The Hollow Men - Episode 23
Rick isn't any better, Drew decides to close down VP Tanks and knows the process of breaking things down will be slow at first.
Last week in Episode 22 Rick is having conversations with the invisible people and everything starts to fall apart.
The Hollow Men is the second collection of not quite true tales of Texas. If you have recently subscribed and like to read things from the very beginning feel free to start with The Cold Days of Summer, the first collection of not quite true tales of Texas. Each episode of The Cold Days of Summer and The Hollow Men contains a link to the previous and next episode so you can easily move through the story line.
A process of breaking it all down
After learning some ancient Hebrew but being no wiser for it and a good lunch at Jack Jordan’s I drove back to the office. Mary Ann arrived a few minutes before 1:00, talked about the weather, asked how the morning had gone and where was Rick. I said Rick was out of the office for the day. She smiled and went to work, going through the mail and preparing a handful of invoices for the little amount of work that had been completed in January. Around 3:00 the phone rang for the first time that day. It was Mr. Anders. He wanted to know if I could come see him at the Odessa Medical Center. I told him yes, hung up the phone, told Mary Ann that I would be out for the rest of the day and to lock up when she was done. Mary Ann smiled and said she would see me tomorrow.
I pulled into the front parking lot of the Odessa Medical Center. I walked into the lobby and saw that Mr. and Mrs. Anders were waiting for me.
“Drew, thanks for coming.”
“Sure thing, Mr. Anders. How is Rick?”
Mr. Anders looked at his wife. She sobbed quietly.
“Not good, Dr. Levenson thinks Rick suffered a complete breakdown. It will be awhile before he's released. They will be running tests on him over the next several days.”
“God, I... I... is there anything I can do?”
“Pray, son, just pray.”
I didn't mention to them that I was way out of practice on praying.
The three of us stood in the lobby, not knowing what to do.
“Can I see Rick?”
“Not today, probably not for a few days. The doctor wants to keep him mostly to himself, so he can hopefully figure out what's wrong.”
“Damn.”
They looked years older since I had last seen them.
“If there's anything you need, anything I can do, please, please let me know.”
“We will, Drew, we will. For now just pray. Call us on Friday. Maybe Rick will be doing better then.”
I shook Mr. Anders' hand. He pulled me in and gave me a fierce hug. Once he let go Mrs. Anders gave me a hug and a kiss on my cheek.
“You've been a good friend to him, Drew.”
“He's been a better friend.” Looking back on this I know I’ve never been able to accept a compliment and spoke a blunt truth. In my mind I heard both Rick and Mark berate me for not understanding the situation and stretching the truth to be kind.
“Call us Friday.”
I waved goodbye and walked back outside. It was 3:45 pm. I hadn't been out of work at 3:45 pm in a long while. I had some time to kill before I went home.
I drove all over town and finally wound up at Endless Horizons, the best record store in Odessa. I walked in and was greeted warmly by the staff.
“Drew, haven't seen you here in months. How have you been?”
“All right, just thought I would take the afternoon off and listen to some music. Any recommendations for me today?”
I left the store with Field Day by Marshall Crenshaw, The Records by The Records and Combat Rock by The Clash. Clearly I had been out of touch with the music scene.
All of the local book stores had been put out of business by the Walden's at the Permian Mall so I ended up there next. I wasn't looking for anything in particular, I was just killing time, scanning the bookshelves to see if anything caught my eye. I was in the classics section when a title caught my eye, The Crack-up by F. Scott Fitzgerald and Edmund Wilson. I had checked this book out years ago at the public library, on the day that Jack nearly pummeled me because he had failed the ninth grade. It wasn't a novel but a collection of short stories, essays, letters and copies of F. Scott Fitzgerald's writing notebooks. He kept notebooks filled with phrases, scenes, descriptions and would use them as sources or filler for his stories and novels. It was also the story of Fitzgerald's fall from grace at the age of thirty-nine. The Crack-up, a strangely ironic title to find on this day, the day of Rick's crack-up. That was all I bought.
I continued to drive around town, in some ways seeing my home town for the first time in years. I saw my home town in a new way, a way I did not try to comprehend or understand. It just was. It just was and the same was true for me. I just was. I just was.
