Rafael Yglesias - Only Children

ONCE ERIC was in his chair, sipping his hot coffee, surrounded by the sounds of Joe’s rustling newspaper, Sammy’s nervous leg flexing the leather of his seat, the secretaries sorting and carrying account statements and confirmation orders, once Eric could feel he had safely arrived at work, had made it through another weekend of being Daddy, he felt whole. His puffy eyes were mesmerized by the frozen numbers of Friday’s closing prices. He listened to the faint pillowed whoosh of distant cars. He sipped more of the coffee and nestled his tired back (he had carried Luke on his shoulders for hours over the weekend) into the crannies of the chair’s cushions, and felt at home.

For the first time in his life, he was at ease at work.

Two years ago, when Eric returned from those months of combat with Luke’s colic in Maine, he had found a rival in his chair. Joe, in his unsubtle way, had hired another broker, named Carlton, during Eric’s paternity leave.

“If you were going to be gone for a long time, I needed someone,” Joe explained. “Carlton was available, our business has been growing, I thought: why not? Be less pressure on you.” Joe went on to say that he thought there was room for Carlton to remain, and then hit Eric with news that Joe must have expected would be killing — namely, that almost half of Eric’s clients wanted Carlton to continue to handle their accounts even after Eric’s return.

Eric doubted that his clients had come to this decision without prodding. Joe’s message was clear: you are on probation. I’ve cut your salary in half, and if you pull anything else on me, you’re gone. Probably Joe expected Eric to react with terror, contrition, and a plea for restitution.

Instead, Eric told Joe that he would be handling two million dollars of Nina’s father’s money and that although he would pay the floor commission rate, Eric didn’t feel obliged to pay Joe a premium rate since Eric wouldn’t be using Joe’s investment advice. Up until Nina’s father, almost all the clients Eric worked with had been given to him by Joe. The few whom Eric had brought in were lured by Joe’s past performance record. Eric’s job, in essence, was to be there to answer the customers’ questions, keep them happy, and occasionally make a choice among several possibilities selected by Joe. Eric had, and could, submit stock selections of his own to Joe. He was permitted to pretend to the clients, and he had often enough, that many of the stock picks were his own. But Joe was in charge, he owned the firm, he could take the clients away, he could reduce Eric’s cut of the profits, he could fire Eric.

Tom’s two million gave Eric a weapon. Eric might be able to afford to quit. He didn’t want to. To continue with Joe, even if it meant staying on the phone all day with Joe’s clients, would save Eric thousands in commission costs. Besides, he needed the base income, since Eric couldn’t be sure he would succeed with Nina’s family money. Also, Eric knew that if he stayed, he wouldn’t be cut off from Joe’s ideas. Joe was too vain and pompous to stop himself from allowing Eric to pick his brain. Besides, if Eric continued to handle half the clients, he would know Joe’s movements anyway.

After a good half hour of amazed questions, about Nina’s father, the amount of money, and so on, that problem was what Joe addressed. “Eric, if you put any of that money into my portfolio, it’s unfair for me not to benefit from the gains.”

“I’m sorry, Joe, if you buy IBM for your clients, that can’t stop me from doing it.”

“You’re being unfair. I’ve trained you, you participated in my clients’ money. I deserve at least, at the very least, to get the retail commission profits. You’re collecting an incentive fee from your father-in-law and a percentage of my profits. You’re being very greedy.”

“You did not train me in any of the important things, Joe. Sammy’s been taught how to analyze a company, how to arbitrage. I’ve been taught how to schmooze.”

“That’s not true! You didn’t want to learn. You’re not interested in the tedious work of discovering value. You want the action.”

“I’ll settle for the action if that’s all there is. If you’d made it easy for me, if you’d opened the door at all, I—”

“Nonsense. I’m here. I’m available. You didn’t ask.”

“What’s the point of arguing?” Eric said. “We’re both so full of shit we couldn’t tell the truth if someone paid us to.”

This put a stop to the sputtering, outraged Joe. His thin eyebrows disappeared into his forehead; his dull brown eyes seemed to shrink and gleam. Then he burst out laughing, and pulled on his thick red wool tie, as if grasping a leash to keep his head from bolting off his torso. When Joe was through laughing, he cleared his throat, looked at the ceiling, and said, “I’ll work more closely with you. I’ll get rid of Carlton. But I must participate in the profits.”

They worked it out. Eric told Joe to keep Carlton. He calculated (correctly, as it turned out) that Carlton would become Joe’s whipping boy, relegated to handle the most wearying and least ambitious of Joe’s investors. Eric gave Joe half of his incentive fee in return for no reduction in his base salary, and kept for himself the significant premium between the wholesale cost of the floor broker and the retail commission charge that would be levied against Tom’s account. But it was understood that no actions could be taken in the account without Eric’s approval and that Eric was not obliged to suffer ridicule if he made losing picks. For the first time, in the true sense, he and Joe were partners.

The year and three-quarters since this arrangement had been Eric’s happiest time at work. Joe began to invite Eric along on lunches with his bigger investors and with some of his old cronies from the large brokerage houses. And once a week Joe would have a strategy session with Eric, from which even Sammy was excluded. It was a deep, warming broth to the lifelong chill in the belly of Eric’s self-esteem.

All these changes didn’t happen at once. When between them, Eric and Joe increased the value of Tom’s portfolio to a little over three million dollars in the first nine months, Tom gave Eric another two million to handle. Now Eric was managing a five-million-dollar portfolio, small potatoes to the big boys down the street, but a thick, aromatic steak to Eric. It was then that Eric became Joe’s favorite son, power-lunch companion, and tactical confidant.

“Fifteen minutes,” Sammy said, and turned on the electronic ticker. Sammy looked thinner. He had taken up jogging, or so he claimed, and his starved face now had the look of a greyhound’s. Since the change in Eric’s fortunes, Sammy was cool to Eric, although more respectful.

“Where’s Carlton?” Joe said.

“How the fuck should I know?” Sammy mumbled, and threw himself into his chair. “Convincing some widow to buy Telephone.”

“Fred Tatter for you,” Irene said to Eric. In the days before Tom’s money, she answered only Joe’s phone. Now she doubled as Eric’s secretary.

Eric put his finger under the receiver and pushed down, flipping it like a pancake in the air. He caught the floating phone in his left hand and brought it to his ear. “Hello, Fred. You’re my first call.”

“I should be working,” Fred said.

Fred was a best-selling novelist. After the second of his successes, Fred had opened a quarter-of-a-million-dollar account with Joe, who had been recommended to Fred by his father. There would be long stretches when Fred wouldn’t call, presumably while he was at work on a new book, and then months of frantic activity (happy months in a way, since Fred was easy to churn, and even if he lost money, they made a lot on the commissions), orchestrated by many infuriating calls. Fred had been inactive for a while. Recently, with his newfound confidence, Eric had initiated a trade for Fred. When Eric persuaded Fred to buy an over-the-counter computer stock, New Systems, that was a first for Eric — because he had discovered the stock himself. Fred was reluctant, but had finally agreed to let Eric buy five hundred shares at nine. Now, three months later, the stock was up ten points to nineteen.“Well,” Eric said. “If you’d bought more of New Systems—”