Escape From 50sville

By D. Scott Apel

OK, Boomers! Looking for a unique vacation getaway? Escape to Sunnyville, where the '50s never ended! In this unique, full-immersion theme park, your past is our present! Spend a week reliving the idyllic, carefree existence of your youth...just don't look beneath the serene surface, where corruption fills the utilidors. And don't go looking for trouble--if you do, you're definitely going to find it...just like the web of depravity, conspiracy and deadly deception the town Sheriff stumbles into. Is "Escape" a contemporary satire? A parable of the '50s? A quirky romance? A fond, nostalgic tribute to the days when both ethics and TV were black and white? A cautionary tale of the abuse of surveillance? Answer: Yes! And so much more! As Mark Twain said, "History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes." The legendary, long-lost comic mystery novel by acclaimed author Casey Bragg is now available!

• Language: English
• Publisher: D. Scott Apel
• Release date: Feb 17, 2021
• ISBN: 9781886404410

Book preview

The Short Life and Hard Times of Casey Bragg

by D. Scott Apel

It is not without some small sense of pride that I present the novel Escape from 50sville by Casey Bragg. Anyone who has read my book Exemplary Lives of Impossible Men (Impermanent Press, 2021) will already be acquainted with Casey Bragg, the ill-fated author of numerous unpublished mystery novels. For those unfortunate few unfamiliar with his saga, I present this short biographical synopsis:

Appropriately enough for a writer of mystery fiction, Bragg’s genesis is shrouded in secrecy. Born in mid-March, 1951, of parents who could not keep him, he was adopted by a Lockheed engineer and his wife living in Sunnyvale, California. His was a closed adoption; his birth mother and father and their circumstances were kept confidential, never to be revealed even to the adoptive parents.

Following high school, Bragg matriculated at San Jose State University, bouncing around among the English, Anthropology (Behavioral Sciences) and Justice Studies (Criminology) departments, eventually gravitating to the Psychology Department, where he earned his B.S. degree. The only aspects of the discipline that held any interest for him, however, were the outliers: aberrant psychology and criminal psychology. With no interest in pursuing a career in the field, he combined his various college studies and began writing mysteries. During the course of his literary career he authored some three dozen novels, occasionally teaming up with other writers whose careers were, unfortunately, no more successful than his own.

Bragg’s demise was a fitting sendoff for a mystery writer: responding to an anonymous 911 call, police arrived at Bragg’s home where they were forced to force their way into his home office—a room that had been locked and bolted from the inside. There they discovered his body in a medical body bag which was zipped up and padlocked from the outside. Oddly, however, they found the padlock key inside the bag, in the possession of the corpse. A CSI team combed the house but found no forensic evidence of any involvement of another individual. The Medical Examiner’s autopsy discovered no indication of a fatal event such as a heart attack or stroke, nor any traces of poison; the Coroner subsequently listed the immediate cause of death as suffocation. Despite suggestions that Bragg had somehow managed to lock himself inside the bag, two professional escapologists failed to replicate the feat despite some 400 attempts.

Police detectives could come to no consensus about the type of death: one camp assumed it to be murder, despite the lack of forensic evidence, while an opposing camp insisted it was suicide—despite the evidence to the contrary provided by the aforementioned escapologists. The case remains unsolved to this day.

The mystery of Bragg’s demise is equaled only by the tragedy of his failed career: despite his persistent efforts to become published, he went to his grave unfulfilled as an author. It is my sincere hope that this posthumous publication of Escape from 50sville will in some way, however minor, rectify that egregious error.

(A more complete biography, including a discussion and analysis of Casey Bragg’s lost oeuvre, can be found in my book Exemplary Lives of Impossible Men.)

