Syrup

by Max Barry

  “Oh, Christ,” I say, disgusted. There are a couple of business suits walking by, but I ignore them. “You might not have picked this up on your little self-obsession trip, but you’ve just screwed me. I sure didn’t ask you to pull me down the toilet with you.”

  “You little shit,” 6 says, as if this is a fact of great wonder. “You loser.”

  I turn and walk away.

  I’m pretty sure she’s going to call after me, but even so I’m almost a hundred feet away before she does it. This gives me enough time to make mental bets on what I think she’ll say, and I’m pretty confident about: “Scat! Wait!”

  “Asshole!” 6 shouts.

  and don’t come back

  That would be a pretty decent breakup, if all my clothes weren’t still at 6’s apartment.

  scat comes back

  I have to hold the buzzer down for about a minute before Tina picks up. “Hello, Scat,” she says warily. “Hi, Tina,” I say, letting an edge of contrition leak into my voice. Given that they’re my only worldly possessions right now, I really am pretty keen to get my clothes.

  There is some scuffling, then another long pause. I suspect that Tina is holding her hand over the microphone and receiving instructions from 6. Eventually she says, “What do you want?”

  “Just my things. I’ll get them and get out.”

  More scuffles and pauses. “Maybe we don’t want you in here.”

  I sigh heavily. Somewhere in 6’s apartment a door closes. Then Tina whispers, “Come on up, Scat,” and the security door clicks open.

  reunion

  Tina is waiting for me at the top of the stairs, mascara-and eyebrow-ring-free. She’s wearing an old tracksuit and, in all, looking disturbingly normal. “She’s in the bathroom.”

  “Fine. She doesn’t even need to know I’m here.”

  I start to walk inside but Tina grabs my arm. I look at her, surprised, and she gives me one of those I-don‘t-believe-it’s-this-stupid looks. I seem to have a bit of a knack for attracting women who specialize in these looks: I could name a long list of teachers, ex-girlfriends and shop assistants.

  “Scat,” Tina says. “She’s in the bathroom.”

  I am obviously missing something. “Yes ...”

  Tina shifts her weight impatiently. “You have to comfort her.”

  “Whoa,” I say, freeing my arm from Tina’s grip. “I don’t think you understand what happened at Coke today. We didn’t part well.”

  “Whatever,” Tina says. “Trust me on this. She needs you.”

  I can’t help it: I laugh. It comes out just right—cynical, hardened and really pretty scathing. “Tina, I’m through with being needed by her. I don’t know if you’ve noticed this yet, but being needed by 6 is not a good thing.”

  “Men, ” Tina says disgustedly, and pretty unfairly in my opinion. She stalks into the apartment and I follow her.

  My clothes are neatly piled by the sofa, so I go over and scoop them up. “This is all I need. Nice to meet you, have a good degree, bye.”

  Tina lets me get to the front door. “Don’t you want your razor?”

  I stop.

  “It’s in the bathroom,” she adds helpfully. “Seems like a nice one.”

  I take a few deep breaths and work up a seriously evil glare by the time I turn around.

  “Oooh,” Tina says.

  “Tina,” I say steadily, “will you please get my razor for me?”

  “Hmm, let’s see ...” Tina says. “No.”

  “Okay.” I dump my clothes in the doorway. “Fine.” I march resolutely to the bathroom door, set my lips in a tight line, and rap three times. I don’t knock, I rap. Firm, authoritative raps.

  I’m braced for another Asshole or perhaps a Fuck off, and the long silence is something of a relief but also something of a concern. I resist a grimace as I try the handle.

  It turns. The door swings open. 6 is sitting on the rim of the bath.

  She looks fine, which stops me a little. I had expected red eyes, maybe disheveled clothes, at least an attractive sniffle. But she looks as composed and cool as if today had never happened.

  “I just want my razor,” I say.

  “So get it,” 6 says.

  “I will.” I sidle past her to the sink and pick up my razor, which looks a little lonely among the jungle of 6’s and Tina’s mysterious sprays and bottles.

