by Peter Stone
“What do you mean?” she asked, her eyes shifting toward mine.
“Because I will have kissed you,” I said, as I leaned slightly forward and put my lips on hers. Nothing fancy and nothing saliva-y. Just a simple, perfect kiss. I pulled back to see her eyebrows slightly raised. She wasn’t the only one with a surprise in store that night.
A few seconds passed before Raymond appeared around the corner. “You know I love you, Lena, but I’m not getting overtime for this.”
She instinctively took a couple steps back away from me. Nothing to see here. “Yes, of course. We’ll come with you, Raymond.”
As the three of us we went down the elevator, I was so excited that I felt like it was still going up. But the only sound in the elevator was the awkward silence that follows a kiss that was maybe eavesdropped on by a security guard.
As Raymond locked the doors, we stepped away from the entrance, and I said, “So next time we kiss we can talk about how we had nothing to talk about after the first time we kissed,” I said. “Okay?”
“Deal,” she answered, in earnest.
We said good night to Raymond, and he told Lena that he’d called the embassy for her. As we walked toward the nearby street, I wasn’t quite sure what he meant until I saw a black SUV by the curb.
“That’s my ride,” she said. “When it’s late, the driver comes to pick me up.”
“Of course he does.” I shrugged.
“Thanks, Cameron,” she said. “And I mean it. You belong here. I’m glad you’re here.”
Conscious of the driver’s gaze, we gave each other a chaste hug, and she got in the car.
As the heavy black car drove away, I started toward the apartment, heading up Virginia Avenue toward GWU. The street grew oddly vacant as I walked closer to the university zone. Lena shot me another Thank you via text.
You still owe me a Tesla, I replied.
What about lots of leftover nachos instead? she retorted. I hear you’re a fan.
I smiled, as the brakes of a car screamed at me and I found myself in the middle of an intersection with headlights just a few feet away. A very angry woman at the wheel shouted some very angry words that amounted to “Don’t text and walk!” plus the gerund forms of some swear words thrown in for emphasis. I ran across the rest of the street and stopped on the sidewalk—feeling that rush of adrenaline that comes after you do something really stupid but don’t get hurt.
Another text lit up the screen of my phone. I was eager to see what else Lena would say.
So I hear you had a very interesting tour of the Capitol today.
The text was from Katie.
I stopped on the deserted street corner. Did she know about the fishing vest guy?! Partially purged thoughts of that name—Wade Branson—crept back into my mind. Suicide. Found dead in the woods.
I was halfway through typing, Did you see the guy in the elevator too? when she followed up with, I hear Hillary met her match.
I erased my text.
I typed back a less revealing Yes, I guess sometimes the best way to learn is by seeing what not to do.
How very diplomatic of you, Katie replied.
I’m learning from the best, I texted back.
And then I realized that I didn’t need to tell her about my conversation in the elevator in order to learn more about Wade Branson. She had offered to help me with any questions. Maybe Katie could save me some research time. Mostly I was hoping she’d say something to make me realize he wasn’t worth thinking about after all. Because I didn’t want to go to bed with his name and grim Wikipedia entry ringing in my head.
So I abruptly typed and sent: Do you know who Wade Branson is?
A minute or two passed with no response, though I could see the dancing ellipsis indicate that she was typing. Then not. Then typing again. With every passing second, I regretted asking the question. She was thinking about her answer, which meant it wasn’t an easy answer.
I continued walking down I Street as the lights of a large grocery store shut off. Every few steps, I looked back at my phone to see if she had responded.
Katie’s reply eventually came. Yes, old friend of BIB’s. Tragic loss.
Did you know him? I responded immediately.
Another long pause and another round of wavy dot-dot-dots.
Finally: Not a very popular topic in the office. Hits close to home.
Okay . . . , I typed back. And waited for a response that did not come.
