Page 46 of Pro Bono

Ollonsun froze and listened, not daring to move in case his desk chair creaked to reveal that he was in. He and the woman listened for each other. He knew that if she gave up and left, he would hear her shoes. Instead, he heard her knock again, this time louder. After about ten seconds he heard her voice. “Mr. Ollonsun?” He waited for the shoes.

Instead, he heard a key in the door lock. His door swung open, and he saw her, the typical young Great Oceana executive—dark blue suit, silk blouse, straight dark hair cut at shoulder length. “Oh,” she said. “Mr. Ollonsun, are you all right? We knocked, but since you didn’t answer, we figured we’d better check on you.”

“I’m all right,” he said, then remembered he didn’t look all right. “This was just a little bicycle accident. I slipped in a gravel patch last evening.” He stood up. “I don’t think we’ve met.”

She stepped forward, smiling, and held out her hand to shake his. “Stacey Ramsdahl, admin.” Her handshake was firm and energetic, and it reminded him that his right hand was in pain from a punch Ron had half ducked so Pat’s fist had bounced off his hard forehead.

Stacey Ramsdahl was not here to waste time. “They need you right away in admin. Do you need a minute to freshen up or anything before we go?”

“Well, I was right in the middle of some things. Would it be possible to put this off until—”

“They need you there right away, I’m afraid.” She turned and seemed to notice his sport coat hanging behind the door, “Oh, your coat’s right here.” The door of every office that people like him inhabited had a coat hook screwed into the back of it, but she greeted it as a great find. She lifted it off its hanger and held it up so he couldn’t avoid slipping into it without physically resisting. “They said this won’t take long.”

She stepped to the door and pushed it open, and he saw the others. There was a man in navy blue coveralls with a tool pouch and a ring of keys on his tool belt. There was also a tall man about Stacey Ramsdahl’s age who was built like a football player. “This is Dennis. He’s going to give us a ride over to the admin offices.”

Dennis was just as friendly. He smiled as he said, “Good to meet you, Mr. Ollonsun.” Pat knew better than to let this one crush his hand, so he just raised it in a little wave, said, “Likewise, Dennis,” and engaged his hands in adjusting the cuffs of his shirt and then the lapels as they began to walk. He was being dragged out of his office to some dreaded inquiry, as surely as though they handcuffed him or prodded him along with guns. He couldn’t resist or escape or argue or, really, do anything except what this tall, attractive, cheerful young couple asked, or he would appear to be crazy or criminal on the building’s surveillance cameras.

The three walked down the open concourse to the bank of elevators. Ollonsun felt as though people must be watching them, but nobody he knew appeared. He stood in front of the doors and stared at them so no strangers noticed his bruised and scratched face.

When they reached the ground floor, Stacey Ramsdahl led the way, and Dennis fell slightly behind. It was as though he was there to be sure Pat didn’t change his mind and turn back. She pushed the door open and held it until all three were out on the sidewalk. A black car was parkedin the five-minute loading zone, and she got in the back seat and patted the seat beside her, so Pat had to slide into it. Dennis slammed the door closed, got into the front, and drove.

Stacey Ramsdahl filled in the silence with small talk as the buildings floated by. “I’ll never get used to Los Angeles. This part always seems like it’s this plain, light-colored facade, so nobody knows that these dull, benign-looking buildings aren’t just a bunch of dentists’ and therapists’ offices, but places where billions of dollars are changing hands twenty-four hours a day and deals for hundreds of movies and television shows and things are going on.”

“I take it you weren’t born here,” Pat said.

“No. Rising Sun, Maryland. When I was growing up, I couldn’t wait to get someplace where all the action was. I picked LA. Now when I tell people that, they say, ‘Rising Sun. What a pretty name.’ And I know it is, but it’s funny that when I lived there, I didn’t ever think of it that way. Where are you from?”

He said, “Evanston, Illinois. I went to college in Boston, and I met my wife there. The woman who was going to be my wife, I mean. The year I met her I waited to register for classes until she had registered and then signed up for every class she was in. Now they’d probably call me a stalker. Fortunately, she didn’t take it that way.”

