Mistress of the Runes

by Andrews

  “Hey, what’s up?” Carlton asked, slouching into his chair.

  “Looks like you’re up, buddy.” Jack slouched as well, like the sales chameleon he was.

  “Cool,” Carlton said.

  I introduced myself, as did others around the table. When he came to Hugh, he grinned. “I know you. Some of you probably don’t know that Hugh here actually fired me. No, it’s okay. It was a long time ago and I needed firing—but I’ll be watching legal closely,” he joked. “I just wanted us all to club a minute…kind of set the tone for where I think we should be headed.

  “You know, I drove the Maserati in here, not because I drive Maseratis—in fact, my dad would probably kill me if he knew, so don’t tell”—he delivered the line in a cornball conspiratorial tone—“but to make a point. If we’re going to stay ahead of the pack, we need to create a certain hipness to who we are. Do the unexpected.

  “You know, in L.A., it’s not exactly hip to have your operation in Texas, and, let’s face it, the media industry is in L.A. and most of the people we want to impress are there, so here is simply not hip. In fact, traveling to Dallas is not hip, and I want to turn that around. I want everyone in L.A. wanting to come here to see you because you’re what’s happening.”

  “Carlton—” Jack began.

  “Just call me C.”

  “C, we have a contract controversy going on regarding our latest client agreements,” Jack began again. “Are you on board for refereeing that so—”

  “So no, not my focus. You guys are big enough to battle that out amongst yourselves. I care more about image. When you have the look, they want to be with you. For example, your entire conference area—your walls, your floors, they’re blue. Blue is like…blue. It’s not hot. It’s cool but not cool, cool. It’s stay-away-from-me cool. I want something that says let’s get it on. I want to bump up the lights and hump up the color.”

  I couldn’t restrain a large grin.

  “And I want to hire more young people,” he continued.

  “Carlton, if you’re twenty-six and you’re referring to young people, then you’re referring to embryos. Why don’t we shoot for competent people regardless of age?” I smiled at him, trying not to move my body even a centimeter, since I was still experiencing excruciating pain from my horse injury.

  “Goes without saying, but we give the hot, hip, happening honeys a little face time before we go to the grandma-garage.”

  He smiled in a way that made me wonder if he knew he was insulting me and everyone in the room, or if he was just stupid.

  “How does that work legally, Hugh? Can we do that?” I asked innocently, hoping Hugh would set him straight about discrimination, but Hugh had already suffered one near-death experience in having once fired Carlton, and he wasn’t walking into any shrapnel on this fight.

  “Probably a way to work around it.”

  “We could make bench-pressing a hundred pounds a prerequisite for secretarial jobs,” I said dryly.

  “Exactly,” Carlton said. “Because a lot of secretarial work involves lifting fax machines and boxes of files, and older women couldn’t do that, and it’s an insurance risk or whatever. I want to talk to you about programming too, Brice. I’m thinking we need to get some e-squeeze going on our nets. Do you watch that show where they have a celebrity walk up and down the beach and ask guys if they’ll do crazy things for money, like one guy had to drop his pants and propose to another guy, but he didn’t have on any briefs?” Carlton paused to chuckle and chortle, as if he were seeing it again at that very moment. “Another one had to let them put shaving cream on his chest and let a duck eat it off. It’s just wacko stuff, but it’s major eye blog. Let’s set up a meeting to talk that.”

  He left an hour later for L.A., asking Jane to return his rental car. We gathered in the conference room again, this time feeling more threatened than usual.

  “He’s going to knock every one of us off,” Hugh said. “That’s his MO. He visits and does his hot and happening thing, and then he brings in a bunch of twenty-two-year-old kids and it’s like the halcyon days of the Internet bubble, when twenty-year-olds were making a million dollars going to work in their socks and T-shirts and playing basketball in their offices.”

  “What do you think, Brice?” Jack looked concerned.

