Unraveling

by Owen Thomas

“It’s not fair to the troops,” Harris was saying. “We’re there and they oughta just shut up about missing WMD’s. We can’t pull out now. Democracy never comes cheap or easy. Does it Hollis?” Unskewering a mushroom into his mouth, Hollis nodded his head in agreement, and kept moving.

  Dana Swensen was talking real estate with Mikki and Jude Dobbs, suggesting that the notion of a bubble of artificially inflated property values was mostly a myth.

  “People have been trained to think that a bust will always follow a boom; that bad news will always follow good. But that’s not necessarily true for property values. Not true in Columbus. Not true in Cleveland. Here, ask Hollis; he’ll tell you.”

  “What will I tell them?”

  “That the bubble theory applied to property values is a myth.”

  “It is a myth,” Hollis said. “I gotta run. Nice to see you tonight.”

  “You’re leaving?” asked Jude. Hollis kept moving, heading for the center of the room, toward the knot of people clustered around Mae Chang, who was still seated on the sofa. He wisely charted an avoidant course around Peaches Pinkle who was taking strong issue with Rhonda Davenport over the sexual potency of Gene Hackman.

  David, Susan, Gayle the lesbian interloper, Bill Swensen and Bethany all looked at him as he approached.

  “How we feeling?” he asked Mae, just a little too chipper, patting her on the knee.

  “Her head is going to hurt like the dickens,” Bill answered for her, “but she’ll be okay. I don’t think she’s got a concussion.”

  David, who had perched himself on the edge of the assaultive table, reached for Mae’s hand, but she pulled it away. Poor bastard, Hollis thought. Somehow, David would get the blame for all of this. Not even Mae knew yet why it was David’s fault, but she would know for certain before the night was over and then David would know. That’s just the way it worked. David needed to grow some thicker skin, be his own man. He worried too much about what others thought of him; too vulnerable to misplaced guilt. He clapped David on the shoulder and winked, knowing that would say it all.

  “Well, that’s fortunate,” said Hollis, pointing sternly at Mae, “because concussions are strictly prohibited in this house.” Mae did something with her mouth that Hollis chose to interpret as a smile. Turning to Susan, he said, “How’s Ben?”

  “Upset, but okay,” she reported. “He’s calmer now.”

  “I found the aspirin, Hollis,” reported Bethany, suddenly between them. “I just gave her the whole bottle to keep with her.”

  “Perfect. Thanks, Beth. You ready to get going?”

  “Going?” said Bethany. “Where…”

  “Going?” said Susan, just a little louder. “You’re leaving?”

  “MmmHmm.”

  “But, the dinner… You’re leaving before dinner?”

  “MmmHmm.”

  “Hollis… where, exactly, are you going?”

  “Little surprise for Beth.”

  “A surprise?!” exclaimed Bethany, her face brightening. “Really? Oh Hollis, you really are too much. What have you done now?”

  Susan, her body language at war with itself, crossed her arms tightly and smiled like a cleaving glacier, exposing her teeth, as though she too was enthralled with Hollis’ unpredictability and the mystery of what he could possibly have in store.

  Even if Susan had intended to fool her guests, she clearly had no intention of fooling Hollis; and he was not fooled. Hollis knew she was upset. He had always known that she would be upset. He even knew that by the time they ultimately started fighting about this evening – tomorrow or the next day – Susan will have carefully framed her objection. I don’t care if you want to leave, Hollis, she will say, that’s not the point. It’s just a matter of common courtesy to let me know ahead of time.

  But that would all be a carefully constructed, post-hoc rationalization. Susan’s irritation had nothing whatsoever to do with common courtesy. It had everything to do with his freedom from her agenda. The party had always been her deal, not his. He had been very clear about that fact. She had elected to throw the party anyway. He was not going out of his way to be difficult. Had circumstances been different, he certainly would have been around to help pry the tumbler out of Peaches’ hand and bid them all a fond farewell. He would have washed the dishes and straightened the living room.

