Chapter Six
Natalie
Being with Jordan was the easiest thing I’d ever done. In spite of the age and economic differences, we just worked. Being together around the clock might’ve been an issue for another couple, but for us it was perfect.
The day after I moved in he took me to his record store for the first time. I’d expected the store to be sleek and ultra modern, but I couldn’t have been more wrong. Seaside Vinyl was one of a trio of stores above a real estate company right out on Pacific Coast Highway. When Jordan opened the door for me and I walked in, I fell in love. The walls were decorated with classic album covers and posters. On either side of the store there were small sitting areas with turntables to listen to a selection of records that Jordan explained he had multiples of. The collectible and hard to get vinyl weren’t allowed to be touched until purchase, which made sense.
I loved his taste in music. Growing up on movie sets with people who were older than me meant I loved the classics. Jordan was surprised and then thrilled that I knew all of his favorite bands, and he had opinions about my favorite songs. The store was open only when he was available to be there, which was quirky but charming. He had a website and an app that he kept updated for customers to know exactly when he’d be around. He’d explained that the vinyl business wasn’t ever going to be a huge moneymaker, so taking on staff and having set hours wouldn’t have been a necessary expenditure.
We were at the store most weekdays from nine to noon or from two to five. When we there he’d let me play whatever I wanted, and I enjoyed it immensely. He was a good teacher, too. I learned a lot about the vinyl business and how it worked, as well as how a retail business worked which was exactly what I needed for my senior project.
The customers who came and went tended to be collectors, most who knew him by name. They’d come in to pick up orders or to make a request, and Jordan would talk to them about things he was on the hunt for. I found the whole thing fascinating.
Toward the end of my second week at the store we were sitting next to each other at one of the listening areas talking about life when I asked him why he chose to open a vinyl store when he already had the sex shops. He grimaced as he traced his finger in circles across the inside of the palm of my hand.
“I needed something I felt passionate about,” he explained. “The erotic shops have been great for money, but it’s not like…”
He trailed off for a few seconds as he got his thoughts together.
“It’s never been something I felt like I had to do,” he said after a few seconds. “I made the first thruster on a lark for a friend’s girlfriend. She fell in love with the damn thing and started telling her friends about it. Word spread and the next thing I knew, I was selling them out of my dorm room. After about eight months I was approached by one of the world’s biggest erotic toy manufacturers. They wanted to buy it, patent and all. I said no and then promptly took the paperwork with their offer to the bank a year later. I took out a small loan to do a production run myself.”
“But how did you get them into stores?” I asked.
“The demand was high and word of mouth was huge, so it wasn’t as hard as it might have been if I hadn’t had that. Still, I put the peddle to the metal and went to every erotic shop in Southern California during my free time. I was scared shitless I would fail, but that didn’t happen. The first run of thrusters sold out within a week. After that, it just exploded. Working in the industry was a real eye-opener. I’d never known it generated as much cash as it did. I worried the thrusters would fall out of favor and I wanted to capture the market somehow. I opened the first store shortly after I graduated college and within five years, I had ten.”
“It’s clearly a cash cow,” I’d teased. “What’s next for the stores? Are you working on any new inventions or that not your thing anymore?”
“I didn’t want to say anything until it was a done deal, but I might as well tell you now.”
I was immediately nervous. Jordan was a straight shooter, and we talked almost non-stop. I feared he was going to say he was going away on an extended business trip, and my stomach sank like a stone.