The Loyal Catholic

By Richard DeVall

Isabella doesn't show up for work. Her car was found with her purse and keys on the front seat. The police are looking in the wrong direction. Her friends are frantic. Cracks appear in their relationships as the stress and strain of their friends' disappearance builds.

Isabella looks around and vomits. He holds her arm in a death grip to keep her from running or falling if she passes out. He tells his dead mother it won't be long until the pretty new girl joins her.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Richard DeVall
• Release date: Apr 27, 2024
• ISBN: 9798224570614

Book preview

Chapter 1

Isabella bites down on her lower lip to keep from quivering. Damn you, teeth. Stop chattering.

A gnawed fingernail full of dirt and grime plows into her filthy palm to prevent her body from shivering.

It doesn't work. Nothing works.

Terrified and helpless, she experiences every cell in her nervous system revolt and turn away from calming her down. She’s rushed straight into a state of panic. The slightest shift on the spongy ground rattles the lock and chain still fastened around her waist, and it sounds like marbles rolling in an empty barrel. Her anxiety level continues to ratchet up. The air is warm, yet, she shakes.

Silently, mentally, she begs her body to stop moving. He'll hear something.

Isabella's grotesque, prurient tormentor slugs ever closer through the brush. I hope he can't hear me breathe. She sees him in her mind's eye, raising his big head, sniffing and sweating, looking for his escaped project, wanting to drag her back to his macabre basement; a psychopath's dungeon.

He's sinister and evil. His egg breath and fish stink radiate out of him, and with it, there's  more than a whiff of mental illness.

For God's sake, don't give yourself away. Keep your head down; look at the moss, and breathe in the dirt.

Her control is fading.

Fear drenches her brain, and it chews down her spine. Her eyes dart in wild circles as she fights to stay focused on the moist dirt.

Freaked-out thoughts fling unwanted glimpses, tiny snapshots of the place she's just escaped — the room with the others.

Heart, give me a massive attack! I don't want to go back. Give me death. God, I beg you, help me to die. I'm a sinner. I know it, you know it, we all know it; please, take me anyhow.

They also begged, her unhelpful mind whispers. They begged him, and they begged God. And how did that work out? He talks to them. The ones he dresses and sprays—the ones who have nothing below their waist.

She can hear him. He's closer. The madman in search of his quarry. She worries he's going to pick up her scent from the fear oozing out of every pore. She's saturated in it. I don't want that disgusting, filthy animal forcing me to touch him again. He took advantage of my kindness.

Isabella slips into shock. She can feel it. Unbridled horror swamps the whole of her. The skin on her arms and legs is covered in a slick sheen; an ice-cold film, despite the heat. She's dehydrated and malnourished.

He'll hear me when I slump over, pick me up like a ragdoll, and carry me back to those things he has hanging from the walls. They were once people. Please, God, kill me with a stroke, take me with an aneurism, I'm begging you.

At that moment, it randomly occurs to her that the food the rats gnaw on every night in the concrete sink is probably legs; human legs.

****

Isabella And Mia Go National

Their big break comes after signing a significant contract to market a new body spray. They have two hundred thousand dollars from Hanon Borsuk, Mia’s boyfriend. His father is a one-percenter with more money than most third-world countries. Two hundred grand is a jackpot for the two women and a tremendous boost to their struggling advertising agency.

They’re frantic to make a marketing success, not only for Hanon and his partner, Ryan, but for their agency. They learned in college all the statistics for each ad medium. Previous to having such a large contract, they'd been dealing with ads on Instagram, Facebook, Google, Twitter, Snapchat, YouTube, Amazon, and TikTok. They can finally apply techniques they learned in school to make a television commercial, not just simple videos, and ad copy.

The first challenge will be to create an extended advertisement, followed by a shorter one that’s pulled from inside the longer version. It saves money, and people recall the longer ad on a subconscious level. There’ll be no room for mistakes. Two hundred thousand isn’t enough money to run a national television ad, and the local audience is too small. Even late-night regional ads are costly, averaging 15 dollars per thousand viewers a second.

They want to hit Richmond in Virginia, Raleigh in North Carolina, Columbia in South Carolina, and the Savannah/Charleston areas of Georgia and South Carolina. Northern Virginia, D.C., and Atlanta are out of the question. They’re aiming for those four midsized populations because they believe it’s the best they can do with the funds they have. Even in those markets, late-night advertising is too expensive for regular television. The only ads they can afford are on streaming services. They can’t pay for cable. Their focus is Hulu, Sling, and Pluto.

