Malibu Motel

by Chaunceton Bird

  “But there are only so many opportunities like that, right? What do you do in the years that you aren’t invited to buy a supercar?”

  “Easy,” Tim said, “I buy a regular sports car, like an Audi R8, and customize it in ways that people usually don’t dare to, then I sell it for more than I bought it for.”

  “How do you customize them?” I asked.

  “Oh all sorts of shit,” Tim continued, “sound system, new paint, maybe some engine work. I have a shop downtown that does all the work for a good price. Lately I’ve been making some good money putting wide-body kits on Ferraris and Porsches. Like your 930. You can make good money putting an RWB kit on a 930. People are afraid to cut up a high-end car, but they love to buy a cut up high-end car. Weird shit, but I make good money.”

  “Millions?” I asked.

  Selina sent a fake laugh to cut at Tim, then added “definitely not, but we make enough.”

  Tim let it slide.

  “Hm. I gotta figure out something like that,” I said, “all the businesses I started more or less flopped. Apps and shoes and bags and electronics and toothbrushes and all that other shit. None of it can bring in any real money.”

  “Yeah,” Tim said, “well I’d be happy to help you get your start in my line of work. Rayburn Enterprises could use another partner.”

  “Maybe just until I get something else going. That’d be great. Thanks Tim.”

  “No fuckin’ problem, Caish. We got you.”

  After the Rayburns left for the night I browsed James Edition, the duPont Registry, and Hemmings looking for a car to get started with. My budget was a couple hundred thousand and I wanted something with good resale potential. I settled on a 2015 Rolls-Royce Wraith and sent the necessary emails to have it purchased before the end of the week.

  When the Rolls arrived, Tim got me in touch with his shop that did the customizations and I had them paint it with a chromaflair paint that changes colors from different angles. And not from orange to a slightly-more-red-orange, this paint goes from green to purple depending on your angle. Pretty bitchin’. I also replaced the twenty-one-inch wheels with twenty-three-inch wheels, per Tim’s recommendation. I also put in new subwoofers. It took a few weeks to sell, and when all expenses were paid I only made $5,300. Tim explained that usually the margins were better, and that if I did that ten times a year, I could probably be making close to two hundred grand. Add that due to the interest I will be making off of the millions that California has yet to pay me, and I will be in a good position. Comfortable, at least.

  But still far from a yacht and a place in Monte Carlo.

  After a few months I settled into a routine. My place in Spanish Hills started to feel like home and I made more of an effort to get out and meet new people. I cut down on my drug use, and weaned my cocaine usage down to about five thousand dollars’ worth a month. My monthly expenses were just my mortgage, my food, my drugs and alcohol, and gas. And a small budget for clubs and parties. Most of this was paid for using money from selling cars. I bought and sold one or two cars a month, and usually made around ten thousand a car. In the first year I only lost money on one car, but it was only ten or twenty thousand.

  Unfortunately my bank account was not making much from interest. My total balance was just over six hundred thousand dollars. I put back $250,000 of the cash I withdrew. The interest on that was less than five K a month. Not even enough to cover half my mortgage. Tim was right. I was too broke to live off interest.

  Then, a real opportunity came my way.

  The Ferrari dealership in Thousand Oaks invited me to buy a new, limited edition Ferrari. Only 399 of these were going to be made, and demand was high. There would probably only be around fifty of these cars in California. The car would cost me $759,900. I didn’t want to empty out my bank account and my cash reserves weren’t enough to cover that (not even near enough to cover that), so I explained the opportunity to Aaron D. Valentini, and he agreed to front me the cash.

  “But,” the massive Mr. Valentini said, “this loan must be conditioned upon a security interest in the future lottery winnings payouts from California for the same amount. Surely you understand that I can’t make a loan of nearly one million dollars without some sort of collateral.”

  “What about the Ferrari?” I asked. “Won’t that be the collateral on the loan?”

  “Oh it certainly will be, but you don’t have a car right now, do you Caish? You are asking for money to buy a car that is not yet available, and which we cannot yet inspect. Thus, we will require a lean on your future earnings.”

