Risking Ruin

by Mae Wood

  Marisa arrived home before seven o’clock. Blessedly, she hadn’t seen a soul she knew. But, she had crossed paths with several early morning joggers and dog walkers. She was sure she had been quite the sight, and was thankful that no one had called the neighborhood’s rent-a-cops. Marisa headed straight to her bathroom, turned the shower to as hot as it would go, and faced herself in the mirror. Yup. Way to royally screw up your life. She looked exactly like the mess she felt like. Her hair was flat and greasy on her scalp in parts and other bits stuck out at weird angles. Her mascara had turned her into a raccoon. She peeled her clothes off and threw them in her hamper with force. Seriously, why the fuck did I do that? I’m not that desperate that I just sleep with men I hardly know. Did I suddenly lose a dozen years of age and now am back in college, doing all of the things that I was too good a girl to do when I was in Charlottesville?

  The hot water felt punishingly good. It cleaned her, calmed her, and let her gather her thoughts. Okay. I’ve got to get a plan together. This is what I do. I handle problems for people. I can handle this. First, I need to minimize the damage I’ve done with Branco. Secondly, this cannot happen again. No more dates or things that look or feel like dates with Trip.

  Marisa settled on an ice queen approach. She’d just keep Trip at a professional distance and hope he kept his trap shut.

  Marisa rolled into her office around nine. That was very late for her, but she was hurting. Chugging what felt like a half gallon of VitaminWater hadn’t made a dent in her headache. She hadn’t had the energy to dress in anything other than her I’m-going-to-pull-an-all-nighter black jersey wrap dress. It looked professional enough, but felt like a bathrobe.

  “Morning, Marisa!,” called Jane cheerily, and Jane was completely oblivious to Marisa’s straggling pace. She was too engrossed in Facebook to look up. Marisa plunked down in her desk chair. She hit the intercom button on her phone.

  “Jane,” she spoke in a voice that was barely above a whisper. “Can you get me a milky coffee and keep them coming?”

  “Sure,” chirped Jane.

  Marisa was staring blankly out her window when Jane appeared a few minutes later with a steaming mug. “Rough night?,” inquired Jane, setting down the mug on Marisa’s desk.

  “Yup,” said Marisa succinctly, taking a tentative sip. “Is it this Branco suit with John that’s getting to you? It’s only been two weeks. I’m sure you’ll figure out what’s really going on. It just takes some time. Is the new hottie General Counsel riding you already?” Marisa cringed and took another sip. He had, in a style, but she wasn’t about to let herself think about last night.

  “You could say that.”

  “What can I do to help?”

  “Well, I’ve interviewed all of the witnesses I can think of and we’ve gotten all of the documents that would prove Susan’s making this up. But after all of that, I still don’t have anything that says either Susan’s telling the truth or she’s lying. It’s going to be a classic he said-she said case and those are never pretty. I wish I could figure out what caused her to bring this up now.”

  “When I was typing your notes, I saw that she’d recently gone through a divorce. Do you want me to pull those court records?”

  “Sure. That’s a good idea. Let’s see what’s there. We need to chase down any angle we have.”

  “Okie dokie. I’ll do that. Don’t stress too much. Jimmy Brannon loves your work. I’m sure once you crack this case, his son will love you, too.”

  This was the second time in three minutes that Marisa’s stomach flipped. She didn’t want to think about her drunken exploits with Trip, and definitely didn’t want to let herself imagine that it was more than a dangerous combination of booze and lust. Trip Brannon and love were two things she couldn’t allow herself to even dream about in the same sentence.

  Jimmy’s update on the Susan-John lawsuit was due in a few days. Marisa spent the entire day finishing a detailed letter to Jimmy about what she’d learned -- not much; what she needed to do -- a lot; and what the risks were--big. Before she realized it, her hangover was gone, as were her lingering thoughts of Trip.

  Marisa spent the next week working on other cases and drafting updates about the eight non-John and Susan sexual harassment claims that Branco was facing. As she thought about them, she noticed some similarities. All but one involved a woman complaining about a male supervisor sexually harassing her at the office. All claimed that the harassment occurred with no other witnesses present. Copy rooms, behind closed doors in offices, late nights or early mornings. They were all he-said-she-said situations with little hard proof either way. Four of the claims bothered her, and she thought a jury could pop Branco for some big bucks.

