by Shilo Jones
“Uh, nope?” I want to grab Clint’s jacket, use it as a pillow, curl up.
“C’mon. Bansal? Amar Bansal? Indo-fucking-Canadian? Brutal bastard. Much respect. Rolled with him. Not side by side, but business. Shot three years ago. While you were in…fuck knows?”
“Bansal? Yeah. The pretty boy? This chick Peele’s got working for him is Bansal’s sister?”
Clint flicks the smouldering blunt into a puddle, clamps a shaky hand on my shoulder. “Never told you this. Amar was all me. Point blank. On the dance floor. Real proud. After him, I moved on North Surrey.” I try and speak. Clint digs his fingernails into the soft spot where bicep meets bone. “You shoulda seen it, bro. Biggie thumping. Lights spinning. Bitches dancing. Like a music video.” Clint’s face is wrapping around, warping, blocking my view of the alley, the city, and when he speaks I think no I’m not the crazy one but of course that’s wrong, of course I am.
“The sister’s at Marigold cuz of me,” Clint says. “Not a fucking coincidence.”
Takes me a while to clue in. “You’re going to—”
Clint wipes his hands on his pants like he didn’t like touching me. “Not sure what yet. Dunno what she thinks she knows. But it’s a problem. Threatens the thing we got with Peele, he finds out I didn’t tell him about Amar. Man, the world’s shit, Marky. That’s why family means so much.”
I’m thinking if the Bansal sister put herself in this kind of risk to get at Clint, she probably feels the same. And the weird thing is I’m trying to feel something about my brother’s admission, outrage or anger, but there’s only a hissing radio noise in my head and if I listen real hard maybe I’ll know what to do. “Clint? I need out. Please?”
“Yeah, fuck off. You’re barely in.” Clint digs in his pants pocket, pulls out his phone, scrolls to a photo. A girl, mid-teens, dressed in a navy blazer and a pleated tartan skirt, walking down the marble steps outside a brick building that’s either a private school or a castle. “Forget the Bansal thing. This is your work. Slutty daughter goes viral.” Clint holds the phone so I can see. “Look at that cutie. Easy.”
“Clint? I really think I need—”
“Doin’ you a favour with this one. Total cutie. Think?”
“Yeah. Cutie.” But looking at the girl’s picture and feeling nothing. Not interested…and not not interested…but nothing at all. Course this one’s just a kid. But when was the last time I noticed or thought about being with someone? About getting laid? A long time now. Touching, being touched. A real long while.
“Daughter of the competing bid.” Clint pockets the phone. “Mother’s some uppity politician. So y’know, a public figure exposed. Father’s a rich-boy addict. Name’s…uh, Carl Reed? Runs an investment company, things get thorny around there…” Clint frowns, spits against the wall. “Reed’s got a side deal with Peele. Peele went through it with me, it’s nothing, but out of courtesy, right, you approach the old man first. Daddy gets to decide: lean on wifey so she pulls the government bid, or—”
I light a smoke, tell my brother it felt good working on site.
Clint pockets his phone. “Twll show up?”
“He works not bad. Said you guys hang out?”
A few skaters roll by, teenagers in black skinny jeans, vintage T-shirts, Vans. One of them ollies over a manhole and as he lands he looks over, catches my eye, and I see something about me bugs him but he puts his head down, boardslides onto Broadway.
“Me?” Clint says, watching the skaters disappear. “Hang with that puke? Course he’s bullshitting. Up my ass to let him run a crew.”
Something feels off in Clint’s voice. Like doth fucking protest? “Kid seems all right.”
Clint pauses. Pretend-uppercuts the cinderblock wall. “You know he uses?”
Ash my smoke. “Huh?”
“Yeah. Can’t believe a word. Don’t tell him I told you. See the shit I gotta put up with?” Clint roundhouses the wall. “Job got held up so no work tomorrow. I’ll phone Twll, have him meet you Tuesday morning. Maybe I’ll come by. Help out. Feels like all I do is drive around.” Clint sighs. “Good thing that Cummins is sick as hell. And hey, the Reed daughter’s for you alone. I’ll give a shout. Otherwise, don’t bug me.”