  Not entirely understanding Mr. Valentini and wanting to get a move on with the loan, I agreed. So what if he had a lean on my future earnings? That would only happen if I lost money on the Ferrari, which wouldn’t happen.

  Well it did happen. But I didn’t lose too much. Only about $22,000. And twenty grand is a drop in the bucket of four million. In fact, I realized that I should be leveraging my assets more aggressively. My money that the state hadn’t disbursed was an asset that, at the time, was not doing anything for me. And as long as I didn’t use that asset, I only had a million or so to work with. I didn’t realize that I could borrow against my future payouts until Mr. Valentini pointed out the opportunity.

  From that point forward, I financed all of my purchases with loans against the pile of gold California was holding from me. It kept my bank account healthy so that I could make at least some money off of the interest, and lowered the risk of cash flow problems.

  It was difficult to deal with the anxiety associated with this change in lifestyle. I’d get headaches constantly and had trouble sleeping. I even had a panic attack. Gabby called to discuss her bill while I was cleaning my G Wagon and my legs went weak. I sat down with my back against one of the wheels then slid down further until just my head was propped up by the tire. I couldn’t catch my breath and my heart was trying to break my ribs. The closest thing I had felt to this was in dreams where I am being chased by the guy from Texas Chainsaw Massacre but I can’t run. Like I’m stuck in sap and my ghastly doom is closing in. I got dizzy and was sure that I was dying right there on my cobblestone driveway. The non-existent walls were closing in. Trapped, suffocating, vision getting spotty. Killed by a phone call from my attorney. Hose in hand. Suds all over.

  The weight of the panic attack eventually lifted, but for a few hours afterward I was still shaking. That was my only panic attack, but the anxiety never left. I tried taking Xanax and Valium, but they just didn’t cut it, so I tried Vicodin and Oxycodone. Those helped. My headaches subsided and I slept like a sloth. Too much Oxy and I started to lumber like a tortoise. But, cocaine solved that problem. Checks and balances.

  California finally gave me my money. On January 12th the state released 1.2 million into my coffers (it would have been 1.6, but Mr. Valentini took $400,000 to cover a few outstanding payments). This couldn’t have come at a better time. Despite all I had done to cut back, I was still getting low on cash. But this 1.2 million was more than enough to last me until my next payment.

  I stopped trying to flip cars when I lost almost forty thousand in a single month. It had been a rough year. That hurt. I decided I could live off of interest and future lottery wins. I’d just cut back in the meantime. No more flying, especially not on private jets. No more month-long ski vacations to Park City. No more weekend vacations to anywhere. No more resort stays. I even cut back on the little things: I try not to drive more than three hours a day to save on gas, I work on my own car when something breaks, I cut down to a pack of cigarettes a day, I cancelled most of my magazine subscriptions, and I stopped ordering and dining out for lunch. No more wine with every dinner, and when I did get wine, not the expensive stuff—and not a whole bottle. No more cocaine on Sundays, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. No more shopping sprees (I cut down my shopping to only once a week, and for the most part I avoid stores like Dior, Dolce & Gabbana, and Louis Vuitton). No more buying anybody drinks at clubs. No mor
e ecstasy. No more $500 tips. No more paying for sex. No more house cleaners, pool cleaners, or car detailers. I even mow my own goddamn lawn.

  This new frugality freed up some cash. For the first time in far too long, I was in a good position to buy a new car. Not to sell to somebody else, but for myself. I missed my Lamborghini more than I missed Jamie. It was time to get another. A new Aventador was just outside of my price range, so I went with a beautiful gloss black Huracan that was for sale at Lamborghini Beverly Hills. It was love at first sight. Mr. Valentini financed it with another one of those leans on future earnings. Finally, after nearly three years of deprivation and sacrifice, I would be back behind the wheel of Italy’s finest. Lamborghini sent a car to pick me up so that I could drive the Huracan out of the showroom.

