Cash Out Read online

  I’m parked in front of the Safeway in Menlo Park, surrounded by a fleet of $60,000 imports. I gaze into space, failing to devise any kind of plan. Maybe the pain meds are making me stupid. Maybe I’m still in shock from what just happened. Was I really roped up by a band of IT geeks? Were they really setting me up for some kind of extortion? Did that guy really call his van the Enterprise?

  My cell rings, gives me a jolt. I’m so out of sorts, I don’t even look to see who it is.

  “Yeah?”

  “Dan, this is Janice from Finance.”

  My chest tightens. “Yeah, listen, Janice—I’m out today and—”

  “Dan, you need to put the P6s into the FOD, and then next week we can worry about the L26s in the PLT.”

  “Janice,” I snap, and catch myself, “I’m out today. I had a medical thing, and I’m on meds right now. And I don’t even know what you’re—”

  “Dan . . .” I can hear the irritation in her voice. “I need those P6s in the FOD by EOB.”

  “Janice . . . Janice, listen.” Long pause. “Janice, I need you to understand—”

  “Can you at least give me the P6s?”

  “Janice, you’ve got the wrong guy.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Janice, I’m a speechwriter. I don’t know the first thing about P6s, or this FOD.”

  Long pause. “Beth Gavin says you’re supposed to take care of this.”

  “Janice.” I close my eyes and count to seven. “Janice, we’ll have to talk about this tomorrow. I’m out of action today and—”

  “I sent you eight e-mails with the relevant attachments.”

  “Janice, I’m going to have to let you go now.”

  “But I—”

  I end the call.

  Three more days.

  I reach for my cell and call home. Kate picks up, sounding harried—the boys are yelling in the background.

  “You okay?” she says.

  I stumble on my words.

  “Dan?”

  “You won’t believe what just happened.”

  One of the boys lets out a bone-rattling scream. Kate puts the phone down and snaps, “Harry, leave him alone. C’mere, Ben.” A second later, she says to me, “Okay, I’m back.”

  “I just had these geeks throw me into a van.”

  Another scream. Sounds like Ben.

  “Geeks? What kind of geeks? What van?”

  “I had to ask this guy in the parking lot to untie me.”

  There’s a loud crash, then screams. I can barely hear her over the racket. “Hold on. Harry, get over here this instant.” And then, “Okay. Now, what?”

  “Let’s talk later.”

  The boys return to screaming. “Might be better.” Her voice tightens. “And if you have time to get those peas yourself, that would be great. I still have to make their lunches.”

  “No problem.”

  “Okay. Bye,” she says, the line going dead right as she hollers, “Harry, leave him—”

  Standing bowlegged in front of the frozen-food doors, I’m thinking about everything but peas. I’m thinking about covering my ass, about calling the cops, about getting a lawyer, about contacting my boss, about notifying FlowBid’s corporate security. I’m thinking about trying to stop this thing before it gets out of hand. Only problem is, if I call any one of those people, my career will be over, and my family will lose all that money—all that future I’ve been working toward the past two years, money for which I’ve given up my one true career passion.

  Maybe all they want is some easy favor . . .

  I open a door and grab a long bag of Jolly Green Giant peas.

  Maybe they want some harmless scrap of information . . .

  I back up and close the door, weighing the bag in my hand.

  Maybe they don’t want me to do anything illegal? Maybe . . .

  I turn around—and slam smack into a pit bull of a man. Or, rather, he smacks right into me.

  He is white, bald, and compact, his enormous upper body nearly too big for his blue blazer. When I look into his dark eyes, I know I’m in trouble: These aren’t the eyes of someone who is surprised or worried. These eyes are like Rod’s—calm and in control. Then he grabs hold of me and sends me across the aisle and through a freezer door.

  It happens so fast—it’s so effortless—that I have no time to feel surprised. Glass goes everywhere, yellow Eggo boxes tumble over my head, a woman shrieks, and I’m getting pulled out of the freezer and pushed across the aisle.

