8. A Little Goes a Long Way （Melissa）
Chapter eight
A Little Goes a Long Way (Melissa)
I t was hard to stay mad at Ryan after he had just finished telling me the story about him and Dad when they’d gone on a fishing trip and Dad had caught a big lake trout and insisted that Ryan eat it the way God intended — raw with just a little bit of seasoning.
“By the time we were packing our fishing gear, I was puking my guts out. Could you blame me? I’d never eaten raw fish before,” Ryan said, laughing.
“I was so sick afterward that Hoffa insisted he would drive me back. What he didn’t tell me was how hammered he was.
Next thing you know, we’re both of us standing on the curb, me sick to my stomach, and Hoffa throwing up in the trash can while a cop noted down the number of my totaled Mercedes. ”
“Don’t tell me it was the same Mercedes,” I said, grinning wildly.
“The very same. Cost me nearly fifteen million to get it repaired.”
“Well, for what it’s worth, my girlfriends and I were thinking of trashing your car two weeks ago.
It’s good to know that Dad had already retroactively done it for me,” I said, tipsily putting down my glass after my fourth double.
My ears were feeling warm and my cheeks seemed to be buzzing.
Outside, it was raining just as it was yesterday.
“If you really want, you can trash my car, run a key down its side. If it will make you feel better,” Ryan said. I could see that he was buzzing quite strongly himself.
“Since we’re drunk and all, and I have half a mind to let bygones be bygones, you know what’ll make me get over your behavior?”
“What?”
“Give me your car,” I said, throwing my head back and laughing. How hilarious would that be? When I retracted my head, I saw that Ryan wasn’t smiling.
“Done,” he said.
“Beg pardon?”
“If it’s a stepping stone to you forgiving me, here, have my car. I mean it. And it’s not just some drunken oath either. I’m sober enough to know what I’m doing. That car means the world to me. It meant the world to my dad and my granddad. I want you to have it.”
“Are you fucking serious?” It wasn’t just my ears that were burning hot now; I could feel the heat climbing behind my eyes and crawling up my forehead.
“Yes. I am. I’ll have the paperwork drawn in no time. Have the car. I mean it,” Ryan said, passing me the keys.
“Ryan. This is too much,” I said, sliding his keys back.
“No. What’s too much is how I behaved with you. This is setting things right,” Ryan said, sliding them back to me again.
“Is this some ploy?” I asked, picking the keys up and looking at him distrustfully.
“I can assure you that it is not,” Ryan assured me. “It would mean the world to me if you accepted this token of apology.”
“So this isn’t some trick to get me to stay at Blue Riff?”
“I wouldn’t think you were Hoffa’s daughter if you stayed at that secretarial position,” Ryan said. “He did great things in his life. I know for a fact that you’ll do greater things.”
“Then keep the car and offer me something better. What am I going to do with a vintage set of wheels anyway?” I said, passing him the keys back. I could see that he was greatly relieved that I had turned down his offer. But in my defense, I had only turned it down in exchange for a better one.
“Anything you want. Name it. It’s yours.”
“I have always wanted to do what you do. I mean, what you did back in the day. You were producing amazing music, headhunting these awesome artists. I want to do that here. So, if you really mean it about patching things up and making us even, you can make me your chief talent hunter, if such a position exists,” I said.
Now my heart was beating so fast in my chest that I feared I might throw up. This was what I had wanted all along — all my life. Meeting new artists, discovering their talent, and signing them on to help them fulfill their lifelong dreams.
“That’s a bigger ask than a car,” Ryan said seriously.
“I don’t need the money anymore, as you know. What I need is to keep myself busy doing something that I love. This way, I’ll become a talent hunter way sooner than I expected. And you….are getting a shot at redeeming yourself.”
“Hmm. We’ll have to fire Evans.”
“Don’t fire anyone. There can be two talent hunters. I know I can do this. I have been listening to the local artists in the country for more than five years. Trust me, I’ve got this. I can handle the workload. I can work overtime. Whatever you need me to do,” I said.
“You, Ms. Frances, have got yourself a deal,” Ryan said, stretching his hand over the table. I promptly shook it to seal the deal, then smiled at him.
“You’re now looking at your head of talent hunting.”
“Yes, but we don’t really have a position by that name. You’ll be the head of acquisitions. You need to start thinking of artists as assets. They’re an asset that our company needs to acquire, and that will be your job.”
“When do I start?”