I’m about to say no problem when my phone beeps. Clint raises an eyebrow at a photo of a fancy gilded ballroom packed with fancy smiling people wearing fancy evening gowns and tuxes, a sparkling chandelier hanging from the ceiling—
Clint snatches my smoke, takes a drag, laughs in admiration. “Peele, that motherfucker. See? Big shot. In our corner.”
A banner draped across the back wall says Vancouver Police Gala. Peele’s on stage in a slick black tux, handing an oversized cheque to the chief of police. I’m about to delete the image when another arrives. Peele wearing a downhill helmet and body armour airing a gap on a full-suspension mountain bike. I groan, show Clint. He hands me my smoke, looks at the photo, tosses a couple punches through the air. Then a third message arrives.
“Fuck you, Peele.” I drop the phone on the pavement. Burning pressure builds behind my eyes. Clint tells me to look at the text, so I do, and this time it’s blood violence murder, a dude in a suit slumped against the steering wheel of a silver Mercedes with all the windows shot out. Clint says yeah, that’s Vincent saying yo what’s up from his big-fish boss Tectonic, some super-secret Chinese guy, all I know is that’s who we’re securing the North Van property for, don’t sweat it, Marky, don’t let that chickenshit Vincent Peele in your head, sending pissy messages, bullshit mind games—
Jasminder Bansal
Monday sales meeting at Marigold. I’ve been awake since five. Met a client at seven. Toured a development site in Richmond, close to the Cambie Line. Determined not to let my failure at the open house set me back.
My ideas come to life through my business.
Seated on a lumpy beanbag chair around a neon-green table shaped in a series of asymmetrical curves. The table has a plastic play crate on it, like in a daycare. The crate is overflowing with puzzles and brainteaser games. A foosball table and an original Pac-Man arcade game square off in opposite corners of the room. A miniature basketball net. A fish tank full of gold-green fish.
Vincent calls this the Flowroom, but I’ve heard employees refer to it, not affectionately, as the Playroom. It’s the secret room Marigold’s clients never see, Vincent told me, a space reserved for synergistic creative interplay. The real estate game is changing, Jasminder. New money. Young money. International money. That’s partly why we brought you on board—
I shift in the beanbag chair, let the thought go. Only two of my colleagues are present this morning; the third is away on business. A man about my age, wearing grey slacks and a tweed jacket with patches on the sleeves, like a dotty professor, smiles in my direction and asks if I’ve tried the shower.
“Excuse me?”
“The shower,” he says, nodding toward a bamboo wall curving around an enclosed private space. Several unlit tiki torches guard the entrance, along with a potted palm tree draped with pink and blue leis.
“Vincent says he does some of his best next-level thinking in the shower. So he had one installed in the Play—the Flowroom. It’s pretty cool. Completely glassed in. Quadruple showerheads. About a month ago I decided to try it. In the middle of a sales meeting. To see, you know, if the man walked the talk. Vincent was mid-sentence. I hopped in the shower for fifteen minutes. Came out towelling my hair. Vincent grinned, gave me a fist-bump, asked if I was feeling the flow.”
“Were you?”
The guy taps his temple. “Like you wouldn’t believe! Freestyle flow. Went in that shower, let my mind wander. Free association. Like a well-paid poet? Came up with a new tactic for a client I was having trouble resonating with. Deal went through that week.”
“That’s wonderful. Congratulations.” I smile. “It’s neat? This room. But our clients—”
“Peele’s a visionary,” the man says as he extends his hand. “Beckett Pea
rl. Beckett. With two ts.” Beckett grabs the tips of my fingers, gently, and I introduce myself as Jaz Bansal, the new girl. He points to the foosball table. “Why should tech start-ups monopolize all the fun? This industry is changing. Our workspaces should reflect that.”
“That’s exactly what Vincent said.”
“Terrific leadership.”
I’m about to ask Beckett how long he’s been with Marigold when Vincent bursts into the room, nods in our direction, yells Strava!, jogs on the spot, pushes a few buttons on his watch. Wearing eighties-style high-cut running shorts and a shiny synthetic shirt. Earbuds in. Drenched in sweat. Shoes and legs caked in mud.
