by Craig Davis
CHAPTER IV
A week had passed like a lifetime. A new Monday dawned, the sun spilling over the city’s horizon like a steamroller. Seconds blinked their alarm upon the clock, warning each minute of its appointment with oblivion.
Joe B. peered into his cup of bargain-brand coffee. “This isn’t so bad,” he remarked.
His wife literally bit her tongue and made a face.
“I’ve become a coffee Philistine,” his voice broke with angst, and his weak attempt at a smile turned into a grimace.
“You look like a gargoyle,” said his wife.
“I gargoyled right after I brushed my teeth,” he replied. “Surely things will turn up this week,” he speculated to no one in particular.
The morning sent a shooting cascade of envelopes through Joe B.’s fingers, blank flashes of white and brown destined for anonymous offices scattered throughout the building overhead. The afternoon dumped thousands of outgoing envelopes, white and brown, flowing like blood through veins – a hundred lengthy chutes, branching into countless smaller chutes, leading from those same offices. Joe B. sorted as his eyes glazed over.
Never did his mind wander from the atrocity of his predicament.
When the day was done, Joe B. slapped the paper fibers off his hands and gazed at the dry skin of his palms. The reality of the new week had sunk in, with its verdict of a steady stream of flying mail and nothing more. Slowly he trudged up the stairs to the lobby floor and called his wife on the public phone at the reception desk.
“Yeah, hi, it’s me,” he said. “Yeah. No, no different. I don’t know, I just need to take a break. I think I’ll go somewhere for awhile before coming home. Sure. No, I’ll be careful not to miss the train. No, not too long. I’m not sure. I think maybe I’ll go sit for awhile in Saklov & Ashe’s. ’Bye.”
Joe B. hung up and headed out the door. Saklov & Ashe’s was an Irish pub owned by a Russian and a Brit. The barmaid, Elle O’Hara, was true Irish, and while stuck in such an unlikely position, always had insisted she preferred the Russian – Ashe made her pour black and tans. Only two blocks down from the Universal Whirligig multiplex, Saklov & Ashe’s offered an after-work toddy for an easy walk, so Joe B. was not surprised to see a handful of Universal Whirligig employees there.
As he made his way toward a barstool, he spied a tell-tale toothpick.
It hung from the mouth of Eli from the office of International Widgetry Integration Dependency Among Indigenous Ecologies. Eli was well-known throughout the Universal Whirligig offices for always having a toothpick in his mouth, dancing between his teeth or upon his tongue. Over the years he’d chewed so many toothpicks, he’d earned the nickname “The Termite.”
Eli the Termite sat contemplating a pint at the bar.
Joe B. sat upon the vacant stool beside him.
“Termite,” he said flatly.
“B.,” came the reply.
Joe B. sat and listened for a moment as “My Way” played in the background. “I used to want that song played at my funeral,” he said at length. “Now I’m not sure.”
“You’d better decide quick, the rate you’re going,” Eli said into his pint. The toothpick hung precariously from his lower lip.
“So you’ve heard?”
“Are you kidding? It’s all over the building. You’ve become the terror of the corporation – the Big Boss’ golden boy, sent packing to the basement. There’s an email going around about you; I’ve gotten it three times already. It says, ‘It could happen to you! No employee is above discipline. Before you know it, you’re fired, so figure it out!’ Something like that. Let’s face it, any one of us could have taken that sucker punch.”
“There’s got to be more to it than that,” Joe B. replied, nibbling a stale pretzel.
“More to the email? No, that was all.”
“No, more to my predicament.”
“Oh. You know, I always thought you shouldn’t have had your office on the 13th floor. That’s just asking for trouble.”
“Thirteenth floor? No, that can’t have anything to do with it.”
“You’re not superstitious?”
“No, I don’t believe in superstitions – they’re bad luck.”
“Well, then, perhaps you’d like to share your thoughts on the matter?”
“Oh, I have several thoughts. Believe me, I’ve had plenty of time to think, particularly in the middle of the night. Things like, ‘Why does the Big Boss have to watch us at all?’ And, ‘Does he want to be respected, or would he rather be feared?’ I have no answers. I don’t know why I’m left sorting mail. All I do know is, I don’t know. I was doing the same quality work as an executive the last year as I did the first twenty. I don’t understand why the Big Boss is getting his jollies at my expense.” Joe B.’s voice began to rise.
