Fraudulent Life Insurance
By GerritTime
Word count: 2,551
Prompt: Facade
I am a man, I am a husband, I am a father.
I am these things because these facts are simply true. If they were lies; I would not be the owner of an insurance firm, with a workforce loyal to a mafioso; I would not have a beautiful wife, who I love dearly and loves me too; I would not have a son, who will continue my reign upon this Earth beyond my grave.
*
I was sitting at my desk, with my son, Sepio, near me.
“Dad, I don’t want to run an insurance firm.” I was holding the phone in my hand as he said this.
“Son, you can make a lot of money in here with very little effort,” Sepio covered his eyes with one hand “it would be foolish to throw it all away.”
The phone was busy dialing my accounting department. “I don’t care about money.”
“Hello Sir.”
“I need to confirm that we’ve paid all our expenses from last year.”
“We’ve double-checked, last year’s been paid for.”
“And have you filed this year’s taxes?”
Supposedly, they had filed them. And so I hung up the phone, preparing to set Sepio’s mind straight on being a man.
“How are you getting married without money? Your wife will want a man who can bring her presents, take her to restaurants, buy her a house, and a man with no money can’t do any of these things!”
Sepio was still covering his eyes, “Dad, I don’t want to get married.”
“Son,” Sepio turned away from me. I grabbed his head, spinning him to face me, “Son! Look at me while I talk to you! You don’t have to get married now, but when you want a woman all for yourself, you will need to spoil her. Women can be very needy creatures, and a proper man knows how to tend to those needs.”
He was frowning at me, as if he were still a confused child in need of lecturing. “Does mom love you beyond your supply of wealth?”
I couldn’t help but chuckle, “Of course she loves me! Why else would she choose me of all men on this Earth?”
The phone rang. It was my wife, Hedonia.
“How’s my lovely little Hedon?”
“She is in need of food. Frankie, I don’t feel like cooking dinner for tonight, can we eat out for today?”
Sepio was staring at the phone, “We already dined yesterday, you know we can’t eat at restaurants every day of the week.”
“Oh please Frankie, I am not in the mood for cooking.” She told me there wasn’t any food left in the fridge.
Sepio was growing a malicious grin, “We are not, going, to, a, restaurant.”
She was silent for a moment, Sepio was containing his laughter.
“I’m coming to your office.” And she hung up the phone.
And then, before I could set Sepio’s mind straight, God showed me even more suffering, as the Tax Department rang my phone. “You are being suspected of tax evasion, you have until the end of this month to resolve your unpaid taxes, or else we will collect your personal property in lieu of missing payments. The choice is yours.”
I phoned accounting. They took an eon to answer. My own employees, whom I pay a good salary to, kept me hanging for an eon! “Hello Sir.”
“Who made the mistake?”
They didn’t know the mistake.
“You know what I’m talking about, I’m being suspected of tax evasion!”
It wasn’t their fault, they said, “We were following Perfio’s orders.”
“Perfio? My lawyer? I have these federal dogs breathing down my neck and you’re blaming my lawyer?”
Supposedly they had no reason to go against me, as they “are responsible for handling your money, we are deadly aware of the trouble our mistakes can put you in,” they would never abuse that power.
I stormed out of my office. Sepio following behind me, smiling as if my suffering brought him joy. “What are you smiling for?”
We arrived at the elevator, I pressed the call button. “What are you smiling for?”
One elevator was going up, incrementing from 7, to 8, to 9. The other was stuck on the sixth floor. “Sepio, am I to believe my own son is a sadist?”
“Please don’t call me that anymore.”
“A sadist?”
He put a hand to his face, rubbing his eyes in frustration.
And from 12 it went to 13 with a little ding, opening its doors to reveal my little Hedon standing inside, “Frankie, I want to talk to you about dinner.”
“Not now Hedonia.” I entered the elevator, pressing the emboldened 11 where my accounting department lies.
“Oh yes now,” with the press of a button, she held the door open, “now is the time.”
Sepio took his phone out, putting it to his ear while backing away from the elevator. “I need to break a few legs, this can wait.”
“Does it always have to wait?” She pressed it again.
