Barry had really outdone himself with the celebration party. Spending half a million dollars for a single event was a little over the top. Merida was not an expensive city, so the money went a long way and he had hired three party planners to organize the details. The guest list included all their workers and contractors and their families included those who lived in other countries. They had invited the soldiers who had come to their rescue as well as local politicians and other people they had worked with the past six months. Close to 1000 people including family members had accepted the invitation, and they had rented out most of the Merida Hyatt for the event.
Barry’s original plan to pick everyone up in stretch limousines was not feasible. There just weren’t enough available in the area, but they were able to find private drivers for everyone who wanted transportation. There were six bars set up including the pool bar and two ballrooms were filled with tables and dancing areas.
Barry, Scott, Matt and Carl arrived in one limo and the girls in another. There were several other limos for the top employees and all the security forces who had participated in defending the compound. A small army of tailors and dressmakers had made them all custom outfits for the event. They had spent time with hair stylists plus makeup artists for the girls.
At Barry’s insistence, the boys were wearing Cuban influenced clothing with button down shirts and slacks made from lightweight, colorful materials, complete with Fedoras. The girls had custom dresses made, but the boys had not been allowed to see them yet.
Arriving at the party, Barry had insisted they have a red carpet and a DJ playing music outside announcing them when they arrived. A fairly good-sized crowd had gathered to see what was going on, and one enterprising street vendor had set up a taco cart nearby. Because Barry was kind of an idiot, he insisted the boys were armed with T-Shirt cannons and they had fun launching Genysis logo T-Shirts into the confused crowd.
Entering the lobby of the hotel, one of the party planners, Oscar, led them to the first reception area.
“Welcome Mr. Yong and friends. I was told to lead you here for drinks and appetizers until your lady friends arrive.” Oscar said politely. He enjoyed working with Barry who had been excited about everything and wasn’t worried about the cost.
The boys sat around admiring the colorful decorations and greeting a few people they had worked with. A lot of people looked familiar but were better dressed than usual. They didn’t know the names of all the construction crew or house staff, but between the four of them they remembered about a quarter of the people in the room. One man, dressed in a sports coat and t-shirt, Scott remembered as Lorenzo Ceron who was the government official who had inspected their facility when they were first getting started.
“Ah, hello. I heard you announced on arrival as Scott Henderson, one of the owners of the Genysis companies who are sponsoring this event.”
‘Hello Mr. Ceron,” Scott said. He was pretty pleased his memory tricks allowed him to retrieve the man’s name. “It has been a very eventful time since the last time we saw you.”
“Ah, I am impressed you even remember me. Yes, it has been eventful. I have received a large number of permit and business license requests from your company. It is safe to say you are one of the few bright spots in our city’s economy at the moment, despite the rather alarming reports I received about military conflict and a large explosion.”
Scott didn’t like where this was going. “Well, we were attacked, but our rebuilding is going well. Is there anything I can help you with this evening?”
“No, I’m not on duty now. I was pleased to receive this invitation even though I must insist this will not affect how I will process any of your requests. Honestly, I was planning to skip this party to avoid impropriety, but the mayor insisted. Perhaps I can introduce you to him?”
Scott wondered why he was getting singled out. Dealing with people was not his specialty, although he supposed Melinda would struggle in a face-to-face meeting. Maybe they should hire another executive to handle this kind of thing? Lorenzo led him to an overdressed man with salt and pepper hair.
“Scott Henderson, may I introduce you to the mayor of Merida, Antonio Bucio?”
“Ah, a pleasure to meet one of the young Americans investing in the great state of Yucatan,” the mayor said with a smile.
“Nice to meet you as well. Thanks for attending our party.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t miss the chance to meet with such a dynamic group of people. I was told by Lorenzo that you are one of the main reasons my city has been an island of stability during this terrible recession. I believe one of you backers, Solomon Rhodes has also been quite active setting up homeless shelters, funding research hospitals and sending generous donations to our schools. Do you know if Mr. Rhodes will be attending this evening?”
That was news to Scott. Solomon Rhodes was donating millions to charities in Merida? The guy was in prison. How did he have so much money?
“Yeah, Mr. Rhodes won’t be attending. He’s unavoidably detained with some business in Texas.” Scott answered. He was pretty pleased with how he had phrased that.
“Oh, that’s too bad. Well, please send him my compliments. There are so many people having a hard time right now, so we really appreciate the support of those who are more fortunate. Please pass on my regards and let Mr. Rhodes know I would love to meet with him at his convenience.”
