by Edward Goble
Chapter 17
After waking up every hour on the hour since 3:00 am, he finally got up for good a few minutes after 8:00 am. A hundred scenarios had been sent forward for consideration; some involving the police, others requiring the stealthy bravado of Rance Broadback, and all of which, now that he was wide awake, seemed pretty stupid in real life. He would keep it simple; go to the bank and withdraw $4000 dollars from his savings, which he would give to total strangers, in order to cover the debt of a bottom dwelling termite that he had never met. The brainless twit would probably do something equally moronic before his next birthday, but Andy wasn’t doing this for the sweaty punk in the red warm-up jacket. This gift was for Albert and Maria Martin (pronounced Marteen.) In the heart of a heartless city he had the chance to help some people that really needed it but would never ask. It felt pretty good, which was a new sensation for the self-absorbed guy from the sunken place.
He had time to download some thoughts before starting the mission, so he opened a new blog entry.
Andy’s Weblog - November 8th
Epiphany
I always thought Epiphany was a religious term, something about the three wise men returning home to tell their people about finding the Christ-child or some such tale. I see it on the calendar in the fine blue type every January sometime before Martin Luther King Jr. Day, which, to me, is kind of the same thing.
Early this morning, as I tried in vane to get some sleep, I experienced an epiphany in a new way, new for me at least. I had an epiphany in the sense of discovering the reality or essential meaning of something. That is, it dawned on me that one of the situations I am going through right now, while uncomfortable and a little frightening, is part of the fabric of what life is supposed to be about. Specifically, I had an opportunity to step outside my personal space, that wonderful insulated comfort zone of my admittedly narcissistic life. And here’s what I found...
Life might not be all about me. Ta-Dah... Is that a mind-blower, or what? Now, this might not be news to you Mother Theresa-types out there, but for a guy that spends most his day thinking about what a goof he is and the rest of the day thinking about what’s for supper, this was big news. I was in a certain situation and an opportunity presented itself to help someone, and, without considering the highly stressful, uncomfortable, expensive cost to myself, I just stepped up to help. Weird and not my usual response—trust me. But what I discovered, after my mouth committed to something that my brain didn’t approve ahead of time, was, that it felt really good. It was liberating, in a strange way, to put all my self indulgence aside for a moment and do something that would not benefit me in any way, shape or form - it was all for the other person.
Now, I don’t know if I could do it everyday, as a matter of fact I’m freaking out at the prospect of actually going through it today, but I know this much; stepping up to help in a selfless way was one of the best feelings I’ve had in a long time. I think it was finally a “good choice” that really mattered.
Still a slow learner - Andy
As he considered the weight of what he was feeling, he pulled on his jacket and left the house for the bank. He wasn’t sure why he was feeling good; he was about to give away a big chunk of his savings. “Rance Broadback put himself in harms way more than once to get you that dough,” he thought. Then he thought about all the people who had purchased a book, they probably never thought about what happened to the twenty bucks after they plunked it down for the hard cover copy. They just wanted the story. They didn’t care that some of it would trickle down to the author who would use it to keep the Keebler Elves fat and sassy, or who would, on one occasion; use it to actually help a friend in need. The realization caused Andy to feel an uncomfortable level of responsibility to his readers, not just to provide a good story, but also to be a good steward. “That’s going a little too far,” he imagined. “They don’t care what I do with the money.” His conscience, in full dialogue now, countered, “Sure they don’t care, but when you do good things, you invite them to share in something that has more significance than another bag of Doritos.”
“This is too deep,” Andy said out loud as he stepped up to the door of his bank. “It just is what it is, don’t make something more out of it... I hate it when I do that,” he whispered.
He finished his transaction and stepped back out to the sidewalk, he pulled out the card he’d received from the scary Top Coat guy, and dialed the number on the card quickly, before he could talk himself out of it.
“Yeah?” came the gruff voice, answering on the third ring.
“Hi, uh, this is Andy. I, uh, is this Allied Financial? We’re supposed to meet about the, uh, the Marteen thing.” He sounded like a squirrel.
“The who?” Johnny wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed. He covered the phone and spoke to his boss. “We s’pose to meet someone about a marteen-thing?”
“Martin,” Andy said loudly, realizing No Neck didn’t recognize the pronunciation. “Albert Martin,” he said again.
“Do you mean Martin?” Johnny said into the receiver.