  The woman who worked as the cashier in Branco’s cafeteria claimed to have been forced to give the chef a blow job in the kitchen’s walk-in cooler in exchange for not being fired after accidentally ringing up a hundred orders of coleslaw instead of a single extra side for a catering order. Sure enough, the coleslaw charges were evident from the cash register’s receipts. But sex in the cooler hadn’t been witnessed by anyone and the entire department swore up and down that the cashier wouldn’t go into the cooler. That said, the cashier had been really good at describing the exact location of the bags of salad that she’d used to cushion her knees while she blew her boss.

  The sole woman in Branco’s IT department described her boss forcing her to watch porn with him every Friday afternoon for a year in their open floor plan office space and then quizzing her about her favorite sex positions with her husband. Sure enough, on Friday afternoons, they were the only two people on the work schedule, which was set by the boss. There wasn’t any porn stored on Branco’s computers, but she knew jurors would just suspect that any IT guy worth his salt could work some computer magic and make any evidence of porn vanish.

  The payroll group was all women, but that apparently hadn’t stopped one lady’s boss’s boss from leaving 5x7 color photographs in her desk chair of what was allegedly his penis. Penis pictures. The boss had denied it. Short of having the boss whip out his erect penis in front of the jury, she wasn’t quite sure how she was going to prove that the dick pics weren’t his. Dick pics. Sometimes I cannot believe clients pay four hundred dollars an hour for me to look at what is essentially porn.

  The odd man out was in fact a man in Branco’s accounts payable group. Dave Priddy claimed that about a year ago he’d been repeatedly groped by his boss, Carol Stewart, during his annual performance review. At that review, she offered to change his review from a “meets expectations” to an “outstanding,” if he’d perform as a stripper at a bachelorette party that Ms. Stewart was hosting for her sister. He turned his boss down, and got a “needs improvement” review and no pay raise. That case was the furthest along. In fact, it was supposed to go to a trial just before Christmas where a jury would decide Branco’s fate. She hated Christmas juries. Filled with the holiday spirit, jurors felt generous with corporate defendants’ checkbooks.

  She wrote Jimmy a detailed review of Mr. Priddy’s claims, and noted the facts that Ms. Stewart had in fact hosted a bachelorette party shortly after Mr. Priddy’s annual review and had indeed hired a male stripper. Marisa had originally thought this claim was complete hogwash. Who would invite one of their subordinates to play stripper for a night? Then Marisa met Mr. Priddy and immediately knew Branco was in trouble.

  Any female juror with a pulse would want Mr. Priddy to strip for her. He was a beefy volunteer EMT on the weekends and was currently Mr. July, the hottest month, on the Munford Volunteer Fire Department’s fundraising calendar. In her heart, Marisa completely believed his claim, but it was her job to try to get Branco off the hook. She thought that Branco should just fire Ms. Stewart and write Mr. Priddy a check, but Jimmy Brannon didn’t like to give money away. If Branco was going to write a check, then it would only do so after a jury and judge made Branco pay.

  The timeline of all these trials meant that Marisa would h
ave no life outside of the office for the next eighteen months. And that was fine with her. Less time to think about Trip Brannon.

  Chapter Twelve

  September arrived, and Marisa was thankful. Not for the promise of lowered heat and humidity on her runs alone, but that it was the second Sunday of the month and she was headed to supper at Erica’s house. Marisa hopped in her Audi and headed down Poplar toward Germantown and Erica’s brick McMansion of a house.

  She and Erica had become quick friends in junior high. Even though their paths led them to different places after high school, they’d stayed close. Marisa headed to Virginia for seven years, and Erica went to the Savannah School of Art and Design, then various places following her inspiration, including some time in France, before returning home to Memphis. Unlike Marisa who came home because Memphis was always home to her, no matter how much Collierville had changed, Erica found her way back to Memphis three years ago with a husband and two children in tow.

