Gap Year - 27. Chapter 27

February 17, 2004

Boston, MA

Will

I walked into the kitchen, hoping that I could scam a late lunch, and hoping I could warm up quickly after my frigid outing. It was one o’clock and I’d spent the morning wandering around campus, getting my bearings for fall when Harvard would be my home. “You are back!” Rosa said and gave me a big hug. It was so awesome to spend time with her. JJ never talked about her, probably because he was annoyed that she’d stayed here in Boston with Wade, Matt, Tiffany and the kids instead of following him to New York.

“I am back,” I said with a smile as I ended our hug, “and I am hungry.”

“You are always hungry,” she grumbled, and pointed to a chair. I sat down and stared off blankly at the kitchen wall, thinking about my visit. I’d left New York after the effective end of Fashion Week and come up here. It had been good to leave New York and its drama behind, although that came with a price, in that Patrick wasn’t here to provide me with great sex. I smiled at that, thinking about how much fun he was as a lover. There was a maturity about him that gave him more confidence, and that seemed to make him relaxed enough to focus on having fun in bed rather than being rushed, which is how everyone since I’d been with Connie had made it seem. But he’d been busy with business anyway, so coming up here was a nice excuse to give him space to do that.

Since I’d gotten here, I’d had an absolute blast with the kids. Maddy seemed to lord it over her brothers, who seemed more likely to argue with each other than with her. It had been even more fun playing with them with Matt, who acted like a big baby himself. This truly was the epitome of domestic bliss, with Matt thriving on his role as a father while studying part time, Wade focusing on school and being a father part-time, and Tiffany seemingly being the glue that held them all together. I was distracted when Rosa put a burrito in front of me. “Gracias,” I said appreciatively. She smiled and nodded, then directed herself to cleaning up the kitchen.

Wade came walking in, reading a paper as he went. “Hey there,” he said when he saw me eating. “How was Harvard?”

“Freaking cold,” I said. “It would have been great it wasn’t 20 degrees outside.”

“It’s 30 degrees,” Wade said, challenging my exaggeration.

“It was 20 degrees when I was walking around,” I said, although that was probably the low for the day. “Either way, it’s cold.”

“It is cold,” Rosa agreed, shaking her head sadly, probably missing the warmer climes of Malibu.

“Better get used to it,” Wade said, and sat at the table next to me. I focused on eating the burrito, while Wade stared at it lustfully.

“I suppose you want food too?” Rosa asked him.

“Only if it’s not too much trouble,” Wade said politely. Rosa rolled her eyes skyward then started making something for Wade.

“I was up half the night playing with your computer,” I told him. He’d joined this website called theFacebook, and he’d let me surf around on his account. “TheFacebook is so much better than Myspace.”

“It’s pretty handy for keeping up with friends on campus,” Wade agreed, but seemed skeptical. Matt chose that moment to walk in. He still looked sexy, with his dark blond hair and rounded features, but in the past he’d been a wolf and it had been part of his personality, while now he seemed more sedate. It seemed like fatherhood had calmed him down a lot. He greeted me warmly as well, then looked at Rosa.

“I will make you something too,” she said, before he could ask.

“Thanks Rosa,” he said, smiling at her and hitting her with his full charm offensive.

“Will likes theFacebook,” Wade said.

“You do, eh?” he asked. “Why?”

“Myspace is all about the site itself,” I tried to explain. “It’s like you have to master and overcome it to do what you want. TheFacebook is more like a tool sitting in the background. It’s way easier to use.”

“These social media sites are a dime a dozen,” he said skeptically. “LiveJournal, Friendster, and now Myspace. I don’t see this FaceBook thing doing anything different. It’s like they’re coming to the party late with technology that isn’t as advanced.”

“Really?” I asked, because it wasn’t about advanced tech, it was about how easy it was to use.

“Yeah,” he said, like his opinion should be fact.

“Matt’s been talking to them about funding,” Wade interjected.

“You doing that on your own, or for the company?” I asked, where when I mentioned the company, I was referring to Carruthers & Schluter.

“Stef told me to go it alone if I wanted,” Matt said.

“He’s passing on this deal?” I asked, surprised. My instincts told me this was going to be big. I guess Stef hadn’t been as impressed.

“They’re heavy into LinkedIn, and they’re worried this could be a conflict of interest,” he said.

“Makes sense,” I said, even though I didn’t really know how that worked. “Are you going to do it?”

“I’m going to pass,” he said firmly, as if there was no way he was changing his mind.