The first hurdle is the script. Then they’ll need freelance actors, videographers, and voiceover people. Creating an ad that will sell the product is hard enough, but to do it on the cheap is nearly impossible. Isabella and Mia are committed to doing their best, and there’s no daylight between them when it comes to confidence in one another. They'll eat bread and drink water if that's what it takes. Every penny is sunk into the marketing of the body spray. Both women understand what’s needed when an opportunity like this comes along. They need to be in it to win it 100%, they become obsessed.

****

The Long Ad

A loud black and chrome, chopped Harley Davison motorcycle cruises up beside a long, silver Rolls Royce at a red light. The chopped bike has raised handlebars, and the driver's arms are old and wrinkly; they stick out from underneath an oil-stained, fringed leather vest. He has exposed hairy armpits.

The window on the rear of the Rolls Royce moves up when the motorcycle comes to a complete stop beside it. Then a timid, slow, and jerky window reverses and comes down a few inches. A man's arm with a manicured hand comes out. The wrist is covered with a monogrammed white shirt, sporting a gold cufflink under a dark suit sleeve. In the hand is a can of Z12 body spray. The biker takes it and nods a simple thank you before he roars away.

Elapsed time is created and sped up by having a popsicle melt onto a cracked sidewalk. The goo is overwhelmed with ants. The background music is a flute version of the elephant walk. Soon, nothing is remaining except for the popsicle stick. (Time sequence - 10 seconds)

The motorcycle, once again, pulls up beside the Rolls. The biker has his wrinkled arms held high as he grasps the handlebars. He’s wearing a new denim vest with a chain hanging from a belt loop to a partially exposed wallet. On the back of the bike is an old, tattooed, skinny woman, sporting a short skirt with high heels and scrawny legs that have bony kneecaps. She smiles toward the people in the back of the Rolls. She could use dentures. The biker turns toward the backseat of the chauffeur-driven Rolls. The same manicured hand comes out with a thumbs up. The biker nods as he revs the noisy engine, then he speeds away.

As the camera pans out, the voice-over says, Z12, who will you attract? The question is followed by a fast talker with a reduced volume, Z12 is a natural scent derived from plants. No animals were harmed or used in the making of this product.

The commercial garners wide appeal. It's bold and different. Z12 begins to move off the shelves. The first commercials stream and loop late at night in the southern regions, then expand into the East Coast market. More money is put into the agency by Hanon and Ryan and it's no longer borrowed; the funds are pouring in from sales of the product. The ad moves from streaming to cable. The sales increase. The ad is widened from cable networks into national broadcasts, albeit mid-day and late-night, but it’s national, and the girls are thrilled. Hanon and Ryan are doing all they can to keep up with the orders. Hanon's father is repaid, and the two owners are on a path to becoming very successful.

The marketing has put all four players on the map. Viewers soar on YouTube, and the short version, without the time-lapse, is placed on all the social media outlets. Likes and followers build on each other, and Isabella and Mia, both in their mid-twenties, can't believe how rapidly they're being pushed into expanding their company.

****

The I & M Advertising Agency is the brainchild of Isabella Serrano and Mia Zhang when they were roommates in college. The Z12 project came about from Mia dating Hanon Borsuk, co-owner of Rohan Industries, a bastardized name of Hanon and Ryan Davidson. All four have known each other from school, where Mia once dated Hanon until he cheated on her.

Years later, they began seeing each other in certain circles, and, against Isabella's advice, Mia and Hanon were, once again, inseparable, causing Isabella to suppress the urge to jam a finger down her throat every time Mia mentioned Hanon.

Ryan, Hanon's business partner, is the total opposite of him. He comes from a large middle class family filled with love. He dates one girl, from high school, through college, and they’re now working on their third child. He was born to be a father and husband. He loves the simple things, like tossing a Nerf football with his two boys in the backyard as his adorable wife, Zoey, stirs potato salad for their after-church cookout. Kneeling, he gives the boys catching tips. They’re three and four years old. It cracks Zoey up.

Why don’t you provide them with investment advice while you’re at it, Ryan?

He raises his head and smiles. "Do they help you bake cookies?

Yes, they do.

Have I suggested you go further?

