Then We Came to the End

by Joshua Ferris

  “Benny,” she said. “Sometimes you just lose track.”

  Soon they were out the door, followed by the last strains of one of Marcia’s hair-band ballads.

  Most of us followed them out soon after, and, in the end, last call was announced. The lights came up, the jukebox went quiet. We could hear the clink of glasses and the exhausted silence of the waitstaff as they began to clean up, wiping down the shiny surfaces, placing the padded barstools on top of the bar. Their work would soon be done, they could see something waiting for them at home — a bed, a meal, a lover. But we didn’t want the night to end. We kept hanging on, waiting for them to send over the big guy who’d force us out with a final command. And we would leave, eventually. Out to the parking lot, a few parting words. “Sure was good to see you again,” we’d say. And with that, we’d get in our cars and open the windows and drive off, tapping the horn a final time. But for the moment, it was nice just to sit there together. We were the only two left. Just the two of us, you and me.

  Acknowledgments

  THE TITLE OF THIS BOOK owes a debt of gratitude to Don DeLillo’s Americana.

  A special thanks to early teachers: Jane Rice, Anna Keesey, and Brooks Landon. A very special thanks to the codirectors of the MFA program at the University of California at Irvine, Michelle Latiolais and Geoffrey Wolff. Jim Shepard made me a better writer, but just as important, a better reader. Thanks also to Mark Richard and Michael Ryan.

  Thank you, Julie Barer, agent extraordinaire. Reagan Arthur at Little, Brown and Mary Mount at Viking UK — wonderful editors. A big thanks to the whole team at Little, Brown.

  Thanks to Kathy Bucaro-Zobens, Doug Davis, Amanda Gillespie, Robert Howell, Dave and Deb Kennedy, Dan Kraus, Chris and Keeli Mickus, Dave Morse, Barry and Jennifer Neumann, Arielle Read, Grant Rosenberg, Matthew Thomas, E-fly and Tere, and the Kennedys of Naples, Florida.

  Thanks to the UCI Humanities Department, and to Glenn Schaeffer, the International Institute of Modern Letters, and the International Center for Writing and Translation at UCI for establishing the Glenn Schaeffer Award, which provided me with crucial funding.

  And to my family, from Illinois to Indonesia, without whom, no book.

  About the Author

  JOSHUA FERRIS RECEIVED A BA in English and Philosophy from the University of Iowa and attended the MFA program at the University of California at Irvine. His fiction has appeared in The Iowa Review, Best New American Voices 2005, and Prairie Schooner. He was born in Danville, Illinois, and grew up in Key West, Florida. He lives in Brooklyn.