“Stop pressing that button.”
She click-click-clicked it over and over and over again.
“If that button breaks, you’re taking the stairs.”
“Frankie, you know I hate the stairs.”
I prepared my fist, “Then let me, and yourself, take the elevator,” crashing it into the elevator wall, “so we can get back home for dinner.”
She stared at me. She kept staring as if to show no fear. She kept staring, even as the doors were closing. She kept staring, even as she pressed that God forsaken button again.
I heard footsteps from down the hall. I knew from the fact this floor contained only two offices, with one being mine, that it had to be my loyal lawyer. Although he was running, which is quite unusual for any lawyer to do.
As the footsteps drew closer and closer, he passed by the elevator, halting with a painful shriek. He peered his head into the elevator, “Hey Franco, I got a call from accounting,” they told him about my unpaid taxes.
I kept up the staring contest, “Let’s go to your office.” And I continued staring, while exiting the elevator, while walking to Perfio’s office, while leaving Sepio behind in the hallway, even while inside his Perfio’s office. I kept on staring to show my wife who’s boss.
A brief and sudden darkness hit me.
“You blinked!”
I turned to Perfio “I’m being accused of tax evasion.”
“I win!”
Perfio seated himself at his desk “I’ll take care of it, I know how to handle the Tax Department.”
“Which means you have to treat me!”
I growled like an animal, “Shut up you woman!”
“I’ll handle this,” He said that I know him “I’m your best lawyer, and your” most trustworthy one, as he put it.
Before I walked out, I turned to my little Hedon “Did you drive all the way here?”
“Yes, is there a problem with that?”
There was no problem, but I used this to accuse her of being a vehicular felon. That would keep her busy with Perfio, letting me take the elevator.
While walking to the elevator, Sepio was still on the phone, “Son, do I need to hot glue that phone to your hand?”
“Dad, my friend can’t get into the building.”
“What a wonderful place to hang out with your friend, an insurance firm!”
“Dad, we want to show you something. He needs to get into the building.” He was staring at me with pleading eyes, as if he were still an ungrateful child begging for a Christmas present.
“Can’t you just show it to me?”
“No, it needs to be the both of us.”
I gave it a moment’s thought, then a pondering, then a conclusion “I’m calling security so he can get in.”
In my office, I called security. They too, took longer than usual in picking up. It seems today, my entire working staff has joined in a conspiracy against me, all in an effort to make me wait for eons on the phone. “Hello Sir.”
“My son said his friend is trying to enter the building, can you let him in please?”
“There’s a young man here in the lobby, could that be him?”
“Ask him if he’s a friend of Sepio’s.”
“One moment Sir.” And they returned after a short eon. “He says he’s a friend of Dixius.”
“Kick him out of the building then, must be someone else.”
“Understood Sir.”
And then, God himself came down from Heaven to torment me, as I got another call from the Tax Department. “We’ve been informed by one of your employes you’ve instructed them to be complicit in your tax evasion. These are currently allegations, but if they turn out to be true, then you could face serious legal punishments, in addition to your tax evasion.”
“Who informed you?”
“All they told us, is that this is someone whom you trust very, very much.”
I stormed out of my office, ready to break a lawyer’s leg if I had to. And while walking to Perfio’s office, Sepio was on the phone, “Dad, they kicked him out of the building.”
“Not now son, I have something more important right now.”
“Please don’t call me that anymore.”
I put a halt to my walk. “Call you what, my son?”
“I,” he paused for a moment, “I’ll explain it, but I can’t explain it on my own.”
“That is absolutely ridiculous, I’ve never heard such a thing before in my entire life.”
He lowered his head, as if he were still an ashamed child who made a mistake, “I’ll go get him myself then.”
And he entered the elevator, from 13 to 12 to 11, while the other elevator was still at 6.
Kicking the door open, I saw my little Hedon sitting on Perfio’s desk, while Perfio stared at her from his chair. They both jumped up like animals in fear. “Hedonia, what are you doing on his desk?”
She said the desk acted as a very comfortable chair.
Walking up to Perfio, my fists were clutched, trembling back-and-forth with rage, “Perfio, why did you lie to the Tax Department?”
