by David Beem
“Yo. Not cool, man,” says the guy across the counter, who is also leaning way, way over to frame his angry-customer face in my field of vision.
“Ah—I’m…sorry?”
“Dude like you ain’t never gonna get no girl like that.”
I release an involuntary sigh.
“I’m sorry, sir,” I say, and we straighten in unison. I slip the business card into my shirt pocket and tap my name tag. “Welcome to Über Dork. My name is Edger, Ed-jer, I’ll be your Dork. How can I help you?”
“You can help me by fixing my computer.” He slaps his InstaTron Plus down on the countertop and shoves it toward me. I slide it closer, open it up, and get to work, but it’s slow going. The world, which was in glorious color again for the first time in forever, has faded back into gray. I’m talking to the guy in front of me as I work, and he’s nice enough now that I’m being a proper Dork. Lots of “mmm-hmms” and “yeahs” coming from that side of the counter. My voice reverts to its work monotone, but this is as good as it gets here. I help this guy, and he’s genuinely happy about it. This constitutes one of the only real wins I get.
“You’re all right,” he says, examining my name tag. “Ed-gur. I’m sorry I got mad at you, boy.”
“It’s Ed-jer. Ah—you know what? Forget it.”
“Ed-jer. Okay. Ed-jer, can I give you some advice?”
“Hmm? Oh, yeah. Sure.”
“If that girl ever comes back, don’ you go sayin’ ‘meep’ no mo. You got to stop that shit.”
I nod and thank him. I am, after all, not a complete dork.
Chapter Two
My smartwatch says it’s seventy-two degrees in downtown San Diego. The sky over the bay is a nice shade of purple as I cut across Broadway and Front. InstaTron Corporate Headquarters is in Emerald Plaza, just a few blocks from the Westfield Horton Plaza Über Dork branch where I work, but my stomach is already in knots. And it’s not because of Mary Thomas. It’s because I can’t see a way to get out of this meeting.
Leg vibrates. I dig out my phone.
Fabio.
“Hey, buddy,” I say.
“Dude. Mike Dame?”
“You heard,” I reply, jumping out of the way of a speeding bicyclist. Fabio says something at the same time a city bus hisses, releasing a giant plume of hot black smog and otherwise making the air taste like a mixture of exhaust and a Five Dollar Footlong.
“Sorry,” I say. “Bus just went by. Can you say that again?”
“I said, maybe he’s gonna write you a big fat check.”
“A check?”
“Yeah. A settlement. You know. So you don’t go to the press about how you basically earned the Mike Dame his bachelor’s.”
I roll my eyes.
“Right. Fabio, Mikey never needed me to do his homework. He just trusted me to get the answers right. There’s a difference.”
“Oh, sure,” he replies, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “And the fact that Mikey’s corner office is in Emerald Plaza and yours is across from the food court is just, what? Karma?”
“Maybe. Hey, is there gonna be a point?” I’m winded. I slow my pace and try to catch my breath. But it isn’t my pace that’s the problem. My problem is me having not seen Mikey in five years. My problem is all the invisible baggage on my shoulders.
“Dude,” says Fabio. “I always knew you were meant for better things. You always knew you were meant for bigger things. This isn’t hard.”
“It isn’t? Maybe you’d like to go instead?”
“Nah, I’m good. Besides, you already know him. You’re one of the few people on the planet who know him as Mikey, Edge. There is absolutely no way you leave that office without a promotion.”
“A promotion?” I exclaim, as two speeding rollerbladers careen straight at me. “To what? Store manager?”
The thrum of skates on concrete freezes me where I stand. I brace myself, anticipating a crash that is as inevitable as the one waiting for me at the top of Emerald Plaza, but at the last minute, they part and zip past. Their wake lifts my hair and ripples my shirt.
“Dude,” says Fabio. “He knows you’ve got the goods. And now he’s found out you’re working for his company. The way I see it, all you’ve got to do is pretend you don’t have Tourette’s for ten, fifteen minutes tops, and you’ll be making bank.”
“I don’t have Tourette’s.”
“You’re right. Saying you have Tourette’s is an insult to people with Tourette’s.”