  But circumstances were not different, and he had stayed as long as those circumstances would reasonably permit. Hell, he had been here for Tilly, that’s what mattered, wasn’t it? Susan should be satisfied. She should be satisfied, but she wouldn’t be satisfied. In fact, she would be secretly angry that she could not accuse him of skipping out on his own daughter. He expected nothing rational from her on this subject.

  And that was all okay. He had the thick skin David lacked. Susan would be fine.

  “Okay,” he said, addressing the group of them together, “here’s the deal. This afternoon when I was out picking up wine for the party, I bumped into Simon Neal. Simon Neal is the Executive Vice President of the bank. He said to say, hello, by the way, Susan, and to tell you that Janice is going to stay in Capistrano for another month and will call you when she gets back.”

  Susan, still smiling, blinked once very, very slowly, as though suddenly inhabited by a Disney animatronic. Hollis turned his attention to Bethany and continued.

  “Anyway, Simon told me that Wally Nunn, another V-P, is retiring. Turn’s out his retirement party is tonight, over at The Blackwell. Started about… oh… an hour or so ago. Simon asked what I had been up to and I mentioned that I was helping a brilliant young mind find its place in the halls of Ohio academe and, further,” he said, holding up a finger, “that I was helping to find said brilliant young mind a path to future employment. Simon told me that OFSC was revamping its internship program and said that Vernon Ashe has made that his mission and that Vernon would be very … interested … in … talking … to … you.” He poked her in the shoulder.

  Bethany gasped. “What?!”

  He said that I should bring you by tonight since everyone will be there.” Hollis spread his arms in the direction of the brilliant young mind. “Whadaya think, Beth?”

  There was a moment of incomprehension on Bethany’s face.

  “Hollis…I…oh my God. I can’t believe you. You’re…oh my God.” She threw her arms around the tops of his shoulders, pressing the warmth of her cheek against his. “I don’t even know what to say.” They parted and she looked at him, searching his eyes. “Am I ready for this? I mean, I haven’t taken a single business class. I’m not even…”

  “Ahhh,” Hollis waved away her concerns. “Relax. Of course you’re ready. But we need to go before they all get too drunk to remember you.”

  David, Mae and Dr. Swensen turned to the question of how much ibuprofen one could safely ingest in a single twenty-four hour period. They spoke in softer tones, as if to tacitly encourage that the other conversation proceed without them.

  Susan looked down at the carpet, averting her attention from Bethany’s gush of gratitude. She toed a string of lint into the carpet until it was gone from view. When she looked up again, she found Gayle looking back at her with a face of solidarity and indignant incomprehension. Susan rolled her eyes and smiled, patting Gayle on the forearm and waving away the new developments with all of those things in life that are not really new and that cannot be helped.

  “That’s certainly exciting news, Bethany,” Susan said.

  “I know. I just can’t even believe this.”

  “Well, look, don’t be any later than you already are. You two should get going. It was wonderful meeting you. Thanks very much for coming tonight.”

  Hollis kissed his wife on the cheek, turned and then, lightly touching Bethany on her yellow elbow, made his way for the door, slapping backs and pumping hands as he moved through the room. When he reached the very spot in the foyer where Mae Chang’s evening had turned precipitously south, he waved grandly at his friends and family, as thoug
h he were boarding a cruise ship. A jumbled chorus of voices and arms returned the gesture.

  “You all enjoy yourselves. And enjoy the dinner. Tilly called a moment ago and wanted me to thank all of you for coming to celebrate her success. So, yes, thanks. We really do appreciate it.” Then, he singled out Susan, who was again smiling ferociously at them: “Honey, I’ve got my cell phone if you need anything. And, oh, just leave the dishes; I’ll do them when I get home.”

  “Ahh, what a guy!” Mikki Dobbs was saying, as the door closed behind them.

  * * *

  They stepped from the house out into a column of dark autumn air that, upon the closing of the door, seemed to fall upon their shoulders like a single cloak of heavy velvet. Hollis pulled a long, slow breath as they crossed onto the driveway, feeling strangely free; almost kingly. The evening was suddenly intimate and formal and slightly electric. He tucked Bethany into the car and she beamed up at him in gratitude for all he was doing and all that he was.

