Chapter 8: The Law of Unintended Consequences

His mother was discharged as planned on Saturday morning. The day before, Kathy took the initiative and stripped the master bed, washing all the bedding and airing the room out all day. Peter felt guilty when she gave up another school day to spend with him as he straightened the place up and wiped down every surface with Pledge and Pine-Sol. He hired the neighbor boy, Michael, to mow the yard again. When they brought her home, Janet walked into a clean fresh-smelling home. She did not comment as she glanced around wearily, checking out the kitchen and living room, before slowly climbing the steps to the master bedroom. Kathy and Peter followed her and noticed her hesitation as she held the doorknob and swallowed nervously.

“It’s okay, Mom,” Peter encouraged her softly. “He’s gone. And he won’t trouble us anymore.”

Janet sniffed and turned to face them with a timid smile. “I know,” she whispered. “It’s just silly I guess, but part of me still dreads the thought of him being...”

“I will always be here,” he assured her, holding his girlfriend’s hand, “and so, will Kat.”

The older woman smiled again and turned back to the door, opening it slowly. She took in the freshly made bed and the clean scents. “You cleaned ... everything,” she remarked. “Thank you.”

“This was all Kathy’s doing,” he boasted. “The stairs make things difficult for me.” He fudged a little to further validate Kat’s contribution and dedication to her future mother-in-law.

“Thank you, Katherine,” Janet said gratefully. “I dreaded what I would come home to. You have made it so wonderful.”

“Of course, Ms. Shipley,” the native girl replied shyly.

They left her to settle in while they prepared a light lunch. Since she was physically and emotionally drained Kathy took her a plate and found her asleep on top of her covers. She pulled the duvet up to cover her and left the tray on her nightstand.

Sunday morning Janet reappeared looking more rested and energetic. She was dressed for church when she came downstairs and accepted a fresh cup of coffee from Peter. Kathy was preparing a simple breakfast of eggs, bacon, and potatoes. Every time Peter tried to help, she chased him away brandishing a kitchen utensil. “I need to prove to your mom, what a good little Squaw I am,” she growled, threatening him with dismemberment.

While she served them, Peter helped his mother sort out all of her medications so that she took the correct ones in the correct doses. After breakfast, she asked him if he would mind staying behind while his girlfriend gave her a ride to Church. “I think it’s time for Katherine and I to have a candid conversation, woman-to-woman,” she explained. He noted Kat’s resigned expression and shrugged.

While they were gone, he cleaned up the kitchen and then settled down at the dining table with the Seattle Times — Sunday edition. He had nearly read through it all when he heard the asthmatic wheeze of the orange goblin pulling back into the drive.

“So how did it go?” he asked cautiously. “You didn’t scalp her, did you?”

She snorted as she removed her flip-flops and plopped down onto the couch. “The Puyallup don’t scalp their enemies,” she retorted, “we cut them up and use them for fish bait.”

He chuckled as she leaned her head back and closed her eyes. “That bad, eh?”

She sighed and got up to join him at the table. She took a sip of his coffee and then decided to get one of her own. “No ... I guess it was to be expected,” she said as she poured a cup. “She is reverting to that bible-belt mentality and she wants what is best for her baby boy — I get it. But it’s still annoying when people like her take such a myopic viewpoint.” She sighed heavily as she stirred in her cream and sugar.

“Let me guess,” he mused. “She wants you baptized and exorcised of all your pagan demons.”

“Yeah, something like that. She hinted at dragging me in with you for services, but I headed her off without completely rejecting her. I reminded her that my heritage is as sacred to me as her faith is to her.”

He nodded appreciatively. “Well done. And are you two still speaking?”

“Your mom got pretty quiet after that but I think she was more thoughtful than put off.” She came over and stood behind him, rubbing his neck with her free hand. “She never even brought up the two of us.”

He looked up at the clock, “When do you have to go pick her up?”

She bent down and nibbled his ear. “I’m not. There is a special thing after the service and they are going to bring her back home after that.”

“Hopefully they won’t show up with torches and pitchforks,” he grinned.

She kissed him. “We have a couple hours ... what do you want to do?”

He reached up her skirt and slipped his hands inside the elastic of her panties, cupping her butt-cheeks. “Let’s go to bed and play cowboys and Indians.”

“Lead on, pale face.”

