Do You Mind

if I ask how it happened?

I knew what she meant, but I pretended not to hear over traffic as we waved signs.

Passing drivers honked, waved, and extended many peace signs to us.

I'm just curious, she said.  You said something like Corner-office-suit-and-tied to Occupy. That can't be a straight line.

Right, I nodded. It wasn't.

Want to tell me about it?

So there it was, a situation I'd dreaded for years in self-imposed isolation. A pretty woman inquires, and when I fill in the blanks--at least if I tell the truth-- she'll almost certainly flee. But she wants to hear it, even if she can't know my need to tell it to someone.

I hesitated only for a moment.

With no clear idea where I was heading or with how much truth, I held my 99 > 1 sign a little lower and stepped closer.

It began, I told her, as major life events often do: the telephone rang, although here it was ringing already as I walked into that corner office, followed closely by my secretary with a sheaf of pink phone messages, and who was clearly distressed, though I hadn't noticed that yet.

I accepted the messages with one hand and picked up the receiver with the other.

"Blanston."

The voice on the other end could not have been more pleasant.

"Blanston?  This is Irv Franklin, general counsel for Advanced Accounting.*  I have your subpoena here, and I had a couple of questions."

"Sure, Irv, but I didn't send--" but that's all I get out before he interrupts me.

"Just who the fuck do you think you are?"

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Next: The Shark Ethic
* Names of firms and persons changed at the insistence of the author's lawyers.