Текст книги "The Wolf of Wall Street "

Автор книги: Jordan Belfort

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Текущая страница: 31 (всего у книги 39 страниц)

CHAPTER 35

THE STORM BEFORE THE STORM

April 1997

As impossible as it might seem, nine months after the sinking of the yacht, my life had sunk to even deeper levels of insanity. I had found a clever way—an altogether logicalway, in fact—to take my self-destructive behavior to a new extreme, namely, by changing my drug of choice from Quaaludes to cocaine. Yes, it was time for a change, I’d figured, with my chief motivating factor being that I was fed up with drooling in public places and falling asleep in inappropriate settings.

So, rather than starting off my day with four Quaaludes and a tall glass of iced coffee, I woke up to a gram of Bolivian marching powder—always careful to split the dose equally, a half gram up each nostril, so as not to deprive either side of my brain of the instantaneous rush. It was the trueBreakfast of Champions. Then I’d round out my breakfast with three milligrams of Xanax, to quell the paranoia that was sure to follow. After that—and in spite of my back being completely pain-free now—I would take forty-five milligrams of morphine, simply because cocaine and narcotics were made for each other. Besides, since I still had a bunch of doctors prescribing me morphine, how bad could it be?

Either way, an hour before lunchtime I would take my first dose of Quaaludes—four, to be exact—followed by another gram of coke, to ward off the uncontrollable tiredness that was sure to follow. Of course, I still managed to consume my daily dose of twenty Quaaludes, but at least now I was using them in a healthier way, a more productive way—to balance out the coke.

It was an inspired strategy, and it had worked perfectly, for a time. But like all things in life, there were a few bumps along the way. In this particular instance, the main bump was that I was sleeping only three hours a week, and by mid-April I was in the midst of a cocaine-induced paranoia that was so deep I’d actually taken a few potshots at the milkman with a twelve-gauge shotgun.

With a bit of luck, I figured, the milkman would spread the word that the Wolf of Wall Street was not a man to be trifled with, that he was armed and ready—fully prepared to ward off any intruder foolish enough to come on his property—even if his bodyguards were sleeping on the job.

Whatever the case, it had been in mid-December, four months ago, when Stratton was finally shut down. Ironically, it wasn’t the states who’d lowered the boom on Stratton but the bumbling bozos at the NASD. They had revoked Stratton’s membership—citing stock manipulation and sales-practice violations. In essence, Stratton had been shunned, and from a legal standpoint it was a deathblow. Membership in the NASD was a prerequisite for selling securities across state lines; without it, you might as well be out of business. So, reluctantly, Danny closed down Stratton, and the era of the Strattonite came to a close. It had been an eight-year run. Just how it would be remembered I wasn’t quite sure, although I suspected the press wouldn’t be kind to it.

Biltmore and Monroe Parker were still going strong and still paying me a million dollars per deal, although I considered it a distinct possibility that the owners, other than Alan Lipsky, were plotting against me. Just how and why, I wasn’t quite certain, but such was the nature of plots—especially when the conspirators were your closest friends.

On a separate note, Steve Madden wasplotting against me. Our relationship had completely soured. According to Steve, it had to do with me showing up at the office stoned, to which I’d said to him, “Go fuck yourself, you self-righteous bastard! If it weren’t for me you’d still be selling shoes out of the trunk of your car!” True or not, the simple fact was that the stock was trading at thirteen dollars and it was on its way to twenty.

We had eighteen stores now, and our department-store business was booked out two seasons in advance. I could only imagine what he was thinking about me—the man who had taken eighty-five percent of his company and controlled the price of his stock for almost four years. Yet now that Stratton was out of business, I no longer had control over his stock. The price of Steve Madden Shoes was being dictated by the laws of supply and demand—rising and falling with the fortunes of the company itself, not the fortunes of any particular brokerage firm that was recommending it. The Cobbler hadto be plotting against me. Yes, it was true: I had shown up at the office a bit stoned, and that was wrong, but, still, that was merely an excuse to force me out of the company and steal my stock options. And what was my recourse if he tried doing that?

Well, I had our secret agreement, but that covered only my original shares, 1.2 million of them; my stock options were in Steve’s name, and I had nothing in writing. Would he try to steal them from me? Or would he try to steal everything—both my stock and my options? Perhaps that bald bastard had deluded himself, thinking I wouldn’t have the balls to expose our secret agreement, that by its very nature it would cause both of us too many problems if I made it public.