  Then there’s a little pause, and in it I realize just how easy it is for me to walk out of here and never see 6 again. I only have to say, Well, see you, and she’ll probably ignore me and I’ll just walk out. And that’ll be it. No more 6.

  It’s that simple.

  I stand there and hold my razor.

  I say, “You know, if you’re not doing anything ...”

  a tender love scene with scat and 6

  “‘Not doing anything’?” 6 says, her eyes narrowing. “You mean, like working?”

  “Oh—no. I mean ...” I sigh. “Come on, 6. We’ve spent a week working eighteen-hour days. We’re both strung out. So let’s ... let’s just go out somewhere.”

  She arches an eyebrow. I’ve noticed that 6 is very egalitarian with her eyebrows: sometimes the left gets to arch, sometimes the right. “You want to go out?”

  “Yes,” I say. “I think it would be good for us. Both of us.”

  6 lets long, silent seconds pass, as if this really is a judgment call. Could go either way. “Fine,” she says.

  mktg case study #7: mktg music

  REVIVE A ROCK STAR FROM THE ‘60S AND APPEAL TO BABY BOOMER NOSTALGIA. NEVER FAILS.

  billy ray

  There’s a southern-style restaurant called Billy Ray just two blocks down from 6’s, and since I can see from the street that they have a well-stocked bar, I suggest we go in.

  “Here?” 6 says, wrinkling her nose. “It’s southern.”

  “Yeah,” I say, thinking fast, “but it’s secretly ironic.”

  “Really?” she says, suspicious.

  “You bet,” I say. “It was in Vanity Fair.”

  Inside, however, it quickly becomes obvious that Billy Ray is a big mistake. Their booths each represent a particular southern state, and the waitress leads us straight to Georgia. Squeezed among the pictures of Martin Luther King Jr. and someone I think is Jimmy Carter is a banner happily proclaiming “The Home of Coca-Cola!” and next to our table there’s even a big Coke machine. “Uh,” I say to the waitress. “Could we get another state? Louisiana, maybe? Or even Texas?”

  “Sorry,” the waitress says, with a truly frightening hybrid accent. “Georgia’s all we got left. Texas always goes first, on account of the hats.”

  “Oh. Of course.” I glance at 6. “I guess this is okay, then.”

  “Can I get y’all somethin’ to drink?”

  “Scotch and ... water,” I say, pulling out of a Coke reference just in time.

  “A Bloody Mary,” 6 says. “A tall one.”

  “Y’okay,” the waitress says, which I think is pushing it. She scribbles this down on a little pad.

  “6,” I say carefully, “you should take it easy tonight.” Then it occurs to me that maybe 6 shouldn’t take it easy tonight: that, in fact, if 6 doesn’t take it easy tonight, she might just hold forth about her childhood and all the shitty men she’s ever known and end up in my arms attempting giggling, unsteady kisses. “Unless you feel you should. You know, to blow off all that crap at Coke.”

  “Coke is history,” 6 says shortly. “I’m thinking of the future.” She abruptly glances at the waitress, who is still hanging around. “Something you need?” 6 demands. The waitress blinks and snaps closed her little pad, then heads over to three men in Texas, who are demanding Lone Stars and making jokes about cowgirls. 6 turns back to me. “The smartest option now is consultancy.”

  I blink. “Really? With which firm?”

  “With no firm.” She shakes her head. “Scat, you need to realize that when the Coke story breaks, there will be no other option. It’s self-empl
oyment or nothing.”

  “Oh,” I say, feeling a little bleak. “Right.”

  “Obviously the soda industry is out. I’m thinking about entertainment. Maybe pop music.”

  “You, managing a rock band?” Somehow I find this a little difficult to imagine.

  “Packaging a band,” 6 says. “You buy a good, broke songwriter and match him to a group of sixteen-year-old boys with good skin. If you push them hard enough at the contract stage, the potential profits are enormous.”

  “Wow. You’ve got it all worked out.”

  “That’s where most of the packagers screw up,” 6 muses. I’m not even sure if she’s talking to me anymore. “They don’t twist the talents’ arms hard enough at the start. If you give the actors a cut of the profits, they start thinking they’re real musicians.”

  The waitress arrives with our drinks, dumping them indifferently on the table and heading off to Tennessee.