  He drove to the Blackwell Intercontinental Hotel on a thick cushion of self-satisfaction. It was the pulse of magnanimity beating in his chest and the blood of a benefactor in his veins. He had helped his good friend Akahito Takada. Not just a perfunctory gesture, but more than anyone could reasonably have expected of him. He had devoted entire days to Bethany’s cause; not just showing her colleges and lending his name and knowledge to what would turn out to be important introductions, but showing her his beloved Ohio. He had given of his own life and experience and wisdom for her benefit. He had welcomed Bethany into his own home, bringing her within the fold of his family and friends. And he was now whisking her through the night, beneath a fulsome autumnal moon that silvered the I-70 and the inside track to an opportunity that only he could have arranged.

  The middle lane cleared and Hollis seized the opportunity to accelerate around the doddering station wagon with the broken tail light and the chaotic collage of sneeringly clever bumper stickers that had been holding his attention captive: He’s a Divider, not a Uniter. And: Jesus was a Liberal. And: Make Levees, Not War. And: 51% is Not a Mandate. And: If you aren’t absolutely appalled, then you haven’t been paying attention. And the one Hollis could not begin to understand but was just as eager to put behind him: Cheney-Palpatine 2008. He was driving much faster than necessary, but it felt good. He felt good. He was good.

  His colleagues at OFSC would certainly be pleased and grateful to have someone like Bethany Koan in their midst. After all, what is there not to like about Bethany Koan? Sharp as a tack; a quick learner; a good sense of values and wise beyond her years. She would start at the bottom, of course, while she got her education; learning the paperwork and working the phones. But she would move up fast.

  He looked at her in the passenger seat next to him – Suki, Bethany… Beth – pulling a tiny brush through her perfect blonde mane and poking around in her purse for a lipstick. She would move fast, all right. With her charm and smarts, she would soon be everybody’s favorite assistant deal closer. They’d be lining up to work with her, to teach her; each vying to be the one who shows her the way.

  The assistive role would be but a short-lived pit stop. She would keep moving. She’d steer clear of the home mortgage department, of course, and escrow, and consumer loans; he would make sure of that. Beth was made for better things and higher places. She’d go straight into commercial loans, just as he had, rolling with the big boys and the big money, making the deals that made the city and letting someone else cross the t’s and dot the i’s in order to close them up and file them away.

  But Bethany would not likely content herself with the deals that made the city. She would not limit her sights to Columbus, or even Ohio. Her intimate connection with Japanese banking and with the great Akahito Takada would, with the right guidance from a certain benefactor, launch her and OFSC into the heady realm of international finance. Deals would be made; alliances forged; markets opened.

  Of course, Hollis’ trusted association with all parties suggested the likelihood that he would serve an integral role in those developments. If called upon to serve for such purposes, he would certainly lend his assistance. But that was an incidental consideration; his role, if any, was dependent on the interwoven fate of his protégé and his former employer. With any luck, after a few years of raking in the money, Bethany Koan would be an officer and a director, and OFSC, in the span of one person’s career, would be a different bank than the one from which Hollis had retired.

  He smiled a little at this thought. OFSC would finally be on the map and would owe its success, in some small way, to him. To Hollis Johns. To his foresight. To his willingness to do the right thing for the right person at the right time. All of that was a long, long way off, of course. And, really, who knew for certain what would come of his efforts on Bethany’s behalf. But Hollis could now see this future so clearly in the headlights that it was difficult to imagine any other.

  Bethany was quiet, surprisingly so. She stared out the window at the traffic as she twirled the strap of her purse around her finger.

  “You okay there, Beth?” he asked.

  “Hmm? Oh, yeah. Yeah. This is really …God! This so exciting, Hollis!” She leaned over and squeezed his arm with both hands. “I guess I’m still kind of shocked.”

  “Well, I think this might be a good opportunity for you. OFSC is a good organization. Top people. You’ll like them.” He gave her knee a reassuring squeeze. “And I know they’re gonna like you. You’re not nervous are you?”

  “A little,” she confessed with a laugh.