“Seriously? How much money do they want?” I asked.

“Half a million dollars for 5% of the stock,” he said. “Too much for too little.”

“Doesn’t seem like a lot of money to spend on something this cool,” I said, wondering what the fuck his issue was.

“It’s got some potential, but it’s also got some problems,” he said a bit apprehensively. It was weird, because he was usually cocky and confident, but he seemed nervous about this.

“What are the problems?” I asked. I could already see the potential.

“The guys who put this together are all Harvard undergrads,” he said, like that made them punks. I rolled my eyes. Weren’t Jobs and Wozniak young when they started Apple? “They’ve also got a big ownership battle looming.”

“What’s that about?” I asked.

“The brothers Winklevoss and some other dude are suing the dude who started this, Mark Zuckerberg, for shitloads of money,” Matt said.

“The Winklevi,” Wade began, cracking me up for his way of pluralizing Winklevoss, “are top rowers on the rowing team, and both belong to the Porcellian Club.” Rowing at Harvard was an uber-preppy sport, and the Porcellian Club was the one that rich society dudes chose. It was like he was trying to imply that they were hot shit because they were studly blue-bloods.

“OK,” I said dismissively, since I could care less that these two dudes were rich guys who had money. Matt snaughed while Wade just looked irritated because I’d indirectly called him out for being a snob.

“Bottom line is that you have this small company that’s starting out with jack shit, and they already have a massive lawsuit aimed at them,” Matt said. “They don’t have shit for financials, and that’s important.”

“I could see that it would be an issue if this were a VC deal, but not for an Angel investment,” I said. He raised his eyebrow at my use of industry terms, acting surprised that I sounded like I knew what I was talking about. That was pretty annoying since I’d grown up around this stuff, and probably knew more about the business than he did at this point. It wasn’t hard to pick up on what was going on when Stef and my father talked about it. All you had to do was listen to them. Angel investing was like this, where a company was super small and you put in a relatively small amount of money. It was super high risk. VC funding came later, after the company was more successful. It was less risky, but required bigger investments.

“You have to be careful with Angels,” Matt said sagely. “Chances of losing your money are pretty high.” When did he get so conservative and turn into a financial pussy?

“If they have a good product and good management, it’s worth it. Shit, that’s how Stef made most of his money,” I argued. “Did you even talk to this Zuckerberg dude?”

“I talked to him briefly, but he’s not the guy who’s in charge of this deal. The dude putting together the angel deal is Peter Thiel,” Matt said.

“The PayPal guy?” I asked. He nodded. “He’s pretty hot. He’s also gay.” He’d been at a lot of our parties and was really attractive. I only knew he was gay because Stef told me. He was one of those uptight Republican closet case guys.

“I kind of figured that out,” Matt grumbled. “Pretty much hinted to me that if I wanted in on this deal I was going to have to fuck him. And that’s not happening.” I filed that back in my brain as a piece of useful information.

“They’re trying to get money from you and they made that a condition?” I asked, surprised. It seems like they’d be sucking up to him for cash.

“Thiel claims this is the hottest new deal he’s seen, so letting me in is a favor,” he said. “He’s so fucking cocky about this it’s raising all kinds of alarms in my mind.”

“He’s also one smart dude,” I said. “If he’s in on this big time, it probably has some real potential.” It made no sense that he’d do this deal unless he thought it was worth the risk.

“Smart people can make mistakes,” Matt said. “In this case, he’s probably trying to keep his investment risk down. He’s putting in half a million for 10%, and he wants me to put in the same amount for only 5%.”

“That’s because he’s carrying you,” I said. He looked at me blankly. “Since he did all the work and research on this deal, and we’re just tagging along on his coattails, he thinks he deserves more.”

“That’s not really fair,” Wade objected. Both of them were starting to frustrate me, and I could see how they were causing each other problems. Wade was all into becoming a lawyer, so he’d probably looked at this lawsuit against theFacebook and decided it was a big deal. Matt had used that to influence what were obviously his changed attitudes about investing, and decided to play it safe. Neither one of them had a killer instinct here, the thing that was so valuable to Stef and my father. Instead, they were more about nitpicking and finding problems than optimistically looking at the product.

“That’s how this works,” I said dismissively, annoying Wade. Matt decided to change the subject before tempers flared.

“Thiel is all into mimetics,” he said, and got ready to explain it to me.

“He’s into that, eh?” I asked.

