Chapter 125

The middle of August arrived before anyone wanted for it to. The University was taking over the apartment so Tiffany, Molly, Katelyn and Bob headed back to the house at Heilman. Baseball practice started a week before classes began and the women had things to occupy their time. He could move into his dorm assignment but no one really thought he would.

Tiffany was serving as Beta Club vice president and she needed to spend time with the faculty adviser to ensure that none of the members had taken summer courses that lowered their GPA below the requisite level.

Katelyn had been elected president of the Junior Class and had volunteered to lead campus tours for the incoming freshmen and their parents. She also wanted to put together a proposal for the student and faculty congresses regarding funding for a few of the less-publicized clubs on campus. There was no reason the athletic department got money from student fees when the Drama Club and the Lesbian-Gay-Transgender Alliance didn’t, she reasoned.

Molly was the lead cellist for the school’s orchestra – and the conductor, spotting talent when he saw it, had put together an aggressive set of works that would show off her skills. He had even managed to get the feature flautist from the London Philharmonic to perform a duet of a piece he’d written just for Molly. That program was scheduled for the week before finals and Molly had been working on the arrangement most of the summer.

Hailey was staying in Calder City for another week. There were things she could have been doing at Heilman but she decided her time was better spent working at Barton. There was always a pile of work as executives in other areas took time off to either take their children to college or to squeeze in one last week of sunshine before summer came to a close.

Phil was not headed to Heilman, nor was he staying in the city. He was off to New York for a day to visit with Stan Balsam before flying to Los Angeles to assume his duties at Lambswool Studios. He stared out the window until he could no longer see Calder City as the plane gained altitude and banked east toward New York. It was only a 90-minute flight but he started to miss Hailey and the rest of the crew before he’d even left the airport.

He was a bit surprised to see a young woman holding a sign with his name on it when he came through the exit at LaGuardia. He had planned to grab a taxi into Manhattan. His appointment with Stan wasn’t until 10:30 a.m. and it was barely past nine when the plane landed.

The young woman frowned when he introduced himself. She worked in the marketing department at Balsam and Associates and had been tasked with picking up a studio executive at the airport. She wasn’t pleased to be handed the job in the first place and she certainly wasn’t in the mood to deal with some college kid playing a prank. He was dressed in a pair of shorts, a T-shirt and a green baseball cap with an “H” on it. He certainly wasn’t the head of a major studio.

Phil’s smile caught her off guard. He pulled out his wallet and handed over his driver’s license. She looked at it for a moment and then back to the guy in front of her. She doubted he was even 20 years old.

“It’s a long story,” Phil said when he saw the disbelief cross her face. “Can I assume that Mr. Balsam sent you?”

The woman nodded. She was 25 years old and a graduate of NYU. She had believed that she would be making $250,000 a year plus stock bonuses when she graduated college. Instead, she had worked at a coffee shop for almost a full year because no one in her field was hiring. The job with Balsam and Associates had been entry level and her advancement had been non-existent (hence her job picking up someone at the airport).

“I’m sorry for the confusion,” Phil said earnestly. “I didn’t expect Mr. Balsam to send someone to pick me up. I was just going to take a cab. Our meeting isn’t for another 90 minutes.”

“It will take that long to get through traffic,” the woman stated in a flat voice.

“Oh, sure,” Phil agreed. “I didn’t think about that. Uh, let me take a minute to change my clothes.”

“Do you need to stop at your hotel before the meeting?” the woman asked in an irritated voice. It wasn’t like any hotel in New York would let him check in before 2 p.m.

“I don’t have a hotel,” Phil admitted.

“You’ll never get one on short notice,” the woman told him.

“Oh, I won’t need one,” Phil said. “I’m flying out to Los Angeles tonight. I only came here to meet with Mr. Balsam.”

“We can stop at a travel plaza for you to change,” she decided. “It will be less hassle than you trying to get back inside.”

“Thank you for taking the time to come and get me. I do appreciate it,” Phil told her.

The woman didn’t reply. Instead she turned and headed out to the waiting vehicle.

“Wow!” Phil said when he saw the brand new Bentley Continental in front of him. “Is this yours?”

The woman gave him a baleful look and shook her head.

“It belongs to the agency,” she told him.

Phil knew the car would cost $200,000 at a dealership.

“Does he lease it or own it?” Phil wondered. The woman was surprised when he had climbed into the passenger seat.

“I have no idea,” the woman told him.

“I apologize if I’ve dragged you away from something important,” Phil said. “This wasn’t my idea and I would appreciate it if you would direct your anger where it is appropriate.”

The woman turned to glare at him but Phil’s gaze forced her to turn her eyes back to the front.

“You are the first representative from Balsam and Associates that I’ve met face-to-face,” he continued. “You should know that you’ve created a horrible impression of the agency. Your company stands to make a substantial amount of money from my studio if we can come to terms. Right now, I’m inclined to cancel the meeting and just head to Los Angeles. I came here as a courtesy to your boss and you’ve treated me with nothing but disrespect from the outset. I would assume that you aren’t tasked with meeting potential customers very frequently. If you were, you would know that your attitude is likely to make negotiations more difficult for Mr. Balsam than they were when I got off the plane.”

Dara Alderman kept her eyes forward as she navigated through traffic across the RFK Bridge and into Manhattan. Once traffic died down, she found a plaza and pulled off the roadway.

“You can change clothes here,” she said. Phil nodded and grabbed his garment bag out of the back. They had ridden in silence for almost 30 minutes, the droning of the radio the only sound in the vehicle. He found a text from Hailey and sent her a reply.