At that moment, I didn’t see a single other person around. A thick summer wind sloppily yanked at the long tree branches above me. The street was zombie apocalypse abandoned. And despite the incredible evening with Lena—for the first time that summer, DC felt fallible. Unreliable. Maybe it was the lonely street or maybe it was the echoing regret for having sent that text, for having shown too many cards. But the city suddenly felt like a hastily chosen New Best Friend who suddenly says something or does something that makes you wish you hadn’t gone all in so quickly, so willingly. I walked faster with each empty block back to the apartment. Like I was being chased.
12
The next morning in my bedroom, I stared at an empty e-mail on my creaky laptop from home. I filled out the “To” field: [email protected].
I hadn’t done anything wrong by googling “Wade Branson.” Anyone could do that. Thousands probably did. But sending an e-mail to this weird address felt like exposure at best and betrayal at worst.
What do you want? I typed, then erased.
I’m sorry, I can’t help you out, I typed, then erased.
But if you need anyone to mow your lawn, I’m your guy, I typed, then erased.
Hillary knocked on my bedroom door. “Later, skater.” I slammed my laptop shut and joined her and Zeph on the way to work. When we got to the Rayburn entrance, I told them to go ahead inside as I called my dad. It was just after sunrise in Lagrima. I knew I shouldn’t tell him about my extracurricular research (he would either overreact and call the Lagrima Police or tell me I was wasting my time and should stay out of it). But just being on the phone with him and knowing that I could would be a nice shot of familiarity in the midst of an increasingly complicated summer.
He picked up the phone, and I could hear Rogelito in the background singing along to “Heaven,” by Los Lonely Boys, which is easily one of the worst songs in the history of songs. My Dad shhhed him. “It’s Cameron!” he announced. “How are things on the Hill?” he asked me.
“Great!” I enthused. “Just about to head into work.”
“Us too! New office park we’re working in. First day,” he said.
“That’s awesome, Dad.” Almost makes you forget about losing CVSU, I thought to say. But I didn’t. The last thing he needed was a reminder about losing the biggest landscaping gig at the Central Valley’s new state university.
“Everything okay?” he asked.
A fresh wave of commuting staffers approached the Rayburn entrance. I stepped out of the way of the stampede and stood alone by the base of the stairs.
“Yes, it’s really fun! I’m learning a lot, and Congressman Beck is great. All that crazy scandal stuff has pretty much died down,” I said.
See? I was learning. How to spin.
The radio suddenly blared loudly through the phone as the sing-along picked back up. My dad reprimanded his companion for interrupting the call, even as he laughed his deep laugh.
“Well, listen, son, that’s great. We’re just pulling up here, and we might lose cell recept—”
The call died. I called him back and a robot lady told me to leave a voice mail. I didn’t have confidence in my dad’s cell phone profiency, so I decided not to leave a message.
Thinking of Lena’s confident posture, I put my shoulders back, stood tall, and walked into the building. As I neared BIB’s office, I bumped into Katie in the hallway. My immediate instinct was to look away, embarrassed that I had asked her about Branson the night before. But I tried to appear confident (“Of course
it’s fair game to ask about a dead friend of the boss!”) and shot her a quick “Hi.”
“Sorry I didn’t text back; my phone died last night,” she said.
She clearly didn’t realize that my generation was way past that kind of excuse, but I forgave it anyway. “Oh, no worries.” I shrugged.
“I was just a little surprised at the question,” she added.
“Yeah, I know it kind of came out of nowhere,” I said. “You know how you get into those Internet rabbit holes where you’re buying a book online and then you’re watching YouTube videos of evil teens paintballing homeless people and then you’re reading about CEOs who commit suicide . . . ?”
“Well, in my case the sequence is usually high heels, political gossip sites, and vintage Richard Simmons motivational videos, but yes, I am familiar with the concept of Internet rabbit holes,” she replied.
“Well, anyway, that’s where the question came from. But don’t worry, I know it’s off-limits here,” I said as we walked into the office.