  He slams me against the metal frame of a glass door and eases his jaw toward mine, completely calm, reeking of some oaky cologne. “You need to watch yourself, Gomer.”

  I try to pull free, but he’s too strong. Scary strong.

  “I didn’t—”

  He pulls me closer, bites his lip and drives a knee into me—right between the legs.

  He does it again.

  “ ’Member what I said,” he whispers as he lowers me to the ground. “Watch yourself.”

  The pain envelops me. It sucks my breath away, paralyzes my limbs, and overtakes my senses. Iron rods of agony slowly spread to my stomach and down my legs, worse than anything I’ve ever felt. Slowly, I slide to the ground and ball up on my side, battling the urge to vomit as I watch this guy stride toward the front, people scrambling to get out of his way, everyone parting for the pit bull in a blazer.

  I hobble through the Palo Alto medical office, twenty-five minutes late for our “appointment.” I know this will be ugly, so I don’t even look at the blond receptionist; I just keep hobbling down the narrow hallway toward that solid-oak door with the black nameplate and white lettering: DR. HEIDI M. DOUGLAS. I stop and take a few deep breaths, preparing myself. I know they’re in there expanding on the list of things I must do if I ever want to have sex with my wife as frequently, and as passionately, as we used to.

  I open the door and poke my head in.

  A cold, wet bag nails me in the face.

  “There’s your fucking peas.”

  I look up, and Kate is standing in front of the couch, her cheeks flushed with anger. Heidi the counselor, is seated on the other side of the room, grabbing the arms of her leather chair, bracing for something close to a category 4 hurricane.

  Kate turns to sit down, folding her arms in a huff. “Knew you’d be late.”

  Kate has fixed herself up, and holy shit, does she look good. Silky blond hair falling to her shoulders, a few strands dropping over her giant blue eyes. Form-fitting T-shirt highlighting her narrow torso. Tight, dark blue jeans that she knows drive me crazy. Black leather boots with square tips and thick heels, just the way I love them.

  Heidi says, “Tell him how you’re feeling right now.”

  Kate is staring at me, her nostrils flaring. “Like I wanna hit him.”

  Heidi soothes, “Dan?”

  “You guys, I was attacked at a Safeway. Some guy threw me into the Eggos.”

  Kate looks confused. “What?”

  I lower myself onto the couch. “He kneed me, Kate. This bald guy kneed me, right in the groin. Right after the vasectomy. The police held me for like an hour to give my statement.” I look at them both, my chest rising. “I got here as fast as I could.”

  Kate looks skeptical. “Was this bald guy one of the geeks in the van?”

  “That was earlier,” I blurt. “The Eggos came later.”

  Kate and Heidi glance at each other. I use the moment to slide the frozen peas under my loose sweatpants, closing my eyes and hissing as I arrange the bag between my legs.

  “Are you serious?” Kate asks. “Two attacks in two hours. I’m supposed to believe that?”

  “I have the detective’s card, honey—”

  Heidi stops me with a wave. “Dan, are you acting like a man?”

 
This startles me. “What?”

  “Are you being a man right now?”

  What the . . .

  “I’ve been attacked, Heidi. I had a vasectomy less than three hours ago, and now I’ve been kicked in the nuts. Do you understand?”

  Heidi says, “A man keeps his word, Dan. He does what he says he’ll do, and he’ll be where he’s supposed to be, when he’s supposed to be there.” She pauses. “That’s what a man does.”

  “Dr. Douglas, don’t tell me about—”

  Heidi waves me off. “You knew today was an important commitment, Dan, but you dropped the ball. How do you think that makes her feel? You know being there for Kate is a big issue with you two.”

  I sit back and look away.

  “We’ve been over this before, Dan.”

  I turn and stare at her.

  “Right now, who’s the one who decides if you will have sex?”

  I look away again. “Kate.”

  “Do you want to have sex with Kate more often?”

  “Yes,” I mumble.

  “But she decides.”

  I roll my eyes and nod.

