The Trade

The Trade

JT Kalnay

Smashwords Edition

Published by jt Kalnay

Copyright 2011, JT Kalnay

This is a work of fiction. While, as in all
fiction, the story is based on experiences, real or imagined, all
names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of my
overactive imagination or are used fictitiously. No reference to
any real person is intended or should be inferred.

Discover other titles by jt Kalnay at:

www.jtkalnay.com

This book is available in print at most
online retailers.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal
enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to
other people. If you would like to share this book with another
person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If
you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not
purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com
and purchase your own copy.

Be Sure to Read All JT Kalnay’s Novels

The Beginning

"The CIA? You've got to be kidding?” Rick
Hewlett looked at his younger friend Jay Calloway. "You'd work for
those goons?" Rick demanded.

"Yeah sure. Why not?” Jay answered. "You get
to work on the coolest stuff. They already told me they want me to
keep working on my cryptography algorithms and viruses. The pay is
pretty good, and you've got job security.”

"Job security? Hah! As long as you don't get
killed!” Rick emphasized the last word.

The two computer science doctoral candidates
had been bullshitting back and forth like this for their four years
together in graduate school. With only three weeks to graduation
they were still amusing themselves by abusing the companies that
each had chosen for interviews. As American-born, English-speaking
"computer geeks" they had their pick of high paying defense jobs or
low paying professorships. Even Wall St. had come calling.

Jay Calloway, 26, wiry, blonde-haired,
blue-eyed, lusting after money and/or excitement, had narrowed his
choices to programmer/analyst for the CIA, research scientist with
the Navy or systems architect with a Wall Street high finance firm,
MacKenzie Lazarus. Jay had site interviews with the CIA and
MacKenzie Lazarus (ML) next week. Surprisingly he’d been able to
learn more about the CIA than the people he’d be interviewing with
at ML.

Rick Hewlett, 35, tall, fully-bearded (though
prematurely grey), well-tanned, equally enamored with the idea of
an affluent lifestyle after the long Spartan days as a graduate
student, but less interested in the high tech toys of the national
security concerns, had also shortened his list to a start up
software company in the Pacific northwest, which had recently
relocated from the desert southwest to a remote suburb of Seattle,
and a smaller environmental consulting firm in rural Oregon. Rick
was packing for his trip to the West Coast.

"Hand me that Frisbee would you?" Rick asked.
Jay tossed it over.

"You're taking me to the airport right?" Rick
asked.

"Right" Jay answered. The two paraded from
Rick's apartment out into the bright Midwest afternoon. Though Rick
could have driven himself, Jay had offered to take him. The two
friends had gotten along surprisingly well on several road trips.
Perhaps the greatest adventure of Jay's life had been their trip to
the Collegiate Peaks in Colorado where they'd camped, hiked, and
rafted for six glorious summer weeks. At least a dozen pictures of
the trip still adorned Jay's room. He often thought of simply
moving there, becoming a guide of some type, and writing some
programs in some abandoned cabin in some remote canyon.

Rick was Jay’s first real friend. Growing up
in the most rural county in Ohio he’d been a "gifted child,”
getting perfect scores on his SATs and posting a 4.0 in math all
through high school and college. This had isolated him as much as
the fact that his parents were hermits, even by the standards of
Vinton County, home of Ohio’s most isolated places. An Ohio few
know. An Ohio of old growth forests, towering cliffs, rushing
rivers, white tail deer, and long buried, long forgotten
arrowheads. Jay had been isolated and uptight until Rick came
along. Ten years older than Jay, Rick was twenty years wiser. He
had experience and cool that Jay had bathed in vicariously. Jay
knew practically nothing about Rick's family or background, but it
hadn't seemed to matter. Rick hadn’t cared a bit about Jay’s own
dysfunctional family unit. Their one trip to Ohio’s wilderness had
been spent hiking and hunting.

Working together the two friends had raced
through graduate school at Miami of Ohio in a record four years,
where the average was six or more. Jay had offered to drive Rick to
the airport more from a feeling of impending loss than anything
else. Having felt close to someone, the being alone was going to be
worse than ever for Jay. Still, Jay knew enough not to follow his
friend to the West Coast, even though lost puppy instincts were
telling him to do exactly that. Jay realized it was time he did
something on his own, if only for a little while. Though the two
had made vague plans for the future about running the most
high-tech consulting firm in the country, nothing definite had ever
come of it.

The two friends got into Jay's old, rusted,
beater pickup truck. Rick's bag and golf clubs went in the
back.

"All work and no play," Rick said.

Rolling down I-71 through Cincinnati Ohio
towards the Cincinnati International airport, which is conveniently
located twenty miles away in Kentucky, the two listened to a Reds
game on the radio. Rick was even quieter than normal, adrift in
thought. He turned to Jay.

"Pull off for a second," Rick said.

"What?"

"Pull off for a second," Rick said. Jay eased
off at the Mitchell Street exit, the way to the zoo. Rick and Jay
both got out of the car. Jay walked around to where Rick was
standing by the guard rail.

“
Are you alright?” Jay
asked.

"When you go to the CIA interview, don't tell
them we’re such good friends. They’ll check on you, know you know
me, know we worked together and studied together, they’ll know
we’re friends, but it’ll go better for you if you don’t tell them
we’re good friends," Rick said. He didn't look at Jay. He remained
looking out over the guard rail, alternating between speaking and
spitting.

"Why?" Jay asked. He realized it was a stupid
question before the last syllable left his mouth. Wished he could
pull the words back out of the air. Rick turned his head to look at
Jay from the corner of his eye. Jay could see the scowl on his
older friend's face. Had seen the angry older brother look before
when he’d said or done equally inane things. He felt the back of
his neck and the cheeks of his face go red and hot.