Grumpy Boss

by Hamel, B. B.

  18

  Rees

  Jack leans back in his chair and stares at me over his computer screen with the biggest frown I’d ever seen. Millie squirmed in the chair beside me, and I let the silence stretch for a bit, waiting for Jack to say something to soften the blow, but it never came.

  “How bad?” I asked finally.

  “Bad,” he said, shaking his head. “We’re about twenty percent short of our goal. And there are about two weeks left to make it up.”

  “Twenty percent is millions,” Millie said, and she leaned back, staring at Jack with a blank look on her face. She wasn’t used to dealing with big numbers like this, so the idea of missing that much likely hit her harder, but even still. She was right—twenty percent was a huge gap to make up, especially without Modesto.

  “Franky, it’s even worse if we take our original estimates,” Jack said, drumming his fingers. “These new numbers are severely downgraded. I’m talking, this is the bare minimum to be viable. If we can’t raise this capital, we’re finished.”

  I let out a breath and glanced toward the windows. The sunlight glittered off the building across the street and I could’ve sworn I saw a conference room full of people having the exact same conversation we were having, only about a different company, under different circumstances—but the idea was the same.

  It was always the same, everywhere. Never enough money when you needed it.

  “I could put in my own,” I said. “Make up the shortage myself.”

  “You could,” Jack agreed. “But then you wouldn’t make any profit yourself, and it would look pretty god damn pathetic. We’d have to disclose that, you know.”

  I shrugged a little, glanced at Millie. “What do you think?”

  She shook her head and laughed a little. “I think I’m was over my head,” she said.

  I smiled at her and resisted the urge to put my hand on her knee. Ever since Modesto’s, it felt like our relationship bloomed, like it was beginning to take root and deepen between us. We hadn’t done anything more, not physically at least, but we talked the entire plane trip back, and most of the night after that on the phone. Now I wanted to show her affection, but I couldn’t, not in front of Jack. As far as he was concerned, Millie was my assistant, and my fake girlfriend, and nothing more.

  Though really, I wondered if it would be such a bad thing, if we made it real.

  “Jack’s right,” I said, putting my knee with my palm. “I can’t put in more of my own money. I’ve put in enough, and any more would look terrible. But we also can’t be short this goal.”

  “Thank you for so eloquently explaining the issue,” Jack said drily. “But we still don’t have an income source.”

  “We need to approach Desmond,” I said.

  Millie leaned back and shook her head. “What, you think he’ll invest?”

  I grinned at her. “Of course not. But we need to get him to back off.”

  “There’s no way he’ll listen,” Jack said. “Not at this point. We’re way too far for that.”

  “There has to be a way,” I said, and stood up, pacing to the windows. I tapped the glass and thought back to the way things used to be, back before we got rich, and things got confusing. “He wasn’t a bad guy back then, you know? He meant well. I think he cared about the company.”

  “But he changed,” Millie said. “Now he’s trying to ruin you.”

  “I know,” I said, and still I felt an odd sense of longing—for those old days before things to complicated, before I got rich. I didn’t miss being poor of course. When folks said money couldn’t buy happiness, they probably never had unlimited money. Maybe it couldn’t cure a depressed person, but comfort and stability was no small thing in the grand scheme, and money made my life so much easier. It was the same for him, and as soon as he got a taste of what it could be like, making so much, I think he got jealous and angry and thought he deserved more.

  Maybe I could’ve done something. Maybe I could’ve given him a bonus, or maybe let him have a bigger cut of the profits, or something like that. Anything to how him that he mattered. Instead, I pushed back hard, and the rift between us grew until now he hated me with a passion, and I hated him in turn, and noting would fix it, no matter what.

  “There have to be other people,” Millie said. “Maybe people that don’t live in the US, that want to invest?”

  “That comes with its own problems,” Jack said, frowning a touch, but looked over at me as I turned. “It’s not a bad idea though. We know some Saudis that might be willing.”

