Ice Cream Man Read online

  Ice Cream Man

  Charles Puccia

  Copyright © 2016 Charles Puccia

  www.charlespuccia.com

  Published by Carduna Publications

  Smashwords Edition

  All rights reserved worldwide. No part of this book may be reproduced or copied without the express written permission of the Author. This book is a work of fiction. Characters and events in this novel are the product of the author’s imagination. Any similarity to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  EPUB ISBN: 978-0-9963234-0-6

  Paperback ISBN: 978-0-9963234-1-3

  Edited by David Gatewood

  Copy Edit and Proofreading by Ian Howe

  eBook formatting and cover design by FormattingExperts.com

  Table of Contents

  I. Office Politics

  Chapter 1: The Mendacity of Truth

  Chapter 2: Daydreams and Nightmares

  Chapter 3: Meeting of Crows

  Chapter 4: Office Lamb

  Chapter 5: Celebration

  Chapter 6: Unnatural Defeat

  Chapter 7: Sign On the Dotted Line

  Chapter 8: End Run

  Chapter 9: A Lunch Klatch

  Chapter 10: Bill Has Mail

  Chapter 11: Uptown Lunch

  Chapter 12: French Connection

  Chapter 13: Return Voyage

  Chapter 14: Family Membership Upgrade

  Chapter 15: Hard Liquor for the Girls

  Chapter 16: First Date

  Chapter 17: Blanca Joins Team Vinnie

  Chapter 18: Vinnie Briggs, PI

  Chapter 19: Gym Rescue

  Chapter 20: Hide and Seek

  Chapter 21: Hacked

  Chapter 22: Cappuccino to Go

  Chapter 23: Frutti di Mare

  Chapter 24: Pump and Slump

  Chapter 25: Runners’ Insights

  Chapter 26: Setup

  II. Too Much

  Chapter 27: The Call

  Chapter 28: The Counselors—Phase 1

  Chapter 29: UltraFit—Rescue 1

  Chapter 30: Insecurity

  Chapter 31: Revelation

  Chapter 32: The BIZ Hospital

  Chapter 33: UltraFit—Rescue 2

  Chapter 34: Legal

  Chapter 35: Hello Mrs. Briggs

  Chapter 36: In-Patient Care

  Chapter 37: Mother Tells All

  Chapter 38: Technique

  Chapter 39: Pleasure and Pain

  Chapter 40: Mother-In-Law

  Chapter 41: A Night’s Reflection

  III. Recall

  Chapter 42: The Call

  Chapter 43: Reunion

  Chapter 44: Paris Speaks

  Chapter 45: Sisterly Guidance

  Chapter 46: The Gang

  Chapter 47: Shopping Surprise

  Chapter 48: Consultations

  Chapter 49: Chat

  Chapter 50: Valet Parking

  Chapter 51: Telephone Calls

  Chapter 52: The Check

  Chapter 53: Dinner Date

  Chapter 54: Return to the Bedroom

  Chapter 55: Twenty Questions

  Chapter 56: Committee Decision

  Chapter 57: Check-Out

  Chapter 58: Shebang Office Politics

  Chapter 59: Leave a Message

  Chapter 60: DIY

  Chapter 61: Yes

  Chapter 62: Bedroom Lifts

  Chapter 63: Incentive

  Chapter 64: Watershed

  Chapter 65: Roommate

  Chapter 66: California Bound

  Chapter 67: Bags Packed

  I.

  Office Politics

  Chapter 1

  The Mendacity of Truth

  The moment Vinnie walked into the room, he knew something was wrong. His boss was standing behind his desk, surrounded by scattered papers, watching the numbers on his fancy atomic clock tick upward: 8:43:10 . . . 8:43:11 . . . 8:43:12. This was not an ordinary Wednesday, the last day of a bright September.

  But the dead giveaway that something was wrong was the way Dan greeted Vinnie: “A complete fucking screwup.”

  Vinnie froze. Dan didn’t curse—never cursed. In fact, he was offended by others cursing, and Vinnie’s own cursing had almost cost him his job.

  Learning not to curse had been Vinnie Briggs’s first lesson from Dan. Two years earlier, Vinnie had approached the interview chair, looked out the window behind Mr. Dan Livorno—senior executive at DV&N—and sung out, “Fuckin’-A view. You can see fuckin’ Queens.”

