Gynophagia Chronicles: Samantha
Friday, August 28, 8 AM
Franklin High School, San Ramon, CA
Narrative Reconstructed by Peter Howard
“You have it?” Glen asked earnestly as Gianni approached in pleated shorts and a collared T-Shirt that matched Glens’ look. The only thing that really distinguished Glen were the Olympic rings on is teat.
“Yeah,” Gianni said, handing glen a thick Manila envelope.
“You’re late!” Glen admonished, taking the envelope and tossing it into his Porsche 988 Turbo Diesel Convertible. From the car he retrieved two badges on neck chains.
“Sponsor’s card,” Glen said. “That means you’re a big time donor. Anywhere I go, you have leave to follow. But don’t run off without me.”
“Very well,” said Gianni, not at all enthusiastic about being reprimanded by Glen.
“Next, this is Franklin High. Say it!”
“Franklin High.”
“The team is the Minutemen.”
“What about the girls’ team?”
Glen batted Gianni’s shoulder. “Say it!”
“Minute Men.”
“The principal is Gwen Farmer.”
“Gwen Farmer,” Gianni said obediently.
“Good,” Glen opened the door to his SUV parked next to the Porsche and retrieved a video camera. “Let’s go.”
The Porsche blasted off with rear tires gained traction only after Glen made sure he laid rubber.
“So, guess what? I get to spend the whole week on this side of the hill just for you!”
“What?” said Gianni. “Why?”
“Well,” Glen said. “Because the AOC found out I was coming here and started asking why am I bothering with this tiny little school. I had to tell them something. So I told them I wanted to see what we might be missing. They thought it was such a fantastic idea, now I get to visit every single bloody tiny bullshit school in Alameda and Contra Costa counties! Add to that: my Parents found out I’m going to be around for a while. I have to meet them for lunch, every single day of the week while I’m nearby!”
“But they live in Brentwood!”
“Oh… that’s close in this area, trust me!” Glen said. “I know they measure distance in feet an inches on the east coast, but here neighbours can be hundreds of miles apart and still visit. Bottom line is this: you owe me big!”
“I paid you big!” Gianni said, getting angry.
“We’ll see.”
Franklin High was only a few minutes off the freeway. The building was a throwback with three stories so that the entire school was housed in a single building.
Glen led Gianni inside to the main corridor. Dark wood to the chair rail with white paint above, the corridors were lined with glass trophy and display cases. Most of it, of course, housed sports memorabilia. On the far wall was a pretty Eurasian woman putting up a newspaper page.
“Excuse me,” Glen approached the woman. “I’m Glen Carrington here to see Principal Farmer.”
“Oh, Yes,” said the woman. “She’s been anxious to meet you, Mr. Carrington. She’ll be back any minute. I’m Lisa, her secretary. I’ll inform her you’re here. Can I get you or your associate anything to drink? I’m afraid we only have coffee or tea… or water.”
Glen refused the offer and elected to remain in the hallway as Gianni casually took interest in what the young woman had been posting. The page was out of the local newspaper and reprinted in the Franklin High Minuteman.
“Someone get an award?” he asked Lisa when she returned to finish her task.
“This? Well, sort of. One of our Journalism Students had a piece picked up by the Amador Herald. Here it is,” she pulled out a copy of the school paper and handed it to Gianni, which Gianni accepted. Then she posted on the board a black and white head-shot of the girl in question. Gianni regarded the photograph for a moment. The girl had an ageless quality Gianni tended to favour. She could have been thirteen or thirty. She was also ethereally beautiful.
“Pretty girl,” Gianni said to himself.
“Yes,” Lisa said with a casual acknowledgement as if it had not occurred to her. “She is that.”
Gianni folded the paper Lisa had given him and put it in his pocket, never intending to read it. At least he had no such intention until the school secretary pinned up a strip of yellow paper with the words: “Carmen Sanchez Interview by Samantha Wells”
“Mr. Carrington?” called a deep womanly voice. Gianni turned to see a leggy, tall, handsome blonde in her mid to late thirties.
“Miss Farmer,” said Glen. “I’m very sorry we’re late.”
“These things happen,” said Miss Farmer. “Lisa, Mr. Carrington is to have access to any student records he requests.”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“Come, I’ll give you a quick tour.”
At the end of this inspired and interesting tour of what amounted to any school anywhere, Glen and Gianni finally made it to the gymnasium where the entire Senior Class were doing swim trials while the Juniors were on the courts.