“Sure, I’ll pass that on.” Scott said. His phone buzzed. He had a text from Melinda saying the girls had almost arrived. “Well, the ladies are arriving so I’m going to go watch their entrance.”
“Well, it was a pleasure,” the mayor said smoothly, handing him a card. “Please feel free to contact me if you need any advice on expediting bureaucratic matters.”
If that wasn’t fishing for a bribe, Scott would eat his stylish new hat. He wondered how much it was going to cost them to keep in business here.
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The girls exited their limousine in glamorous new dresses, complete with heels and elaborate hairstyles. They all had flowers braided into their hair and Scott’s eyes widened when he saw Adriana. She had dyed her hair to match the light green color that was coming in at her roots, with small red flowers braided in. A tropical print dress and wide brimmed hat completed the look.
The girls entered with much more dignity than the boys, although Barry had insisted on photographers to capture their runway moment. The crowd had grown a bit larger since the boys entered, and many were cheering as if these women were real celebrities. Scott could see how someone could make that mistake and he heard people in the crowd speculating on who they were. He was still working on his Spanish, but he was amused to hear one girl insisting that they were Princesas.
“Hey Scott, pick up your lower jaw and escort me into the party.” Adriana teased, clearly amused with the reactions she was getting.
Scott noticed that Adriana had arrived with Elsa, Zaliha, Melinda, Marta and Angela Stein. He quickly kept his eyes moving when Angela made eye contact with him. He was definitely not going to notice how good she looked in her white floral dress.
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“Oh, do I have competition now?” Adriana asked. Scott kept his eyes down in embarrassment.
They walked into the reception area, and the girls quickly ditched Scott and his friends to talk to various people. He decided he needed another drink.
Scott watched as Carl was already surrounded by four different women. He seemed to be telling a very entertaining story based on their reactions. Scott cast a worried glance at Melinda, but she was ignoring Carl’s antics and had gone off to a table to talk on her phone. He hoped she wasn’t ordering a hit on the women flirting with Carl. He decided to give her a call, so he sat at a nearby table and made eye contact.
“Hey Melinda, you look great!” Scott said. She actually did look good for someone her age. Her hair looked nice, and her wrinkles were less pronounced. Melinda also seemed fit enough that Scott wondered if she had gone through a version of the procedure she had forced on him. If he didn’t know better, he would have guessed she was an athletic woman in her mid-forties.
“I feel like crap.”
“Well, I have to admit it was worth it. Adriana seems to like hanging out with me now.” Wow, that girl is kind of shallow, Scott realized.
“She is kind of insecure. She liked you before but was too embarrassed to be with you the way you used to look and act.” Melinda explained.
“What?” Scott said.
“Well, sorry. Anyway, you probably felt the same way about me. We can’t all have natural charisma like that magnificent man.” Melinda said, gesturing over at Carl. How did Carl get women half his age fawning over him? Scott thought he looked almost as good, but he didn’t exactly have groups of random women hitting on him. Well, maybe a few women had checked him out.
“Anyway, I’m about to make an announcement, so we can talk later.” Even with five personalities, Melinda had better things to do than talk to Scott right now.
“Hello, is anyone sitting there?” Scott looked up to a dark-haired young woman. Her eyes sparkled in the light, and he couldn’t miss her tight black dress and bright red lipstick. He briefly looked around to see if any of his friends could bail him out.
“Ah, not at the moment but I really need to go meet my friends.”
“OK, maybe I can meet them too. My name is Carmen. I came here with my parents. This party is amazing! I heard you were some kind of VIP.”
Scott looked around nervously. Either this girl liked him, or she was some kind of spy. This was way outside his social experience.
“Yeah, this is a party for one of the companies I work with. It’s mostly my friend Barry’s company. He’s that guy over there doing shots with that guy who looks like a shaved gorilla. That gorilla is Sotera, and he would just laugh if he heard me call him that. He beats me up all the time sparring, but he’s super nice the rest of the time.” Scott found he was talking way too much. He should stay focused on getting away from this girl!
“Let’s go say hi then, maybe do a shot with them?” Carmen asked.
“Yeah, if Barry is doing shots, he’s probably about 15 minutes from passing out. Before that we can expect him to treat us with his latest crackpot theories on quantum physics.” Scott decided it was time to get away from this overly friendly girl. “Anyway, I think I need to go find my date.”
“No problem. See you around.” The girl smiled and left. Scott struggled not to enjoy the view as she left. He didn’t really know if Adriana was his date, but he was going to try not to ruin it if he had a chance.
