It Had Been Years

by Malflic, Michael

  It was smiles and greetings as he entered, while he was professional he was objective and already detached. The target company’s CEO, CFO, and entire Senior Sales and Development Team gathered in the Chardonnay Conference Room, waiting with much the same anticipation of a young child on Christmas, wanting to see if Santa really had come through again. After all they had been good little boys and girls. An excited energy fell over the room and the company’s CEO, Mitchell, began to speak. He proceeded with a formal set of thank you’s and acknowledgements more commonly found at a ladies church luncheon or a Hollywood Awards show than a Silicon Valley conference room.

  Now it was Vincent’s turn. “I found the operation fascinating: and the market opportunity genuinely exciting, which is in fact, very rare for me. Understanding that we are firmly bound by our nondisclosure agreements I do have a few more technical questions that I would like to address in some detail.”

  “Of course,” Mitchell, a Michigan born and educated electrical engineer responded. “Wonderful” the somberly dresses stranger continued, ties were not wore in the valley, no one stopped to notice, it was the first day he had one on.

  “Out of respect for everyone’s time I suggest that only the C Team, Senior Level Product Design and Corporate Council need to be present” Ahh, he was suggesting, controlling the situation but allowing others to feel they were making the decisions. Almost instantly an over worked Sales & Marketing, Operations and Manufacturing Planning Senior Team members excused themselves, Vincent taking time to shake each members hand and thank them specifically and with detail for each contribution they had made during the process, they were after all very good and talented people. He wanted to be remembered fondly by them.

  As the last one, left the smile faded from Mitchell’s face, he knew this wasn’t good and was expecting a shake down under the rouse of technical concerns. An attempt to rework the terms while not unheard of was considered unprofessional once both parties attorney’s had agreed to the contract language. Mitchell went from being a gracious host to interrogator in one question. It was his money, it was his reputation, it was his dream that was about to be called into question and he didn’t like it at all. With a sharp tone of in his voice “What is the nature of your “technical concerns?””

  Vincent just folded his hands on the table “I need to get some of the team on a call, just to review a few things. They’re waiting on an audio bridge, I see no sense in dialing them in until Design and Engineering is here. I also strongly suggest that your Corporate Council be present.” He subtlety emphasized the last four words. Mitch was no longer worried about this being a shake down, this wasn’t about price or terms. This was something much more serious. “Is there anyone else who should be brought in?” Vincent sitting calmly at his end of the table “You may want whoever handles your intellectual property rights, patents, and licensing agreements here.” He said sliding Mitchell the dial-in information for the audio bridge. Mitchell excused himself.

  The Chardonnay Room was decorated in soft golden yellow hues, earth tone brown leather chairs and wide tinted windows looking out to the California sunshine. The room is full of executives who are rarely motionless and even less often speechless, all of them sitting there like statues, each of their own minds racing in a million different directions on what could possibly be happening or why. Mitchell returns with the CTO, the Chief Design Engineer and the Senior Design Team. Corporate Council hustles in and in a winded voice “Smith and Wallace are dialed in” they were the company’s Intellectual Property Specialists.

  Vincent took a deep breath, closed his eyes, pausing just for the briefest moment before exhalation, thought to himself, “I hope no one has spent anything they thought they were going to make on this deal.” With that he opens his eyes, releases his breath and reaches for the speaker phone in the center of the table. Sometime the world moves so fast, all of this had taken twelve minutes from the time he walked through the front door. Chris had just moved up in line to fifth from next at the coffee shop, he hadn’t even ordered yet and Vincent had an entire room, if not an entire company full of people reeling. After everyone present and on the phone did the customary, My name is…who ever they work for and whatever they are responsible for in their own little fifedoms. Vincent once again spoke “There are area’s of concern as I mentioned, as the old saying goes the games not over until the fat lady sings, specifically there is a concern not over functionality or interoperability but the concern is specifically over 2300 lines of code and the ROM bus and actions on the 3C-59 chipset. The words hadn’t even settled when the Senior Design Engineer spoke, Ramesh. He was chief architect of that portion of the content delivery system. He was agast, appalled and physically disturbed by the question. He rambled on about the authenticity of his design, about the random often identically created lines of code and chip set similarities. Vincent looked up from his papers, Mitchell was dazed, the CTO had begun to perspire, Corporate Council had all but crushed the pen she was holding in her hand she was squeezing it so tightly and writing so furiously. Everyone on the phone that was dialed in was strangely silent. Vincent continued “So with such accurate awareness of our findings before I could even detail them, I’m certain this can be resolved quite easily.” Vincent was lying, he knew he was lying, as so did everyone else present but it was presented in such a way that so many wanted to still have hope that no one called him on it. Once again, before details could be given Ramesh spoke, this time pressing for the detail to and the nature of the concerns, in painfully explicit detail. “We believe strongly that the specific section of code, the subset operating functions and portions of the chip set and green board infringes on the Intellectual Property Rights, and patents of WUZ. Is there an agreement that I over looked, or a partnership or royalty contract that inadvertently failed to be presented?” Vincent inquired. At this point Vincent’s investment and engineering review teams spoke, everyone just listened except for Ramesh his protests grew more aggravated as they detailed the concerns.

