The Countdown Begins
University Hall’s pay phone booth.
I was on the phone with my mother for the first time in ages.
She was practically vibrating with excitement.
“Son! The refrigerator finally came today! It’s a side-by-side, too! If you just hold a cup up to the door, ice drops out automatically! And cold water comes right away! I had no idea something like this existed! It’s amazing!”
It seemed the latest model from General Electric, which she’d ordered last month, had finally arrived.
She’d never seen ice and water come out of a refrigerator before, and she’d been delighted for ages.
“And the new sofa in the living room is so soft. You’ll be shocked when you come home next time. Your father sits there every day watching TV and falls asleep on it. He used to complain his back hurt and wouldn’t even sit on a sofa.”
“Sounds like you bought something good.”
“Mm-hm. I picked it from the catalogs you sent. Leather, too. The day it was delivered, your father kept stroking it with his hand and saying, So this is a sofa~ He said it was the first real leather sofa he’d ever sat on. Hohoho-”
My throat grew a little hot.
Before I regressed, my parents had never gotten to enjoy any of this.
They’d sat on an old spring sofa clutching their backs, wrapped a broken refrigerator in tape to keep using it, and in the end had been driven out to the slums.
But things were different now.
This time around, I could give them a different life.
Wasn’t that reason enough to make money?
“Oh, and listen. The second floor renovation is finished, too. The painters wrapped up today and the whole house looks completely different. Right—just like you said, we left your room exactly as it was, so don’t worry. We redid all the other rooms from top to bottom.”
“That’s good. How’s Father?”
“Your father? He’s out at the site right now in that car you bought him for his birthday. He’s been so happy driving the new car around lately. Yesterday he even took some of the elders from the Korean Association out for a drive.”
A Buick Roadmaster.
This black full-size sedan, revived in 1991, had long been my father’s dream car.
It was the car I’d ordered and sent him as his birthday present this year.
A legendary brand reborn after being discontinued in 1958, thirty-three years earlier.
My father had once told me he used to clip out a picture of the Roadmaster from a magazine and keep it in his wallet when he was young.
If he liked it that much, then I should buy it for him. Fully loaded, no compromises.
I wanted to give him something better, but for now, I was satisfied with fulfilling the dream he’d had in his youth.
“Your uncle’s in a great mood these days, too. He added ten more warehouses next to the junkyard. He’s got new equipment in there and the workers are going day and night. He says every day that thanks to our nephew, his life has finally turned around.”
“Isn’t Uncle overdoing it a little?”
“Oh, please. Compared to when he used to get up at four in the morning and roam around salvage yards, this is paradise. The workers handle everything themselves, so he says he only has to supervise. Yesterday he even went fishing during the day. Said he caught a bass the size of a whale or something. You can’t trust a word he says—every time he talks, the fish gets bigger.”
With the receiver pressed to my ear, I looked out the window.
The snow-covered Harvard Yard.
The faces of my family in Garden Queens came to mind.
My mother, marveling in front of the new refrigerator.
My father, shoulders squared as he gripped the wheel of his new truck.
My uncle, trading jokes with his workers in the expanded warehouse.
“Honestly, I’ve been talking your ear off. You must be busy, so I’ll let you go. Make sure you eat properly! And if you need side dishes, just say so!”
“Yes, Mother. Take care of your health.”
I put down the receiver.
Click.
Winter sunlight streamed through the lounge window.
“······.”
University Hall.
Finished in 1815, this granite building was one of the oldest administrative buildings at Harvard.
The president’s office and the deans’ offices were on the ground floor, while the basement was packed with student organization offices and meeting rooms.
Thud— thud— thud— thud—
I crossed the hallway to reserve a meeting room.
The air smelled of old paper and trapped damp.
Dust danced in the pale winter sunlight that spilled through the half-basement windows.
At the end of that beam of light, in front of a worn brass sign that read Room Reservation, I spotted a familiar silhouette.
“Phew······”
A blonde girl was clutching a stack of files to her chest and letting out a sigh deep enough to cave in the floor.
It was Caroline Channing, whom I’d already become fairly familiar with.
Huh? Didn’t she say last time that classes were over and she was heading home?
I remembered meeting her briefly while I was waiting for Grace before.