  While no other job applicant would start an interview with that kind of language, Vinnie couldn’t help himself—which was probably why he was so desperate for a job. To Vinnie, cursing was like breathing: it just happened. But apart from this unfortunate proclivity, Vinnie was otherwise an astute, polite young man, barely twenty-two.

  Dan sat in his prestigious corner office in the Hawthorne Building, above Second Avenue and Forty-Fifth, with a spectacular view of the East River, Queens, and on a good day, planes in flight at La Guardia. He fixed his interviewee with a stare. “Mister Briggs, there’s no need to curse. Lacing an opinion with curses reveals nothing meaningful about a person’s thoughts. And I would prefer that you not curse in my office.”

  Fuck, Vinnie thought at the time. So much for getting the executive assistant position at Del Vecchio & Neale. After that, Vinnie saw no reason to sit—his interview was doomed. He knew that Dan had only included him among the final eight—culled from two hundred—because Dan’s sister-in-law, Rachel, had twisted the man’s arm. It had been a lucky break, and ten seconds into the interview Vinnie had already blown it.

  “I’ve fuckin’ screwed this, haven’t I?” he said. “I’m sorry to have wasted your time, sir. I’m truly fuckin’ sorry.”

  Squinting his eyes, Vinnie waited to be dismissed, watching the seconds click by on the atomic clock that sat on the executive’s desk. But Dan extended his hand. “No, Mister Briggs, you can sit. You’ve just expressed your thoughts very succinctly. Let’s continue and see what surprise comes next… with less cursing, please.”

  Three days later Vinnie called Rachel: “Rach, you’re talking to the new administrative assistant at DV&N! I fuckin’ told Dan he wouldn’t regret it, and he said, ‘Let’s hope I fuckin’ don’t.’” For two years after that, Vinnie liked to tell people he was Dan Livorno’s last “fuck.”

  He wished now that had remained true.

  Dan never regretted hiring Vinnie, despite his foul mouth—and to be fair, Vinnie did manage to curtail his cursing by perhaps seventy percent. And two years later, they were best friends. Vinnie knew Dan’s ways as well as he knew his own, so to see Dan’s office in a mess was a surprise, and to hear him cursing was a shock.

  Bending down to pick up some papers strewn on the floor, Dan mumbled to himself. He turned to Vinnie and his mouth slightly opened, but then it closed again, holding back whatever he had been about to say.

  “Talk to me, Dan.”

  Dan sighed and looked at his computer screen, frowning. “I was working on my economic model, and Bill’s voice came booming across the room. He burst in here with his usual yappy good morning…”

  Vinnie’s mouth barely opened. “And? Are you okay?”

  “He came in and stood there.” Dan pointed to the door. “Had the nerve to say, ‘Good morning, Dan.’ Good morning, my ass.”

  Vinnie’s head shook.

  “Told me the proposal presentation has been moved from Monday.” With his fingers pulling on his lower lip, Dan made a contorted grimace. “You know what he said? I’ll tell you. ‘I know it’s a bummer, but you’ll be fine.’ And then he laughed. ‘Har har, har har.’” Dan imitated Bill’s notorious laugh with its harsh R sound, a go
od imitation. “I heard him belch from across the room. Big man Bill Barrington, fucking executive VP at Del Vecchio & Neale, Incorporated, and he belched. He’d been drinking before nine o’clock. The man I report to, drinking before noon.”

  “So, how long’s the delay?”

  “Delay! No, Vinnie, not delayed. The meeting’s been moved forward. Moved to tomorrow. Bullshit. This is plain bullshit.”

  The presentation was the final step before the DV&N board decided whom to promote to the new Executive Director position—heading up the newly created European Operations office in Paris. Dan was one of two finalists; the other was Linda Lords, his counterpart at the DV&N California office.

  Vinnie thought Dan looked capable of eating him, the furniture, the entire thirty-fifth floor.

  “No way. That’s fuckin’ ridiculous. He can’t change it in one day.”

  “That’s what I said. I argued, but Bill had all his bases covered. I reminded him about the delays in retrieving the crucial European data—data I’ve been promised. I’ve waited weeks for that data, as you know. And it was Bill who promised to fix the delay in the first place!”

  Again Vinnie’s head shook. “Son of a bitch. Dan, let’s talk to Gary.” Gary Del Vecchio, co-founder and president of Del Vecchio & Neale, could overrule Bill Barrington.

