A Novel Page 3

  “It’s a good one.”

  “Why wouldn’t I be happy? I’m at the top of my game. Sales are up more than fifty percent over last year, name recognition is at an all-time high, and my last book clawed itself onto the New York Times bestsellers list.”

  “I saw that,” he said. “Congratulations.”

  “And I just bought an Aston Martin.”

  “Which one?”

  “The Vanquish.”

  “That’s not a car, it’s a work of art,” McKay said. “Cobalt blue?”

  “How’d you know?”

  “I know you. But you still didn’t answer my question. Are you happy?”

  I looked at him quizzically. “Why did you really come to St. Louis, McKay?”

  He sat up a little. “All right, I’ll tell you. First, I wanted to tell you that I forgive you.”

  I just looked at him. “I didn’t ask to be forgiven.”

  “No, but I offer it all the same.”

  I don’t know how he thought I’d react to his offer, but I wasn’t impressed. “I haven’t forgiven you,” I said.

  “I know. I hope you will someday. Not for my sake but yours.” He scratched his chin, then said, “The other reason is a little more vague. Even to me. I guess I feel responsible for you being who you are. I did, after all, create you.”

  “You sound like Dr. Frankenstein.”

  “If the electrodes fit,” he said.

  I laughed and took a drink of wine. “This monster isn’t going down.”

  “No,” he said. “I expect not.” His voice was slightly softer. “But I would hope you would consider stopping.”

  I looked at him incredulously. “Why?”

  “We’ve hurt a lot of people in our lives. Good people. People who still had trust in humanity. People with simple faith.”

  “We woke them up,” I said. “We saved them from their ‘simple’ faith.”

  “It wasn’t ours to take.”

  “So let me get this straight. You came to St. Louis because you think you created a monster and wanted to stop me.”

  “No,” he said, shaking his head. “I came to help you, Charles. I’m paying you back.”

  I chuckled darkly. “Paying me back? You mean revenge?”

  “No. I’m past that. Way past that. I meant what I said about you doing me a favor. I know, I didn’t see it that way at first. I was livid. Crazy livid. You stole my world. You burned my house down, why wouldn’t I be angry?”

  “For the record, you burned my house down back,” I said.

  “For the record, you lit the match,” he said. “But we digress. For years you were Satan incarnate, the great unholy traitor. Then one day I was watching Marissa push Trey, my oldest son, in a swing, and something happened. I felt something I had never felt before.”

  “Bored?” I said.

  “Joy. That’s when I got it. At that moment I saw the blessing of what had happened and, to my surprise, I actually felt gratitude for you. If it wasn’t for you, I would have still been up on that stage tonight missing everything that really mattered or could bring real joy. I never would have known my two little boys. I owe you for that.”

  He looked into my eyes. “I had lost sight of what brought real happiness. I’d forgotten what real joy was. Sometimes in making our way through life we get ourselves so lost and tangled in the thicket of self-interest that we forget that our self-interest is much more than a flashy car and a fat wallet.”

  “The thicket is where men like us are meant to be.”

  “No, it’s not. Trust me.”

  I suddenly laughed.

  “What’s so funny?” McKay asked.

  “I figured out what this reminds me of. A Christmas Carol. Marley’s ghost visit.”

  McKay smiled at the suggestion. “That’s exactly what this is.”

  “So, you’re honestly telling me that if you had to do it over, you wouldn’t? You would have been perfectly happy with a nine-to-five job, kissing some boss’s butt, driving a Chevy Malibu, and saving up for a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Hawaii? I don’t think so.”

  “That’s a fair question,” he said, nodding. “I get to answer with the benefit of my career—the money, the open doors, the personal growth. I even met Marissa through my work. So, in fairness, how would I separate it? But around every corner there’s regret. I regret putting off life and family and children. I regret the people I’ve hurt. I regret the marriages I’ve ruined.”

  I gripped my glass so hard that I worried it might shatter. “Yeah, tell me about it.”

  At least he had the decency to look ashamed. “Like I said, I have my regrets. But I was talking about the actual business of what we did. When people lose money, they lose hope. And when hope fades, so do marriages. Sometimes lives. Without hope the world is barren. That’s my legacy—a wake of roadkill on the highway of greed. It’s a nice little legacy to keep me up at night.”

  “You’re forgetting all the people we’ve helped.”

  He smiled cynically. “Helped? We helped ourselves. As for our customers, few. Very few. And whenever we found a unicorn, we’d grab them by the horn and wave them around as proof of our veracity, but we both know that they’re the rare exceptions. Half the people never even open the success box they just paid five grand for. And almost none of them get a refund. They just resign themselves to the bondage of paying a new monthly fee.”

  “Losers lose,” I repeated. “It’s what they do.”

  He shook his head, took a drink, and said, “I have regrets.”

  “So that’s why you came all this way? To share your regrets?”

  “And to give you some advice.”

  “Also something I didn’t ask for.”

  “Yet, like forgiveness, I offer it all the same, if you’ll allow.”

  I flourished my hand. “By all means.”