“Yes, Albert Martin,” Andy said. “Man this guy is thick,” he didn’t say.
“Oh, yeah, sure. You’re early. That’s good, right?”
“So, where do we do this?”
“We’re on Filbert, just off Hyde. Here’s the address,” Johnny gave Andy the numbers which, conveniently, were not printed on the card; giving Andy the idea that this was probably a pretty mobile operation. “Just come up the stairs, we’re on the second floor, can’t miss it.”
“It’ll be about twenty minutes,” Andy cautioned.
“Uh huh,” No Neck murmured and snapped the phone shut.
Andy took his car and parked around the block from the address. He hardly noticed the tantalizing scents of the freshly baked breads in the shop on the first floor as he focused nervously on his task.
Top Coat encouraged Andy to sit while his associate counted out forty crisp one hundred dollar bills. Their guest was somewhat surprised that the oaf could count that high, but he seemed to manage, licking his bulbous thumb and peeling off each bill until there were four neat little stacks. Top Coat just sat looking at Andy with that little smile that, to Andy, suggested, “I’m happy you’re paying off, but I would have rather slit the little drug dealers throat.” Andy tried not to tele-communicate what he was feeling, which was, “I’m not so sure you shouldn’t anyway.”
“It’s all here,” Johnny announced, placing the bills back in the bank envelope and retrieving a small bottle of hand sanitizer from his coat pocket. He squirted a puddle into one of his hands and, before he sat the little bottle down, noticed Andy was watching. So he offered their guest a squirt, “You want some? Money’s got germs. Lot’s of ‘em.” Andy shook his head and tried to pull his eyes away from the quirky oaf as the giant began lathering his mitts like a surgeon.
Top Coat leaned forward in his squeaky chair and opened the lone file folder on his desk. In it was one slip of adding machine tape stapled to a piece of copy paper. He made sort of a show of picking up “the contract” as he called it, and handed it to Andy.
“Can you confirm, my friend, that this is the contract that we reviewed last evening?”
Andy took the paper. It was the adding machine tape that showed the loan amount and the ungodly interest schedule. At the bottom was Albert Martin’s nervous signature. On the copy paper Albert had filled in a few blanks that included the Martin’s Deli and his own, former, address. Andy passed the “contract” across the desk.
Top Coat motioned for him to step behind the desk. Against the wall was a wastebasket with a portable paper shredder attached to the top. The shredder was plugged in below the adding machine, the only other electric appliance in the room, as far as Andy could see. Top Coat folded the contract paper and adding tape in half so it would fit in the mouth of the cheap shredder. He pushed a button and the shredder proceeded to eat the tape and drop thin strips in to the empty can. Top Coat lo
oked up with his patented grin and rubbed his hands together like he had just finished a good meal. “All done... It has been a pleasure doing business,” he said without extending his hand.
“That’s it?” Andy said. “No receipt or anything?”
“None needed,” Top Coat assured him. “This is how we work. Our record system is very lean. You can go and assure your good friend that he is no longer under obligation.”
“And the boy?”
“If he ever needs a loan, have him give us a call,” Top Coat smiled, larger this time exposing small, sharp teeth, giving Andy a chill and causing goose-pimples to jump up on his arms and neck. He walked to the door and left without another word alternately rubbing his arms to kick-start some blood flow.
“If I never see those guys again it will be too soon,” he thought as he descended the stairs. The smell of pastries and fresh bread caught his attention on the way out of the building and he bought a sourdough round a bear claw and a loaf of cheese bread. The cheese bread and half of the sourdough made it all the way home.
He stopped by Martin’s before garaging the car to let Mr. Martin know that the deal was done. Mr. Martin promised to repay him somehow, which Andy deflected, saying he would have done the same thing for him if the situation had been reversed, which he would have, although, to Andy, that was just what people in the movies said in times like this. He left the Deli and drove through a greasy spoon diner called Tony’s over on Lombard and circled back to his place with a to-go sack of fried goodness to go with what was left of the fresh bread. “Two steps forward, one step back,” he admitted. “Time to work,” he thought as he ascended his stairs.
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Appalachian Malady - 6
Reversing the evenings geographical course, Broadback flew back to Knoxville, took 1-75 north to the proposed highway 66. He drove west to I-65 and then north back to Louisville. He stopped at the airport and exchanged his rental car for a different color, a white one this time, in case anyone from the Rose Park area was looking him, which he didn’t really expect, and arrived back at the 21-c a little after 8:30 am. He showered and got in to bed for a nap before his meeting/date with Dr. Sophia Garza. He couldn’t help thinking that something had passed between them that was deeper than he would normally allow on a case. He would have to be extremely careful. “Think with your brain, Ran,” he reminded himself as he set the alarm on his watch.
