The Awakening

by Allen Johnson

  “And that is—how do you say in French—bullshit! Who’s the subcontractor?”

  “Dupré Ingénieurs.”

  Anthony looked up at the ceiling, closed his eyes, and exhaled. “Do you know how much business we give Roland Dupré each year, Badeau?”

  Badeau haltingly hunched his shoulders.

  “No, of course you don’t.” Anthony turned to the CFO sitting to his left. “Ferrand, how much did we pay Dupré Ingénieurs in ‘89?”

  Ferrand straightened himself. “It has been un bon moment since I have looked at the numbers, but, if my memory is correct, I would say environ—approximately—3.8 million francs.”

  “And would you say we are their most important client.”

  “Sans aucun doute—without a doubt.”

  “That’s my assessment, too.” Anthony turned to his office manager who was taking meeting notes. “Lucy, get Dupré on the line for me, and put him on the speakerphone.”

  Lucy rushed to her desk and retrieved Dupré’s private phone number. In the next moment, she was dialing the number on the conference speakerphone placed in the middle of the table.

  “Take notes, Badeau. You’re going to learn something.”

  The phone rang and was picked up on the fourth ring. A sandpaper voice answered: “Allô. Je vous écoute.” His words were impatient and clipped.

  “Good morning, Roland. This is Anthony Rossi.”

  “Good morning, Monsieur Rossi,” Dupré said, his tone of voice suddenly softening.

  “I’ve got Jean-Pierre Badeau on the line with me.”

  “Bonjour, Monsieur Badeau.”

  “Bonjour, Monsieur Dupré.”

  “It seems we have a little problem,” Anthony continued. “We’re behind schedule on that parking garage job, and you are the cause of that delay.”

  “Attendez un petit moment, Monsieur Rossi …”

  “No, you wait a minute. We’re losing 12,000 francs a day on this job. As of today, that adds up to 252,000 francs in lost revenue. That’s money out of my pocket, and, believe me, I will not let that continue for long. Are you getting my drift? Tu comprends?”

  “Je vous en prie, Monsieur Rossi; we are very busy …”

  “Écoute moi! You think I care about your pissant problems? I don’t give a shit about your problems. Tu me fais chier—you piss me off.”

  The French administrators gasped.

  “Now, wait a moment. Ça va pas, quoi.”

  “This is very simple, Roland. We do nearly four million francs of business with you every year. Look it up. If you want that to continue, you absolutely must deliver, and deliver now. Are you getting this? Tu comprends?”

  “Oui.” Roland’s voice was not happy, but it was compliant.

  “Now, you have some of our samples that have been sitting in your warehouse for ten days.”

  “Je ne le savais pas. I did not know that.”

  “Well, now you do. And here’s the bottom line: I want the tensile strengths of those samples by closing time tonight. Got it? D’accord?”

  “That will be very difficile . . .”

  “Roland?”

  “Oui.”

  “La ferme! Shut the hell up.”

  The French administrators looked at each other with gaping eyes.

  There was silence on the line. Anthony waited calmly with folded arms, a tight-lip smile drawn across his face. Then, he raised a single index finger to the managers in the room, indicating both silence and patience, as ten seconds ticked off the clock. Then, finally:

  “Monsieur Rossi?”

  “Yes. I’m here”

  “D’accord. We have an understanding.”

  “That’s good, Roland. Have a nice day.”

  “Ouais.”

  Anthony pointed a finger at Lucy to terminate the connection.

  “And that, Badeau, is how the big boys play hardball.”

  “Oui, monsieur,” Badeau said.

  Anthony glowered at the French project manager. “Ah, one other thing, Badeau,” he said offhandedly. “You let this kind of thing happen again, and your foul-smelling ass will be on the street.”

  Badeau did not understand the expression “foul-smelling ass,” but he knew it wasn’t a compliment. He started to lean to the left.

  “Badeau.”

  Badeau was in mid air. “Oui, monsieur?”

  “Don’t even think about it.”

