The Passionate Attention of an Interesting Man (16 page)

Fastening a shoelace, Norman chuckled. “You won’t believe this—an all-black
Salome
.”

“The Wilde? Another executioner gig?”

“The Baptist.”

“Get
out
!”

“Apparently they have a
Krunch outlet in the desert.” He stood up, smoothing out the lie of the sleeves of his tunic. “But the director is gay and a half, so anything’s possible. They’ve already signed the Salome. A genuine babe. And they’re talking of nudity. So far, I’ve got an edge.”

“Do me a favor? Memorize your part in the Wilde. For the audition, right? Don’t let the competition out-prepare you.”

“Okay, my friend. Thanks”

“No, thank you. Call me before next month, because I’ll have to arrange the hotel reservation. The scene will be my room during one The Corporation’s business conferences. They come from miles around and so on. Mr. Prendergast pays his visits to the errant executives. He likes his work. Very proper, unflappable, a little mysterious. Think of something new, okay? Really frighten me.”

“You got it, buddy.”

They were standing there.

“Well…”

“Yeah.”

“…anyway…”

“Sure.”

At the door, they embraced, a nice long one. Richard accidentally let out a sigh, and Norman said, “Richard, you take your fun so
seriously
!”

THE  SUITE

The usual professional cynics declared that the firm was lavish with quality-of-life extras so   the boss could keep an eye on everyone—because no one ever wanted to leave the grounds. The cafeteria, open only to employees and their guests, served the best food in the county. The living quarters, in six huge towers and divvied up by an intricate series of promotions, were loaded with space-age accessories, from the instant ironing valet to the on-demand video-and-music library servicing the entertainment center. The daycare “corrals” were playrooms shelled entirely in glass so parents could
effect a moment or two of visual nurturing at any time of day.

That did leave every employee exposed in some way or other to virtual surveillance. Take the twenty-four hour concierge service—was this a blessing of aides or a network of spies? What were they writing in those logs as you walked from the front door to the elevator? And what did the daycare handlers learn about your
homelife from your children? Cynics said the apartments were bugged, even screened.

Yet one had to admit that the firm was a great employer. A happy place, even a workers’ paradise. It was set out on a sprawling so-called “campus” way past the suburbs in a life so complete in itself that, despite the free-parking garages, most of the staff sold their cars after the first year. Like everything else in the firm, the pay scale was top of the line. Well,
duh
: wasn’t this the proudest corporation in the state? It was the fourth biggest in primary billing, and from the way its profits surged in good times and held fast even in bad, quarter to quarter, it would soon rule unrivaled.

Nationally, too, the firm maintained a high-status reputation. In the business world, it was a truth universally acknowledged that nothing smiled upon one’s self-esteem like a surprise visit from one of the firm’s headhunters. Of course, the firm had its own terms for it: a “
talkabout” from a “messenger.” It was one of the boss’ many innovations. Far more than your mere man of action, he was a scrambler, an improviser. Legend told that his favorite saying was “I want it on my desk last Thursday.”

So you would say yes to the messenger, and you and your family (if applicable) got whisked off to headquarters. A very few days later, your personal property would arrive, to be stored in your new furnishings (options: “classic,” “cutting edge,” “time travel”) in your new place in one of the residence towers. Single newcomers, on any but the executive level, were set into two-bedroom flats with a roommate. The cynics: right. Another spy.

C. J. came to the firm with a marketing background built up more on the job than through an impressive diploma. It was said that the boss, a self-made man, liked others of his kind. Signs were posted all over the office floors of the sort one glimpses in old black-and-white movies: START SOMETHING. Or COMMERCE IS CATCHING. One read, YOU CAN LEARN FROM YOUR WORST ENEMY.

C. J. was twenty-six, and he had been in love three times. All ended badly. His first was in high school: his best friend, Kurt O’Connor. The two boys spent time together in a tree house on an abandoned property, and one afternoon—so suddenly that he scared himself—C. J. kissed Kurt on the cheek. Kurt didn’t say anything, but he went home right after and always had something else to do whenever C. J. called.

