She's With the Band

These Times are Hard

Dana's flat looked exactly as it had been left it a day ago. Physically, nothing had changed but Valerie knew that everything had. Dana was in the hospital and the flat was lifeless as if her presence was the only thing that breathed life into it. With hard eyes, she strode to Dana's room, followed by Gale.

"I could have done it myself, really," Valerie tried again for the sake of her dying argument. She grunted as she attempted to take out Dana's travel suitcase from under the bed. It was somehow heavy and lodged in between the wooden planks of the bed.

A very amused looking Gale stood behind her, waiting for her to admit that she couldn't take it out. He held back a smile; instead, his expression was knowingly cocky and he leaned on the doorway. A few moments passed and Valerie was still struggling with the handle of the suitcase, refusing to give up.

Finally, she sighed in exasperation and cursed at the universe. She looked at Gale with a defeated expression and refused to hold his eyes. "Fine, I can't get it out."

Gale moved towards the suitcase and tried to dislodge it with both arms. At first, it wouldn't budge; he suspected that its heavy weight must be the reason. He breathed heavily as he took out the suitcase and threw it on Dana's bed. Valerie stepped around him and unzipped the suitcase to reveal a pile of heavy winter coats stacked on top of each other.

"That's why," he panted with exertion, "it was so damn heavy." Valerie wasn't paying attention to Gale, who was watching her by now; instead, she took out one of Dana's coats. It smells just like her, Valerie thought as she clutched the coat deep within her embrace, all the while convincing herself that she was hugging her sister and not an inanimate article of clothing.

Gale stood awkwardly, feeling as if he had overstepped his boundaries and should look away. He silently tiptoed out of the room to give Valerie some privacy to pack her sister's belongings.

He took a seat on the couch just outside the room and closed his eyes for a few moments. His phone wouldn't stop buzzing today and he needed to clear his head and think. His mind replayed the week's headlines.

Managerial fiasco for Irish rock band The Draft!

Embezzlement under their noses: The Draft edition.

The Draft Vs. Jacob Daniels: A lawsuit?

The entire band had spent the day before preparing public statements for the press and doing interviews. It was rough time for all of them; especially since it was Daniels who always had their backs during scandals like these. Now, he was the scandal. And the whole band was reeling from the consequences.

Gale's mind was oscillating between before and after. Before the scandal, the band was playing at sold-out stadiums for their world tour. After the incident, they had to cancel the remaining tour dates. They were doubtful of the success of the European leg of the tour in the absence of a manager to coordinate the entire show. To add salt to the wound, the band was forced to put their plans for a new album on hold indefinitely. It was all happening during a time when they lacked direction and coordination the most.

Daniels almost got away with it; transfers from the band's profit and into his bank account at his offshore company had been underway for awhile. It all became evident to the band when a secretary from the offshore company left a message for Daniels to inform him that the transfer of profits had been unsuccessful. With the message reaching several crew members before Daniels himself, the seed of gossip had been planted. The crew were the first to speculate fraud and were quick to become suspicious of Daniels' closed door meetings with financial advisors. The band didn't want to believe the rumors regarding their old friend, yet even they had grown weary and suspicious of Daniels' uncharacteristic behaviour.

The band watched their profits decline despite the successful statistics. Daniels blamed it on the global economic recession and started deluding the band with technicalities. Profits got so low to the extent that the band had to hire an external audit firm to monitor the money flow before they ran into debt. Daniels was quick to oppose this uncanny intrusion and strongly fought against the firm. At the peak of suspicion, the firm was hired despite Daniels' pleas.

The firm didn't have to look far to find evidence of fraud; Daniels wasn't smart enough to erase his tracks completely. He was fired in the span of a heartbeat. Now, the question that plagued Gale's mind was: should they file a public lawsuit against their long-time friend?

"Alright," Valerie's voice derailed Gale's train of thought, "I'm done." She came out of the room, looking sullen. They exchanged a silent moment of grief for two completely different reasons. Valerie feared the death of her only sister. Gale feared the downfall of The Draft, which was another form of death for him.

Gale broke the silence at last, "I'll take that suitcase from you." By this time, Valerie's entire body had been aching from overexertion, so she handed him the suitcase without much protest. They made their way out of the flat and neither had the heart to look back.

Back in the car, Valerie could see that the hour was getting closer to midnight. She felt guilty for being away from Dana and Gale could feel her heavy guilt weighing the air down. He turned the radio on, hoping to enliven the air, yet he immediately regretted it. A late-night show host was gossiping about the week's headlines.

"And in surprising news, an ex-manager is facing fraud charges from his former employers The Draft!"

"I'm... sorry to hear that," Valerie said. Despite the million thoughts roaming through her head, she wasn't oblivious to common courtesy. "The media must be giving you a hard time."

"Thanks," Gale replied with as evenly as he could muster, "it's been rough on all of us. He was our friend." His hands gripped the stirring wheel tightly and his knuckles became pale from the strength of his hold.

"Are you going to sue him?" Valerie knew this topic was the farthest thing from conversational, yet she couldn't help asking.

Gale paused for a few minutes, considering his answer. "We're not sure. It's a long legal process."

"I think you should," Valerie offered her candid opinion, "embezzlement from the workplace isn't petty theft. It's huge, and you should be compensated for your lost money."

"You think?" Gale was interested in hearing what else she had to say.

"It's a standard procedure of the HR department in my previous job when we had substantial evidence against the employee," Valerie explained from her experience as VP of the department at the Fairfax.

"We did hire an auditing firm and they proved an inconsistency in accounts," Gale said matter-of-factly. He decided to go into a full explanation of the situation since he doubted Valerie knew much beyond the media's version of the story. He told her about the friendship, the offshore company, the financial advisors, and even how they confronted Daniels during which time Valerie listened intently with a calculative stance.

"I think your case against him is strong," Valerie offered in support, at last.

"I agree, but the lads," he said, referring to Dylan and Michael, "don't want to put the band under anymore scrutiny from the press. They want to distance themselves as much as possible."

"It's a gruelling process, I'll admit," Valerie replied, "but as long as he's not legally stopped, you won't get much distance."

"I think you might be right," Gale agreed with a sullen face.

The bright lights of the hospital came into view from a distance. The radio was playing a soul tune but it was reduced to a mere background noise as both Valerie and Gale were lost in thought.

Gale parked in front of the main entrance and ran to get the suitcase out from the trunk. The night was cold and the wind was rustling the leaves on the trees around them. Valerie clutched her arms closer to her chest and breathed into them.

"Honestly, Gale, I don't know how to thank you enough," Valerie could hear the slow progression of the song from the car's radio.

"Don't mention it," Gale set the suitcase at Valerie's feet and looked up. "I hope your sister gets better."

Valerie offered him a small smile and took the suitcase into her functioning hand.

"Goodnight."