I took my time driving home and pulled up to the curb around 6:00 PM. Mom was home, but Dad was still at work. Mom and I made small talk while she finished fixing dinner. Around 6:30 Dad pulled up in the driveway and came in the front door.
We ate dinner quietly, Kaiser sat sleeping by my feet. He slept most of the day and night now. He had gotten old and moved a lot slower than he used to. I suspected he might be going blind, and deaf as well. At night he would often moan in his sleep and dream of rabbits to chase.
After dinner I helped Mom clean the kitchen while Dad and Kaiser moved to the living room. Later we all watched television. Dad went to bed at 9:00. I gave up at 10:00 and went to bed but I didn't immediately go to sleep. Kaiser stayed with Mom, too used to the old habit of a late night snack. In my room I read The Crack-up.
“Of course all life is a process of breaking down, but the blows that do the dramatic side of the work – the big sudden blows that come, or seem to come, from outside – the one you remember and blame things on and, in moments of weakness, tell your friends about, don't show their effect all at once. There is another sort of blow that comes from within – that you don't feel until it's too late to do anything about it, until you realize with finality that in some regard you will never be as good a man again. The first sort of breakage seems to happen quick – the second kind happens almost without your knowing it but is realized suddenly indeed.”
It sure looked like the second kind of blow had brought Rick down. It was the second kind of blow was how I was thinking to shut VP Tanks down. I would execute a plan, slow and steady, measured, so that when it was over and done, there would be little to remind me of what we had done. Rick and I were the in-betweeners and it was time for us to fade away. Rick just faded faster than I had ever imagined or planned.
I woke up a little later than my usual time during the week, at 6:00 am. Dad had already left for work. Mom and Kaiser were still asleep. I moved quietly, showered, dressed and was out of the house by 6:30. I drove to work, not to work, but just to stare at the walls and listen. I listened for voices but I heard none. I picked up around the office, looked over the books yet again and planned the end of VP Tanks. I didn't know what the future held, but I had decided sometime between yesterday afternoon and this morning, perhaps in my dreams, that it was time to shut the doors. Maybe Rick would come back, maybe he wouldn't, but I was pulling out. We had done well over the years, damn well. We both had enough money that if we weren't crazy we wouldn't have to work too much the rest of our lives. Through our investments in Fidelity Magellan, real estate and high rate CD's we had made our money work for us.
Going through the numbers helped keep me sane. As noon approached I finalized my plans. Friday I would visit Rick and Uncle Bill. Hopefully the visit with Rick would go well, the visit with Uncle Bill would be about closing up shop.
It was a Thursday, which meant lunch with Matt. That was something I wasn't ready for. Shortly before noon I drove to Manuel's. He asked where Rick was and I made something up about him following up on a couple of deals. He nodded his head, our table was ready and we went inside. The waiter knew us well and confirmed Matt’s order of a #1 combination, my #3 and two iced teas. Matt tried to make small talk but I wasn't much of a conversationalist.
“Drew, you're taking the slowdown rather personally, aren't you? It may pass, it may not, but we just have to manage our way through whatever life brings us.”
“I know, Matt, I know, it is, well, this week is harder.”
“You want to talk about it?”
I looked at Matt and thought about it. Was I ready to talk about what happened yesterday? What happened with Rick? That I was thinking about closing down VP Tanks? No, I wasn't.
“No, Matt, not today. Maybe another time.”
I smiled at him, he smiled back. He seemed to understand and accepted that I wasn't ready to talk.
“Well then, how about the Cowboys, think they can beat the Redskins on Saturday?”
We talked about the NFL playoffs and enjoyed our food. It was my turn to pick up the tab and I did. Matt wished me a good day and to say hello to Rick. I shook his hand, watched him drive away then drove back to the office. I was back by 12:55. I was dreading having to explain things to Mary Ann. She arrived right at 1:00 pm.
“Hey, Drew, Rick is out following up on things?”
“No, Mary Ann, he's not. We need to talk.”
“Oh, that doesn't sound good.”
“Yeah, well, its not. You've noticed business has dropped a lot the last few months. Things came to a head yesterday. Rick is gone, I don't think he will be back.”
