by Tod Goldberg
The rest of the class went well enough, provided Fiona kept focused on any potential assassins and not anything having to do with whatever manifest destiny was, since the professor had managed to jump a hundred years to discuss some other trivial American policy and how it was originally tied to these violent separatists, though he didn’t use those words. The fool.
Now, as she and Brent went in search of what he deemed “the best rice bowls, like, ever” for lunch, Fiona kept being accosted by young men with flyers promoting different off-campus events, all of which boiled down to wonderful opportunities to get drugged and raped in the comfort of a beer-soaked fraternity house.
“Do you ever go to these parties?” Fiona asked. She handed Brent a flyer for a Sigma Upsilon party called the Pimp and Ho Ball. “No,” he said. “They don’t invite guys.”
Well, that made sense. Little else about the day had. While she’d sat in the classroom, Michael had texted her about Big Lumpy’s death and the potential for bugs in Brent’s room and possibly even in his computers-he and Sam were dismantling the ones left at Madeline’s-and informed her that she should avoid going to his dorm room at any cost, not that that was something high on her list of desires, anyway. And he also told her about the conditions of Brent’s inheritance, which could be both dangerous and ludicrous. Michael didn’t want her to tell Brent about Big Lumpy’s death or his conditions until they were away from the school, since they didn’t know who might be listening in. Any college kid could be one of Yuri’s people for all any of them knew and Fiona should treat any and all of the university’s thirty thousand students as suspects.
Great.
And then he’d texted her again just a few minutes ago to tell her that they had a black-tie event to attend that evening and to find Brent appropriate clothing for it, as if she was his accommodating yet exceptionally hot aunt or, well, whatever. It was just another piece of an increasingly odd puzzle. Her main goal now was to keep Brent safe, but unfortunately that didn’t extend to his food choices, apparently.
Brent finally found the haute cuisine he was looking for-it wasn’t much more than a trolley with a man cooking rice in a wok over a Bunsen burner-in front of the Otto G. Richter Library and now that he had his food, it was like the kid turned on for the first time all day. He was making observations about the people walking by, asking Fiona what she thought about the history class (“Egregious,” was Fiona’s reply).
“Can I ask you a question?” Brent said. They were sitting across from each other at a small cafe table that overlooked a fountain surrounded by grass.
“That depends,” Fiona said. “Is it going to be some sort of disgusting come-on?”
“No,” Brent said. “I don’t think of you that way.”
“Why not?” Fiona wasn’t aghast. At least not entirely.
“You’re more, like, I don’t know, motherly, I guess.”
The rules for what constituted justifiable homicide were nebulous, but Fiona surmised that any man telling a woman she was motherly counted. “Go ahead,” she said.
“So, like, what would you do? Big Lumpy wants me to, like, be his stepson or something. Wants to get me into MIT and to work with the government and all that stuff, but I’m, like, not even sure what I’m going to have for dinner.”
Fiona wasn’t exactly equipped to deliver life advice. Her mantra all these long years usually boiled down to a simple “Why don’t we just shoot them?” which, when truly examined, didn’t seem like sound advice to give to a young, impressionable boy like Brent.
So Fiona asked Brent the one question she thought was banal enough not to drive him toward a full-time life of crime. “What do you want to be when you grow up?”
“I am grown-up,” Brent said.
“You’re nineteen. That’s like being grown-up without any of the side benefits, like money or class or a plan. No offense, of course.”
Brent didn’t seem offended. It actually seemed to make him rather contemplative. He shoveled his mouth full of teriyaki chicken and rice and chewed with real determination, as if obliterating his rice would somehow bring about a universal truth or two.
“I guess I want to do stuff with computers,” he said, “but also something where I can get girls. Most computer guys? They don’t get many girls and I don’t want to be like that. I mean, I like role-playing games and stuff, but I’d rather have a real girl than, like, a really intimate relationship with an elf or an orc or some fey creature or something.”
“I don’t blame you,” Fiona said.
“Like, you and Michael? You’re pretty much a couple, right?”
“Sometimes.”
“But, like, okay, I mean, not to be gross, but, like, you guys have hit it, right?”
Fiona couldn’t decide if she wanted to be offended, which made her realize that she probably shouldn’t be. Brent meant no actual harm. He just didn’t know how to speak like a human being. “Yes,” she said, “we have had sexual relations in the past.”
“And that’s not because, like, he can analyze stuff, right? It’s because, like, he can see stuff and then, like, beat ass and stuff, right?”
“Among other things, but yes, I suppose that’s part of the allure.”
“Well, I want that, then,” he said.
“If you take Big Lumpy’s offer-whatever it is-you understand that the life you have now will no longer be the life you have, right?”
Brent shrugged. “My dad? Michael said he’s somewhere safe, but, like, I’m not stupid. I know my dad is nuts. He’s, like, clinical probably. I want to help him, but I also don’t want him to ruin my life. Do you know what I mean?”
Fiona knew exactly what he meant. He might love his father, but there was going to be a divide between them now larger than the one that already existed. Distance is always best when dealing with family members of dubious mental standing, Fiona had found. The Atlantic worked well in that regard, at least for her. “I understand,” she said.