He was in for a rude awakening. The chances of him getting away with stealing my stock and options were less than zero—even if it meant both of us going to jail.

As a sober, lucid man, I would’ve still had these thoughts, but in my current mental state they smoldered in my mind in a most venomous way. Whether Steve was planning to fuck me or not was wholly immaterial; he would never get the chance. He was no different than Victor Wang, the Depraved fucking Chinaman. Yes, Victor had tried to fuck me too, and I’d sent him back to Chinatown.

It was now the second week of April, and I hadn’t been to Steve Madden Shoes in over a month. It was Friday afternoon, and I was home in my study, sitting behind my mahogany desk. The Duchess was already in the Hamptons, and the kids were spending the weekend with her mother. I was alone with my thoughts, ready for war.

I dialed Wigwam at his house and said, “I want you to call Madden and tell him that as escrow agent, you’re giving him notice that you plan on liquidating a hundred thousand shares immediately. It comes out to about $1.3 million, give or take a few bucks. Tell him that pursuant to the agreement he has the right to sell his shares too, in ratio with me, which means he can sell seventeen thousand of them. Whether he decides to or not is his fucking decision.”

Wigwam the Weak replied, “To get it done quickly I need his signature. What if he balks?”

I took a deep breath, trying to control my anger. “If he gives you a hard time, tell him that pursuant to the escrow agreement you’re gonna foreclose on the note and sell the stock privately. You tell him that I’ve already agreed to buy it. And you tell that bald motherfucker that that’ll give me a fifteen percent stake in the company, which means I’ll have to file a 13D with the SEC, and then everyone on Wall Street’s gonna know what a fucking cock-sucker he is for trying to fuck me. You tell that motherfucker that I’m gonna make the whole thing public and that every fucking week I’m gonna keep buying more stock in the open market, which means I’m gonna keep filing updated 13Ds. You tell that cocksucker that I’m not gonna stop buying until I own fifty-one percent of his company, and then I’m gonna throw his bony ass right the fuck out of there.” I took another deep breath. My heart was beating out of my chest. “And you tell that motherfucker if he thinks I’m bluffing, then he should climb inside a fucking bunker, because I’m about to unleash a nuclear bomb on his very fucking existence.” I reached into my desk drawer and pulled out a Ziploc bag with a pound of cocaine in it.

“I’ll do whatever you say,” replied Wigwam the Weak. “I just want you to think about it for a second. You’re the smartest guy I know, but you sound a bit irrational right now. As your lawyer I strongly advise you against making this agreement pub—”

I cut my lawyer right the fuck off. “Let me fucking tell you something, Andy: You have no fucking idea how little of a shit I give about the SE fucking C and the NAS fucking D.” I opened the bag and grabbed a playing card off my desk, then dipped deep into the powder, scooping out enough cocaine to give a blue whale a heart attack. I dumped it onto the desktop. Then I bent over and stuck my face in it and started snorting. “And furthermore,” I added, my face now covered in cocaine, “I couldn’t give two shits about that Coleman motherfucker either. He’s been chasing my ass around for four fucking years, and he still ain’t got shit on me.” I shook my head a few times, to try to get hold of the rush that was rapidly overtaking me. “And there ain’t no fucking way I’m getting indicted over that agreement. It would be too anticlimactic for Coleman. He’s a man of honor, and he wants to get me on something real. That would be like getting Al Capone on tax evasion. So fuck Coleman where he breathes!”

“Understood,” said Wigwam, “but I need a favor from you.”

“What?”

“I’m running short of money,” said my shyster lawyer, pausing for effect. “You know, Danny really fucked things up for me by not cockroaching it. I’m still waiting for my brokerage license to come through. Could you help me out in the interim?”

Unbelievable! I thought. My own fucking escrow agent was holding me up for money. That toupeed motherfucker!I should kill him too! “How much you need?”

“I don’t know,” he replied weakly, “maybe a couple hundred thousand?”

“Fine!” I snapped. “I’ll give you a quarter million, now go call fucking Madden right fucking now and call me back and let me know what he said.” I slammed the phone down without saying good-bye. Then I bent over and stuck my face back in the coke.

Ten minutes later the phone rang. “What did the motherfucker say?” I asked.

“You’re not gonna like it,” warned Wigwam. “He denies the existence of the escrow agreement. He says it’s an illegal agreement and he knows you won’t make it public.”

I took a deep breath, trying to maintain control. “So he thinks I’m bluffing, huh?”