“Shh, keep it down,” Eli warned, looking around the room suspiciously. “There’s plenty of Universal Whirligiggers here, and you don’t know what might get back to the Big Boss. Be careful of what you say!”
“Why? What have I got to lose?”
“You could be terminated.” Eli’s eyes grew like plates as his voice went Austrian.
“I wish the Big Boss would terminate me, take the decision away from me. That seems to be his M.O. – pull strings you didn’t even know were attached.”
“You say that now,” reasoned Eli, “and maybe it’s so. But as long as you’re not fired, you at least have the opportunity to work your way back into the Big Boss’ good graces. If you work hard, you can earn his favor.”
“Earn it? What was I doing before? Do you have any idea how many years it would take to rise to a vice president again? I’m old! Look at me! My hair is in all the wrong places – the shower drain in particular. My joints pop more in the morning than my cereal. I don’t have another twenty years for ladder climbing.”
“You would be an American success story.”
“My American dream has turned into a nightmare. Now I know what a dartboard feels like.”
Eli accidentally let his toothpick drop into his beer, and, while he wedged his fingers into the glass to retrieve it, tried to think of something positive to say. He couldn’t. “Well, it’s tough. How’s your family holding up?” he managed at last.
Joe B. calmed down a little. “They’re hanging in. The budget cuts haven’t been so bad yet, so everyone’s being a good soldier. But my Jack Russell terrier is depressed.”
Eli snorted. “That’s a good one.”
“It’s true.”
“That’s what you need, something to take your mind off work. You’re down now, but lighten up a little and you’ll feel better – try to think of something funny. Go ahead, tell a joke.”
“I can’t tell jokes.”
“Sure you can.”
“I’m serious, I always mess jokes up some way.”
“Oh, go ahead, try.”
“All right! All right – watch out. Okay, there’s this chicken. He goes into a store, and he’s checking out, and he’s buying Chapstick. So he says to the checkout guy, ‘Put it on my bill.’ ”
A slight pause hung in the air. “A chicken?” Eli asked.
“Yeah?”
“A chicken doesn’t have a bill. It’s got a beak.”
“Oh, yeah. The chicken was wearing a baseball cap. Did I mention that?”
“Wow.” Eli looked like he’d been hit with a skillet.
“I tried to warn you,” Joe B. shrugged. “But you forced me into it – so now how about a little support? You’re supposed to laugh anyway.”
“I am?”
“Of course. Didn’t you know that? If I had a dollar for every courtesy laugh I busted out with, I wouldn’t be working in the mailroom – I’d be retired. You’re not supposed to leave your mates hanging. I can’t count the number of lame jokes I’ve laughed at without knowing why.” Joe B.’s face turned grim.
“It’s part of the game, where you play by the rules and hope they don’t change along the way,” he continued. “
So I always supported the good efforts of my colleagues, and tried to counsel others away from causing disaster. And if a project did run into criticism from the Big Boss, I always gave him the benefit of the doubt. I always stood up for his good judgment. Now the shoe is on the other foot – the wrong foot – and it’s not comfortable.”
“Well, gentle or terrible, the Big Boss had the right to demote you,” Eli drained his drink. “His decision to make.”
“Yeah, and he made it all right. Now I know what a spittoon feels like,” Joe B. said, heavily emphasizing the “toon.”
“That’s putting yourself down a bit much, don’t you think?”
“It’s my way. I derive my self-esteem through self-deprecating humor. It’s a vicious cycle.”
“I’ll bet. But that’s not going to be very productive. Now this is what I think – what I have to say is plain and simple. There’s no great mystery to what’s going on here. Now, don’t take this the wrong way. I don’t want to come down too hard on you, but the fact is, you screwed up.”
“Oh, well, thanks for going easy on me.”
“You have to realize there’s more happening in the Big Boss’ world than just your job. He’s got no more than a few seconds to ever think about you. From what you say, you must think the whole company revolves around you. You have some kind of Copernican complex.”
“A what?”
“You know – when you realize you’re not the center of the universe. Wasn’t that Copernicus? He discovered the Earth goes around the sun. Didn’t he? Or was that Jan Brozek? I always get those two confused.”
