The Art of Making Money - Jason Kersten [85]
SEVEN HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND meant at least 15,000 bill faces. It meant 7,500 security strips and watermarks, and more print cartridges than many businesses use in a year. Since every bill had to be hand-assembled, Art and Natalie were looking at a minimum of two weeks of nonstop production, not to mention buying new computer equipment, arranging for a temporary hole where they could work, and transporting paper and supplies. Fortunately, the one problem they didn’t have was getting the money to pay for it: Sandy agreed to front them five thousand dollars to pay for the production costs.
The operation would have to be done in Chicago—a sacrifice that Natalie conceded to, given the one-time scenario of the deal. Her only condition, which Art was happy to comply with, was that as soon as the deal went down they would hit the road for a long trip before setting up in Arkansas. Both of them were hungry to rekindle the romance from their earlier trips, and they wanted to do it before the baby arrived.
Setting all these plans in motion helped Art to forget about the letter. But as he and Natalie drove back to Texas, the possibility that his father had responded—or worse, hadn’t—snowballed into an anxiety that grew with each mile. He suppressed it by mentally preparing himself for disappointment. It was certainly possible that the man in Alaska was a different Art Williams; if it was his father, why would he be willing to reconnect with him now after having remained silent for so long? And the way his father had always moved around, the address could be old, a cold lead. When they finally pulled into Sharon’s driveway, he had primed himself for the inevitable letdown.
“Guess who called my office.” Sharon said to him the moment he walked in the door. “He left a number; he wants to talk to you.”
ART DIDN’T EVEN BOTHER UNPACKING. He drove straight to a 7-Eleven, got five dollars’ worth of quarters, and dialed the number on a pay phone outside. A female answered. Despite the barricade of time, Art thought he recognized the voice. But given how impossible it seemed that his dad could be with the same woman, and the advantage of anonymity, he simply requested to speak to Arthur Williams.
“Just a moment, I’ll get him.”
Footsteps went away, then new ones approached.
“Hello?”
That voice he was sure of.
“Dad.”
“Hello, son!” said Senior. He sounded more cheerful than Art had ever imagined.
“Oh my God, I can’t believe it’s you.”
“It’s me. I’m so glad you wrote me,” Senior said. “I’ve been waiting for your call. When I got your letter, it made me so happy.”
“That’s good,” Art said, and then they began the awkward process of reconnecting. With sixteen years and a continent between them, it was easiest for both of them to pretend like they’d last seen each other a few weeks ago. They stretched to speak in the possessive tones of family while touching on subjects that exposed just how much of strangers they’d become to each other. “It was simple things first,” remembers Art. “I told him that he was a grandfather, that I had a wife who was pregnant. It was . . . there was too much to talk about over a pay phone. Baby steps. Of course, I had a shitload of questions I wanted to ask him, but I wasn’t gonna do it over the phone.”
Art was able to get some basics. After he’d left, Senior had driven back West and then moved Anice and her children to Alaska. He’d worked as a mechanic, had a house there in the mountains, and was “semiretired.” Every subject led to more questions, but it was easier to stay general