Kill Process

by William Hertling

  “Don’t—” Don’t bother, I want to say, but it’s too late, and already the temperature seems to be skyrocketing. Why can’t he stay on his own side of the desk, where we’d have a barrier between us?

  “What’s up?” He goes back to his side of the desk and sits with a squeak from his pneumatic chair.

  I swallow deeply, my throat tight. “I’m giving my two-weeks’ notice. I’m leaving Tomo.”

  Daniel blanches at this, and for a few long seconds, he’s too stunned to speak. I’m the strongest engineer he has by far, and to a certain extent, his reputation to make things happen is due to my contributions.

  He clears his throat. “I thought you were happy here.”

  “I am, or was, although something’s come up, and I need to leave.”

  “I . . . you . . . you’re the best employee I’ve got.”

  I shake my head at him. I lean down, pick up his badge from the floor.

  He glances down at his waist, sees his badge is missing, and takes the one I hand him.

  “It is a personal thing?” he asks. “You could take a leave of absence. No need to quit. Take three or six months off. Come back when you’re ready.”

  “It’s okay, Daniel. My mind is made up. I’d like my last day to be in two weeks. I have some work to transition to the rest of the team. I can be finished before then.”

  We go back and forth a few more times, and I leave an in-shock Daniel in his office.

  * * *

  It’s been five days since the dinner when I promised Emily I’d find someone to talk to. I’ve put it off as long as I could. Now I’m out of excuses and spend Thursday morning investigating support groups.

  There are many in Portland, and, as I normally do, I over-research everything about them. Time, methodology, location, outcomes, duration, leaders and their educational background.

  I don’t want one near home or work, afraid I’ll run into someone I know and ashamed of what I see as a weakness in myself. The logical half of my brain argues anyone there is in the same boat as me. The emotional side counters that I’m better than those people, and have more to lose.

  Which is it? Am I weak, and therefore should be ashamed? Or better, and too proud? It doesn’t make sense it could be both. But then my emotions usually don’t make sense to me.

  Late Thursday morning, Emily texts me from outside Big Pink, and I take the elevator down to meet her. She’s waiting in the lobby with two coffee drinks. People are streaming around us, coming to and from the massive elevator banks behind me.

  “Quad shot mocha,” she says, holding one out. “Let’s walk.”

  “I like my coffee black,” I say.

  “The chocolate increases happiness and the sugar elevates energy. The milk is for your bones. It’s good for you. Drink up.”

  “This from the woman who eats salad without dressing? Besides, they debunked that bit about milk.”

  “My coffee is black. The dessert drink is for you.”

  I sigh and accept the cup, and Emily walks away without waiting, her heels seemingly no impediment to her quick pace.

  I chase after her, trying to sip my coffee on the run. The sweetness is sickening.

  “Have you set something up yet?” she asks, when we’re half a block away. The sidewalk is crowded with workers from the surrounding office buildings.

  “Set what up?”

  “You know, a thing,” she’s almost whispering, which might be a first for Emily. I realize she has no idea who my coworkers are, and this is her idea of discreet. They’re only my coworkers for another thirteen days.

  “No, I’m still researching support groups.”

  She looks up at me. “Oh God, you’ll take forever. Here.” She digs into a pocket and holds out a slip of paper.

  I unfurl two fingers from my cup and take the paper between them. I try to read the paper from around the cup, but can’t make it out. Emily grabs the coffee back from me.

  “Thanks.”

  The half sheet flyer is for a domestic violence support group that meets early tomorrow morning.

  “No way. It’s in a church.”

  “It’s good. My friend went there for several years. She says it helped a lot.”

  I glance up from the paper, check out Emily’s face. People don’t walk around volunteering their domestic violence support groups unsolicited. She’s been asking around. Nothing terrifies me more, but if Emily can do this for me, I can go for her.

  “Fine, I’ll do it.”

  “It’s not religious. They only meet at the church.”