“What the fuck? How do you know about all this shit? You’re throwing out venture capital terms like you’re a fucking expert, and now you know about this weird ass philosophy deal that Thiel has a hard-on for?” Matt asked.

“I know about the VC stuff because I’ve been raised around it. And I know about mimetics because I sat in on some discussions Grand had with Rene Girard, who developed that theory,” I said. He’d been a guest at Escorial a number of times, and both he and Grand seemed to enjoy their conversations. It had been fascinating to watch Grand’s cool but polite logic collide with Girard’s enthusiasm for his theory.

“Well it seems like it’s just the same shit we already know wrapped around a fancy name,” Matt said. “Basically, it means that if someone wants something, so do you.”

“Yes,” I agreed. “And his theory is that because of that, people will always end up in conflict,” I pointed out, since Matt’s conclusion had sort of wiped out the bigger picture of what Girard was saying.

“Philosophy always seemed like just so much bullshit,” Matt said. Wade said nothing, probably because he liked thinking about it sometimes.

“You’re trying to tell me that he only wants you to fuck him because you’re off limits?” I asked.

“That, and he’s trying to make it sound like everyone wants this deal,” he said. I decided that his issues were his issues, and had no major bearing on this deal.

“So you’re a big no on this?” I asked Matt.

“I am,” he asserted strongly.

“You tell Thiel yet?”

“No, I’m supposed to meet him at his hotel at 4:00,” Matt said. “No way I’m going over there to have him sell me on this deal and then try to grope me.”

“You mind if I go instead?” I asked, referring to the investment in theFacebook.

“You don’t want to do this,” he said, a prelude to lecturing me on what a bad deal it was.

“Yeah, I do,” I said crisply. “If you’ll give me the info, I’ll go over and see him instead of you. I’ll surprise him,” I said a bit playfully.

“He’s looking for someone who can be a partner in this company as it grows,” Matt said, implying that he could do that while I couldn’t.

“He’s looking for cash,” I said. “So where’s he staying?”

“It’s your money,” he said, like I was being a complete idiot. He was getting close to really pissing me off. I just glared at him. “The Ritz Carlton,” he said, and gave me the room number.

“Thanks,” I said, then stared at him intently. “And not a word about this to anyone, especially not to my father.”

“He and Stef are going to want to know what happened,” Matt said. “I’ve been talking about this.”

“I’ll tell them after it’s a done deal,” I said.

“What if he wants to fuck you?” Matt asked.

“Dude, he’s hot. I’ll wear his ass out,” I said, making Wade chuckle.

Matt shrugged. “It’s your money and your dick. Besides, first you have to assume he even wants to fuck you.”

“You think he wants you, but he’ll pass me up?” I asked, being just as cocky and arrogant as he was. “As if.”

Wade laughed. “You win this one by default.” That was almost even more annoying.

“I’m going to fuck this guy senseless and score some stock in this company,” I declared, all but making it my life mission.

“If you’re lucky, you’ll walk out of there without achieving either goal,” Matt challenged.

“Guess time will tell,” I said. “I have to go get ready.”

“Wait,” Wade said, and left the room. Matt and I stood there, wondering what he’d come back with. He strolled back into the room and handed me some papers. “This is the deal they offered Matt. It looked good to me.”

“Then I’m sure it’s good,” I said as I took the papers. “Thanks.” I took them upstairs and spent some time going over them then spent some time getting ready. I had a suit that was pretty conservative, but it fit me really well. When I took the jacket off, the pants bulged in all the right places. I went down to the kitchen and ran into Wade.

“You look good,” he said, like he was surprised.

“I always look good,” I joked. “Thanks.”

“Jorge can drive you over there,” Wade said. “Let us know if you need a ride back.”

“Awesome,” I said, trying not to lust too openly at Jorge. He’d been one of the security dudes who had saved our ass at Goodwell last September; he’d fucked me then, and he’d snuck up to my room every night since I’d been here. He was turning out to be a lot of fun.

He led me out to the Escalade limo that they usually used when Tiffany traveled with the kids. “I brought out the big car for you,” he said, as he opened my door. I felt his hand rub my ass as I climbed in.

“That’s not the only big thing you’re saving for me, I hope,” I said, winking at him. He smiled, then shut the door. I took out the papers to read over them one more time while the Escalade made good time to the Ritz.

“If you need a ride, let me know,” Jorge repeated as he opened the door for me.