  “So what do you think, Dan? Should you try a little harder to do things to help put Kate in the right frame of mind? The right kind of relaxed and rested physiological state? You know, reduce her stress levels around the house? Give her time to rest?” She looks at me, concerned. “Are you getting the texts?”

  Part of the Heidi Douglas program is that the husband agrees to receive automated text messages from the good doctor. They’re reminders for hubbies who’d otherwise fall off the wagon. In my case, I’m reminded to make a family dinner each week—and it can’t be “a giant platter of meat,” as Kate adds, meaning I need to include vegetables, a salad, stuff like that. To say the texts annoy me is an understatement, but I keep telling myself, Obey the text, get more sex.

  “Yes, I’m getting the texts.”

  “And you must follow them, because we need to prove to her that you won’t let her down. That last one’s a biggie, isn’t it, Dan? Kate might put on a good face in front of the kids, but you can see how scared she is that you’ll let her down, can’t you? These kinds of fears are common for people who were hurt at an early age, aren’t they?”

  She’s right. “They are.”

  “And for Kate, the most natural reaction is to shut you out, to avoid any kind of intimacy, because when she felt that wonderful closeness as a child—when it counted most—it was always taken away.”

  Kate’s eyes have welled up, but somehow she also seems happy—glad that someone is finally putting her feelings into words. And it’s like a sock in the gut, seeing her there, so vulnerable, when I realize what she may soon learn about her husband.

  Heidi pierces me. “What do you say to Kate right now, Dan?”

  I look at Kate again, at those enormous, experienced eyes that have bewitched me for so long, at her lower lip easing out in that vulnerable way, and I melt.

  “Kate, honey.” I pause. “I’m never gonna leave you.”

  She nods and wipes away a tear. “But you don’t love me.”

  “That’s not true, honey.”

  She sniffs. “Not like before.”

  I wince. How do I do this? “Kate, I know what you’re going through. And I’m sorry I was late. But I’ve just been attacked twice in the span of two hours. A gang of nitwits kidnapped me and threw me into a van. And then some beefy little bald guy threw me through a freezer door. Look—I have the detective’s card.” I show it to her, then catch Heidi giving me the stinkeye. “But—yeah, I should’ve called.”

  Kate looks off into the distance. “I had my cell the whole time, Dan.”

  I take her hand. “I guess I was in shock.”

  Heidi says, “Dan, do real men make excuses?”

  Twenty minutes later, after doing everything I could to placate Kate—or Dr. Heidi, I’m not sure which—I convince my wife to walk with me to our usual post-therapy date spot—the small bar in Cafe Fino in downtown Palo Alto. I’m sure we’re quite the sight, with Kate looking so ultrafine, and me looking like I’ve been neutered, abducted, and thrown through a freezer door.

  I try to take her hand, but she eases away.

  “I’m really sorry about being late, Kate. I’ve been having kind of a tough day.”

  “So some kids from work really threw you into a van? What was it, some kind of prank?”

  “I wish.” Call me a coward, but I don’t want to say too much.

  “And this bald guy at the store—he was with the guys in the van?”

  “Don’t think so.” I reach into my sweats and rearrange the peas. An older woman walking toward us gives me a stern look. “The bald guy—God knows what the hell that was.” I sigh. “You think I should see the doc again? You know, after getting kneed?”

  “No idea, dude. I don’t have a scrotum.”

  The gin martini at Cafe Fino feels good going down. Really good.

  “Wish I’d been there,” Kate says, staring straight ahead. “Bald little fuck would have a big gash in his scalp right now.”

  Kate likes to fight. Or, I should say, she used to. When I met her, Kate was a competitive kickboxer. (As you probably can tell, I have an affinity for fighters.) But that was then, and now Kate is all about being a good mom, and her kickboxing days are a distant memory.

  Back then, in our single days, when we were really just kids, things were so much simpler. You didn’t have to whittle away on long self-improvement lists for the chance to screw around with your wife, the gorgeous creature who used to wake you at 3 A.M. every other night, her naked body pressed against you. Back then, you had no children for whom you’d sacrifice everything. Back then, you had no gigantic sum of stock to lose just days before it vested.

