Escaping my Life Ch. 01

He looked around at his 'corporation' and realizes it looked like a college dorm. He turned and went into his own office. It's a mishmash of furniture, Ikea desks and left-over chairs from his dad's firm.

He wondered if this is how he wanted to be seen by the corporate world. He puts his feet up on the desk and just leaned back trying not to topple the secondhand rolling 'executive' office chair.

Charles recognized that he has done well for himself. MyLife had expanded far away from its beginning as a college dating and social application and subscriptions were growing state by state and now Canada and a foray into Mexico.

He had gotten the investment money without loss of the control of his company.

Charles continued to smile to himself. The reason he could negotiate and keep control was because the luddite investors had no real idea what his vision was or how to control a social medial company.

He had repaid the investments and bought back as much of the original stock options as he could. He needed the safety of control for his next step. Total control of the data and control of the data storage locations.

***

"Hey babe, you have to get up and get out of here," Charles commented. He reaches over and nudges the mound of blankets and comforter next to him.

A tossed brunette-haired head rises from the pile and a quiet voice is heard mumbling, "What time is it?"

"Four AM babe and you need to get on the road. I need to get ready, and you need to get ready for your day too," stated Charles already gearing up for the new business day.

"I brought a bag. Can't I just get ready with you and catch a ride into the office? I thought I was coming back over tonight after the late hour investors meeting. It's not like we are not going to the same place." She whined.

"You knew the rules from day one. No sleep overs and no boyfriend-girlfriend bullshit. You driving into work with me will be the fucking talk of the corporate campus for weeks." Charles paused waiting for her to move, "Time for you to head out princess."

"Don't you think we are past the friend with benefits thing here?" she cleared her hair away from her eyes and looked up at him. "We have been together for over a year, and everyone pretty much knows we are banging, why not make it public?"

Charles looked at her as if she had the proverbial two heads. 'What is it with females and not understanding a simple business arrangement?' he kept looking at her and could swear she cocked her head in confusion like his old German Shepard.

'We go out to places we are not recognized. I buy her dinner and drinks, talk about stupid useless stuff and come back and have sex. Simple formula, she gets a great meal, high class drinks and orgasms. Why do they always want something that screws it up,' Charles thought in a flash before the steel door in his mind slammed shut.

"Out now," he started quietly, but with an edge as he threw off the covers and headed for the shower.

"Can I at least shower here and then head in separately?" she asked with a sexy tone to her voice.

Charles paused on his pathway, 'She is an energetic fuck,' he thought. 'Why not? One last fuck before I dump her ass and find a new fuck toy,' his thoughts continued along this simplistic misogynistic mental path.

"Sure," he said, and she smiled. "But fair warning that I am going to take your ass and fill it."

She moaned but nodded her head. She really did not mind anal, but he was forceful going in and she was going to have to play with her own clit if she wanted anything out of it.

He was in the shower soaping his body with body wash when she slipped in Infront of him to hog the hot water. He was fine about her position because his cock was already half hard and sprang to full hardness when she bent over to grab the body jell and her ass and pussy slid all over his hardened cock.

As she straightened his arm went around her waist and pulled her close. He grabbed the body wash from her hand, squirted a glob in his hand and then gave it back to her. He pulled himself back and massaged the jell over his cock.

She had taken the bottle back when she felt his fingers slip between her cheeks. He massaged the jell into her rosebud and then felt the crown of his cock lodge in the same location. She moaned loudly as he pushed forward slipping past her ring. As he sawed forward, she moaned louder in the pain and please feeling of being taken. As he began to pump, both knew he would not last long.

The one thing that did that unnerved her, was during his anal lunging he moaned something out loud. He stated a phrase just as he was coming.

"Business is Business."

***

Brian sat staring at the screen in front of him. Nothing unusual, it was his geek life after all. Graduating, barely, then like a homeless dog looking for scraps, he came wandering into MyLife looking for work.

Admittedly he somehow thought he would be elevated to the upper floors due to his past relationship with Charles.

'That was a stupid hypothesis,' Brian thought to himself.

