Pissing in Pools
Entertainment costs
Joel Miller sat in his oversized executive chair in his high-rise office overlooking Wilshire Boulevard.
The October morning marine layer was hanging on and blocking the view of Santa Monica and the coast. He had been home for three weeks since the plane’s landing in the South Pacific Ocean.
His secretary, Sarah, was behaving as he had instructed, under his threat of having Simo take her whole family out.
Joel chuckled at that thought. It had thrilled him to his core, telling the media and the world about Xander the asshole, and the events aboard the flight.
But this morning his guts were churning in anger.
In front of him was an email from JJ, Halo’s assistant and friend.
Thinking he had left the stupid bitch alive had him scowling at his monitor.
He should have hit her head harder, but his arms and hands were so weak from rowing for hours on end…
he scowled again and wished he had pushed her off the life raft in the rough seas while Sarah was asleep.
For the fifth time he re-read JJ’s email to him. She was blaming him for the crash and the deaths of her stupid fiancé and Halo. The bitch was even pissed off at him for blaming that fucker, Xander, for it.
“Stupid bitch,” Joel grumbled. As he read, his aggravation intensified. She wanted him to take care of Xander’s family and her fiancé’s mother, or she would post a video telling her side of the story.
“Ha! The bitch knows the story is two against one… but the cunt can still cause problems…” Joel muttered to himself. Reading on, he read that she would consider keeping quiet if he stopped playing the hero in the media.
He looked down and saw his leg was bouncing. Fucking bitch is forgetting who she is dealing with, Joel thought, then ran his pale hands down his face. With a sigh, he pushed the intercom button on his desk.
“Sarah… get me Simo on the line.” He waited for her response, but there was nothing but silence. “Sarah! Did you fucking hear me?”
“Uh… yes. I’m sorry… Joel. Are—are you sure?”
“Yes, goddammit! That’s why I asked you. Hurry the fuck up already!”
“Y—yes, Joel.”
Joel spun around in his big chair, facing the window again. “I should have fucking fed JJ to the sharks… fuck me.”
“Joel, line two.”
Joel grabbed the handset and pushed it up against his ear. “SIMO! How goes it, my man?”
A grumpy, accented voice growled into Joel’s ear. “What the fuck, Joel? It’s what…” There was a pause and Joel heard stuff being moved around in the background. “…fuck. It’s 9:30 in the morning.”
Joel heard him cough and curse in a different language. “Uh, sorry big guy. Early bird gets the worm. I have some big business on the horizon that I need to discuss with you personally.”
“I told you that you don’t know me…”
Joel kept quiet. Then the big man finally broke the silence. “How big?”
With a quiet sigh of relief, Joel replied, “Maybe, uh… six figures.” Joel looked down and realized both his legs were bouncing. Hearing silence, he waited once more.
“Where?”
Joel about leapt out of his chair. “How about across the way from my office? Hancock Park, by the mammoth at the tar pit like before?”
“Thirty minutes. Don’t be wastin’ my time, Joelly.”
Joel heard the line go dead and slowly hung up the handset into its cradle.
He turned back to the window, thinking that Simo would know what to do.
The big man knew everyone in LA and could get things done…
as he had done before with his father’s housekeeper in Costa Rica.
Simo was not one to fuck with and if you did? You better have an army at your front.
Joel looked down and glanced at his Jay-Z Hublot gold wristwatch.
Getting up, he went to the safe behind a large framed picture of him standing next to a beaming Halo Raines at the Academy Awards two years ago.
Ignoring it, he swiveled the picture out of the way and punched in the code to the electronic safe.
He pulled out two bundles of hundred-dollar bills, stuffed them into his khaki pants pockets, and closed the safe.
Grabbing his Ray-Ban aviator sunglasses, he quickly headed out of his office.
Without glancing at Sarah, he called out, “Got a meeting. Call me on my cell only if it’s important.” He suddenly stopped in his tracks, turned to face Sarah, and pointed his finger at her. “You finish moving your shit into my pool house yet?”
“Y—yes, Joel. I left my bed at my apartment, is that ok?”
“Why the fuck would I care? Just get your personal shit out. I might need to use it someday.” He turned on his heel and left the overly gold-leaf decorated office behind.
Sarah watched her boss leave. When he was out of sight, she slumped into her chair and rolled her shoulders to try to relieve the massive amount of tension cranking up her headache.
Thinking about Simo scared her to her bones.
“Mi Dios…” she muttered, shivered, and brushed away a tear forming in her eye.