  “I’m going to call Desmond,” I said, shaking my head, and holding a hand up to forestall Jack’s response. “I want to talk to him. Even if we’re not going to become best friends again, and it probably won’t fix anything, I have to try.”

  Millie looked more hurt than angry. She shook her head like I was making a horrible mistake. And maybe she was right—reaching out to Desmond wasn’t going to solve anything, and it might only make it worse.

  I still had to try. We were on the brink of failing, and failure was not an option, not for me. I wanted Millie to make her money, hell, I wanted all my investors to get filthy rich, and it would be nice if I earned a little bit extra myself.

  I left Jack’s office with Millie on my heels. She caught up with me in the halls, but didn’t say anything, only match my stride. I knew what she was thinking already, and didn’t have to say it out loud. I shut my office door and she turned to me, arms over her chest, as I walked over to my desk and sat.

  “This is a bad idea,” she said.

  “Convince me,” I said, gesturing for her to sit.

  She hesitated, making a face like she’d rather do anything else, but she sat down, her back straight. She looked at me like I was a judge in a court room—and I saw the lawyer inside of her, struggling to get out. From all the time we’d spent together, I knew she’d make an exceptionally good lawyer, and that she was absolutely not going to fail if she put herself out there and took a chance. All she had to do was try—and maybe I could convince her to take that final step once all this was over.

  “Think about how this plays out,” she said, holding a finger up in the air. “Most likely, he’s not going to do what you want. That’s true, right?”

  I nodded slightly. “I’ll conceded that. It’s unlikely he’ll listen.”

  “So if he won’t listen, then calling has a non-zero chance of making things worse, won’t it? Imagine if you lose your cool and you two start arguing, and he only doubles down. That’ll make this whole thing even more impossible.”

  “True,” I said, nodding along. “You’re not wrong.”

  “And even if he doesn’t do that, calling him shows that he’s winning. Even getting a taste of victory might make him fight even harder. For all we know, he’s about to give up on his own, without our help. Maybe calling might galvanize him into action all over again.”

  “You’re not wrong,” I said, laughing, shaking my head. She was a damn smart girl, seeing, this issue from all sides and extrapolating the likely outcomes. I couldn’t argue with her, not really, but she didn’t see the one fact hat mattered above all else.

  “So why do it then?” she asked. “If the chances are pretty good that this is going to backfire, why would you take the risk?”

  “Because we used to be friends, and I wish we still were.” Once the words left my mouth, I knew they were true. I was fucked up, and a little pathetic, but I missed my friend.

  She deflated and lowered her hand. She blinked at me, and her lips pulled down slightly, and I felt almost sick—the pity in her eyes was disgusting, and I hated myself for being that vulnerable. I had to look away from her before I saw just how weak I’d become.

  “You really miss him?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said, hedging a little, afraid to truly open up.

  “Come on, it’s okay if you do. I just didn’t really realize… from what you told me, I thought you two were just colleagues.�
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  “We were good friends,” I said, still not looking at her. I squeezed my eyes shut in an attempt to get some courage, but that didn’t help. I opened them again, and looked at the blue sky above the glittering glass buildings. “We’d work all day then spend most of the night together, drinking at the bars around town. Alvin would hang out, make jokes, we’d all get drunk and discuss what to do with the company next, how to grow it. When we became a legit organization, we’d do the same thing, but in the conference room at night, with six packs of craft beer and boxes of pizza. We did that constantly, every day, for years.”

  I let out a slow breath, remembering those days, when we were young and building something, and so sure of ourselves, unable to imagine that we couldn’t succeed. If we were given a chance, of course we could build a company that could compete against the big guys, because we were smart and idealistic. Desmond and I were close, which was why it felt like such a betrayal when he left, and why things remained so fraught between us. That wound never healed, only festered.

  And it didn’t help that I had few other close friends. Ever since he left, I threw myself into my job, dove down deep into it and refused to look up, because every time I did, I hated what I saw of myself. I was alone and bitter, though rich. I spent all my time making more money, but almost no time enjoying myself.