  Badeau sat back down squarely in his seat, his face pinched around the mouth and eyes. “Yes, sir,” Badeau mumbled, speaking to a spot on the conference table.

  “Well, you certainly took care of that problem,” the specter said.

  Anthony could find no words to say. The color drained from his face, while he blinked away a tear.

  “Wait a minute. You are not crying? Tell me those are not tears of compassion.”

  “Am I that much of a monster?”

  “You tell me. Remember when you were peeping on your wife? Hennessy left a blueprint at your home. It was condemning evidence of your partner’s treachery and your wife’s unfaithfulness. Why don’t we see how you leveraged that piece of information?”

  Anthony reached down into his top-loading leather briefcase and pulled out the folded blueprint; he placed it before him like a dinner plate, making certain that it was square with the table. Then, he fished out a pair of standard office scissors and, with equal precision, placed them perfectly parallel on the right side of the blueprint.

  “Now, we’ve got a second problem, and this one is more serious.”

  On cue, the shoulders of the men around the room contracted, their faces morphing into wads of tension.

  “And the problem is the lycée remodel job,” Anthony pronounced, placing his right hand on the blueprints. “These are the prints.”

  With that, Anthony slid the drawings the full length of the table, skimming the speakerphone and coming to a stop at Hennessy’s water glass. It was a perfectly placed shuffleboard stroke. Hennessy visibly blushed, unconsciously loosening his tie and undoing the top button at his collar.

  Anthony took the scissors in hand, stood up, and started walking slowly around the room. All the managers watched in silence, as Anthony patted the blades of the scissors in the palm of his hand. He walked counterclockwise around the executive table, passed Hennessy and then returned, settling in directly behind him.

  “We were low bid on the lycée project. In fact, we left 350,000 francs on the table to the next lowest bidder. I don’t like that. I don’t like leaving money on the table.” Anthony punctuated each word of his last sentence by lightly tapping the jaws of the scissors on Hennessy’s right shoulder.

  “So, tell me, Hennie, what do we have to do?”

  Hennessy started to speak, but his throat was dry and as a result squawked out an indecipherable syllable. He took a drink of water and then a second gulp. Finally, looking over his shoulder to glance at Anthony, but catching only the outline of his suit, he said, “We’ll have to come in under budget.”

  “That’s right,” Anthony said. “We’ll have to come in under budget. That means snipping the overruns and waste wherever we can.” Anthony dropped his left hand over Hennessy’s left shoulder and lifted the midsection of the vice president’s tie. With his right hand he inserted the scissors’ jaws across the bottom three inches of the necktie. “We’ll have to snip the material costs,” Anthony said, slicing off Hennessy’s $100-designer tie.

  The eyes of the executives rounded. One American undid a tentative smile, while a French counterpart mouthed, “Oh là là.”

  “And then we need to snip labor costs,” Anthony continued, slicing off the next three inches of his partner’s necktie. “And, just to be on the safe side, we will snip nonreimbursable overhead costs.” As Anthony drew out the word “s-n-i-p,” he slashed off another section of silk, leaving a pile of material on Hennessy’s lap and a ridiculous chopped flag at his neck.

  The vice president was mute. He undid what remained of hi
s severed tie, balled it up, and tried to stuff it into his suit pocket. But his pocket was sewn shut to protect the drape of the suit, and, out of pure frustration, Hennessy ripped the side pocket open and crammed the tie remnant into the new cavity. Anthony saw all this and huffed a small laugh of satisfaction.

  The company president returned to his chair and sat down, placing the scissors on the table to his right. “This meeting is over,” he said without fanfare.

  The men began to get up and leave, and then Anthony spoke again. The men froze.

  “One other thing, Hennessy. Don’t ever loosen your tie in an executive staff meeting again. It shows weakness. And we all know you’re not a weak man.”

  The managers stood immobile, not knowing if they were excused.

  “That’s all.”

  The men quickly filed out of the room, most taking a long draw of air outside of the boardroom, visibly thankful that they had been granted a temporary reprieve.