He drug his ass out of his chair and walked quietly towards another damn meeting.

***

It was Thursday and he was waiting on the sidewalk for his minions. Only his 'inner circle' were allowed to do the bagel and coffee walk on Thursdays, 8am sharp. He was there and so should they have been. He had been at the office for over two hours already.

'Fucking lazy, that's what they have become, fucking lazy' he thought as he waited at the corner of Market and Battery. The crisp wind flowing up Market St. made him pull up the collar on his $4500 Armani overcoat. He missed dressing in jeans, t-shirts, and his leather jacket, but he had to play the part for the press and advertisers.

'So, everyone keeps telling me,' he thought.

The 'boys' finally arrived but noted Charles non-responsiveness. They began their walk. Charles already had his $5 bill folded in his hand.

He could see 'his' homeless man Fred at his normal corner. His normal routine was followed, hand Fred the $5 bill pat him on the shoulder and wish him a good day.

"Remind me again why you give out your hard-earned cash to a guy that's a burden to society?" Ricky asked. They had all heard the story a hundred times, but every so often one of them poked Charles with the question.

"As I have already told you assholes, he is the only honest man out here. You just lied to a regulator. Chris over here is lying to his wife so he can get a little extra from the Latina barista. You..."

"OK, Ok, I was just asking," stated Ricky holding up his hands in surrender.

"But maybe, just maybe, the explanation can get through to you this time." Charles paused and looked back at Fred. "The first day we opened, and I made this walk, Fred asked me for cash. I asked him what it was for. I asked him if he was going to buy life sustaining meds or good food, or other bullshit like the other lying panhandlers."

Charles paused just briefly, "Nope he looked me straight in the eye and said, 'Sometimes a man just need a beer.' No truer statement was ever made!"

Charles turned and investigated each of their faces. "You high price goat ropers need to use it as a learning lesson. All I get from you, is memo's detailing ethics concerns and data misuse. You send me that bullshit as a cover-up in case something goes wrong. But each of you is happy to spend their bonus checks each year."

At this point, Charles was getting upset. "Everyone wants to use our platform and the price of admission is signing over their soul. Everyone knows it." Charles did a brief pause.

"Yet we continue to add new subscribers by the thousands each day. New vendors are begging to become one of our 'limited partners' and use our data holdings. They are flooding in by the hundreds each day."

"Admit to yourselves, we are the new Vikings. Raping and pillaging our way through Europe, the Americas and now Asia."

Charles looked back at Fred halfway-down Market St. "Enjoy the rape and pillage gentlemen, not sure how long the pillaging will last."

***

Months later...

Charles rolled over and felt the bed looking for Jeanne. That side of the bed was empty. The bedclothes were thrown back and the bedsheet cold. He could hear the water running in the ensuite shower and thought about her naked with water running down her curvy body. He groaned to himself. The afternoon 'nap' fuck had been fun, but he was regretting the evenings future 'entertainment.' He was receiving another stupid 'humanitarian' award for providing free services to another non-profit.

Jeanne was not one of the pie-eyed girls he had bedded in the past. She was missing all starry-eyed notions and did not have one romantic bone in her body. It was what first drew him to her. All business and action. She was built for it too. Not a straight line on that body. Curves that flowed into curves. Her eyes drew him in like a moth to a bug-light.

And she loved sex too. Public sex, kinky sex, all types of sex and even the thought of some of their antics started to make parts him start to react.

But he laid back down and contemplated one more night lying to all the others around him. How he wished he could just scream out, 'I own you bitches,' like he had called out to the partygoers seemingly, so long ago.

And the antics of his fuck-mate just made it all worse.

While he was going tonight, his heart was not into another night of bullshit. His new Armani tux seemed to mock him, hanging next to the closet.... Mocking, yet ready for him.

The evening would be sort of a double entendre. While he would blush on command and stammer how he was 'so proud' to receive the award, there were other actions at work. His gift of 'free' services, came with a hidden price tag, DATA. He was mining all the data from the non-profit. He was mining the companies' providing funds and gifts and the board members themselves. Because of his participation, more wealthy donners stepped up and all their financial information was mined and placed within the vaults of his servers.