It was difficult to identify individual girls in their white caps and blue one pieces save for a number printed on the girls’ caps. Glen began video recording them all methodically.
“Excuse me,” Gianni called as a stocky PE Instructor passed by.
The woman was stocky yet attractive, not quite pretty, in Gianni’s opinion, and a little brutish in her behaviour. Gianni thought instantly that this one might easily take down the body builder back at Tropicana Blue…
“Yeah,” the woman said with only a hint of personability. “What can I do for you? HEY! Lilly get out of the pool! I told you no mucking around!”
After a moment she turned back to Gianni. “Sorry.”
“That’s al right,” said Gianni. “We need to be able to put names to these athletes. Do you have a print out that…”
“Numbers on the caps, yeah… got that,” she went to her bag and produced a thick stapled set of papers. “Names, Numbers, locker assignments, it’s all there…”
“Thanks,” said Gianni.
“No sweat,” said the instructor.
It took Gianni several minutes to find a single Wells on the list. Then he found three. 1404, 1405 and 1406, Samantha, Jenna and Grace, respectively. He spotted Grace first. The girl had a large chest that reminded him of Lena the flight attendant and whose smile reminded him of Kathy, Lena’s companion. She was exceptionally pretty, even with her hair hidden by the white cap. Then he spotted Samantha by identifying 1404. When she turned so that he could see her face, Gianni could not believe the colour of her eyes. Surely she wore contacts! But: contacts when swimming? Not smart, if she was.
“Not bad,” said Glen.
“What?” asked Gianni.
“That girl, Jenna wells, good time. Pity she’s a senior. We could have developed her as a talent. Maybe some of the younger girls in that family might be prospects. That coach is holding them back, though…”
The last Gianni could tell for himself. The woman was obviously good at discipline but she had no concept of how to run a training regimen, at least for her swimmers. Instead she focused on the least among them and applied that standard to all.
When noon finally arrived, the pair made their way back to the administration office. Lisa graciously surrendered her desk to them as she broke for lunch.
It was never this easy, Gianni thought. The price was being bored witless for a few hours, and here was the reward. The entire wells family history, medical and academic. All that was missing was actual tissue samples. The whole thing amounted to one hundred eighty eight gigabytes of data. All the girls were at least halfway through high school without a single culling. That was not unknown, but it was rare, certainly. It was, however, common among the families he was following. In Toronto, the Maynard family’s twelve girls had all made it to sixteen. In KC, the Bidens had nine girls: all alive and all fifteen or older.
Gianni took he file from Glen as Miss Farmer appeared.
“So,” asked the principal. “What do you think of our swimming program?”
Glen shook his head. “There’s a lot of talent here, Miss Farmer.”
Farmer’s expression slacked. “But?”
“But I think your coach is…”
“Is what?”
Glen pulled out his wallet.
“Call this man,” he extracted a card and handed it to the principal. “Mike Borov is guy you want to talk to. He’s our athletic resource director in Washington. He can find you the right personnel to develop the talent you have on your budget. If you’re truly interested in having an Olympic Level Program, you’ll call him.”
Gianni drove as Glen read the file Gianni had given him.
“You’ve got to be kidding me!”
“What?”
“Mike, DeSilva’s bribed Commissioner Albertson?”
“Repeatedly.”
“Jesus H Christ!”
“What’s wrong?” Gianni asked, knowing exactly what was wrong. “You could destroy Johnny with that!”
“Yeah! And I could take down one of my father’s closest friends along with him! How’d you get this?”
“Trade secret! Crimes nobody wants reported, and all that jazz…”
“So you broke into Johnny’s club, got this, and you need me to get these?” Glen indicated the Wells files.
“Yes I did,” said Gianni. “Time is short, and I need them without attracting the wrong kind of attention. Need I remind you a school, even a charter school, is a de-facto government institution. Johnny, on the other hand, is a hood. You think he’ll get the police involved with this? Not a chance.”
“Okay,” Glen said. “But this shit is useless to me.”
“Hey,” Gianni said. “I risked my neck to get that for you. You only risked your job.”
“Yeah… whatever,” Glen was not happy. “So there is a whole lot of cloak and dagger involved here… I knew it!”
Gianni drove the Porsche down Hartz Avenue in Danville and parked in front of a bistro with a patio imaginatively called “The Patio.” Glen’s parents were already there.
