17. Lance #3
“This is a university, not a hair salon. Millions of dollars come in at the top of the fiscal year and they are managed to the penny. There are forms and there is a process, and the process is the only thing standing between this institution and a state audit.” He picks the folder up again.
“And now you have a guest speaker who expects to go to the top of the pile because he did not plan. That is not how it is done. This is finance. I tell this man that his legally binding contract is not valid and then what defense do we have next time? There are precedents and we have to follow them. Even if we don’t always like them. ”
I had a battalion commander who talked like this.
Same cadence, same way of answering a question you didn’t ask.
Same habit of explaining a decision three times because nobody had ever made him defend it once.
You didn’t argue with him either. You stood there and let it wash over you until he ran out.
I clench my jaw and have to remind myself that he’s good at his job.
He knows where every dollar in this university is, down to the cent, and which form it came in on.
In a month I have not seen him get one single thing wrong.
And, even though Jonny Bishop couldn’t have anticipated the mess that his visa would still be in, he is also correct that the contract he signed is legally enforceable.
The spirit of a contract is not a contract itself.
His phone rings and he waves me out.
I stand in the corridor and close my eyes. Then I open my bank account on my phone and look at the balance. I look at the estimated cost of a one-way ticket to Istanbul.
I can live without that money. Jonny can’t.
I put my phone away and walk back to my office. He’s still in the chair, back straight, waiting. I close the door and sit down.
“Fairhaven University is willing to honor the spirit of your agreement,” I say. The lie tastes like copper. “When you get your passport back, come to me directly. I’ll authorize the transaction.”
His face crumples with relief. It’s the first unguarded expression I’ve seen from him since he was eighteen. “Lance, I can’t thank you enough.”
“It’s what we’re here for,” I say.
The silence that follows is different from the ones before. The professional scaffolding has done its job, and now that the crisis is resolved, there’s nowhere for either of us to hide.
“I forgot to congratulate you on your marriage,” he says, breaking it first. “I read about it somewhere.”
“Don’t bother. I’m divorced.”
He winces. “I have this other party trick where I stab people and ask them where it hurts.”
I almost laugh. It comes out as a breath through my nose, but it’s real, and he sees it. “It was a short marriage and a long mistake,” I say. “I’m better off.”
“I’m sorry anyway.”
“And I’m sorry about the other day. At Captain Eddie’s.” He looks up. “You were handling it. You were doing fine, actually, and I walked over and took it off you like you couldn’t. That was about me, not you. You can take care of yourself, and I had no business interfering.”
He looks at his hands. “Water under the bridge.” A pause. “You were trying to help. I know that. I was just—” He stops. “It’s been a strange few weeks. Coming back here. Being Parker again, even for a little while. People keep looking at me like I’m a ghost.”
“You’re not a ghost,” I say. “You’re just different. We all are.”
He meets my eyes for the first time since he sat down. There’s something searching in it—not warm, not cold, but open in a way he hasn’t been. “You know, I saw your show,” I say, before the moment can close. “Jonny on the Spot. It’s really good.”
“You watched it?”
“About twenty episodes last night.”
He blinks. “That’s a lot.”
“Well, I couldn’t sleep and just went down an Indian rabbit hole. Or a mongoose hole.” I hear it leave my mouth. “That sounds dirty. That’s not—I meant the animal.”
He presses his lips together. His eyes have gone bright and he’s looking very hard at the corner of my desk.
“I’m going to stop talking,” I say.
“No, please don’t,” he says. “This is the best thing that’s happened to me all week.”
“The one about the elephant festival was my favorite,” I say.
He looks genuinely surprised, and something in his face softens. “That’s one of the older ones. The production value gets better.”
“The production value was fine. It’s you. You’re good at it. You make people want to see what you’re seeing.”
He’s quiet for a beat. “Thank you, Lance. That’s—that means a lot, actually.”
We look at each other across my desk, and for a second it’s not the Comptroller’s office. It’s the courtyard behind the Bean Stop with the string lights and the October wind.
Then he stands. “I should let you get back to work. I’ve taken up enough of your morning.”
“You haven’t,” I say. But I stand too, because he needs to leave and I need to let him. “It was good to see you, Jonny.”
He pauses at the door. “It was good to see you too.” He says it carefully, like he’s testing the words for weight. Then he nods once and walks out.
I wait until the front door closes. Then I lean back in my chair, press my hands over my eyes, and fight the urge to cry like I haven’t since I was seventeen.
Not because he hates me. Because he doesn’t. And that’s so much worse.