Human Commodity (3 page)

Mason bounced around temporary jobs… always on Wall Street… as he waited for something to take hold.
 
It happened six months after he had graduated top of his class of ten, in the summer of 2013.
 
He was working in the mailroom at Dugan Securities when the man he was sorting the meager letters into the plastic tubs for, conveniently died.

Mason, with a full degree from an Ivy League college, had been offered full-time employment in the mailroom.
 
Due to the derisory amount of correspondence, Mason was the only employee in the mailroom… although he had named the copier ‘Lance’ and began a close relationship with his new friend.

Over time, the associates forgot that Mason had the same accreditation as they held, and better than some of them.
 
He was the cheerful kid from the mailroom, whose smile had nothing to do with their stale jokes.
 
While Mason toured up and down the floors in the brass-doored elevator, he reflected on his plans for redecorating the fifty-seventh floor to his personal tastes.

Mason took a sip of scotch and brushed his fingers through the girl’s blonde hair.
 
She was still taking long pulls on his cock, though he could tell her throat had tightened with frantic anxiety at the thought of not fulfilling her duty.
 
He lifted his hips and her fingers reached to pull his sack forward.
 
He could imagine her inward groan as she realized he had not so much as tightened in preparation to spewing his load.
 
Mason chuckled softly and returned to his musings… the day when he finally realized a method towards a rich reward for his persistence and struggle at Dugan Securities.

Epiphany Day had arrived three years after Mason had sequestered himself in the mailroom.
 
It was a Friday when Mason slipped on some jeans and grabbed a bottle of beer after ending another busy week.
 
His employment with Dugan had reaped its rewards… Mason was certain of this… although he was still trying to determine exactly what those rewards were.
 
He lived on the third floor of a house that had been divided into four apartments.

The owners lived in the basement, and rented out the top floors in an effort to meet the mortgage payments.
 
When the couple had purchased the brick building, the man had been the CEO of a company that had liquidated five years previously without being able to cover the ‘golden parachute’ he had counted on.
 
Being CEO of a firm that had gone bust without the foresight to cover his own ass had effectively made him unemployable.

Mason studied his bulletin board, which was the one solid wall in his living room.
 
He had copies of correspondence and finance reports… courtesy of ‘Lance’… stapled or tacked to almost the entire surface.
 
The television was set on the news channel, and Mason glanced at the clock.
 
It was five minutes until the financial reports that no one wanted to listen to any more.

He continued to stare at his wall and mentally shuffled memos.
 
Something was gelling just out of reach, and Mason’s eye twitched in anticipation as he made his way towards the TV.
 
The poor newscaster… Mason actually did feel sorry for Paul Morrison… looked like a beaten man.
 
He had given up months ago trying to paste the smile on his face.
 
Now he looked weary, and slightly afraid of the flood of scathing e-mails he would receive from the few that still held onto hope his news would make mention that something… anything… was rebounding.

The screen changed from Paul’s cheerless, wary face to a crowd in Amsterdam divided between angry sign bearing… mostly female… protestors being held behind police barricades and a ‘normal’ mix of citizens whose faces were smiling with nervous relief.
 
Paul’s voice droned his news script from behind the frenetic scene.

“Amidst a barrage of opposition and potential lawsuits from the Preservation of Humanity Organization, Holland is the latest country to legalize the sale of women.
 
In an attempt to appease POHO, Holland has restricted the trade to women twenty or older.
 
In a somewhat surprising move, feminist backed POHO has aligned itself with local prostitutes, who are claiming that it is unfair to legitimize the female commodity while stripping them of their source of income.
 
Legislators have received wide support from constituents that see this new law as a temporary means of financial recovery until employment opportunities are on the rise.
 
In other news….”

Mason did not listen to the list of floundering stocks and bankrupt corporations.
 
His mind had frozen on two words… words that any first year economics student knew… ‘trade’ and ‘commodity’.
 
His brown bottled brew almost slipped from his hand as he somehow managed to drift to his wall.
 
Holy shit!
 
Mason put down his beer and quickly rearranged several sheets.
 
He stood back from the new display.
 
Holy shit!

Mason cradled his cell phone pinched between his ear and his shoulder while he pushed the sofa and chairs out onto the balcony.
 
Eddie and Phillip had never expected Mason to be the one who would call.
 
Still, they hopped on a red-eye flight to New York and they met at the airport in the morning.
 
They discovered that the trip was a leap of faith for both of them, as they had no idea what the hell Mason was up to.
 
Anything was better than dealing with an endless pile of bankruptcies and divorces, Phillip told Eddie.
 
Eddie countered with his mundane proficiency treating depression, ulcers and migraines… of which he was one of his own most steadfast patients.

The two men exited the taxi and stood on the cracked pavement of the sidewalk, looking up at the old brick building.
 
They were both quietly dismayed at learning they would have to climb the threadbare carpet on the stairs to the third floor, and they were wondering if the strain of working finances had caused their former roommate to go nuts.
 
Shit, they were both better off than Mason was, if living accommodations were any indication.

They knocked on the door and it opened immediately.
 
“Hi, guys.
 
Glad you could make it.”

Eddie studied his former roommate.
 
He had not seen or even talked to Mason in almost three years.
 
He looked pale and exhausted… and the damn twitch was practically break-dancing next to his left eye.
 
The questionable state of Mason’s mind was not helped when the two men followed him into the living room.

They could see the sofa and some tables out on the balcony.
 
The living room… if that was what it was… held two chairs and a coffee table with a copier surrounded by mis-fed sheets of paper that littered the floor around it.
 
Mason noticed them staring at the machine, and said casually, “‘Lance’ junior.
 
You guys want a beer?”

“Shit, Mason.
 