  “I thought so. Don’t you worry about a thing.”

  Whatever nervousness Bethany was feeling seemed to Hollis to have dissipated by the time State Highway 315 crossed Olentangy River Road and they began gliding along Tuttle Park Place back towards the OSU campus. Perhaps, he surmised, the trip was reminding her of their first day together. Not the actual first day, in the Marriot lobby restaurant, a lifetime ago when he still thought of her as Suki Takada; but her first day out as Bethany Koan, when she had so impressed him and Fawn Sherwood at OSU with her potential as a student of business. The day of the waffles and the park and the gardens and the Bonsai. The day they had held hands on the way back to the car.

  “Did you meditate this morning?” he asked. She laughed her beautiful laugh and buried her face in her hands, confessing that she had slept in and not seen the sun rise.

  “Every day, every day, every day,” he said, playfully. “It’s important.”

  “I know. I know. Oh, Hollis, I’m terrible.”

  “What am I going to do with you, Beth?”

  Wally Nunn’s retirement party was at full throttle when they arrived. The banquet room, one of the smaller offered by The Blackwell, was full of people and jostling with raucous merriment. A swing band was busy over-working a medley of Benny Goodman hits from across the room. Hollis could pick out voices here and there that he recognized, and then the faces of his old colleagues, here somehow alien and out of context, started to leap out at him. There was Nancy. And there was Michael Wohlf. And Bernard. And Michael Richards. And Gabe. And Barbara. And Louis. One by one they came back to him, these faces that used to be so familiar, so much the intimate cast that populated his daily life. They all looked the same now; now that he really looked at them as they went about eating and talking and dancing, oblivious to his presence. The same, and yet…

  They stood and watched for a moment, as though on a beach just out of reach of the breakers, before venturing in. A uniformed man with a bottle poured them each a glass of wine. Hollis put his arm around Bethany’s shoulder and gave it a reassuring squeeze, sensing her trepidation. At the far end of the ballroom heads and arms were visible through the crowd spinning and bobbing and flailing like people drowning in a rhythmic undertow. A sure sign of bankers cutting loose.

  It took a few minutes before people began to notice Hollis, standing in the bank of doorways next to a woman in yellow that they did not know. But eve
ntually their distracted attention lingered long enough to trigger recognition, and he was soon awash in glad-handing and hugging and good-natured exclamations.

  Hey, Hollis! How the hell you been? Where you been hiding yourself?

  Hollis had not attended a company function since his retirement, but he had imagined doing so. He had imagined his return. Hollis, the avuncular elder statesman. Hollis, the approachable icon of the good ol’ days. Hollis, the beloved mentor who always had the time and the solution. Hollis, who had heroically lobbied the board to stop the merger. Hollis, who had come up in the days when OFSC was making its name and banks were still banks and not financial department stores hawking insurance and investment tips. Hollis, the deal-making legend who knew absolutely everyone.

  The reality now compared strangely to what he had imagined. The greetings were friendly, even effusive, but casually so, fleeting, and not as reverential or reminiscent as they might have been. All was in passing; delightful impromptu interludes with an old pal; social detours on the way to the buffet or the bar or the dance floor. Of course, it was the environment. The party, the people, the music. All of the celebratory commotion would allow only but so much personal attention. He knew that. He knew that.

  At each turn Hollis found himself explaining how much he was enjoying his retirement; so much more time to explore what the workaday world would never allow. The reading and the studying of the many topics that interested him. More quality time with his family, which, he reminded them, was very important to him. And the travel. Serious travel that he and Susan were planning. Still in the thinking stages, of course, but there would be some serious traveling. There was just so much to see and do in the world. He was seriously thinking about Tibet. He was looking into Lhasa.

  They were happy to see him, he thought. They seemed happy to see him. They acted that way. But the din of conversation and music and the ebb and flow of people prevented interactions of any depth and made for little more than a series of shallow and less-than-satisfying exchanges. As soon as a conversation threatened to turn meaningful someone else would wander by and the frothy ritual of surprised recognition, fervid greeting and the how’s-retirement-in-fifty-words-or-less confabulation started anew.