  “What I’ve learned is that the more I unplug from the matrix, the more I find myself. And the more I like myself. It’s like the Australian aborigines: when they come of age, they leave the tribe and go on a walkabout to find themselves. They call it the heart song—the path of the ancients. And in this walk, disconnected from everything permanent, everything they know, they find themselves and who they are in this world and what they have to offer.

  “I wish I had done that. I think everyone should do something like that. The problem is, in the rapids of Western society, we’re just dragged along by the current, too concerned with keeping our heads above water to wonder where the river’s taking us.” He leaned forward. “Have you ever thought about starting over? Ditching the past and being someone else?”

  “That doesn’t work,” I said. “The past never leaves us. It is us.”

  “The past doesn’t leave us, but we can leave it,” he said. “The past isn’t us any more than we’re the road we drove here on. It’s done, except in here.” He tapped his right temple. “But what we’re really talking about isn’t being free from the past, it’s being free from the future. It’s not the past that enslaves us, it’s the future it’s connected to. You pick up one end of the stick, you pick up the other. Sometimes you just need to chuck the stick.” He looked me deep in the eyes. “So why don’t you? It’s clearly not the money, since you have more than God.”

  “I’ve never even considered it,” I said. “I guess I’m just too entangled.”

  “It’s not that complicated. Just walk away before it’s too late.”

  I took a slow sip of wine and said, “I’ll think about it.”

  He gazed at me silently, then an amused smile slowly raised his lips. “No you won’t. Not until you’re old and gray like me with a tire around your middle. When that day comes, you’ll remember this chat and then take a drink and think, What was that guy’s name?” He poured me some more wine and refilled his own glass.

  “You flew all this way just to say this to me?”

  “Just?” He slowly nodded. “I’m afraid so.”

  “All right,” I said. �
��You’ve delivered the message. Your conscience can rest easy.”

  “This isn’t about my conscience.”

  “Well, it’s not about mine,” I said.

  He took a deep breath, then forced a smile. “So be it. So be it.”

  I tried to look unaffected.

  “So what’s next for the posterity of Jesse James?”

  “I’m starting a new tour next week. The Internet Gold marketing package. And you? Changing diapers?”

  He looked at me for a moment, then said, “I’m dying.”

  He said it so matter-of-factly that at first I thought he was joking. But his eyes assured me that he wasn’t.

  “Are you serious?”

  “As serious as stage four pancreatic cancer.” He breathed out slowly. “Regrets. My beautiful little boys will grow up never really knowing their father. Now that’s something to be sorry about.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I really am.”

  “Me too.”

  “So that’s why you came to St. Louis.”

  “I needed to set things straight before . . .” He stopped. “Doesn’t matter. Nothing matters anymore except Marissa and those little boys. Nothing.”

  Neither of us spoke until the room felt very uncomfortable. “I’ll get the check,” I said.

  “I’ll let you. I’ve got future college educations to fund, and you still have more money than God.”

  Chapter Three

  I keep having the same terrifying dream. If I’m to be engaged in nocturnal reruns, why couldn’t my subconscious treat me to something that I didn’t want to wake from?

  —CHARLES JAMES’S DIARY

  MONDAY, APRIL 25

  I didn’t sleep well, something that was becoming overly common. Of course, my surprise meeting with McKay and news of his impending death made sleep difficult. But even after I fell asleep, there was no peace. I had the dream again—the same terrifying dream I’d had six times over the last few months.

  In my dream I’m walking down a long, cracked, and broken road in the middle of a barren desert landscape. I’m walking west, toward a setting sun. I believe it’s Route 66 I’m walking, or at least what’s left of it.

  My dream is apocalyptic. Something bad has happened, and there is fire on both sides of me, making it impossible for me to get off the road. There’s nothing for me to do but keep walking. I can’t see anyone but I can hear them screaming and wailing. Then I hear someone calling my name.

  That’s when I woke, tangled in my sheets, breathing heavily and soaked in sweat. It’s just a dream. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. It’s just a dream. As usual, it took me a while to fall back to sleep.

  A few hours later I woke to my alarm clock. I groaned as I crawled out of bed. I changed from my wet, sweat-soaked underwear into my exercise shorts and went downstairs to the hotel’s fitness center and ran on the treadmill for an hour.

  Afterward I grabbed a protein smoothie at the hotel’s bar, spiking it with an energy shot, then returned to my room. As I was drinking breakfast my phone rang. It was my personal assistant, Amanda, calling from Chicago.

  “How did it go last night?” she asked.

  “We did six hundred K.”

  “Not bad for a Sunday.”

  “No. What’s up?”

  “Paulie called,” she said. “He wants to change up his presentation. He’s wondering if he can have an extra ten minutes on the stage tonight. What should I tell him?”

  “Tell him he can have five if he can increase revenue ten percent.”

  “I’ll pass it along.”

  “And make sure he lets Carter know about the time change in advance. Carter freaks out when things run over and I don’t want to deal with another one of his meltdowns.”

  “Will do. Are we driving together tonight, or should I take the train to Milwaukee?”

  “We’ll drive.”

  “I have you booked at the InterContinental.”

  “What’s wrong with the Pfister?”

  “They’re booked up with a convention.”

