HARMONY

Part 28 "Another one goes down"

Singing to himself, Steve taped his gaff.

Joe gave him a push with his foot. "Tell me about how I can save my house," he said.

"Sure," Steve said. "Lots of people are in a tough spot and really don't know why."

Joe looked over his shoulder. "Let's go out back."

Steve nodded and followed Joe out the back door and into the parking lot. A late afternoon sun illuminated the broad side of a cement wall.

Joe stood back and crossed his arms. "My wife really likes her roses."

With a heavy sigh, Steve pointed to a grease pencil tucked behind Joe's ear. "Can I borrow that?"

Steve drew a stick-figure house and a family with smiley faces. "Those sub-primes featured the sweetheart introductory interest rates, the low—sometimes no—down payments, and sketchy income documentation." Steve drew a dollar sign. "It was anything goes because the banks and brokerage houses knew they could turn around and sell them to Fannie, Freddie and others."

"And they sell those loans to Wall Street?" Joe asked.

Steve gripped his grease pencil. As he drew a large office building, Rod and a few more men walked up and stood next to Joe. "Yep. But they didn't sell them one at a time. Instead, they bundled the strong loans with the weaker loans and sold them all together as a package." He attempted a crocked smile. "Like putting the shitty weed with the good weed in one baggie and selling it."

A few good-natured chuckles responded to Steve's joke.

"Why the hell didn't anyone inspect the loans?" asked Rod.

Steve turned to face fifteen or more puzzled looks. Confused faces that came from men who didn't do 'ass work,' who woke with the sun and used back muscles and blistered fingers to earn a day's pay. Men who sent paychecks home with pride knowing they earned their money to patch roofs and buy groceries.

"There are inspectors. S&P, Moody, Fitch—they would give the loans ratings from AAA to B, kinda like in school."

From the back, Rex grunted. "Bullshit. I read where those rating companies were on the take, just like you."

A few heads swiveled between Rex and Steve to see if these were fighting words, but Steve laughed. "He's kinda right," Steve said. "Those three inspector companies compete with each other, but, they make their money by collecting fees from the companies whose loans they rate."

"See, so they ain't gonna give a shitty rating because they ain't gonna get paid," Rex said.

"Not exactly," Steve answered. "They do have to maintain some integrity."

Joe lit a fresh cigarette. "How do those ratings affect me?"

Steve drew letters on the wall. "Well, indirectly. See, the higher the rating, say AAA, the less 'on cash' collateral that company or bank needs to back their assets. A little like a poker game—If you're rated to have a strong hand, the dealer will take your bet without having to see all your chips on the table."

"I don't get it," Rod said.

Steve drew down arrows across the wall with dollar signs next to them. "If you're a company, holding boxes of loans and people aren't making payments, you're rating goes down and you gotta show more collateral, meaning more actual money—which now you don't have 'cuz people aren't making payments."

Joe flicked ashes onto the ground. "If my damn payment didn't go up and my wife didn't get cut to part-time, I'd be making those fuckn' monthly payments."

Steve drew a large sad face on the wall. "For lots of reasons, people aren't making their payments. And that means if you're the company that owns that loan, you're not getting paid. And if you're not getting paid..." Steve's voice spread across the small group like the memory of a dead man's ashes. "Then you can't make your payroll, your bill payments, make more loans and God help you if the people that you owe money to come knocking."

A few more questions were raised, but most had lost interest or were so disgusted by this foggy world of finance they had walked off. Steve went to complete his taping task.

"Think you're pretty big shit with all your money talk?" Rex breathed into Steve's face as Steve stood up from the last of his backstage gaff taping. "You're fucking nothing."

"Just trying to help," Steve said. He hooked the tape onto his belt in one swift motion—he didn't look at Rex. "I do have some background in finance."

"Let's go somewhere we can talk," Rex said. "Maybe I could use some of your...advice."

"Sure," Steve said. With a bit of pride he added, "I finished my cord taping with time to spare before the show."

Weaving through and around the backstage bustle, Steve followed Rex out the backstage doors. They walked past the trucks and into a remote area of the darkening parking lot. Somewhere the strumming of Stairway to Heaven faded.

Steve started to slow down and glanced behind him. Vaguely remembering his encounter with the crack whores, he looked around. "Hey Rex, I think we're good here. Should be quiet enough to have a discussion."

Rex also looked around. He slammed a fist into Steve's gut, followed with a punch to his head and kicks to his ribs. Leaning over Steve's crumpled, bleeding body, he hissed. "Listen mother fucker. You know nothing of finances."

Steve groaned.

"You've got nothing to add to no discussions and your little circus career as a roadie is over." He gave Steve another swift kick. "Over tonight."