Chapter 6 - The Chaos at the Country Club
The connection popped open to pure, unadulterated, high-definition insanity.
The background was blinding—crystalline light bouncing off massive crystal chandeliers, gilded gold wall sconces, and soaring floor-to-ceiling mirrors inside the Grand Ballroom of the Oakridge Country Club. High-end floral arrangements featuring white orchids and import roses sat on thirty round tables covered in pristine silk cloths.
But the party was not happening. The party was destroyed.
In the center of the dance floor, directly beneath a three-tiered ice sculpture carved into the shape of two intertwining swans, two uniformed county police officers were forcefully wrestling a man down against a mahogany buffet table.
It was Victor.
His expensive white linen designer jacket was ripped cleanly open at the left shoulder seam. His hair, usually combed back with expensive pomade, was plastered across his forehead in wet, sweaty strands. His face was beet-red, his eyes wide and wild with terror as an officer pulled his right arm behind his back, snapping a heavy steel handcuff over his wrist with a sharp, metallic CLACK.
“I have lawyers!” Victor was screaming into the phone’s microphone, his voice high-pitched and hysterical, completely stripped of its smooth, aristocratic polish. “You can’t touch me! Call Arthur Vance! Call my office!”
In the corner of the screen, my sister Khloe was curled into a ball on a plush velvet sofa, sobbing so hard she was hyperventilating. She was wearing a three-thousand-dollar designer engagement dress that was now stained with spilled red wine down the front, holding a ruined bouquet of crushed orchids, her mascara running down her neck in dark, thick rivers.
And in the foreground, standing so close to the phone camera that his flushed, red face filled half the screen, was my father.
Behind him stood a tall, thin man wearing a sharp navy-blue blazer with a gold Oakridge Country Club crest embroidered on the breast pocket. The manager was holding a thick black leather binder jammed full of printed invoices, pointing a trembling finger at my father’s chest.
“Audrey! Oh God, Audrey, thank God you answered!” my mother wailed into the speaker, her camera shaking violently as she gripped the phone with both hands. She wasn't looking at the camera; her eyes were darting frantically back and forth across the chaotic ballroom. “Audrey, it’s a nightmare! It’s an absolute nightmare! Victor... oh God, Victor!”
“What happened, Mom?” I asked. My voice sounded strange to my own ears—completely flat, calm, and detached, like an air-traffic controller monitoring a crash from a thousand miles away.
“It was all fake!” Mom shrieked, her voice cracking into a high-pitched scream that made Earl wince. “Everything! The credit cards he gave the venue bounced twenty minutes ago! The five-thousand-dollar deposit check he wrote three months ago was drawn on a closed account in Cleveland! The German car he drove here was towed out of the parking lot ten minutes ago because it was thirty days overdue on a fraudulent lease!”
“Audrey! Give me that damn phone!” my father’s voice roared over the line.
He shoved my mother’s shoulder aside, grabbing the device and slamming his furious, sweating face into the frame. His eyes were bloodshot, his collar unbuttoned, his silk tie crooked.
“Audrey!” Dad barked, his voice filled with that familiar, imperious command he used whenever he was terrified and needed someone else to carry the load. “Tell Trevor to get his shop account opened right now! We need a wire transfer!”
I stared at my father through the glass. “What are you talking about, Dad?”
“The country club manager called the cops!” Dad shouted, gesturing wildly behind him toward the man with the binder. “They’ve got the doors locked! They won't let anyone leave the building—not Aunt Cheryl, not Uncle Bob, nobody—until the event bill is paid! It’s thirty-two thousand dollars, Audrey! Thirty-two thousand dollars for the catering, the open bar, the ice sculpture, and the hall rental!”
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“Thirty-two thousand,” I repeated flatly.
“The manager says if someone doesn't produce a verified corporate check or a wire transfer within fifteen minutes, he’s pressing full criminal fraud charges against Victor AND against me because my name is on the secondary event agreement!” Dad screamed, his face turning an alarming shade of deep purple. “Your sister is dying over here! Aunt Cheryl is having a panic attack in the bathroom! Tell Trevor to use his business line of credit and wire thirty-two thousand to the Oakridge account IMMEDIATELY!”