“I don’t really have any other family here. And I’m apparently, like, good at something I didn’t know I was good at. I’m like Batman, but without the car or the freaky little friend. I could be down with that.”
“I guess,” Fiona said, “you have to decide, then, what you use your intelligence for. If he is going to somehow provide you an opportunity to change your life, it will be your choice how to spend the time.”
“Or, like, he could cut off my eyelids.”
What was it with everyone being afraid of getting their eyelids cut off by Big Lumpy? Even if Fiona told Brent that Big Lumpy was dead, she was sure he’d still fear this fate.
“Have you ever seen anyone who’s had their eyelids cut off?” she asked.
“No.”
“That’s because it probably never happens. You’d remember seeing something like that. It’s a good threat, though, because it’s pretty hard to imagine it not being horrifying.”
“I guess I hadn’t thought of that,” he said.
“You do also have to think about your father,” she said. “I know what Michael told you and I know what you just told me, but the fact is, Brent, that you’re going to need help to care for him. And this business with the Russians might go away soon or it might linger. So you have to consider how best to help your father live a safe life, too. Nothing is permanent but family.”
Tears began to well up in Brent’s eyes, which was about the last thing Fiona needed to see. She’d much rather a man leer at her than cry on her, which was a personality glitch that she wasn’t proud of, but, well, there you go. No one’s perfect.
Brent sniffled once and Fiona thought, Okay, he’s got control of himself now… and then he broke into full-fledged shuddering sobs, and it occurred to Fiona for the first time during all of this that no nineteen-year-old should be faced with these kinds of problems, that the weight of what Brent was going through would be enough to drive anyone to the brink, much less a boy. What the hell were they doing at school? Trying to keep his life
as normal as possible, but it was time to admit that nothing would ever be normal again for Brent Grayson.
She reached across the table and took Brent’s hand in hers. “It’s going to be okay,” she said.
“How?” he asked.
“Michael is going to fix it-you’ll see,” she said and for one of the first times in her life, Fiona realized how much she hoped that was true. That he’d be able to just fix it all and make everything right.
Brent blew his nose and then looked at his watch. “I’m going to be late for class.”
“Let’s not go,” Fiona said.
“I have to,” he said. “I’ll fail.”
“Have you ever failed a class in your entire life?”
“I’ve never gotten anything lower than a B.”
“Then you’re due an F,” Fiona said. “It will add character to you and women love character.”
“They do?”
“What could be more attractive than a computer genius who failed a computer class? You’ll be the bad boy.”
“I will?”
“You will,” she said. “Trust me. I’ve been with a lot of bad boys and failing was like second nature to them. It suggests a certain unpredictability that women admire.”
“Like Sam?”
Boys. Always with the wrong role models. “Like Sam,” Fiona said.
“I suppose I could do the wrong thing for the first time. Do you think we could get ice cream?”
“It’s not the first time,” Fiona said. “Getting involved with Yuri Drubich was a pretty big mistake.”
“But it’s going to turn out okay and I’m going to be rich.”
“Is that what you want? To be rich?” Fiona couldn’t believe the words coming from her mouth. Maybe it was a self-fulfilling prophecy. Someone tells you you’re motherly and next thing you know, you’re dispensing hard-won life advice. Fiona frankly wished she could get back to advocating bullets and bombs, but the situation wasn’t quite right, not with the kid crying into his rice bowl and all that.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, when you get the conditions from Big Lumpy, you’re going to meet them just so that you can have money?”
“I don’t know,” he said. He shrugged, because that’s what he did in the absence of anything else he could possibly do. “I guess I need to know where my father is going to be. I mean, like, really. I know Michael and you and everyone are trying to protect me, and that’s totally cool, but I’m a grown man and I need to know the truth.”
Fiona didn’t think Brent was actually a grown man, but she understood his need for transparency and his need to manifest his own destiny, such as it was, so she decided to break the news to him and deal with whatever ramifications might come from Michael down the line. She was a grown woman. She didn’t need to ask for permission, after all.
But then her phone rang. “Living still?” Michael asked.
“We’re just about to leave campus for an adventure,” Fiona said.
“What kind of adventure?”
“Brent has never failed a class. Today seemed like the day to teach him how much fun that is. He’s expressed an interest in getting ice cream.”
“How’s his mental state?”
“Michael,” she said, “you need to tell him everything.”
“I know,” Michael said. “Do you think you can get him to agree to Big Lumpy’s provisos?”
“I don’t know if he wants to,” Fiona said.
“He doesn’t have to,” I said. “But I’m going to need him tonight. If we’re going to bring down Yuri Drubich and we’re going to ensure that Brent and his father are safe, he’s going to have to grow up fast.”