  I was still young, and yet I acted like I was ancient.

  Millie made me see that. Having her in my life made me realized how badly I wanted someone close. Lady Fluke was a good friend, but we were never close, not the way that I was with Desmond, and not the way that I am with Millie. The Lady meant a lot to me—she was one of my last friends. But I needed more, and I thought only Millie cold give that to me, only she had the slightest chance of making it happen at all.

  “But he left all that for money,” she said softly. “I can’t imagine how that must have felt.”

  “At the time, I was angry,” I said. “I felt like he was betraying me, in the same way that he thought I was betraying him by not giving him more power in the company. We couldn’t come together anymore, something got blocked between us. And it never recovered from there.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said, leaning forward, hand on my desk. I reached out on impulse and covered her hand with mine. “If that’s how you feel, why don’t you tell him that? Admit that you miss his friendship and say you want to patch things up.”

  I laughed softly and shook my head. “I can’t do that,” I said. “I can’t trust him anymore. I’m not going to make myself vulnerable and have him stab me in the back all over again.”

  “You’ll never heal what broke in you two if you can’t take the risk,” she said.

  “Then maybe it’ll never heal.” I squeezed her hand and laced my fingers through hers. “Maybe that’s not so bad.”

  She chewed on her lip then pulled her hand back and stood. I felt the absence of her fingers like a ghost on my palm. She stood, and I stared at her body, thinking about that night in the moonlight as she walked across my office, and over to her little table.

  “If you want to call, I won’t stop you,” she said. “I still think it’s a mistake, but I’m glad you told me your reasons at least.”

  I gave her a sad, tight smile, and picked up my phone. I pulled up the number Alvin gave me and stared at it for a long time. I hadn’t spoken to Desmond in so long, and suddenly I felt nervous, which was wild. I hadn’t felt nervous about anything in a long, long time.

  I called it. Nothing happened, until several beeps came over the line, and a robotic voice repeated, over and over: The number you are trying to call has been disconnected. Please hang up and try again.

  I gaped and slowly lowered my hand. Millie stared at me with confusion, then worry, and she leaned toward me. “What happened?” she asked.

  Rage flared. True, red hot anger. I clenched my jaw and stared at my phone. I dialed the number again, and got the robot woman’s voice again. I slammed my phone down on my desk.

  “Alvin fucked me,” I said, and pushed my chair back, grabbed my office line, and dialed his number.

  19

  Millie

  In the relatively short time that I’d known Rees, I’d see him angry a few times. He always looked sort of pissed off, which was scary at first, but then I thought it was kind of sexy.

  But I’d never seen him so pissed off before. He stood with his desk phone in his hand, practically trembling with rage. I walked back over to him and wanted to do something to help, but I knew I couldn’t calm him down, and couldn’t do much more than be there for him. I stared and chewed on my lip and thought of the story he’d just told me—about missing his friend, about wishing he could fix things, about money tearing him apart. I wondered if that happened to a lot of wealthy people, and guessed that it probably did. Money cause issues in the same way that it solved them. People were always people.

  I wished he could have his friend back. I wished none of this were happening—except the part where we met, and started down this path together.

  He grimaced at me, then jabbed a finger at the phone, turning on speaker. He put the receiver back down and stared with fury as it rang and rang, some phone in that tiny, rundown surf shop in San Francisco buzzing away, ignored, unanswered—until a voice appeared.

  “Hello?” It was Alvin, no doubt in my mind.

  Rees glanced at me, then sat down and leaned over the speaker, staring at it like he wanted to smash it with his forehead.

  “Alvin,” he said. “If you hang up, I will come out there, and I will hurt you.”

  There was a long beat. I thought for a second that maybe Alvin had hung up after all—but then he let out a sad little groan. “Rees,” he said. “Hey, man.”

