Greg rested his head in his hands. His cubicle provided little peace from the rest of the office. The other salesmen droned on their phones or laughed with each other. Greg tried to look at his screen again, but the image blurred and made his head ache. The conversation with himself began again. He lost track over the years of how many times he'd had it, but it seemed to come around at about four o'clock on most workdays.
"How did I get here?"
Sometimes he tried to convince himself that the solitary conversation was therapeutic, a way of compartmentalizing and address his various worries. He knew it was a lie. He couldn't remember when the lie started, either.
Sixteen years earlier, he walked into the insurance office to speak with an old friend of his father. At the time, Greg had been a twenty year old, fresh faced young man celebrating his daughter's second birthday. He had a pretty young wife, eyes on a new house, and a bright future ahead of him. The years turned out to be less kind than anticipated. When he turned thirty, he almost had an affair. He stopped at the last minute, but it forced him to ask painful questions about the course of his life. Greg began to believe that he'd married entirely too early, let alone have a child. He loved his family, but at the same time they represented all the paths not taken. Early on, he and Victoria, his wife, planned on traveling the world. Every summer would be spent on a different beach or tucked away in some mountain cabin. Greg had not taken a vacation in a decade. When asked about it, he waved off the question with ambiguous references to the economy or Congress. The truth, again painfully, was that the only thing worse than being stuck at work would be a vacation sapping all of his meager free time.
Greg looked at the clock again. A few minutes had passed. Carl moved across the office toward Greg's desk. "
Carl, Jr."
Greg reminded himself. Carl senior had hired Greg and been a good boss until health forced him into retirement. The man's son, a bronzed, flabby man who seemed like he would be greasy to the touch, took over the small insurance firm. The new Carl came in with new dynamic ideas, a fancy business degree from a state university, and zero hours of actual work experience. The older members of the sales crew had enough clout to avoid Carl's meddling, but Greg was right in the line of fire.
"Heya, Greg, could you come talk with me in my office?" Carl's teeth almost glowed from the whitening treatment, especially in contrast to the coats of spray-on tan.
"Uh, sure." Greg's heart sank. He hated the lectures about morale and approaching everything with a smile. The office grew muted as Greg stood up and followed his boss into the small office.
"Have a seat." Carl closed the door behind them. Greg grew more unnerved. Carl enjoyed leaving the door open during his lectures so the others in the office would hear and receive the message vicariously. In reality, the others just laughed at the unlucky man to be the target of Carl's most recent management tool. Greg took a seat in the cheap plastic chair while Carl moved behind the desk to sit in a luxurious, leather office chair. "I'll get to the point. Greg, we've appreciated your work over the past years, but unfortunately we're going to have to let you go. This is not a reflection on your work, necessarily, and we would have liked to keep you on, but the firm isn't bringing in as much as it needs. In light of that, we're making some cuts and you have the lowest sales."
Greg's ears rang. At his home, beside the door, Victoria had placed a small ceramic bowl. The bowl attracted a variety of odds and ends such as pens, random receipts, small flashlights, and other things one finds in their pocket at the end of the day. Primarily, the bowl was the resting place of the family's mail. Greg automated almost every bill he had to pay, but many of the companies chose to send paper bills anyway. They stacked in the ceramic bowl, getting higher and higher, until someone would throw them out in frustration. He should have been thinking about the bills or maybe even the receipts, but beyond the ringing in his ears, all he could wonder was where that bowl came from.
"Greg?" Carl's voice cut through his thoughts. How long had he been sitting there? "Greg, don't worry. I talked to my dad about this before I called you in here. We're not going to cut you loose without a net. You'll have two months of severance pay, and you'll keep your benefits through the end of the year.
He manged to reply. "I've worked here for almost twenty years. This is the only thing I've ever done."
"You're still a young man, Greg. Maybe this can be a reason to shake up your life."
"Shake up my life? You fucking prick. I have a family to take of and you want me to 'shake up' my life?" For the first time in years, Greg felt something. Anger. "Let me ask you something, Carl. Have you ever, just once, taken a look at our yearly revenue over the past two decades? Have you seen the fucking inverted 'V' that is our year over year revenue tracking? Yeah, you fucking have. And I bet it chides your ass to know that the last time this firm made more money year over year was the year your dad retired. You can fire me, but that's not going to save this sinking fucking ship. Have you looked at the world? You think everyone is brimming with such confidence that they don't need insurance?"
