by Kim Karr
Best Lay Ever: You’re sneaky...bedwrecker. I looked all over that room after you left. Had to meet Cam going commando.
Me: I’ll keep them safe for you until you get here.
Best Lay Ever: When I get there, you will not be wearing my boxers though.
Me: What do you want me wearing?
Best Lay Ever: Not a goddamn thing.
Me: That can be arranged.
Best Lay Ever: Good. Just so you know, I’m going to book a room for that weekend at the Montage Resort.
Me: :( You’re not staying here with me?
Best Lay Ever: You’re staying with me. With as loud as you are, the last thing I want is my brother hearing you scream my name all night. And it will be all night, Maggie.
Me: Changing your name to Mr. Arrogant.
Mr. Arrogant: Sir would be better, but I preferred Best Lay Ever.
Me: I’ll be dreaming of you. Sweet Dreams. :)
Mr. Arrogant: Sleep well, Maggie, but my dreams will be anything but sweet.
Date: January 2
Time: 5:06 a.m. PST
Mr. Arrogant: To answer your question, I don’t see stars when I come, I don’t see anything. It’s more of a feeling.
Me: What kind of feeling?
Mr. Arrogant: Like everything makes sense in the world, for that short time, anyway. Like I can see things so clearly.
Me: You are awful philosophical for so early in the morning. If I weren’t so tired I’d change your name to Socrates.
Mr. Arrogant: I’m pretty sure he had a big dick.
Me: See, your mind always goes to sex.
Mr. Arrogant: So does yours. After all, you asked the question. I thought about it and gave you an answer.
Me: Much appreciated. I like the stars better.
Mr. Arrogant: haha! Later.
Date: January 2
Time: 9:02 a.m. PST
Mr. Arrogant: Booked my flight.
Me: Well aren’t you efficient today!
Me: Now that I’m awake, I can tell you that I dreamt of you last night.
Man of My Dreams: Hold that thought. Headed to a meeting and can’t be sporting wood when I walk in.
Me: So this is a bad time to tell you my dream was about my mouth all over your big dick?
Man of My Dreams: Fuck me, Maggie. You’re killing me here.
Me: That was the goal. See ya ;)
Man of My Dreams: I wish...then you could take care of this massive hard-on I have now. Have a good one.
Date: January 2
Time: 7:24 p.m. PST
Me: Got your flowers.
Rod Stewart: ?
Me: I know it was you. The card was signed by Rod Stewart. Clever. They are beautiful. That was really sweet.
Rod Stewart: You got me. And I’ve never been called sweet.
Me: There’s a first time for everything.
Rod Stewart: There is, and some firsts I wouldn’t mind trying out when I see you.
Me: Does your mind always go to sex?
Rod Stewart: Always. Don’t you want to know what I’m thinking, my little bedwrecker?
Me: I’m sure it has something to do with sex…and firsts. Well I hate to break the news…but I think you already know I’m not a virgin.
Rod Stewart: Oh, you’re wrong.
Me: (smiley face with a laughing tear)
Rod Stewart: …
Me: Okay, I give! What are you thinking about?
Rod Stewart: Knew you’d want to know. I’m thinking about how I’m going to take that sweet virgin ass of yours. Soon. And then I’m going to come all over it.
Rod Stewart: It’s been over a minute. Nothing to say?
Me: I have to run.
Rod Stewart: Yeah, more like run scared.
Me: Never.
Date: January 2
Time: 7:52 p.m. PST
Me: I’m home. Call me.
Rod Stewart: Give me a couple of hours.
Me: Where are you?
Rod Stewart: Work.
Me: This late? You really are a Wall Street wolf.
Wall Street Wolf: Yep. Gotta run. I have houses to blow down.
Me: Or teeth marks to leave behind.
Wall Street Wolf: Only on you, bedwrecker.
Me: ☺
Date: January 2
Time: 10:49 p.m. PST
Me: Tell me what you think about when you masturbate.
