THE THOUSAND POUND CHRISTMAS
By
Victoria Burgess
Copyright © 2019 by Victoria Burgess
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof
may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever
without the express written permission of the author
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They buried ‘Big Jim’ Streeter a week ago Tuesday. All six-foot-four, 392 lbs of him tucked into something the funeral director called a Goliath casket. The memorial service for the town of Eaton’s mayor was held at the high school gym, as much for the bleacher seating that would accommodate the crowds, as for the double-wide doors which could accommodate the width of the casket.
The eulogies were respectful across both sides of the political divide. A little gentle ribbing here and there about Big Jim’s immense heart, his sizeable depth of knowledge, his well-padded budget, and his enormous skill at negotiation. His supersized appetite for life was mentioned more than once. But all in all, kind words were spoken. Oh, there was an uncomfortable moment when his widow learned Jim would require two plots for burial, rather than one. Fortunately, the funeral insurance policy Jim had taken out a few years back covered the extra cost.
The local hearse lacked the reinforced chassis necessary to handle the weight of his casket. So a flatbed trailer, tastefully done up in black paper crepe, conveyed the mayor to the cemetery, where a crane waited to lower him into his final resting place. Lucky guy, some said, to die in early November, before the earth froze over and no amount of shoveling could break through the hard cemetery ground.
Most people agree with that sentiment, but I know better. My name is Rachel Presley and for five years I was Big Jim’s second-in-command. As someone who knew the mayor well, I can confidently attest to this:
Big Jim would have been irritated as hell to have missed Thanksgiving, his favorite meal of the year.
ONE
My shoes are wrong. Not the shoes themselves, per se. I’m wearing beige leather pumps with a two-and-a-half inch heel. Perfectly respectable footwear for my new role as Eaton’s provisional mayor. They even come with a fashion bonus: a nude shoe ‘extends the leg,’ or so I’ve read in countless women’s magazines. Plus everyone knows that a heel, even a modest one, helps lift the rear. Not literally, obviously. A shoe can’t be expected to perform miracles, after all.
The problem is the toes. They’re open. As in, open-toed pump. (Definitely not the alternative label, peep-toe pump, as some of the higher-end designers have taken to calling them. Any clothing item with the word peep in the name is inherently unsuitable for work that doesn’t include dancing and pole in the job description.) Semantics aside, my big toe and two adjacent toes are protected by nothing but sheer nude pantyhose. Which at the end of the day is really no protection at all.
This is made obvious when I step in a puddle. Sludge pours through the open toes. It drenches my shoes and soaks my stockings, leaving my feet a slimy, sloshy mess.
There is only one appropriate response. I catch the word before it leaves my lips, but not the irritated huff that follows. The sound draws the attention of the two men walking ahead of me. They stop and turn.
“You all right, Rachel?” This from Nelson Davis, who, in addition to being the husband of Esme Davis, one of my best friends, also happens to be the listing agent for the industrial space we’re in the midst of touring.
“Fine,” I reply. “Didn’t notice the puddle, that’s all.”
Guy French, Nelson’s client, studies my feet with a frown. “That gonna be a problem?”
For you? Nah. You’re not going to be the one sloshing around an abandoned manufacturing compound in 35-degree weather with soaking wet feet.
But then, I’m the one who needs to make this deal happen. No, strike that. I’m the one who has to make this deal happen. In less than two hours I lead my first council session as the town of Eaton’s acting mayor, stepping up to take Big Jim’s place. A key component of the budget I’ll be presenting depends on filling this empty manufacturing space and creating jobs. That’s not going to happen if I retreat now, taking my stinky, sodden feet back to the car, propping them on the dashboard and cranking up the heat. Nor do I imagine the steaming bouquet of dank feet and rotten stockings that would greet Nelson and French when they joined me in the car in an hour’s time would inspire the confidence necessary to commit to this venture.