  “I said I’ll go.”

  “Oh, okay.” Emily looks away, down the street, toward nothing I can see that’s important.

  I have no idea why things are suddenly awkward between us.

  I pocket the paper and take the coffee back. For a moment, we’re both holding the cup at once. “Thank you,” I say. “I know you mean well and you care.” My voice is gruffer than I want it to be, and I realize I’m not mad at Emily, but I am scared and my knees are weak. I take a long chug of the mocha, and the chocolate and sugar fortifies me.

  Emily knows me better than I know myself.

  CHAPTER 13

  * * *

  I’M SO NERVOUS before I leave for the support group I contemplate a drink even though it’s still early morning. All I know of support groups is what I’ve seen on television, which I associate with alcoholics, and though this group is for domestic violence survivors, it’s enough to conclude a drink is probably inappropriate.

  I descend a flight of dark stairs to the basement of the church, in a cold room with a linoleum floor and high, squat windows letting in a trickle of natural light. There are no men present, so for once I don’t worry about the distance to the exit or being blocked in. One woman, professionally dressed in a green satin blouse and slacks, smiles at me, and gestures for me to join the women seated in a circle on folding chairs.

  “Please, help yourself to coffee or water, if you like, and take a seat,” she says. “We’ll begin in a few minutes.”

  I skip the beverages and sit down. It’s the most diverse group of women I’ve been in for a long time. The youngest is still a teen, awkward and gangly, with red, puffy eyes. The oldest could be a grandmother. There’s a woman in ripped sweats and a band t-shirt, and nearly opposite her, a middle-aged woman in an expensive tailored suit. Portland is known as the whitest city on the west coast, due to draconian discrimination laws before the Second World War, yet here are two black women, a Hispanic woman, and an Asian woman.

  For a moment, I’m comforted. I’m not going to stick out here. I might have one arm, I might be afraid to step into a room with a man, and I might make a scene if a man touches me, but here none of that will happen. If anything, I’m almost average for the group. Maybe losing an arm is extreme, even by these standards, although it’s possible someone here has experienced worse.

  At some point the woman in the green blouse talks about the ground rules. A gnawing pain blossoms in my stomach, and soon all I can focus on is the feeling. My limbs tingle, another kind of nervousness I know from past experience.

  The pit in my stomach grows every day around this time. It used to begin at 5 P.M., a full hour before he came home from work. Then he started coming home at different times, sometimes 5, once at 4:30. The gnawing and trembling appeared earlier then, at 4 or 3, even. Eventually, the feelings became too much, overwhelming, and my body and mind would go numb. I had to finish the household chores earlier then, by noon, for fear I’d lose control of my body, and be unable to do them—

  He touches me on the shoulder, and I know I shouldn’t, but I lash out, I fight back, but I miss and I fall out of my chair.

  I’m confused. Where am I? I don’t remember this linoleum.

  I realize I’m on the floor in the church basement.

  The woman in the green blouse speaks to me, but her words come through a long, narrow tube. A squeak is all that reaches my ears, and I can’t unders
tand anything over the pounding in my head.

  I lurch to my feet, and stumble through the ring, crashing into several empty chairs before I run outside.

  I gulp air as though I swam a hundred yards under water. The tunnel vision is so bad I can barely distinguish my car. Eventually I find it, grab onto the fender, and for a moment I’m afraid I’m going to be sick.

  The woman in the green blouse circles into my vision, a cautious ten feet away, sunlight so bright on her blonde hair it’s almost blinding. She’s speaking, but I still can’t make out what she’s saying. She approaches me slowly with something held out in front of her, and she places it into my hand, which doesn’t protest. She backs away, and my hand folds tight of its own accord, crushing the business card inside.

  I’m in my car, in the driver’s seat. I have no idea how long I stood next to my car, no idea how I got in, or how long I’ve been sitting here. I haven’t driven anywhere, because I still see the church right across the street. It’s still the same day. I’d know if a whole night passed, right?

