he'd have to take over the winter. His employment history was starting to put off the kinds of employers who had good jobs to offer, and the market for temporary help was really poor.
As he reached the tail of the canopy he split the layers of fabric, putting half on each side of the stack, rolling the stack from both sides into a smooth cylinder, pressing the air out as much as possible. Straightening out the deployment bag, he started snaking the cylinder of fabric into the bag, S folding it back and forth across the bag's width. It was a tight fit getting all of the canopy into the sturdy canvas deployment bag, and as he was pushing and shoving the mass of fabric, making sure to fill all the corners in square bag, he felt a sort of resentment over having such a change thrown in his plans. He'd finally managed to resign himself to another menial job over the winter, and now Jack was dangling easy money in front of him - if only he'd give up his resolution to stay straight. And it sounded so easy.
Getting the flap closed on the bag, he pulled the elastic packing band through the grommet on the flap and pushed a loop of suspension lines through the band, locking the bag closed. He got up and released the leg straps from the wall. Returning to the bag, he began 'S'ing the suspension lines across the mouth of the bag - stowing the loops of line in the rows of packing bands on each side as he pulled the containers toward him. When he had all the suspension lines stowed, he laid the lumpy and misshapen bag down and kneaded it into a flat smooth square.
Careful not to put a twist in the lines, he picked up the bag and slid it into the open container. Carefully arranging the bridle cord and folding the skirt of the pilot chute as he compressed the spring, he pulled the container closed. With some pulling and straining, he got the grommets in the side flaps over the cones in the top and bottom flaps, slipping the ripcord pins through to hold it closed. A few pokes and prods straightened the rumpled corners, and a punch or two smoothed out the bumps. Closing the Velcro cover that protected the pins and cones, he sat back and admired his handiwork. It sure would be nice to be able to jump full time, he thought. If he was even a little careful, he could jump-bum around the country for a couple of years on his half of the recovery fee.
Tom's stomach tightened when he thought of what could happen if things went wrong, but as he reviewed the plan in his mind, he couldn't see many opportunities for catastrophe. If Jack's people were as professional as he said they were, the whole gig should go off without a hitch. The more he thought about it, the more attractive Jack's deal sounded. Thousands of skydivers were racking their brains trying to figure out a way to make a living off jumping, and here it was handed to him on a platter - and he was trying to talk himself out of it!
Tom slung his rig over his shoulder to carry it to his locker, and with the weight on his back, the harness in his hands, he decided. The prospect of heading south with the weather and jumping right through the winter was too good to turn down. Stashing his rig in his locker, he set out to find Jack and tell him he was in.