  They’d fled New York after the birth of their second child. Erica’s husband Josh did something with financial modeling that Marisa didn’t even pretend to understand. All she knew was that Josh was good at his job and that the internet and monthly week-long trips to New York allowed him to live in Memphis, where the kids could have Erica’s parents nearby and a green backyard.

  Erica and Josh had met when she was in New York, taking some classes at Parsons, and he was in full young financier models and bottles mode. Marisa was never sure what caused their very different lives to merge so smoothly, but they had. They’d married within a year of meeting. Marisa stood up for Erica as a bridesmaid at Erica’s unconventional beach wedding in Anguilla. A little while after, Simon arrived, followed closely by Miriam.

  It was Miriam’s addition to the family that had resulted in Erica pressing Josh into moving to Memphis. She claimed that she wanted green space for the kids and the help of her parents. Marisa had always thought that it was giving up her small but dedicated studio space in their apartment so that Miriam could have a nursery that had done them in on New York.

  Regardless, Erica found herself in the most unlikely of places for an artist. A big house in Germantown, shuttling the kids to activities in a large Tahoe, and all of the other trappings of a suburban stay-at-home mom. But inside Erica was still the bohemian artist. She leased studio space in a loft not far from Marisa’s condo, and Erica’s mom kept the kids after kindergarten and preschool twice a week so that Erica could have full days in her studio. These were luxuries of time, money, and space that Erica couldn’t have dreamed of affording in New York.

  Marisa knew from Erica’s complaints that the moms in her children’s school thought Erica just had an intense hobby. They had no clue that Erica’s work was shown in galleries outside of Memphis, including Dallas, Chicago, and Miami. But between Marisa’s work and Erica’s work and family, they saw each other infrequently the first year they were both back in Memphis.

  Then Erica came up with her best idea ever, in Marisa’s opinion. A Shabbat-inspired supper with Marisa at the family’s dining room table the second Sunday of every month. Erica even insisted that Josh always be home for dinner that evening. She told him it was because she wanted all the people she loved around the same table, but Marisa knew it was really because having Josh at home allowed “the girls” to hang out in the kitchen, gab, and drink as much wine as they pleased without being bothered by the children.

  Marisa pulled up into Erica and Josh’s driveway and found Miriam drawing with chalk on the walkway. Miriam was her mother made over – wavy dark brown hair, round and honest milk chocolate eyes, and a smile so large that it obscured the rest of her face. “Risa!,” shouted the almost five year old, going in for a hug. “I’ve missed you. I love you. Are you coming to my birthday party?”

  “Of course, sweetheart. I love you, too. I wouldn’t miss it.” said Marisa, releasing Miriam and brushing chalky handprints from her jeans. “I’m going inside to help your mommy with dinner. I’m hungry.”

  “I’m starving! We’re making pizzas tonight!”

  “Excellent! And what a fantastic unicorn you’ve drawn.”

  Marisa found Erica in the French Provençal kitchen, kneading dough with the family’s Golden Retriever, Sponge Bob, lounging at her feet. “Hey, chicka!,” she said as she plunked a bottle of Beaujolais on the grey granite island and immediately grabbed the waiter’s corkscrew from the side drawer. Marisa poured herself a large glass. “Don’t get excited. It’s just a Louis Jadot that had on hand. You want a glass?”

  “I do. The past two weeks have been domestic hell. Both kids had lice, then my mom got the flu, then Bob ate something in the backyard and vomited on every shoe in my closet. I haven’t been able to work a bit and Josh had to spend a few extra days in New York. And I can’t even begin to tell you about the demands from the ridiculous room mom in Simon’s class. No, I’m not going to come to the school and make photocopies for four hours once a month. That is what Kinko’s is for. I offered to just set up a house account so the teacher could drop things off that she wanted copied, and the room mom looked at me like I had three eyes. I’m more than happy to help at the school, but geez, we pay them enough and I’ve only got about twenty hours a week to get any real work done, so no. Just no.