Jeanne, on the other hand, was in this relationship for the prestige, lime-light and glad handing that would be his Bain all night long. He so hated the claptrap of the rich and famous. The false bravado, one upping and general elitist bullshit had him tired before he even took his after-sex shower.

She on the other hand, loved the air kisses between the beautiful women, to not smear their lipstick. Loved the casual comments on where they had traveled or vacationed. The comments that were not casual nor arbitrary. These women were predatory.

Soon the cute hello's would denigrate into downright one-upmanship as she talked about the properties 'they' owned in London, NY or San Francisco. She did not 'own shit' he thought as he nodded to mundane useless questions from all of hangers-on that clung to the edges of his notoriety.

He would know when she had one glass of champagne to many, when she disparaged his small winery in San Luis Obispo County. She would begin as soon as someone brought it up and let it evolve into descriptions of a 'money pit'.

'It's my money' he thought, "fuck her and her 'marketing background" he would mutter while thinking of his father. MyLife had exponentially more marketing power and share than his father's firm or the one he had plucked her from.

He was seriously rethinking the advice his father's friends had given him. 'Get a solid girlfriend, preferably a wife. Look and act with grounding and stability. It's all a sham anyway, but the banks and investors like stability. Just pretend to be stable and get all you want on the side. It's all just a game,' they kept telling him.

'But,' he thought, 'if you hold all the cards and have enough money and power to burn, why play the game by their rules?'

"Come on babe, get out of bed and let's get you ready for the big affair," Jeanne commented as she leaned against the door jamb in just an oversized towel that was stretched to keep hold of her curves. Another was wrapped around her head to protect all the work her stylist had done for the event.

As they fucked earlier, she had protected her 'do' from his wandering fingers. He would have loved to pull that hair as he took her from behind.

He would make her pay later though. He would shove so deep in her mouth that her mascara would drip down her cheeks. And that ass, that big round bubble butt and shaved pussy would be taken until he was satisfied. And he would do it all again at 3 am, when he went to go on his nightly pee run. He may just have to do a 'hat trick' and take her in all three of her points of entry.

*

Later at the party, he looked at her curves and was always amazed that she could dance and spin in 5-inch heels completely drunk. It was one of those female oddities that utterly fascinated him. She was now getting past the point of 'tipsy' and heading to drunk.

As he stood there in a party, essentially in his honor, surround by sycophants...he had never felt more alone.

***

He had arrived early at the lawyers and was seated in the conference room. The ornate wood paneling and overly solid table and chairs wept 'Lawyer.' He stared at the conservative artwork and Remington sculptures. Everything about this room cried solid, sensible lawyer.

He contemplated getting up and walking out, but he wanted something. To hear how his dad's partners were going to handle the distribution of wealth? Maybe? Or maybe he just wanted to bask in the banalities they would say about his father and his passing.

"Fuck you" Charles heard as the door was opened. 'How are we to handle his god damn messes now!" came the same voice.

Three older men entered the room followed by a fourth, the lawyer.

The three older men froze just within the doorway as they found Charles sitting in the seat across the ornate table from the door. They had that definite deer in the headlights look.

"Gentlemen, I believe you know the deceased son, Charles."

"I am sorry for the confusion. I was not told you would be here for the resolution." Stated Mr. Reilly one of the partners.

"Why would I not be here?" responded Charles.

***

He stood at the edge of the grave and then walked over to an adjacent tree and sat his ass down. He would hear later from his lover about grass stains on his silk blended Armani suit.

As if he gave a fuck.

He signaled his security team to keep the 'well-wishers' away. That included his vapid girlfriend and her entourage. He just waived her off and she blew him an air kiss. She continued with mindless chattering with her friends. She took over his duties of thanking the throngs for coming out to support 'them.'

She had hated his dad. Of course, it did not help that his dad had drunkenly hit on her at his last big obnoxious birthday party. He was not sure if would have cared if his dad had gotten a little something-something.