Dr. Garza spent part of the morning in her clinic examining the front legs of a horse that had ran at Churchill the previous day. The animal had a slight limp, which alerted its trainer to bring her to Dr. Garza immediately. These horses were worth their weight in gold and if a trainer allowed an injury to slip by on his watch, it would mean the quick end of a job. The doctor put a concoction of ointment on the leg where she noticed a slight swelling and then wrapped it gently with a bandage. She pet and scratched the horse playfully then gave her report to the trainer who took his charge back to the stable. Sophia then went out to one of the practice tracks where she was to meet her father and a horse manager and check the progress on a filly that had been under her care for the past few weeks. The horse looked to Dr. Garza as if she was nearly back to 100% and she signed off on the animal’s health for the anxious and thankful manager. She had a quick coffee with her father, they rarely crossed paths during the course of a day, and made it back to her office by 10:00 am where her assistant had several messages waiting including one from James Rafferty.
“Rafferty.” He answered on the first ring.
“James, you called,” she said with her rich accent that was unintentionally sensual.
“Sophia, yeah. I need you to come up to the track this afternoon.”
“Uh,” she began.
“Is there a problem?”
“Mm, no, of course not. What time?”
“Maybe 1:30, 2:00 o’clock, something like that? There’s a filly I’d like you to see. Need a second opinion.”
“I’ll be there.”
“Meet me down on the field level. 8th race on the card.”
“Okay.”
“Hey, you okay?” he said.
“Sure, fine. I’ll see you in a few hours,” she said and hung up the phone.
She stepped back in to the reception area of their small office near the paddock of one of the larger stables and spoke to her assistant. “I’m going to Churchill to meet Mr. Rafferty, I won’t be back till late. If there are any needs call my cell or send them to my father.” She checked her watch again and took off her lab coat and stethoscope and hung them both on the back of her door. She got her purse and keys from her desk drawer and left out the back. Her Acura MDX was parked in the gravel just outside her door. She opened the trunk lid and traded shoes, exchanging the well-worn Nikes she wore around the farm with a pair of Fendi Ballerina flats that she thought went well with her jeans. Her only other upgrade from her normal office attire was an heirloom pearl necklace that she draped over her head and tucked inside her red polo. She loosed her hair from the scrunchy that kept it out of her eyes and away from the horses, and shook it, letting it fall like strands of black silk down her back and shoulders. The rear tires of the MDX spit gravel as she nudged the accelerator more firmly than usual, excited about her lunch appointment with the handsome Spanish man she couldn’t get out of her mind.
They met in the artsy lobby of the 21-c. Pena/Broadback spotted her as she pulled in to the valet parking area near the entrance. She walked with a confident gait that was more business executive than runway model. Pena/Broadback was captivated by her exotic sophistication. She didn’t look like a typical doctor, or a typical anything, as far as he could tell. She was different, refreshingly different. And he hoped, with every fiber of his being, that she wasn’t wrapped up in the puzzle he was slowly piecing together.
“Dr. Garza,” he called, standing from his seat in one of the Queen Anne chairs that graced the elegant lobby. She turned and saw Michael Pena and smiled. She remembered correctly, he was classically handsome. Michael/Rance noticed her take a deep pleasant breath as she pivoted and came to him. Her smile eclipsed the light from lobby’s 19th century Tiffany chandelier.
She extended her hand, “Mr. Pena,” she said, the smile never leaving her face. He received her hand and drew her close, kissing her soft brown cheek.
“It’s Michael,” he reminded her.
The bitter stench of a cheap cigarette woke John Sanchez up just before dawn. He silently adjusted his body position to get a better view of the perimeter of his camp in order to spot whoever it was that was walking around out here this early in the morning. The next thing he saw was the light from two flashlights that were sweeping the forest floor in the pre-dawn light. They were an eighth mile away and headed his direction. If these were hunters, the cigarettes guaranteed failure. Sanchez adjusted a pine branch at the front of his lean-to and decided to let them come to him. As they neared his camp he could see in the afterglow of their lights that they were dressed in camo, much like he was, and were carrying weapons. But unlike his deer rifle, these two were packing fully automatic Bushmaster M4’s, which made Sanchez think they were probably hunting a different kind of animal, one that might shoot back. The two eagle-eyed guards passed fifteen meters south of his camp and never even looked his way as they continued smoking and talking about the NASCAR championships.
