A Waste of Time

Anna first saw the man when he was in the living room speaking with her parents. She didn't hear all of what they were talking about but she did know that her father wasn't happy at all. Anna heard her father raise his voice to the man and she peeked her head around the corner from the kitchen.

"I didn't mean to upset you." the man said.

"If you want to give money to someone I suggest you go find a charity."

"There's a big difference between flying a commercial flight and your own private jet."

"Mr. ... Nemo was it?"

"Yes."

"Mr. Nemo I suggest you get out of my house. We don't know who you are. We don't know where your money comes from. We don't want it."

Anna looked at the man's face. He seemed very sad to hear that news. "I'm sorry you feel that way. If any of you ever need anything, anything at all, I'd be happy to ..."

"We don't need anything from you."

"Here's my card just in case you change your mind."

"Keep it."

Instead of doing as Anna's father instructed he left his card on the coffee table and then silently stood up to leave.

Anna, her younger sister, and her mom all followed at a distance as Anna's father and the man went to the front door. The man apologized again for upsetting the head of the house and then he left.

"Who was that?" asked Anna's mom once the man had driven away in his truck.

"I don't know. Some idiot."

"What did he want?"

"He comes in here and says he wants to give us a million dollars."

"For what?"

"For nothing. A gift he said."

"A million dollars?" asked Zoe. "When do we get it?"

"We're not. It's not our money."

"But ..."

"But nothing. He probably doesn't even have that kind of money to just give up. It's obviously some scam. No one just walks up to a random person on the street and says they want to give them a million dollars."

Everyone had to accept what was said. But that didn't stop Anna's imagination from exploring the possibilities. What would she do with a million dollars? Before Anna even said anything her sister started walking around the house saying how she'd buy this or go there or do that. That night as the sisters were getting ready for bed they started to ask each other what they'd really do if they had a million dollars.

"I'd buy at least two houses." said Zoe. "You know, that way I could have a place to live in and a place to invite guests over to so they don't have to see the way I really am."

"You're so weird." Anna replied. "If we got a million dollars we really should just save it. I mean, we could spend some of it but most of it would be best kept in the bank."

"I don't think you can keep that much in the bank. It's like a rule or something."

"Speaking of rules, you know we wouldn't be able to keep all of it either. If someone gave us a million dollars we'd have to give like 90 per cent of it to the government for taxes."

"Hey, I got that guy's card. Do you want to call him?"

"Dad said it was a scam."

"I know. But no harm in just asking for more information."

"I don't know. If it is a scam then ..."

"We'll just call and ask if the million dollars was only for Dad or if we could claim it."

"You heard Dad. There's almost no way the guy actually has that kind of money."

"But we're just asking questions. If he asks us to do some crazy stuff then we'll just say no and hang up on him."

"You know what they say about something being too good to be true."

"But even if we did have to give a bunch of it to taxes and it's not really a million dollars, that could be my new car. That could be you getting your own place so you don't have to live here anymore. That could be my scholarship to that school in Paris."

"Yeah and it could also be some kidnapping thing where they put you in a box and sell you as a sex slave in Germany."

"Get real."

"I am real. That guy is not just going to give us a million dollars."

"Wanna bet?"

"Sure. What do you want to lose?"

"If you win I'll give you a dollar. And if I win you give me your car."

"My car!"

"But just think, you'll have a million dollars so you can buy a new one."

"Ok. Fine. My car in a bet for a dollar."

The plan was set and the young women talked at length into the night as to who would win.

The next day was a Friday and Anna was busy at work until six in the evening. It was seven thirty by the time she actually got home and when she did her younger sister who was as yet not employed was waiting for her.

"Ready to call?" Zoe asked but Anna brushed her off so she could get her apron off and come down for family dinner.

Anna remarked in her mind that their family was not what you would call poor. They certainly weren't rich by any means but also not poor. They lived in a large two story home and there were three cars in the driveway. Anna didn't make that much money yet because she was fresh out of college and found out that her major didn't really lead to any promising careers out of the gate. Zoe was supposed to be in college but the family couldn't afford to send her to the place she wanted to go. So she was technically supposed to be looking for an alternative school or finding a way to pay for that expensive school but most of the time she loafed about the house or had fun with her friends.

