Friends Like These(19)
“Yeah, you can help us, Jonathan.” The younger one waved a piece of paper in my face. “With this.”
I didn’t flinch. You couldn’t with a guy like that. Instead I looked steadily at the page: an invoice with four bright-red PAST DUE stamps at the top.
“Peter handles all the renovation details,” I said with an unfortunately dismissive wave of my hand. “Including payments.”
The man’s blue eyes narrowed. He wanted to hit me. I could feel it. And, fine, I shouldn’t have said it like that, or waved my hand. As if the details— this man’s details— were beneath me. I didn’t actually think that— though I had grown up in a five-bedroom co-op off Fifth Avenue with live-in staff. My father had emigrated from China to the U.S. forty years ago, with nothing but his acceptance to Columbia University in hand. Seven years later he graduated with a BA, MBA, and JD and, after a brief stint at Bridgewater, soon started his own hedge fund— Cheung Capital— now worth more than ten billion dollars. But no matter how much money we had, my father had raised us all to value hard work and to respect the people who did it. Was I being a jerk on purpose?
“Seems like he’s not handling the payments well enough,” the older man said, pointing a crooked finger toward the wrinkled invoice that still hovered inches from my face. “You owe us eleven thousand six hundred thirty-seven dollars and forty-two cents. We need to get paid. Right now.”
“A misunderstanding, I’m sure. We certainly want you fairly compensated,” I said. “I can take the invoice and ask— ”
“Nope,” the younger man said. “Tonight, you’ll pay us. We’re not leaving until you do.”
“Let me see that, please.” Keith was at my shoulder now. He reached out and snatched the invoice from the younger guy.
Then Derrick came out into the foyer, followed by Stephanie. They formed a kind of protective half circle behind me, and I swallowed back a lump in my throat. Finch was watching from his perch on my couch, drink in hand. My whisky, from my crystal decanter.
“He can’t just pay you if he doesn’t know what it’s for,” Derrick offered, almost pleasantly, like this was a simple fact on which we could all agree. “As soon as he talks to Peter, he could, like, Venmo you or something. Why don’t you leave the invoice and— ”
“Venmo?” the older guy spat out, shaking his head. “Eleven thousand dollars?”
“Yeah, I don’t think so,” the younger guy sneered. With more light on his face, I could see that he was older than I realized, mid-thirties.
“I will pay you,” I said. “That’s all he means. I have the money.”
But there was a knot in my stomach, and my head was starting to spin. Lately, Peter had been paying all the contracting bills— directly from my account. Thousands and thousands of dollars. And I trusted him to do it all correctly, even though it was a fact that Peter was not exceptionally good with details. Had he lost track of something?
“It’s wrong. You have my guys come here and do honest work. We pay up front for all the materials. And then you don’t pay us?” The older man’s cheeks went pink as he motioned back toward the driveway. That stupid car Peter had talked me into. “It’s stealing.”
“Stealing?” My heart had picked up speed. But if they really hadn’t been paid, that wouldn’t be a totally unfair way to see it.
“Damn right. Stealing from my men, that’s the worst part. You take from me, it’s taking from them. How are they supposed to feed their kids, huh?” The old man seemed enraged. “Like you said, you’ve got the money.”
“Pop, that’s enough,” the young man growled. He looked me up and down, lip curled. I stood taller. “Don’t give this asshole the satisfaction of groveling.”
“Asshole?” Stephanie raised an eyebrow. “That’s a nice way to talk to a customer.”
“Customer?” the young guy shot back. “Customers pay their bills.”
“Listen, I should be hearing back from Peter any minute,” I said, hoping we could still defuse the situation. “I just texted him about . . . something else.” At this point, I certainly wasn’t mentioning the abandoned boards in the side yard. “Is your address on the invoice? Because as soon as I confirm there hasn’t been some kind of bank mix-up, I can drive a check right over.”
Not that I had my checkbook with me. And you couldn’t just withdraw $11,000 from an ATM. But these were details I would sort out as soon as I spoke to Peter.
“Yeah, our address is on the invoice.” The younger man took a full step closer. We were only inches apart now. I was taller than him, and I could hold my own in a fight, but the rage in his eyes was extremely unsettling. “If I don’t hear from you by tomorrow morning, I’ll be back.” Now he looked past me to my friends. “And none of you will like what happens.”
“Hey,” Finch called from the living room. “Maybe he didn’t pay you because y’all are shitty contractors. You ever consider that?”
Finch sounded drunk, but almost certainly was not. Finch was always pretending something.
I held up a hand. “Seriously, Finch. I’m handling it.”
“Man, if you left all those uncovered boards and shit on my grass, I sure as hell wouldn’t pay,” he went on. Because when had a polite request ever stopped Finch? “I’ve worked construction. You pick. Shit. Up. That’s 101. The grass underneath those boards has got to be all fucked. You’re the ones who probably owe them money.”