“Pretty much,” said Wigwam, “but he said he wants to resolve things amicably. He’s offering you two dollars a share.”

I rolled my neck slowly in a great circle as I did the calculations. At two dollars a share he would be stealing more than $13 million from me, and that was just on the stock; he was also holding a million of my options, which had an exercise price of seven dollars. Today’s market price—thirteen dollars—put them six dollars in the money. So that was another $4.5 million. All told, he was trying to steal $17.5 million from me. Ironically, I wasn’t even that angry about it. After all, I had known it all along, from that very day in my office all those years ago, when I’d explained to Danny that his friend couldn’t be trusted. It was for that very reason, in fact, why I had made Steve sign the escrow agreement and hand over the stock certificate.

So why should I be angry? I’d been forced down a foolish path by the bozos at NASDAQ; I had been given no choice but to divest my stock to Steve, and I had taken all necessary precautions—preparing myself for this very eventuality. I ran the entire history of the relationship through my mind, and I couldn’t find one mistake I’d made. And while there was no denying that showing up at the office stoned hadn’t been good business on my part, it had absolutely nothing to do with what was going on here. He would have tried to fuck me either way; all the drugs had done was bring it to the surface quicker.

“All right,” I said calmly. “I have to head out to the Hamptons now, so we’ll take care of this first thing Monday morning. Don’t even bother calling Steve back. Just get all the paperwork together for the stock purchase. It’s time to go to war.”

Southampton! WASP-Hampton! Yes, that was where my new beach house was. The time had come to grow up, and Westhampton was just a bit too pedestrianfor the Duchess’s discerning tastes. Besides, Westhampton was full of Jews, and I was sick and tired of Jews, despite being one. Donna Karan (a higher class of Jew) had a house just to the west; Henry Kravis (also a higher class of Jew) had a house just to the east. And for the bargain price of $5.5 million, I now owned a ten-thousand-square-foot gray and white postmodern contemporary mansion on the fabulous Meadow Lane, the most exclusive road on the entire planet. The front of the house looked out over Shinnecock Bay; the rear of the house looked out over the Atlantic Ocean; and the sunrises and sunsets exploded with a nearly indescribable palette of oranges and reds and yellows and blues. It was truly glorious, a vista worthy of the Wild Wolf.

As I passed through the wrought-iron gates at the front of the property, I couldn’t help but feel proud. Here I was, behind the wheel of a brand-new royal-blue $300,000 Bentley turbo. And, of course, I had enough cocaine in the glove compartment to keep the entire town of Southampton dancing the Watusi from Memorial Day through Labor Day.

I had been to this house only once, a little over a month ago, when there was still no furniture. I’d brought a business associate named David Davidson here. Naming him that had been a cruel joke, although I found myself spending more time watching him blink his right eye than focusing on his name. Yes, he was a blinker, but only a one-sided blinker, which made it that much more disconcerting. Anyway, the Uniblinker owned a brokerage firm named DL Cromwell, which employed a bunch of ex-Strattonites; we were doing business together, making nothing but money. Yet the Uniblinker’s most desirable trait—what I liked most about him—was that he was a coke addict, and on the very night I’d brought him to the house, we had first stopped at Grand Union and bought fifty cans of Reddi Wip. Then we sat on the bleached-wood floor and held the cans upright, pushed the nozzles to the side, and sucked out all the nitrous oxide. It was a helluva buzz, especially when we alternated each hit with two blasts of cocaine, one up either nostril.

It had been a banner evening, but nothing compared to what was in store for tonight. The Duchess had furnished the house—to the tune of $2 million of my not-so-hard-earned money. She was so very excited about it that she’d been spewing her aspiring-decorator bullshit ad nauseam, and all the while she never missed an opportunity to bust my balls for being a coke addict.

And fuck her for that! Who the hell was she to tell me what to do, especially when I’d become a coke addict for her benefit! After all, she had been threatening to leave me if I didn’t stop falling asleep in restaurants. So that was why I’d switched to coke in the first place. And now she was saying things like: “You’re sick. You’ve haven’t slept in a month. You won’t even make love to me anymore! And you only weigh a hundred thirty pounds. All you eat are Froot Loops. And your skin is green!” To have given the Duchess the Life and have her turn on me at the last second! Well, fuck her too! It was easy for her to love me when I was sick. All those nights when I was in chronic pain, she would come in and try to comfort me and tell me that she loved me no matter what. And now it turned out that it was all a clever plot. She could no longer be trusted. Fine. Good. Let her go her own way. I didn’t need her. In fact, I didn’t need anybody.