"Escape" from Custody

The story of how this novel found its way to publication seems a fitting capstone to the author’s life of mystery. Even though, following his tragic demise, Bragg’s files were confiscated by the police as potential evidence, I managed (not without considerable effort and persistence, as well as a modicum of harmless subterfuge) to convince The Authorities that one of those confiscated files belonged, in fact, to me: that I had loaned my novel and notes to Bragg for his evaluation and appraisal and wished them returned. Given patience and persistence, I was eventually able to cut through miles of red tape preventing this return by virtue of having read Bragg’s early draft. By first confirming that much of this confiscated material had indeed been perused by police analysts seeking clues to Bragg’s demise, then by engaging those forensic readers in the minor deception of reciting from memory enough of the novel to convince them of the accuracy of my claim, they ultimately released the file (or a copy) to me, albeit reluctantly. Only by compulsory cunning and obligatory artifice was I thus able to liberate a sliver of Bragg’s brilliance from a fate similar to the Ark of the Covenant in Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Of course, I can hardly in good conscience expect to perpetuate this masquerade of misattribution, and hereby quit all claims to being the actual author of this piece; that honor (or blame!) must rest solely on the shoulders of the late Casey Bragg.

"Escape from 50sville"—The Backstory

While few of Bragg’s notes carry any dates, Escape from 50sville was possibly begun as early as the mid-1980s and intended as a near-future mystery (as opposed to a 1980s contemporary tale). Apparently, Bragg revised and expanded the work on numerous occasions through the early 2000s, a date that is indicated or implied by a scattering of then-contemporary details which would appear curiously anomalous if they’d appeared in earlier drafts—minutiae such as slang and pop culture references. So while we cannot ascertain whether Bragg had originally intended this book to be a sagacious depiction and critique of the surveillance culture then (and still!) growing like kudzu around us, we can at least credit his prescience with the inclusion of such details as the digital tablets carried by the characters (no doubt a precursor of the iPad), as well as the digital video trickery engaged in by several characters.

The irony of reading a near-future novel in the present it was intended to portray is that any accurate predictions are overlooked as prescient prognostications, while erroneous auguries pop out like bubbles in a bathtub. Bragg clearly had wireless connectivity in mind given his liberal use of miniature surveillance cameras, for instance, but wireless routing is so ubiquitous today that his late-‘80s forecast is easily overlooked as being prescient.

Although Bragg placed Escape from 50sville in a near-future setting, he was purposefully vague about precisely when the book was to take place. My best guess, deduced from various notes, the vague ages of the characters, and the technological developments he included, is that the story takes place somewhere in the mid- to late 20-teens.

Editorial Intervention: A Confession and Mea Culpa

As editor of this work, I have taken the liberty of updating some of the technological references Bragg used in the 1980s and ‘90s in order to make the novel more accessible to a contemporary audience, as well as to prevent readers from running into the anachronistic speedbumps of archaic terms which might eject them from their engagement in the story. Portable computer, for example, has been replaced by the more easily identifiable term laptop. (Although the term laptop was in fact in use in the ‘80s, when Bragg was writing this book, there was no way to predict whether or not it would catch on).

Other examples of this techno-linguistic upgrading include Bragg’s floppy disk references, which have been updated to thumb drives or flash drives (which were not available until about 2000), and his description of digitally altered video, which is now herein referred to as deepfakes—a term that had not yet been coined before Bragg’s untimely demise. It is my hope that my minor tweaks appear invisible and lead to a smoother reading experience—and that even these terms will remain contemporary for long enough that they themselves do not sound archaic, although the current trend towards internet data storage and storage in the cloud replacing flash drives and external hard drives virtually ensures the obsolescence of some of the hi-tech terms and accessories. Such is the toll the inexorable juggernaut of technology takes on fiction with every innovation: today’s bleeding edge hi-tech reference is tomorrow’s archaic punchline.

Literary allowances must also be made for the fact that this is essentially a first draft. Although I have attempted to perform a polish, should any gaping plot holes become evident, as the editor, I assume all responsibility; Bragg certainly would have eventually worked these out had he lived to burnish his work. I have also attempted, using Bragg’s notes (as well as a healthy application of intuition), to fill in the gaps where he had not yet completed a scene or a passage. To differentiate between Bragg’s work and my editorial additions and commentary, I have separated my comments from the narrative by setting them apart [in brackets].