  Kate crosses her legs on the stool. “All right, walk me through your bad day.”

  As we sip our martinis, I give Kate the blow-by-blow: the IT ambush, the extortion scheme, the frozen-food knockdown. When I tell her about the IT nerds’ scheme, I leave out the sexual subplot—but I admit that I did leak damaging tidbits to BusinessWeek.

  Kate covers her eyes. “I can’t fucking believe you.”

  I sink my head. “I know.”

  Eyes still closed. “With everything we’ve been working for, Dan. You jeopardized it all.”

  “I know. I just . . .”

  She opens her eyes and looks around, raises her hands as if to say, What the fuck? “I mean, this affects everything we’ve talked about for the past five years.”

  I reach down and rearrange my peas. “I know.”

  “Why, Dan?”

  “I’ve told you why, Kate. Fitzroy’s a prick. The man destroys careers for sport. BusinessWeek reached out to me, and he had it coming.”

  Kate puts her martini down and turns to me, those giant eyes searching my face. “Who gives a shit about Stephen Fitzroy?” she whispers. “All you had to do was hang on for a little longer—just a few days longer—for the options to vest.”

  I look at her.

  “A month from now, you could’ve leaked stuff to BusinessWeek every day.”

  “I’m sorry, Kate.”

  “Makes me wonder what else you’ve done.”

  I squint at her. “What?”

  “You heard me. Makes me wonder what else they have on you. Something you don’t want me to know about.”

  Like a flash, I am reminded of “the erotica.”

  Not erotica, exactly. But a handful of stupid instant messages I had with a married woman who works down the hall, which the nerds have intercepted. The thought of Kate reading a transcript of my dirty online chat with Anne Browne, a hot public-relations coordinator, makes me sick. My skin goes cold, and I’m overcome by a wave of guilt that twists my gut into a knot.

  I’m such a fucking i
diot, such a fucking horny scumbag, such a fucking animal.

  The thing with Anne was, it came out of nowhere—kind of. Sure, I liked the way she paid attention to me—smiling at me a little longer, giggling flirtatiously at my lame jokes, letting her eyes settle on me and stay there. But I never wanted it to go beyond that. Then one day we were exchanging some banter on IM, pretty harmless, talking about preferences and turnoffs and crap like that, and the next thing I knew we were trading sex secrets. We never did touch—not that Kate would care. Nor that she would even necessarily believe me.

  I hate myself.

  After a long pause, Kate says, “Are you sure you can’t go to FlowBid security?”

  “First thing they’d do is scour my activity on the network, and we’d be fucked.”

  She sighs and looks away. “We need to find a lawyer.”

  “Kate?” I rearrange the peas again. They’re starting to thaw. “What do you say we call it a day?”

  Kate turns to me, crestfallen again.

  “I’m sorry, honey. My crotch is soaked.”

  Kate calls our sitter, Stacey, to say we’re coming home early. Dan’s testicles are throbbing, she explains, and he needs to lie down. Through the cell, I can hear Stacey laughing. Stacey says she and the boys have walked to Burton Park, where they’re playing in the sand lot.

  At the parking lot, standing between our cars, Kate says, “Why don’t I go pick them up at the park? That way they don’t have to walk back, and we can send Stacey home, and you can go frost your testes on the couch?”

  “That’s okay,” I say, trying to be conciliatory. “I can go get them.”

  Kate frowns. “I thought you were supposed to be in pain?”

  “I’ll manage. You go home and get their bath ready and set the couch up for me with a bunch of pillows.” I reach into my sweats, pull out the wet bag of thawed peas, and toss it to her. “Just throw these in the freezer.”

  The April sun is still pretty strong, and the interior of my old Corolla feels like a vinyl oven set for 120. The AC crapped out three years ago, but right now I have the windows rolled up. A few minutes later, Kate calls my cell. I’m still glad to hear her voice.

  “Calling for a nuts update?”

  “I wanna reiterate, Dan. We have a plan for this matter with the nerds.”