C. J.’s second love was a professor in C. J.’s first year of community college, a spirited lecturer in English with an unpredictable taste in neckties. The class met at twelve noon each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and the professor made a point of lunching directly after with any willing students in the school café. C. J. never missed a lunch, and finally the professor invited C. J. to his apartment to hear his antique jazz LPs. Thus encouraged, C. J. wrote the teacher a letter confessing affection, and the next day he was summoned by his adviser and requested to drop the English course “for personal reasons.”

C. J.’s third love was consummated. He met this fellow in a bar two towns down the highway and convinced himself that, because the sex worked, everything else would as well. However, C. J.’s new boy friend was one of those “out” guys, like the ones you see giving pep talks on YouTube, recommending aggressive lifestyle choices. This boy liked to hold hands in the street and whistle at cute men. He also wanted to move in with C. J., and when C. J. told him that would necessitate considerable thought, the boy turned up in C. J.’s town, telling their secrets to strangers. And suddenly the entire universe took one giant step back from C. J
. Nobody was rude, exactly. Rather, folks used to be friendly and now they were businesslike. The waitress at C. J.’s luncheonette of choice habitually traded vacuous quips with him, but now she said nothing, and when she left the check she wouldn’t meet his eyes.

So, when C. J. got the firm’s offer, he jumped at it and lit out of there. It would be all new at the firm, he told himself—a restart of his life, as if he were an e-screen with fresh apps to install. And there was this: the boss’ theory of blending work and leisure was so all-encompassing that the firm was in effect one of the biggest cities in the state. Everyone knew that. And that meant C. J. wouldn’t be isolated any more, the only one like him or, worse, stuck with crazy versions of himself, like his ex-boy friend the professional gay.

And, right from his first day on campus, the firm welcomed C. J. in exactly this way: he made a connection with someone like himself within seconds of his arrival. It happens that, in another of the boss’ innovations, individuals of the executive caste were required to serve as docents, to help the new hires acclimatize themselves. Another of the signs on the office walls read INSPIRATION IS CONTAGIOUS.

It was a Saturday in June, late morning. C. J.’s guide was a
fortysomething named Robin, and by the time she was showing him the pools—three of them, one for kiddies, one vast, one vaster—C. J. felt he could Signal.

“Good cruising, I see,” he noted, as a gaggle of the bold and beautiful passed in swimsuits, the women bearing pool bags.

Grunting sardonically—and only a lesbian can pull that off—Robin said, “So you guessed, huh? What tipped you off?”

“That little gray streak in your hair,” C. J. replied. “It’s so…uncompromising?”

“Ha. You’re fast, mister. And if you can answer the following question, I’ll give you three tips on how to get along around here.”

C. J. moved out of the way of a family group: a youngish couple arm in arm, two kids happily trudging along behind them, the entire unit in subdued but unmistakably contented spirits.

“What is this?” C. J. murmured to Robin, “Stepford, U.S.A.?”

“Well, they do treat you up. Did I mention that the ice cream is free?”

“No possible way!”

Robin nodded as, in front of them, in the vaster pool, a
showboater in electric-blue trunks effected a glittery swan dive off the high board.

“One pint,” Robin went on, “once a month, at the super. You use your
emp card, with a wave of the hand over the reader. Any flavor. So. Ready for your question?”

“Hit me.”

“No gal has ever revealed this innermost secret of the club, so ponder well, poor deprived male that ye be…Who is the woman that all gals have loved and desired for the last several decades? The
only
one.”

Now both C. J. and Robin had to move aside as a bunch of jocks ran past to clump into a mass cannonball and fire into the water, drenching everyone lounging at the water’s edge.

“Dibs on the guy in the red trunks,” said C. J.

“It’s the dire secret,” said Robin, focused on her question, “that no dyke has ever revealed to men.”

