Chapter 5

Charlotte started that next Monday and she picked up her job duties very quickly. Mr. Atwood couldn’t have been more pleased with her performance and how she had taken to her new responsibilities. Charlotte and Angela were a good match too, which made his job all the easier. He was really feeling good about his choice. The first month seemed to fly by.

Charlotte got her first paycheck two weeks after starting with Mr. Atwood and couldn’t believe it – almost two thousand dollars! More than she made in a month downstairs in her old position! it was so much she thought that maybe payroll had made a mistake!

“Peter, I think there’s a problem with my paycheck. It says here it’s $1975.45 – that can’t be right!” she said.

“No, that’s correct,” he said.

“Really? I am making that much? Every two weeks?” she asked unbelievingly.

“Yes, my dear. That is what this job pays ... at first. So enjoy your new found wealth. Go have a ball!” he said.

So for the next month, Charlotte took some money and bought herself some new clothes and makeup so she could look good for Peter. And he seemed to appreciate her efforts too – they had a number of “private meetings” during that first month in which Charlotte never emerged the same graceful, stylish way she went in! On a couple occasions when she came out of the office and headed to the ladies room to freshen up, Angela giggled and once she laughed out loud.

“I see you have been in conference with Mr. Atwood again!” she said. Charlotte just looked at her, still woozy and glassy-eyed as she made her way, following the wall, to the bathroom.

It was about six weeks since she started working for Mr. Atwood when she came into work one morning. “Good morning Peter, would you like a cup of coffee?” she asked.

“Yes, I would thank you,” he said. When she brought his coffee back, smiling, to his desk he said. “Charlotte, sit down for a minute I have some news.”

She sat down perplexed. “What is it, Peter?” she asked.

“How would you like to go on your first business trip with me? I will need to go out of town for a few days next week to meet with an old and very good client. You don’t have to go, they have been clients here for some time and their portfolio is well-established, but I thought you might want to,” he said.

“I would love to go. Where are we going?” she asked.

“He has a place in Malibu. We would fly to Los Angeles and then drive up the coast to Malibu to meet with him,” Peter said.

“Really? Oh, Peter, I’ve always wanted to go to California! Yes! Yes! I want to go!” Charlotte said excitedly.

“So you’ve never been there? Well, maybe we will have to do a little sightseeing while we are there then!” he said.

“Oh yes! I would love to see some of the things I have only seen in pictures or read about!” she said.

“Okay then, I will leave it up to you. I want to meet with our client on Monday. I think we can safely get away with a couple days for ‘client relations’. And don’t forget you have a lot of built up leave time that you could use. I have a few days built up myself, so I think we can pull off a week in Los Angeles. I really don’t think it will take much more than three or four hours with our client to show him how we are doing. Like I said he is a long-time client and trusts us to take care of his investments. After we show him how good he’s doing and what we should do next, we will have the rest of the time to see the sights,” he said.

“Yes Sir!” she said. “I will make all the arrangements.”

“That’s fine. A couple of things, though. We will fly first class with the minimum number of stops and layovers. I hate rushing to my flight or hanging around the airport for hours at a time.

“Secondly, I want a limo and driver to take us to Malibu and back. Appearances count for a lot and in the money world, showing off is a key point. We need to show that we know money, so a limo and driver is a good way to do that.

“And lastly, I want a nice hotel room. Preferably a suite, in a quality hotel. I don’t want your first trip to be in a small cramped flea-bag hotel. Remember, we have a very liberal expense account – let’s use it,” he said.

“Oooh, this is going to be fun!” Charlotte said. She went right to work – when she wasn’t doing some other secretarial work she was online looking up hotels and booking the flight or looking for things she wanted to see or do.

She planned everything down to the smallest detail. This was her first trip to California and there was so much to see! She didn’t know when (or if) she would get back to L.A., so she wanted to see as much as she possibly could.

On her lunch hour, she stopped by a travel agency that wasn’t far from the office and picked up a handful of travel brochures. She looked through them as she ate her lunch, tossing out the ones she didn’t want. She was ruthlessly efficient – she knew she didn’t have long and she had so much to do! Soon she had the stack of brochures pared down to her favorites and she mentally checked that off her to-do list.

When she got back to the office after lunch, she made some phone calls and booked the flight and hotel room. Then she began looking into the limo that he had requested. Charlotte knew he wouldn’t want one of those super long stretch limos, that would be a waste and make him look bad in the eyes of the investor.

But he needed something to impress, so in looking through several companies, she found one that had a seventy-inch stretch Chrysler 300 limo. It was big enough to be impressive and luxurious, but it didn’t have the sofa, disco lights, and all the nonsense of a party wagon! She booked the limo for their trip and that step was done as well.

About 4:30 that afternoon Peter was wrapping things up for the day about ready to go home when Charlotte came over to his desk. “Peter I have everything set for our trip. I have booked our flight, the hotel, the limo, and even got us a rental car once we come back from Malibu to sightsee in. I also got a bunch of travel brochures and I would like to sit down with you maybe tomorrow and so we can draw up an itinerary,” she said.

“Very good. You have done a great job on this Charlotte, I am proud of you,” he said.

“Thank you, Sir,” she said smiling broadly. She was pretty proud of herself, as well ... she had taken this first trip and planned it to perfection!

“You are pretty excited about this trip aren’t you, Charlotte?” he said.

“Oh yes! I haven’t been out of New York since moving here when my father retired. And although I have been to many places all over the world growing up, California was never one of them. I’ve always wanted to see it,” she said.

“Well, I’m glad you are accompanying me on this trip. It will be nice to have someone to talk to about something other than money and investments! The last few trips have been nothing but work, work, work! And I’m sure we will both have a wonderful time. You have done a great job in planning everything out,” he said.

“But really you don’t have to try to cram everything into this one trip ... we have a lot of clients on the west coast and you and I will be going to Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, several times a year. You may actually get tired of jetting around! One of my previous secretaries, Rachael, was like that. She didn’t really like to fly as it was, and the amount of time we were bouncing around got to be too much for her,” he said. “She finally took a job in another line of work, one that kept her on the ground!”

“Well, I have no problem with flying, I got really used to it growing up. And if you don’t mind me saying so, you can ‘bounce around’ on me anytime, Sir!” she said with a coquettish smirk.

The next few days went by aggravatingly slowly for Charlotte but eventually, the time came for the pair to leave on their trip. Peter had told her to just leave her car in the garage locked and he would pick her up so they both didn’t have to try to find parking.

On the day they were set to leave, Peter pulled up in front of her house in a taxi. He went up and knocked on the door to find Charlotte sitting in the living room, her bags packed and ready to go. He carried her suitcases out to the taxi and the driver put them in the trunk with Peter’s. Then they headed to the airport.

“I am so excited, Peter! I didn’t get a wink of sleep last night! I have dreamed of seeing California since I was a kid. I used to watch all the old beach movies and I can’t wait to see those places!” she said.

“Well don’t expect to see Frankie and Annette strolling along the beach! Most of those places you saw on those old beach movies have long since gone. In fact, most the places that replaced those places have folded ... the ‘60’s were a long time ago!” he laughed.

“I know. But some of the things are still there, like the Hollywood sign and Venice Beach and things like that,” she said.

“Yes, those things are still there. And we will see them, if not this trip then in future trips. I usually get to Los Angeles at least four times a year so there’s lots of time for sightseeing,” he said.