  With his head bowed toward the desk, Dan sighed. “You know what else he said to me? He said, ‘Dan, you’re always prepared. You’re an Eagle Scout. I have every confidence in you.’” Dan looked up. “He’s a bullshitting drunk, that’s what he is. He told me the rescheduling couldn’t be helped. All due to some crisis in LA with our Northrop Aviation account.”

  The rest of the story came in spasms, but Dan had already hit the high note: the Paris presentations would be tomorrow morning—ready or not—and would be followed by the board’s decision. A decision that was suddenly looking not at all favorable to Dan, seeing as he didn’t even have his core data yet. Apparently they needed to accelerate the schedule so that Linda could be back in California on Thursday night, followed by Bill on Friday. They wanted to show Northrop that DV&N’s senior executive VP could make on-site decisions.

  “He said it’s the same for Linda as it is for me,” Dan continued. “Level playing field; might even be worse for her. Reminded me that Northrop is our biggest West Coast client, even cited the DV&N motto, ‘Clients first, that’s the DV&N way,’ as if I don’t know.”

  Dan had suggested to Bill several alternatives that seemed, to him at least, far more reasonable. “But nothing I said convinced him,” he finished.

  “Anything… else?” At this point, Vinnie was almost afraid to ask.

  Dan picked up a ruler, letting the sharp edge roll over his shirtsleeve and then slapping his palm with the flat side. “The usual Barrington gossip. Gave me Gary’s itinerary. Next week Argentina, then a Miami break. Bill said, ‘Screwing his boyfriend up the ass.’ Classic Bill.” The ruler slapped twice. “Asked if Gary forced me to hire you to increase the number of office faggots. Told me what I need is an assistant with big tits, not a little queer. I hate that man, and he’s my supervisor.”

  Vinnie rocked quietly on the balls of his feet. Did he imagine his squeaking rubber heels reverberating through all thirty-five floors above New York’s canyon at 9:15:42 a.m.? The telephone squealed, went unanswered.

  “I’m sorry, Vinnie. I shouldn’t have repeated that.”

  Each man knew evil had been in the room. Vinnie wanted a declaration of war. Dan slapped his palm, ran the edge of the ruler over his forearm. Vinnie thought, When you’re fucked, you’re fucked.

  “I’ll stay all night,” Vinnie said. “You’ll still outshine Linda. And as Bill said, it’s the same for her as you. Stop worrying over the missing data. Big deal.”

  Leaning across his desk, Dan said, “Vinnie, you’re missing the point. The data…” He inhaled, sputtered. “The goddamn data. My forecast model is a breakthrough—it predicts what happens when markets collapse. But I need the 2001 and 2008 data to prove it. Without it, all I have is extrapolation and speculation. I’ve invented a completely new way to respond after market crashes, against convention. But in today’s investment climate, no financial services company would try my model unproven. Even Gary’s belief in me won’t go that far.

  “I put DV&N at the head of the financial pack. Now this is my shot to set a whole new paradigm. And you and I both know the board won’t accept my word without data. They won’t risk Europe. It’s over. I’m screwed.” Dan’s hand moved swiftly, wiping moist eyes, a Vinnie move.

  “I still believe you’ll win,” Vinnie said quietly. “But if not, you’ll have this job—and a quarter-million salary plus the bonuses, I might add. Sure, matters are complicated if Ginny takes her Bloomingdale’s Paris job, but you can afford to commute. You’ve said you don’t see her much during the week anyway. What’s with the feeling so fuckin’ sorry for yourself?”

  The ruler flew from Dan’s hand across the desk. Vinnie ducked. “It’s not the goddamn money, Vinnie. I don’t want to talk about it. Please leave, I need to think.”

  Vinnie backed away. He knew it wasn’t the money, knew it really had to do with Dan’s marriage. And knew better than to tell Dan that he knew.

  With a pause before he closed Dan’s office door, Vinnie turned to catch a glimpse of his boss swiveling in his chair to look out the window. What’s he see? Paris?

  ****

  Back at his desk, Vinnie muttered aloud. “I fuckin’ love my boss. Best boss ever. Best friend, too. There’s more to this than Northrop, more to Dan’s upset. Look at him, hunky, handsome, with a cute bubble ass…”

  Using a slightly higher voice, Vinnie answered himself: “Now, Vinnie, keep your mind off Dan’s ass.”

