He was skeptical. Diana sat across from him, blushing from the embarrassment of being forced to wash her dirty linen in front of him. He was so butch. Ridiculously masculine. A big gorilla, she told herself, with all that silky black hair.
“Yeah? And you’re telling me you really worked at that job?”
“My work got done, didn’t it?” she asked coldly. “I don’t think you need to ask questions about my motivations. I did what you asked me to. And now I need a reference.”
Cicero grinned suddenly. “You came here to ask me for a reference?”
“Yes.” She shifted in front of him; her slim body, with all those curves, moved deliciously. “I—I—” she blushed, and fell silent.
“Go on,” he prompted, mercilessly.
“I can’t find a job.” Diana’s cheeks flamed. “I had no reference from you, and working for my husband’s company didn’t seem to count.”
“But you’re a rich girl. Why don’t you just go back to England?”
“I don’t give up that easily,” she said, magnificently cold.
Cicero couldn’t help it, he quite admired her. What it must have cost her to come in here and ask him for help. So, the spoiled little brat was getting her first reality check. He looked down at the pictures in front of him. One showed the weary Diana, the other the glittering Felicity, and all he could think was what a moron Ernest Foxton was to pick the second girl.
“I’m not going to ask your reasons,” he said, “because I don’t care about them. But I guess I misjudged you. I suppose I owe you a favor. First, a reference from me would be worthless, because Blakely’s discredited me. Second, you need one to get hired. It’s Catch-twenty-two. You gotta have a job to get a job.”
Diana lowered her blue eyes. “That’s just great. How the hell can I swing that? I only worked eight months in my whole life, and that was a year ago on another continent.”
“You can come and work for me,” Michael said.
Surprise made her rude. “Work for you? I don’t think so.”
“It’s the best offer you’ll get.” Cicero shrugged. “Look, lady, I don’t like you either, but this is an office. You don’t need to like me, you just need to do what I tell you and turn up on time. I can only hire you for maybe a month. It’s real short-term, too, but at the end of it you get a reference. I can pay you eight hundred dollars, no benefits.”
Diana looked across at him.
“I’ll take it,” she said.
TWENTY-FIVE
The days crept by, and the temperature crept up.
Diana learned things she’d never thought herself capable of learning, and it stung her. She learned how to get up twenty minutes earlier to avoid the worst of the subway crush. She comparison-shopped at the delis and supermarkets for the cheapest detergents, and bought last-day discounted meat and fish. To keep the bugs out of her apartment, she learned to clean twice a day. She bought a small portable fan she couldn’t afford, and learned how to sleep in her bra and panties lying uncovered on top of the bed. The heat in Manhattan seeped up from the sidewalk, cooked a little more between the close-set concrete valleys, and thickened through the dirty windows of her apartment. It was a full-time job to keep her skin cool and her make-up on her face.
Meanwhile, there was Michael Cicero.
She disliked him, but she had to respect him. Each day he was out there, hustling. Sometimes he left at nine and pounded the pavement until four forty-five. Diana sat in his cramped office, watching a phone that never rang. She did what she could. She tidied the place and swept it, made minor repairs, and even repainted one cracked wall. She fetched coffee and magazines, and pretended she was interested. She talked to a bargain-basement accountant about maximizing Michael’s tax write-off.
Diana knew she’d have quit long before if she were Michael. There was stubbornness, and there was stupidity. Cicero had a degree and an employment history; he could get work elsewhere. An English teacher, something like that.
But Michael wasn’t interested in some other job. He came in each day, wrote up whatever tiny project he was working on—if there was any work—went to knock on all the doors that stayed closed to him, and then left.
And she sat at her desk in the stifling heat and read magazines.
Time was running out for them both.
*
The doorbell jangled, and Michael came in, his white shirt crisp, his pants pressed. He didn’t look like someone about to go under.
“How did it go?”
He shrugged. “Same as usual, I guess. How about you?”
