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Nation of Airports 01.05
A vacuum cleaner woke Michael around eight-thirty, from a hurried absurd dream about a boat trailer's tires stolen out of spite. He threw on yesterday's clothes and made his way downstairs. A young round brown woman ran the vacuum; another scrubbed out a carpet stain near the stereo. In the kitchen a taller fatter woman cooked flank steak and Portobello mushrooms on a range-top grill. "El señor está abajo," the cook said, pouring Michael coffee.
Walt's large unfinished basement had a blue-felt pool table and a home-theater with a two-meter screen, along with an old sofa and three mismatched chairs. Walt played pool while watching financial news, mute and captioned. " Buenos días," Walt said, shooting.
"Buenos días. Did you ever leave the basement?" Most of the guests, including Tammy and Laurie, had left the party around one o'clock, either to sleep or to hit the casino nightclubs. The stragglers had migrated downstairs to watch ski movies and, save Michael, smoke pot. Walt held the table against all comers.
"They're cleaning upstairs," Walt said, shrugging. "We can have breakfast down here." The pool balls came to a stop. Both were white with odd red and black markings.
"What are those?" Michael asked, yawning.
"Practice balls. They let you see how straight you hit."
"So that's your secret. Practice."
"They say it makes perfect, but I'm hardly that ambitious," Walt said. "Up for a game?" He fished the normal balls out of the pockets. "Sleep well?"
"What sleep I got." Michael handed him the rack. "You're up and at 'em."
"I take afternoon naps. It's a huge help. The Spaniards were on to something with siesta." Walt sorted the balls quickly and set the rack. "Guest's break."
The morning unrolled pleasantly from there, playing nine-ball and eating fajitas while Walt called his broker by speakerphone. His only trade was to dump his shares in a British wireless company. The numbers they discussed distracted Michael from his shooting.
Around ten o'clock they geared up, Walt opting for his longer snowboard. They drove Walt's small ragtop four-wheel-drive to a sports store a few miles up Highway 50, shouting conversation over the wind and the crunch of roadside sand. The day was bright and warm, with tall piles of meringue clouds in an electric blue sky. "We should ski California," Michael suggested. "Look out over the lake."
"Nevada has more snow. Most of what's left in Cali is bunny hills. I was up there just after the storm with Laurie and it was already melted."
"So how'd you meet Laurie?" Michael asked.
"The property company that rents me the house had a cocktail party."
"She seems a little adult for you."
"She has been known to let her hair down." Walt smiled rakishly. "But she is tightly wound. I don't know. We've dated a couple of months. So far it's all right."
"So far?"
"Real estate people are crazy. Laurie's the third one I've dated, and the previous two turned out to be total loons. So I'm waiting for her to lose it."
"Why do you keep dating them?"
"Because they keep themselves up. Have you seen Laurie's ass? Speaking of real estate hotties, I thought you hit it off with the lovely Tammy."
"I thought so as well. Is she crazy too?"
"Let's hope," Walt said.
The sports store occupied the far end of a long strip mall. The store tech, a short sun-worn man with a gray-black ponytail, had been a late guest at Walt's party. Walt helped him set the bindings while Michael padded around the store in his socks, trying on neoprene gloves. "Don't you think five is too light?" Walt asked Michael.
"The chart says five," the tech said, taking off his reading glasses.
"I ski on eight," Walt said.
"You're a little heavier than me," Michael said, which made the tech smile. "But sure, six is good. Don't ask me. I'm on vacation."
They caught their first lift just after eleven. Already the beige and brown hill below them glistened from the thawing snow. They skied for two hours, keeping mostly to blue runs, though Walt also led him through well-traveled glades. Walt's riding had improved markedly from their last time together three seasons ago. He was too big to be nimble but he was strong, and with his size he pushed through what he failed to navigate. Michael liked the fat skis he rented. As promised they cut easily through the meringue crud in the trees. On the wet slopes of corn snow the skis fell fast, at the edge of Michael's control. He needed to stay low on his knees and lean into his turns, as if racing a motorcycle. By one o'clock his thighs ached and Walt was leaving him well behind. His eyes stung from sweat-run sunscreen.
Walt waited for him at the junction with the run down to the lodge. "You wanna eat?" Michael nodded and followed him down. Michael pushed himself through the shallow bumps, found a good rhythm and overtook Walt for a brief exultant moment. The crest of a bump gave way and he lost his edge, sliding twenty feet on his side. The skis stayed on but when he stood Michael felt a twinge in his knee. Sloppy old fart. At the lodge he would set the bindings to five.
Walt passed him again and continued off the run, down the slight slope to the muddy stream of runoff that separated the chairlift from the base lodge. When Michael got off the hill Walt had already stepped out of his bindings. "Gotta get you off those planks," Walt said.
"I tried once," Michael said. "Nearly broke my wrist."