I stop at the corner of Broadway and State and wait for the light, clench my eyes, and count to ten.
“I gotta go,” I say.
“Don’t fuck this up.”
“So helpful. Thanks.”
I press End Call. The light turns green. A horn blares when the first car in line doesn’t move fast enough, and I startle. Business suits brush past me on either side. I teeter into the street, then stop. My gaze pans up…and up, and up. Emerald Plaza. The concrete frame gives up somewhere around the twentieth floor with the tops of the eight towers becoming hexagonal glass green roofs. I shove my phone into my pocket and loosen my tie. This is crazy. I’m not going up there. Not going to happen.
The light turns yellow. A car honks at me, and I hurry to the other side. Crap. I can’t just say I didn’t get the message. I need my job. But would Mikey really fire me for being a no-show?
I try to picture him as I knew him in South Bend. In a pickup game at the gym. Sharing a large fry at Five Guys. But the memories are burned at the edges like pictures you find after a fire. Standing at the bottom of these towers of concrete and steel, knowing his world is up there and mine is down here, those charred memories are hotter than ever.
Still winded, I push through the front doors and into the lobby. The white noise and high-ceiling atrium inside are dizzying. It’s like I’m locked inside a Hitchcock camera lens doing that reverse vertigo trick. I try to block it all out and mind my own business. I cast around for the elevator—there. A glass case with a glowing green pyramid on top. It’s an elevator fit for Willy Wonka. No wonder Mikey likes it here. As I stand in front of it, my pulse rises. I don’t know if Mikey would fire me, but he certainly could. I picture Gran’s face after telling her the paychecks have stopped, and my thumb pushes the Up button. The doors open, and I go inside.
Chapter Three
The elevator stops at the twenty-seventh floor. Staring at my reflection in the closed doors, I quickly lick my hand and press down a thick crop of crazy hair. My reflection splits in two—and here’s Mary Thomas.
Standing in front of her is as terrifying and reality-bending as before. My brain slips into a cheesy and cinematic parallel universe. I know it’s nighttime, but somehow, rays of sunshine beam down through the ceiling onto her long, silky blonde hair. She tosses it side to side in slow motion. A faraway boys’ choir is singing in Latin, and even though I don’t know Latin, it’s obvious they’re singing about her girl-next-door face, her fair skin and bright eyes, her tan leather jacket with lots of cool zippers—and most especially they’re singing about her oh-my-God-long-legs and tight-fitting jeans. For this is one horny boys’ choir.
“Mr. Bonkovich?”
My eyes flutter as I crash-land into reality. No more slow-motion hair tossing. No more horny boys’ choir. Just this beautiful woman and my dry mouth. For a second, I can’t say anything. I can’t do anything besides marvel at how her accent makes my name sound sophisticated.
“Mr. Bonkovich?” she says again, sticking out her hand to keep the doors from closing.
“Hey,” I reply, jutting my chin out and trying to play it cool.
“Thank you for coming,” she says, eyeing me doubtfully. “This way.”
She gestures down a corridor to the right. I exit the elevator, and we’re off to the races. Her long legs are really moving. Her shoulders squared, hips swinging. She’s no-nonsense sexy. And since she’s emitting beauty rays comparable in power to the Death Star Superlaser, I clear my throat an
d cast around for anything else to input into the brain subprogram, lest my eyes become disrespectfully trapped in the Mary Thomas Zone.
Outside the tall windows on my left is the nighttime cityscape and the San Diego bay. That’ll do. City lights in pinks and purples reflect on the ocean. Pretty. The clear California sky is a deep midnight blue. Fantastic. And depressing. It reminds me of what Fabio said earlier. My “office” is across from the food court. What would it be like to work up here instead?
My gaze pans unconsciously to peer through the shorter windows on my right. Through those is a conference room larger than the entire sales floor at the Über Dork. Everyone inside is younger than me. They’re wearing ripped-up jeans, skirts, yoga pants, beanies. They’ve got scooters parked on the wall, and they’re eating sushi and noodles and laughing as someone keeps hijacking the PowerPoint presentation with a music video of a guy singing, “Give me compliments.” It’s like we don’t even work for the same company. Nobody in there has to wear a shirt that says DORK.