  9:31am Pacific

  The deal was all but dead, they woke with awe and wonder expecting Santa Clause to show up and when they went downstairs to look under the tree the reaper was standing there waiting for them. Death had arrived for all of them because one of the children didn’t do as he was told. Ramesh was after all brilliant, a Stanford grad, he also had access to WUZ’s technology, it grew out of a University technology commercialization incubator he had worked in. There was to be no executed contract, no agreement and most importantly no exchange of funds and before those few moments no one but one in the company knew the truth, perhaps some had suspected but not enough for whispers to even become prevalent. It was the act of a lone individual. Mitchell asked for all outside parties to excuse themselves for a moment. He hung up the Conference bridge dialed Smith and Wallace back in. They were deflated, no one but Ramesh had the soul to fight, a core element of their solution, the very thing that had made it so revolutionary was at best used without licensing and in a more probably reality had been stolen, buried and hidden and no one knew except the man who committed the act an certainly knew better.

  9:43am Pacific

  Vincent stepped back in and the audio bridge was redialed. Mitchell read from a hand written prepared statement from council. “While we are unaware of any infringement on others property right or patents the similarities warrant further investigation on area’s of the technology that are not related to IEEE sanctioned, drafted or proposed standards.” He went on for a few more minutes, blah, blah, blah, this and that and legal ease gobbly goop in the end it was just over. It was painful to watch a man’s dream and his life’s work die a sudden unimagined death in front of him. Vincent shook a humbled team and councils hands, Ramesh was not present for the final moments. Vincent told Mitchell that “We look forward to your supporting documentation, and if all is in order we can pick back up.” It was a lie again, out of courtesy. No supporting documents were ever going to be produced, The comp
any was insolvent in 30 days. At 9:34 Chris had pulled back into the parking lot and nine minutes later Vincent was back in the car. Sitting with his knees exactly over his feet, ass on the front third of the seat, and his back rounded awkwardly both forward and backwards at the same time. He sipped his latte and dialed his phone. They were going to look into acquiring WUZ. He arrived at the airport at 10:25 admittedly two hours early, bags checked, headset on, seated comfortably exhausted in the air clubs lounge. He plugged in his PC and began documenting the day’s events for the files final report. Mitchell sat at his desk wondering what dream might spring up next to his own professional graveyard.

  Tiff, Sarah, & Steph

  Tiffany was young, she was beautiful, desperate and just slightly above average intellectual capacity, the only thing she had learned in life was how to use her looks to get her way. A flip of her dark hair, a sultry cliché look from her dark green eyes. Pushing out a pouting lip and the occasional petulant stomp away from whoever or whatever was causing her world to end at that very instant. It was a child like feature that she hadn’t yet outgrown. She wasn’t a dreamer or an aimless drifter, she wasn’t an artist or a writer or a poet, she could have been, but never gave much thought to that sort of thing. She never gave much thought at all to anything beyond the moment she was in, in her mind there was no cause and effect beyond the next few hours. She lived much differently than most because all she cared about was the here and the now and on occasion where to go next. Chances are where she was, and in a rare case if Steph, wasn’t there, where she was going next would involve her. Stephanie and Tiff had been inseparable since High School, through two miserable years in Community College then into where they both truly felt they belonged, the night club scene. Stephanie much like her friend was quite adept at using her body to manipulate others, she had dark red hair and pale white skin, a large chest and heart shaped ass. The pair were quite aware of who they were and what men wanted at the most primal levels. They were roommates, best friends, they knew every detail about the other. In their existence, they shared everything, each feeling and elation, they saw the other as someone who each could keep the company of at any given time or event.

  Sarah on the other hand had lived her life in books, built a planned future based on her past, she seemed destined to have just a little something more from life than the other two. The day she moved into the building, the pair had mistaken her for another party girl. Someone to stagger and whore herself through life along side of them, Sarah was not running in those circles. Tiff and Steph didn’t notice and thought she seemed nice enough and about the same age so they adopted her, including Sarah in their jaunts around town. The pair worked in a restaurant as waitresses second and eye candy first, sporting tight cut away t-shirts and short shorts. They spent the midday portion of their lives serving catsup to men who were most often staring at their squeezed together mammalian protuberances or their other tangible body parts. A look in the eyes, a smile and a little extra time distributing condiments helped the daily income level quite a bit. The pair thought they were celebrities, paying only for the necessities in life housing a little food and transportation, most everything else was provided by this or that ship that would pass in the night. Steph for example, when being casual could be seen sporting her favorite baby doll T. It was a skin tight, pastel shaded number sporting a logo that said The Pink Taco, she loved the food and it was a happening scene on a sprung for trip to Vegas, she didn’t like the shirt for the memories she like the shirt as a form of advertising. Pink Taco she considered to be even more desirable than her Kitty T-shirt that had lips around the word kitty. They both were of course entendre laden, suggestive euphuisms for her “girlie parts” as she put it when discussing such things with a person who she didn’t know for more than a few minutes. Tiffany sported a chest adorned with barbell pierced nipples that seemed to defy both nature and sensibility since they were almost always erect. Life was simple for the pair, it was just a party, or a party waiting to happen, wax this or that, shape and fix and change, six drinks none of which were paid for with their own funds and a tooth chipping orgasm. The pair had in fact learned something they had never consciously realized, how to save their money since they only paid for the bare minimum with their own meager funds.