All these thoughts were roaring through my brain as I walked up the mahogany stairs and opened the front door to my latest mansion. “Hello,” I said, in a very loud voice, stepping through the front door. The entire rear wall was glass, and I was looking at a panoramic view of the Atlantic Ocean. At seven p.m. at this time of spring, the sun was just setting behind me, on the bay side, and the water looked an interesting shade of Prince purple. Meanwhile, the house looked gorgeous. Yes, there was no denying that in spite of the Duchess being a world-class pain in the ass—a henpecking killjoy of biblical proportions—she had a flair for decorating. The entryway led to a vast living room. It was a wide-open space with soaring ceilings. There was so much furniture crammed into this place it was fucking mind-boggling. Overstuffed sofas and love seats and club chairs and wing chairs and ottomans were scattered this way and that, each one a separate seating area. All of this fabulous fucking furniture was white and taupe, very beachy, very shabby chic.

Just then came the royal greeting committee. It was Maria, the fat cook, and her husband, Ignacio, a mean-spirited little butler, who at four-foot-eight was a shade taller than his wife. They were from Portugal and prided themselves on providing service in the formal, traditional way. I despised them because Gwynne despised them, and Gwynne was one of the few people who truly understood me—she and my children. Who knew if these two could be trusted? I would have to keep a close eye on them…and, if necessary, neutralize them.

“Good evening, Mr. Belfort,” said Maria and Ignacio in unison. Ignacio bowed formally and Maria curtsied. Then Ignacio added, “How are you this evening, sir?”

“Never better,” I muttered. “Where’s my loving wife?”

“She’s in town, shopping,” replied the cook.

“What a fucking surprise,” I snarled, walking past them. I was carrying a Louis Vuitton travel bag, loaded with dangerous drugs.

“Dinner will be served at eight,” said Ignacio. “Mrs. Belfort asked me to inform you that your guests will be here around seven-thirty, and if you could please be ready by then.”

Oh, fuck her, I thought. “Okay,” I sputtered. “I’ll be in the TV room; please don’t disturb me. I have important business to attend to.” With that, I went into the TV room, flicked on the Rolling Stones, and broke out the drugs. The Duchess had instructed me to be ready by seven-thirty. What the fuck did that mean? That I should be dressed in a fucking tuxedo—or top hat and tails? What was I, a fucking monkey? I was wearing gray sweatpants and a white T-shirt, and that was just fucking fine! Who the fuck paid for all this shit? Me—that’s who! And she had the nerve to be giving me orders!

Eight p.m., dinner is served! And who needs it? Give me Froot Loops and skim milk, not this chichi bullshit that Maria and the Duchess hold so dear. The dinner table was the size of a horseshoe pit. Still, the dinner guests weren’t all that bad, with the exception of the Duchess. She was sitting across from me, on the other side of the pit. She was so far away I needed an intercom to converse with her, which was probably a good thing. Admittedly, she was gorgeous. But trophy wives like the Duchess were a dime a dozen, and the good ones wouldn’t turn on me for no good reason.

Sitting to my right were Dave and Laurie Beall, who were up visiting from Florida. Laurie was a good blond egg. She knew her place in the general scheme of things, so she understood me. The only problem was that she was also under the influence of the Duchess, who’d crawled inside her very mind—planting subversive thoughts against me. So Laurie couldn’t be fully trusted.

Her husband, Dave, was another story. He could be trusted—more or less. He was a big country bumpkin—six-two, two hundred fifty pounds of solid muscle. When he was in college he worked as a bouncer. One day someone had mouthed off to him, and Dave punched him in the side of the head and knocked his eye out. Rumor had it that the guy’s eye was hanging by a couple of ligaments. Dave was an ex-Strattonite, who now worked at DL Cromwell. Tonight, I could count on him to repel intruders. In fact, he would do it with relish.

My other two guests were the Schneidermans, Scott and Andrea. Scott was a Bayside boy, although we hadn’t been friends growing up. He was a confirmed homosexual who’d gotten married for inexplicable reasons, although, if I had to guess, it was to have children, of which he now had one, a daughter. He, too, was an ex-Strattonite, although he’d never possessed the killer instinct. He was out of the business now. He was here for only one reason: He was my coke dealer. He had a connection at the airport and was getting me pure cocaine from Colombia. His wife was innocuous—a chubby brunette with only a few words to say, all of which were meaningless.