Wall Street Wolf: Right now, you.
Me: Holy fuck, you’re masturbating right now?
Wall Street Wolf: Got me all excited earlier, couldn’t help myself.
Me: Are you really touching your big dick?
Wall Street Wolf: I should say yes since it has you all hot and bothered, but no, I’m still at work.
Me: It’s almost 2 a.m. there!
Wall Street Wolf: Yeah, working on something big. Good news is no one is around, so if you want to help a guy out, I’d be happy to repay favor later.
Me: …
Me: Did you get my picture?
Wall Street Wolf: Hell, yeah, I got that picture. Fuck me, Maggie. Those tits are gorgeous. See what you do to me?
Me: You know I have a weakness for suits?
Wall Street Wolf: It’s not the suit you should be looking at.
Me: Can’t help myself, your hand inching into the waistband isn’t enough to get me off, but the suit, now that has me wet.
Wall Street Wolf: How the fuck am I supposed to work when I’m constantly hard. Gotta go before I really do have to jerk off in the office. I’ll call you in an hour when I get home.
Me: I’ll just be touching myself until then.
Wall Street Wolf: FUCK ME.
Me: I hope to. ☺
6
Superstar
Keen
The fight for shares among investment brokers is ramping up into a full-blown war.
Don’t bother to pick a side, though, because who the winners and losers are is something you’ll never know.
Our weapons of choice aren’t bullets or bombs. They are buys and sells. That doesn’t mean the fight doesn’t get dirty, though, because it does.
Right now the social networks are dominating the market, and with more than 400 million employees on their payroll, their share of the pie continues to grow at one of the highest rates in history.
We all want them.
Every single one of us.
Fuck, who wouldn’t?
And that is why their businesses are the halos high in the sky that our pitchforks can’t seem to poke deep enough, hard enough, fast enough.
Every day more and more just like them enter the market. No matter, though, because with tech giants such as Google and Apple taking the lion’s share of those upper tiers of the market as of late, to win the war, each and every Wall Street firm has had to adjust their strategy.
Buy fast.
Dump even faster.
Move on to the next big thing.
And fast.
Did I mention fast?
It’s been insane.
One wild and crazy ride, though, that’s for certain.
It takes all of my concentration to maintain my edge, to move quickly, to react accordingly.
To know when the yen is up, when gold is down, when the SEC is coming after someone so I can back the fuck away.
That’s what sets me apart from most of the others in my firm.
My drive.
My commitment.
The time I spend researching.
The others have families, wives, kids, a house, a yard to maintain—not me. I work all the fucking time.
Night and day.
My job is my life.
My life is my job.
It’s all I have.
And I fucking love it.
The investment firm that I work for occupies the top five floors of a sprawling black-glass office building that rises up forty stories just near the corner of Wall Street and Broadway.
Today, like every day, as the
car approaches the office building, I find myself welling with pride. The mirrored black glass gleams brilliantly in the morning sunshine, reminding me of just how far I’ve come in the last five years.
Just before I get out of the car, I take my phone in my hand, and before I know what I am doing, I’m texting Maggie. Like it’s become a part of my day. Like the time I spend texting and talking to her isn’t eating up my time in the pit. Jeopardizing my research, my focus on the market, my trades.
Yesterday was excessive. I need to cut back. Besides, her questions are fucking ridiculous. I’m almost certain it’s her way of getting to know me. Still, they are off the wall, and yet, I find myself answering them, and to boot, giving them real thought.
Then there’s the sexting and phone sex. Both of which I can honestly say I have never thought about doing before—before her, that is. Even though I know I need to limit the time I spend on the phone with her today, here I go again.
Me: FaceTime fucking beats phone sex a million to one.
Maggie: Do you know how early it is here?
Me: Did you wake up screaming my name?
Maggie: I’m screaming your name right now, and it’s not because you’re making me come. Good night, Keen.
Me: Keen? That’s all I get after last night?