It’s only eleven,” Eddie replied.

“Right.
 
Sorry.
 
I’ll put some coffee on.”

“Never mind,” Phillip said.
 
“What the hell is all this, Mason?
 
I mean, what the fuck?”

Eddie joined Phillip over by the solid wall covered in documents.
 
There was a matching wall across from it, but Phillip disregarded it as making no sense to him at all.
 
This wall had ‘Employee Compensation’ written on a piece of duct tape that had been plastered at the top.
 
Phillip scanned a few sheets and almost groaned.
 
It looked to him suspiciously like a method of blackmail.

“Have a seat, guys.
 
I’d rather not have you passing out on the floor when you figure out how rich we’re going to be.”

The lawyer and doctor were skeptical… Eddie was trying to remember if he had packed any extra tranquilizers for his friend… but they were already there, so they might as well hear the financial genius out.

After thirty minutes, they realized the offhand compliment was more accurate than they had assumed.
 
Mason
was
a financial genius, and Phillip murmured, “Shit, Mason… this could work.”

Eddie felt a fluttering in his stomach.
 
It was a good feeling of all the pooled bile retreating back to their non-painful recesses.
 
“My wife is going to be fuckin’ pissed,” he commented.

“Your wife is going to fuckin’ divorce your ass,” Mason laughed.

Phillip winked.
 
“Eddie, I know a good lawyer.”

They turned to the new bulletin board wall where Mason had begun to outline the new firm in blank sheets of the squared off hierarchy of their new empire.
 
The duct tape at the top read SHCI, with Sanford Human Commodities Investments below it and Mason Sanford scribbled just underneath it.
 
Fifty-six blank sheets were lined up beneath for each of the Dugan Security building’s floors.

There were flanking columns on either side with Phillip’s name scribbled on the top sheet of one, and Eddie’s name heading the row on the right side.
 
Phillip added ‘Commodity Investment Law Firm’ on the label over his, and Eddie titled his new enterprise ‘Commodity Training Compound’.

They spent Saturday and Sunday formulating plans, with Phillip’s eyes barely leaving his laptop screen while he searched legal precedence.
 
When his vision blurred, he helped Eddie iron out the details of his divorce from Nancy.
 
There were no children to worry about, and with what they were looking at, he would merely use the house as a bargaining chip.
 
Walking away from it would be the least of his worries, but he had to make sure that his ex-wife could not worm her way into any future money he earned.

Nancy had quickly turned into a depressing mistake, and all of her sexual prowess had mysteriously vanished.
 
Mysterious, until Eddie walked unannounced into his wife’s office at the clinic and found her on the leather sofa, flipped between the spread thighs of the receptionist.
 
Nancy did not even bother to lie about the affair, and she admitted that she had married Eddie for a more acceptable ‘public face’… and his shrewd background in finance that would help them to establish their joint medical practice.

To the shock and dismay of their employees, the two men took an unexpected week off work.
 
While planning their new firm, they rented apartments in New York.
 
Meanwhile, Mason took his first vacation since Dugan Securities had hired him.
 
Being the outstanding employee his efficient reputation had earned him, he worked three hours in the morning separating the mail.
 
The temp merely had to deliver it in the separated bins in the afternoon.

‘Lance’ spat out thirty-seven new sheets for Mason’s purloined collection, including the memo from accounting to Mr. Dugan of the salesmen’s commissions for the month, a letter from Jordan and Compton addressed to Dugan’s top associate acknowledging his purchase of thirty percent shares in the competitive firm and that he was free to place his top trades through them, and more dirt on the newest Mrs. Dugan who was currently screwing a tennis pro at the club.

The blonde kneeling between Mason’s thighs was becoming irritating.
 
He could tell that her jaws were aching, as her lips barely moved as she plunged up and down on his rod.
 
Her hands had stopped squeezing his balls, at least.
 
For a while, he thought she was trying to force his load into his cock.
 
Fuck… she’s supposed to be the best they pushed through.
 
I need to tell Japan to get the whole lot through some remedial training.

Mason rose, and the silent girl watched him with her eyes filling.
 
Patsy’s hand dropped to her bald pussy, and she tentatively spread her lips to take the pressure off her sore folds.
 
Bill, the horrible masked trainer, would slap her pussy with a cane this time instead of using the crop.
 
He had left most of the terrifying equipment in the training room unused, as he pushed her quickly through the sexual exercises to please her new Master.
 
If she had known it would be like this… god how she wished she could send word back to Kayla and her girlfriends to run away and hide.

Mason sat down and she licked her lips with her exhausted tongue as she stared at the two rubber clips he was holding.
 
Mason reached into his rocks glass and captured an ice cube, then reached his other hand over to cup her breast.
 
Shit, even her nipples are flat.
 
This girl is gaining no response from serving me.
 
Her performance was completely unacceptable
.
 
The ice peaked her nipple with frigid bumps around the pink tightened nub, and the girl gasped when the clamp bit into her tip.
 
What the hell would she have done if I’d used the metal clips?
 
Mason reminded himself that she had not gone through all ten levels of training, but he was becoming skeptical that even the full regime would elicit the responses he required.
 
“Get back to work, slut.”

He leaned back with his drink and smiled while he thought about Phillip and Eddie working frantically to establish their role in the new business.
 
God, the walls were a mess with Phillip’s legal presentations and Eddie’s designs for the training facility.
 
Mason had added his share of tacked paperwork while he planned his blackmail scheme to steal Dugan Securities.
 
He even worked up a budget.
 
Mason chuckled and the girl’s tired mouth worked harder as she thought he was making fun of her attentions to his cock.
 
The lips of her pussy clenched painfully on her swollen wrinkles.