After four courses and two and a half hours of torturous conversation, it was finally eleven o’clock. I said to Dave and Scott, “Come on, guys, let’s go into the TV room and watch a movie.” I rose from my chair and headed for the TV room, with Dave and Scott in tow. I had no doubt the Duchess wanted to talk to me as little as I wanted to talk to her. And that was fine. Our marriage was basically over; it was only a matter of time now.

What happened next started with an inspired notion I had to divide up my cocaine stash into two separate snorting parties. The first party would commence now and consist of eight grams of powdered cocaine. It would take place here, in the TV room, and last for approximately two hours. Then we would adjourn to the game room upstairs, where we would play pool and darts and get whacked on Dewar’s. Then, at two a.m., we would head back downstairs to the TV room and start the second snorting party, which would consist of a twenty-gram rock of ninety-eight percent pure cocaine. To snort it in one sitting would be a conquest worthy of the Wolf himself.

And follow this plan we did—right down to the very fucking letter, in fact—spending the next two hours snorting thick lines of cocaine through an 18-karat-gold straw, while we watched MTV with no sound and listened to “Sympathy for the Devil” on repeat mode. Then we went upstairs to the game room. When two a.m. rolled around, I said with a great smile, “The time has come to snort the rock, my friends! Follow me.”

We walked back downstairs to the TV room and sat in our previous positions. I reached over for the rock and it was gone. Gone? How the fuck was that possible? I looked at Dave and Scott and said, “Okay, guys: Stop fucking around. Which one of you took the rock?”

They both looked at me, astonished. Dave said, “What are you, kidding me? I didn’t take the rock! I swear on my kid’s eyes!”

Scott added, in a defensive tone, “Don’t look at me! I would never do something like that.” He shook his head gravely. “Fucking around with another man’s coke is a sin against God. Nothing less.”

The three of us got down on our hands and knees and started crawling around on the carpet. Two minutes later we were looking at one another, dumbfounded—and empty-handed. I said skeptically, “Maybe it fell behind the seat cushions.”

Dave and Scott nodded, and we proceeded to remove all the cushions. We found nothing.

“I can’t believe this shit,” I said. “It makes no fucking sense.” Then a wild inspiration came bubbling up into my brain. Perhaps the rock fell insideone of the seat cushions! It seemed improbable, but stranger things had happened, hadn’t they?

Indeed. “I’ll be right back,” I said, and I ran to the kitchen, full speed, and slid a stainless-steel butcher knife out of its wooden holder. Then I ran back to the TV room, armed and ready. The rock was mine!

“What are you doing?” asked Dave, in the tone of the incredulous.

“What the fuck do you think I’m doing?” I sputtered, dropping to my knees and plunging the knife into a seat cushion. I began throwing the foam and feathers on the carpet. The sofa had three seat cushions and an equal number of backrests. In less than a minute I’d shredded all of them. “Motherfucker!” I muttered. I switched my focus to the love seat, cutting the cushions open with a vengeance. Still nothing. Now I was getting pissed. “I can’t believe this shit! Where’d the fucking rock go?” I looked at Dave. “Were we in the living room at all?”

He shook his head back and forth nervously. “I don’t remember being in the living room,” he said. “Why don’t we just forget about the rock?”

“Are you fucking crazy or something? I’m gonna find that fucking rock if it’s the last thing I do!” I turned to Scott and narrowed my eyes accusingly. “Don’t bullshit me, Scott. We werein the living room, weren’t we?”

Scott shook his head. “I don’t think so. I’m really sorry, but I don’t remember being in the living room.”

“You know what?” I screamed. “You guys are both worthless pieces of shit! You know as well as I do that that fucking rock fell into a seat cushion. It’s gotta be in there somewhere, and I’m gonna fucking prove it to you.” I stood up, kicked the remains of the cushions out of my way, and walked through a littering of foam and feathers into the living room. In my right hand was the butcher knife. My eyes were wide open. My teeth were clenched in rage.

Look at all these fucking sofas! Fuck her if she thinks she can get away with buying all this furniture! I took a deep breath. I was on the edge. I needed to get a grip. But I had come up with a perfect plan—saving the rock until two in the morning. It could’ve been perfect and now all this furniture. Fuck it all! I dropped to my knees and went to work, making my way around the living room, stabbing wildly until every couch and chair was destroyed. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Dave and Scott staring at me.