I have also taken the liberty of performing some (hopefully) judicious abridgment of this otherwise overly lengthy work. I beg the reader’s indulgence in accepting my judgment regarding which sections should be summarized or excised altogether. My guiding principle here was to streamline the story without sacrificing any essential plot elements or crucial character interaction. Having read Moby-Dick (twice!), no one, I believe, could fault me for skipping those painful chapters dissertating on the history and physiology of whales on the second reading. Once was enough, Herman! And so it is with Escape from 50sville: the overly-detailed descriptions Bragg regularly lavishes on his location, for example, often become redundant, and his detailed delineations of data mining quickly turn tedious. It is my sincere hope that I have simplified the narrative without going (to coin a phrase) abridge too far.

D. Scott Apel

Pahoa, Hawaii

March, 2021

Escape from 50sville

CHAPTER 1

It was July third, 1959, again.

I got the call on the car radio—an urgent order to head immediately to an address on Pine, or as we called it, Cleaver Street. Five minutes later I pulled my modified ’57 Chevy Bel Air patrol car up to the house: a Craftsman style; typical of the neighborhood. There was no sign of trouble.

Before I could even open the car door I was intercepted by my superior, Don Wheazel, Assistant Vice President of Facilities for Sunnyville Holdings LLC. He stormed up to the car and stuck his pointy little head in my window.

You’re out of costume, he stated with great authority, or at least what he probably thought was great authority. But it’s difficult to be authoritative when you’re five-six, have no chin and sport a crew cut—in other words, when you’re Don Wheazel.

Sadly, he was right—I didn’t have my hat on. I hated the uniform, but it was mandatory. Focus groups indicated that being approached by a law officer in a plain brown wrapper was less intimidating than if he was wearing a conventional cop costume—and God forbid the guests should suffer even a twinge of anxiety on their nostalgic vacation, especially from an Authority Figure. So I became Sheriff Drake by corporate fiat.

I reached back into the car, retrieved my Smokey the Bear hat and put it on.

Where’s the fire, Don? They said it was urgent.

Wheazel glanced around to make sure we were alone.

"There’s a child missing!"

Nobody brings their kids here, I balked. Kids’d be bored shitless here.

Well, these guests did. Brought their grandson. Four years old. Said they wanted him to experience their childhood before he was too old to enjoy it.

All right, I sighed. Gimme the deets.

Said they missed him about an hour ago. Thought he might be playing hide-and-seek, but couldn’t find him.

An hour, huh? Can’t have gone far. I’ll check the security footage.

I headed for the house, Wheazel in tow.

Let me talk to them, he insisted. Don’t you talk to them. You’ll just upset them. They’re already frantic.

Don, just tell ‘em nothing bad ever happens in Sunnyville. It’s not allowed. I stopped at the front door and looked down at him. Nothing bad ever happens in Sunnyville, does it Don?

He clenched his jaw and glared at me, but he shut up, maybe only because we were within earshot of the frantic grandparents. The front door was still open and the couple met us in the doorway. They were about my age, which figures. Who else would succumb to the seduction of nostalgia and book a week’s vacation in an idyllic recreation of their youth?

A quick look around indicated that these guests had sprung for the Ward & June Package: ’59 Ford Galaxie convertible in the driveway; 1 bed/1 bath Craftsman; even their ’50s casual costumes were more JC Penny than Brooks Brothers and Dior. But that didn’t matter—whatever they paid for their package, they were guests and they were anxious. And that just won’t do.

Take ‘em to the kitchen, I whispered to Wheazel. Make some coffee. Keep them distracted.

He nodded curtly and ushered the couple into the kitchen.