  “I know what is next. You’ve made your point.”

  “What is my point?” the specter asked.

  “The point is I’m a contemptible human being.”

  “Is that how you would put it?” the ghost asked with a patronizing tone. “My language would be much more vulgar than that.”

  “You know, I don’t care about your language. There is nothing that you can show me that I don’t already know about myself.”

  “And still you are—how did you put it—oh, yes, ‘a contemptible human being.’ Shall we see just how contemptible?”

  Hennessy was at the door when Anthony stopped him. “Hold on, Hennie.”

  The vice president turned and faced Anthony, who was still seated, kicked back in the captain’s chair. Hennessy took his seat at the opposite end of the table, separating the two men by twenty feet.

  Anthony stared at Hennessy, whose forehead was glistening with small beads of sweat. “You don’t look well, Hennie,” Anthony said.

  “Yeah, I think I have a cold coming on,” Hennessy said, pulling a handkerchief from his back pocket and patting the back of his neck.

  “Hum. Well, keep hydrated and get a good night’s sleep.” Anthony paused. “Are you sleeping well these days, Hennie?”

  Hennessy’s right thumb started twitching uncontrollably. He took his hands off the table and placed them on his lap.

  “Look, Anthony, I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry?” Anthony said innocently. “What are you sorry about?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Hennie, you have something to say to me?”

  Hennessy took in a deep breath. His eyes fashioned a slow blink. “Penelope and me.”

  “What about Penelope and you?” he asked without mercy, reverting to tapping the scissors in his hand.

  “Well, you know, I’m . . . she . . . I mean, we’re . . . you know.”

  “What are you jabbering about, Hennie?”

  “We’re sleeping together.” Hennessy sopped up the sweat on his forehead. “You knew that, of course.”

  “Not until just now,” Anthony said calmly, reveling in the lie.

  “Damn.” Hennessy looked woefully out the office window. “I’m sorry, Anthony. I’m really sorry.”

  “You said that, Hennie.”

  “Well, I mean it.”

  “Uh-huh. So, tell me, is she a good lay?”

  “Damn it, Anthony.”

  “No really, I’d like to know. Does she do that swishing thing with her ass, when she wants you to mount her?”

  “Please, Anthony.”

  “Isn’t that the best? Don’t you just love that? Damn, I love it when she does that.”

  “Okay, Anthony, what do you want? What do you want me to do? You want me to sell out? You want me to go back to the States? You want me to . . . what do you want from me?”

  “No, no, no, no, no. It’s not what I want, brother. It’s what you want. Do you want my wife?”

  Hennessy looked questioningly at the president.

  “That’s not a trick question, Hennie. Do you want my wife?” After a pause, he added, “Understand that although she can be very seductive—and she does do that swishing thing with her ass—she can also be manipulative and pouty and completely self-centered. So, what’s it going to be, Hennie? Do you want my wife?”

  Hennessy was dead still, as if in a trance. Finally, he muttered, “I don’t know.”

  Anthony pursed his lips and ran his knuckles across his jaw line. “You don’t know. Okay, I’ll tell you what: Tuesday of next week, I’m going to Spain on the Águilas project. I’ll be gone for five days. During that time, I want you to think very hard about your role in the company and your future with Penelope. And when I get back, we will sort this thing out.”

  Anthony’s speech was delivered with cool, almost calming, reserve. What was menacing was the sound of metal slicing across metal, as the president snapped the blades of the scissors again and again: swish, click … swish, click.

  “Okay,” Hennessy said. He opened his mouth as if to apologize, but changed his mind and only said again, “Okay, okay then.” He stood up to leave, turning his back on Anthony as he moved toward the door.

  “One other thing, Hennie.”

  Anthony didn’t bother to turn around. “Yes?”

  “As long as I’m in town, keep your swinging dick away from my wife.”

  Hennessy said nothing. His back still to Anthony, he simply nodded and walked out.

  In the next instant, Lucy stepped into the room, shutting the door behind her. “Miss Monique Ducros is on the line. She seems quite upset.”