  We arrived at the dealership at noon on Friday. The saleswoman asked for a few signatures and then handed me the keys. I slid into the car as they opened the glass doors at the side of the dealership. The car’s startup interrupted every phone call in the building. I eased it off of the showroom floor, through the parking lot, then onto the open road. The odometer had 159 miles on it (all testing miles from the factory). Before the day was through I would double that mileage.

  I was back. The howl of the exhaust announced it. People on the sidewalk and in crosswalks stopped in their tracks and pulled their phones out. Every person in every car couldn’t help but admire the perfect machine. Most of them saying, “Hey, nice car! I’ll trade ya! Ahahaha!” They knew I was on top. My Facebook and Instagram got a lot of love when I posted a video of me going 100 mph. Every time I stopped a crowd formed. Riley wanted to go for a ride, so I swung by Empire Apartments. Riley then told me that Empire was old news, and that Riley had been living at a place in Thousand Oaks for the past year. After picking up Riley, we took the Huracan to the Rayburns’ house. They loved it. Tim and I both knew that Huracans were minor league compared to Aventadors, but he didn’t mention it. The Rayburns got in their Lamborghini and we all went for a drive that lasted late into the night. We drove down PCH, snaked up through Encinal Canyon, across Mulholland Highway all the way to Woodland Hills, then took the 101 back to my place.

  After the Rayburns left, Riley and I had the best sex I’d had in months. Finally. Finally I was back. Finally I was happy again. Truly happy. Turns out even a couple million can buy happiness. A beautiful place in Spanish Hills, a Lamborghini, and a young model. Try getting any of those without millions of dollars.

  9

  The trouble was, and this really was quite troubling, I couldn’t get my bank account above two million dollars. The car buying and selling hadn’t done much, and interest on my money wasn’t enough to live on. Another problem was that now I had payments to make. In addition to my mortgage, Gabby was leaning on me to pay her bill, so I agreed to a repayment plan that involved monthly payments (plus interest). I was also making payments on loans for my Huracan and a newly purchased Tesla. Both car loans were made by borrowing against my future lottery payouts. Then, when I missed a payment on the Huracan, they repossessed the car. Didn’t even give me a chance to make good on the payment, just stole it when I wasn’t home. Right out of my garage. Bastards.

  After a few months, most of my cash was tied up in mortgage payments and I couldn’t make payments on the Tesla anymore either, so that was repossessed too.

  When California gave me my last lottery payout of $815,000, my total net worth was down to one and a half million. Less than what I owed on my house. I sold the G Wagon, figuring all I really needed was my Porsche, but that only brought in another hundred thousand. Being the entrepreneur that I am, I thought up a plan to thwart the impending blackness of poverty. I’d flip houses. I was no longer on good terms with the real estate agent that sold my other houses (her fee was unreasonable, so I didn’t pay it, now she’s suing me or whatever), so I called Hailey Preis.

  Hailey and I met years ago at a beach party. She’s a beautiful woman that doesn’t look a day over fifty. Which isn’t bad for a forty year old who has spent her entire life in event management. The night we met, Hailey was explaining that her gray hair (which was dyed black) was gray as a result of a Super Bowl halftime show she organized a couple years back (“Christ almighty, these fuckin’ divas, they turned my hair gray and gave me congenital heart disease”). Her wrinkles came from the cigarettes she was forced to smoke to cope with the stress of her career, and the bags under her eyes came from her second gig of flipping houses. Her second gig was the reason I reached out to her.

  As mentioned, my plan was to rebuild my empire buying and selling premiere real estate. I’d call my company Calloway Enterprises Inc. “The House You Want for the Price You Deserve.” I paid a marketing studio in LA ten thousand dollars to develop that tagline, a logo, and a website for Calloway Enterprises. I rented some office space downtown and put together a team. Hailey Preis would manage the team, Matt Hollioak would be the salesperson, Zack Preswright would be the general contractor, and Nettie Ups would be our primary contact at BazookaMedia, the marketing studio taking care of our internet presence. If everything went as planned, this team would work without me having to micromanage them. I’d compensate them using a salary/commission system that Gabby drafted, then pay myself with whatever profits were remaining. On the advice of counsel, I incorporated Calloway Enterprises so that I wouldn’t have any personal liability for the debts or losses of the company.