  “Well,” I say, holding up my glass, “to the future, then.”

  6 looks up, then nods. “To the future.”

  the future

  “I guess we’ll need an office,” I say. “And for that we’ll need a bank loan. I don’t know about you, but my credit history isn’t exactly—”

  “Scat,” 6 says, looking at me oddly. “This isn’t something we can do together.”

  I stare at her. “What?”

  “I’m sorry,” she says. “You can’t work with me.”

  I’m stunned into silence, and when I do manage to speak, my words come out high and whiny. “But why not? I thought—”

  “Think about it, Scat. The only way to survive this catastrophe is to distance ourselves from it. And each other.” She sips at her cocktail.

  “But—6 ...”

  “I’m sorry,” she says again, and this time her voice is harder. “This is the way it has to be.”

  I don’t know what to do, so I stare at the table. I feel totally lost. Across the room, the Texans bray laughter. I reach for my scotch with unsteady hands, sip at it, then gulp the rest.

  “You’ll be all right,” 6 says. “Even if you have to get out of marketing, you’ll find something.”

  And that does it: suddenly I’m furious. I’m as furious as I’ve ever been in my life. Great, thick bubbles of rage burst inside me, spilling out everything I’ve kept pent up for the last week. “Oh. Well, gee thanks, 6. It’s so nice to have your confidence in me, after you’ve destroyed my career. It’s so great to know that after you’ve sucked me dry, you still think I can pick up a job flipping burgers at McDonald’s.”

  “Scat,” 6 says, faintly alarmed, “quiet down.”

  “Don’t you tell me to quiet down!” I shout. I lurch to my feet, failing to make the best impression because I’m still wedged between the booth’s fixed seat and table. “I’m through with listening to anything you’ve got to say! I can’t even believe I’m here with you now!” I grind my fists against my forehead. “The only reason I asked you out was because Tina wanted me to, and I’m sitting here”—yet another injustice strikes me—“drinking water with my scotch because I don’t want to offend you by drinking Coke! And you’re—”

  “Have Coke with your scotch,” 6 says. “I don’t care.”

  I stare at her, unable to believe she’s really doing this. “I will! I’ll drink all the goddamn Coke I want!” I pull out a fistful of change from my pants pocket and turn to the Coke machine.

  A couple of the Texans have stood up to see what’s going on. “You need any help, miss?” one of them asks 6.

  White spots blaze before my eyes. “Don’t give her any help!” I yell, shoving coins into the Coke machine’s slot. “Help her and a week later you’ll be wondering what the hell happened to your life!” I push the button for a Coke and a can rumbles toward the slot ... then stops.

  I bend down and peer into the slot. There is no can. “Oh, great!” I scream. I have now completely, utterly lost it. “This is just perfect!”

  “Scat,” 6 says from behind me. “Why don’t you sit down?”

  I wrap my arms around the Coke machine and start rocking it back and forth, grimacing with the effort. I’m just getting up some momentum when a strong hand falls on my shoulder. “Hey, buddy,” a Texan says. “Why don’t you leave the machine alone?”

  “Yes, Scat, leave it,” 6 says. “Those things are dangerous.”

  “You’re dangerous! I’m getting my can!”

  “Scat,” she says, exasperated, “there have been fatalities. Don’t mess with the machine.”

  In response, I say something like, “Rrrrrrrrraaeegh!” and push the Coke machine as hard as I can. It rocks backward, teeters on the edge of falling over, then swings back.

  “Oh, shit,” I say.

  I try to get out of the way, but my legs tangle with the Texan’s and the Coke machine crashes down onto us. It feels like catching a train with my spine.

  I must black out for a few seconds, because I open my eyes without having any memory of closing them. 6 is standing over me, looking down. She even looks concerned. “Scat? Can you hear me?”

  There is something stuck in my throat. “I ...” I croak.

  She leans closer. “What?”

  “I...”

  “Scat, are you all right?”

  I abruptly realize what the thing in my throat is. It is the best ad in marketing history. “I ... have an idea.”

  The Ad

  a meeting with jamieson

  So it’s six A.M. Monday morning and we’re pacing back and forth outside Coke.

