“How do you think I get rid of guys so easily? I make sure some other floozy starts distracting them. It’s amazing how easily a guy decides they don’t care about you after some girl with big boobs starts flirting with them.”
This was the kind of thinking that made Emma and I best friends. She didn’t care why I broke up with Rob; her only concern was how she could make my life easier now that the deed was done.
Emma and I hadn’t always been close, though. When I first came to the company I was pretty sure she was going to punch me in the face. I was horrible at my job and had cost her a client by not getting a project she had given me done on time. It didn’t matter how much I apologized, Emma was pissed.
Fast forward about three months, and she finally warmed up to me. I had settled into the tasks at hand and was really kicking butt when I finished a project ahead of time. I went over the digital copies with her and handed her everything on a flash drive so she could upload it and get it to the client ahead of time. She landed the client and a huge bonus; we became friends after that.
“You know Rob and I were supposed to go on that big hiking trip in a couple of weeks. Maybe you’d like to come with me? I already have the gear.”
“No.”
“Think about it. We could hike into the woods. Spend the whole weekend talking and having a blast. It would be an adventure of a lifetime.”
“I think your idea of fun and mine are totally different. There is no way I’m going into the woods overnight. Sorry, you’ll have to find a new partner for this one.”
“Yeah, I’ll see who might be available. It was worth a try, though.” I laughed at the thought of Emma taking off her high heels for anything.
“Maybe you should do it alone. You know like the girl in that movie Wild. Didn’t Reese Witherspoon star in that? I mean you look a little like her with your blonde hair and those crazy blue eyes. You could go alone and have an independent adventure.”
I’d never actually considered going hiking alone. The idea of spending the weekend out in the woods had been one I came up with in an effort to get closer to Rob. I had been hoping that some time away from technology would make me feel more connected to him. I certainly wasn’t a skilled hiker or camper, though, and I would have been relying on Rob for most tasks, so there was just no way I could go alone.
“I’ll find someone to go with me. Maybe I’ll actually go to that hiking group that I always get invitations to on Facebook. Someone there is bound to want a partner for a weekend in the woods.”
“Sure, that sounds great. Now let’s get back to work because you really need to kick butt on everything, so Rob doesn’t have an excuse to yell at you,” Emma said as we walked to my desk. She looked down at my list of tasks I had on my desk. “You’re going to be here all night if you don’t get to work.”
She was trying to tease me, but it was the truth. I had a lot of work to do and was definitely going to be stuck in the office late. My mind was still all jumbled up with everything that had happened with Rob that morning, though, and I just knew I wasn’t going to be able to get everything done on time.
“I don’t …” I started to say.
“That’s not an option. Look at me, Jordan,” Emma said and grabbed my cheeks. “It’s do or die. You need to kick butt. Get some caffeine, finish everything on this list, and show Rob and everyone else that you deserve to be here. If you slack off even a tiny bit, Rob is going to take advantage and point it out to Margaret. You remember what happened to Ian last week, right?”
I swallowed hard at the thought. Of course, I remembered what happened with Ian the previous week. He had two projects due for Margaret and got sick. It was his second time calling in sick in the last month and his third time being late on a project. When he showed up to work the next day, all his things were packed up and human resources were waiting for him at his desk.
He was in tears as they brought him into the conference room and then back out only five minutes later. Just like that, he was fired. I liked Ian. He had a wife and a family, and I knew he had really been sick. If they were willing to fire him, then I knew for a fact I would be out on my behind if I let my guard down at all. My relationship with Rob, or lack of relationship, couldn’t change my job performance.
“You’re absolutely right. I’m going to get this all done and turned in on time!”
“That’s my girl,” Emma said and gave me a hug before heading off and leaving me to work.
Chapter 2
Caleb
“Wow, you look … um, relaxed,” my brother, Jeff said when I approached the table at Lou’s Diner.
“I am relaxed.”
“I thought you told me you had a shower up at that cabin.”
“I’ve got a shower.”
“Oh.”
“Jeff, just spit it out. What are you trying to say? Do you think I stink or something?”
Meeting up with Jeff once a month was my least favorite thing to do. I liked the peace and quiet I had up at my cabin, that was why I stayed up there. But since I had to come into town and get supplies anyway, I figured I could at least try to keep in touch with my brother. At first, our visits were fun, and I felt renewed and excited to see him, but lately, he was really draining me of my energy.
“You’re really starting to look a little crazy, Cal. I mean the beard is getting really long and your hair as well. Do you want me to take you over to the barber? I’d be happy to pay.”
“Oh, you’d like to pay for my haircut?” I said as I burst out laughing. Jeff knew that I had plenty of money and I wasn’t in need of his help in paying for a haircut. It was comical that he thought offering to pay for it would be an enticement to me at all. “Jeff, I’m letting it grow out. It’s part of my process.”
“Your process? What the hell is going on, Caleb?” Jeff asked with concern. I knew he was worried because he was using my full name instead of Cal, which he had called me since we were kids.
“I’m okay. I haven’t gone loony or anything like that. I’m working on a solar project and enjoying the quiet up at my cabin. I promise I’m not going insane.”