  “Tell her I’m not in,” Anthony said blankly.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Lucy opened the door to leave.

  “And, Lucy, don’t take her calls again—ever.”

  “Yes, Mr. Rossi.”

  The scene went to black. The president and specter were back in Anthony’s office. The windows were still opaque—black reflections of the players. Suddenly, the room was cold, very cold.

  “Lucy is an interesting character in this morality play.”

  “She is indispensable to me. She understands the organization inside-out.”

  “She is American, is she not?”

  “Yes. She’s been with me since the early days in Seattle.”

  “She is also a little in love with you.”

  “I know that, but I’ve never touched her; she’s too valuable to me. She went through a messy divorce, and I think I became her substitute husband.”

  “And you so enjoy her adoration; after all, it gives you so much leverage.”

  “I know I can trust her,” he said without expression.

  Anthony stood before the mirrored windows. He could see himself; he could not see the phantom. Except for the voice of the specter, he was alone in the darkened room. He examined his reflection. His face was drawn and sallow; he hardly recognized himself. He shook off a shiver.

  “What do you see in the glass?” the specter asked, his voice echoing, as if from a dark abyss.

  “I don’t know anymore. What do you see?”

  “I see a man at the crossroads of his life.”

  “What road do I take?”

  “That depends on you.”

  Anthony turned to face the phantom. “I beg of you: Who are you? Please tell me.”

  “I was a man who confused power with virtue. I believed that savagery was the only redeeming force in life. I was like you, Anthony.”

  “Why do you haunt the earth? Why have you not found peace?”

  “Who are you to talk of peace?”

  “It’s what I want.”

  “There is only one pathway to peace.”

  Anthony’s eyes were yearning. “Please tell me.”

  The specter became visible again, standing just behind the president’s shoulder. He leaned into Anthony’s ear. “Charity,” he whispered, pronouncing the word as if it were the holiest of benedictions.

  Anthony pondered the s
pecter’s words. For a moment, it appeared that he understood everything. Then, slowly, like an unexpected storm, his expression changed from humility to arrogance. When Anthony asked the next question, his voice was not pleading, not even remorseful; it was defiant and marinated in pride. “What do you want from me?”

  The phantom bristled. “You have the audacity to speak to me in that tone? Have you learned nothing, cow dung?”

  The specter gripped Anthony’s shoulder with his boney fingers and squeezed. Anthony buckled and fell to his knees.

  “You are a cold fish,” the specter said, “but not nearly cold enough.”

  A piercing chill stabbed the flesh and bones of Anthony’s shoulder. Then, veins of ice splintered from the phantoms grip, cutting up and around Anthony’s neck and across his chest. Anthony opened his mouth in agony, and his breath, a thin white vapor, crystallized and fell to the ground like shattered glass. The rivulets of ice traversed crisscross over his body. His nose turned pale, then blue, cracked at the seams, and separated from his face. When the phantom finally released his grip, Anthony toppled to the floor, a solid block of ice.

  San Bartolomé, the sixteenth-century church on the hill, was only a few steps up a winding passageway from the Garcias’ home. The sanctuary was deserted with the exception of one sole figure, Lupita, who knelt at a front pew near the center aisle, her head covered with a white cotton scarf that draped around her neck and down her back.

  Usually, she came to pray for her parents. No, that was not right: She came to pray to her parents. They had been gone for sixteen years, but for Lupita their memory had never dimmed. She remembered her mother, how she would brush out her long black hair at night. “You have such beautiful hair,” she would say. “You will drive the boys crazy with desire.”

  It was a nonsensical thing to say, and her mother knew it, because Lupita had no interest in turning the heads of young boys. She was more preoccupied with climbing trees or playing hide-and-seek with her school friends in the narrow and crooked side streets of Espejo. And so Lupita would laugh and say, “Oh, Mama, you are so silly,” which would make her mother laugh, and they would fall into each other’s arms, until her mother raked her fingers across her daughter’s ribs, which straightened Lupita’s back in a hurry.