Across the table from her, Brent sat and quietly picked at his food. What had she been like at nineteen? Different, of course, but she’d grown up in a world where there was always something larger at stake. Independence. Freedom. Even if she didn’t believe in what everyone was fighting for, it had been a part of her life then and thus at nineteen she’d felt like she was a woman, though if photos were any clue, some of her fashion choices were utterly deplorable. Madonna made every young woman dress like an idiot, she supposed, at one point or another over the course of the last twenty-five years and she, sadly, had been no different. But Brent had real issues. Concrete ones-the death of his mother, his father’s descent into guilt and eventual madness, and then all of this. He may have had the outward shine of someone holding on to whatever youthful things he could clench, but the truth, she imagined, was far different.
“I think he already has,” Fiona said. “You need to explain to him all of the conditions. And Michael? Tell him what you would do.”
“What I would do doesn’t matter.”
“It does to him,” she said.
“Okay,” Michael said. “Put him on the phone.”
Fiona watched as Brent listened to Michael. He asked a few questions, but mostly he was quiet, until he finally said, “MIT sounds cool. And working for the government could be cool, too. But I don’t want the money. All I want for sure is for my father to be cared for. Is there a way to do that?”
Fiona didn’t know what Michael said right then, but she was sure that he would say that there was no problem getting that taken care of, even if it would prove to be the biggest problem he’d ever faced.
14
Check fraud used to be the most popular form of financial malfeasance for low-level crooks with high-level ambitions. The easiest way to perpetuate this crime involved rental properties. A person would put on a nice outfit, rent a Mercedes, maybe even bring along some arm candy with a fake wedding ring to fill out the picture, and then the con man would make deposits on several medium-priced rental properties in a weekend, but only those that were being shown by the owners, not by real estate agents, so that no one would bother to check his credit. This was back when people assumed that if you had a Mercedes you had a good credit score.
It also used to be harder for real people to check someone’s credit or even a person’s simple identity. It took time and money, not like today where a simple Google search can usually reveal enough about a person for one to decide whether or not he’s a dirtbag. A savvy con man would pony up a check for the security deposit and the first month’s rent, maybe even a pet deposit, and hand-deliver it to the owner on a Saturday at four p.m. Everyone would shake hands. The owner would run off to his bank and deposit the check, only to learn on Monday that the new renter’s mother had died, or his wife had died, or maybe the renter himself had suddenly developed terminal cancer, and thus would ask to get his money back. Normal people have a hard time saying no to death and/or terminal cancer. The owner of the property would promptly write a check to the mournful owner, they’d shake hands and the owner would walk back into his home feeling like he’d done the right thing.
Of course, the con man’s check hadn’t cleared yet, probably wouldn’t clear for five to seven days, since if the con man was really smart, his stolen checks were from out of state, which would cause a longer hold and a longer processing time, all to figure out that the check was a fugazis all along. But the empathetic homeowner wouldn’t know that for many days.
The con man would take the owner’s check directly to the owner’s bank, cash it, and be off into the world, thousands of dollars richer.
It was a solid con for a very long time. Until people stopped writing checks. Until people started checking the identities of not just people they were doing business with, but every person they encountered, usually out of simple interest. Meet a person on the street, find them interesting or alluring, and two clicks later you’re looking at their vacation photos on Facebook, know where they went to kindergarten, elementary school, high school, junior college, college and whatever other clickable institution of learning one can imagine. In short, an entire involuntary database that can tell you whether or not the person you’re interested in is to be trusted with even your phone number.
So the world has
become more cautious and, for the most part, no one accepts a check for a large purchase without first getting a DNA swab from the inside of your cheek, at least metaphorically speaking.
Except for charitable organizations. Charitable organizations accept checks every single day because they are created to be generous and forgiving. If you write a bad check to a charity, your karma suffers, but they usually won’t have you arrested. It just isn’t a charitable thing to do.
And when you show up with a cashier’s check for a million dollars, they tend to really turn on their warm and caring side. Or at least that’s what I was hoping would happen when I walked into the Moldovan Consulate with that check in my hand. Plus, warm and caring people tend not to blanch when you ask them to take you on a tour of their facility, even if they’re preparing for a black-tie gala.
So after Barry came back with the cashier’s check for me, I brought Sugar back to my loft and called Sam to let him know that I’d need a chauffeured ride over to the Moldovan Consulate. Preferably a chauffeur with a gun, if need be.
“What kind of car?” Sam asked.
“Big and American,” I said. “Something we can all fit in tonight.”
“Mikey,” Sam said, “you realize that the potential for snafus tonight is high.”
“I realize that,” I said.
“So, in that light, what are you going to do with Sugar?”
“I thought I’d have him sit in the car with the engine running,” I said.
“I like that idea,” Sam said. “You’re not thinking of arming him, are you?”
I was in my kitchen and Sugar was sitting at my counter watching YouTube videos of people getting smacked in the groin.
“No,” I said. I smiled at Sugar and then walked outside to my landing, where I wouldn’t have to hear Sugar’s cinema verite. “What do you have on Drubich and his ties to Moldova?”
“My sources tell me his mother is actually from there,” Sam said, “and that while he is Ukrainian he keeps a vacation home in beautiful Chisinau, where he regularly spends his afternoons reading Tolstoy in Stefan cel Mare Central Park.”