“I reorganized the office,” Diana lied. She got the office straight two weeks ago, but she figured it would make him feel better.
“I bet.” He gave her a slow, knowing grin, and she blushed. Cicero had a disturbing habit of making Diana feel undressed when he looked at her. Nobody could be more formal, more reserved, but still, it was as though her dress was being peeled from her shoulders, her bra cups tugged down from her breasts. Annoyed with herself, she felt her nipples harden.
Desire was a trick. It never got satisfied.
He came across to where she was sitting and loomed over her, and Diana shrank from him, like she always did.
“What are you reading?” he asked.
Diana handed over the magazine. “There was an article on the Internet about how computing is making kids dumber. Concerned Parents of America, that sort of thing.”
“Yeah.” Michael flipped through it. “I can see why, too.”
“Can I ask you something?” she said.
Cicero was surprised. He looked down, which was a mistake. Diana was leaning forward eagerly, and her large, lightly freckled breasts were pushed together right under his nose. He caught a glimpse of the caramel lace of her bra. Damn. What a body she had.
“Sure,” Michael said, trying to keep his mind out of the gutter. He hadn’t had a girl since Iris had left. An automatic hard-on was already starting in his groin. Shit. He moved out of the line of sight of her cleavage.
“The day Ernie had us fired. What were you going to ask me to do?”
His lips curled upward. “You got pretty mad. Actually, I was somewhat impressed with your ability to judge book covers. I was thinking about giving you a shot at working with our illustrators, picking out frames and other in-book graphics.”
Diana’s mouth opened slightly. Cicero envisaged shutting it with his. Her lips were plump and red, vulnerably soft. His teeth would tear at them, biting them gently, forcing them apart with his tongue while she pressed those glorious tits up into his hands.…
“You really thought I could do that?”
Stop. Stop. “Yes, you had real talent, visually.”
“I liked what I saw,” Diana said thoughtfully. “I never could draw, but I could pick stuff out. Look at that, for example.” She pointed to a large color spot detailing the graphics on CD-ROM Encyclopedia. “Boring, banal. Why would a child be interested in that? I know I wouldn’t.”
Cicero looked closer at the magazine in his hand. She was right. There was nothing there to interest a kid.…
He clapped the magazine shut and grasped Diana’s hand.
“What? What did I say?” she asked, alarmed.
“Nothing. Everything.” Michael stood up straight, all thoughts of sex vanished from his mind. “You little beauty. You found it. You did it. We’re back!”
He made her put up a closed sign and switch on the answer machine.
“We take the afternoon off?” Diana said.
“Don’t be inane. I never take afternoons off. We’re going to take a meeting.”
Michael led her westwards, back into the Village at Sixth and Twelfth, and ducked into French Roast. In the chic coffeehouse, among the louche beat poets and lazy students sipping their frappes, he sensed the old adrenaline bubble up in him like a Louisiana swamp on overdrive. He picked a table, and the lithe young waitresses swarmed around to serve him. Diana had been here alone, and it had taken he
r thirty minutes to get a menu. She watched the girls play for his attention. Really. They could barely be more obvious if they had just unbuttoned their tops, right there.
“You know I’m banned from publishing,” he said when her vanilla hazelnut arrived with his espresso.
“I had picked that up, yes.”
Michael made an impatient gesture. “The point is, my expertise has been going to waste.”
“True. I’ve been in livelier cemeteries than our office.”
“The whole Green Eggs thing was about a new look on old stories. To give children something visual, something worth reading.”
Diana sipped her coffee. “I understand; they were good books.”
“Today what do kids do? Play computer games.” He rifled through her magazine. “And the article says most computer games are mind-sapping garbage.”
“Of course they are.”
“But they needn’t be. I proved I can sell high-quality, smart books. American parents are crying out for something valuable to teach their kids. What if we just went into computing?”
An unfamiliar sensation started to churn in Diana’s flat stomach. A second later she recognized it. Butterflies. She had butterflies of excitement.
