Chapter 30

The first task David had given Greg was to work with his dad to negotiate a deal with VRS for Dare and Corvus’s product. Greg soon figured out he was in over his head. None of his college business courses had dealt with anything like this, not even close. The only thing that kept him from throwing his hands up in defeat was that his dad and the people who worked for him didn’t seem intimidated.

This was the day that everyone would meet in a downtown hotel to hammer out the agreement. The one complication Greg had was that Cassidy had overheard what he was doing and insisted on coming along. He decided not to fight her because he could tell she needed something to do, and David would say it was fine anyway. So, he’d agreed that she could drive him to the meeting and be his ‘security.’

While he’d gone to the front desk to see where the meeting was, Cassidy had valeted the car. She approached him as the woman at the desk checked their bookings.

“We have a problem,” Cassidy whispered.

“What?”

“We’re underdressed,” she said, pointing to where his dad and another man entered the lobby.

They were in suits and ties, while Greg and Cassidy had opted for business casual. He knew he’d messed up when David, also wearing a suit, walked in.

“Nothing we can do about that now.”

The clerk told Greg which conference room to go to, and he went to greet everyone.

“This is my father, Rob, my brother Greg, and his associate, Cassidy Hope. This is James Burrows, our attorney,” David said to make the introductions.

Ms. Dixon, David’s leading lawyer, had finally settled on someone to handle David’s legal affairs while he was in California. Greg had heard that his brother had met Mr. Burrows at a political fundraiser.

As they walked to the meeting, David asked Mr. Burrows, “How’s Kat?”

Greg noticed that Cassidy perked up with interest. He would have to ask her who Kat was later.

“She’s doing well,” Mr. Burrows said cautiously.

“I’m glad to hear that. Please tell her I said ‘Hi’ when you talk to her next,” David said as they walked into the room.

Greg was relieved when he saw that the two young guys from VRS were also dressed in business casual. He noted that they’d both been smiling as if telling each other a joke, but when they saw the suits, they suddenly acted entirely differently. It was a good lesson that one should dress for the occasion.

Greg’s dad had told him he should kick the meeting off by throwing the ball into the VRS court to see where they were in all this.

“I understand you’re looking for additional capital in order to launch the Real-Time Virtual Reality product,” Greg said.

“When we agreed to distribute and support RTVR, as we call it in-house, the product was still in beta testing,” Denzel Chu, the lead partner, said. “We discovered through that process that the originally specified hardware was not sufficiently robust to handle rendering the real-time VR, necessitating changes to the hardware spec. That means additional costs.”

“In addition, word has leaked that we’ll distribute the product, which requires onsite installation and setup. The demand was so great that we were forced to set up a website to accept pre-orders. The volume of those pre-orders tells us we have to hire staff quickly, both for the initial installations and for our customer support center.”

He then had Sunil Patel, the other partner, hand out folders with their projected needs. The two of them went into detail about their plans. They were offering a twenty percent ownership interest in exchange for a lot of money.

“I don’t think we can do this for twenty percent. Neither of you has the experience to handle the growth you’re about to see. We’ve been in contact with several industries besides football, and there’s a much larger market for this than you’re anticipating. Navigating growth like this is critical. Because of that, we require a fifty-one percent interest so we would be assured it was handled correctly,” Greg said.

“But that would mean giving up control of our company,” Sunil said.

“You would still run the day-to-day, but this would protect our investment,” Rob said.

“Absolutely not,” Denzel pushed back.

David shrugged and stood up. The rest of his team followed his lead and began to gather their stuff.

“Wait!” Sunil said, panicked. “There has to be a compromise that leaves us in control of our company.”

One of his mom’s most potent closing tools was the ‘takeaway.’ To make it work, the other side had to know you were willing to walk away.

“There would have to be safeguards in place,” David said, joining the negotiation.

“Whatever you want,” Denzel agreed.

At that moment, Greg got it; his dad had clued him in to David’s end game. David wanted someone to oversee the rapid growth because it wasn’t something a couple of tech guys would necessarily know how to manage. That was why David had insisted that Rob, Ron Pennington, and Grace Davenport be hired as consultants to help VRS launch Dare and Corvus’s product.

David left to go to class now that he was comfortable negotiations would go their way. In the end, they agreed to David getting a forty percent ownership interest. None of the parties were completely happy, but they all felt they could make it work.

David had assumed Lisa’s funeral would be sometime during the coming weekend. So, when he got the notice that it was that day, Tuesday, he’d had to scramble to be able to attend. He hadn’t realized Lisa’s family was Jewish, nor all that being Jewish implied regarding a funeral. David had contacted Crystal since she’d said she wanted to be there, too, but she had to study for an exam and wouldn’t be able to make it.

It was held at a local funeral home. Because there wasn’t much notice, some people had come as they were. But the majority had dressed for the event, with men in suits or slacks and jackets and the women in dresses. Dark colors prevailed, but not everyone wore black.

David was stopped in the foyer by a young man.

“I know you from somewhere.”

David thought for a moment and couldn’t remember ever meeting him before. Then a young woman stepped up.