According to Forbes magazine Costco was expanding at an unprecedented rate, enjoying a market capitalization of $1.2 Billion. Over the previous decade, they boasted a return on equity of over 350 percent. Peter needed little urging to consider them for his next Option play. He placed an order to buy 50 June Calls at the $40/share strike price. At $4.25 per contract ($425) he committed just over $21K. It was executed on the market first thing Monday morning and he set his Stop Loss at 4.

After they enjoyed a light breakfast the three of them loaded into the orange goblin and Kat drove them up to the Bellevue BMW dealership where they wandered around the lot checking out the choices. There were dozens of Model-3s available and they quickly narrowed down their search to three different vehicles. The one they both preferred was a light metallic blue with black trim. They had been on the lot for over 15 minutes and had yet to be approached by any sales staff.

“I wonder if anyone is ever planning on coming out to help us,” Peter grumbled as he rolled along under his girlfriend’s power. She enjoyed pushing him around in the chair and he patiently tolerated her assistance.

“It’s not like there are crowds of customers,” she replied with a grumble. So far, they had only seen one other couple checking out the cars — and they were approached immediately by a middle-aged man with a red sports coat and clipboard.

“Maybe I can coax them into helping us,” he smirked and pulled out his cell phone.

“It’s a beautiful morning here at Bellevue Audi, BMW, Volkswagen! My name is Marissa, how may I direct your call?” a sweet young feminine voice answered.

“Hi Marissa,” he replied, trying to match her bubbly tone. “My name is Peter Shipley and I would like to speak to someone in Sales.”

“Certainly sir. Would you like to make an appointment?”

“No that won’t be necessary, you see we are already here on the premises,” he said, “In fact, we have been here for nearly 20 minutes now and have been ignored by everyone so far. We would very much like to purchase this pretty blue M3, but it would appear that we may have to go elsewhere.”

“Oh...” she stammered. “Um ... let me see if I can find somebody to come out and assist you. Can you ho...”

“Well, I can see several people watching us from the showroom windows,” he interrupted. “Let me ask you this Marissa — are you by chance a salesperson?”

“Well ... yes,” she replied uncertainly. “But I am very junior to...”

“Why don’t you come on down here and see about helping us out and I can guarantee you a cash sale and a nice little commission,” he suggested.

“Yessir!” she replied excitedly. “Um ... who should I look for?”

“You can’t miss us,” he replied. “Look for the two lovely ladies and my wheelchair-bound self.”

Ironically, once it became evident that they were serious customers — several ‘senior’ salespersons tried to impose themselves and send Marissa back to the customer service desk. At first, they simply ignored Peter and addressed Janet with predatory expressions. When Peter firmly suggested that they go back to ignoring customers and let Marissa take care of them, there was a brief but awkward stare-down. “Or ... we can take our business elsewhere,” he stated sternly. Something about his presence and demeanor convinced them that there was more to the boy than they originally suspected.

Marissa was beside herself with excitement to complete her first sale. The transaction ultimately took them about 2 hours and they were back home before lunch with a brand-new car. Kat made a brief detour to collect the mail before heading to school to turn in his assignments for the week.

By the following weekend, they had processed another $8,500 in sales, with Pinball Wizard being their most popular game so far. Alan uploaded a preliminary Beta version of Canyon Shooter and the feedback was mostly favorable. One particular anonymous user was exceptionally negative about it as well as most of their other games, without being specific about their complaints. This created an entire string of discord from other users who stood up for PAK Gaming. Peter ignored the drama and focused on the insights provided by the gamers he had come to recognize on the board and respect for their honest and free opinions.

On Sunday evening April 29^th, he prepared a summary report for the PAK gaming meeting that the three of them planned on having the next day after school. While he was at it, he took a long and in-depth study of his portfolio holdings and Options.

With the proceeds from his Oracle short he added to his stock portfolio he was now sitting on:

20,000 MSFT @ $18.50/sh

5,000 ORCL @ $27/sh

1,000 AAPL @ $47.5/sh

5,000 AMD @ $9/sh

1,000 IBM @ $23/sh

1,000 INTC @ $44/sh

5,000 CSCO @ $24/sh

2,000 LOT @ $24.25/sh

1,000 COST @ $43.5/sh

He was also holding onto the following Options contracts:

MSFT 200 MAY 11.5 Calls at 13½ ($270,000)

ORCL 100 MAY 25 Calls at 5.6 ($56,000)

ORCL 100 MAY 30 Calls at 3.30 ($33,000)

COST 50 JUN 40 Call at 4¼ ($21,250)

When he completed inputting all of his holdings and valuations, he made a quick comparison with the figures displayed on his E-Trade account. They were a perfect match! His eyes grew wide and he gave a loud whoop of excitement that startled Kathy who was sleeping on the bed behind him.