Back then, Caroline had been dragging a suitcase home and had waved, saying she had a cousin in Garden Queens and might come visit during break.
So why was she still on Harvard’s campus?
Then Caroline spotted me first and her eyes widened.
“······Sanha? I thought you went back to Garden Queens?”
“I’m planning to head down next time. I still have some things to finish up on campus, so I came to book a meeting room.”
“Ah! I see!”
Caroline came toward me, unable to hide how pleased she was to see me.
Even though the semester was over, she was still as energetic as ever.
“I went back home and came right back.”
“What? Why?”
“I guess I got used to working as a work-study student. If I don’t do something here for even a single day, I get restless and can’t stand it······ whew—”
She’d only just started joking when she suddenly let out a long sigh.
“Honestly, I just came back because it felt uncomfortable staying at home. I had a huge fight with my parents.”
It was a family matter, so I didn’t pry, but Caroline seemed like she wanted to talk to someone, and she kept going.
“My dad is seriously awful. He wants me to major in business or economics no matter what once I’m a sophomore.”
Harvard students choose their concentration in November of sophomore year.
Freshmen spend their first year exploring classes without a major.
As for me calling myself an economics major, that was because I’d already made my choice; most students didn’t finalize theirs until the end of sophomore year.
For pressure like this to already be falling on Caroline, who was still a freshman, meant her parents must have enormous expectations.
I asked her, “What do you want to major in?”
“I want to major in political science and minor in psychology. I want to become a top-tier secretary who understands the psychology of organizations.”
“A secretary?”
“Mm-hm. For a CEO or a senior politician.”
Caroline shrugged.
“I like helping and supporting people. Honestly, I know my own limits. I don’t have the courage or the talent to strike out front and carve a new path that didn’t exist before. But I’m good at standing beside someone like that and carefully handling the big and small things. It’s like standing next to someone who can draw the big picture and helping with the brushstrokes. I think that suits me.”
“That’s good. You sound like someone looking for the lord she’s meant to serve. Honestly, how many people in the world really get to reign as lords? Most of us function as part of an organization and retire as part of one, too. Becoming irreplaceable within that structure is a fine thing, I think.”
“See? You and I really do speak the same language, Sanha! But my dad gets furious and says that wanting to work under someone else is slave mentality. We seriously just can’t understand each other.”
Caroline sighed.
I’d become a little curious by then.
“What does your father do, anyway, that makes him so stubborn?”
“Landman.”
“!”
It was an unexpected answer.
Since it was a profession most people didn’t know much about, Caroline added an explanation.
“Well······ it’s the job of coordinating mineral rights between landowners and oil companies. It might sound a little unfamiliar.”
As of 1992, American land law was wildly obnoxious compared to most other countries.
Surface rights and subsurface mineral rights were separate, which meant the owner of the land and the owner of the underground resources were often different people.
Through generations of inheritance, mineral rights could get split among dozens of people.
To develop underground resources like gold mines, oil fields, or natural gas, you had to untangle all those overlapping claims and get every stakeholder to sign off.
The person who specialized in that work was a landman.
More simply put, he was a broker for mining rights—or perhaps a broker for land rights.
“So, for example, if an oil company wants to develop an oil field, the landman goes around finding the landowners and untangling the contracts first. He gets signatures on the mineral lease, negotiates royalty terms, clears up any legal trouble in advance, and even negotiates with the government if he has to. Only then can the drilling rigs actually enter the site.”
Caroline counted it off on her fingers as she explained.
“My dad worked as a freelancer in Texas for a long time. Basically, he’s an independent landman—he mostly brokers contracts between oil companies like ExxonMobil and landholders.”
Texas was the largest oil-producing region in the United States.
If you specialized in mineral rights there, especially as a freelancer, you’d have to be a fairly respected veteran in the industry.
So if he’s self-employed, he’d have ties to plenty of oil companies and landowners. He’d be earning commissions based on the independent network he built himself. That explains why he’s so adamant about not wanting his daughter to work under someone else.
I asked Caroline, “If your father’s worked in that field that long, he must have a pretty wide network.”
“Yeah. He probably has business cards from hundreds of Texas landowners and oil company reps. I don’t even know how many card binders are piled up at home. Why? Are you interested?”