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“I have an announcement,” Melinda’s voice came over the speakers after a song finished playing.
“For those of you who don’t know me, I’m the boss! Anyway, please head to the dining hall and sit at your assigned tables. I’ve left a small gift for all my employees, so please take a break and eat some of the amazing food. Especially you Barry! Can one of you meatheads make sure he eats something and stops drinking before he blabs all our company secrets… again!”
Scott had spotted Adriana talking to some ridiculously good-looking guy and had decided not to interrupt her. He was glad that Carmen had flirted with him, or he would have been more upset.
Instead, he decided to hang out with Matt and Zaliha. Scott felt like a third wheel, but they were both really smart and not afraid to talk about geek culture, so he was having fun.
They made their way to the dining hall. All the young people were at the same table near the front. Looking around, most of the tables had gift baskets with envelopes. He saw people opening their envelopes and they looked pleased. At Scott’s table they only had envelopes.
“What, no gift basket? Lame!” Barry complained.
Melinda continued, “Oh yeah don’t forget to look in the envelopes at your table. We’ve had a rough start, but everyone here helped us get things back on track and I’m deeply grateful for the hard work and excellence of all our amazing employees.”
Scott opened his envelope. Inside were a small stack of dividend checks. A sticky note on top, said they had hired an accountant and he should expect his taxes would be about 30% for Mexico plus an additional 7% on top for US expat taxes. The first check from Genysis Mining, followed by Energy, Robotics and Biotech and they all had big numbers. He fumbled with his phone and added it up. The total was $1,642,500 US dollars. Scott stared at it, completely stunned.
“Whoa dude…” Barry said.
“Yeah, that is a lot.” Matt replied, looking equally stunned. They compared their numbers. Matt had received the most, slightly over $2 million. Barry had $1.8 million. Elsa had $250k and even Adriana received $61k for her small share in the mining company. Her construction company was the only venture currently running at a loss. Her work building submarines, ships and designing the base were not enough to offset the huge expenditures getting the habitat started.
Scott’s dad approached the table. His mom and sister had also flown in for the event and they were sitting together at another table.
“Hey Scott! From the stunned look on your face, I guess you got a bonus too. I got $140k for completing my first run as captain! Your mom and I are going to make a down payment on a house and move down here. Your sister will be off to college, but I bet she won’t mind visiting us down here! Oh, I didn’t forget that I would help you pay off your student loans.”
“Um, that won’t be necessary.” Scott mumbled. He showed them the check on the top of his small stack which was for $245k.
“Nice! Owner money is the best!” His dad was enthusiastic.
“Yeah, my loans won’t be a problem. Maybe I can help you buy that house, but you might want to wait. There is some interesting real estate about to come on the market. Maybe you could wait and just rent a house this year?”
“Oh?” Scott’s dad could tell there was a story here.
“Let’s talk about it later.”
“Sure, well I hope you can show your mom around a bit. I’m going to leave on another run. This time I’m going to Savannah. They load up the ship quickly, so I don’t get to stay here long. I’ll probably be rotating with another crew so I can stay here about half the time. Can you imagine working six months a year and I’ll probably earn more this year than I did the last ten at my old job.”
“That’s great!”
“Right, well I’m sure you don’t want to hang out with your parents when there are lovely girls like Adriana who probably want to dance.”
“I have no idea how to dance.” Scott said, his eyes shifting around as he took a half step back.
“Don’t worry, I’ll teach you.” Adriana said. Then she whispered, “Well, I’ll give you one lesson and then we have to hire you a dance instructor.” Preferably someone 60 years old and 300 pounds, Adriana thought.
Sergio approached their group. He was wearing a tailored sports coat and lightweight slacks/ Sergio carried a metal briefcase with a handcuff chain, just like in the movies where they kept huge stacks of cash.
“Hold up. Melinda wanted me to hold the contents of your envelopes. We could reissue them if you lost them, but I thought it would be cool to have a suitcase with millions of dollars inside. Some people here might look at you funny if they saw how much money you guys are making.” Sergio said. “I’m already holding Angela and Dr. Springer’s check from the old people's table. Don’t forget you all have rooms booked in the hotel so have a great time and don’t try to leave the hotel until tomorrow!”
With that complication sorted, the group drank too much, danced with a lot of people they didn’t know and generally had an amazing time. At some point they all ended up in the pool with new friends and they had all had fuzzy memories of anything that happened after that.