“I don’t know. What are you currently making?” I asked.
She told me, and I smiled again. Devin Range was a cheap bastard.
“Caryn, I can guarantee you’ll make more than that. We might also tie your compensation to how much my business increases under your watch. You can make as much or little as you want, based on how you help me build the bottom line.”
“I don’t know. I need to think about it,” she said.
“Why don’t we do this: I send you a plane ticket, and you spend Thanksgiving at our house? You talk to everyone and get a feel for the job. Frankly, I don’t know everything you’d need to do. I’d hope you could help figure that out for me,” I said.
There was a long pause.
“David, are you doing this to get even with Devin?” Caryn asked.
I decided that I needed to be honest with her. We didn’t need our business relationship to start off with a lie.
“Yeah. A part of me needs to balance the scales, so to speak. But that part of it is just a happy coincidence. Honestly, I need your PA skills in the worst way come the first of December. That’s when I go to LA to shoot my new movie, and my first movie will premiere after the first of the year. While I’m in LA, I want to see if acting is a viable career path for me, so I’d need your business skills to help me with that. I also have other business interests like the family farm, photo resales, and two charities I created.”
“Okay. That’s enough to get me interested and make it worth a trip to your home. I trust that you won’t breathe a word of this to anyone who might be tied to Range Sports,” she said.
I agreed, and I had a big smile on my face when she hung up. Now I had to tell my mom and dad. I probably should have done that before making the offer.
◊◊◊
Somehow, I found my way to the Pearson farm. I seem to have fallen into a routine. I might have to shake that up when I came back. Then again, my trips to their farm were always relaxing. I knew how hard farm life could be, but I could see myself as a gentleman farmer, especially if I had someone like Zoe as my wife.
As I pulled up, I saw two horses saddled up and ready to be ridden. I got out of my car, and Zoe came out of the barn.
“I hope you’re okay with going for a ride,” she said.
Seems I really was predictable. I wasn’t sure if that bothered me or not. Then she kissed me, and I forgot all about it. We rode the horses to the farm that was for sale. Zoe stopped at the edge of the woods and got off, so I joined her.
“There are a couple of bags in the saddlebag,” she said.
“What are we doing?” I asked.
“The walnuts have all dropped. We need to gather them before they soften and go bad,” Zoe said.
If walnuts were left on the ground for too long, they would mold. Zoe showed me how to pick out the best nuts. When they drop, they looked like green balls. The outer husk had to be removed to get to the nut. She gave me a hammer and chisel to knock the husk off. She would go bag up the walnuts and then dump them for me to dehusk. It was a lot of work for the little we collected. I would guess that when we were done, we each had about a five-gallon bucket’s worth.
When we returned to the barn, she dumped them all out at the horse-cleaning station and used the hose to clean the nuts. Zoe gave me the job of using a brush to knock off the worst of any debris left on the shells. She then had me gather them all up in buckets and put them into a dryer. Zoe told me that the nuts needed to be kept at 95 to 100 degrees for 3 to 4 days. After that, she would bag them up and throw them in the freezer.
It was a shame how many nuts would go to waste on the farm with no one around to take care of them.
“So, what do you plan to do with your bounty of nuts?” I asked.
“Put them in nice colored foil bags with ribbons on them and give them as Christmas gifts.”
I smiled at her ingenuity. She had spent an afternoon and had much of her Christmas shopping done. That was a much better gift than something you bought at the store. Little things like this were what attracted me to Zoe. Well, that, and she was pretty cool.
I wrapped her up in a bear hug and kissed the top of her head. Today had been another great day hanging out with Zoe. If I weren’t careful, I might end up with an honest-to-God girlfriend.
◊◊◊
Chapter 9 – So How Soon Can You Start Monday November 16
I got up and let Duke out to mess around with Precious. While I stretched, I realized I felt relief that I’d decided who’d be my new manager. It might not be a done deal yet, but in my mind, it was.
My good thoughts were interrupted by a weird yowl from Precious, and then everything became quiet. That was never a good sign. I walked around the side of the garage and found the cat from hell hanging from Duke’s ear. It looked like her claws had become tangled, and she was stuck. When Duke saw me, he trotted over, much to the dismay of the entangled kitty.
“Shit!” hissed from in between my lips.
I had a bad feeling that Precious wouldn’t be cooperative. Taking a deep breath, I carefully lifted Precious so she wouldn’t be hanging off Duke. I discovered her claws weren’t actually in his ear, but on his neck. Labs have two layers of coat. The soft undercoat is weather-resistant and acts as an insulating layer that protects the dog from extreme cold and from getting wet. The dense, straight outer coat is coarse and reinforces the hair coat’s waterproof quality. Precious had gotten her claw hooked into his undercoat. It took me a moment to free her.
Precious was so grateful to be free that she clawed the shit out of me. She was lucky I had laid down my Bo staff, or there might have been one less kitty in the world. She was smart enough to run home. I was sure she would tell Brit all about how Duke and I had mistreated her. Every time I thought Precious and I had come to an uneasy truce, she pulled something like that. Next time she pissed Duke off and needed to be saved, I might be a little slow to come to her rescue.
◊◊◊
When I made it to school, Pam was out front waiting for me. She seemed nervous, so I gave her my full attention.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
She glanced around to make sure no one was listening to us.
“I’m getting fat,” she complained.
I swear, I tried.
“David!” she said, and her face scrunched up. “You can’t laugh at me.”
“I’m sorry,” I said and looked her in the eyes. “How can I help?”
“First, you can be supportive,” she huffed.
I thought the foot stomp was a little excessive.
“I know. You just caught me by surprise.”
“I need to buy new clothes.”
“That’s why I gave you the debit card,” I said, and then wondered. “Do you need more money put into the account?”
“No, but Mom said I couldn’t just spend your money without asking.”
“I gave you the debit card for exactly this kind of stuff. You don’t need to ask my permission to use it. If you want, I’ll call Lacy and tell her myself,” I offered.
“Would you go shopping with me?” she asked.
I had three thoughts fire through my head, none of them kind. Helping a girl shop for anything but sexy underwear or swimsuits was the last thing a teenage boy wanted to do. I couldn’t imagine anything that would be worse than being forced to shop for maternity clothes. Luckily, I remembered that Pam was my baby’s mama, and I might want her to talk to me again.
“I’d love to,” I said.
It was her turn to laugh, but she wasn’t about to let me off the hook.
“Good. You can pick me up at Tracy’s after you’re done at the dojo. Tracy said her mom would cook for you,” Pam said.
A meal cooked by Mary Dole might actually make this whole thing worthwhile. If I were lucky, the store would have a comfortable chair, and I could take a nap in it while Pam shopped. We hugged it out to confirm our plans. She grabbed my hand, and we walked to the front of the school. Alan saw us and clearly wanted to ask me about it, but he bit his lip and kept his mouth shut.