Lame Ducks
Page 3
writing down the pieces of the story as he knew them, a way to organize his theories. He wondered if there was a connection between the Sun’s silence regarding the water plan and the apparent moratorium on publishing pictures of the governor’s trysts. He became so absorbed in the puzzle he didn’t notice the shadows forming behind his furniture.
Simon’s office building was as vanilla and cubicled as any he had seen once one got past the marble and brass foyer. He stepped off the elevator to the sound of monkeys chained to typewriters and breathed in the bouquet—coffee predominantly, but with notes of nicotine and an earthy, moldy smell from the never-cleaned, perpetually-running HVAC.
He knew a somewhat naïve intern named Meghan. He had taken a special shine to her because she was the only intern who had come through the Sun who didn’t try to sponge press passes off of Simon for the chance to eyefuck Hollywood’s latest hunk of meat. He reckoned it would be a little suspicious of him to just saunter over to her desk and pick her brain about the California Speaker of the House, but if he judged correctly, her consuming passion for state politics would blind her to the average person’s total apathy.
“Hey Meghan. What’s new today in California politics?”
She giggled. “I don’t just talk about politics, do I?”
“No, sometimes I overhear you talking about college football.”
“Ha ha. Must be someone else.”
“Oh, that’s right. You’re the one who talks about all the TV shows you watch.”
“TV shows? Quit teasing.”
“You don’t watch TV?”
“No, I don’t like TV.”
“Oh, so you’re too good to watch TV, is that it? You think TV watchers are a bunch of fat slobs?” Simon was enjoying himself.
“No, no, I didn’t say that,” she pleaded, smiling.
“I guess you read a lot. Reading makes you just as fat if you think about it. You don’t move at all when you’re reading.”
“I’m not trying to defend reading.”
“In fact, you can watch TV at the gym. You can be working out and watching TV at the same time. Try bringing a book to the gym.”
“I don’t even go to the gym!” Meghan protested vainly. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, so you don’t even work out, but here you are giving me shit about watching TV.”
“I wasn’t!”
“I know what I heard, Meghan.”
She eyed her boss as he walked by her cubicle.
“Hey, you need to tell me about what you’re writing on sometime,” Simon said, suddenly serious. “I don’t know enough about that stuff.”
“Oh, I’d be happy to.”
“All I know is entertainment, you know?”
“Well I wish I knew more about that stuff,” Meghan said, transparently trying to be conciliatory.
“Nah, it’s not important.”
“Well, it is to some people,” Meghan said.
“I wish I had a more important beat.”
She stretched her arms forward. “Politics isn’t any better.”
“But how does the government even work in California? Is it the same as the national government?”
“Yeah.”
“So there’s a Speaker of the House in the national government too, right?”
“Yes, that’s right. He’s the leader of the House, chosen from the House’s majority party.”
“Which is, Republican right now?”
“Yes, Republicans have the majority in the state Congress right now.”
“But isn’t the governor a Democrat?” Simon asked.
“Yes.”
“And he can just veto anything, right? How does anything get done when that happens?”
“Sometimes they agree on things.”
“Are they agreeing right now or is the governor just vetoing everything?”
“Oh, they’re not agreeing on anything. The Speaker and the governor hate each other.”
“How come?”
“Well, a lot of reasons. For starters, their parties have different philosophies.”
“But isn’t it just a show for their voters? Don’t we want to see a wrestling match?”
“I suppose for a lot of politicians, maybe, but the speaker and the governor really don’t get along, and haven’t for a while.”
“So what do you think? Who do you like?”
She giggled. “Oh, me, I don’t really know. I just follow politics, but I don’t have a strong opinion on anything.”
“But you’ve got to have some kind of idea.”
“No, not really.”
“Come on. You report on this stuff. Why did you want to get into this in the first place?”
“Well,” she again stretched her arms in front of her, bashfully smiling. “I guess I kind of agree with the speaker.”
“How so.”
“I just think that the government’s bad at a lot of things. Bureaucracy is really wasteful and ineffective.”