“Mom and Dad are worried about you. I’m trying to hold them off, but you’re going to have to go see them. Mom needs a hug, or she’s never going to feel like you are okay. Can you please just make a trip down to Arizona and see them? I’m tired of lying to them.”
Jeff and I had decided to tell our parents that I was off on sabbatical trying to find myself while working with the underprivileged. For some reason, Jeff thought that telling them I was building my own cabin and going to live in the woods wasn’t going to go over well with them. It didn’t matter to me at all. Since Kristen broke up with me, and I left my engineering job, I was lost. I knew I was lost, and I had to find myself. Luckily, I had the financial means to take some time and do just that.
“I’ll go visit them in March. Let them know I’ll come the first weekend.”
“Thank you. Now I’m going to try and ignore your grizzly look and go over this financial stuff with you.”
“Thanks, I guess.” I laughed.
To keep Jeff busy, I’d given him some of my Bitcoin to invest in new cryptocurrencies. I’d sold off a few dozen coins when I left my job and had plenty of money to live off forever if I really wanted to. My small $10,000 investment in Bitcoin had ballooned to several million dollars over the last few years and offered me the opportunity to retire. I kept about a dozen coins and let Jeff handle their income to invest in new up and coming opportunities.
“Okay, so Cardano is a big one. I bought it at five cents, and it’s now well over a dollar. Here’s the list of what you own and the profits. I was thinking we should just keep what is in there for now and ride it out. What do you think?”
“It’s at a quarter of a million now?” I asked a little surprised. “How much did you buy?”
“Only fifteen thousand. It’s growing like crazy.”
“Have you researched the cap? Where’s it going?”
> “I have, and there is a lot of speculation.”
“Okay, let’s just hold onto it for now. But sell off fifteen thousand so I’ve got my money out of it.”
“Sounds good. Now, how about these?” Jeff asked as he slid another six sheets of paper over to me.
I looked through the cryptocurrencies he had purchased and their increases. Everything was doing well, and since I wasn’t the one doing the research, I hesitated to make any big decisions on them. “I trust your gut on these, Jeff. Maybe sell off a little of Ripple? What do you think?”
“Yes, I was going to suggest that. But I have some stop-loss loaded, and I can add some more if you want to make sure you don’t lose too much.”
“No, it’s fine. I think these currencies are going to ride up and down a bit. Let’s hold most of them. Close out your stop-loss orders, please. And if they bottom out, I want you buying more and not selling. Understand?”
“Yes.”
Jeff was a financial advisor by trade, and I knew he really enjoyed researching and investing in cryptocurrencies for me, but he didn’t have the stomach for the ups and downs that came with them. I also wasn’t sure he truly understood the technology behind them because if he did he would know that this was the wave of the future. I’d cashed out millions of dollars’ worth of Bitcoin, but I wasn’t about to take all my money out of the trade.
“Can we order some food now? I’d really like to eat,” I said when we had finally finished talking business.
“Sure. I’m hungry too. I’m trying to eat healthier, though, so I’m just getting a salad.”
Jeff waved the waitress over to our table. He was a regular at Lou’s Diner in downtown Portland, and the waitress knew him well enough to wait for him to motion her over before approaching us. Jeff was pretty obsessive about getting business out of the way before we ate, and the two of us had been meeting once a month for nearly two years now with the same woman waiting on us.
“Hi, Doris. How are you doing?” Jeff asked in an overly friendly voice.
“I’m doing well, Jeff. Do you want the burger today? Well done?”
“Not today, I need to cut back and tone up. I’ll have the Cobb salad. Thanks.”
“I’ll have a double cheeseburger with bacon and fries. And a second order to go please,” I said without waiting for her to ask.
“Your brother doesn’t seem to be worried about his figure.” Doris laughed and then walked away.
“How can you possibly eat that much and have those abs?” Jeff asked.
I stood up and pulled up my shirt to show off my perfect eight-pack. It wasn’t just a six-pack anymore. Since moving up to the mountains I had more definition than ever in my muscles. Who would have thought that getting out of a gym and into the wilderness was the key to getting the muscular frame I’d been trying years for?
“Put those things away.” Jeff pretended to cover his eyes. “Come on, Cal, there are children in here.”
“Can you believe how built I’ve gotten the last year? I swear, I’ve wanted to bulk up for years and could never do it. I always ended up chubby instead of with bigger muscles.”
“Are you lifting weights or something up there in your cabin?”
“No. I’m just building projects and staying busy. I’m eating a lot of protein and vegetables, and I’ve gained at least twenty pounds of pure muscle. Look at these guns.” I smiled as I flexed my arms for him.
“Damn, you’re starting to look like that guy from Game of Thrones, what’s his name?”
“I don’t watch television,” I said with a laugh. “I have no idea.”
“Well, he’s ripped like you are. You know, when you finally decide to come down from that mountain, the ladies are going to be all over you.”
“You could always head up to the mountain with me. I’m sure you have enough money in your bank account to take a year or two off.” I knew his answer was going to be no before he said a word. Jeff was the responsible older brother. He wasn’t about to give up his cushy life for anything that was off the beaten path. No matter how much he loved the idea.