“You seem nervous,” Mary Thomas says suddenly.
“Turnip.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Nothing.”
“Did you say turnip?”
“Probably not.” The key to playing it cool, I figure, is to keep trying. “So, uh, what’s the rent on this place?”
“Two hundred,” she replies, and by the way she’s smiling at me, she can totally tell I couldn’t give two shits about the rent but needed something to talk about and so why not rent? “It’s a fair amount of space,” she says. “But I expect we’ll be needing more soon.”
“More space?”
The corridor dead-ends at a pair of floor-to-ceiling glass doors with sleek chrome handles. She turns to face me. Her head tilts slightly to the side. Her forehead creases.
“Well,” she says. “We can’t stay here forever now, can we?”
“But… I just met you.”
Mary raises a perfectly arched eyebrow. And then my subconscious throws me a bone. “Hey. You’re Australian.”
Again, her head tilts. “Good catch. Thought I’d lost my accent.”
“Don’t worry,” I hurry to say, smiling. “I won’t hold it against you. There’s only one human race.”
Her eyes narrow as she peers obliquely into mine. “You’re very wise,” she teases.
My heart skips a beat, and then she gestures with her hand at the glass doors, through which is a waiting area and receptionist seated behind a desk. The receptionist’s floral blouse, permanent frown lines, and glowing blue earbuds are giving off an unmistakable frumpy cyborg vibe. Kind of like a female Lobot from The Empire Strikes Back.
A hand touches my arm, zaps me with static electricity. I flinch.
“Ooh!” Mary Thomas jerks her hand back. “Sorry. Hey. Don’t be nervous, Mr. Bonkovich.” She smiles faintly. “I won’t let him bite you.”
“You can call me Edger,” I hear myself say, and her smile goes full-on, one hundred watts of gleaming beauty power. The knot in my stomach falls apart.
“Well then,” she says lightly, her eyes sparkling. “You’ll just have to call me Mary.”
Mary pulls the door open, and we go inside.
“Henrietta,” says Mary. “This is Edger Bonkovich.”
The receptionist comes out from behind her desk, and her dour features read like a book: Let’s get this over with.
“Mr. Bonkovich.”
“Edger, please,” I say, extending my hand. “It’s nice to meet you.”
Her eyes narrow to slits, and her mouth forms a cartoonish one-sided frown. “Escher.”
We shake. I clear my throat.
“Uh… Ed-jer.”
“Sorry,” she replies, but her unchanging expression makes it sorry-not-sorry. “This way. Ed-sure.”
I try to smile, but I might as well be trying to make ambidextrous Spock eyebrows. I can’t even figure out what muscles to use. I look to Mary for support, but she only nods for me to follow Henrietta. Next thing, we’re striding down another hallway, this one ending in a set of doors as massive as the last.
“Mikey likes his big doors, huh?”
Henrietta gives me a withering look.
“Mister Dame will see you now. Ecker.”
She heaves the doors open, and since I’m happy for any excuse to look away from her raging condescension, such as an Act of God, asteroid, comet, or, really, a one-spotted ladybug would do fine, I turn and get my first glimpse into an office larger than some Third World countries.
“Holy crap.”
Mary and I step inside, and the doors swing shut behind us. I wait for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. Mesh shades are drawn over floor-to-ceiling windows in a room that’s a museum of anachronisms: a model steam wagon sits next to a model Tesla; a katana next to an AR-15; a samurai suit of armor beside…beside what I can only assume is either a superhero costume, or else your basic space-ninja body-armor-type deal. Kurosawa meets cyberpunk. Black and sleek with chrome detailing. Probably Mikey’s billionaire cosplay outfit for Comic-Con. The exhibits are displayed on pedestals under track lighting, shelves, or sunken show areas, like the one displaying a full-scale mockup of a da Vinci glider parked next to a modern glider.
“Holy crap,” I say again, my voice squeaking with excitement. “That radiotelephone’s bigger than a football!”