  I also doubled down my efforts to win the lottery again. Moving forward, I would buy twice the normal amount of tickets every time I went to the gas station—which I did at least once a day. After the first three weeks, I won five hundred dollars from a Scratcher that only cost me a buck.

  I organized a dinner party at Surasawa, America’s most prestigious sushi restaurant, to make sure the Calloway Enterprises team knew our mission. I had pitched Calloway Enterprises to each of them before, but we had never met together as a team. Taking them to Surasawa was my way of demonstrating to them the kind of lifestyle Calloway Enterprises could give them. I had just closed out the first month of business and, although we had yet to make any purchases, we had some excellent leads on ideal aging estates in Hollywood and Bel Air.

  Getting a reservation at Surasawa is nearly impossible, and I almost lost ours when I came down with a pretty bad flu. But I paid a bit extra and the owner let me bump our reservation back a week without any hassle. Nothing cash can’t cure.

  I picked up Matt and we met Zack and Hailey there. Surasawa is unassuming; it is on the second level of a newly developed brownstone building just off Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. The restaurant is reservation only, and only seats small parties. The dining area is relatively small, my master bedroom has more square footage. The Calloway Enterprises team sat at the sushi bar, and the four of us took up the entire bar space.

  Haruki Surasawa, the two Michelin-starred chef that owns Surasawa, must be over ninety-seven years old. He stands at probably 5’2,” fully extended, but has a hunch that puts him in the sub-five-foot range. Not a single hair anywhere on his head. He speaks with an accent that he probably keeps for authenticity sake (if I remember correctly, he has lived in California for at least ten years).

  With our order placed, I get to business.

  “Thank you all for coming out tonight, although I guess you should be thanking me.” I smiled but I don’t think they got it, because they just looked at me with blank faces. “Not just because I’m buying you the best sushi in the world, but because I am giving you all an opportunity to make lots of money.” Still no reaction other than a couple small nods. “Like I said on the phone, I want to hire each of you to work with me at Calloway Enterprises. At Calloway Enterprises we will change the way houses are flipped and revolutionize the home buying process. You’ve each been selected because you’re—”

  “Because we’re the best of the best of the best?” Hailey interrupted, “Come on Caish cut the melodrama. We’re your friends and we know you’re in a tight place and we wan
t to help.”

  “Well, that’s part of it, but this is something I’ve been thinking about for several years.”

  “Caish,” Matt said, “Hailey’s right, we’re here because we want to help.” Zack was nodding along with a sake to his lips.

  “You think I’m asking for charity? That I’m buying you the most expensive sushi in the country because I’m broke?”

  “That’s not what we’re saying,” Hailey was saying. “We’re saying that you don’t need to waste our time talking about revolutionizing industries. If you wanna sell a few houses, great, we can help with that. But let’s keep it real. Renovating houses is expensive work, and we’re expensive people, so before we agree to any of this, we’re going to need to talk numbers. And—”

  “Yeah, got it. We’ll talk numbers,” I said, “I was just going to give you some context on why we’re here and the direction I plan on going with this. I want to do more than sell a few houses. I want to create a company that reimagines the housing market and takes it from where it’s at now, which is like, 1960s practices, and modernize everything. Change the way people think about buying a home.”

  “See, Caish,” Zack chimed in, “this is what Hailey’s talking about. You can put that preachy shit in Facebook ads, but when you tell it to us, it makes us feel like you think we’re idiots. I mean, ‘change the way people think about buying a home’? Come on Caish.”

  “What? Can we not do that? Can we not start a company that has new ideas and uses new tools? There are better ways of buying and selling houses than the frustrating process that we go through today.”

  “Okay, Caish, like what?” Hailey asked.

  “Like, how about no more signing fifty thousand forms? How about being able to buy a home the same way people buy a computer? You can buy anything online, why not a house?”