“Okay. What would the governor say to that?”
“I don’t know. Something about the government existing for everyone. That the general public has a right to some things.”
“Like what?”
“Oh, I don’t know.”
“Give me an example. What’s the hot topic right now in Sacramento?”
“Well, the speaker wants to privatize the state’s water supply. His party has been talking about backing his plan, but it’s still a draft. There is no official bill yet.”
“What’s the rationale?”
“Private companies would be able to do the government’s job better.”
“But politicians are liars, right? So who’s lying? Are they both lying?”
“Oh, politicians aren’t all liars.”
“But what’s the angle here? They aren’t being totally upfront, are they?”
“Oh, don’t get into all the scandals and rumors.”
“Well, I’m an entertainment reporter. What else do you think I report on?”
Meghan laughed. “You’ve got a good point!”
“Come on, tell me the scandals. You’re into the boring stuff. Don’t try to push that on me,” Simon said.
“Oh, gosh. Well, people are saying the governor is gay…”
“Really.”
“…And he goes to male prostitutes.”
“That’s a scandal.” Simon said.
“Yeah, but why are people so interested in what he does in his personal life? That’s not real politics.”
“Okay, okay, so what’s a political scandal.” Simon asked.
“The scandal right now is that we’ve been running a budget deficit for five congressional sessions in a row and the Congress is gridlocked.”
Simon pretended to snore.
“Stop it!” Meghan laughed.
“Where’s the mob ties? Where’s the corruption? This stuff is dry. No wonder no one reads the Government section.”
“People read it!”
“Hook me then. Where’s the lede.”
“Oh, I don’t know. There’s always allegations of corruption.”
“But you don’t buy it?”
“I mean, people are always slinging mud. Like with the speaker, people like to accuse him of being cozy with lobbyists.”
“Is he?”
“I don’t know. He has some industry ties, but that doesn’t mean anything.”
“Doesn’t it? What industry?”
“His brother-in-law is CFO of a land management company.”
“What’s that? Like real estate?” Simon genuinely didn’t know what a land management company was.
“No, it’s a new industry that’s come up. They groom tracts of land for new development or something. Do environmental surveys, manage forest fires, stuff like that.”
“The government doesn’t do that?”
“They
do, but these companies have arisen and have been bidding for government contracts.”
“And the speaker’s brother is CFO of one of these?”
“Brother-in-law.”
“That’s not suspicious?”
“It doesn’t mean anything, necessarily.”
“Well what if he had other connections like that? Would that point to something fishy?”
“Well, he’s been in Sacramento for a while, so he knows a lot of people.”
“Okay,” Simon decided to end here for now. “Well, anyway, thanks for the politics lesson. Oh, what was the name of that land management company again?”
“Hm. I don’t remember. I’ll look it up and email it to you.”
Simon got nervous. “Oh, no, don’t worry about it. I was just curious.”
He didn’t want anything to do with that company coming through his inbox, especially not his work email.
“I should get back to my desk,” he said, walking off.
On his way back, from the window near his desk he saw Rinehard stoop into a black SUV with a bunch of large men in suits. He’s got bodyguards now.
That night he called Casper’s prepaid cell from a payphone. “So I got a lead on the speaker. His brother-in-law works for a land management company, which I don’t know the name of, but it shouldn’t be hard to figure out.”
“Okay.”
“I also induced that the governor’s dirty secret is still kind of a secret…”
“Wait, what about this land management company? What’s the name of it?” Casper interrupted.
“Relax, I haven’t found that out yet. I had a busy day, I don’t just kick it on the beach all day saving whales.”
“You think that’s what I do?”
“I have no idea what you do. But you can put in some time on this, too.”
“I don’t have the resources,” Casper said.
“You’re part of the richest family in LA, but you don’t have the resources? You’re connected to everybody.”
“And I draw attention everywhere.”
“That’s in your head, man.”
“It’s not.”
“Listen, do you have a computer? You know