Maggie: (smiley face with zzzz’s above it)
I laugh and shove my phone in my pocket, ignoring the wood that started to rise minutes ago when I mentioned making her come. The way she screams my name does something to me. Something I can’t think about right now.
I climb out of the back of the car, say my parting farewells to Todd, who as usual nods without speaking, and then stride into the grand entrance meant to dazzle all those who walk through it.
Huge glass doors.
Marble floors.
Modern statues.
Fur rugs and designer furniture.
Walking fast, I board the elevator. The car rises quickly, as it always does, and I mentally prepare for another day of taking on the world.
As I exit the small space, I can already make out the faint echoes of the mighty roar. It is music to my ears, and I head right toward it with a vengeance.
My phone pings with a text, and although I shouldn’t, I pull it from my pocket.
Maggie: Is it true that in the underground parking garages on Wall Street, wolves get laid by a happy hit squad of prostitutes on their mid-afternoon coffee breaks?
Me: I thought you were sleeping.
Maggie: Now that you woke me up, all I can think about is sex.
Me: Hold that thought, will you? I need to fucking concentrate today. Later.
Walking through the maze of custom-made desks and sleek black telephones, I enter the pit, and immediately my adrenaline starts to surge through my veins.
The pit is a vast space loaded with desks, telephones, computer monitors, glass walls, and some very obnoxious dudes. All with their jackets off, leaning back in their chairs, reading their Wall Street Journals, and talking shit.
A dozen more steps and I will be where I make the magic happen.
Two steps away, and the big bossman claps a hand on my shoulder. “We need to talk, son,” he says.
All of a sudden, my gut twists. Mr. Foxtrot has said like five fucking words to me in just as many years.
“Certainly, sir,” I tell him as calmly as I can and ignore the feel of my phone buzzing once again in my pocket. This time I can’t possibly respond to her, yet I find myself wondering if he will notice. When he doesn’t stop at my desk, I decide against checking the phone, and instead follow him as he strides quickly toward what I assume our destination to be—his office.
“Jesus Christ, Ray!” Bill screams when we pass by his cubicle. “Pick up your skirt, grab your balls, and make a goddamn decision.”
I give him a quick glance and smirk as I watch the numbers and letters flash across his screen, bringing the previous day’s stock quotes right in front of his face.
“It’s going to soar as soon as it opens, Ray—you better make a decision real quick.”
Bill is in his forties. A real hard-ass seller with a raging coke addiction. He sweats profusely, never shuts the fuck up, and somehow managed to make $5.2 million last year. Yet, he’s still out here, and not in a corner office, or even an interior office.
The way things are going for me, I’ll have a corner office in another year, and Bill’s salary within two.
I’m on my way up.
Way up.
Right to the top.
The bossman walks faster and sets his attention on each of the desks we pass. Every broker is diving in, getting ready to work—the roar growing louder as the minutes tick past nine and toward nine thirty.
Usually I’m here earlier than all these yuppies, but since I stayed late last night and know I’ll be doing the same tonight, I slept in a little later—and yes, also because Maggie kept me up extra late too.
“Fuck them, we could eat them for breakfast!” screams John, the guy who’s been out in the pit the longest.
“—ten thousand at eight and a half—” says a short-timer who is balder than a pool cue.
“—pick up a hundred thousand shares—” says Liam, a real Irish tightwad.
Though the chatter usually perks my ears, I find myself pulling my phone from my pocket. With Mr. Foxtrot ahead of me and preoccupied with all the hustle and bustle, I check my messages.
Maggie: Are you more like Richard Gere in American Gigolo or Pretty Woman?
Me: ?
Maggie: Are you all about the sex or the market?
Me: You’re insane. Which answer will get me a look at your wet pussy faster?
Maggie: Neither. I’m not one of the hooker whores down in the basement of your building.
Me: You’re stuck on that, aren’t you? Internet surfing?
Maggie: No! Just curious.