“What do you mean he's gone? Did he quit? Where is he?”
I didn't answer her questions, instead I asked her a question.
“Have you noticed anything strange about Rick lately?”
She was quiet for a moment and then she spoke.
“Yes, sometimes I walk up on him and its like I interrupted a conversation, but there was no one else there. He's been edgy too. I just thought it was the way business has been lately.”
“He had a breakdown. His parents checked him into the fifth floor of the Medical Center. They asked me not to call until tomorrow. Maybe I'll see him then. I don't know.”
“What about here?”
I took a deep breath and spoke.
“You know our plan has always been to close up shop when we thought things had headed too far south. The last three months have not been good. We've got enough work to keep us busy until the end of March but I don't plan on accepting any new orders. I expect to shut everything down by the middle of April.”
There, I had said it. I had finally verbalized what had been running around in my head. VP Tanks would soon be no more.
“Oh God, I... I”
I interrupted Mary Ann.
“Don't worry, or at least don't worry too much. I've thought about you. I need you here until I close the doors. Once the doors are closed I'm going to give you six months severance, you won't be working, but I'll pay you like you're working. As for college, if you want to finish, I'll pay for it. I'll keep funding a scholarship and I'll make sure you receive it.”
She didn't say anything for a few minutes.
“Why are you doing this? You don't have to. I'll take it, don't you worry, I can use the money, no question about it, but you don't have to, so why do it?”
“I could say it is the right thing to do, and it is, but that's not the real reason. You've been an important part of VP Tanks. I just want to make sure you have got a good leg up on the next stage of things, whatever they may be.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Go back to school. I've got a house in Austin, and I'll start back to school in August.”
We talked a little bit more. The phone rang a couple of times that afternoon but nothing of consequence came out of the conversations. At 5:00 Mary Ann left for the evening, said she would see me tomorrow. Alone in the office I turned on the stereo, listened to Marshal Crenshaw and drank a few beers. At 6:00 I locked the doors and drove home.
Friday morning I called SouthWestern Tank, asked how the few tank orders we had with them were doing, then called up the rest of our subcontractors to follow-up on things. At 10:00 I called Mr. Anders at his office. His secretary passed me through.
“Hello, Drew.”
“Mr. Anders, how are you? How's Rick?”
“Still testing. No further results.”
“Can I see him today?”
“Let's see what how the tests go. Maybe on Monday.”
“Okay.... Mr. Anders, I've been thinking. I don't see Rick coming back anytime soon. Business has been slowing down over the last few months... When we started VP Tanks we talked about an exit plan. Our whole goal was to make sure we don't get burned by a bust cycle. I don't know if the bust is coming, but our indicators are saying it is time to get out. With Rick away, our backlog almost gone... I'm seriously thinking about closing things down. It will take a couple of months, probably wouldn't be done until late March, early April. I don't plan on taking on any more new work, just wrapping up the work that's already in place.”
“I see. I understand what you're thinking. Rick mentioned to us a couple of times over the last few months that it might be time to think about closing VP Tanks. He didn't want to, but according to him the plan was to get out before either of you got hurt.”
“Mr. Anders, I just want you to know that I am thinking about this. I want to talk to Bill Remington, my uncle, he's mentored us over the years. I will make sure that everything is split up 50-50 between Rick and me, but I'm thinking I'll have to work with you on this. I don't see Rick being involved, not any time soon.”
“I understand, Rick, I understand. It's just happening so fast, so fast. Right now I'm not thinking about VP Tanks, I'm focused on Rick. I can't help you right now.”
“Understood. I'll keep you informed every step of way.”
“Drew, Rick had full trust in you. So do I. You make the decisions, I know you will make the right ones.”
I told Mr. Anders I would call him on Monday. We said a few more things, but nothing that mattered.
After that call I had my second beer of the day. At 11:30 I drove into town for lunch with Uncle Bill at Picadilly's. As we stood in line we didn't say much. I got a chopped steak, green beans, a stuffed potato, ice tea, a slice of cherry pie and a biscuit. After we sat down and took a couple of bites we started talking.
“Where's Rick?”