  I unfurl my hand, which has cramped up tight, and look at the business card. It’s damp with sweat, but the text is clear, and the words that stand out are psychologist and private practice.

  Private practice means not having to go into a room and hear other women talk about their experiences.

  My breathing gradually returns to normal, eventually my vision appears normal, and I might be fit to drive. I’ll call and make an appointment. From home.

  * * *

  I stare up at the building. My appointment with Charlotte, the psychologist from the group session, is in a few minutes. After the experience at the church, I’m not sure I can handle this. I avoided thinking about it on the drive over, although now that I’m here, I’m sweating and faint, and haven’t even gotten out of the car.

  In the elevator ride up, I get agita, that combination of nauseous and acid reflux and impending vomit which apparently only Italian-Americans experience often enough to warrant a word for the specific feeling. Are we going to talk about what happened? How can we not?

  By the time I reach Charlotte’s office I’m shaking, and it takes everything I’ve got to keep putting one foot in front of the other.

  Charlotte opens the door when I knock and takes in my sweaty, trembling mess.

  “Come in, Angie. I’m glad you called. Please, pick a seat.”

  The office has two chairs and a couch. I pick the chair, because I could make a faster exit from it.

  Charlotte settles into the other chair with a pad of paper. “You’re anxious.”

  I swallow, unable to form words, and nod.

  “We’re not going to talk about anything from your past today. We’re not even going to talk about feelings, or any challenges you feel.”

  I nod again, my head like one of those desk toys that bounce up and down uncontrollably, although I don’t understand. Isn’t that what therapy is? Talking about stuff you can’t handle? How are we not going to do any of that?

  “You’re anxious. I’m going to give you some tools for dealing with anxiety. How does that sound?”

  My head continues its unstoppable bobbing.

  “Wiggle your toes in your shoes, and pay attention to the feeling of your toes rubbing around inside your shoes.”

  What the hell? I can’t see the point of it, but I do what she says.

  “Can you feel your toes?”

  Of course I can. I nod, a little slower.

  “Now focus on your heels. There’s some weight pressing down on your heels. It’s the weight of your legs, the pull of gravity. Can you sense that?”

  “Yes.” My voice is a whisper.

  “Good,” she says. “Now think about your legs and pants. Your pants are touching your skin. The fabric is lying on top of your legs. Can you feel that pressure, the sense of the cloth resting on your thighs?”

  “It’s very faint,” I say.

  “That’s okay.” She continues to lead me through my entire body, all the way up to my hair. I thought maybe she was going to become all new agey on me, and talk about energy and wacky stuff, but she never did.

  “How are you feeling?” she asks, after she’s assessed whether I can feel the difference between the side of my face closer to the window and the side away from it.

  “I’m okay.” I’m startled to realize I’m relaxed, even slightly blissful.

  “That’s a big difference from when you walked in. That’s what we call grounding, and you can do it any time you feel like you need to. I can teach you more tools you can use.”

  “Is that what therapy is?” I ask. “I thought . . .”

  “Different people need different things. I like to find out what a new patient needs. Based on what happened at the church, and how you looked when you came in, I thought we should start with something to help you cope with your anxiety. If you agree, we should continue to focus on some more tools to help you deal with anxiety. Would you like that?”

  I feel like I’ve been drowning for years, and someone has thrown me a life preserver.

  “Yes,” I say, and resist the urge to cry.

  CHAPTER 14

  * * *

  MY LAST DAY at Tomo is a Wednesday. Thomas takes the next two days off work, and we spend a long weekend in a small beach house in Manzanita. It’s cold and wet, but we bundle up and go for long walks on the beach. At night we curl up by the fireplace and read books.

  More than anything else, I sleep. I’m shocked by how tired I am. It’s like the exhaustion of years of double-duty hit me all at once. Thomas asks if I’m okay when I sleep until nine one morning.