Turning from the water to face Robin, C. J. said, “Give me a hint.”

Robin thought for a bit, then uttered one word: “Dummies.”

“
Oh
! Candice Bergen!”

“You’re good, man. Now the prize. Tip number one: always call your employer ‘the boss,’ even when you mean your section head or your supervisor. Is there really a boss of this whole shooting match somewhere around here? Isn’t there?” Robin shook her head. “We’ll never know. Just say it. ‘The boss.’ It shows you’re going with the program.”

The two were now walking out of the pool area, heading up to the miniature golf field and the so-entitled Mad Cantina, a snack bar with a rotating menu of ethnic specialties. One day it was Thai and the next Italian; the crusted spaghetti with baby peas outselling even the miniature pizza pies. Midway along the path, a pretty blonde was offering free lollipops out of a wicker basket strapped to her side.

“Sugar-free,” Robin noted, to C. J. “Just fruit juice and glue.”

“Yes, but…the whole user-friendly atmosphere starts to get…I mean, doesn’t it?”

“I think it’s supposed to.
Unreal
. It’s all so soothing that you start to lose all your natural precautions. You become strangely…”

“Honest?”

Robin shrugged. “Anyway. Tip number two: don’t be afraid to disagree. It’s different here—they actually like initiative, most of them. And that’s more unreal than the free candy. Three—and this is most important, buddy: don’t worry about raises and promotions in your job title. They just happen, like all the other strange and wonderful things around here. The key advancement centers on your housing status. Triple. Double. Single. Extension single. Then…when you’ve utterly made it…a suite.”

From behind, a very small child ran past them toward a thicket of trees, waving two of the free lollipops, both in a bizarre shade of…what? Deep-sea blue? As a mildly exasperated mother came by, giving chase, Robin repeated, “A suite. The sum of all ambition in these parts.”

“
Gordon
! If you don’t turn right around this instant, I can name a certain young man who’s headed for a…
Gordon
! Did you hear me?”

“You can fill everybody’s life with perks and rewards,” said C. J. pensively. “Make them happy and eager to do well. But some things will not change, right? Parents and kids. The way people get along with each other. Best friends.”

“Housemates,” Robin suggested.

Gordon’s mother came back into view through the trees, dragging an unrepentant Gordon by one hand, still holding the two lollipops.

“One sweet isn’t enough?” asked Mother. “Well, you’ll go right up to Jeanette and say you’re sorry. And you will certainly give her back her lollipop!”

“I licked them both,” said Gordon.

“That’s how they type you around here,” Robin went on, as she and C. J. watched Gordon and his mom disappear, lollipops and all. “By your rooms. Get into a single as soon as you can. What did they start you in?”

“I‘ve got one roommate.”

“A double? That’s prime, straight out. Most newbies come in on a triple, which can be gross. Which building?”

“Tower Northeast. It’s 16-C.”

“Met your roommate yet?”

C. J. shook his head.

“You’ll be okay, gay boy. Even a gal with a gray streak can see you’re a charmer.”

C. J.’s roommate had the rather preppy name of Trent
Southy—pronounced
Su
¬-thee—but he was about as far from preppy as an employee of the firm could get. His English was sometimes ungrammatical, his delivery was brusque, and he seemed to have absolutely no sense of etiquette. C. J. eventually learned that there was a lot of that in the firm, following the boss’ belief that rough diamonds had the bite to eat into market share, leaving your more traditional country-club suit at an empty table.

Still, rough diamonds aren’t generally fun to meet, especially this one. There was a conflict of humors from the first moment, for C. J.’s style was soft and whimsical while Trent found soft men outrageous. He was, at least, tall and very well set up with a slamming physique of the kind that rises from sturdy legs to a heavy upper torso, and if he wasn’t conventionally handsome he had a presence. A club-deluxe gay like C. J. had to admit as much. But men like Trent do not make it easy to like them.