Sanchez shimmied out of his lean-to and quietly followed the guards, careful to maintain separation and taking advantage of the dense foliage. Other than pausing to light another smoke, the two walked non-stop for ninety minutes. After covering a distance that John Sanchez determined was nearly three miles from his camp the men reached a fire road that blocked vehicle passage with a six inch steel beam that extended from side to side and was anchored to thick concrete standards. One of the guards shook the big chain and padlock that was wrapped around the gate and then leaned up against the big slab of concrete while his partner hopped up on the bar and sat, lighting another smoke. Th
e two men were either waiting for something or taking a break. Sanchez pulled some cover around him, shielding him from view on all sides, and hunkered down to wait with them.
Tami Beatty was up with the sparrows, as her mother used to say, tapping away at the keyboard of her computer at quarter after five in the morning. Part of her wished she would have spent the night with Rance Broadback and woke up in the master suite of that big southern mansion they were talking about over dinner. But she knew it wasn’t time for that, not right now anyway. And he knew it as well. Knowing that their feelings for one another were somewhat the same would have to be enough for now.
She began by researching Senator Phyllis Lecter; third term Senator from the Hoosier State, mother of three, married to a seed farmer, deep roots in the south... Ranking member of the Federal Transportation Committee, blah, blah, blah. Tami was scanning documents, briefs, news articles and anything she could find with a picture or a story. Mrs. Lecter had family in Kentucky, but as for anything remotely shady, Tami was striking out. The only thing anywhere near controversial was an amendment she stuck in to a bill that impacted the route of a new federal highway. It looked like, in the eleventh hour, she inserted a provision in to her own legislation that called for a road to be re-routed from its projected path. There was nothing particularly strange about this, although re-routing the new interstate 66 was going to cost hundreds of millions more, since it had to be cut right through the protected forest land of the Appalachian range. And, changing the route effectively bypassed Indiana, her home state, diverting the freeway instead through the mountains of West Virginia and eastern Kentucky, right through the pristine forests of Appalachia.
Tami reminisced about growing up in Kentucky and spending a summer or two at camp in the eastern part of the state. The rolling mountains of the Appalachian range were as beautiful as they were daunting. The majestic, undeveloped forests rivaled the plains of the Dakotas and Big Sky country out west in terms of shear geography. It was sad to think of all the ancient hardwoods that would be destroyed, trees that were standing when Daniel Boone walked across the land. She thought about an angle for a story on destroying the natural heritage of the Appalachians, but guided her mind back to the task of finding out why Senator Hagin had killed himself, or, been murdered.
She looked up from the screen and considered the financial impact of a new interstate. “Cutting a federal highway through southern Indiana would bring in billions in development over the years. She’s taking millions out of her own state economy,” Tami thought. “That’s more than just weird.” Scanning further in to the issue, it appeared that Senator Lecter justified the change to her constituency with some kind of Farmland Protection Measure. Quoting her husband and a dozen or so other rural Indiana farmers, not all progress was good progress, and it was incumbent upon her and the people of the great state to protect their farming heritage from becoming another “asphalt corn field” like Central California. “That’s fine,” Beatty thought, “so why did she propose the highway come through her state in the first place?” She found a written transcript of Senator Lecter’s defense of her amendment on the Senate floor where she partnered with Senator Hagin to “cross the political aisle with the goal of enhancing the economy of the depressed Appalachian region with The Road that Leads to Jobs.”
“Okay,” Tami said out loud, “politician-speek, but not dastardly...” She closed Firefox and briefly thought about calling Rance, “Mmm, wait till you have something solid, sister,” she murmured to herself.
“Michael,” Sophia Garza began as the server delivered water and menus at a little restaurant a few blocks from Pena’s hotel. “Thank you for agreeing to see me again.”
“Are you kidding? You just beat me to the phone. As I said, you are all I’ve been thinking of.”
“You are kind,” she finally said, before sipping at the edge of her water glass. Silence passed between them as she pondered what prompted her to ask a stranger out to lunch. Michael/Rance studied her face like an art student might study the Mona Lisa. “What is it?” she finally said feeling his gaze like warm breath on her neck.