  “There’s always a room. Pull the celebrity card.”

  “I tried. They really are booked. Overbooked, in fact. I’m sorry, if I had known earlier that you were coming . . .”

  “It’s all right, it’s just one night.”

  “The InterContinental is nice,” she said. “You also have an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. The reporter will meet you at the hotel. I’ve reserved a private room in the hotel’s restaurant for you to meet.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You need to be careful with this one. I think she might be doing an exposé.”

  “They’re always doing an exposé,” I said. “And I’m always careful. If I can’t win them over, I crush them into dust and blow them away. Are you picking me up at the airport?”

  “At two twenty-five, unless your flight arrives early.”

  “Great. I’ll see you soon.”

  Chapter Four

  I have learned of two deaths in the last twenty-four hours.

  —CHARLES JAMES’S DIARY

  The flight from St. Louis to Chicago was only an hour, just long enough to take a short nap and write down some marketing ideas for my upcoming tour. I landed at O’Hare a little after two. I called Amanda from the plane, and she pulled up at the arrival curb as I walked out of baggage claim. She popped her trunk and got out of her car to greet me. As usual she hugged me.

  “Welcome home.”

  “Thank you.” I threw my suitcase in her trunk.

  “Do you want to drive?” she asked.

  “No. I want you to drop me off in front of the building so I can get into the office. I’ve got a lot to do before we leave for Milwaukee.”

  “No problem. I still need to pick up your shirts at the dry cleaner anyway.”

  We both climbed into the car. While I checked my e-mails, Amanda pulled away from the curb, taking I-90 to the Downtown Loop.

  “So how was St. Louis?”

  “I had dinner with McKay Benson.”

  She took her eyes off the road to look at me with disbelief. “Our McKay?”

  “The one and only.”

  “Whoa. How did that come about?”

  “He ambushed me backstage after my presentation.”

  “He just happened to be in St. Louis?”

  “No, he came just to see me.”

  “That sounds painful. What did he want? A job? Revenge?”

  “Actually . . .” I paused, stowing my phone in my pocket. “He’s dying.”

  Amanda looked over at me. The news clearly affected her. “Are you serious?”

  “That’s what I asked. He has stage four pancreatic cancer.”

  “I hear that’s the worst kind to get.”

  I nodded. “He said it’s just a matter of time.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  We drove a little more in silence, then Amanda asked, “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. Why?”

  “You look tired.”

  “I didn’t sleep well last night.”

  “I’m not surprised, after seeing McKay and hearing his news.”

  “It wasn’t just that. I had the dream again.”

  She frowned. “The dream. How many times is that now?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. Five. Six.”

  “At least. What are you going to do about them?”

  “What I always do.”

  “What’s that?”

  I looked at her and grinned. “Nothing.”

  The Charles James Wealth Seminars offices were located on the eighteenth floor of the Michigan Boulevard Building in downtown Chicago off the Loop, just ten miles from my home in Oak Park.

  Amanda dropped me off at the curb in front of the building and I took the elevator to the eighteenth floor. As I walked into my offices’ lobby, our new receptionist, Candace, smiled at me. “Good afternoon, Mr. James.”

  “Afternoon,” I echoed, hurryin
g by.

  “Oh, Mr. James, your friend is here. I had him wait in your office.”

  I turned back. “Who?”

  “Your friend. I’m sorry. He didn’t say his name.”

  “I’m not expecting anyone.” I turned and walked down the hall to my office. My door was partially open. I stepped inside. Seated in one of the chairs in front of my desk was an older, gray-haired gentleman I’d never seen before. He was dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt and wore round, wire-rimmed eyeglasses. He looked up at me as I entered. He looked tense.

  “Who are you?” I asked.

  “My name is Carl West.”

  “What are you doing in my office?”

  “I’m here because my son invested in one of your get-rich-quick courses.”

  “Good for him,” I said.

  “No, good for you. He used every dime he had and borrowed two thousand from me. Nothing ever came from it. I told him to get a refund.”

  I noticed his hands were trembling. I suddenly feared he had a gun. I looked him over but couldn’t see one.

  “All our packages come with a satisfaction guarantee,” I said.

  “So you say. But you folks got it all figured out, don’t you? At first he was too embarrassed to ask for his money back. But then it turned into fights with his wife when the bills got bad, so he asked for a refund. Your people humiliated him, made him feel like a quitter and a loser. They made it so difficult that he finally gave up. But that’s your scheme, isn’t it? That’s how you finance your fancy cars and private jets.”

  “I don’t have a jet.”

  “Neither did he. He could barely afford his used Chevy.” He blinked rapidly, then removed his glasses and wiped his eyes. “We’re just ordinary people, Mr. James. My son laid floor coverings for the Carpet King. He didn’t make much but it was honest work. He wanted more for his family. He was married, had a new baby. He wanted to give his family a better world—the one you promised him. But it ain’t real, is it?”

  I could feel my face warm. “You need to leave my office,” I said. I took a business card out of my pocket and wrote Amanda’s name on it. “Have your son call my assistant. She’ll take care of him.” I offered him the card. He looked at it but didn’t take it.