“No problem at all,” I say. “Just took on a little water.” I shake my right foot, then my left, as though performing a solo hokey-pokey. “Let’s move on.”
To my horror, my shoes begin to squish and squeak as I step forward. It’s possible the sound could go unnoticed on a busy sidewalk. A subway platform. But here it echoes off the cavernous cement walls surrounding us, impossible to ignore.
Squeak. Squeeeeeek. Heeph-huff. Sqick-squeak. Squeeeeeek.
The sort of high-pitched cacophony one might expect to hear from a pair of wrestling otters.
Nelson looks as though he’s struggling to hold back his laughter. I can’t blame him. We’ve known each other for years and the situation could be construed as amusing, particularly in later retellings (of which I have no doubt there will be many).
But it’s Guy French I watch. His lips turn down and his eyes narrow a fraction. He checks his watch, clearly looking for a way out. An excuse to end the meeting and walk away. I don’t intend to give him one. Although it was Mayor Streeter who succeeded in setting up this meeting with French, I’m the one who did all the behind-the-scenes legwork pulling it together. This has been my deal from day one.
Canine Cuisine was started by French’s grandfather in the 1950’s. Today it’s the nation’s largest privately-held manufacturer of dog food and snack treats. His family’s net worth is measured in hundreds of millions. As for Guy French, he’s in his late fifties, attended elite boarding schools and graduated from an Ivy League college. He’s been married three times and prefers vacationing in Nice over Cannes. Very likely his suit costs more than my monthly mortgage. He wears a beret at a jaunty tilt and is arrogant enough to believe it looks good.
And like many rich and powerful men, I’m sensing French has an innate discomfort dealing with women who aren’t there to serve him in some way: bring him a drink, stow his carry-on, buff his nails. But I’m not here to correct his fossilized thinking. I’m here to get this deal done.
So I ignore my shoes and stride confidently forward. Or something like that. In real terms that translates into pasting what I hope will pass for a self-assured expression on my face while we take an extended tour of the plant offices, manufacturing facilities, and distribution bays. Nelson discusses the building’s power and storage capacity, operating expenses, expansion opportunities. I talk tax breaks, available workforce, and other financial incentives.
Ninety minutes later, French is impressed enough to open up a little and talk specifics. No actual rendering will be done on-site. Rendered by-products necessary for Canine Cuisine would be shipped directly from slaughterhouses in Chicago, sparing the town that grisly step. What French is looking for is a facility capable of producing both wet and dry dog food. He’ll need to install storage tanks, canning and packaging machines. An extruder and a fat distributor, enormous vats for producing steam, die cutters for shaping, and industrial ovens to bake the finished product.
“Making those installations won’t be cheap,” he says. “While your initial offer is generous, other towns I’ve looked at are a bit more generous.”
“How much more generous
?”
“Somewhere in the range of half a million more generous.”
Obviously, I can’t agree to that but throwing out a number, even one as outrageous as half a million, indicates a willingness on his part to enter into negotiations. I glance at Nelson and see victory in his eyes, too. We can get this done. The fact that there won’t be any on-site rendering is already a huge political win for me.
I check my phone for the time. It’s later than I thought. Thirty minutes until the council session opens.
“Listen, why don’t we discuss this on the way back to town?” I suggest.
My adrenaline is running high. It’s mid-November. I want some kind of commitment before the end of the year and things always bog down during the holidays. I try to continue our discussion of lease terms, but French is determined to play coy. For reasons I can’t fathom, Nelson helps him dodge me. The two men talk football instead.
Before his driver escorts him back to his hotel, French pats his pockets and frowns. “Did I get your card, Mr, uh—”
“Davis. Nelson Davis.”
“Yes, that’s right.” French accepts his card and studies it. “Nelson,” he says. “Like Mandela.”
“Exactly,” Nelson agrees. His hesitation so slight I doubt Guy French noticed it. I did, but only because Esme and I have previously discussed this particular tick of Nelson’s.