Katie got swept up in some committee preparation as I sat at my desk and tried not to think about Wade Branson. And waited for a decent hour to text Berto back home. When it was ten fifteen a.m. (seven fifteen a.m. his time), I decided he should be awake.
I texted, Good morning, sunshine.
About a minute passed when he replied, Dude, you woke me up! You suck, but I love you anyway. Qué pasa?
I replied, Can’t really text now, but all of that scandal stuff is getting more interesting.
Oh, really???? he responded.
If you knew that knowing something or finding something out could help someone, but it would also be dangerous, would you still want to know?
Hell yes. Don’t be scared. Soldier for truth LOL haha, he wrote back.
Easy for him to say.
Look, guerito, he added, don’t go all Watergate on me, but why not do a little digging?
Okay, I have some research to do, I typed back.
Just remember to give your boy Berto a shout-out when you’re testifying in court, he taunted.
Thinking of that nightmare scenario nearly made me stop the Wade Branson querying altogether, but I searched for the name anyway. I kept one window on my laptop open to some literacy nonprofit home page—and another window open for research about Branson. Whenever anyone neared my computer, I flipped over to the literacy nonprofit, and when they left, it was back to Unsolved Mysteries with Wade Branson. This was a common intern trick, established by most to concurrently check social media and instant messaging while working; I was doing it to research a suicidal CEO.
Over the next few days, I must have read every Internet site that mentioned Wade Branson. Most of the articles focused on his death—that Wade Branson, CEO of Livitas Pharmaceuticals, shot himself in the head in Boston, six years ago. His body was found under the Kingsley Park entry bridge near the company’s headquarters in the Fresh Pond neighborhood. The photo that every article seemed to feature was a distant view of the death scene, with a tieless set of railroad rails that led under a bridge. A bright yellow tarp covered the mass of Branson’s body, which lay on the tracks—just under the small overpass. And an angry policeman approached the photographer and was frozen in a hand-waving get out of here gesture.
Branson’s death coincided with reports that one of Livitas’s blockbuster drugs had fatal side effects in a small group of patients. Thativan was a celebrated depression drug—known for its swirling rainbow logo and ubiquitous marketing campaign which featured parents and kids, couples, and even people with pets—all reunited because they had finally found a way to manage their depression. No more side effects like nausea, tremors, headaches, and the brutal brain “crackling” many patients reported in association with their previous depression medications. Thativan changed the pharmaceutical game as the depression drug market exploded and less desirable competitors were crushed. Patients were happy again. Almost as happy as the millionaire execs at Livitas.
They just didn’t realize that their miracle drug also made people brain-dead.
Though it eliminated the common side effects of depression medication in most patients, a trend emerged among Thativan patients. First it was a junior high teacher in Appleton, Wisconsin, who had a really bad headache one day and was in a coma the next. Then a high school quarterback in Baton Rouge who collapsed on the practice field and an accountant in Dallas who called in sick one day and never showed up to work again. A growing list of victims had one thing in common: They were all Thativan patients. I didn’t really understand the multiple clinical essays that explained the reaction, but it seemed that in a small group of users, the drug destroyed key brain synapses and thus full mental function. Thativan killed their brains.
And when Branson realized he was responsible for these pharma-induced plagues, he killed himself.
• • •
My breaks from the bleak investigation were lunches with Lena in the various cafeterias of Capitol Hill. She told me about her upcoming Princeton class schedule and her end-of-summer trip to Mexico City. And I did my best to not mention the mysterious suicide that was filling my days. Being uncomplicated, noncontroversial—different from the intrigue and the gossip of her city—these were my selling points with her. And so I was happy to critique the different lunch menus with her. And scandalize her with tales of thirty-five-plus student class sizes in my public schools back home. And kiss her a couple times in between. We both knew the summer would end—and with it, probably any semblance of a sustainable romantic relationship. It wasn’t her fault that Princeton girls didn’t have boyfriends from junior colleges; that’s just how it was. But there was something about the transience and brevity of the summer that made our time more easy, more fun.