  Vinnie snapped back: “Yeah, fuck you.”

  Vinnie made a resolution. “I’ll help Dan and I’ll find a way to screw that homophobic Barrington.” After all, Bill had screwed Vinnie over, too, in addition to denigrating him.

  Joining Dan in Paris had never felt right for Vinnie. He had told Dan, “I’ll never leave the City.” So Dan had somehow arranged a DV&N scholarship for Vinnie to attend NYU’s Stern School for a master’s in marketing. And Dan had been emphatic that the scholarship stood, independent of Dan winning Paris. But Vinnie didn’t see it that way. In his mind, his fate depended on Dan moving to Paris. Dan would start his new life, and Vinnie would start his own.

  His future, his friend’s future, and his own dignity depended on finding out what Bill Barrington was up to. Vinnie would show him who was getting screwed up the ass.

  Chapter 2

  Daydreams and Nightmares

  The mouse pointer wandered aimlessly around the screen in response to Vinnie’s idle pushes. He was ruminating, struggling to understand. Why had Bill decided to keep Dan from getting the Paris job? Surely that’s what this was about. And fuck Barrington with his anti-gay remark. If victory’s not possible, revenge is.

  Like a dog at a car door, Vinnie poked into the corridor: go or stay. Vinnie returned to his desk, deciding to call Blanca rather than chance running into Bill. Blanca Santos, Bill’s executive secretary and Vinnie’s close work friend, answered her phone.

  “What the fuck, Blanca?”

  “Uh-oh,” Blanca replied. “Sounds like I better take my shoes off for this one.”

  Vinnie loved Blanca’s fascination with shoes and her boast that she had more shoes than anyone at DV&N. Six-inch heels gave Blanca her distinctive click-clack clawing sound along DV&N’s hallways. The two friends were soul mates, bound by differences and similarities. Blanca, Puerto Rican, married, had two young sons and lived in a single-family Garden City house. Vinnie, a single gay man with no partner, resided in a West Village one-bedroom. Both had grown up in tough neighborhoods and had suffered humiliation from the epithets flung at them—Blanca’s were usually Rican or island monkey, while Vinnie’s were wop, mick, or faggot, depending on the bigot in question. But they’d long ago reali
zed that their biggest difference was their bosses. “Chalk and cheese, Vinnie,” Blanca had said. “Mine’s a fondillo and yours un santo.”

  Asshole versus saint.

  Vinnie gave Blanca a rundown of events. “Blanca, why? A fuckin’ last-minute problem in California?”

  “You’re right, Vinnie, sounds like Shithead’s up to something. I had no idea.”

  Like Vinnie, Blanca knew her boss well. It was during a happy hour game for the executive staff klatch—which typically included Vinnie, Blanca, Shareen Cooper, DV&N’s office manager, and Maria Benfatto, executive assistant to CEO Gary Del Vecchio—when Blanca chose Bill’s hypothetical Facebook nickname and nom de guerre, Shithead.

  “And what’s up with Dan?” Blanca added. “I mean, sounds like he’s nearly in tears.”

  A small cough almost gave Vinnie away. He had intended to tell Blanca about Dan’s marital problems—it was Vinnie’s one secret from Blanca—but wouldn’t betray that information until after Dan was safely ensconced in Paris.

  Blanca grumbled. “I have to agree, Bill’s up to something, and it probably involves Linda too. I’m stumped.”

  ****

  Behind his closed office door, Dan’s thoughts went in a thousand directions. Vinnie thinks I want more money. If only he knew. He thinks I’m as crass as Bill and Linda.

  Like Vinnie, Dan believed he’d lost. Unlike Vinnie, he didn’t mean only the job; he and Ginny needed Paris, to resolve their marital issues.

  Last night, Dan had hoped to end the last year’s pie-sliced marriage: good, bad, awful. At first, the long silences had seemed like nothing, easily explained. But after a while, that nothing had become something.

  He still remembered the exact day when his lust for Ginny had begun. She had entered the lecture room with her treasure-packed body. He loved her silky voice, the melodic way she spoke. Their first sex sealed his love, but it also triggered his anxiety over rejection.

  Now, his teenage torment resurfaced. Someone would steal Ginny from him. He had the cheerleader stolen from him, his first love, and he’d been humiliated by it. He’d never forgotten. It could happen again.