And then it hit me—it was inside the carpet! How fucking obvious! I looked down at the taupe carpet. How much did this fucking thing cost? A hundred thousand? Two hundred thousand? It was easy for her to spend my money. I started slicing up the carpet, like a man possessed.

A minute later, nothing. I sat on my haunches and looked around the living room. It was completely destroyed. Just then I saw a stand-up brass lamp. It looked human. With my heart palpitating out of my chest, I dropped the butcher knife. I picked the lamp up over my head and started swinging it the way the Norse god Thor swung his hammer. Then I released it in the direction of the fireplace, and it went flying into the stone… CRASH!I ran back over to the knife and picked it up.

Just then the Duchess came running out of the master bathroom, wearing a tiny white robe. Her hair was perfect and her legs looked glorious. It was her way of trying to manipulate me, to control me. It had worked in the past, but not this time. I had my guard up now. I was wise to her game.

“Oh, my God!” she screamed, putting her hand to her mouth. “Please, stop! Why are you doing this?”

“Why?” I screamed. “You want to know fucking why? Well, I’ll tell you fucking why! I’m James fucking Bond looking for microfilm! That’s fucking why!”

She looked at me with her mouth agape and her eyes wide open. “You need help,” she said tonelessly. “You’re a sick man.”

Her very words enraged me. “Oh, fuck you, Nadine! Who the fuck are you to tell me I’m sick? What are you gonna do—try to take a swing at me? Well, come over and see what happens!”

All at once a terrible pain in my back!Someone was pushing me to the floor! Now my wrist was being crushed. “Oww, fuck!” I screamed. I looked up and Dave Beall was on top of me. He squeezed my wrist until the butcher knife fell to the ground.

He looked up at Nadine. “Go back inside,” he said calmly. “I’ll take care of him. Everything’s gonna be fine.”

Nadine ran back into the master bedroom and slammed the door. A second later I heard the lock click.

Dave was still on top of me, and I turned my head around to face him and started laughing. “All right,” I said, “you can let me up now. I was only kidding. I wasn’t gonna hurt her. I was just trying to show her who’s boss.”

Clutching my right biceps with his enormous hand, Dave led me over to a seating area on the other side of the house—one of the few I hadn’t destroyed. He placed me in an overstuffed club chair, looked up at Scott, and said, “Go get the vial of Xanax.”

The last thing I remember was Dave handing me a glass of water and a few Xanax.

I woke up and it was nighttime, the following day. I was back in my office in Old Brookville, sitting behind my mahogany desk. Just how I got here I wasn’t quite sure, but I did remember saying, “Thank you, Rocco!” to Rocco Day, for pulling me out of the car after I’d smashed it into the stone pillar at the edge of the estate on my way home from Southampton. Or had it been Rocco Night I’d thanked? Well…who really gave a shit? They were loyal to Bo, and Bo was loyal to me, and the Duchess didn’t say much to either of them—so she hadn’t crawled inside their minds yet. I would be on alert, though.

Where was the Doleful Duchess? I wondered. I hadn’t seen her since the butcher-knife episode. She was home, but she was hiding somewhere in the mansion—hiding from me! Was she in the master bedroom? No matter. The important thing was my children; at least I was a good father. In the end, that’s how I would be remembered: He was a good father, a family man at heart, and a wonderful provider!

I reached into my desk drawer and pulled out my Ziploc bag with nearly a pound of coke in it. I dumped it on my desktop and dropped my head into the pile and snorted with both nostrils simultaneously. Two seconds later I jerked my head up and muttered, “Holy fucking Christ! Oh, my God!” and then I slumped back in my chair and started breathing heavily.

At that moment the TV volume seemed to increase dramatically, and I heard a gruff, accusing voice say: “Do you know what time it is right now? Where’s your family? Is this your idea of fun—sitting in front of a television set at this hour of the morning—alone? Drunk, high, strung out? Look at your watch for a second, if you still have one.”

What the fuck? I looked at my watch: a $22,000 gold Bulgari. Of course I still had one! I focused back on the TV. What a face! Christ!It was a man in his early fifties, enormous head, huge neck, menacingly handsome features, perfectly coiffed gray hair. In that very instant the name Fred Flintstone came bubbling up into my brain.

Fred Flintstone plowed on: “You want to get rid of me right now? How about getting rid of your disease right now! Alcoholism and addiction are killing you. Seafield has the answers. Call us today; we can help.”