Chapter 23

Many things happened in the next week.

Our refrigerator arrived the next morning, and we put the leftover frozen food in it. Caroline’s University of the Pacific envelope showed up in the mail, meaning she had to get down to the University and select her classes for her first semester.

All of our signs were ready, the ones for our new offices in the Stanford Center, as well as our Stockton offices. We’re using Jeremy O’Malley’s maintenance man, Mort Robertson, who should be quite the help around here. He and Jennifer seemed to hit it off ... we’ll see how that goes.

I feel like Jenn’s older brother now, looking out for her. She really is a diamond in the rough ... all she needs is to be polished a bit.

Caroline and I went to a furniture store and got the office furniture we needed. It’s being delivered as well. Things are really falling into place well for O’Hara and O’Hara Realty LLC.

There was even news on Robbie. The last we heard, he was turning on his fence to get a lighter sentence. His trial is under way ... he could still get five years in jail.

RING

“Hello, this is Richard O’Hara?”

“Hey Rich, this is Stan.”

“Hey, Stan ... you moved in yet?”

“Yeah, actually ... but that’s not what I’m calling about. I got offers on three separate listings down in Mountain View. When are you and that wonderful wife of yours going to grace us with your presence?”

“Set them all up for whatever day you want, I’ll be there to sign them,” I said.

“Sheila will send you the particulars, Rich. How are you guys doing over in Stockton?”

“You actually sound like you miss us, Stan.”

“I do, a little ... uhm, I got something to tell you, now ... now don’t freak out, OK?” I heard his voice crackling a little.

“What is it, Stan?”

“Mary and I are getting a divorce.”

“My gosh, Stan ... what’s all that about?”

“She caught me with ... someone, recently.”

“Stan, you stupid son of a bitch, who is she ... some college coed, some D-cup dodo, as Caroline would say?”

“Richard, I can’t – I can’t believe I did something as stupid as that, but I did, and Mary won’t believe it was the first time ... she thinks we’ve been having an affair for ten years, but we haven’t. It was a case of opportunity, after that meeting we had.”

“Oh, my lord Stan ... you mean it was ... Sheila? You had an affair with Sheila? ... You fucking idiot! Does her husband know?”

“No, I don’t think so, Rich ... I feel so stupid. We’ve known each other for so long, it felt comfortable to take her to get something to eat, after that meeting.”

“Do you love her?” I dreaded the answer to this, because it could have such a ripple effect on this company, as well as affecting many lives in the process.

“No, I don’t love her ... but she is awfully nice, she understands me better than Mary does, or at least I think she does.”

“Stan, after we deal with these sales, buy your wife the biggest ring you can and grovel as much as you can ... you can’t let Mary get away. You two went to college together, for god’s sake. Caroline and I will meet you at the homes as soon as you want, OK buddy?”

“Thanks for listening, Rich ... when did you get to be so smart?”

“Michael and Jennifer O’Hara, my parents, have suffered through every problem known to man, but they’re still together because they love each other and they never, ever went to bed mad at each other, and they’ve been together for close to 30 years. That’s how I’ve gotten so smart.”

“Don’t be stupid, Stan ... fix this, I know you can.”

I caught Caroline up on the news, including Stan’s indiscretion. Her reaction was expected, “You do anything remotely like that to me, and I’ll cut off your nuts and feed them to you, you got that mister?”

“Yes, Mrs. O’Hara, I completely understand. No affair, no nuts cut off – got it.”

That did as I had hoped – it made her laugh.

“Why don’t we head to UOP, so you can do the paperwork to start class in two weeks, and after that we’ll head to O’Hara and O’Hara West. I expect Stan to call me soon to set up the sales appointments he talked about.”

Well, Caroline’s stop at UOP took practically no time at all, due to the fact that she’d spent nearly four hours poring over classes, schedules and so forth. We were quickly on our way to the recently opened Palo Alto offices of O’Hara and O’Hara Real Estate, LLC.

We got there rather quickly, Sheila behind the receptionist desk. Everything except the two Logo signs were up and running. The oak wood version of our new logo was strikingly stunning hanging on the wall above and behind Sheila. There were two ceiling lights pointing and showing it off.

I don’t know if Stan told Sheila what he told us, so we went inside and said hi to everybody. All of our Realtors in one place, that was my goal when I started my Brokerage. Both of the Wheelers were on the phone, so we couldn’t say hi to them.

We went back to Sheila and asked her when Stan was expected in. She had a rather neutral look on her face, I think she was trying to hide that she was trying to hide something. I asked Sheila to come outside with me, so Caroline took her place at the reception desk for a moment.

“Richard, you know – don’t you?” she said looking down, averting her eyes.

“Yes, Sheila ... Stan called Caroline and me, and he told us both. I can’t believe it. My two longest serving employees having a torrid love affair?”