No, you have not, she smiles

This is man stuff, sweetie, right boys? he looks down at their cherub faces. He's never been so happy. The boys smile and run circles around their dad's legs, purposely stepping on his feet and laughing like crazy when they do it.

After the cookout, Zoey gathers the paper plates and plastic forks and packs them into a plastic trash bag. Ryan cleans the grill and the boys are soon put down for a nap. After the two adults sit in the living room and chat for a brief period, Ryan excuses himself to go into the basement.

A third of the area has been walled off, soundproofed, and has a weather-tight, exterior door, instead of a flimsy, hollow interior door. He calls it his sanctuary; a home away from home and a place to meditate.

Ryan and Hanon had dreams of creating natural scents. They didn't want off-the-shelf chemicals going into anything they created. Soon after college, with the help of Hanon’s father, they had a warehouse filled with vats packed with flowers and herbs. The technique used to capture the fragrance was a distilling method and the concentrated vapor was mixed with essential oils to create a long-lasting scent for both skin, and clothing.

They were struggling until Z12 launched them into orbit. It was their twelfth product, and the two men weren't imaginative with names.

When asked about it, they referred Isabella and Mia to Chanel number five. It was their fifth try for a new fragrance. Z12 comes from the Zenobia flower, which comes from an evergreen plant. It’s our twelfth try, and we believe the story is important to go along with the product.

The two women designed the can and printed the brief history on the backside of each. The final process was contracted with a processing plant in Luisa County, Virginia, to pressurize the liquid into a spray can and attach the wrapper.

Both men are thrilled when they repay Hannon's father for the startup money. Business is good, and everyone's life is changing for the better. The men are anxious to find the next fragrance.

Meanwhile, Isabella and Mia land a new client who produces casual, yet stylish and affordable canvas shoes.

****

Another Popular Ad

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Fog surrounds a group of people gazing at a smoldering hole in the earth. The men and women are dressed in dirty jeans and sweat-stained tops. A camera filter mutes any color, and the atmosphere is dystopian meets Frankenstein. The huddled crowd has weapons; spears, shotguns, pistols, and machetes. The man closest to the hole says, We have to go in there and kill the creature. If we don't stop it now, humanity will end and everyone we know and love will die.

In the back of the group is a thirty-something model. He’s handsome and casually dressed. The good-looking actor has the obligatory three-day growth on his face, a strong jawline, and is no stranger to the gym. He doesn't have a weapon and slowly backs away from the group milling around the hole in the forest. He’s nonchalant as he walks backward, and as he gets closer to the camera, color begins to emerge in the trees and bushes as they bloom into full greenery. The man's flesh is skin tone, his jeans are dark blue, and his T-shirt is sky blue. You can always get new friends, he shrugs, but I don't want to get my new Fit-N-Flex shoes dirty. I feel like I'm walking on air. They're washable, but that would mean I'd have to take them off my feet, he smiles with brilliantly white, perfect teeth that sparkle.

A professional voiceover speaks. Now available anywhere fine shoes are sold.

Fit-N-flex didn't break records, but the advertisement did sell shoes, pleasing the manufacturer. The partners and the long-time girlfriends are beside themselves with self-aggrandizing comments they could hardly contain.

God, we're good.

The two owners are on the balcony of a new downtown office with views of the city. The sun is setting in a brilliant display of whites and yellows that reflect off the James River. A  bottle of Pinot Chardonnay by Lamborghini sits on a table between them. It’s a gift from the Fit-N-Flex folks that came in a chilled box with two crystal champagne glasses, along with the wine. The women are in heaven.

As they sip and study the river, the bridges and islands, Isabella and Mia are close to pinching themselves. They didn’t expect to have such a rapid rise to success. In college, they talked about years of hammering away at building a customer base and concentrating on repeat customers.

They’re relatively young and already hiring fresh faces, younger than themselves. They’re doing all they can to keep away from the pitfalls of growing pains and failing from success. The business owners will need to keep up with new customers and give them the attention they deserve. It means letting go of everything they control. Taking the long view from a mile high both partners understand that without delegating more, and more, they'll burn out.

Let's move Carrie into the position of office manager, Mia says. That way she can handle the day-to-day and also take care of your travel arrangements when we can’t zoom. That’ll free us up some. Mia worries her bottom lip with her teeth. Do you think Jason can do the new hires if we give him some guidance?

Yes, I think he can, Isabella answers. "We're going to be busier than we’ve ever been with staffing up and all that. We've got to trust him. We have to trust