“You are a beautiful, surprising woman,” he said.
“Thank you... I think.”
He laughed, “Think about my weekend. I fly out to scout commercial property and spend a few days in a rental car. Boring - typical business trip, next thing I know I’m having drinks in a home that makes my fathers hacienda in Spain look like a rented shack. Then, as if that weren’t enough, I am asked to lunch by a stunning Venezuelan doctor... You don’t know me very well, Sophia Garza, but I assure you, my life is not this interesting.”
The fact was that Michael Pena, the real Michael Pena, was a middle-aged homebody. He was the perfect cover for Rance Broadback mostly because he had no life. A high school friend of Rance, Michael did run a company for his Spanish father, and he did have a nice little niche running containers out of the Oakland California shipyard, and he also, conveniently, was approximately the same height and weight of his old football teammate. Rance ran in to Michael at a high school reunion and, after doing a thorough background check, made an appointment to see his old friend. Rance explained that he was a private investigator, usually government work, nothing too spooky, but that once in a while his work required a different identity. The circles he ran in were much too sophisticated for him to acquire the identity of someone who was deceased, or create an identity, so he needed to assume the identity of a real person. Someone who, at a moments notice, could take a few weeks off from whatever they were doing, and take a vacation.
Michael was the perfect candidate. After the set of fabricated identification was complete, Michael knew that some day he might receive a phone call from Rance that triggered a rapid set of events. He would call his office, explain that he was taking a trip; he was not permitted to say the destination, only that he would touch base regularly. He was then to proceed, by car, to a cabin in the Mt. Shasta area that Rance owned and kept ready as a safe house, where he would stay until further notice. If he hadn’t heard from Rance within two weeks it meant that something was wrong. Worst case scenario would be that Michael Pena would open a newspaper to find that Michael Pena had died, a scenario that, while unlikely, triggered a contingency plan which placed him in a federal protection program. It sounded exciting to Pena who was, at this very minute, cleaning his morning catch at the cabin in Lake Shasta.
Rance had several contingency identities, which were never used more than once, their rightful owners being generously compensated for the favor.
“Interesting?” Sophia asked.
“I work in an office, I live by myself, and my family is, for the most part, in Spain. I’m a loner. I rented the suite at Churchill because; I like nice things, yes, but also because I don’t like crowds... I have no earthly idea what Mr. Rafferty might have thought he saw in me.”
Sophia was visibly puzzled. “Do I disappoint you?” Pena/Broadback asked. Rance was trying to discover her motives as well as discover what she might know or suspect about her boss. Vulnerability could be a great tool, although he wasn’t sure it would work on someone as self-assured as Dr. Sophia Garza.
“No. Not at all. I am curious, I guess. James is very intelligent. I would say, extremely intelligent. I wouldn’t be surprised if he knew something about you, maybe something you do not even realize, that drew him to you.”
“That sounds a little intimidating,” Pena/Broadback said, sounding surprised.
“I’m not kidding. James could have easily ran some kind of background check on you before you even met, in fact, I’ll bet he did.”
“Really...” Rance said and gave a little shiver suggesting he was playing out of his level. “I’ve never heard of such a thing,” he said.
Sophia leaned in, she felt responsible to at least warn this colt about the pasture he was grazing in. “Michael, I’m curious, what is your business? James said something about freight, or shipping or something.”
> “That’s basically it. I haul containers to and from the docks. It’s a pretty simple operation.”
“And you want to expand out here? Why?”
Michael/Rance explained the same logic to Sophia that he described in the smoking room. He figured if she was working him for information on their behalf, he would offer little more to the story than they already knew. “That highway will open up shipping lanes between Florida, Alabama and the Great Lakes. I know there are a ton of outfits that will want that business, but I want to tie up as much business as I can long before the project is ever completed.”
“It’s a long way from Oakland, California,” she said.
“Our advantage is the water. See, with my fathers company running freighters back and forth to Europe, we have a built in advantage for companies that want to export.” Rance was hesitant in dangling the hook in front of her in a way that was any more obvious, but he decided to take a chance and just give it a little tug. He said, “I guess if Mr. Rafferty had a product he wanted to export, or at the very least transport north and south across the new interstate, I might be a good contact. I don’t know.” He let that hang, studying Sophia’s face for a sign. She nodded, her face straight and close to expressionless.
“I don’t know why I am saying this, Michael, but...” she paused before adding, “be careful. Okay?”
