Questionable Identities

Benson Babu

Creative Writing 133

                      Questionable Identities
I
      Willie Mendez stuck his gleaming slender fork into his vegetable omelet, and keeping his fork submerged, edged closer to the table and fixed his demure brown eyes on the man seated across him.
                “Ollie.   Can I believe that I am calling you Ollie?”
    “I don’t see why not,” replied Oliver.
          “Two months ago you walk into my firm and ask to see me. And the thought that crosses my mind is: What could this grey-haired handsome lawyer want with me? And after just two hours, you ask for a merger between our firms.   Mendez and Mendez is not a slipshod firm mind you; but still, I just couldn’t absorb the fact that a man like yourself who’s set up three law firms in Texas and made your son owner of one on his birthday… that someone like you would possibly want to merge with Mendez and partner with me.   And I remember, I was on my chair calling you Mr. McKenzie; and now here I am calling you Ollie as if you’re my best friend and taking you out to breakfast at a diner in Virginia.”
      Oliver continued staring at his golden pancake watching the blueberry syrup seep within the clean crevasse made with his knife.
  “Yeah. A weird twist of fate. But the truth is that this isn’t a one way street. I may have been in Texas taking on white-collar murderers and extortionists, and even the government every now and then and the boys that I’m bringing in are firebrands in their mid-twenties some putting seventy to eighty hours a week. But Texas isn’t gonna give these boys (and gals) their money’s worth.   At least not the way a firm near Washington D.C. can.”
“And you knew that it would be a waste of time trying to compete with a little guy like Willie Mendez, so you decided to merge with me,” Willy retorted facetiously.
      Oliver set his utensils on the table and glancing at his distorted reflection on his stained knife, let out a quick quiet...