“Monday. I want you to take some days to tend to your matters. Just take care of everything, take your time to grieve, be with your friends, and do what you need to do. Then, next week, you can begin. By that time we’ll have an office ready for you, and I’ll give you the four-one-one on how to land the best artists and give them the best deals,” Ryan said.
“Meaning you’ll be my mentor?”
“And thus the circle of life continues,” Ryan muttered a bit drunkenly. “The mentee becomes the mentor.”
I looked beyond Ryan, out the window, and realized that this rain was going nowhere. I was not in the mood to go out into the rain, hail a cab, and go home. Right here was better, right here was warm, and right here was better company than a wet cab driver.
“It’s nice out there,” I said, pointing out the window. “Doesn’t seem fair that you remain trapped here.”
“Oh, you better believe I am not trapped here. I have a secret place I go to every time it rains. I often smoke a…well, let’s just that whatever I smoke there is no easier to get now that it’s legal in the state of New York.”
“I know what you mean. Well, do you have any on you right now?” I asked, grinning at him. “Have you ever felt raindrops on your skin when you’re high? It feels like tiny kisses from fairies.”
“I used to think that it felt like I was getting acupuncture from God,” Ryan said.
“Well, let’s not keep him waiting then, shall we?”
“Oh, you’re gonna partake?” Ryan asked.
“Not that I’m on some self-destructive spree or anything, but the more inebriated I am, the less I am reminded of the fact that I am an orphan now,” I said, making Ryan purse his lips morosely.
“You’re not an orphan. That term only applies to kids.”
“I was Daddy’s kid, wasn’t I?”
“You are.”
“And Daddy’s no more. Ipso facto, Bob’s your uncle.”
“I only have the one uncle and we all call him weird Uncle Cuthbert. You do not want to hear the rumors about him.”
“Get me high enough, and I might indulge you,” I said.
“This next bit’s going to make you think I’m Batman or something,” Ryan said, staggering out of his chair and heading to the bookshelf to the left of the office.
“Let me guess, you’ve got a secret elevator there?”
“Do you like ruining things?”
“I’m sorry. Please, Mr. Wayne. Do go on and show me your fantastic secret elevator,” I said, prodding him in the back.
“Fine,” Ryan said smally, then pulled on the seventh volume of the Encyclopedia of Britannica. The bookshelf parted in the middle and disappeared behind the wall. Behind it were the stainless steel doors of the secret elevator.
“You’re right. That was damn impressive,” I whistled.
“This that billionaire shit,” Ryan said, stepping into the elevator.
“You aren’t going to take me to some dark basement and then tell me to put the lotion in the basket, right?” I asked.
“Literally the opposite.”
“So I’ll be taking lotions out of baskets?”
“There are no lotions. We’re going to the roof!” Ryan said, laughing.
He wasn’t kidding about the secret place. I had not imagined that it would look like this. What I had in mind was a standard New York skyscraper roof with concrete and pebbles strewn about. But this Zen garden atop the roof, complete with a wooden gazebo in the middle, right next to a big koi pond.
The koi were swimming frantically about as rainwater pelted on the surface of their pond.
This must be what fish apocalypse feels like, I thought and giggled.
As we hurriedly raced to the gazebo, saving ourselves from the rain with nothing but our hands, I realized just how big the roof was.
We ran for half a minute until we got to the gazebo.
Thankfully, it was dry under the gazebo. But that minor sprint left us both soaking wet.
“You wanna see some more of that billionaire shit?” Ryan said, shivering a bit.
“If it has something to do with keeping me dry, be my guest,” I said, rubbing my arms vigorously.
“Then look at this,” Ryan said, pushing a button under the gazebo’s wooden railing, making the floor in front of us sink and disappear. The next second, a firepit rose from the hole, a fire already burning inside it.
“Isn’t that like a big fire hazard?” I asked a bit fearfully.
But fear was secondary right now. I seated myself on the chair in front of the fireplace and slid it as close to the fire as I could without burning myself.
The warmth from the flames was a welcome feeling, making me regret less and less that I’d come here in the rain.
“It’s not. It’s premium German engineering that set me back nearly two billion dollars,” Ryan said.
“Two billion dollars for the fucking firepit??” I asked, completely aghast. “What, does it get fire straight from the pits of hell or something?”
“Two billion for the whole building. I hired a German architecture collective who designed and then built the whole thing. If this rooftop Zen garden is blowing your mind, I can show you the forty-foot-deep swimming pool in the basement that will drive you crazy,” Ryan offered, taking his shirt and coat off and hanging them near the fire.