The last thing I did before I shut down for the night was ask Hopeton to come over to my apartment the next day. It was a Sunday, and that meant we could spend a solid block of time working out logistics and operational steps needed to get me up and running as the in-country manager of our newly expanded PanStar team.
“Nice place,” Hopeton remarked after he arrived. We walked out onto the balcony, so he could admire the view of the bay.
“Yeah, I wanted you to see it because I figured we should use my second bedroom as the PanStar PanCity office.”
Hopeton laughed and asked me if I was gonna get t-shirts made up.
“I wanna wait until I meet all our street crew captains. That’s when I’m gonna start recruiting for our company fútbol team.”
We walked back into the apartment and sat at my big dining room table.
“Do you mind if I lay out an agenda?” I asked.
“Be my guest,” Hopeton replied.
I told Hopeton I needed to know:
What street facing activities did he specifically want to train me on over the next day or so?
What public facing accounting did I need to learn, and how would I be trained?
Similarly, how was he planning to teach me the ropes about how crew bosses handled their more informal transaction accounts and how the two ledgers were reconciled?
“And, most importantly, I think- do we want to bring Wilkie in to manage the books for us?” I asked.
“I’d like to sit with him at least one more time before we make any final decisions,” Hopeton replied. “And I think I need to extend my visit for at least two weeks. It doesn’t make sense to just give you only a small part of the exposure you need and then leave.”
“Can Biz hold down the fort without you?” I asked.
“Sure,” Hopeton said. “He’s been managing the PanStar office day to day for me for a while now. We’ve started to scale back any public transactions, so he doesn’t have much ‘civilian’ work to take care of.”
I nodded. That made sense to me.
“And I’m pretty sure he and Lucci have some extremely high tech fiduciary hustle going on. Something about digital currency.” Hopeton told me. “So, for him to have that comfortable couch to sit on, in that private backroom with all that strong air conditioning and a giant plasma tv going full blast as he moves his cyber money around…” Hopeton shrugged and shook his head.
“Biz is gonna Biz,” I mused. “I’m telling you, Hopeton- that motherfucker is gonna wind up a millionaire. Just you watch.”
“And he’s taking Lucci along with him,” Hopeton added.
We broke off for a few minutes while Hopeton took care of changing his flight and extending his hotel reservation. Once that was finished, he laid out the next few days’ gameplan.
“I’m assuming you don’t have to be up under Mundo’s scrutiny next week.”
‘No, not at all,” I laughed. “He knows I’m gonna be out and about on site visits, riding whip on all of the construction managers. I’ll have Wilkie stay in office all week to give Mundo someone to focus on if he gets bored. You and I can ride together- once I’m done with my check-ins, I can give you all my focus. And if you don’t want to have to deal with any extra people, I can give my driver the week off.”
“That’s a good idea,” Hopeton remarked. “You can carry me around.”
“Just like the old days.”
“Here’s how it will run,” Hopeton started. “On the street side, I’m going to have you shadow me on some collections. You’ll see me dealing with the street crew bosses mainly, plus a few of the individual runners. This will give you a feel for how the money is handled- how they get their re-ups, who does the pick-ups at the end of the day, security, conflict resolution, et cetera.”
“All the street shit that you and Bolo tried to keep me and Olmando away from all those years,” I replied.
“Exactement, frè’m,” Hopeton confirmed. “And for the most part, this is still the shit you won’t be dealing with. But for educational purposes, you should see how it’s managed.”
Hopeton broke off to ask me for some water. I checked my watch- it was one o’clock.
“You want to go get some food?” I asked.
“No, I’m fine,” he replied. “Let’s power through this and then head out. I have a taste for some seafood.”
That sounded good to me.
“Would you mind texting Wilkie and asking if he’d like to join us?” he asked.
“Not at all,” I said. “I’ll let him know we can pick him up whenever he’s free.”
Wilkie was available.
Hopeton and I got back to business.
“After we spend a few days on the street, next step is to get you familiarized with our accounting system,” he explained. “And you may recall this is what I said was the tricky part.”
“Yep, I remember,” I said. “And that’s why I wanted to bring Wilkie in. You know I can do it if I have to, but it’s really not my thing at all.”
“I know it’s not your thing, but I need you to understand how it’s working- ‘here’s how we’re going to get it done,’ without hurting your brain. I’m going to introduce you to some of our neighborhood managers- the ones I trust, in some of the less heated neighborhoods. I’ll have them show you how they keep their internal logs, how people pad or hide earnings and how to spot when someone’s skimming.”
“Okay,” I said. “I can handle that.”
“And IF we bring Wilkie in, I’ll come back and show him the same thing, so both of you are on the same playing field.” He then shot me a look, daring me to lapse into Bitter ‘Brón mode.
“Don’t worry, Cabrón,” Hopeton reassured me. “We will utilize Wilkie’s talents. It may not be at the level you’d like- not right away, at least. But you won’t be stuck doing all the paperwork.”
“Good to know,” I replied. “What about the public facing paperwork? Is that what we’re going to start Wilkie out with?”
“Yes,” said Hopeton, pleased I was keeping up. “As long as things go well over the next few days, vibes-wise, I will start training Wilkie on how to keep the ‘clean’ version of the Panama books. I need something that can withstand a surface audit. We’ll work it simply, using Excel. Wilkie will have to be able to grasp how these differ from our real, street, numbers.”
“And I’ll have him work out of my apartment, only. He can use the second bedroom as his office,” I said. “That way I can keep an eye on him and he can stay under Mundo’s radar.”
“I approve of that plan,” Hopeton replied. “The less Mundo is aware of, the better for all of us.”
“Mundo’s too wrapped up in becoming a father,” I said. “Plus, not to be an asshole or anything, but I think he’s got a little sidepiece stashed away in Bethania. Now is the perfect time for you to bring me in on this without raising his suspicion.”
“And your protégé, Wilkie, potentially,” Hopeton added.
“And Wilkie,” I agreed.
It was nice to have a junior to mentor, especially one who seemed like he’d appreciate it.