After dinner Zoe pulled Anna to their room and asked again about calling.

"Don't you think it's a little late?"

"Then we'll just leave a message."

Anna shrugged her shoulders. Zoe took that as a yes and she got her phone out. Anna waited and even as she was telling herself not to get excited, she sort of felt her body getting into the mood of things.

"Hello." Zoe said. "You left your card here. Uh, huh. Yeah, but I wanted to ask if... Oh. Ok. But see was that only open to my father or could anyone claim the money? ... Really? ... How much?"

Zoe froze in place and her eyes got really big. She tried to say something to the man on the phone but she was unable to get a hold of herself.

Anna could hear the man on the phone start to say "Hello? Are you there? Hello?" Anna reached over to her sister in shock and took her phone.

"Hello." Anna answered. "You'll have to forgive my sister. She's not good on the phone."

Zoe started to fan her face and then breath in quickly.

The man started to explain again to Anna. "I understand this may come as a big surprise."

"What exactly did you say to her?"

"I'd be willing to give a gift of 100 million dollars to each person in your family."

"Each of us?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I have my own reasons."

"That's not good enough. When the IRS comes to get their taxes we're going to have to explain where all this money came from. We can't be involved in anything illegal."

"There's nothing illegal about this. I will give you a gift. You can claim it as a gift on your taxes. I'll leave it to the government to make the rules on how much you'll have to pay them but as for where the money comes from, You can just point to me."

"And who are you?"

"I'm George Nemo. I'm the guy who's going to give you 100 million dollars if you want it."

"Why us?"

"Why not you?"

"We don't need the money. Why don't you give this to the red cross or something?"

"I guess I could do that. But as of right now I'm offering to give you 100 million dollars with no strings attached. You don't have to work for me. You don't have to give me anything."

"We can just take the money and walk away and we don't have to ever see you again."

"If that's what you want."

"We'd have to do it in a public place."

"I wouldn't be giving you cash. I'd transfer the money to your bank account."

"So you want us to give you our banking details."

"No. We go to the bank and meet with the bank officer. We set up the transfer and then it takes a few days and you get the money. There's nothing scary or illegal about any of this. It's all above board."

"Do I have to decide now?"

"No. Take your time. You can call me back whenever you're ready."

"Ok. I'm going to talk to my uncle, who's a police officer just so you know. I'm going to talk to him and we're going to look into ..."

"Anna. Sorry to interrupt you. You're Anna, right?"

"Yes."

"Your mother is an only child and your father only has a sister who is already a widow. So which uncle are you talking about?"

"Um ... How do you know that?"

"I'm talking about giving you a huge sum of money. Don't you think I'd do a background check on you. Now look I'm happy to instantly make you a millionaire but I don't like being lied to."

Anna felt extremely uncomfortable with this. Who was this guy? She took the phone from her ear and looked down at it. She pushed the area of the screen that would end the call.

"What did he say?" Zoe asked.

Anna shook her head. "He's some kind of stalker."

"What?"

"Yeah. We better call the police."

After going downstairs and letting their parents know what they did another phone call was made. The next thing Anna knew she had an appointment to go down to the police station to file a complaint. That appointment happened and on Tuesday of the following week she got a phone call from the police to inform her of what would be happening.

They issued a temporary restraining order against George Nemo. If he came around they could call and have him arrested. It was only for 90 days but at least it was something. Anna was really happy to get that news because her parents had been on her case all weekend about being so stupid as to actually call an obvious scam artist.

...

It was the middle of the summer and Anna noticed a change in the break area at work. There was a sign up saying that the company had been purchased and the new owner's name made Anna do a double take.

Nemo Holdings

About a week after Anna had seen the sign a big meeting was called and some lawyer guy showed up to explain what was going to be going on. Allegedly, nothing was supposed to change at the company. No one was being fired. Everything would just continue as it always had just with a new owner.