  When out on the town Sarah was as one might predict be the responsible, respectable member of the party, she didn’t do trampy, even on the few times she tried she ended up just being pretty. The other two looked like they fell out of a swingers club party which on occasion they were known to do. The trio would be out dancing and drinking although some more than others, Tiff and Steph would use their affection for each other to lure in the occasional man. A redeeming feature if it could be considered one is that they didn’t discriminate, depending on the day and the mood it might be the 22 year old construction worker, strong and young, or the thirty something “in his cute little clothes” all the way through to more mature sexy an confident gentlemen in their 50’s which to most 22 year olds seem ancient, at times though there was something quite beguiling about and older confident man. The pair would play and dance, touch and rub and move and grind. Life was not always an orgy, in fact there was something quite simple and innocent that was part of the two’s relationship. On nights when they did not choose to keep the company of another or after the flavor Du Jour had left they could be found sleeping together in the same bed, curled up next to each other without illicit intent. It was like twenty two had magically become twelve again, when things were simple and where just what they were.

  Sometimes the pair would take an interest in the same man, when they took him home he expected to live out a common fantasy as they played a game with him called “what gets you off”. The man was dreaming of a threesome as the pair would tease and titillate each other right in front of him. They were not in their own minds demeaning themselves because “dick” as they would call him during their little game would be reduced to nothing more than their requisite piece of meat.

  Sarah on the other hand was studious and no where near aware of the carnal desires as her two friends. She was however very much in love with Joe. She liked being one of the girls and Tiff and Steph accepted her very much for who and what she was. Before the pair had befriended her she never talked openly about sex except in a text book reproductive lesson kind of way. She didn’t share or even think of sharing and verbalizing intimate details of that portion of her life. Joe was the benefactor of her friendship with the two. Sarah was not bisexual and she was very much straight & monogamous. With the exception of a few awkward touches and the occasional attempt at an unwanted kiss from one of her suitors from her youth, she had only known the intimacy of one man. Tiff and Steph on the hand knew so many different touches and so many different lovers that except for the holiday card sent to preferred customers by condom manufacturers most were just grouped into basic categories. Good, bad and indifferent, sure they always liked proficient but they also like men who were polite, and if one could be found that was both polite and funny well, his skills in bed could be as they put it “improved with a little coaching” but they would almost always see him again, some men were as one would expect selfish jerks. Men classified as indifferent were never discussed, good was raved about and bad was discussed in painful levels of detail of the gents inadequacies and deficiencies, unless of course he was nice and funny. Tiffany was a social alcoholic, she binged in excess like a first semester college freshman on a September evening. She would never drink alone, but all too often drank in excess in the company of friends and trusted lovers, like so many things in her life she never stopped to think about why. In these people’s company she would drink so much that the room would still be spinning in the morning when she woke up. Steph was not such a heavy drinker, but liked a little Bolivian Marching powder now and again, the occasional handful of X and intermittent joint and for all the things she would put in her body she never worried about what would happen tomorrow or what ill might
befall her. To that point, nothing of consequence ever had. Sarah was usually good for a glass or two of red wine and then back to bottled water. On a particularly adventurous night she might have a third glass of wine or instead of wine have a Whiskey Sour or Tom Collins, not ever more than one, she was the picture or restraint and control even when partying. On one night in the girls apartment Sarah found her self topless after being persuaded to compare breasts with the other two by Tiffany. In the end the pair concluded that they all had their own unique qualities but as Tiff put it “I still like mine the best”, which Sarah found despite her general uncertainty of the entire situation hysterically funny. That evening ended with a conversation detailing likes and dislikes of the male genitals, Sarah was uncomfortable and didn’t have much to offer beyond medical references and statistics. Tiff and Steph thought these comments added a bit of legitimacy to a conversation that otherwise was just a group of girls talking about dicks. As the night wound down it ended with Tiffany once again proclaiming she still liked hers the best, Steph showing Sarah how she liked her nipples played with, Sarah was not attracted to the pair but when she left highly aroused and just a little more sexually aware and more aroused than anything in recent memory allowed. Parts of her body were alive that she had taken for granted. Joe again was the beneficiary.

  With that past and everything it entailed behind them Tiffany was on a mission, she wanted to go dancing and drinking, she wanted to go to “N’s” party, but she wanted her friends to go with her. Stephanie droned on about some article in a fashion magazine about self pleasure, and the need for a regular release for healthy glowing skin or something like that. “Ok Tiff, I’ll go, but it better be decent or I’m leaving.”