“Clearly a bi-Polish disorder,” Joe B. observed.
“Well, anyway, with your attitude, you were ripe for a fall,” said Eli testily. “The Big Boss finally had to put his foot down.”
“Yes, and he put it down right on top of me.”
“That’s right. Sitting up there in your office, building walls out of file cabinets, you thought you were safe. You thought you had it made in your little ivory tower.”
“Yes, you’re right. I see it now. Even my hummingbirds were fat and happy. Even my bugs were too snug in my rugs. I got what I deserved, all right.” Joe B. was just plain unpleasant. There’s no other way to put it.
“Make light if you will, but you need to listen to me. You thought you’d figured out how to work the system, but the Big Boss knew what was going on all along. He never lets his employees down when they’re doing the right things. He always rewards good work. You’ve been demoted, so what do you think? Obviously you’ve done something harmful to Universal Whirligig.”
“Don’t you suppose I’ve thought of that? I didn’t do anything – it can’t be that simple. There has to be more to it than that.”
“Of course it’s that simple – what else could it be? The Big Boss makes his best employees prosper, and the bad ones end up in the mailroom. You prospered for awhile, but then you did something wrong. Bada bing, bada boom. What you need to concentrate on now is doing better work.”
“Sort mail better?” inquired Joe B.
“Do what you have to do. But just as the Big Boss punishes bad work, he rewards good work, and the best employees always rise to the top.”
“I have not done any bad work,” Joe B. insisted, turning hot again. “I have done the same work I always did, and the one thing I thought that job preformance would protect me from has happened – the Big Boss hates me.”
“He doesn’t hate you, he only hates your work.”
“That’s just silly – I am the sum of my work. And how do you know who the Big Boss hates? You’ve got him all figured out now? What, you have lunch with him on Tuesdays? He calls you in the evening for advice on the coming day? Got him tucked neatly into your little box?” Joe B. spewed.
Elle the barmaid stared, polishing a glass.
“Don’t get mad at me just because you don’t understand him,” Eli retorted. “He’s got to watch out for Universal Whirligig. Any bad employee makes the whole company look bad, makes him look bad. Whoo, boy, if you make him look bad, he’ll get you. Cross him and he’ll make you pay. Do what he wants and he’ll keep you happy.”
“Now that you’ve got him fitting inside your head, the Big Boss turns out to be pretty small,” Joe B.’s voice turned into a growl. “Does he hide behind doors, waiting to spring out and catch his underlings at something? Petty, superficial – that’s our Big Boss all right.”
“The problem with you is you can’t take friendly advice. You need to listen to me,” Eli snarled back.
“Oh, you’re doing a bang-up job with your advice! I demote you.”
“You don’t know what’s good for you. I’m trying to help you here.”
“You have helped me. You’ve helped me see that you’re an idiot.” Joe B. patted him on the shoulder.
“Oh, hardee-har-har. I’ll ignore that, because you’re upset, and I’ve had only one beer. This is what you need to do – get the Big Boss’ attention and show him you’re worthy of his favor. You have to work your way back into his approval. Now, you go back to Universal Whirligig and crank out so much work that you overcome whatever you did that was so terrible. Do everything you can to gain his notice, then send him gifts and good wishes to win him over. You’re in the mailroom now – start by sending him a card.”
“What?!” Joe B. blurted.
“Sure, it’s a natural. Just slip a greeting card into his mail. It’s a small start, but it’s a good idea! Get back on the Big Boss’ good side! A nice card will soften him up for whatever you think of next. Don’t get one too fancy. Send it up to his office, then he’ll start watching you doing well again!”
“Now you’ve officially gone nuts. Do you really think a greeting card is ever going to make it onto the Big Boss’ desk? Do you really think it would make any difference? He already sees me. What I needed was for him to ignore me a little more. Maybe you could as well.”
“Look, I don’t need this aggravation,” Eli turned defensive. “I don’t have to waste my time with your problems. I’m doing you a favor, and don’t you forget it. Some gratitude you’re showing! You’re in no position to refuse my advice. You should just take it and be happy!” His toothpick shot out of his mouth and twirled past Elle the barmaid. He deftly pulled a new one from his coat pocket.