Anna raised her hand to ask the question on who exactly the new owner was. Everyone else there had just assumed it was some big company with shareholders but Anna had a feeling that wasn't exactly the case.

"Mr. Nemo apologizes that he can not be here in person. He's attending to other important matters. But I can assure you that he holds this company and the work that you all do in very high regard and he's looking forward to paying a visit as soon as his schedule permits."

Yeah, and Anna figured his schedule would permit him in about another 28 days.

Over the next few days Anna went about researching as much as she could find about George Nemo. There didn't seem to be much. He had no presence on social media and there weren't any news stories about him. However, when she mentioned the name around town again and again she heard very good things about him.

Anna discovered that he was half owner of the ice cream shop near her house. He was also the owner of an office building downtown. He owned part of a used car dealership, a call center, several restaurants, and even a taxi company. None of the companies seemed to have anything to do with each other. He was just going around town buying whatever.

"Money laundering." Anna said as she sat in her car looking at the pizza delivery place owned by George Nemo. She just could not believe that someone would have enough money to buy their way into full or half ownership of most of the businesses in town. That didn't make sense.

That evening Anna was working on her plan to investigate this guy some more when a family meeting was called.

Anna sat on the sofa next to Zoe. Her parents didn't look happy and Anna was just hoping that this wasn't going to be about George Nemo.

"I have something important to tell you girls." their father started. "I'll admit that I think I've known for a while but today I got confirmation. I have cancer."

There was silence in the room. The different members of the family looked back and forth at each other. Eventually it was Zoe who asked.

"What kind?"

Her father took the pack of cigarettes out of his shirt pocket. "They don't call these cancer sticks for nothing."

"Lung cancer." said his wife.

"I'm going over my options with my doctor now. I have to go in for some more tests and later the doctor will tell me what my other ... um ... options are."

"Why didn't they do the tests already?" Anna asked.

"They put me on the schedule. These things have to be ..."

"Schedule? What? You have cancer and they want to put you on a schedule?"

"Calm down. That's how they do things. They have to order some ..."

"Daddy, this is serious. You need emergency care."

"Anna. Stop. This is the real world. The doctors at the hospital don't serve only me. They're busy people and I have to wait my turn just like everybody else."

That statement didn't sit well with Anna. It stayed on her mind for the rest of the night as she discovered she was not emotionally ready to lose her father. She was up half the night thinking of what to say to the doctors or other hospital staff to get them to do more for her father and more quickly.

In the morning Anna asked to look at her sister's phone. Zoe wanted to know why but Anna just gave her a vague answer. With a bit of pleading Anna got the phone and then she looked through Zoe's call history. She counted down the number of days in her head to figure out the date it must have been.

She thought she found the number she was looking for and wrote it down.

Anna left the house and went to a nearby coffee shop. She found a table where she hoped she could just sit and concentrate on the call. She dialed the number and crossed her fingers that it was the right one.

"Hello."

"Hello. Is this George Nemo?"

"Yes. Who's this?"

"This is Anna Arbor."

"Well, you still have a couple weeks left on your restraining order. Are you calling to say you want to extend it?"

"No. Actually I wanted ..."

"Cause you can make it as long as you like. If you don't want me around I can take a hint."

"I'm really sorry for how I treated you before. I wanted to ask you for a favor."

"No can do. I'm under a restraining order not to go anywhere near you."

"I understand you're upset with me but I really ..."

"Look, if you're worried about your job, don't be. I have no plans of firing you or anyone else down there."

"Not my job. My father has cancer."

"Cancer!" the man said and sounded like the word had hit him emotionally. "What?"

"He got the diagnosis yesterday and I wanted to reach out to you and ask ..."

"How the hell did he get cancer?"

"He's been a life long smoker."

"Smoker? What? When did he start smoking?"

"I think he started when he was a teenager."

"But wait. He was supposed to have quit."

"He tried like so many times but ..."

"Oh my ... FUCK! Are you fucking kidding me?"

Anna was a bit shocked to hear the level of anger coming from him. "Excuse me?"