I returned to the office after lunch one day to hear Marcus tell me that he had jumped on my laptop to get the anemic list of new literacy statistics I had been assembling while not researching Branson.
“I hope you don’t mind, bro!” He shrugged. “You found a ton of stuff in there! It’s great.” I clearly should have set lower standards for myself, given that he was overjoyed with about 15 percent of my effort.
My face flushed red, and I bolted to my open laptop. No signs of Wade Branson were readily apparent, but it made me wonder who else could have accessed my computer, and the websites I’d visited. It was a careless mistake, and from then on, I wiped my search history every time I looked up anything about Branson.
One of the final items I found about his suicide seemed to confirm his death as such—it was a suicide note tucked into his jacket pocket and found by an examiner. A couple websites had pictures of the brief and neatly typed message, which read:
Please forgive me. I drove my company to release a drug that saved thousands but destroyed a sliver of users. This is a tragic trade-off, and I will spend eternity living with my conscience.
I made mistakes due to avarice and scientific zeal.
I misled my partners and best friends, who have no responsibility for nor knowledge of my indiscretion.
After causing the death of a few bright lives, the same conclusion only seems fair for my toxic one.
—WB
If suicide could be generous, his was. Generous and nicely written. Absolving his associates of any knowledge of his wrongdoing, he took the fall—fully and unquestionably. But the man from the elevator had questions anyway. Questions that were starting to be my questions too: What did Branson’s death have to do with Ariel? What did Ariel’s death have to do with me?
Livitas was sued into oblivion in the following months, and those blameless “partners and best friends” quickly condemned Branson. Among them were colleagues, scientists, lifelong friends, and one early investor in Livitas: congressman and burgeoning political power Billy Beck.
Those words from the interrupted Capitol tour echoed in my mind:
“Look him up, and tell me who’s the dangerous one.”
“Sunlight kills mold.”
I opened the desk drawer—Ariel’s desk drawer—just far enough to see that unclaimed, framed picture of her and her arm around a friend. And though I was veering closer to Watergate territory than Berto had cautioned, I typed a quick message and hit send:
“Let’s talk about mold.”
13
The man responded within minutes: Saturday, 10 a.m., Ben’s Chili Bowl. The daytime hour and public restaurant setting were comforting. Maybe he’d save a spooky subterranean parking garage for later.
And when I stepped out of the U Street metro station that quiet weekend morning, I found a neighborhood in transition. Fluorescently lit drugstores cozied up to crumbling Victorian row houses, utilitarian office buildings next to shiny new high-rise condos. It was as if these buildings were playing musical chairs with each other and rushed to land wherever they could when the music stopped. Our meeting place, Ben’s Chili Bowl, claimed a prime spot across the street from the metro station. I stepped through the colorful exterior and found a simple diner atmosphere and sparse, prelunch crowd inside. An epic, smoky smell of chili hung in the air and seemed to say Since 1958 louder than the sign on the wall.
Next to that sign sat the only familiar face in the restaurant. It was the man from the Capitol, though he had lost the fishing vest in favor of decidedly nondescript jeans and a flannel button-up shirt. He casually motioned for me to join him. As I walked over to him, I noticed two sloppy cardboard boats of hot dogs and french fries on the table.
“Thanks for meeting me here,” he said. He was relaxed but matter-of-fact. This was a business meeting, after all. “Have you ever heard of a half smoke before?”
“Why am I here?” I demanded.
“I hear that both Bush Two and Gore ordered this when they came here,” he said, showing me his half-mutilated, chili-soaked hot dog. “One thing they could agree on was a good chili dog.”
“What is this about?” I continued.
“Some people say ten a.m. is too early for a half smoke, but I say it’s all of the deliciousness with none of the crowds,” he said.