Five minutes after he’d entered the plaza, Phil exited wearing a charcoal suit, a crisp white shirt and a blue tie that matched Hailey’s eyes. His hair was short enough that he could comb it out and he no longer looked like a college kid coming home from Spring Break.

“I’m sorry I was such a bitch,” Dara said when he resumed his seat in the car and they merged into traffic again. “It just irked me when I saw you. I thought you were trying to play a trick on me. Then I saw you weren’t playing a joke and it irked me further. You’re what, 19 years old?”

“I’ll be 20 in two weeks,” Phil said with a laugh. Hailey’s texts had managed to cheer him up. He also admitted to himself that he would have been peeved if his mother had sent him to the airport to retrieve somebody too stupid to find their way to Calder City on their own.

“Yeah, that makes it better,” Dara said, shaking her head. “I thought I’d own this town by the time I was 25. Instead, I’m a go-fer. I barely make enough money to pay my rent, my student loans and eat. Then you come strolling up – a guy who owns a studio at 19 years old!”

“My family trust owns the studio,” Phil corrected. “I’m just the trustee appointed to run things. Look, a year ago, I was just a college kid who didn’t know his ass from his elbow. Sure, my family owns a ton of stuff – and they’ve given some of it to me. To be honest, outside of mowing lawns when I was a kid, I’ve never earned a penny that didn’t come from my family or from my family’s influence.”

“So you understand why I’m unhappy,” Dara said.

“Oh, I always understood it,” Phil replied with a shrug. “I simply pointed out that the path to advancement isn’t through alienating potential partners. If you had been pleasant – or even polite – I likely would have mentioned to Mr. Balsam how much I appreciated the fact that he sent someone friendly and helpful to pick me up. Now, if I mention your name at all, it’s likely to be in a negative manner. The next time he sees you or hears about you, he won’t think of when a guy who paid one of his clients $12 million gave you a compliment. Instead he’ll think about how close you came to screwing up a big deal for Randi Raver.”

The Thomas sisters were the only people happier to learn that the majority of the crew would be back at college soon than the crew itself. The group had enjoyed its stay in Calder City but was ready to return to the low-stress life offered at Heilman College.

The first day of school dawned sunny and warm and the group split off to their respective classes. Phil Warner’s absence was the second-biggest topic of conversation that day (with Hailey’s sparkling engagement ring ranking at Number One).

Hailey, Tiffany, Molly, Katelyn and Bob tried to go about their normal routines – except things were decidedly abnormal.

The sounding-board – and confidante – that Hailey had come to rely upon was gone. For the first time she was forced to stand on her own – without the support of a group that ruled through terror and without the guy whose personality and influence opened many doors.

The same was true with Tiffany and Molly. They had grown accustomed to getting Phil’s perspective on everything from their coursework to their underwear selections.

Katelyn and Bob became more insular, spending less time with Hailey, Tiffany and Molly and more time by themselves (when either had a free minute). As expected, Bob spent only a night or two each week in his dorm room.

Many of the differences were subtle but others were obvious. The entire crew used to get together for breakfast each morning, to discuss what might have happened the night before or what might happen that day.

That changed almost immediately. With three cars available, the push for transportation wasn’t as evident as when Phil lived there. The couples appropriated a vehicle each, with Bob and Katelyn driving the SUV; Tiffany and Molly using the sedan and Hailey driving the convertible. That meant that mornings didn’t need to be used for planning rides and meeting places.

Bob and Katelyn ate their breakfasts in her apartment; Tiffany and Molly fixed theirs next door. After a week of eating alone at the dining room table, Hailey moved to fixing a bagel or a bowl of cereal in the apartment she used to share with Phil.

It took the individuals and couples several days to understand that Phil was the true linchpin of their friendship. On the surface, none of them had much in common – except for the ties they’d groomed in the previous 18 months. Without Phil coming along, it was obvious to everyone that the five people likely would have gravitated in other directions with interests far too different to remain friends with the people they knew as freshman.

Finally, Hailey cornered everyone the last Friday in September.

“Are we only friends when Phil is around?” she asked Bob when he came home from practice.

Bob took a moment to consider.

“No,” he answered. “I’m still your friend. Why?”

“Because we never even talk any more!” Hailey said bitterly. “You and Katelyn go upstairs as soon as you arrive and I don’t see you unless I pass you on campus.”

“Did you need to talk to me about something?” Bob inquired. He hadn’t intentionally ignored Hailey – or Tiffany or Molly. It just worked out that way.

“No but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to talk to you about ... stuff,” Hailey told him. “How is the baseball team doing?”

Bob shrugged. It was Fall Ball and not a true indicator of what sort of team Heilman would have in the spring.

“We miss Ted and Phil’s leadership,” he admitted. “Well, I guess I should say that I miss it. Last year, we ... the three of us ... sort of kept things running for the team. Ted was the disciplinarian, you know. Phil was the comic relief. I bounced back and forth from each side. Now, we don’t have that. We have some pretty good players still but it’s not as fun as last year, I guess. I hope it gets better in the spring.”

“He’s determined that he’ll be back in the spring no matter what,” Hailey told him.

“Yeah, I know,” Bob agreed. “But he’s going to have a ton of work to catch up on and I sort of figured baseball would fall by the wayside like it did his freshman year.”

“He’s going to be fine,” Hailey assured him. “He’s getting credit hours for his independent study. He’s not going to skip baseball. I’ll make sure of it.”