“That’s … a pretty good idea,” she said slowly.
“No kidding it’s a good idea.” He looked at her, but she had the impression he didn’t see her. His mind was picturing a vast empire, she thought, limos, stock offerings, the cover of Forbes. Modesty had never been Michael’s strong point. “I still have contacts in publishing who call me up every day, and most of them have CD-ROM divisions.”
“But that’s still publishing, isn’t it?”
His face darkened. “Yeah. Fuck.”
“Language,” Diana said absently.
“Whatever. OK, so I have to go to a computer-games manufacturer, and get them to start educational software.”
“But they don’t know you.”
“Nothing good is ever easy, babe. I’ll need help. Your job will change. You’ll be scouting out hackers and code-writers, and guys who can draw pictures. You’ll write my letters and come with me to the banks.”
“What use would I be at the banks?”
“You look classy,” he said, as though pointing out the obvious.
“But … but Michael…”
“I’m not interested in buts. You were going to say the month was almost done, and how will I pay your salary?”
She blushed. “Something like that, I’m afraid.”
“Don’t worry about it. You let me take care of it,” Michael said intently. “If your check isn’t there, you have my permission to walk.”
“Thanks,” she said dryly.
“It’s going to be hard and thankless at first. No more nine to five. No more reading magazines and filing your nails all day. Are you in?”
She glanced at her nails regretfully and wondered if she’d ever get a decent manicure again. “I’m in,” she said.
*
He wasn’t kidding. Diana started setting her alarm for six A.M., and coming home at eight, not that she missed the extra time in her cramped box of an apartment. She started taking a flood of calls, typing up proposals and brochures, registering the new company, dealing with everything from lawyers to labels. Michael had no time to help her with anything. Getting the first slice of funding was like climbing the Eiger without oxygen—dizzyingly difficult. Diana went to so many loan officers that one bank blurred into another. She laid out sample graphics and bound up Michael’s papers. She got blisters and learned how to walk on them anyway. At night she came home too exhausted for anything more than a pot of pasta, a shower and the sleep of the dead.
On weekends she cleaned to placate Rita, shopped for food and went over draft pitch letters with a highlighter.
Once or twice Diana even called her lawyer for another helping of bad news; Ernie had everything tied up with pretrial motions. It might take months to get money out of him.
When Michael finally came home with the funding, they had all but given up. Citibank was prepared to take the risk. The business plan paid off, and they had twenty thousand dollars for staff and one project.
Cicero found their first code-writer. His name was Opie Z., and he was eighteen years old, scruffy and brilliant. He was a tip-off from Seth Horowitz, miserable in a gilded cage over at Blakely’s.
He sat in the offices with the brand-new portable air conditioner and studied his shoes.
“Dude. I ain’t much for nine to five. And I got a record. Couldn’t do that Microsoft thing.” Ruminatively, he spat chewing gum into a wastebasket in the corner. “Nor the slick Willy Silicone Valley shit, neither. ‘The Imagine Arts family.’” He made a face. “I don’t got a family, and if I did, they wouldn’t ask for my résumé and shit.”
“Right,” Michael said. The boy was smart; his defiant street gear and low-slung swagger couldn’t hide that for a second. What the fuck. “If you come and work here it’s basic wages. You get to write your own stuff. When I get more money, you get more money.”
Opie thought about it. “But I ain’t about nine to five, either.”
“Sure you are,” Cicero said instantly. “You turn up at five past nine, just keep walking right past the door, because you won’t be wanted. This is for real.”
How can he be cool like that? Diana wondered, hovering in the background with iced water for their guest. We need this guy so badly it’s not even funny. Without him, this thing is dead in the water. Opie was scowling at him, daring him to back down, but he was calmly crossing his arms and leaning back, like the little punk had nothing that could scare him.
The kid dropped his eyes first. “OK. You better not mess with my code, dude,” he said.