Esme and Nelson Davis are black. According to Nelson, not once have any of his wealthy white clients associated his name with Nelson Rockefeller, another famous Nelson. It’s always Mandela. Now, Esme and I both agree that to be associated with Mandela on any level is a wonderful thing. But Nelson is going through a phase where he’s hung up on money. (Understandable, since it’s been over six months since he closed a deal and Esme’s bakery is currently responsible for carrying the entire financial weight of the Davis family, which includes their two young daughters.) But since all this information falls under the category of things women tell each other that their husbands would cringe if they knew, I won’t mention any of it.
Instead, I ask Nelson why he didn’t help me pin down French.
“Too soon, Rachel,” he replies. “Let me dig around some, find out what other offers are on the table. Once we know what else he’s looking at, we’ll know how to beat them.”
“How long will that take?”
“As fast as I can make it happen.”
No point in pushing harder. His strategy is solid. Besides, I know he needs this deal as badly as I do. After all, Nelson’s a family guy and Christmas is right around the corner.
We say goodbye and I head to my office. Now that the excess watery sludge is gone, the sound emanating from my shoes is more subdued. Rather than squeaking and squawking, my feet, which are pretty much blocks of ice at this point, are now issuing a subtle huff with each step I take. Almost as if they’re trying to give me a raspberry.
My assistant, Audrey Cho, doesn’t miss it. “What the hell is that?”
“My feet.”
“Your feet?”
“I stepped in it.” I’ve just slipped behind my desk to sit down, so I have to raise my leg to show her. “Literally.”
“Oh, man.” Audrey’s expression flattens. “Is the deal still gonna happen?”
“Absolutely.”
It has to. Manufacturing jobs bring economic stability. Commercial pet food is a twenty-six billion—yes, billion—dollar industry, growing at a rate of roughly four percent annually, with no sign of slowing down. All I want for the town of Eaton is a tiny slice of that money.
“He’s ready to sign the lease?” she asks.
“He hasn’t said ‘no’ yet.”
Audrey recognizes an equivocation when she hears one. She releases a breath and shakes her head. “We’ll see about that. I don’t trust a man who wears a beret. Only assholes wear berets. The only thing worse than wearing one yourself is putting one on some poor creature who can’t fight back. You take the cutest little dog in the entire world, put a beret on him, and what have you got? A tiny little asshole dog, that’s what.”
She shoves aside the Canine Cuisine literature littering my desk (all of which features pampered, beret-wearing pooches) and replaces it with a single sheet of paper. She points to the bottom line.
“Sign here.”
My stomach immediately knots. “That’s it?”
“Yup. Your declaration of intent to run for mayor. No more of this ‘acting provisional mayor’ crap. Get through the special election in January and the office is officially yours.”
“If I win.”
“Of course you’ll win. Sign.”
Although I have a pen in my hand, I hesitate, though I’m not sure why. I’ve carefully considered the pros and cons of running in January’s special election. I’ve spoken with my family, particularly my son Matthew, whose bored, “Whatever, mom. You’re already doing the job, and besides, no one else wants it,” is a striking example of both sixteen-year-old indifference to anything that doesn’t directly involve him and astute political wisdom. I am acting as provisional mayor. Not one of Eaton’s remaining nine councilmen has indicated the slightest interest in filling Big Jim’s size fourteen shoes.
Maybe that’s what worries me. They won’t be easy shoes to fill. The town budget is a disaster. Mayor Streeter deferred maintenance to the town’s roads and infrastructure, making potholes the size of kiddie pools a fact of life in Eaton. Always the good guy, Streeter curried favor with the local schools, police, and fire departments, actively lobbying for every reckless funding request and rash expenditure. A tactic that kept him in office for over twenty years. But then, teachers, cops, and firemen vote. Potholes don’t. Potholes, like the weather, are just something to complain about. A fact Big Jim was savvy enough to recognize. Something that wouldn’t exactly be a stretch for Matthew to grasp, either.