“Thanks,” I said, and patted him on the shoulder. I strode confidently into the Ritz, wondering if I’d have to go to the front desk to get cleared through to Peter’s room. I knew that would be a big pain in the ass. I was hoping I’d find someone going up, where I could just hitch a ride. I saw this couple strolling toward the elevators so I followed them, keeping my distance. The woman looked hot, but a little slutty for the Ritz, while the dude looked familiar.

The elevator door opened and they strolled in, and right before the doors started to close, I hopped in as well. Only when I was in the elevator did I recognize the guy. “Napster dude!” I said, smiling at Sean Parker.

“You know him?” the woman with him asked in an annoyed tone.

“This is Little Willy,” he said, trying to give me shit.

“There isn’t anything little about me,” I said, raising an eyebrow. He laughed.

“That’s what they all say,” the woman said, making both of us laugh even harder.

“Where are you going?” he asked, ready to push another floor.

“Same floor as you,” I said.

“Well that’s convenient,” he said. He asked me about my life, and about Stef and my father, and that took up our time in the elevator. I walked down the hall with him and we stopped in front of the same room. “You going to see Peter Thiel?”

“I am,” I said.

“Cool,” he said, but looked nervous and confused. He knocked on the door, which was ajar and not fully closed, and heard a voice say “enter,” so Sean pushed the door open and we all walked in. “Hey Pete!”

“You got in early,” Peter Thiel said, as he strolled over and shook his hand in a friendly but guarded way. When I’d first met him about four years ago, he had looked pretty dorky, with his hair parted on the left, and with a couple of crooked teeth that almost looked like fangs. Now he parted his hair on the right, he must have gotten his teeth capped, and he carried himself in a really confident way. Guess that’s what becoming a multimillionaire could do for you. He was in his mid-thirties now, and I jokingly thought that like a good wine, he’d aged well. “I’ve got a meeting at four, then we can talk.”

“That’s fine,” Sean said. “I just wanted to check in with you.” Peter introduced himself to Sean’s woman, but from the moment we’d entered this room until now, his eyes had been drawn to me.

“You look familiar,” Peter said to me. It was funny to see his mind whirl like a computer, trying to link my face with a name.

“Will Schluter,” I said, and shook his hand. I smiled gently and stared into his eyes as I did.

“Of course,” he said. “I met you at Escorial!”

“You did,” I agreed. “I thought the last time you were there I looked incredibly hot, and I was also very charming. I’m pretty disappointed you didn’t even remember my name.”

He smiled, then chuckled. “Been a long day, so cut me some slack.”

“Done,” I said, and raised my eyebrow just a bit.

“So what brings you here?” he asked me. What he probably wanted to ask was ‘what the fuck are you doing here?’, but he was being polite.

“You were supposed to meet with Matt Carrswold,” I said. “He doesn’t want to do the deal, but I do.”

“I agreed to let Matt buy into theFacebook because I thought he’d be a good partner, not because I needed the money,” he hedged.

“I’m confident that I can be an even better partner than he could be,” I said, and winked at him.

“Did Matt tell you about the deal we had worked out?” he asked, flirting back.

“He did, and I am willing to totally fulfill those conditions,” I said in an almost sultry way. It was hilarious that Sean and his woman didn’t seem to get the sexual undertone in our conversation.

“I’m open to talking about it,” he said.

“We can do that over dinner,” I said in an authoritative way.

“I need to spend some time with Sean,” he said. “Can you give me an hour?”

“Sure,” I said. “Do you have another room where I can make a few phone calls?”

“I do,” he said, and led me into the other room, one with a big king-sized bed in it. “My bedroom.”

“I’ll bet this is a fun room,” I said, blatantly flirting with him.

“I wish,” he said if a frustrated way, which was cute.

“You mind if I kick back and make myself comfortable while I’m waiting for you?” I asked.

“Not at all,” he said. He walked out of the door and shut it behind me. I tried to eavesdrop, but they were too quiet. I had a lot of time so I took off all my clothes, hung my suit and shirt up, then took the papers and hopped into his bed. I noticed that there was a Time magazine on the nightstand so I decided to catch up on the news. I’d felt pretty disconnected from events while I was in Australia and I’d been too busy in New York to pay much attention. I laughed, then shook my head ruefully when I saw that a couple of weeks ago the CIA had admitted there was no threat from weapons of mass destruction from Iraq before the invasion. That just exposed this whole fucking war as the big lie that it was.

There was a knock on the bedroom door, which was a short warning before Peter opened it and came in. That gave me time to hastily toss the Time magazine back on the night stand and kick back in the bed in what I hoped was a sexy pose. His eyes all but bulged out of his head when he saw me, which was pretty flattering. “That was fast,” I said, since it had only been half an hour.