He looked at the hole in the ground after they had lowered the casket. I dawned on him that it was somewhat symbolic.

There is the hole in the ground like the hole in his chest where his dad had been ripped out.

There is the hole in the ground that symbolized the emptiness of the relationships he had with everyone around him. His 'friends', his 'girlfriend,' business associates, 'partners' and the hoard at the gates wanting a quote or selfie. They all just wanted a piece of him like some zombie movie.

The hole was his desire to dominate, but it was never filled. He had butchered his competition. But they just did not stay dead. A new upstart would pop up and it would start the cycle over again, over, and over. Kill, trash, pulverize and repeat endlessly. He could not fill the hole with them

'Demands by the Board for more profits. The Board, for the company he created. They were making demands on him?' Charles thought.

A never-ending hole to fill.

And worst of all, there was a hole in the ground that symbolized the fallacy of his power. He created this Frankenstein monster, but the monster had come back to kill Dr. Frankenstein, remember?

His was just turning on him.

Charles looked in the hole. He did not try and stand by the edge, too many flowers, fake grass and the damn lowering mechanism. He just stared.

'It did have that look of a giant maw, gaping wide, with soft flower lips.' He thought, 'Come to swallow me whole' in the drama that kept chasing him.

Senate committees, EU committees, reporters, paparazzi, FBI, MI5 and 6, lawsuits, death threats, they kept piling up.

The hole just kept getting larger and deeper. The hole was there, to swallow him and all of the burden he carried, just wanted to make him disappear.

He kept contemplating the meaning of it all...

He started to chuckle and then outright laugh.

"Fuck, I have turned old like my dad. Here I am 'contemplating the meaning of life.' He thought.

The idea of how they would react if the maw did swallow him, did make him give one more chuckle.

Charles turned and looked at the throng of well-wishers and his insipid girlfriend in her $4000 little black dress and her $1500 miniscule black veil. He did not have the patience or desire to deal with their drama.

He turned away from them and walked to the tree line.

He sat in the shade until most of the minions had left. He watched a squirl run here and there. He understood the squirl, move or die. He watched the squirl run to the edge of the hole. It stuck its head between the piles of flowers and looked down. Down at his father in a wooden box. An incredibly expensive, ornate wooden box, but in the end, a wooden box just the same.

It then turned to look at him. It froze in place as their eyes met and then it scurried back to safety of the tree line.

He wondered if he could turn away. Scurry away to safety and find shelter from his monster.

***

Three years further along...

Charles could not help himself. Even after so many years he got angry when he opened his closet. Gone were the vestiges of his past life. His beloved leather jacket, a gift from his father for his 18^th birthday, gone. His comfy jeans, worn by living in them, gone. His boots, vans, his hat, his old stuff, gone.

Charles's girlfriend Jeanne had 'disappeared' them all. She had tossed all his favorite clothing and items, telling him to "grow up."

"Grow up?" he thought. He was the CEO of one of the largest corporations in the world, and she says "grow up' because he liked to lounge in his faded Levi's, vans and band t-shirts.

Now, she had the nerve to pressure him to announce their very public engagement/wedding. As if he wanted to deal with her. He had no interest with all the other shit going on in his life. 'Really' he thought, her biggest concern was planning a huge bullshit wedding that the social pages would talk about for years.

'Fuck that' he thought as he put together some talking points for the emergency board meeting planned for this afternoon.

And so, not only was he taking it up the ass on a private level, but he had the Board members completely freaked by potential litigation.

The momentum of the senate committees looking deep into all the social media companies was gaining strength. Not that the Senate committee members would understand how any of his business models worked, but those 'little fuck staffers' were smarter than their bosses.

The MyLife Company executives and Board Members realize that they are also cornered. They worried about what Charles would say out loud to the media or to the Senate. All of them knew that they were facing potential jail time. They had known for years that the way they manipulated the data, the advertising and sales of meta-data could be construed as criminal in the American courts. In the EU and the rest of the world it was plain illegal, without a doubt.