Carl's eyes narrowed and his lips tightened. "I know your upset b--"
"You're god damn right I'm upset." Greg stood up and yanked open the office door. "Hey everybody, quick announcement. I've been fired. Now, I know you all love working here, but me getting canned is the iceberg scraping a gash in the fucking hull. I'm first, the rest of you can just line up because you're never going to outsell that man's in-fucking-competence."
The others watched in silence. Greg went to his desk. He immediately realized he had nothing personal in his cubicle, but he grabbed a hole punch for good measure. He flipped off Carl and stormed out of the building.
***
The sleepy, small town of Cedar Pines rolled by as Greg drove home. He didn't know what he would tell Victoria. Emily, his daughter, was off visiting friends for the week, so at least he would have time alone to break the news to his wife. She had harped on him for years about getting a new job. She wanted more money, a better house, or better clothes. Greg had agreed about finding a new job, but not for the money. He simply wanted to not hate work so much every day. If more money meant he hated going home less, that would be an added perk.
He loathed himself for staying at his dead end job until it turned on him. He hated his wife a little more for being right about it all these years. Time and again, he had opened up his resume and tinkered slightly, changing a font or taking out one lie and adding another. Through all of it, he applied for nothing, as if some magical job would appear from thin air. He daydreamed about landing a new career and the thought of telling Carl Jr. to jump on a dry dildo often lulled him to sleep. It all seemed so difficult, though. Greg couldn't face the thought of rejection, of trying and failing, or of being told his dream's high aspirations stood on a false sense of value. Instead, he avoided it. He made excuses and grew comfortable in his discomfort.
A street light up ahead flicked to yellow. Greg impulsively turned onto a side street to avoid the wait. The street led into a neighborhood that reeked of opulence. Enormous houses with well kept lawns and four car garages lined each side of the shady road, further souring Greg's mood. A man walking down the sidewalk caught his eye. The figure had his back to Greg and walked with a slender cane. Something about the man drew Greg's attention. It distracted him enough to almost crash into an oncoming car. The other car's horn blared, and Greg swerved into the gutter. His car jerked and rattled as the wheels rolled over the rough terrain. He pulled the wheel again, swerving back into the street and steadying himself. When he thought nothing could get worse, he felt the jarring thump of a tire going flat. He drove on for a while hoping the noise would go away. Finally, he pulled to the side of the road and discovered front right tire sagging with deflation.
With a defeated resignation, Greg went to the trunk and began to gather the spare tire and jack. As he went to work removing the flat tire, he heard a soft noise in the distance.
Click...click...click.
The man with the cane was still walking down the sidewalk, slowly approaching where Greg had stopped. The man was dressed in a black, fitted suit and looked as if he had wandered out of a funeral. He took long strides jabbing the tip of the cane against the stone.
Click....click....click.
Greg ignored the man and focused on his own problems. He bruised his knuckle with a tire iron and almost threw out his back trying to position the spare on the axle. As Greg lowered the car down from the jack, he realized something was missing. The clicking had stopped.
The man stood behind Greg, as silent as stone with his hands folded across the top of the cane. "Car trouble?" the man asked. His voice was harsh and raspy. He wore circular, black glasses. His skin was pale and looked a little too much like paper.
Greg waved at the man and put the tools back into his trunk, though he held on to the tire iron as he eyed the man. "Flat tire is all, thank you."
"Is that really all, Gregory?"
Greg's hand gripped the tire iron. "I'm sorry, do I know you?"
The man smiled, a grim split in his face. "Everyone knows me. I whispered to you in your cradle. I'll wink at you from atop your grave. I held your mother's hand when she sucked her first cock. I'll watch your daughter do the same."
"What the fuck did you just say?" Greg's knuckles turned white with tension. He held out the iron rod with clear intent. "You think you can wander around here saying what you want, old man? You some kind of freak?"
The man's smile did not falter. "Bravery is not your strong suite, Gregory. You're a little worm, wriggling up from wet earth to be squashed beneath the feet of greater men."
"Listen, buddy, I don't know who you think you are, but I've had a fucking terrible day and --" Greg stopped. He couldn't move. The man kept smiling as he walked closer. A strong smell of sulfur filled the air, and Greg's insides coiled in revulsion. His anger dissipated into pure fear.