  “He’ll be here any minute,” 6 is muttering. I’m not sure if she’s talking to me. “Always at six.” 6 rose at three this morning and spent about two hours on her hair and makeup. I’m not sure if I’m more impressed by the length of time or the end result. “There,” she says suddenly, and the headlights of a dark blue BMW sweep the lot. When the CEO of the Coca-Cola Company steps out, 6 and I are waiting for him.

  “Mr. Jamieson,” 6 says, as if it’s a bit of a surprise to catch him. “Good morning.”

  Jamieson is relatively young, or else he has a damn good dermatologist. With his side part and natty glasses, he looks a little like an accountant done good. His dark eyes assess us quickly.

  “Morning, 6,” Jamieson says. “Coming to the gym with me?”

  “It’s a date,” 6 says.

  working it out

  This is a very important conversation, so I try hard to concentrate. But it’s hard with 6 in Lycra bike shorts and a crop top.

  “So,” 6 says, casually pumping what looks like a hundred pounds. “Did you get my voice mail?”

  Jamieson takes a pause from the punching bag. There’s a little Pepsi logo drawn on it, which is cute. “I don’t check my own messages anymore. Don’t have the time. Julie takes them down for me.” He thumps the bag, one-two-three. “What was your message? ”

  “Oh, you know,” 6 says vaguely. “Just updates.”

  a visit to julie

  “Hi, Julie,” 6 says. I’m amazed: she sounds really warm and friendly. For a moment I could believe that 6 and Julie are old friends.

  “Oh,” Julie says. She smiles warily. “Hello, 6.” So I guess you don’t get to be the CEO’s personal assistant by being gullible.

  6 walks around and sits on the corner of Julie’s desk. Back in her business attire, she’s the epitome of professionalism. I just stand in the doorway and try to not look out of place.

  Julie looks up at 6.

  “I need you,” 6 says.

  the seduction of julie

  “I don’t think so,” Julie says.

  “Julie—”

  “I can’t do that, 6. Mr. Jamieson’s messages are private.”

  “I understand that policy, and it exists for a good reason,” 6 says. “But this is a message I sent. I just want to retract my own message.”

  For a second Julie appears to be lost in 6’s dark eyes. Then she blinks. “I’m sorry, but no. I can tell Mr. Jamieson th
at you wish to retract the message if you like, but I still have to show him—”

  “Julie, the message is my resignation. If Mr. Jamieson gets that message, I’m through.”

  Julie is silent for a long moment. 6’s eyes never leave her.

  “Nevertheless,” Julie begins.

  plan b

  “Stupid bitch,” 6 snarls, stalking through the corridors like a wildcat. “Goddamned bureaucratic idiot.”

  I am prudently silent.

  “It doesn’t matter,” 6 says brusquely. “I’ll tell Jamieson I was drunk.” She opens the door to her office, which, incidentally, I haven’t seen before. It’s huge. You could raise a family in here. There’s a forest of indoor fernery, neatly offsetting the solid oak desk and dark patent leather chairs. 6’s personal coffee machine sits on its own table underneath a massive framed Coke ad from 1962. One wall is completely glass, which, since this is the fourteenth floor, is a little scary. But most impressive is the flanking poster of Elle Macpherson, who is smiling brightly and very, very naked.

  I take a chair, trying not to look at the Elle. That really is a nude picture. “So—”

  “So,” 6 says, “we go ahead and present your idea this afternoon.”

  “The presentation,” I say. “Right.”

  6 gets hip

  We spent the whole weekend preparing for this, but I still feel nervous and unprepared. It’s Fukk all over again.

  It’s even the same room, with the same giant wooden doors. The only real difference is the audience: we don’t get to present to the board, who only meet once a month, but to the SMT: the senior management team. These are the guys responsible for actually running the company, as opposed to making grand decisions about strategic direction. They’re thinner, too.

  There’s a very different atmosphere among these folk than the board, and we enter to uproarious laughter. A short, bald guy is telling a story, surrounded by a dozen colleagues in pants and ties (no jackets, no women). Jamieson is at the back, smiling.