  “So yes, I do want a huge glass of wine. I also want you to tell me all about your crazy single girl life. I’ve got a bottle of Pinot Gris in the chiller for when I kill off whatever you’ve brought. It could be hunch punch from some rave and I’d drink it, but I’m glad it’s not,” said Erica, finally stopping long enough to take a breath and a sip of wine.

  Marisa plopped down in one of the cane-backed stools at the granite-topped island and shoved an indelicately full glass of wine at her friend. “I’m so sorry. I’m hoping that since I’m here for dinner, neither the lice nor the flu are joining us?”

  “I’m all for misery loving company, but I wouldn’t do that to you. So, entertain me. I want to hear about the latest Match.com guy.”

  “I’ll be honest. I didn’t sign up.”

  Erica set down her glass on the table and whined. “But, you promised.”

  “I know I promised. And it’s not like I don’t think you have a point or that I shouldn’t do that, but.”

  “But what? Give me one good reason why you wouldn’t at least try to meet someone.”

  Marisa surveyed the kitchen carefully. No Miriam. “Where is Josh?”

  “He and Simon are playing on the Wii in the upstairs playroom. Why? What’s going on?”

  Marisa took another large sip. “Okay, you have to promise to keep your voice down. This is top secret pinkie swear stuff.”

  Erica’s face was full of concern.

  “Look, it isn’t bad. No one died. I’m not knocked up. I just ended up sleeping with a guy I shouldn’t have,” admitted Marisa with sadness in her voice.

  “Oh, sweetie. Everyone has done that at some point. I’m sure it isn’t as bad as you think. Did you drunk dial Ryan? I’ve been betting you’d do that, and it’s totally okay if you did. You guys had fun?”

  “It wasn’t Ryan,” stated Marisa, cutting Erica off. “It’s a guy I met through work. He’s technically a client, so that’s a big no-no. Plus, he’s kind of a playboy.”

  “Oh my God!,” said Erica bouncing up and down excitedly. “You slept with that slick guy from Branco, John something. You had dirty old man sex!”

  “No!,” shouted Marisa and then slapped her hand over her mouth. “If you must know,” she said, dropping her voice to a whisper, “and you clearly must know, it was Trip Brannon, as in James Walker Brannon III of the Brannon family. Turns out he lives in South Bluffs too, and we bumped in to each other, had dinner, and both drank too much.”

  “Oh, he drank too much. Embarrassing, but much more so for him than you. You’ll get laid. Soon, I promise,” said Erica scanning the room for underage interlopers.

  “Good God, Erica! Will you just listen? I bumped into hi
m after a run and we went to Pig and Barley for dinner. Turns out he owns an interest in it. We had a great meal and we drank way, way too much. We ended up making out in the restaurant like some overly hormonal teenagers and then we went back to his house. And for the record, from what I recall, he performed admirably.”

  “Well, good for you. I want to hear more, but the pizza dough is ready and the kids need food. Can you help me get Miriam inside and cleaned up, and then everyone can top their own? I’ll get the boys. And don’t think I’m done with you. I think we’re going to have to take Bob on a walk after dinner.”

  After dinner, Erica leashed up Bob as Josh and the kids disappeared out of the dining room. She called after them, “Aunt Marisa and I are going for a walk. We’ll be back in about thirty minutes and I want everyone to be bathed, in pajamas, and ready for stories.” Erica opened the back door and turned to Marisa. “Talk,” she commanded.

  “So, Trip is Jimmy Brannon’s son. He’ll probably take over the company when Jimmy retires in a few years. John, who I did not have old man sex with, dirty or otherwise, thank you very much, has been Branco’s General Counsel for about twenty years. He is retiring, and Trip is stepping into that role. That’s how we met.”

  Marisa badly wished she could tell Erica about the recent lawsuit involving John and precisely why John was retiring, but she couldn’t. Those were client confidences and sharing client secrets was one line she definitely wasn’t going to cross.

  “I had a meeting with Jimmy and Trip about a new lawsuit I’m handling for the company. I didn’t know who Trip was. Strike that. I knew he was going to be the new General Counsel, but I did not know he was a Brannon. I offered to take him to lunch after the meeting, thinking we’d get to know each other a bit and I’d be able to start building a relationship, a professional relationship, with him.”