Until the Day I Die(10)

Then Perry had suggested the pact.

“This is our brainchild,” he told us. “We build it together, and when we sell, we sell together. None of this splitting-up, edging-each-other-out stuff. For this thing to work it’s got to be all of us or none of us. Agreed?”

Everyone agreed. We’d seen enough friendships shredded by a failed venture that we were wary. That was not going to happen to us—or our company. I had to admit, the whole pledge thing got me a little teary. When Perry and I finally collapsed into bed that night, I told him that our promise made me feel as if I were in one of those kids’ books where the gang makes a blood pact to always stick together. I’d never felt a stronger feeling of belonging. He smothered me in a hug, and we fell asleep.

It was like a dream, how Jax just worked, right from the start. Our business model might’ve looked slapdash on paper compared to a flashier Silicon Valley outfit, but the four of us were strong on substance, not optics. With Ben’s GPS experience and Perry handling his proprietary middleware stuff, we only had to pull in a database person, server administrator, and a few testers for extra support. I was CEO, raising additional capital and mapping long-term strategies. Sabine was COO, handling day-to-day details, staffing our cadre of paid interns, and generally running the office.

When Shorie wasn’t at lacrosse practice or hanging out with Daisy, she’d tag along with us to the office and do her homework or play Ping-Pong with whoever needed to take a break. She even used to bake pumpkin muffins and zucchini bread for us in the tiny office kitchenette.

Perry, Ben, Sabine, and I worked twenty-four seven, including holidays. We ate all our meals in the office and slept there so many nights I lost count. Even Shorie moved in a cot to help out at the end. And finally, at the end of two crazy months, we had a lean “minimum viable product”—a version of Jax ready to launch. Our salaries were just enough to get by on, but after one year, we were able to pay Arch back in full.

Three years later, we had expanded the features, had over 1.3 million users with an 80 percent retention rate, and had been valued at close to six million dollars. Which, to be clear, isn’t the same thing as getting six million actual dollars, just a guesstimate of worth. We weren’t rich, not yet, because we hadn’t monetized the app. But if everything went as planned, there was a chance we could hit the jackpot.

I sit in Ben’s truck in the broiling parking lot of Shorie’s dorm with my eyes closed. The left side of my head throbs. After all the emotional conflict with Shorie, now I just feel wrung out and only just slightly pissed.

What the hell is taking Ben so long? Are he and Shorie discussing how to handle me? How to get me away from Jax before I make a huge mistake, blow it up, and ruin all their lives? There have been other behind-my-back conversations, I’m fairly certain. Meetings where I was the subject at hand. Maybe because I’ve been less than on top of things. But more likely because of my recent announcement that I wanted the partners to sell Jax.

I dropped the bomb in June. Gigi and Arch, Ben and Sabine, and Shorie and I were all gathered for a Father’s Day brunch at a funky downtown bistro called Red Mountain Grill. When dessert came, I told everybody that after Perry’s death, I’d tried to keep up with my duties, but I’d not been able to. Without him there, I was overwhelmed. And the company had become an albatross, weighing me down in ways I hadn’t expected and couldn’t fully articulate, even to myself.

The bottom line: I was ready to invoke our pact. Perry was gone, and even though that wasn’t what he’d meant when he originally suggested it, continuing on without him felt wrong. I wanted to sell.

We would need to hire an outside firm eventually, but for now Layton, our in-house lawyer, could handle the prep. The payout wouldn’t be as big, not after only three years and with only a fraction of the users we could amass if we had two more years. And when some other firm bought us, there was no doubt we’d be forced out as shareholders. My partners might be disappointed we hadn’t achieved the ultimate dream—a $100-million-dollar buyout by a Facebook-size company—but our prospects weren’t exactly shabby. We could possibly get $10 million—$2.5 million for Ben and for Sabine, $5 million for me—and that wasn’t bad. But my bottom line was the same no matter how much we made. I was finished with Jax.

They were all stunned, naturally, but said they understood. With the exception of Gigi. On our way out of the restaurant, she pulled me aside and informed me that she and Arch had been hoping to purchase some stock in the company now, before we sold in a couple of years. Arch had lost so many tenants recently, he’d had to turn over two of his shopping centers to the bank. The one in Houston that he still owned was doing well for now, but who knew what would happen? I had apparently ruined their retirement plan and was being horribly selfish for not safeguarding their future. Like my son would’ve wanted, she said, her pupils expanded to large black pools of hatred.

I realized the real estate crash must’ve had an effect on Arch’s shopping centers, but he’d never mentioned it. To me, the whole thing smelled suspicious. My mother-in-law was notorious for not knowing the nitty-gritty of her personal finances. I wasn’t about to get roped into changing my mind on something this important based on her tenuous grasp of her husband’s business.

I removed my arm from her grip and spoke calmly. Perry left me everything he had, including his shares of Jax. He trusted me to do what was right for our family.