“Honestly, a little. I’m interested in the energy industry, too.”
“Really? I heard the barrier to entry in that field is really high.”
“That’s exactly why I want to learn more. If it’s possible later on—way later would be fine—could I maybe meet your father? Hearing realistic stories from someone in the industry would help me a lot.”
Caroline blinked in surprise.
“You want to meet my dad? Seriously?”
“Yeah. The fastest way to learn is to hear directly from someone who’s worked in the field for a long time.”
“······.”
Caroline stared at me for a moment.
Then she suddenly broke into a bright smile.
“Okay! My dad will be thrilled if I tell him I have a friend who’s interested in the energy industry! I had zero interest in it myself, so he was kind of disappointed on the inside. I’ll call him later!”
“Thanks. Oh, and I was hoping to borrow a meeting room······”
“Any time! There’s seriously no one around these days!”
Caroline set down the reservation ledger she’d been hugging and opened it.
“How many people are using the room?”
“Three, including me.”
“Three? Hmm······”
She twirled her pen once.
“I’ll put you in Room 91. It’s the biggest and best one. Normally it’s only available for groups of eight or more, but the place is empty anyway because it’s break.”
“Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it! That’s what friends are for! And thanks for listening to me complain! I feel a little lighter now.”
Caroline placed the key on my palm and winked.
***
Room 91 was broad and high-ceilinged.
There was a solid mahogany table that could comfortably seat twenty and leather chairs with tall backs.
Outside the windows, snow-covered Harvard Yard lay in full view.
I welcomed Vito Hamilton and Soren Hamilton to that table.
As you might guess from their surnames, the two were relatives.
Vito slid a thick file folder toward me.
“Mr. Lee. The acquisition process for the four bankrupt corporations you instructed us to obtain has been fully completed as of today.”
After the last warehouse acquisition incident, his address and tone had become extremely polite and formal.
Probably due to the enormous fees involved.
“Black Gigantia Drilling Solutions, Pinkfoot Goliath Drilling Company, Brazilian Black Geological Exploration Institute, and King Baboon Pipeline Services. All four were officially acquired through court auction.”
When acquiring bankrupt companies, people often used what was called a 363 Sale.
The name came from Section 363 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code, a structure in which assets and liabilities were separated under court supervision so only the juicy assets could be taken cleanly.
The previous company’s debts and lawsuits and other headaches didn’t come along with the purchase.
“Since the economy is sluggish, there were no competitors and the creditors stayed quiet. The judge’s calendar happened to be open, which allowed us to acquire only the valuable parts without worrying about contingent liabilities.”
“Good work.”
Meanwhile, Soren, seated beside him, also set down his calculator.
“Mr. Lee. The tax structure for the four acquired entities has also been finalized.”
The documents Soren handed over were densely filled with each corporation’s asset valuations and estimated taxes.
“If you apply net operating loss carryforwards under the Lee Energy holding company, you can significantly reduce corporate tax for the next three years. The Texas state energy industry revitalization fund application is also pending approval. If you satisfy the employment-retention requirement, you can recover about 18 percent of the acquisition amount as a subsidy.”
“······.”
There was a subsidy program that paid companies if they acquired bankrupt businesses without laying off the existing employees and instead preserved the jobs.
It was part of a policy to lower unemployment during a downturn.
Flip.
I turned over a page of the file.
It was a list of workers who had been laid off from those four bankrupt companies.
Drilling technicians, geological surveyors, pipeline technicians, transport drivers······
Red lines had been drawn beside dozens of names.
That meant they’d already been dismissed.
“Where are these people now?”
“Most are probably drawing unemployment or drifting through day labor jobs. Their companies went bankrupt overnight, so they lost their jobs just as suddenly.”
“I should reach out to them. All of them.”
Vito and Soren both looked at me at once.
“All of them? The companies you just acquired are little more than shells now. If you rehire the workers, the fixed costs could be quite substantial······.”
“I’m not talking about having them return to the acquired companies.”
I placed my finger on the list.
“I’m planning to transfer them to the headquarters, Lee Energy.”
“!”
Their eyes widened.
But this was the obvious next step.