Damn, I was getting tired of that question.
“That's part of what we'll talk about today. Rick had a collapse Wednesday. He's been checked in at the medical center. His parents don't think he will be back anytime soon. That combined with how our backlog has been evaporating I've come to the conclusion to close VP Tanks. I don't plan on taking on any more new work, just finish what we got.”
“How's Rick?”
“I don't know, not yet. I may get to see him on Monday, but that's up to the doctor.”
I gave him a sanitized and summarized version of the last month.
“Drew, I had no idea. I knew the backlog was going down but I didn't know about Rick.”
“I didn't know about Rick, not for sure, until Wednesday morning.”
As the meal went on we talked about the exit plan. Nothing special, the whole point was to minimize our liability, to close business out, keep our cash, stay legal and disappear.
“You need to get Kevin involved sooner than later. You still talk to him every month, right?”
I nodded my head yes.
“This time, not only cover the month's business, but also the plans to close things out. He can help you a lot, rely on him heavily. You're paying him every month, make sure you get your money's worth through April.”
I nodded my head again.
“I think you're okay from a money perspective. You two have done a good job of managing your expenses and leaving only enough money behind to keep the business afloat. You're still investing regularly in Fidelity Magellan?”
“Every month we both send them money. Still putting money in CDs too, though most of my money has been going to Fidelity Magellan. Rick has a rent house in Odessa, and he's buying another house in Corpus Christi with his brother. I have two houses in Austin, one that Jack is living in and paying the monthly mortgage. The other is a rent house.”
“What's your plan there?”
“I'll apply to UT for the fall semester. If they accept me that's where I'll be come August. It would be good to get in the house earlier in the summer, get it repainted, do some repair work, buy some furniture. I would like to be fully settled in before I start back to school. Guess I better give the renters 30 day notice in April or May.”
“I would give them notice in April, give them plenty of time to find a new place.”
I nodded my head.
“Does Rick, hmm, well does Rick's parents know your plans for VP Tanks?”
“I talked to Mr. Anders this morning. He says he trusts me on what to do. Said that Rick had told him things were slowing down and that it might be time to close up shop.”
“That's good, it will make it easier on all involved. You too both have health insurance, right?”
“Yep, we set up that a couple of years ago with Houston Copeland. Never really understood the value of it until now. Guess Rick's parents are glad we have insurance.”
“I'm sure they are. That's one less burden they need to deal with right now. Talk to Kevin about making sure the insurance is covered for awhile, probably more of a concern for Rick than you. You should be able to get student's medical insurance at UT, might be cheaper than what you are paying to Copeland.”
“Good point, I hadn't thought about seeing what UT can offer.”
“Sounds like you've got most of the bases covered. All we need to do now is put in place a good plan and then execute it. Let's get together next week, no later than Friday and review your exit plan. We'll need to go over all remaining contracts you have, any open bids and what you think the probability of winning them is.”
“Got it. Anything else?”
“Yeah, keep the receipt. You definitely want to expense this lunch.” Uncle Bill smiled as he spoke.
“Don't worry, we've been expensing every one of these meals. I won't stop now.”
With that we were done. We walked outside.
“How does it feel? To know VP Tanks will be no more?”
“Strange, but I'm ready. Once I made the decision I felt a lot of tension go away. The one bad thing is Rick. Shit, this isn't right, it isn't fair. We're finally getting to a point where we can enjoy the rewards of of our work and this happens. No way someone can tell me this is right.”
“It isn't right.”
With that we shook hands. Uncle Bill got in his car, waved at me and drove off. I walked to my truck, got in and drove back to work.
Author’s note: Things have not gotten better since we last checked in on Drew and Rick. Rick is out of pocket, but Drew starts finalizing and takes the first steps in his exit plan.
The poem “The Hollow Men” by T. S. Eliot ends with these lines:
This is the way the world ends This is the way the world ends This is the way the world ends Not with a bang, but a whimper.
Drew sees the end of this world, but also sees the shadows and forms of other worlds. Maybe that will be what keeps him sane?
In Episode 24, Drew visits Rick, tells others about Rick, works through the details of closing VP Tanks and finally tells his parents what has been going on with Rick.