“What...?” she sat up groggily. “Everything okay, babe?”

He flinched in embarrassment and made to shut down his computer screen. He hesitated for a moment and then turned his wheelchair to look at the half-dressed angel sitting up in his bed. “I’m sorry Cher, I didn’t mean to wake you,” he replied with flushed excitement.

She dangled her long beautiful legs over the side of the bed. “What’s got you so spun up?”

He chewed his lip for a moment and then nodded as he came to a decision. “I was just going over the books for the company and my personal ... stuff,” he remarked. “Come here, I want to show you something.” He turned back toward the computer and minimized his portfolio spreadsheet, pulling up the company report.

He made room for her to settle into his lap and took a second to sniff the scent of her skin before kissing her shoulder softly. “First of all, these are the numbers for the PAK Gaming, Co. for this last month. You can see since we started business last March, we are up to nearly $25K in profits.”

She gasped as she looked over the spreadsheet on the screen. “Holy shit! That is awesome, babe!”

“It is,” he smiled. “And once we release the Canyon Shooter, we are going to probably double that.”

She pursed her lip and whistled softly. “We are gonna be freakin rich!” she breathed.

“Yeah,” he replied hesitantly. She turned to him and slipped her arm around his neck.

“What, baby?” she asked curiously. “Is there something else?” She studied his face as he wrestled with something internally. Then he looked deep into her eyes and saw something that gave him some sort of resolution. “Sonny?”

“Okay,” he sighed. “Before I get into all this, I just want you to know that it changes nothing about us, okay?” He grimaced when he saw a split second of worry in her eyes. “No! Don’t go freaking out on me here, this is a good thing. Amazing even. I just want to preface everything by reminding you of how much you mean to me ... that is, well — you mean everything to me.”

“Okay...” he felt her posture stiffen as she braced herself.

“No!” he exclaimed sensing her discomfort. “I mean it, Kat,” he blurted. “I love you! And I want you to know that everything I’m about to reveal is about ‘us’ not just me.”

“Okay ... Peter,” she put her hands on either side of his face. “You’re doing it again and you know this shit freaks me out! Why don’t you just get to the fucking point already?”

He nodded and took a deep breath, reaching for the keyboard. “I haven’t been completely open with you about certain things,” he stated evenly. Her expression suggested that he was not doing a very good job of convincing her. “Okay, look. There was more to the settlement than what was distributed to my mom.” He noticed her eyebrows arching slightly but her expression didn’t soften. “Um ... it’s a bit complicated but in a nutshell, I managed to retain a portion of it and have had complete control of it since last month.”

“A ... portion,” she replied.

He nodded. “Half a million dollars, actually,” his voice got low as he continued.

Her mouth dropped open and her hands slid down to his chest. She opened her mouth but he cut her off.

“That isn’t the best part,” he told her with a sparkle in his eyes. “I used it to fund an online brokerage account ... You’ve seen the E-trade commercials on TV.”

She nodded as she held her breath in anticipation.

“Well, I used some of it to buy stock in a bunch of different companies,” he stated. “I used some more of it to buy options and make some more risky plays.” He indicated the stacks of magazines, papers, and books scattered around his room.

There was a long silence between them as she waited for him to continue. She finally slapped his chest angrily. “Are you going to tell me what the hell this all means or what?”

He took another deep breath and turned back to the computer. “This is strictly between you and me, okay?” He pulled up his spreadsheet and let her study it for a moment. Then he pulled up his E-trade home page.

She leaned forward and glanced over the figures. “So, these are all stocks that you own?” she asked as she ran her long nail down the screen.

He nodded. “So far. I’ve been adding to it as I can.”

“And these are your ... Options?”

He nodded again and then pointed to the top of the screen. “This $187,000 is what I have available to me right now as uninvested capital.” He added. “And this...” he pointed to a block in the corner. “Is what my entire portfolio is worth as of yesterday afternoon at three pm in New York.”

She bounced in his lap as she read the amount, “You are a fucking millionaire?” she whispered breathlessly.

“We, babe,” he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her bare shoulder once again. She surprised him by jumping out of his lap and turning on him.

“Just hold on a second,” she replied emotionally. “How is that possible? Are you into something illegal or what? How...?” She threw her arms up in the air as her words failed her. “Does this have something to do with that Jericho dude? What are you guys into?”