Joel found the bench and sat down. He was early. He glanced around and Simo was nowhere to be seen. Pulling out his phone, he began playing a game about angry birds.
He hadn’t been playing long when he looked up and saw a huge man casually walking up the cement path.
Simo’s shoulders looked like they sported football pads under his black leather blazer.
His long black ponytail was over his shoulder.
As Simo neared, he made out his large white sunglasses, and saw he was wearing a white silk shirt underneath his jacket, with black slacks and…
incredibly, he was wearing black and white wingtip shoes.
Like the gangsters in old Chicago. On other men it would be ridiculous, but on Simo it worked.
Joel remembered how he heard women describe Simo at the club: ‘Scary-Sexy’ was their consensus.
Then he recalled the time he watched Simo carry two six-foot guys under each arm and literally throw them out the back door.
One of them was Demetri’s, his Ukrainian porn production partner, right-hand man.
Demetri had made his man apologize to Simo personally.
The other guy was a Russian gangster who never apologized.
Eventually, the idiot turned up dead in the local hospital’s morgue.
He had been gut-shot and sealed in a morgue body locker, still alive.
The Russian had suffocated to death, but before he died, the man tried to claw his way out.
The reporter had said it actually traumatized the pathologist so badly that he took a leave of absence.
Then, suddenly, the LA Russian mob was gone, replaced by a new one, and Demetri went from calling Simo, the Greek, to the Hollywood Hitman after that.
“Don’t fuck with Simo,” Joel muttered under his breath in amazement.
Joel stood up, stashed his phone, and stuck out his hand.
“SIMO! Right on time, big guy, thank you!” He watched the big man look down as he enveloped his hand and began pumping it up and down.
Joel tried hard not to wince, feeling like his arm was coming out of its socket with each pump.
“S’up, Joelly?” Simo flashed his white, toothy grin. “Why you bring me down here so fuckin’ early?”
“Sorry, big guy… I have a big problem. I am willing to pay for some information and help.” Joel watched Simo sit down on the bench; he, in turn, sat down tentatively next to Simo. He heard Simo chuckle deeply.
“So… Joelly didn’t save the plane after all, eh? And Jenny Jones is a problem now, eh, Joelly?” Joel saw Simo’s massive finger in his face, shutting him up, and Simo continued, “I was waitin’ for your call, but not at fuckin’ nine in the morning…”
Joel felt his leg trying to begin bouncing, but with immense effort he controlled it. “Uh… yeah,” Joel mumbled.
“Fuckin’ right.”
Simo pushed his white sunglasses down his nose and stared at him hard. Joel could feel those dark eyes boring into his skull like a slowly turning hand drill. Then came the words that almost caused him to piss his pants.
“I am upset at you, Joelly.”
Joel swallowed hard and, in near panic, he squeaked out, “W—what d—did I do?”
Joel’s beady eyes widened as Simo slid up against him, so close that Simo’s huge thigh was up against his own rapidly bouncing leg. Just then a young, fashionable mother, pushing a very expensive stroller, walked by and began to sit down at the adjacent park bench.
Suddenly, Simo called out to the pretty mother, “Hey, Lady, no offense… you not be wanting to be any part of this here conversation. Friendlier places are out there today.” Simo pointed his finger suggestively down the path.
The young mother attempted a polite smile and quickly said her thanks, nervously. Then she hastily left with a sympathetic glance back at Joel.
Joel’s lips twitched as he tried desperately to smile.
“Simo! I—I dunno what I did to upset you. I am very sorry for whatever I did.” Joel watched in rising anxiety as Simo’s face came within inches of his own.
Surprised by the proximity of the huge man’s face to his own, he was shocked.
He half expected Simo’s breath to reek of rotting flesh and death, but there was nothing but minty, hot breath on his face.
Then the smell of expensive, luxurious cologne wafted over him, surprising him further.
Then Simo’s words stabbed at his guts. “Why you go and kill that Halo girl? She was an angel and I liked watching her movies. Now I don’t get to see her anymore.”
Joel’s mouth fell open as Simo’s smoking embers of words burned through his guts. There was no lying to this man. He was as sure as hell that that nose would sniff out the truth. Joel tried to shrink back, but Simo followed him. “I—I…”
“You better tell the fuckin’ truth… or well, you know…”
Joel thought he felt a drop or two of pee escape as Simo clenched his ham-hock-sized fists and then popped his knuckles right in front of his face.