Me: You had it right the first time, they’re the happy hit squad of prostitutes, and to answer your question from earlier, I’ve never dipped my pen in that ink.
Right then the buzzer sounds, announcing that the market has opened. And just like that, the room breaks into pandemonium. Feet come flying off desks. Journals hit the trash. Eyes open wide. The gates are open and the bulls are ready to charge.
Like each of them, the mighty roar is surging through my veins and resonating with every fiber of my being.
As we near Mr. Foxtrot’s office, I shove my phone back into my pocket and hear the ping of it again. Maggie will have to wait.
Phillip Foxtrot is a big man. Husky and tall, just his natural state is intimidating, and I am no pussy. However, couple that with the fact that he rules his empire with an iron fist, and yeah, I’m shaking in my shoes a little.
Quickly, he closes the door to his massive office and sets his gaze on each of the six television screens he has on the wall to the left, and then shifts his attention to me. “Take a seat, Keen.”
I hustle to the chair in front of his desk.
“No, Keen, sit in my seat,” he says, indicating the chair behind the giant mahogany desk.
I stand where my feet are frozen on his plush carpeting.
“You got a problem with that, Keen?”
“No,” I reply, “no problem, sir.”
“Good.”
With my shoulders squared, I walk my ass around his desk and take a seat, right in his fucking black leather swivel chair.
“You like how that feels?” he asks.
“Ummm.” Fuck, what’s with the stuttering? I try again. “Yes, I do, sir. Who wouldn’t?”
“Move around a little in it. Pick up a pen. Lean back. Make yourself comfortable.”
Okay, I’m not going to lie: right now my balls are shriveled up inside themselves.
“You want to sit on a throne like that someday, don’t you, Keen?”
I nod.
“Do you know what it takes to be king?”
I grip the sides of the chair. “Sure—intelligence, det
ermination, and hard work.”
He circles around the desk. “No, Keen, it takes balls. Big balls.”
I say nothing.
The man who founded this firm sits on the edge of his desk and looks down at me, the silver at his temples gleaming amidst his dark hair. “Do you have big balls, Keen?”
I glance at the silver framed photo on the desk of his wife and two kids. “I like to think I do, sir.”
He leans down lower. “Have you ever come out to my house in the Hamptons?”
“No, sir, not yet.”
I’ve heard about his summerhouse, of course. In fact, he has two houses in the Hamptons—one where his family vacations and one for his firm meetings, as he calls them. The firm meetings are for the higher-ups and clients, and are not meetings at all, but actually wild parties. These “meetings” are thrown almost every weekend from Memorial Day to Labor Day. Live bands. Food. Booze. Girls who work for the firm dancing topless, strippers and hookers considered guests, and everyone naked and howling at the moon by midnight.
Mr. Foxtrot motions for me to get my ass out of his chair, and I do, with great relief. Once I am sitting across from him, he looks right at me and says, “It’s your time, Keen. It’s your time. Not only will you have an open invitation next summer to some of the best pussy around, but you might even be throwing your own parties before the decade ends.”
This is it; my promotion is on the table already. I’ll be a higher-up before the day is done. I can’t fucking believe it. I’m an eagle soaring high and building my nest.
I did it.
I fucking did it.
All that work paid off.
With a great smile and hearty tone, Mr. Foxtrot says, “All you have to do is one small thing for me.”
I nod eagerly. “Sure, anything, sir.”
He stares at me for a beat, then two. “I thought I could count on you.”
“You can, sir, you can.”
After a few moments of silence, he pulls a sheet of paper from his desk drawer and casually pushes it toward me. “The National Association of Securities Dealers is releasing Surfnet for trading on the NASDAQ stock exchange under the four-letter trading symbol SURF. Tomorrow the opening tick will come out way too high, but by noon, when no one buys it at the inflated price, it will drop. I want you to be on it. To purchase as much as you can without drawing the attention of the SEC, and then dump it the next day when the price rises again due to good press.”