  “Anything happening here will be filtered through the eyes of a hopped-up, barely post-teen, testosterone-driven male.”

  “I gotta get him laid. Young guys are all about gettin’ laid,” Jack said, having reached a decision on how to handle him.

  I studied Jack for the first time. He was wearing tie-dyed and stonewashed jeans, punked hair, and bad posture.

  “I’ll bet you wore that to the beach when you were eighteen. Who would ever have guessed you could recycle it into office attire thirty years later,” I needled him.

  “Check this out. It’s a prototype, and Carlton’s going to flip over it. It’s a music chip embedded in my sunglasses.” He rubbed the edge of his glasses and began grooving to a sound only he could hear. “Want to try them on?”

  “No thanks, I already have voices in my head,” I said, and sank back into one of the rich blue leather chairs as everyone else vacated the conference room.

  *

  Horses and employees get spooked when they don’t trust the intelligence of their leader, and within days our offices were full of spooked people. We’d suffered poor leadership before, left in the hands of number crunchers and deal makers, generals claiming they wanted peace when war was all they knew. They did deals in secret and kept employees in the dark. People and horses are jumpy in the dark.

  But now the staff was beyond merely jumpy; like any herd of horses they assessed their new leader, and it appeared that he was frightened or perhaps crazy or maybe just plain dumb. The horses knew they were in trouble; the herd had no leader. Oh, there was Carlton, the board-appointed twenty-six-year-old CEO—but no herd of horses is going to follow a colt.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Bull riders who taped their ribs and climbed back on another bull were either insane or had access to better drugs, because I couldn’t even sit up without shrieking. Liz stayed with me a good deal of the time and put up with my occasional lashing out at her like a wounded animal.

  I began four weeks of agony, the kind of agony that wouldn’t allow me to lie in my bed in any comfortable position. I rarely slept more than two hours a night; I was unable to turn on either side or breathe well, unable to live my dream and unsure what my dream was anymore.

  But each morning I dragged myself to work without the benefit of pain pills. I wouldn’t let anyone at the office know how injured I was. I had never shared my personal life—I didn’t want to get too close to people at work, certainly not to less strategic warriors who could get me killed in a corporate battle, or to weaker ones who under pressure might betray me. I kept my distance.

  By nightfall I was on pain pills and feeling like I might pass out. To occupy my downtime, I lay around the townhouse and reworked ranch-house blueprints—making the barn part of the house. I’d become more emotionally attached to my mare, watching and talking to her, and I wanted her under the same roof with me.

  I was getting hooked on the fact that I could communicate with her and she seemed to understand—the way she looked at me, or made a sound, or tilted her head. Maybe I was wrong, but I thought it was possible that this amazing animal could know what I was thinking and maybe even teach me something, if she didn’t kill me in the process.

  The house I had designed centered around one large thirty-by-thirty-foot room that combined kitchen, living area, dining area, and office. The proposed fourteen-foot ceilings would lift the spirits and make that space seem less confining. A large master bedroom, walk-in closet, and bath adjoined the north end of the main room. Off the southeast end, separated by a breezeway and tack room, lay the barn aisle with two horse stalls across from a deep basin sink and a wash area for horses. Adjacent to that, a sliding doo
r led to a feed room and workshop. A firewall running east and west separated the breezeway, garage, and tack room from the rest of the house. Everything was compact and efficient.

  “So you’ve already started construction, you’re changing the house plans, and you’re doing it all without consulting me?” Liz said, and I checked her expression to see if she was kidding.

  “Yes, but I’m completely open to input, if anyone is interested.”

  “No hallways?” Liz asked, looking at the drawing.

  “No. Every room opens off the main room like a cabin.”

  “But hallways—”

  “Separate people from each other. I haven’t had good experiences with hallways. I’ve vacuumed them, shouted down them, asked myself if that cold draft lingering at the end of one might be a spirit. Hallways are unsettling and cost money.”

  “You have a strong opinion on every piece of trivia in the world, don’t you?”