He did no such thing, he said.
“Are you trying to mock me?”
He respects me very much, he said, and would never do such a thing.
I grabbed him by the shirt, raising him into the air, “Stop playing the fool with me!”
“As your lawyer, I would advise you to get your hands off of me. I can sue you into the ground if you so much as lay a finger upon me, so consider yourself lucky to have gotten this far.”
I was taken aback by this statement. My own loyal lawyer, has gone from accomplice, to traitor. If I were an animal, I would simply get on top of him in a fist fight. But as a man, with my capacity for rational thought, I let go of him, and rushed to my office with a devilish plan.
“Security, grab the cocaine, I want to get rid of my lawyer, Perfio, by the end of today.”
“Alright Sir, we’ll plant it on him right now.”
I had used this strategy before to rid my firm of high-status employees. And I know this works, because my targets resign with a great silence.
“We will also be coming up with your son, he’s bringing a friend to your office.”
“That’s fine by me.”
With that business resolved, it was time to resolve the business of my dinner, by phoning my little Hedon. She took an eon to answer, as if she too had joined the conspiracy my employees had conjured up. “Yes Frankie?”
“I’m going home in a few minutes, you better come quick to avoid taking those stairs—”
“I’m not getting back in the kitchen.”
I told her I didn’t say such a thing.
“Yes you did, and for today I want to eat out.”
“I don’t want to eat out, so we won’t eat out.”
And she hung up.
While storming out of my office, the elevator doors opened. Sepio came out of it, alongside his friend, with two security guards behind them. Sepio’s friend reached his hand out to me, “Hello Sir, we want to tell you something very important.”
I stormed past the elevator, and noticed the other elevator was still at 6. “It’s good you’re friends with my son, but—”
“Sir, please don’t call them that.”
I neared my lawyer’s door, “Can this wait? I need to break a Hedonist’s leg.”
I burst his door open, but only Perfio was inside, that wretched Hedon was nowhere to be seen. “Where is my wife?”
He was sweating profusely, while telling me he did not know where she was.
“I know your lying!” I walked up to his desk, he seemed to be afraid of me. “Where is my wife?”
Then my son, his friend, and the two guards entered the office too. “Dad, we want to tell you this now.”
“Not now son.” I placed both hands on Perfio’s desk, “Now tell me where she is.”
“Sir! Can you please stop calling them that!”
Perfio was seemingly short on breath, “Tell your guards to sniff their cocaine.”
“This is ridiculous! I can’t call my own son, my own son!”
“Dad, I’ve been meaning to tell you this for a long time.”
“That you’ve taken a DNA test, and that your mom is a whore?”
Perfio took a deep breath, “You can’t just call your own wife a whore.”
“Ok, I’m sorry, but it’s not like she’s here to hear me.”
Sepio stared right at me, “Dad, I am not Sepio, I am Dixius, I am non-binary!”
I couldn’t help but laugh, that boy always knew how to say the most ridiculous things imaginable. “Amazing, you’re some sort of quantum computer! What’s next, that friend of yours is your boyfriend?”
Their cheeks burned red-hot. They looked at me. They stared me right in the eye. And they held each other’s hands.
The smile on my face faded away. I was not angry, I was not sad, I was not shocked, I could only feel disappointment. “You’re no son of mine.”
And they stormed out of the office, with their backs turned against me.
It was in that moment, that a realisation came upon me; That little Hedon never takes the stairs. And so I grabbed onto Perfio’s desk, who was now sweating like a fountain, and flipped it over. When the desk crashed onto the floor, it revealed that wretched Hedon sitting on the ground, right in front of Perfio, who was now covering his crotch with both hands.
Me, being a man, I took the only reasonable option a man should take in this scenario; rushing your lawyer, pushing him down, punching him, and punching him, and punching him, until the security guards grab a hold of you.
*
Thus, I am no longer a man, no longer a husband, no longer a father.
I know this is true, as God chose to enact his wrath upon me by stabbing me with reality; I have lost ownership of my personal belongings and the insurance firm; I have lost my adulterous wife; I have lost my delusional son.