“Ha, you think I want to unplug and run away from my problems like you? No, I would rather deal with life than run away from it.”
“Screw you,” I yelled at him so loudly that the rest of the diner customers all looked in our direction. “You have no idea what I’m doing and why I’m doing it.”
It was just like Jeff to think that I was running away from life by going up to the woods and building the cabin. Of course, he didn’t see how great it was for me or how I was figuring out my life. No, in his eyes I was just running away from my problems. Specifically, he thought I was running away from the heartache of having the woman I loved crush my dreams. I’d bought a ring for Kristen and was about to propose to her when she called things off. It was like she did it overnight without thinking at all.
Kristen and I were happy. At least, I thought we were happy. Everything was perfect. I was working as an engineer, and she was working just down the street at a law firm. We were kicking butt at our careers, had two fancy cars, and a luxury apartment downtown. If anyone had suggested that our life was anything but perfect, I would have laughed at them. But then one morning Kristen rolled over and just broke up with me. “I think we want different things in life,” she said as if that was a reason to throw everything away.
I tried to save things. I did everything I could think of, and she still didn’t want to get back together. I was romantic and bought two tickets to a tropical beach for us to take a vacation together, but she refused. Nothing worked, and yet I continued to try until one day I showed up at her office and saw her out front kissing a man. Kristen wasn’t just kissing him, she was passionately in love with him, and I saw it in her eyes. From that moment, I stopped trying to win her back.
“You can be angry with me if you want, but you know it’s the truth. So you had a bad breakup. Toughen up and move on. Stop sulking about it.”
“I’m not in the mountains because of my breakup,” I lied.
“Then why? You really wanted to build a cabin by hand? Oh, wait—you went off to the woods so you could get the body of a Greek god? Yeah, that’s it.”
“Jeff, stop being an asshole. Lots of people reassess their lives and try to find something new. Stop pretending like I’m so weird. I just wanted to get away from the craziness of everything and try and find myself.”
“You have millions in the bank. I don’t understand why you’re off in the woods. Go to Tahiti or something like that,” Jeff said as Doris brought our food.
“So you’d feel better about me running away from my problems as long as I was spending a lot of money doing it? That’s asinine.”
“You look like some sort of mountain man who can’t be around people anymore. I’m just afraid you’re going to stay up there so long that you won’t ever want to come back. What about the snow? There’s supposed to be a huge snowstorm coming in a few weeks. You won’t be able to get down from your cabin after that. Cal, I’m just worried about you.”
I knew Jeff was worried, and that was why he was being a jerk. The problem was I didn’t care. I was tired of coming into town to visit him and just listening to all the things I was doing wrong.
“Hey, Doris,” I yelled. “Wrap both of these up to go. I’m not staying.”
“You could try being nice to her.”
“That was me being nice,” I growled back at him.
“Here you go, Caleb,” Doris said as she handed me the two boxes of meals to take with me.
“Thanks,” I said roughly while she turned and walked away. “Was that better?” I asked Jeff.
“You know, the longer you are up in the mountains, the more you’re turning into a real asshole. Maybe I won’t keep managing your money for you anymore. You clearly don’t appreciate it.”
“I was just letting you do it to make you feel important. I could keep my money exactly where it is and not care one bit.”
“Fine. Then take care of it yourself,” he said and threw the financial papers at me. “I’m tired of trying to make you normal. If you want to hide away in the mountains for the rest of your life, then do it. Don’t expect me to take care of things, and definitely don’t expect me to keep lying to Mom and Dad for you.”
This was pretty much how all our visits had been ending the last few months. Jeff was always angry with me, and I was always equally angry with him. Nothing about seeing each other was reassuring or helpful anymore, yet I didn’t want to totally cut myself off from my family while I was trying to find my way in life.
“Listen, I’m sorry I’m not doing what you expect, but I can’t explain why I need to be up there over and over to you. I’m going to leave now, and we can try this again next month.”
“Fine. I’ll see you the first Sunday in March.”
“Deal,” I said and turned to leave.
“Cal,” Jeff yelled and then ran up after me. “Take care of yourself up there. I was serious when I said a storm was coming. Get enough supplies, okay?”
“Thanks, Jeff. I think I know how to take care of myself by now,” I said and turned to leave.
Did he actually think that after two years in the mountains I didn’t know how to make it through a winter? I’d been through one already, and this year we had several weeks of snow. It was no big deal. Oregon winters weren’t like Colorado or someplace like that, and this year was already unseasonably warm. The snow we got was already melted, so I was pretty positive I could handle another week of snow if I had to.
Just to be safe, I did load up with essentials at the big box store. I had a long list of items I needed for building my new shed as well as some technology items I had to pick up for the solar panel system I was adding on. Despite it being winter, the sun was still out, and the power I was getting from my panels was very impressive.
I spent the rest of the day going around town and gathering everything on my list. I was trying to get back up to the cabin before dark, but as I drove out of the city, the sun was setting, and I had to make the rest of the drive in the dead of night.
Accidentally His Page 2