“Where’s Astrid?” asked Glen.
“She was being a pain in the ass,” said Sylvester Carrington. “I told her to stay home. How are you, Michael!” He was nearly sixty years old, his greying hair still with hints of the blond locks he had sported in younger years. Like his son, he was solidly built with a broad chest and six foot four. Also like his son, he had an athletic past, having played ten years in the NFL. His build and carry betrayed his confidence moment to moment.
“Very good, Sir!” said Gianni. “Hello, Martha,” he kissed Mrs. Carrington on the cheek. “You look as beautiful as ever.”
Certainly that was not a lie. Sylvester Carrington’s second wife had been a Playpen Playmate in her youth. He’d married her when he was still playing for the San Diego Chargers, shortly after he’d culled his first wife. At forty four she was a full head shorter than her husband at 5’8” and wore a flimsy orange silk dress that seemed to expose rather than cover her lovely figure. Indeed, she seemed not to be wearing any underwear at all under it, nothing supported that generous chest that held firm even at her age. Her dirty blonde hair was cut neck length and billowed over her crown. Both her lips and eyes smiled expressively when Gianni approached.
“Michael,” Mrs. Carrington said. “It’s wonderful to see you again. How are things?”
“Busy, actually,” said Gianni. “Mrs. Carrington, you truly are a vision.” He said, and he meant it.
“Only a true gentleman could pull off such an obvious lie,” said Martha Carrington. “If you had learned from this one, Glen, you’d be married by now!”
Glen rolled his eyes.
“I’ve vowed,” she continued, turning back to Gianni. “To get Glen a wife before I die! So I have to torture him daily till he relents.”
“A Whole week of this!” Glen reminded. “You sooo owe me!”
“For what?” Sylvester asked.
“Glen did me a personal favour,” said Gianni.
“Oh good,” said Martha. “Pay us all back by finding Glen a wife.”
“So, Pop,” Glen evaded. “Anything interesting in banking today?”
“No,” said Sylvester. “Market’s flat. But I didn’t get much work in, anyway. I’ve been on the phone all morning.”
“With who?” Glen asked, obviously not really interested.
“Got a call from Marcus Jackson’s campaign manager. Or your mother did.”
“It was Sheila, actually,” said Martha. She was sent a news clipping from this morning’s Amador Herald. The local paper out here.”
Gianni’s ears picked up. “What kind of clipping?” asked Gianni.
“Well, it seems that some high school student interviewed Carmen Sanchez. The answers she gave were quite shocking, or, to the unwashed masses and certain idiots in office they would be shocking. Anyway, Sheila asked me to find a way to get to the girl and talk to her discretely, so we can find out what else she has, etc. Apparently, our boy Marcus is working closely with Sanchez on legislation not to be made public before the election. The thing could derail his Senate Campaign if it gets publicized prematurely. We’re hoping the cat isn’t already out of the bag, so Sheila wants to do damage control. They’re furious with Sanchez.”
“Are you involved with the Jackson camp?” asked Gianni.
“Martha runs the Bay Area headquarters in Walnut Creek,” Sylvester said proudly.
This is too easy! Gianni thought. First his main objective garners more information than he could have hoped for and now he could pay off Johnny with a simple phone call and a name.
“So, anyway, Martha calls me and gives me the girl’s name, which is Samantha Wells. Well, I called up all the people with that name in San Ramon and guess what?”
“What?” Gianni was on the edge of his seat, feeling the blood drain from his face under Glen's suspicious gaze.
“I wrote the mortgage this girl’s family house not twelve years ago. Not only that, but Martha and I see them regularly! So I pull up the file and it dawns on me that Martha put me up to it back then, so I called her back and we both remember what happened.”
“Right!” Martha said. “And it was Bernie Foss that asked me to intercede on behalf of Mr. Wells all those years ago, first with a credit line, about seventeen years ago, then with a mortgage.”
“You did say Wells, correct?” Glen asked.
“Yes! I called Bernie and told him about it. Now he’s flying up from Los Angeles tomorrow night. The Jacksons will be here Sunday and we’ll all go visit the Wells’ that afternoon. Isn’t it interesting what a small world it is?”
“Yes,” Glen said, slack faced and casting a sideways glance at Gianni. “Very interesting.”
“What’s good here?” Gianni smiled… hoping to change the subject.