Joe B. slapped a five-dollar bill upon the bar and stood up. “You don’t need this? I don’t need your advice. You just make me more miserable, you and your stupid suggestions. My advice to you is to get a new hobby! Pickertooth! Peckerwood!” He threw his arm up in the air as he ranted out of the tavern.
“You’ll be sorry!” Eli shouted after him. “You’ll find out! Do what I say – send a nice card!”
Joe B.’s trip into Saklov & Ashe’s had not had its desired effect. Indeed, it left him even more agitated about his sorry circumstances. He stormed down the street, stormed onto his train, stormed into his house. He stormed about so much, by nightfall he was drained. Still, he lay awake in bed next to his lightly slumbering wife, staring by the dim light at the same page of his book for hours. His mind turned about randomly within his skull. He considered going crazy.
Then the phone rang. It was Eli.
“Hey, sorry to call so late. I need to ask you a question. I didn’t wake you, did I?”
“No,” Joe B. replied coldly. “But thanks for asking. Glad I could help out.” And he hung up.
The following mornings sent a shooting cascade of envelopes through Joe B.’s fingers, blank flashes of white and brown destined for anonymous offices scattered throughout the building overhead. The afternoons dumped thousands of outgoing envelopes, white and brown, flowing like blood through veins – a hundred lengthy chutes, branching into countless smaller chutes, leading from those same offices. Each new day dawned like the one before. Each day, that is, until Thursday. On Thursday afternoon Joe B. caught sight of the fullness of his new reality, in the form of his first paycheck as a mailroom employee. He stood and stared at the gr
im figure, at the meager future it offered.
“I have to get a meeting with the Big Boss,” he thought with renewed vigor, or perhaps desperation. Immediately he devised a brilliant plan.
At the end of his shift, Joe B. went to the supply room and signed out a two-wheeled hand truck. “I have a large load to deliver to an upper office,” he told the crusty old man behind the window.
“Will you return the truck today?” he asked.
“Yes, but it may be late. I’ll leave it next to your office door,” Joe B. proposed.
“Here’s the form,” said the man matter-of-factly.
“The form?” Joe B. asked.
“To check it back in. Put the form in this slot,” the man indicated a shallow shelf built into the wall next to his window.
“Doesn’t the hand truck sitting here indicate it’s checked in?”
“Have to do the paperwork. Some vice president decided we have to back everything up with a paper trail. So fill out the form.”
“Oh, yeah, that guy,” Joe B. muttered.
Just as the time before, Joe B. and his hand truck took the elevator to the highest floor possible. Then he switched to the stairs, carefully lifting the truck behind him over each step. Gradually he made his way to the floor only one level below the Big Boss’ office complex. He peeked through the door, making sure no one would spy him out, then entered the hallway and officiously pushed his dolly on an expedition to the snack room.
“I’ll get in to see the Big Boss if it kills me,” he thought, hoping for the best.
Once in the break room, Joe B. faced a long row of vending machines backed up to the wall. Considering them all carefully, he thought hard about what the Big Boss would most likely want at his disposal – soda, or juice? Chips, or fruit? Sandwiches, or pie? At the far end stood one filled with spinach pizza and freeze-dried sorbet. Joe B. had his target.
With no little difficulty, he lifted the machine just enough to get the hand truck wedged underneath. With a mighty grunt he tipped the snack cornucopia up toward himself and pulled it away from the wall. The electrical cord strained against the wall socket before popping out and dragging along the floor like a 16-gauge tail.
“Give the Big Boss a card!” he scoffed to himself. “I’ll give him something he’ll really notice!”
Lugging the machine down the hall was one thing, but maneuvering it up a stairwell was something completely else. Joe B. had a full floor still to climb to get to the Big Boss’ offices. The break room door itself barely accommodated the machine. The thing must have weighed a ton as Joe B. hefted it up the stairs, one herniated step at a time.
“Lift with the legs, lift with the legs,” he chanted to himself, almost wishing he had not slept through all the safety videos he’d sat in front of over the years, but at the same time pretty sure they’d not covered this particular situation. The hand truck wheels slowly mounted the edge of each step before Joe B. stopped to brace himself and rest his back. Then another, then another, thirteen steps in all, and he had made it to the landing halfway to the Big Boss’ floor.