  “Hallways are anything but trivia. Hallways are tunnels. Tunnels are nothing more than mini-corridors. And corridors ultimately result in concourses where people are lost forever.”

  “That’s a very odd but interesting way to look at things.” She put her arm around me and her nearness felt confirming, accepting, and something more. It felt sexy. “You promised me, before you threw your body under your horse for the umpteenth time, that you and I were going to have a talk about the next step in our relationship. The proposition, remember?” And she kissed me sweetly, her lips lingering on mine, creating that swaying effect again as if my gyroscope was malfunctioning and allowing me to float without bodily orientation to the earth.

  “Okay, here’s the proposition,” I said, trying to breathe. “I want you more than I’ve ever wanted anyone in my life. You are driving every molecule in my body insane, but I refuse to allow my physical desires to overwhelm my basic intelligence—”

  “This started off nicely, but it seems to be headed in the wrong direction,” Liz said while kissing the back of my neck and edging up to my ear. I knew I needed to blurt this out while I could still think.

  “I have to get you out of my system. Now wait a minute. Don’t get upset and whirl on me,” I began, catching her by the arm. “If I could just get physically used to you, my mind could catch up.”

  “What are you suggesting? That you want to have a one-nighter with me?” She looked at me, clearly puzzled, then started laughing.

  “I don’t think one night would do it.”

  “You are priceless! You think like a man!”

  Liz marched off, and I could tell Madge’s idea wasn’t as smart as I’d thought.

  *

  “So how did you bring it up to her?” Madge asked later that evening while I slumped on her couch. As I walked through the entire scene with her, Madge’s chuckle progressed to out-and-out laughter, followed by guffaws. “That is the worst presentation of a great idea I’ve ever heard. You did it off the cuff, out in the open, on the spur of the moment like she was a hooker on a street corner. You are priceless, Brice.”

  “That’s seems to be the consensus.”

  “I’m surprised she didn’t hit you.” Madge grinned.

  “Lately your advice sucks.” As I stalked out I could still hear Madge laughing in the background.

  *

  I rang Liz at the station before the sun was up to apologize and asked her if we could meet for breakfast and talk.

  “Have you thought about seeing a counselor? Might do you more good than an omelet,” she said with a lilt in her voice.

  “I’m seeing a sexy TV anchor and I’m incapable of two relationships at one time.”

  “Good to know.” Her voice softened. “Let’s do seven fifteen after my show.”

  I hung up and checked my watch. It was five a.m. and I was standing in the middle of my one hundred and sixty acres in the dark with one ungloved, frozen hand wrapped around a paper cup filled with coffee, waiting for the sun to come up and the crew to drive in. I believed if I was going to prove I was on top of every construction issue, I’d better be on-site ahead of the workers long before I was due in my own office.

  One of the problems with driving from town to the ranch construction site was that by the time I got there, I inevitably had to go to the bathroom. I shifted my weight and tried to think about something else, but it was a losing battle. I was going to have to use the portable potty.

  I stomped across the cold, hard ground remembering how I used to be afraid of this expanse of land; it had seemed so far away, so big and so barren, as if I could get lost out here and no one would find me. Now I prowled around in the predawn dark energized. I pried open the big plastic door on the portable toilet and braced myself against the cold wind as the thirty-mile-an-hour gusts flapped the door like a skiff sail.

  As soon as I lifted the potty lid I slammed it back down. A pile of human waste was stacked so high inside the cavernous hole that it left the toilet lid smeared with feces. I gagged and backed out of the john, then jotted down the phone number stenciled on its plastic door.

  “Pretty rank, huh?” It was the crew boss, and I was startled at the way he’d appeared out of nowhere, his advancing sounds muffled by the intense wind and the wide-open prairie.

  “Gotten to where I’d rather drive down to Buford’s Store than do my business here,” he continued, with what was clearly a sharing violation.

