During business school, Gordie was always scribbling in a spiral-bound journal with the word, “Players,” inked in the upper right corner. He carried it around both years and jotted notes like a man possessed.

Inside, he profiled classmates. Not all of us. Just the sharpest minds, the most acid tongues, the people who showed the greatest promise in his infinite and overbearing wisdom. They were players.

A player would run Apple. A player would take home a billion dollars. A player would chair the Senate Ways and Means committee, bootstrap an Internet sensation, or self-destruct on the front page of the New York Times when dalliances with high-priced call girls, or perhaps some skeevy, do-it-yourself porn, creeped into the public conversation.

By the end of two years, Gordie’s notebook was dog-eared and doodled and detailed with the meanderings of his chosen elite. What they said. Who they were. Why they were the money crop. Almost all of our classmates, including me, blasted him for being a “horse’s ass.”

But in private, we wondered who made the cut. Whether we would hit it big or slog through life among the great unwashed. Each of us feared—when the race was over, when everybody was dead as John C. Calhoun himself—whether we would have anything to show for our youthful ambitions. Whether we would leave a legacy of un-careers: unexciting, uninspired and so un.

Such, such were the joys of my MBA.

Back then Gordie made Shiny grind her teeth. “We can’t invite him,” she said during my first year at Darden. “Nobody will come to our wedding.”

“I will.”

He was in my study group. I wasn’t about to snub the guy even though we weren’t especially close. Not at first. That all changed during our second year, when we road-tripped to DC for job interviews.

I met with a Goldman partner, who happened to be in town on business. It was my twelfth meeting with the firm, and it turned into a power play—his—rather than a question-and-answer session.

The partner insisted I join Goldman, right then, right there on the spot. The offer exploded the second our meeting ended. He was kind of annoying, the way he repeated my name over and over like he had stepped out of a be-all-you-can-be, Tony Robbins seminar.

“The train’s leaving the station, Jack. Better get on board. Or you’ll look back when you’re an old man, Jack, and decide today was the the worst mistake of your life. You don’t want to be gumming your cantaloupe fifty years from now and thinking, ‘Could a, should a.’ Know what I’m saying, Jack?”

“Uncle.”

Gordie interviewed with a fund that specialized in defense-company buyouts, but only because the managers begged him to return. He politely refused their offer…again. He explained to the managing partner, “I’m starting a hedge fund.”

“Yeah, I thought so. Put me down for a million bucks.”

“Your firm?”

“Me personally.”

“Our minimum is two.”

The managing partner snorted and nodded. “Okay.”

Needless to say, Gordie and I were euphoric during our drive back to Charlottesville. We stopped for dinner, and that’s where the trouble began. I ordered a beer. Drank half. He pounded three and chased two with shots of Jim Beam. We pulled into a convenience store thirty minutes later.

“I need to pee,” Gordie said. “Like now.”

Somebody was in the bathroom. Three minutes turned into five. At the six-minute mark, Gordie kicked the door with an oxblood wingtip. “Are you making a career of it in there?”

I was eating a candy bar, anxious to hit the road. “Just go outside.”

Didn’t happen. A big country boy rocked open the bathroom door, which thumped against the wall and raised eyebrows all the way to the greasy wieners turning on rollers next to the checkout counter.

He had a ZZ-Top beard. Looked to be 230 pounds, his belly still growing. He was plenty annoyed.

“All yours, you skin-head lookin’ doofus.”

Gordie was sensitive in those days. His hair was still falling out, a few wispy clumps all that remained. “Up yours, pal. Tell your mom to get her money back from the condom factory.”

ZZ made a move on Gordie. I stepped in front, even though the big man had thirty pounds on me. The clerk looked over in our direction.

“My buddy’s just a little drunk.”

Gordie slipped into the bathroom. And through the door, we heard him pissing. Faucet hard. “Damn it stinks in here. That big turd left his brains behind.”

ZZ bounced me against the door.

I stared back, not cowering, but not lashing out. “It’s not worth it, pal.”

His breath stank of onions, his body from sweat and fried food coming out all the pores. “We’ll be waiting outside.”

We’ll?

“Why don’t I buy you and your friends a six-pack, and we forget this ever happened?”

For a moment, I could almost see the thought bubbles over his head. He finally said, “Why don’t you.”

ZZ picked out a six of long-necks. I paid. He left. And it looked like the coast was clear.

Gordie emerged from the bathroom, oblivious, hymn-singing drunk. “Let’s grab some roadies.”

“Shut up and get in the car.”

“What?”

We exited into the parking lot. ZZ was standing next to a black van, swigging from his beer. He had two friends in tow, both just as big, one of them holding a wooden baseball bat.

“Oh sh–.” Suddenly, Gordie was sober.

ZZ broke his long-neck against the black van. The glass shattered into a jagged shank. The van’s alarm pierced the night.

His friend with the Louisville Slugger reared back. “Let’s give baldie’s head a big ole ride.”

I finger-punched ZZ in the Adam’s apple. His hands shot to his throat. Deep sucking breaths that took him down.

The third guy charged. I went low. Slammed his balls up his nose. But his momentum mashed me hard against the van, and something cracked inside.

Gordie bobbed like a knuckle ball. He ducked the first swing. But not the second. The meat of the Louisville Slugger connected with his outstretched hand. Thwack of wood against flesh. Then the keening. He sounded like coyotes after the kill, or perhaps the thing they had killed.

I charged. Stumbled at first. Recovered my old speed from Colgate football.

The guy with the bat reared back.

I nailed him with a hard right. Hammered him again and again. His nose. His eyes. His cheekbones, left, right. On top, I wound up to throw another punch.

Somebody grabbed my collar from behind and pulled me off, saving me from myself. “Enough.”

It was Gordie, his left hand dangling.

The cops showed within seconds. The clerk vouched for me. She said Gordie was the “asshole drunk, who started the whole thing.” The authorities probably would have charged us with something, until they found a bag of crystal meth on ZZ. There was more in his truck.

Gordie’s hand was broken. So were two of my ribs. I was more concerned about my suit, splattered with blood, rubbed raw at the knees, the best one I had. On the way back to Charlottesville he asked, “Where’d you learn to fight?”

“My uncle.”

“Some teacher.”

“It’s not what you think.” My mouth tasted of metal.

“I owe you.”

“Then shut up.”

We never discussed the fight again. In the days that followed, classmates asked Gordie about his hand. They noticed me wince every so often. And for the rest of our second year, he took notes whenever I spoke.