But no matter. Now it’s my turn. No more good guy. What Eaton needs is a belt-tightening, straight-talking, you’ll-get-what’s-good-for-you kind of mayor who sets firm fiscal priorities. A mayor who raises property taxes—just two percent—and temporarily tables an unnecessary school expenditure in order to bring the budget into line.
A mayor who’ll be instantly and intensely loathed by the entire town.
Right. So maybe there’s a reason for my hesitation after all.
I draw in a fortifying breath and scrawl out my signature. Audrey whisks the paper away and replaces it with another. “Great. I’ve already added the announcement that you’re officially running for office to the meeting agenda. It’s the last item.”
Pushing aside my worry, I focus my attention on the agenda, paying particular attention to the scheduled speakers. “I don’t recognize a couple of these names.”
Audrey frowns over my shoulder. “Which ones?”
“Mike Capella?”
“New school board member. Jack Dorr stepped down after his heart attack a couple of months ago, remember?”
“Oh, right. And um… Jym?” I squint at the paper. “Is that a typo? Jym Granger?”
“I don’t know. I stopped taking calls after lunch and let everything go straight to the automated system.”
Eaton’s town council meeting is open to the public. In theory, anyone is welcome to speak, as long as they sign up in advance and stay within their maximum allotted time of fifteen minutes, or wait for the open forum at the end of the session. The automated online system allows townspeople to directly add their names to the agenda. Envisioned as a time-saving nod to our glorious democratic process—Speak up! Every voice matters! Your representatives want to hear you!—it’s devolved instead into a total pain in the ass.
Rather than actually contributing to council sessions, people began using the meetings to air petty grievances and outlandish opinions. My neighbor's dog barks at all hours. Plow trucks barge down my street at the crack of dawn and wake me up. Exxon Mobil is behind the whole global warming scam. Bottom line, democracy be damned. Some people (you know who you are) sh
ould just shut up and stay home.
Which is why on most meeting days Audrey shuts down the automated system and screens potential speakers with ruthless efficiency, scheduling habitual whiners to private, one-on-one meetings with staff. Still a hassle, but necessary. The town council meets twice a month because we have actual work to do.
But, whatever. Jym Granger. Not a name I recognize. Probably new to the area. Someone who’s lived in Eaton all of five minutes and already knows how everything should be run. Fine. I’ll give him his requisite fifteen minutes and then scoot him out the door.
That decided, I touch up my lipstick and give the skirted suit I treated myself to a week ago a quick once-over. It’s too late to do anything about my shoes, but the suit still looks good. It’s the perfect shade of aubergine wool. Not too light, not too dark. Size sixteen, but flattering. Or at least I hope so. Today’s the first time I’ve worn it. Out of habit, I move to my office mirror and angle sideways to check the view from behind.
I catch Audrey’s eye in the reflection. Although she doesn’t say a word, the message conveyed with her single arched brow is clear: How many of Eaton’s male councilmen stand in front of a mirror before a meeting, wondering if their suits make their butts look big?
Point taken. I grab my paperwork and head for the door. “Ready?”
“Always.”
Audrey Cho is Korean-American. She’s maybe ten years younger, three inches shorter, and a solid fifty pounds heavier than me. But Audrey’s weight never seems to bother her. No insecurity there. She dresses in loud patterns, wears short skirts and high heels, adores vintage jewelry and shocking red lipstick. Her personal flair makes the extra pounds seem an edgy choice. Like her tattoos and her asymmetrical haircut.
If there’s a boyfriend (Girlfriend? Who knows these days?) lurking somewhere in the picture, Audrey never mentions it. She simply powers through her workload with a brash competency that makes her invaluable. I make a mental note to bring in a plate of homemade brownies tomorrow to show my appreciation for her overtime. And hopefully celebrate the approval of our fiscal year budget.
The Thousand Pound Christmas Page 1