“A minute and a half more, people,” Vincent says, his voice too loud because his music’s still playing. Tinny electronica fills the room. Beckett knocks a Slinky off the table, picks it up, slinks it between his hands. I try to remain open-minded. Many powerful wealth-generating ideas come from eccentricity and idiosyncrasy and plain wackiness. A Flowroom? After the last little while I’m up for anything. I notice an old Game Boy on the table, say sweet I remember these, start up a game of Mario. Beckett says he has high score; he’s never been bested.
Mario boops a coin.
Vincent’s timer beeps. He does deep-knee lunges around the table, drops, does twenty push-ups while Beckett pumps his head to the electronica coming from Vincent’s earbuds, yells what was your time?
“Thirty-nine minutes. Off my personal best at thirty-six. Still a ways to go to match Rick Rypien. Man, that boy can dance.”
Beckett sees my raised eyebrows, says, “Grouse Grind. Crazy-intense workout. Vincent does it twice a week.”
“Three times now, Becks,” Vincent lowers into a squat, lifts his arms, rises. “Used to do it only on rest days but the phase ramped up.” Does a couple more squats, hops up, flashes me a hang loose, pauses in front of the Pac-Man, smacks a few buttons, lunges, almost trips over a beanbag chair. “Training for the Test of Metal. You should race with me, Becks. It’s sold out, but I can get you a bib like no probs. You could keep up for a few minutes. It’d be fun to drop you. Team! I’m gonna ask Mabes—her full name is Mabel, Jasminder, but only I call her Mabes, not you, we’ve known each other since forever—to get me a smoothie. Any suggestions? Office has a tab over at Grassroots, big perk, take advantage.”
Mario rides a warp pipe. I’m smiling, thinking about what kind of smoothie I should try. There are so many options.
“Soy almond,” Beckett says.
“Oh, way too heavy,” a girl I’ve yet to meet, seated across the curving green table, says. She has close-cropped red hair and is dressed like she’s about to leave for a dinner date: elegant bordering on severe. “I suggest coconut ginger.”
“Coconut ginger?” Vincent says. “Wow, Elodie. Totally avant-garde. Reminds me…met a sculptor the other day? Commissioned him, said yeah, do me one of those whatevers. And make it bigger!” Vincent jogs behind me, showers me with sweat, calls his assistant about the smoothie. “How’s Jasminder this morning? Trail run? Yoga? Happy to meet the family team?”
“Jaz,” I say. “No exercise yet?” I lift my coffee mug sheepishly. “Only caffeine.”
“Yes, of course. But hey, Jasminder’s better than Jaz. A nice, inclusive name. I encourage you not to shorten it.”
“Jasminder is a lovely name,” Elodie says while she fights to maintain her posture in the slumping beanbag chair.
“Thank you,” I say, hoping we switch topics.
Beckett looks up from his tea. “Hey, Vincent, about the race, the Test of—”
“Shh! Time’s up. Check my stats! Average heart? A little high. Working a bit hard on the finish. Sprinted from the SeaBus. Could be fighting something off. Maybe a cold, nothing major. Won’t have to skip any workouts.” He vanishes behind the curving bamboo wall, emerges with a towel, wipes his face, dries his hair, tosses the towel on the table. He must catch my look because he asks, “Something the matter, Jasminder?”
Shit. “Uh, well? I guess I’m not used to—”
“Of course not.” Vincent smiles at a motherly-looking lady who hands him a metal cup dripping condensation. He slurps at the smoothie, wipes his beard with the towel. “Takes some people a while to get used to our offices being so chillaxed. See, already you’re being challenged. Personal growth is our number-one asset. Working at Marigold is like…perpetual personal revolution.”
Beckett sticks an empty cob pipe between his teeth. “A constant process of…” He falters, swings the Slinky in a pendulum.
“Reinvention?” Elodie offers.
“Bang on!” Vincent throws himself into a beanbag chair. “You’ll be fine, Jasminder. The revolution has been serialized! Deputized! Media eyes!” Vincent rubs a patch on his upper arm, giggles. “Wow. This wearable nutrition thingy’s really kicking in. Liftoff! So…team? Last week’s deals? Who’s first on the recap?”
Beckett and Elodie share a fake-friendly glance.
“I’ll go first,” Elodie says.
Vincent claps. “Perfect. A volunteer! Go on. My heart rate is…oh. Still too high. Focused breathing. Where were we—wait! Elodie. Have something for you.”