  “You gave me a fake number,” Rees said, speaking clearly and slowly. “You tried to fuck me.”

  “Yeah, right, about that,” Alvin said, sounding like his voice was trebling. “Look man, I’ve been drinking a lot, okay? I was pretty wasted when you showed up.”

  “And are you wasted right now?” Rees asked, almost spitting the words.

  “No, no, it’s too early to be wasted,” Alvin said, then added, “but you know, I’ve had a few drinks, but I’m fine, man.”

  I sighed and touched my forehead with my fingers, trying to think. Alvin was an alcoholic—we should’ve seen it. The way he had that alcohol hidden, the way he drank, the state of that place, it should’ve been obvious. And yet we both missed it.

  “Alright,” Rees said, trying to talk slowly, like Alvin was a toddler with a tenuous grip on language. “Did you give me a fake number on purpose, or was that a mistake?”

  “Rees, man, come on,” Alvin said, and I knew he did it on purpose. That dumb, dumb asshole tried to trick Rees, and it almost worked. If Reed had decided not to call Desmond after all, then Alvin would’ve gotten away with it.

  He almost got lucky. Instead, he fucked up massive.

  Rees looked like he wanted to burn something. His eyes met mine and it was pure madness in them.

  “You fucked me,” Rees said. “You really tried to fuck me. You know how dumb that was, don’t you, Alvin?”

  “Rees,” Alvin groaned. “You know I got loyalty. Desmond takes care of me, man. I don’t know what I’d be without him. He got this place, and you know, I got bills and shit, and—“

  “He buys your fucking alcohol too I bet,” Rees said, cutting him off. Alvin let out a pathetic whine. “God damn, he owns you. Pays for everything, even your booze, and if you try and do something against him, he can take it all away and leave you ruined. You realize that, right? He owns you, Alvin.”

  “I know,” he whispered, voice sounding pathetic. “But what can I do?”

  “I told you, I can help,” Rees said. “You know I have resources. If you’ll let me, I can use them.”

  “What do you want, man?” Alvin sounded angry all of a sudden, like his mood shifted and turned like a leave in the wind. “What the fuck do you want from me?”
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  “I want Desmond,” Rees said. “Give me an address. And a phone number. No lying this time. I want Desmond.”

  Alvin sighed, and another long pause came over the line. I pictured Alvin pouring a drink and slugging it back, staring at his empty surf shop, the counter dusty, the product practically rotting on the hangers.

  “I need money,” Alvin said finally. “I need a lot of it.”

  “How much?” Rees asked, and his expression soured, but I knew he was willing to deal.’

  “Five million,” Alvin said.

  Rees laughed like it was some sick joke. “Ten thousand, and I’ll buy you a place to live. In the fucking Bay Area, that’ll be over a million.”

  “I need five,” Alvin said. “Just to live, man, and my shop—“

  “One,” Rees snapped. “And that’s all I do for you. One million, you do whatever you want with it.”

  Another silence, and I thought I heard the sound of Alvin pouring a drink. Rees looked exhausted and terrible, but his eyes were sharp and bright.

  “Fine,” Alvin said. “But I need money now. You know, I got bills—“

  “Fuck you,” Rees said. “You give me the address and the number, and after I’ve found and talked to Desmond, then I’ll fucking pay you.”

  “He’ll kill me,” Alvin said, whining again, and it was the saddest thing I’d ever heard, a grown man talking like that. He was so shattered, and held together by almost nothing. Desmond took everything from him, and kept him on a tight leash, owned and controlled, dominated to the core, and left to rot in the California sun.

  “I don’t care,” Rees said. “Make the call. Otherwise, I’ll hire a fucking private investigator for less, and find him that way.”

  “Shit,” Alvin said, then rattled off a number and an address.

  “Say it again,” Rees said, and I grabbed a pen. Alvin said it one more time, sounding like he wanted to throw up, and I wrote it down.

  “I need money,” Alvin said. “I got bills. I really do.”