Mary’s gaze zeroes right in on the radiotelephone, despite its position being mostly obscured by all the other features on display. She casts a sidelong glance at me, her eyes sparkling with mischief. “Now there’s a good example of size being overrated,” she says, smiling on one side only.
“Yeah,” I say, doing my best to tamp down my excitement at finding a girl like this one who appreciates the value of microchips. “The radiotelephone predates its cellular counterpart. And don’t get me started on the difference between the modern smartphone and the—”
“Same old Edger.”
I recognize him intuitively; the timbre of his voice, a silver, Ferrari kind of sound. The kind of timbre you hear in a really great tenor. And his height, say, six-foot-two. Shorter than me, but still tall. And then there’s his athletic build, silhouetted against the weak light pinching in through the window shades. Seeing him there, I’m drenched in sensory memory: the feel of autumn in South Bend; glimmering sunlight through blazing red and yellow leaves; the smell as you come into Fitzpatrick Hall after they’ve mopped the floors. And Kate—and I can’t see Mikey without thinking about Kate—these experiences come flooding back all at once, and with the ache of a broken promise.
Chapter Four
I’d heard Kate’s voice from across the quad. Her brassy, commanding tone crawled into my head like a conspiracy theory. I wordlessly picked up my soccer ball, both teams yelling at my back, and space-walked from the field in search of the voice. Like a siren song, it lured me, into the trees and gimlet sun, to emerge into a gathering on the far side.
She’d been moderating a debate there, apparently wrapping up. I leapt out of the way as a gaggle of girls carted a podium, microphone, and amp off on a dolly. Kate turned to spot me doing my best not to stare at her like a thirteen-year-old at the window of a Victoria’s Secret. I guess I couldn’t have been too overt. She took it I’d been there as part of her whole deal, because she stalked straight up to me to hand me a stack of papers and said, “Come on.” The fact that I was sweaty and wearing soccer shorts, soccer socks, shin guards, cleats, a soccer shirt, and holding a soccer ball didn’t seem to tip her off that I had no clue on God’s green earth about what had just been debated. Maybe they’d been debating soccer. When I leafed through the papers and found nothing neither pro nor con to do with soccer I naturally did what any red-blooded, virile, heterosexual male in my situation would do: I blanked.
I couldn’t think of what to say. It’s possible, in hindsight, I said “turnip.” I don’t think I did. I have on occasion been known to say “kumquat,” just to change things up a bit. On that day, I mana
ged to say nothing at all. And I think nothing at all must’ve been the right thing not to say—because she smiled at me.
Kate was intelligent, beautiful, and had a killer body, which she kept in tip-top shape at CrossFit. I spent most of our relationship in a constant state of bamboozlement. It didn’t make sense to me that I’d managed to score even one date, let alone a follow-up or any kind of exclusivity. That isn’t to say I think I’m unattractive. Enough ex-girlfriends have told me I’m good-looking to where I can only conclude I’m probably not hideous, but Kate had scads of honest-to-goodness good-looking guys after her. And not one of them lacking in that major key attribute in which I lacked. Namely, muscles. In a phone call back home, Gran’s boyfriend, Shep, a former Marine, told me I had to get me some of those if I was going to keep a girl like Kate.
I started working out. Trips to the gym became lessons in humility, but I figured the key was to keep showing up. Just show up, I’d tell myself, no matter how many times I fired off the back of the treadmill like a speeding bullet, launched off the StairMaster like a human rocket, or pantsed myself on the assisted pull-up machine. I stuck to it, and my body began to change.
But if my thinking was that I could get myself in better shape to be more worthy of Kate’s interest, one thing I couldn’t change was my wealth. Whereas Kate came from money—literally suitcases of it lying around her house, delivered by twins in black suits who wore sunglasses at night and drove an intimidating black SUV—all my money was locked up in stocks for Gran, who raised me after Mom drove off a cliff and Dad walked out the door one day and never came back. At Notre Dame, I dressed like the biggest hobo on campus, while Kate dressed like Hollywood.
When I met her, she’d been dating this dude named John who looked like Justin Bieber and went to the Graduate School of Theology. John seemed like he had a lot of God in his future. And I think Kate saw that too, because when I’d asked her out that day on campus, she’d said, “Sure.”