Storrs Connecticut, Spring 2009

Andrew Charlton had the financial times open and was intently reading about the demise of the bank that he had given forty plus years of his life to. At twenty-four, the ink still drying on his Yale MBA, he began as a management trainee at First Standard Bank and Trust of Hartford. Married to his wife Mary for just two years as he started his new job. Mary’s parents were not overwhelmingly pleased with the match. However, the arrival of the first grandchild Allen named after Mary’s father had improved the family relationship.

Andrew began work at the grand sum of fourteen thousand a year to support his wife and son. Those first years the couple struggled, but Andrew worked hard. Forty years later, he was CFO when he allegedly retired. In fact, he was forced out. His views were considered dated and clearly not compatible with the bank’s new business model. Andrew was vocal in his opposition to derivate mortgage lending.

The Bank’s President/CEO and his team of imprudent young men had embraced a practice that would become known as securitization. Andrew recognized these new practices as a derivative scheme. In Andrew’s experience, derivative financial schemes eventually lead to financial ruin. Such financing was, in his view, pure gambling with the depositor’s money. When the CEO and his team decided to double down on their bets, Andrew went to the board of directors. The directors promptly handed Andrew their request that he retire with, of course, adequate compensation for his years of service.

At sixty-four, he was out of work. It was not that Andrew needed work or needed the money; he was by then a very wealthy man. He began to look around for something else to do and probably would have found it if Mary had not gotten sick. It was a double blow. The forced retirement had been bad, but Mary’s cancer was crushing.

They had three children all grown his son Allen and two girls Maryjane and Jennifer. In addition, they had five grandchildren. But his wife Mary was his life. She was two years older than him. He did not expect to be left without her. Their love was the profound kind you so rarely find. She was the woman who had always been there at his side. Now she needed him at her side, and he spent the next two years helping her die. Early on, they had received the verdict and knew there was no chance. It was strangely the best and the worst time in their lives, and when it was over, he felt lost and alone.

Andrew drifted through life for another two years. The only bright spot was the banking catastrophe that overtook the country in 2008, which proved his predictions entirely correct. He was completely vindicated. Now, as he read the failure of his own firm, First Standard Bank (they had dropped the old fashioned “& Trust of Hartford” from the name, ) he had a mixture of satisfaction and sadness at his former employer’s failure.

He was seated in the Starbucks closest to the University where he had taken to coming mid-mornings. It was usually fairly deserted, and he could linger over a cup of coffee and read the bad news in reasonable comfort. The house he had shared with Mary was now far too big for him and filled with the ghosts of better days.

“Is this chair taken?”

Andrew looked up to where the speaker stood, a beautiful woman had her hand on the vacant chair opposite his at the small table.

“No, by all means, take it,” he said, expecting her to take the chair to an adjacent table, but she sat right down on it. As Andrew looked around the coffee shop, he could see it was nearly deserted and had many completely free tables.

“Thank You,” she said.

Andrew went back to reading his paper. He had noticed the woman was young, mid to late twenties, with a profusion of long light red hair and breasts that were considerably more than ample. He read for a few minutes in peace, resisting the temptation to lower the paper and take a better look at his new table companion.

“Shame about that bank,” she said.

Andrew lowered the paper and gave a quizzical looked at his new companion. She smiled back at him. She had a bewitching smile that seemed to radiate more from her deep-blue eyes than her pouty, sexy mouth.

“I read the article before class this morning. I’m studying for my MBA in finance at the University,” She said.

“Well, they got what they deserved. Feel sorry for the employees, a lot of good people lost their jobs. The officers and board were warned, but they thought they were so smart. They couldn’t listen to experience, “ he said.

“You say that like you personally warned them,” She said.

Whereupon, Andrew launched into a lengthy discourse on just how he had warned them. He went on to recount his history at the bank and the blockhead stupidity that had forced him into retirement. She sat there as if entranced stirring her coffee and occasionally taking a sip while nodding her head in agreement with his discourse.

When he had talked himself out, he said, “I must be boring you.”

“Oh, please, you must know this is fascinating to a finance student,” and she smiled a wicked smile. It had mischief in it, and he half considered that she had mischief in her.

“Tell me, why did you sit with me when the place is all but empty?” He asked.

She thought a moment. “That’s a fair question. Since you have been so open with me, I believe you deserve the truth. The fact is, when you look like I do, you can never sit alone in peace in a public place. Therefore, I look for someone who has the two essential qualities and ask to sit with them.”

“And those qualities would be old and decrypted,” he said with a little laugh.

She laughed with him, “ No, handsome and interesting. I seem to have done very well this morning, you must admit.”

“Now you are teasing me,” he said, “and why do you stir your coffee so much?”

“Oh, I like it cold,” she said and then, “I sometimes wonder how people see me. I have all these physical faults, and yet men and even women hit on me constantly.”

He would have said she was kidding, yet she seemed so sincere and looked very serious.

“I have to reply that I do not see any physical faults,” he said.

At this, she leaned forward as if conspiratorially and whispered.

“My breasts are too big.”

This was a fact he received an excellent view of down the front of her blouse. Then she leaned away from him, bringing her hand to her waist.

“Too small,” she said as she slid her hand down to her hips.

“Too narrow,” She said of her hips as she swiveled in the seat and stuck her legs out, showing that her dress left them naked to well above the mid-thigh.

“Too long,” she said, coming back to her original position, “I stir my coffee to cool it. I sit with handsome men because I like to.”

For a long moment, Andrew Charlton was speechless. He had come to the conclusion that in all his life, he had never seen a woman quite so spectacular. As if her physical appearance was not quite enough, she had about her some quality that he could not quite explain. It made her more sensuous than anyone he had ever known.

“I believe your position is unsupportable,” he said in his best banker’s voice, “You are perfect!”

This brought a shy smile that was pure and simple, unlike those that had gone before.

“You are quite the gentleman. I guess I got really lucky today,” she said.

They finished their coffees and took a walk in the University garden one block away. It had gone well past noon when she said she needed to go to class. He smiled said it had been a lovely morning and would have walked away, but she held his arm.

“You have a cell phone?” She asked.

He dove into his pocket and pulled the iPhone, his oldest daughter Maryjane insisted he have in his possession at all times. He rarely used the phone other than to call his children. She took it worked with her fingers for a moment, and gave it back.

“There you have my number under Michelle, which is my name. Call if you want. I like German films if you’re interested there’s a good one at the Regal Cinema,” she said.

Then she kissed him lightly on the cheek and left him standing among the flower beds.

Andrew Charlton pondered his encounter with Michele for two days. It was not possible that a young woman would want a date with him. Was It?

“He was 67 for god sake.”

She would have to be after something. But in the end, what did a man his age have to lose? So on Saturday night, he was standing in front of the Regal Cinema waiting for Michele to arrive. He had called her and arranged to meet at 6:00 p.m. in front of the theater. At precisely that time, a cab pulled up, and Michelle exited.

He saw the long legs first. She wore a black dress with a balloon skirt and a tight bodice, which extenuated all those alleged faults of hers. She wore little makeup and cheap jewelry, but the dress, shoes, and the little clutch bag all shouted expensive as did the delicate, black lace shawl she wore over her shoulders. She came up to him and put her arm through his.