“Dude,” Cicero replied, “I have no intention of doing that.”
He extended one massive paw and took the boy’s hand in his own.
“Welcome to Imperial,” he said.
*
The first attempt at a game was a mess. Clumsy, slow-moving and crawling with enough bugs for a Hollywood horror movie. Diana struggled along on slave wages until Opie got it right.
But when he did, it was glorious.
Michael burst into the office.
“What is it?” Diana sprang to her feet, almost alarmed at the look on his face. He ran over to her and lifted her up in a bear hug, making her gasp and squeal with shock. Michael never behaved like that. He was the biggest tight-ass on the planet.
“It’s this. This.” He high-fived the bewildered Opie. “We got a development check from Nexus Games. They loved the ReadWrite code. They want to press ahead. Take a look at this.”
“Wow.” Opie peered at the check. “I ain’t seen that many zeros outside of a Backstreet Boys gig.” He chuckled at his own joke.
Michael glanced over at Diana. “You get a pay raise, too,” he said. “Call a temp service. Get some extra help. We’re in business.”
The funny thing was, she thought a month later, that it was almost enjoyable. There were six people now in the cramped offices, working on the first complete game. She had a secretary of her own, Mona. Mona was a hefty girl and very smart. She didn’t bother flirting with Michael. Somehow, this endeared her completely to Diana. It was just annoying to have to deal with all the stupid female hormones.
Her new job was overseeing graphics. She worked under Michael, finding packaging ideas, rewriting the language of the game, trying to make it understandable for children. He sent her out of the office looking for illustrators.
“What will they know about computers?” she asked, perplexed.
He gave her another of his are-you-stupid looks.
“Nothing. We can just scan the work.”
She felt foolish, and it made her snappy. “Fine. I’ll come up with something.”
He was a bastard, a slave driver, and he expected Diana to figure everything out for herself. When she wanted a bag, she went to Hermes. Where did you go to shop for cheap ta
lent? Eventually, after her leads went nowhere, Diana moved to the source. In the blistering heat of the August sun, anyone rich fled the city. The only people left were poor and hungry. When she turned up at Forbidden Planet, St Mark’s Comics, and the other underground comic-book stores, they were happy to give her some names. She met five or six artists, picked two, and brought them back to her boss.
“I can’t believe you found these guys,” Michael said.
“I know you couldn’t believe it,” Diana retorted. “But I did.”
TWENTY-SIX
The first game was a bust.
The second, a minor hit. Enough for a bank loan.
By the time summer eased into fall, Cicero had moved offices. He set up on West Fourth Street, in an elegant brownstone. Five programmers and six illustrators, all scouted by Diana, worked twelve-hour days, but nobody minded. Michael cut them in on royalties and bonuses, and his success was their success.
Diana found she was working too hard to enjoy her newfound status. She wasn’t rich, and she wasn’t back where she wanted to be, but at least she was kissing the bounds of respectable again. And in September, Herb Brillstein called.
“He has a proposition for you,” Herb said.
Diana clutched the phone in her bedroom in Rita’s tiny place and prayed silently. It was neat, but too cramped to take any longer. She wondered if her roommate was listening in to this call on her extension. The little bit of money she made with Imperial was enough to afford decent clothes, food and health insurance, but that didn’t leave much over for rent. Oh, to be rich again. Her ex-husband had millions. What had Herb managed to pull out of the fire for her?
“He doesn’t want to go to trial. Plus he’s thinking about getting married again.”
Felicity. Diana’s hand curled into a tight ball of anger. I was such a moron to trust her, she thought. And I’m going to get my revenge.
“He understands that you can contest the divorce in the UK, and though you weakened your case when you moved out, he wants done with it. But they’re pretty hard over in the UK. His lawyers said they would be prepared to wait us out, as you were married less than a year, you took employment and when you moved out you didn’t contact your husband—”
For All the Wrong Reasons Page 21