Kopelson

Dan Feuerbach
English 352
2-20-2006
Character Sketch

Jenny Baldwin, age nineteen, died from a heroin overdose, a rarity in Lincoln. He insides would consist of an exploded pump feeding into a spider web of ruptured veins, capillaries and arteries.
Dean Graham, thirty-seven, died of syphilis, his tissue could spread to anybody who it was put into.
Mark Ferguson drowned in a river, his body wasn’t found for eight days. He would be mostly soggy hamburger and shriveled innards.
Harvey Kopelson tossed the donor profiles onto his desk. They scattered slightly on the glass protecting the dark oak of his favorite piece of furniture like brittle brown leaves. None of these potential products would sell.
The ligaments would be weakened by years of inactivity or the skin would be dry and leathery or the heart valves would cause an infection from a deadly disease or the bones would not hold up. Everything on the lists was deteriorated.
“Not enough healthy people die,” Kopelson muttered to himself.
People needed transplants. People needed his transplants. He needed a solid inventory of these investment goods. He needed arms for car crash victims and skin for burn victims, ligaments for athletes who landed the wrong way and heart valves for people who ate much pork.
He turned around in his leather chair to look out the window directly behind him. It was getting late. He should have left three hours ago. He should have told Bob to call him at home. It didn’t matter though. The good part about having no family is the freedom of not doing what anyone else wanted.
He tapped the butt of a pen on his desk. The call should be coming in any minute. Bob had something important to tell Kopelson. He flipped the pen around in his palm then clicked it so the point was exposed. He spun it again and clicked it again. He repeated the process until he could think of something better to do.
He rolled back over the transparent mat onto the sapphire Saxony carpet. He pulled the lower left hand drawer open and felt the smooth rollers practically open the drawer for him. He pulled out a tin of Camel Exotic Blends-- Ismar Stingers—and an ashtray from his trip to Munich for the transplant supply conference. He was supplier of the year...
He opened the windows in his office and counted his steps as he walked to the door.
“Eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one,” he said to nobody.
Fuck the ban, he thought. After the door was shut he lit up his cigarette.
He sat, staring out his window, counting pick-ups or SUVs, green cars or bikers, students or professionals.
He stamped his cigarette out into the tray when the phone rang. He picked up the receiver. He knew who it was.
“Hey Bob, what up?”
“Not too much, how about yourself?”
“Just looking through the donor list for this month. Looks kind of on the diseased side. I’m not worried though, you know how it is. Hit or miss. Feast or famine. Next month will be better.”
“Well, Harvey, that’s what I called about.”
There was a pause. Kopelson did not expect good news.
“Tomorrow MedSupply is going out of business.”
Kopelson’s blood turned to ice. He reached for another cigarette.
“What do you mean?” he forced it to sound as nice as possible “your stock went up three points last quarter.”
“I’m ready to retire. I’ve had enough. Selling these transplants to people who sell transplants. Going to families and asking for free fibulas and tendons, putting up the whole ‘they would have wanted it that way’ act. Then making a profit. And then there’s the regulations that…”
“Donovan you stupid bastard. Do not do this to me. You supply me with a full third of my total inventory. If you drop out I’ll have to put my business on hold to find a new supplier. You can’t just do this to me. I can’t lose all that money.”
He stamped out one and lit up another.
“Are you smoking?”
“Don’t fucking change the topic Donovan. What have you got left in your freezer? You have to let me pick and chose. I need more parts. I’m already under supplied as it is.”
“I sold most of my inventory to Benza Corp. this morning, tomorrow I make the official announcement. Don’t worry. You boys in BioServices will do fine.”
“You sold your shit to them? I have been a loyal customer for years.”
“They’ve been a loyal customer for longer, and in higher volume.”
“You stupid bastard.”
“Look, Harvey, I hate to do this to you, but it was time for me to get out.”
“You’re just going to walk away from this? You fucking Judas.”
“I’m going now. Good luck.”
“I’m not done yet Donovan.”
It was too late, Donovan’s voice was replaced with a dial tone.
He lit up again.
“Dickless wonder,” Kopelson muttered to himself. He hoped Donovan could here him.
He stood up to reach halfway across his desk and pick up the donor profiles. He threw them in the trashcan and sat back down.
The leather on his chair farted as he slid down. He closed the lower left hand drawer on his desk. He sat back up and grabbed his paperweight. A scarab encased in glass sitting in its coveted position right next to the first dollar he ever made with his business.
He tossed the half oval from hand to hand. Feeling the smooth surface and occasionally pulling the cigarette out of his mouth to ash.
When he finished the last drag, feeling the heat of hot toxic tar pulled through the filter he stamped the last cigarette on hand into the ashtray, effectively making it a piece of garbage.
He looked at the clock. Nine. Well what else could he do? He turned off the light, locked the door to his office and went to the elevator. He still had time and money to buy another pack. As for tomorrow, he thought, fuck it.