  Although money is tight, Apple lures me in with a refresh of their laptops, and I resist for a week before I give in. I spend a few days playing with my new toy and getting my development environment set up just right.

  I build skeletal prototypes of my ideas for the protocol between disparate social networks. They’re simulators, more than proper software, but I still take great joy in passing messages back and forth between the separate programs.

  I show off my code one night to Thomas, who leans in to stare at the text scrolling by in my console.

  “See, right there, it’s passing messages back and forth.”

  “This line here, where it says ‘message received’?” He smiles. “That’s cool!”

  He’s happy for me, because I’m excited, but it’s clear he doesn’t experience the same thrill I feel. That night at dinner he suggests I meet with a client of his, Mat, who is the CEO of a small tech company. “He’s recently been through the funding process, and knows everyone in the startup community.”

  I know he wants to be helpful, but I grit my teeth in resistance. I want to do things at my own pace, in my own way. At lunch with Emily a few days later, she convinces me to at least give it a try.

  “You’re not committing to anything,” she says, around bites of lettuce-wrapped chicken breast. “You’re only meeting someone to find out what they know. There’s nothing wrong with learning.”

  I sprinkle more hot sauce on my chimichanga and manage to look doubtful.

  Emily sighs. “It’s an email. Humor Thomas and talk to the guy.”

  I let Thomas email me an introduction to Mat, and after a few back and forth emails, Mat and I agree to meet for lunch at Pok Pok, a restaurant in Southeast Portland, far from the tech bubble downtown.

  I arrive fifteen minutes early to ensure a table in a far corner where we won’t be overheard. Of course, this table choice requires some compromises. The front door looks like it’s a few hundred feet away. Don’t believe everything I think. Don’t believe everything I think. I repeat Charlotte’s mantra five times, counting it off, then practice grounding myself. Seat. Floor. Butt. Shoes. The panic subsides, and when Mat approaches, I’m able to greet him with a smile.

  He holds out his right hand for a shake, and his eyes flare when he sees my stump. I turn my left hand around and give him the best off-hand shake I can.
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  I decide to try one of the corny jokes Charlotte told me. “I had a little problem with a pit bull on the way over.”

  Mat laughs, and the awkward moment passes. We exchange the usual greetings and discuss our backgrounds. He’s British, and has been in the United States almost ten years. He founded his latest company several years ago, their specialty data analysis for other tech startups. We geek out on our favorite statistical analysis software until we’ve ordered food.

  “I heard you want to do something in social media. Aren’t you worried about a Tomo noncompete?”

  I swallow hard, and force myself to wave it off casually. “No non-compete. Didn’t sign it.”

  His eyes go big. “Wow. That’s fortunate. What’s your angle?”

  I’m wondering how much I can and should say. The question is natural enough, yet I’m reluctant to share my idea.

  He sees my reluctance, and misunderstands. “Ideas are cheap. It’s building them into profitable companies that’s hard. Gifford Pinchot says ‘ideas are like insects: many are born, but few live to maturity.’ ”

  “I’m not worried about you stealing my ideas. I’m thinking about how ridiculous it sounds. I want to create a direct competitor to Tomo.”

  “Hmm.” Mat leans back like he’s wondering how he got himself into having lunch with an insane person.

  “It’s not as crazy as it seems. I don’t want to build the whole thing. The concept is we decompose the social network into its constituent parts and enable anyone to build a single part in isolation by defining standard protocols to allow the pieces to plug in together.”

  “One app for photo-sharing, a different one for status updates, like that?”

  “Even more fine-grained. Consider your feed—everything you see when you visit Tomo. Tomo has an algorithm that chooses what you see, and you don’t have any control over it. Tomo gives you a hundred and fifty updates a day, max. Other social networks give it to you raw: every message, as it happens.”

  “That’s a whole different approach,” Mat says. “The most you can do is dip a toe in the stream and sample it. You can’t read everything.”