"So all this fucking time he's been smoking."

"Um ... Ah ... Yes. He's a smoker. I wanted to ask you, if you could calm down for a moment, I wanted to ask you if there was anything you could do to help."

"Which hospital is he going to?"

"General. We have health insurance but I don't know if ..."

"I'll take care of it. You won't have to pay a dime."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I got it." Then he muttered under his breath but Anna still heard him. "Fucking cancer. I save his fucking life for him to go and get fucking cancer."

"I appreciate anything you can do."

"Don't worry about it."

"And I'll tell the police that everything before was just a misunderstanding."

"That was you being paranoid."

Normally Anna would fight back if anyone else had made a comment to her like that but in this case she held her tongue. "I probably deserve that." she said.

"And tell ... ahem ... Your Father not to worry. One way or another I'll get him cured."

"Thank you."

"Listen, can I call you back on this number or do you want my lawyer to get in touch with you instead."

"It's ok if you call me. I don't really like talking to lawyers."

"Yeah, me neither. Say, now you do me a favor. Tell Mr. Arbor to knock off the fucking smoking. You see him with cigarettes or a pipe or whatever, you take it from him. I don't care if he's your dad, you be the boss and kick his ass if he puts any of that shit in his mouth."

"Will do."

"I'm counting on you. Don't let me down."

That same day, when Anna was at work she got a phone call from her parents asking what all the fuss was about. Anna didn't understand what they were talking about at first but she started to put things together once they filled her in on what had happened. Her father's company had told him that they wanted him to go on sick leave. Then the hospital called and said he was being put to the front of the line and they wanted him to come back that day. Experts were being flown in and everything. Anna's father was not very happy with all the special treatment.

It all got to be so much that Anna's father started to just tell people that he would refuse any and all treatment unless the doctors left him alone.

So, when Anna got home there was a family meeting and for about an hour they went around and around the issue until Anna finally convinced her father to accept help from "that rich snob" as her father referred to Mr. Nemo.

That seemed to settle things for the moment. Anna called Nemo again to get his address so she could send him an official thank you letter. She thought she might get a call or a letter back from him but he didn't get back in touch with her. He stayed at a distance.

Though he wasn't physically there, she did hear his name from time to time.

"Can you believe this guy?" Anna heard a doctor say to another.

"For the money he's paying I'll believe anything he wants."

"Dude walks into my office and says I'll get 10 million a year so long as this guy doesn't die."

"He offered me the same thing."

"Don't tell me you didn't take it."

"I did. I admit it."

"So what do you think? Mr. Nemo. Nobody. A guy only has a name like that when he's trying to hide something."

"Or maybe he just read Mobi Dick too many times."

"I never got around to that one."

"You'd like it."

"Yeah?"

"It's basically just gay porn on a boat."

"Fuck off."

...

Brub-rub Brub-rub Brub-rub

Anna was pulling out of her parking spot at the supermarket and heard the sound of a flat tire. She got out of the car and saw that the front passenger side was the problem.

She'd call triple A if she were a member but of course she wasn't a member. Her father was at home but she wasn't going to call him and ask him to come out and change her tire. Fuck. Ok. She could do this. She was capable. She didn't need help. She could do it herself.

At least she was in a parking lot and not on the highway.

Honk.

Anna turned around to look.

HOOOOOONK

"Hey, lady. You gonna move or what?" yelled some guy who was looking for a space.

"I've got a flat tire."

"Fuck." yelled the guy and drove off.

Anna shook her head and looked down at her watch. How many minutes would this take. She had frozen food in the car.

She got out the tire and the jack and tried to figure out what she was supposed to be doing. She thought she had it worked out. She jacked up the car. She bet that looked attractive. She tried not to notice all the people looking at her who were walking past.

Alright, so the hard part was over. Now she just had to get the old tire off, put the spare on, and drive to the mechanic shop. She put the ... um ... she didn't know what the thing was called but it was the thing you had to put on the ... other things that held the tire on. She thought she had it on correctly and started to try and unscrew the first one.