  “Ever think about just calling the number on the side of this unit and asking them to change it out for a new one?” I shouted above the high winds as I placed the call and left word on their answering machine.

  The crew boss glared at me in the same way Hugh did whenever I suggested tidying up one of his legal documents, and it dawned on me that complaining about shit rather than cleaning shit up might actually be a gene on the Y chromosome.

  Changing the subject, I asked him for an update on the work they’d complete today.

  He grudgingly gave it to me, construction workers having an aversion to estrogen on the job site.

  I headed for the new horse stalls that we’d finished the day before. Since the barn two-by-fours were already up and the stalls already bolted into place, the area was inaccessible by large dump trunks; therefore, dirt had to be brought in on a truck, loaded into wheelbarrows, and pushed into the barn and over the stall lip before it could be dumped.

  Heavy equipment the workers used for tamping down the stall floors wouldn’t fit through the finished stall doors, so they had to tamp the dirt with a handheld pneumatic device. A fine layer of rock screenings made its way into the stalls via wheelbarrow load, until it was just a cushy rubber mat’s height away from being flush with the aisle. The horse shavings would bring the entire stall up to the one-by-four edging. The dirt work complete and screenings in place, it looked beautiful, and I could only imagine how happy the horses would be.

  I stopped at Buford’s Store before heading off to my breakfast with Liz. Several men in cowboy hats and tight Wranglers eyed me as I ducked into the ladies’ room. When I emerged a big fellow in farmer overalls said, “You the one bought the hundred and sixty acres?”

  “I’m the one using it for a while,” I said, suddenly thinking of the blue-eyed Indian woman and wondering vaguely why all of the interesting women I’d seen over the last few months had blue eyes. Or maybe Liz’s gorgeous blue eyes are just making me aware of blue eyes in general, I reasoned happily.

  The man eyed me unabashedly as I left the store, and one of the tall lankier guys packed his jaw with a chaw of tobacco and climbed into the beat-up pickup parked next to mine.

  “Like that truck?” he asked.

  “Love it.”

  He nodded and we both drove off.

  I smiled, thinking if I were straight I could pick up guys with my pickup. Maybe that’s why they’re called pickup lines. Men stare at trucks with more longing than cleavage. I checked myself in the rearview mirror as I drove, noticing I was so cold my nose looked like I drank my breakfast under a bridge. That’
s attractive, I thought.

  Thirty minutes later I pulled into a small caboose-shaped diner and saw Liz was standing out front waiting for me, looking celebrity-fabulous even in a parka. Passersby were waving to her and saying how much they enjoyed watching her on TV.

  “Hi,” I said and leaned in and kissed her on the cheek, moving slightly closer to her mouth as I pulled away. She sighed and I put my arm around her. I didn’t notice where we sat or who served us or what we ate. I never took my eyes off Liz, determining how to begin this conversation without having her rocket out of the seat and leave.

  “You look beautiful,” I began and she thanked me. “While I was out freezing my ass on the building site this morning in the dark, I was thinking of you, as I seem to do nonstop.”

  “Now these are the kinds of conversations I love,” she said, drinking her orange juice.

  “Good,” I said and paused to breathe. “I was thinking that our…relationship…is more loving than I’ve ever experienced, even when I was living with someone, and I just don’t want to do anything but make that better.”

  “What are you asking me?” Liz was cutting into her waffle now, obviously enjoying my inability to eat and my fairly nervous condition.

  “Well, most likely a lot of things…later. But right now, at this moment, at breakfast, I’m asking if you would think about sharing the ranch with me.” I paused to take a breath and sip my coffee.

  “Share, as an investment? Or are you asking me to live with you?”

  She knew full well what I was asking.

  “This is the first time I’ve ever suggested living with someone with whom I haven’t slept, but I’ve tried it the other way around and the results haven’t been spectacular.”

  “We’ll see,” she said.

  I could tell Liz was amused, just by the sound of her voice.

  “We’ll see? And what, exactly, will be the determining factor?”