“Oh, that’s so sweet. And then you married and came here together.”

“Yep.”

He could see that the short ride was coming to an end. The building for Admin and the other parts of Great Oceana that didn’t deal with the public was ahead. A few seconds later Dennis swung across the lane and up the driveway into the garage entrance. Then he got out and came around the car to Ollonsun’s side to let him out so he would be aimed in the direction of the lobby entrance. The only other way out was overStacey Ramsdahl, who was already unbuckled and waiting for him to move.

The parking attendant got into the driver’s seat and waited while Ollonsun and Stacey got out, then drove the car away. The three reassembled in their formation, with Stacey leading the way to the elevator, pressing the button, going in, then Ollonsun, and last, Dennis, moving in behind them and blocking the space until the doors closed and the elevator rose.

She had pressed the button marked 4. Ollonsun didn’t know where they were going, but he was fairly sure that the floors with the bosses, the people to be feared, were at or near the top, which was the twentieth. He felt a moment of hope that maybe this really was a meeting about something routine. The doors parted and the three stepped out. In front of them was an arch, and above it, the words Human Resources. He felt even better. He had been here a few times over the years, always for some dull practical matter—hiring, getting a child added to his health insurance, signing things when the company improved the pension system. He just hadn’t remembered which floor it had been on.

Stacey stepped out and led the way, and they proceeded inward. She stopped at the reception desk and said, “Gabrielle Nagata?” and the woman behind it pointed to the left and said, “Four eighteen.” They made their way to the right number, and a small Asian American woman with short black hair was waiting for them at the open door.

“Hi,” she said to Ollonsun, and reached out to shake his hand. He took a chance and shook it. “I’m Gaby Nagata, Mr. Ollonsun. Come on in.” Ollonsun’s two guides stepped aside so he could enter, and Stacey touched his upper arm and said, “We’ll wait out here.”

The room was large, with Gaby Nagata’s desk and two others, but nobody was in them. Ms. Nagata dragged a chair up to the large desk, andsaid, “Have a seat,” then went behind it and took a large folder from the left corner, slid it in front of him, and opened it. The printed forms inside were facing him. Still smiling, she leaned across the large desk and pointed to the first horizontal line at the midpoint of the first form marked with a red X. “Sign here,” she pointed to the next, “here,” the bottom, “and here.”

“What am I signing?” he asked.

“This one is to claim your bonus package,” she said. “You’re welcome to take your time reading it. I can leave you alone here while you do it, but there are a lot of pages that need to be signed, so it may take a while, and I understand they’re waiting for you upstairs.”

“Let me just take a minute or two to scan through it.” He looked at the top page and realized that the pages were separation papers. The bonus she’d mentioned was a severance package. He leafed through the papers quickly. He would get an extension of two years of his health insurance, including for his dependents. His pension accumulation would be removed from the Great Oceana account and made over to him in a lump payment, with a warning that it needed to be reinvested promptly in another retirement plan or be treated by the IRS as income. This added to his shock. They didn’t even want him as a client.

He glanced at Gaby Nagata. She was staring into his eyes, and her smile had disappeared. He looked down again to check the last few pages. His last day of employment was filled in, and it was today. There was a page that tallied up the amount of his final paycheck, which would be mailed to him on payday. Then there was a long list of things he was responsible for returning: his company ID card, keys, parking pass, any company-owned electronic equipment, and other miscellaneous company property.

The final page, which was to be dated and witnessed, was a long paragraph stating that he understood that he was no longer an employee of Great Oceana Vested Corporation, and agreed never to present himselfto any person as such in the future, or to state or imply that he was in possession of any company financial or investment information, all of which was to be considered proprietary, or that he was engaged in any official or unofficial relationship or connection with any employee of the company.

He looked at her again. “Two years’ health insurance? That’s nothing. It will go by in a flash.”

She said, “It will go by in two years.”

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