He shut the door and walked over to the bed and lay down on it, fully dressed, above the covers. “When you said you were going to get comfortable, I didn’t think you’d get this comfortable.”

“If you want me to get up, I will,” I said.

“You trying to seduce me?” he asked.

“Matt was under the impression that was part of the deal,” I said. “Like I said, I’m a better partner than he is.”

“You’re sure about that?” he taunted in a playful way.

“You really only wanted him because he’s taken,” I said. “You crave what other people have.”

“There’s a whole theory about that...” he began, but I cut him off.

“Mimetics,” I said. He raised an eyebrow.

“You know about that? How?”

“Because Rene Girard has been a guest of ours a number of times, and I got to hear him talk about his theory,” I said.

“Do you agree with him?” he asked.

“He says that all desire is mimetic, and while I think some is, I don’t think all of it is,” I answered.

“I don’t know whether to fuck you or have a conversation with you,” he said, laughing.

I reached over and put my hand around his neck, pulling him in for a kiss that was OK. He was a little awkward with his lips. “We can’t do both?”

He was about to answer, then looked a little flustered. “I have to go finish this meeting.”

“Hurry back,” I said, and chuckled as he all but ran out of the room. It was hilarious that it only took him 10 minutes to return.

“I decided to finish up that meeting over dinner, and you can join us,” he said, as he lay down on the bed next to me.

“Then we better get this deal done,” I said. I handed him the contracts and he scanned them, probably to make sure they were the same. Whatever. He pulled out his pen and look confused. “Need a hard surface to sign them on?” I asked, pulling down the covers to expose my abs. I tensed them to expose my six pack.

“That will work,” he said. It was extremely erotic to have this financial deal executed on my stomach, and that caused an obvious reaction. I used my feet to move the covers down, pulling my dick toward my feet along with them. I felt his fingers running across my pubic area as he signed, and somehow I managed to stifle a moan. He finished signing and smiled. “We’re now partners.”

I pulled the cover down the rest of the way, and when it finally released my dick, it had pulled it back so far that it sprang back toward my head and smacked Peter in the side of the face. We both laughed. “Why don’t you show me how fun it is to be your partner,” I said sensually, and pushed his head toward my cock.

Sex with him was much different than I was used to. He was 37 years old, and that seemed to result in him being a bit less vigorous than the younger dudes I’d been with, but at the same time he was smoother and made things last longer. When we were finished, we ended up smiling, and I decided that was a good sign sex had been good. “I think that’s the best deal I’ve done.”

I laughed. “I think so too.”

He got suddenly nervous. “You are eighteen, right?”

“Nope,” I said casually. “Seventeen.”

“Fuck,” he said, and got pretty freaked out.

“Why is that a problem?” I asked calmly.

“Because it’s fucking illegal for a 37-year-old guy to have sex with a 17-year-old guy,” he said angrily.

“Not in Massachusetts,” I said. “So you can fuck me here freely, but if I run into you back in California, you can’t fuck me until September.”

“Really?” he asked, surprised.

“Really,” I said. “Besides, do you really think I’d turn you in? Seriously?”

He shrugged. “I guess not. I’m usually pretty careful about that, because when you’re rich, sometimes people use that shit to try and entrap you.” I decided to blow off the argument over whether these guys who had hit on him were predators, or he was.

“I’m not like that,” I said.

“No, you’re not,” he said, and ran his hand across my cheek. “We should get ready for dinner. The guy who invented theFaceBook is joining us too.”

“Why is Sean here?” I asked.

“He’s going to be the president of the company,” Thiel answered. “That way Mark can focus on developing the platform.” That was pretty common in a deal like this, for an Angel to bring in an experienced leader to help make the company successful.

“Makes sense,” I said.

“You know with this deal you signed, you have a seat on the board,” he told me. I thought about that, about whether I wanted to do that, and decided I was ambivalent.

“If you want me to do that, I will. If you want to appoint someone else, I’m good with that too,” I said. He looked stunned at that, since I was putting a lot of trust in him, but I knew he wanted to win on this deal, and since our interests were the same, it didn’t worry me.

“Thanks,” he said. “If you don’t mind, I’ll think about it.”

“If you decide you want me on this board, the meetings will definitely be more fun,” I said. That was our cue to get up and start putting on our clothes, because otherwise we’d probably end up fucking again.

“No doubt,” he said.