His eyebrows narrowed and he tilted his head slightly, this was an open door. “Be careful?”
“They are smart and they don’t always play by the rules, okay? I don’t know much about Mr. Rafferty outside the farm, but I know he is very connected, both politically and in other ways.”
“Other ways?” he inquired.
“I don’t know—it’s just that some of the people that come to the farm are scary. They seem different somehow. Rafferty calls them “investors,” she said. Her mind was honing in on something specific and it was written all over her caring face.
“What is it?” he asked, touching her wrist gently.
“A few months ago James asked me to escort a man to the farm from the Lexington airport. Similar situation, I said sure. But this guy is strange. Tall, thin, dark suit, dark glasses... Rafferty said he was a key investor. He was weird. I felt very uncomfortable around him. Williams, I think his name was. Anyway, this is the type of people, you know?”
Rance just nodded sympathetically, thinking, “Tall, thin, weird guy named Williams? Couldn’t be…”
“And he came back again, too, to meet with the others. But I won’t escort him anymore—James knows that. He gave me the creeps.”
“If it’s the Williams I know,” Rance thought to himself, “he gives me the creeps, too.” He finally asked, “Who are these Investors?”
“Mostly the people you met at the party. There’s Rafferty, Prate, this Williams guy, I guess. Uh, Senator Lecter, Welsh, and that devil, McCoy... Have you met him yet?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“You would remember,” she said.
“Hmm,” Rance felt the need to change the direction of the conversation in order to keep her from pushing away. “I’ll be careful. Thank you. You didn’t have to tell me any of that.”
“I know,” she shook her head and smiled, “I just feel, I don’t know...” she considered what she was thinking before speaking. “I just like you, I guess,” she laughed at her admission, “Okay, I’ll admit it, I like you. I’m attracted to you.”
“That’s something else that never happens to me, Sophia, trust me. Is it my boyish charm?” Michael/Rance grinned and turned his head in a way that a model might when advertising a clean shave.
“That’s it. That and the fact that most of the men I’m introduced to are nearly a foot shorter than me,” she laughed referring to the jockeys around the farm, “I never get to wear my pumps out on dates.” They both broke up over the image.
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Andy stood from his desk and stretched his arms toward the ceiling, arching and groaning he could hear his back cracking like a bowl of Rice Crispies. “I should start a walking regimen,” he said, and then chuckled out loud, picturing spandex and a sweatband. It was a strange dynamic, though, that he had to admit about his body. When he did a little physical exercise, he felt great, he could just about feel the blood course happily through his veins. Then, when he was a sloth, which was far more often, he felt lousy and sick much of the time. “My body kind of acts like milk sitting in the refrigerator. If I’m using it, sloshing it around and pouring it, it stays pretty fresh. But if I let it sit there, it sours and becomes a stagnant science project,” he thought. The unrelated idea of the refrigerator flipped a familiar switch and Andy walked to the kitchen to look in the big white box. He extracted a bottle of Gatorade and went to the living room window. The shades were open and Andy could feel the coldness of the glass as he drew near. The day had vanished while he was fastened to his office chair and the foggy mid-week evening had effectively chased everyone from the streets. It was 7:30 pm, but it felt like midnight.
He felt antsy, so he pulled on a sweater and windbreaker, a scarf and knit cap, and stepped out in to the brisk November air for a little walk. He thought about Debbie Williams as he walked. He considered walking all the way to the Daily Grind, where they would meet on Saturday morning, but reconsidered when blasted with a cold pacific ocean wind at the cross street. He adjusted his route and walked, instead, to the local Starbucks, which was about half full of people somewhat like himself. Locals who emerged after the commuters had gone for the day. People of the lofts, apartments and condos tucked in and around the businesses of the city. Several of the twenty-something’s clicked away on laptop computers working on graphic design, spreadsheets or the great American novel. Andy remembered working like this, plugging his old black Powerbook in to a wall socket at Pete’s Coffee and tapping away, saving his work to floppy disk and lugging the eight pound rig back to his dorm room after three or four hours of inspiration. After receiving his grande mocha, he landed a well-worn velvety green chair that wasn’t all that different from the oversized set-up back at his place. It was a relaxing perch from which to think, listen, people-watch and spend part of an evening. This was therapy. He allowed his eyes to close and held the mug close to his chin, inhaling and enjoying the close of an unusual day.