Joe B. stood breathing hard, staring up the remaining flight to the door at the top. He tried to stretch the kinks out of his back as he wondered whether to give up. The hulking machine told him he might not be able to haul it all the way up, but he sure wasn’t going to take it back down. Again he tilted its weight back on the dolly and moved toward the stairs. How he longed for the elevator, but on the other hand the stairwell provided him cover, as nobody else used the stairs to leave the building. Taking this detour, he was sure not to run across anybody who might wonder what he was up to.
With a final groan Joe B. vaulted the huge box of spinach and sorbet over the top step, almost losing his grip and sending it careening back to the landing. But he recovered in time to pull the hand truck safely away from the precipice, and he paused to catch his breath as well.
After a moment to compose himself, Joe B. peeked through the door. The coast was clear as far as he could tell – he didn’t even see a security guard – so as quietly as possible he wormed his load through the narrow opening and into the hall. Slowly he approached the Big Boss’ offices, where at least the swinging double doors offered him much easier access.
“I have a delivery for the Big Boss,” he said gruffly, crouching behind his leaning tower of pizza.
“We are not aware of any deliveries today,” said the same young woman as last time, shuffling through a small stack of papers on her desk.
“They told me to bring this machine up for his personal use – in his office.”
“In his upper office?”
“Uh, yeah – ”
“That’s odd.”
“They told me he wants to keep some snacks handy. To serve guests.”
“That’s what’s odd,” said the woman, no longer shuffling. “Because that’s why he had a full kitchen installed.”
“A full kitchen?” Joe B. asked blankly.
“With a chef.”
Joe B. mentally slapped himself on the forehead. Of course the Big Boss wouldn’t need a snack machine! He could have a five-star restaurant if he wanted one.
“Well, then, I guess – I don’t know – why they asked me to – uh – bring this – up here,” Joe B.’s voice trailed off as he nervously pointed to his delivery.
“Don’t I recognize your voice?”
“Um – I doubt it. I need to take this up to the Big Boss’ office.” Joe B. thought he could hear himself sweat.
“You won’t be able to get it upstairs from here. Why didn’t you use the service elevator? It opens directly to the kitchen area.”
Joe B. mentally slapped his forehead again, and harder this time – “The service elevator!”
“Of course, you can’t get here from there, either. And didn’t you really come to see me?”
“Uh – ” he offered.
“Sir, nobody really sent you up with that vending machine, did they?”
“I need to see the Big Boss,” he croaked.
“Sir, I can’t let you see the Big Boss today. You’re clearly up here under false pretenses.” Her eyes glowered sternly, in a pretty kind of way.
“Well, it’s not really a lie if you don’t expect anyone to believe it, is it? I mean, you never believed the machine was for the Big Boss, did you?” Joe B. reasoned.
She wasn’t buying this argument either. “No, sir, I didn’t, and I’m afraid you couldn’t see the Big Boss even if I did.”
“But you don’t realize, I have to talk to the Big Boss! For the sake of my family, I have to see him.” Joe B. had set down the machine, and gripped the edge of the young woman’s desk with both hands.
“Yes, I remember from the other day. But nobody can just knock on the Big Boss’ door and walk in. He decides whom he will see, and sometimes it takes a long time to bring an issue before him. Please be assured, he knows of your request. If he decides to see you, I will let you know personally.”
Joe B. knew nothing to do except stare at his vending machine. “What about this thing?”
“We’ll take care of the sorbet server,” she smiled. “A Building Supervision and Maintenance Department employee will come get it in the morning. You know, one of those men in a green uniform? They pretty much always take care of these things.”
Joe B. looked down at his dusty denim coveralls. His forehead flinched.
“Please take this with you,” she continued, reaching into a cabinet next to her desk to retrieve a suede-covered notebook stamped with the Universal Whirligig logo. “it’s got pockets and pen holders inside, with a nice clip for a large notepad. Until the Big Boss can see you, if he so chooses, let this token remind you that he cares about all his employees. And here, here’s a temporary PIN for elevator priority.”
Loot in hand, Joe B. turned and exited silently, decidedly more depressed than before. For all his scheming and striving, he was no closer to getting through to the Big Boss. He looked down at the notebook �
�� surely he was the only mailroom worker to have ever received one – and considered its cold solace.
In the lobby he realized he’d forgotten the hand truck.