“Michael, that’s David A. Dawson, the actor,” she said, then turned to David and asked, “Why are you here?”

“I visited patients in the children’s oncology ward, where I met Lisa and Sadie. I wanted to come and say goodbye to Lisa and see if there’s anything I can do for Sadie and her mom.”

Michael and the woman, who introduced herself as his wife, Paige, offered themselves as guides to help keep him from making any missteps in an unfamiliar situation.

David saw a basket of skull caps and went to take one since he saw everyone else wearing them.

Paige put her hand on his arm.

“If you’re not Jewish, you’re not expected to wear one.”

“Sorry, I just assumed,” David said, a bit embarrassed that he didn’t know.

“TV seems to get it wrong and usually portrays our non-Jewish guests wearing yarmulkes. When I was a kid, I used to complain because they felt a bit strange until I got used to them,” Michael shared.

“Thanks,” David said as they walked in.

The room was set up with a center aisle. In the front, on a rolling platform, was a plain pine coffin covered by a cloth embroidered in Hebrew. David went to the front and said a prayer for Lisa. Sadie and her mom, Janis, were sitting up front, so he stopped and said some of the awkward words one says when attempting to give comfort in a situation like that.

It was clear they were barely holding it together, but they both grimly acknowledged his words. He went to the back and found a seat.

David didn’t know why, but he was surprised when the rabbi turned out to be a man in his 30s. He had a neatly trimmed beard and wore a business suit. David guessed he’d expected someone older, maybe with a long white beard and a long black coat like he’d sometimes seen portrayed on television.

The rabbi spent some time comforting Sadie and Janis. Then he got up front and told anecdotes about Lisa and said what he could to comfort the family.

As the rabbi spoke, David’s thoughts turned inward. Time was the one thing no one could stop. What it doesn’t change, it destroys; time tears down everything. People do all they can to desperately hang onto the past, their memories, and themselves.

Like so many who went before Lisa, their memory would soon fade. Eventually, they would become a shadow in our memories. That was all there was left. Lisa was gone.

When his mother had faced her own mortality, she’d promised to start living life to its fullest. David had—no, everyone had to ask themselves if they were genuinely squeezing every last drop out of the little time they were given.

For himself, was he doing everything he could to create what he wanted out of life? If not, when would he start working toward that? The problem was, he’d forgotten that he didn’t have unlimited time. That bitch never stopped. Did he plan on waking up when he was 30—or worse, 60—and realize he’d let time slip through his fingers?

Was this it? Was this the future he’d dreamed of?

What would it take for him to begin to act? Or better yet, what did he really want? Kicking the can down the road left his options open to all possibilities. But he knew that he was letting time slowly grind him down, take those possibilities, and remove each one. It would do so until he was out of choices, ultimately out of time as his number was called. The sad part was that it could come too soon, as it had for Lisa.

David sat there, listening to the rabbi tell stories of what a lovely girl Lisa had been and what a tragedy it was to lose someone so young. It made him reevaluate everything.

Coming to USC to play football had been nothing but frustration to this point. What was so clear to him in that moment was that he’d let it all happen, just as his uncle said. On day one, he should have focused on football and made it clear to the world that he should have been this year’s starter at quarterback.

He was the one who’d gone along with the insane idea of playing defense. He’d somehow convinced himself that was okay. But instead of dwelling on what had gone wrong to get him to where he was right now, he’d finally matured enough to clearly see what was in front of him. He was redshirting, and if you put a gun to his head, David would have to admit that was the best decision.

After the loss at Utah and the injuries beginning to pile up, he’d seen a different team at Monday’s practice. Combine that with an interim head coach, and the result was a wasted year. His playing a handful of additional games now wouldn’t make a difference next year. More than likely, he would just risk getting hurt again.

But there was a light at the end of the tunnel: the Notre Dame game. David vowed to change his focus to beating them. Doing that would set him up as next year’s starter. Matt was having a rookie year where he looked good one moment and terrible the next. In the three games David played, USC won.

So, the bulletin board fans and media had already started comparing the two. If David could win the Notre Dame game, he’d be set to take over in spring ball. The only qualification was who would be the coach.

If Coach Merritt lost his interim label, David would have to admit that USC was a mistake and transfer. He still got messages from the Oklahoma coaching staff telling him they were keeping track of his progress.

He would only stay if they hired a coach committed to winning a national championship. The truth was that he hated losing. David hadn’t come to USC to play on a .500 team, which this season seemed to be heading toward.

It felt good to have a plan he could now work on. Step one: Win the Notre Dame game. Step two: Wait to see who the next coach will be. If he was all about ego and the status quo, David would cut his losses and go somewhere where they were committed to winning. Between now and the end of the year, he would have a backup destination planned out.

His next thought was about his personal life. What the heck was he doing playing house with Crystal? What made him think he had to be in a stable relationship? He hadn’t been in college for a year and was dating someone exclusively. Yes, he’d warned Crystal that he might want to spend time with other girls, but the reality was David knew he wouldn’t do anything to hurt her.