He smiled as he watched her antics. He was entranced by the movements of her lithe body and long hair sweeping around her head as she spun about and paced back and forth.

“Well?” she demanded finally as she stood over him glaring. “Why are you staring at me like that?”

“Because I think you are adorable,” he replied, “and I love you.”

She blew out her air and swept her bangs out of her face. “Baby, I love you too,” she said guardedly. “But I draw the line at a long-distance relationship between the walls of different prisons!” she chopped the air with her hand. “Please tell me you’re not doing something that’ll get you busted...”

He waited for her to finish and then shut down his computer before returning to the bed. “Come here,” he asked calmly as he plopped himself onto the mattress with his back against the headboard. She moved over to sit across from him with her legs crossed beneath her. Once again, he found himself trying to accept that she was his. “Okay, first of all. Everything I am doing is completely above board; nobody will be doing time for anything illegal.” He leaned forward so he could speak to her as quietly as possible. “Second, what you have seen is just the beginning.”

She shook her head in disbelief. “You just doubled a half a million bucks in two months!” she whispered loudly. “There is no way that is even remotely leg...”

“Tripled,” he corrected.

“What?”

“I tripled half a million,” he replied calmly. “And I’m going to do a lot more than that over the years to come.”

“How?” she demanded. “And don’t treat me like I’m stupid, because I’m not. And don’t give me that far-away look and tell me it’s complicated bullshit, Peter! Tell me!”

He pursed his lips together. “Okay, you are going to think I am crazy but I paid attention to current events and took advantage of the market. You could say that my timing was perfect — miraculous even, but there is more to it ... and that is ‘complicated’ I’m sorry.” He held up his hand to stop her from blowing up in his face. “I will get to that I promise.”

She bit her lip and gazed at him skeptically.

“Okay, let’s talk about the stock market. You understand that you can buy shares in a company like Microsoft and if they do well, your shares will become more valuable.”

She nodded. “You know my dad worked for Ma Bell for like 35 years,” she said. “Aside from his pension, he gets these stock certificates in the mail all the time. He has stacks of them in an old safe.”

It happened again as soon as she uttered the common moniker for the telecom giant. He felt his awareness shift as an unwarranted sense of déjà vu interposed itself. He felt/heard/envisioned something about the company like a premonition. And then it was gone.

“You just did it again!” she blurted. “Are you listening to me? What is up with you?”

He shuddered and blinked at her. “That’s ... um, the complicated part,” he whispered. “I’ll try to explain it later. For now, good on your dad. Tell him to hang on to those stock certificates as long as possible. Your family will be set for life.

“Now back to Microsoft. They were the first company I bought stock in and it was pure chance that I got them right before they announced a two-for-one split.”

“So, your stock doubled,” she nodded.

“Yep, but there is more to it than that. A stock splits when the company is trying to attract more investors. For many, the price is just too much per share, so when the stock splits the price does too. Now everyone can afford to jump in and buy Microsoft. But nothing has changed.”

She frowned. “They diluted their stock. What is the point?”

“The point is they drive up public sentiment because they want more people to invest so that they have more capital to work with,” he replied. “It was that bullish sentiment that I jumped on when I bought my first options.”

“I don’t understand how options work,” she admitted.

“Not many do, and those that think they do find the idea of derivative investing, far too risky for their blood.” He spent several minutes explaining to her how Call options worked and how he mitigated his profits and losses.

“So, you are making more money trading ‘futures’ as you call it, than you are simply buying stocks?”

He nodded, “Exponentially.”

She frowned as she played with the frayed hems of her cut-offs. “It almost seems too good to be true. Like you’re betting on good news.”

“It works both ways,” he continued. “Remember how I was watching Oracle so closely a couple of weeks back?”

She nodded. “They crashed, didn’t they?”

“Only for a week or so. All over an accounting error. But I made my most profitable play on it.” He went on to explain how ‘shorting’ worked and described his Puts that earned him roughly $250,000.

“But you own 5,000 shares of Oracle,” she argued, recalling the spreadsheet on his computer.

He nodded. “I do now. I bought it with part of the profits from shorting them. And now I own Calls on it which are already in the money since Oracle has recovered.”

She stared at his boyish face, recognizing the older wisdom in his eyes. “I just don’t understand how you know all of this,” she said softly. “it’s like insider trading or something, and people go to prison for that.”