Vincent hands Elodie an odd-looking stuffed animal. I almost drop the Game Boy, have to rein in a laugh. A line of tension runs from Elodie’s jaw down the side of her neck and through her arm to the hand holding the stuffed animal. Her voice loses its severe edge, sounds deflated. “Is this…Quatchi?”
“Sumi,” Beckett corrects.
“Sumi, yes,” Vincent says. “My favourite! Sue me! Lovely. Very cleverly done, Olympic marketing people. Brilliant. Sell me! Sue me! Quite nail-on-head, am I right, Jasminder?”
This morning I walked by Elodie’s office and caught a glimpse of the woman’s war wall, decorated with her framed degrees and awards. Elodie has an MBA from Columbia. Now she’s holding a child’s toy that resembles a stuffed rat wearing a cartoon superhero’s cape.
“Nail-on-head?” I ask. “I’m not sure what you mean?”
Vincent frowns, but only for a fraction. “Beckett? Would you be so kind as to fill Jasminde—”
“Already on it,” Beckett interrupts, waving his tablet in my direction. “Liberated information, Jasminder. Ahem! Sumi. An animal guardian spirit with the wings of the Thunderbird and legs of an American black bear who wears a killer-whale-like hat in an artistic style of Haida people. She lives in the mountains of British Columbia and is a passionate environmentalist. Her name comes from the Salish word sumesh, meaning ‘guardian spirit.’ Her favourite sport is alpine skiing in monoski.” Beckett snaps his laptop closed. “The internet hath provided. Gosh. Where would we be without it?”
“At the library,” Elodie says, her voice hollow. I’m still up in the air about her.
“Is that a typo?” Vincent asks. “Shouldn’t it be: ‘Her favourite sport is alpine skiing with a monoski?’ ”
Elodie twists the stuffed animal’s cape around her index finger.
“Certainly you must be right,” Beckett says enthusiastically. “How about we make our contribution, Vincent, get that egregious typo corrected?”
I’m only half listening, back to playing Mario, thinking about the showings I’m scheduled for this week, tallying hypothetical commissions, feeling optimistic for the first time in years and maybe Beckett’s right, this Flowroom place is kinda cool.
“Sounds like a plan, Becks. I love contributing. To friends, work, community. And Wikipedia. If you’re not contributing you’re—”
“Depleting,” Elodie says, dragging a fingernail across Sumi’s eye.
“See Sumesh, sacred guardian,” Beckett rumbles in a voice that might be trying to imitate a Salish man.
Vincent jolts to his feet, smacks at the nutrition patch on his arm. “Flowroom! This thought has legs! What if we pay the Olympic people to let us use Sumi in our marketing material—”
“Love it!” Beckett gasps.
“Right on! New development, mix Sumi into the strat
egy, Millennials, big into their comics—”
Elodie bristles. “Graphic novels.”
“—yes, as if, Elodie. But picture it: Sumi on her penthouse patio, kickin’ it in a Carine Gilson satin-silk robe, English Bay sunset in the background. Then another image of Sumi on a…not a fucking monoski! Beckett? Make a note: we change that to a snowboard.” Vincent rocks from side to side, jumps, pretend-grabs his snowboard. “Boned stalefish! Swish-swoosh! Two feet of fresh! Carving sick powder turns, taking freshie facials in defence of our old-growth forests. Who’s feeling the flow here, people? Me! Our West Coast superheroine Sumi fully living the West Coast gnar—”
“YOLO!” Beckett shouts.
“And that’s just in the morning! Afternoon, Sumi’s chillin’ on Robson, eating the best sustainable sashimi in the world. Who’s peckish? Should I call Mabes, takeout sashimi—”
“So delicious,” Elodie says, brightening. “Vancouver sushi.”
Peele nods. “World-class. Al pastor tacos.”
“Exceptional,” Beckett says. “Japadog.”
“I am deeply suspicious of people who do not consume ethnic food,” Elodie says, looking directly at me.
“Right,” Beckett says. “It’s borderline ra—”
“Absolutely,” Elodie says. “It’s like: I love dim sum. How can I be ra—”
“I like chicken fingers,” I say. “Plum sauce?”
Elodie glances at Beckett who glances at Vincent who smacks his lips, says, “I had those. Upscaled, lovely, forty dollars a plate at—”