If you wanted to develop oil fields or mine gold, you needed people.
And not just any people—skilled hands and feet, experienced veterans who knew the work inside and out and had spent their whole lives in the oil business.
“If we’re going to expand the gas station franchise, we’ll need an exponentially larger facilities team, transport team, and management team. It’s far more efficient to take these people in and place them where they fit than to hire rookies and train them from scratch.”
If we didn’t grab them while they were on the market, then when the economy recovered, we’d have to tempt them with salaries twice or three times as high.
So hiring them now was the cheapest way to keep labor costs down.
Of course, they’d also get stable jobs with reliable income while they were unemployed, so in every respect it was a win-win deal.
Soren’s eyes gleamed.
“You mean to secure the skilled workers at this point in time.”
“Exactly. And they’re family men who were cast out of bankrupt companies. If I extend a hand to them, they won’t forget it. I’m also planning to pay them ten percent above the industry average. And I’ll provide separate incentives.”
“Splendid. I imagine every one of them will want to return to work.”
Vito nodded as well.
“Understood, Mr. Lee. I’ll take responsibility for drafting all the paperwork needed for the rehiring and succession process.”
“Thank you.”
I shook hands with Vito and Soren.
***
Back in Dormitory 202 at Matthews Hall, I returned to my room.
As I flopped onto the bed, the mountain of papers piled all the way to the edge of the blanket rippled.
Even more documents from Vito and Soren were stacked on the desk.
Vito handled the law, Soren the taxes and accounting.
They were experts in their fields, so their work was reliable.
The problem was that I was the only one who had to gather their results and coordinate everything.
Answering calls, managing schedules, organizing data······ I barely had enough hands for it all.
I need to hire a secretary.
If possible, it would be better to pick one from among the Harvard students.
For the time being, the work wouldn’t be complicated.
Organizing my schedule, answering the phone for me, sorting files, or passing my words along to other people.
There was no need to spend a fortune and hire a professional secretary on a full-time basis.
If I posted an ad on the dorm bulletin board, I could probably find one or two people quickly enough.
Then the door opened.
Victor came in carrying a pizza box.
“Hey, Sanha. What’re you doing?”
“Trying to hire some people.”
“People? For what?”
“A secretary. Someone to manage my schedule, organize documents, and sort data.”
Victor set the pizza box down on the desk.
“What about me?”
“······You?”
“Why not? Is there some reason I can’t?”
Victor said it with a serious expression.
“I took CS50 this semester. I learned straight from Professor David Malan. I know C, and I can even write Excel macros.”
CS50 was Harvard’s intro computer science course, a wildly popular class with several hundred students enrolled every year.
Victor pointed at the pile of documents on my desk.
“This is all personnel data, right? I can write a program and sort it myself. Names, experience, addresses, special skills······ just tell me what you need.”
“Hmm.”
I thought about it for a moment.
Victor was my roommate, he already knew at least some of what I was doing, and his mouth was reliably shut.
Besides, he was already part of Blood & Guts, the club Grace had founded.
“You really want to do it?”
“Of course. There’s a lot I can learn from you. I told you before, didn’t I? I want to work beside you and see firsthand how a business actually runs. Even if it’s unpaid, I don’t care.”
Victor’s eyes glittered.
Yes—before I regressed, Victor had always been that kind of guy.
He might seem easygoing on the surface, but when something caught his interest, he pursued it seriously.
“Fine. Try it first. Since it’s your first time, the hourly rate is twenty dollars. But secrecy is absolutely mandatory.”
“Whoa, that’s a strong hourly rate! Got it! Thanks!”
“Then here’s your first assignment. Put up a notice on the campus bulletin board. I need to hire one more secretary.”
“Okay. What qualifications?”
“Someone like you. Hardworking, discreet, and able to handle a computer.”
“Preferably a pretty girl, right?”
“······We’re supposed to review the resumes based on ability.”
I walked to the window and pulled back the blinds.
Swish.
Twilight had settled over the campus.
Far beyond the Charles River, Boston’s lights glittered in the distance.
The capital had been secured, the legal obstacles removed, and the organization that would become my hands and feet was finally taking shape.
Which meant oil field development and gold mine development were now in the countdown stage.
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