"Get a lesson. It's hard on your own. Kelly could teach you. From the store. He was an instructor. Got fired when he got caught sneaking a joint. He'll charge you like forty bucks. Do it Sunday. That way if you break something you'll get a sick day." They walked up the short flight of stairs to the lodge's deck, Michael's ski boots clanging loudly on the steel grating floor. Loudspeakers under the eaves played old anthem rock. They took the nearest table, spreading gloves and helmets out to dry. "You having a good day?"
"I am."
"Good. I'm glad you finally made it up here."
"I'm sorry it took me so long."
"You've had a rough season." Michael nodded. "I'll get our lunch. You want a soda?"
"Iced tea, if they have it. Thanks." He regretted Walt's reference to his brother's death. Michael hadn't thought about it since leaving San Francisco, and he had enjoyed not thinking about it. The hill looked more brown now. They had only seen a few other people all morning, and the lodge was empty. Michael was surprised they earned enough to keep the resort open at all. He took off his boots and shucked his socks, then stripped off all his gear, down to his gym shorts. He draped the clothes over the deck railing to dry.
Walt came out of the lodge door, carrying drinks in plastic bottles and the fabric cooler Walt's cook had prepared. He wolf-whistled at Michael. "Some of us need a tan," Michael said. "In Russia I got so little sunlight I'm surprised I didn't get rickets."
Walt set down the cooler. "You are a little pasty. Don't sit like that too long or you'll really need a sick day. Speaking of which, how's the new job?" Walt unpacked the lunch: cold cut sandwiches on baguette, plastic tins of olives and crudités. Cloth napkins and silverware. Michael remembered bologna and mustard sandwiches from his ski-bum days.
"I don't like it."
"I'm not surprised. Structural Capital? I know you needed to get out of Russia, but you shouldn't stay there long," Walt said, wagging his fork. "Documentation equals loser."
"We don't just write documentation," Michael said defensively. "We're like analysts. Some of the research that people in our group do is profitable. But yeah, it's kind of arm's length. I miss not doing something directly."
"I'm amazed you couldn't go from Russia to someplace more interesting. There's lots of fun in Prague. Or even Warsaw. Not that you want to live in Warsaw."
"Budapest, however..."
"Oh, yes. Hungarian women. You should go to Budapest."
"Maybe someday."
"Maybe yesterday." Walt offered him the olives, swimming in oil with little cubes of feta. "I mean, why would you stay if you don't like the work?"
"I need to understand more. About the business. About our corporate mission."
"Your mission?" Walt rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Empyrean Group," he said with distaste. "Socially-responsible consulting. You're being wasted. If you had only gone to work for that search-engine company."
"I never realized you felt so strongly about it."
Walt frowned. "Look, you studied business. You're good at business. I think you should do business. As for your firm, I'm probably too cynical. But all these think-tanks, consulting firms, global financial funds, they just don't work. They all come in with big ideas and they don't talk to the locals and they either fail or get corrupted. Look at you. Doing good in Russia, cleaning up the mess left by the fall of Communism -- which was, as I recall, the last effort to do good in Russia. You want to act directly? Take emergency medicine to war zones. Everything else, you're part of the problem."
"I'm starting to agree with you," Michael said.
"Oh? Do tell."
"Russia was discouraging," Michael said. "It was a good project. The country really needs a private non-profit sector, now that the state welfare system is gone. But even if they wanted to develop one, no one in the most affected communities has any training in either business principles or technology. The Orthodox Church resented us, but they needed us too. Our real problem was the government."
"Gotta give props to the hetman," Walt said. "Half the country has Genghis Khan's genes. What did you expect?"
"It wasn't just the corruption, though that was bad. Anything that even resembled a way to create grass-roots action, even online discussion groups, got us visits from state security. They weren't even subtle. How do you make democracy if people can't act?"
"Compared to Asia --" Walt began.
"Maybe a decade ago. But Russia's going backward and I don't think it's just a pendulum. And we're enabling it, just like you said, by cleaning up after it. I joined Empyrean Group because I believed they were exemplary. It wasn't just good; it was uncompromising. In Russia we compromised daily. I had a lot of bad dreams."
"You could have quit."
"I may not find anything better elsewhere. But it doesn't feel like the firm I joined four years ago. I thought a research arm would be a good place to look around. See what we're into, what we're about."
"Find out where the bodies are buried," Walt said. Michael smiled despite himself. "So what have you learned?"
"Nothing. I mean, we have our fingers in a lot of pies. But I still haven't figured out why. Maybe it's beyond me."
"Moving in mysterious ways?" Walt teased. "Maybe. But did you ever think that maybe there isn't a why? That maybe it's become a regular old company? Maybe with a bigger pro-bono arm than most, but really just about getting paid for work?"
"Maybe. I've only been there a few months. There's still more I have to learn."
"Don't take too long," Walt said. "I mean, I'm no poster child for the virtues of work, but I got lucky. You need to be on a career path soon. You're already thirty-three."
"Thirty-four," Michael corrected.
"That's older than Jesus," Walt said. "You better get cracking."
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