Meanwhile, I got to work. I unlatched the top of my clipboard to reveal the tablet underneath. Can’t go around carrying a digital tablet in 1959—too anachronistic. Breaks the illusion. I turned on the console TV in the living room—actually a flatscreen camouflaged to look like an ancient Zenith tube set. I logged into the intranet and used the tablet to access Central Surveillance, then selected the four closest lamppost cams that 360’d the exterior of the house. I fast-scanned the footage from the previous two hours on a quartet of split screens but didn’t see anything off-script: the paperboy rode by and tossed the day’s fake newspaper right onto the porch (perfect aim was part of their training); the errand boy, a teen-looking guy from Central Casting, mowed the lawn down the street (with a hand mower. Hope he was getting paid well); the milkman stopped and delivered a couple of bottles to the porch. No one entered the house. No one left the house.

So: The kid was still in the house. Somewhere. Maybe G-ma and G-pa weren’t off track when they thought hide-and-seek.

I began a thorough search of the rented residence. Looked under the couch. Looked behind everything. Checked the bedrooms, under the beds, the closets.

No kid.

I braved the kitchen, where Don was attempting to calm the couple over coffee. Hope he made decaf.

Excuse me, I said. What was the last thing you and your grandson talked about? Before you noticed he was missing.

Grandma answered.

I asked him if he wanted me to bake some gingerbread. He said he did, and I told him to check the panty.

I nodded and opened the door to the small walk-in pantry. It was lined with shelves laden with boxes and cans of food, all part of the set’s stock. The narrow back wall was slightly askew. There we go. Kid must have found the internal latch. I pulled the wall of shelves toward me, stepped onto the hidden landing and walked down the service stairway to the utilidor—one of the miles of utility corridors honeycombed beneath the neighborhood. The whole park, for that matter. Motion detectors turned on the lights as I walked, but all I saw was an empty corridor. No kid.

I continued walking. Every fifty yards or so was another identical staircase, with the house address painted on the wall next to it. Lucky me—at the intersection of the block corridor and the larger neighborhood corridor, I spotted a golf cart parked beneath a map of the utilidor system. A red arrow pointed to the current location. YOU ARE HERE. And so was the kid, curled up fast asleep on the cushioned back seat.

I shook his shoulder gently. He opened his eyes.

Where am I? I got losted.

Don’t worry, buddy. I’ll get you back to your grandma. Wanna take a ride?

He sat up and nodded. I climbed behind the wheel of the cart. Hold on.

We drove back through the corridor to his house. I took him by the hand and led him up the stairs, through the pantry, and into the kitchen. His grandparents jumped up and Gram-gram grabbed him. While she hugged the boy, Pop-pop thanked me and shook my hand.

Just doing my job, I said. When I saw Wheazel glaring at me, I added, Sir.

I stepped outside and waited while Don made profuse apologies. He hardly needed bother—the oldsters were just happy to have the kid returned. I think he slipped them a couple of passes to the Midnight Movie at the Lido, but they didn’t seem like the kind of folk who’d use them.

Eventually, Don left the house and we walked back to our cars.

Jesus, he said, relieved. That could have been a PR nightmare. Can you imagine the bad press we’d get if a child was abducted from ‘The Safest Town in America’?

Not to mention what personal injury might have befallen the kid.

Well, yes, of course.

So don’t worry, Don. You don’t have to put his picture on any milk cartons.

Don was over being nervous and snapped back to his stick-up-the-rear demeanor.

It’s the fifties, he said. We use glass bottles.

Aren’t you gonna tell me what a great job I did in there? I needled.

He bristled. I should write you up for being out of uniform.

Remember, Don, I said, you’re Facilities. I’m Operations. You’re not the boss of me.

I’m tempted to take your behavior all the way to the top. To Mr. Buckminster.

Uncle Bucky? I chuckled. He’s not gonna make you my boss.

Good thing, too. For you. I’d never tolerate your insubordinate attitude. Makes you unfit for your position.

Guess you shouldn’t have elected me Sheriff then, huh, Don?

CHAPTER 2

To paraphrase Julius Caesar, like Gaul, all Sunnyville is divided into three parts: the Town Square and downtown shopping area, dominated by the domed City Hall; the guest suburbs that surround it on three sides; and the transportation network: the veins and arteries of delivery roads and parking lots outside the berm—the tall dirt embankment that surrounded the park proper—as well as the vast underground network of utility tunnels on top of which the various neighborhoods perched. If I were to define a feeble fourth, it would be the citizen’s trailer park, located in a cleared but unimproved dirt field outside the berm—a dozen double-wide trailers arranged like sun rays or the hours on a clock that housed the twelve full-time residents of Sunnyville County.

[Hello. The editor here. Apologies in advance for the interruption, but this seems like a fortuitous opportunity for a brief explication. On the off-chance that you skipped over the Introduction (which I would suggest you read following this brief hiatus), it seems prudent to remind the reader that, as the editor, I have taken the liberty of abridging certain unnecessarily lengthy digressions and descriptions from the narrative. Case in point is the redaction of some of Bragg’s text describing the layout of Sunnyville which occurs at this point. While this detailed description of the geography and layout of Sunnyville is clearly of prime interest to the author, it is also primarily of interest only to the author; for the casual reader (as opposed to the student of city planning or theme park architecture), plot and character trump dry details of static settings every time.

[In general, Bragg continues this section by describing Sunnyville as a wheel with City Hall as its hub. The grassy Town Square in front of this domed building is surrounded by retail outlets, restaurants, and the Lido movie theater; side street spokes radiate out into a full three-quarters of the grounds beyond this central public space, along which are located the various neighborhoods and vacation accommodations—the suburban housing that characterizes Sunnyville. This entire area is surrounded by a high berm that isolates and insulates the guests from any view of, or contact with, the outside world. The final slice of this circular pie is devoted to parking lots—one for employees, one for guests, and a third that houses Sunnyville’s fleet of ‘50s automobiles rented to guests as part of their holiday packages. At the far end of these parking lots, away from the town proper, is the warehouse-sized Admissions building as well as a nondescript apartment complex—the barracks—for temporary resident employees. To the west of the town proper (and outside its surrounding berm) is an area under development for future construction as well as an encampment—essentially just a cleared but undeveloped dirt field—of the dozen double-wide trailers that house the permanent resident employees required by Florida law to qualify Sunnyville County as a legitimate and autonomous governmental entity.

[A more writerly approach than this dry geography lesson—which Bragg did, in fact, employ, however sparingly, throughout the remainder of the novel—would be to merely mention these geographical details in passing, doling out details a tittle at a time (and yes, tittle is the intended word and not a typo for little) and integrating them into the text when and where appropriate. To be blunt, Bragg’s original detailed description of the layout of the grounds could perhaps have been accomplished more adroitly with a simple single-page illustration—a literal line-drawing map. It further occurs to me that I could perhaps have done the same with this digression.]

[My apologies once again for the intrusion, along with my promise to attempt to keep these explanatory intermissions to a minimum. I now return you to the text of Escape from 50sville.]

Instead of going back to my trailer that evening, I went to the Mayor of Sunnyville’s identical unit for our weekly County Supervisors meeting—a thinly-veiled excuse for a poker party and beer bash. The game was already in progress when I arrived. Nine old men with double-wide bottoms were wedged into a breakfast nook designed for half that many diners. They were all staring at their cards and puffing on large, dark cigars. Doc Finnegan, the Physician General and Coroner of Sunnyville County, stood leaning against the sink in the kitchen, watching the game. When I entered, he grabbed a couple of beers from the fridge, popped them open, and handed one to me. We touched bottle necks and nodded to each other—if not precisely a formal toast, at least our personal ritual.

[Me again. The editor. In a particularly George V. Higgins-esque move, Bragg at this point introduces most of these dozen permanent residents yet never mentions them again (with the exception of Doc and a single brief scene near the end). As they play cards, the men—all men, all in their 60s—engage in a dialogue that Bragg’s notes indicate runs something like this:]

Gerber Senior, Bob, the Clerk of the County Courts for Sunnyville County, offered.

"Gerber Gourmet, John, District Attorney for Sunnyville County, amended. That’d sell better to