I pass by Laura Rice on my way back to my desk from break. I smile at her, but she just looks away and frowns. I think to myself how weird that is and return to work.
Before I can even get logged in, Sarah, my manager, comes over, leans across the wall of my desk and sighs. “Rubin, we need to talk,” she says in a strained voice. When I start to stand, she tacks on, “Bring your stuff.”
BONNNNNGGGG! There goes the death knell. I know, with those words, what is about to happen. I’m a little surprised, as I thought this would be easy. I thought I would be elated. I thought I would just get up and run out of the office, whooping and screaming. I’m actually feeling pangs of fear. Never before in my life have I been fired before. What am I going to do now? I haven’t even started to look for another job yet. I’ve been living paycheck to paycheck for months, and not to mention drinking most of that. I have no savings. I have no money. I’m going to end up on the street.
No time to panic right now. That’s not what I do, right? I survive by always maintaining my cool, always keeping in control. Keep a clear head. Focus. Think.
I gather my notebooks, put them in my backpack, and sling it over my shoulder. “As the priest comes to read me the last rites,” I say.
“What?” she asks as we start to walk.
“Take a look through the bars for my last sight.”
“What are you talking about, Rubin?”
“Of the world that has gone very wrong for me.”
“This really isn’t the time for jokes.”
I’m singing now. “Could it be that there’s some sort of error, it’s hard to stop the surmounting terror. Is it the end or some craaaazy dream?”
“Rubin, really.”
I’ve broken into a full operatic croon, complete with sweeping waves of my arms, and maybe... just maybe, a hint of a dancy spring in my step. “Somebody please tell me that I’m dreaming. It’s not easy to stop from screaming, but words escape me while I try to speak. Tears they flow, but why am I crying, after all I’m not afraid of dying. Don’t I believe there never is an end?”
She looks nervously from side to side, hissing at me through tightly sealed lips. “If you don’t mind, you’re really making a scene.”
At the corner of one row is some kid who looks about my age. He’s got a short mullet and glasses big enough to examine stars with. He turns, looks up, and briefly, just as we round the corner, he and I make eye contact. In that instant, he understands everything that is happening. He knows my predicament. He knows what is about to happen. This is the moment we have all lived in fear of, every day since we were hired. This day comes for every man, and for some, it comes sooner than others. He doesn’t know when he will take this walk as well. He shakes his head slowly and breathes in deep. “God be with you,” he whispers.
I’m able to break stride for a heartbeat, and I stop at his desk, tightly gripping the wall. I want to tell him that everything will be all right, but we both know things will never be right again. I steel myself, rage alight behind my eyes. “If there’s a God, then why’s he let me die?”
Sarah grabs my collar and pulls me back with her. I can’t take my eyes off the young man, and with all my power, I plead with him, messages going through our eyes alone, begging him to fight this.
We enter CONFERENCE ROOM 2, where Laura Rice and her retinue of three men from ‘Upper Management’ are all waiting, sitting against the back wall, looking vaguely like the ‘hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil’ monkeys. They are clad in their three-piece, personally tailored suits, eyes fixed on me like I’m some elusive wild animal. “Good afternoon, Rubin,” is all Laura Rice says as Sarah closes the door behind us, trapping all of us in this tiny cell.
I don’t care though, as the door hits home, I perfectly pirouette past Sarah and put one boot onto the vinyl-upholstered, wooden chair in the corner and stare majestically at the drop ceiling, raising an unseen, but elegant chalice above my head. “As I walk, all my life drifts before me, and though the end is near, I’m not sorry, catch my soul, ‘cause it’s trying to fly away!”
“He’s been doing this since I came to get him,” Sarah says, taking a seat in the corner of the room.
“Rubin, are you all right?” Laura Rice asks.
“Mark my words, please believe my soul lives on, please don’t worry now that I’m gone, I’ve gone beyond to seek the truth.”
“Can we get started?” Sarah asks.
“When you know that your time is close at hand, maybe then you’ll begin to understand life down here is just a straaaaaange illuuuusion.”
Laura claps her hands. “Rubin, please!”
“Sorry.” I’m back with them. “How can I help you lovely ladies today?”
Sarah shakes her head. I can see the edges of a smile on her lips.
“We’ve had some problems this weekend, Rubin, some problems,” Laura says to me, eyes on the ground. Come on now, at least look at me.
“What kind of problems?” I coo.
“Oh, come on,” she says, looking at Sarah. “You can’t pretend you don’t know.” I came so close to prying that anger out. I really thought she was going to yell right there.
“Two no-call/no-shows,” Sarah says, with the basic decency to look at me while she sights the guns on me. “Saturday and yesterday. That’s a big deal.”
“Company policy is three in a row before termination,” I point out.
“The absences are just compounding the problem,” Laura says sharply, looking over at the three silent partners, whose eyes stay fixed on me like the dead eyes of dolls. “On Friday alone, we had several complaints about you, Rubin, several complaints.”
Sarah is struggling to suppress a laugh, but still manages to stay serious. “You called 911 on a customer,” she says.
“He was threatening suicide,” I say, palms up in the air. “What could I do? I didn’t want that on my conscience.”
“He called back to file a complaint yesterday, after he got out of his psychiatric evaluation,” Sarah informs me. “SpectraCom has gotten wind of this already.”
I can’t help but laugh at this. It comes out in one, short, explosive, shotgun blast of a laugh that makes all the blood in Laura’s body rush to her face and try to burst out through her cheeks.
“This is a big deal, Rubin,” Sarah says, looking at me with unmatched pity in her eyes.
“A big deal,” Laura echos.
“I have a feeling, from the sound of it, I won’t have to think about it tomorrow,” I say flatly.
“Do you remember Vincent Calhoun?” Laura asks, her eyes still on the other frozen members of her management team.
“No,” I say.
“While we were monitoring your calls on Friday, you called him an idiot. You spoke to him about his account without verifying his information, you yelled at him, and then you hung up on him.”
“I spoke to him six times!” I protest.
“I thought you didn’t remember him,” Sarah says.
“My memory was jogged,” I respond. “He called in repeatedly about a refund on a credit that was not his. How do you get the same person six times? I was sick of dealing with him.”
“You can’t treat customers like that,” Laura says, and apparently it’s directed at Sarah.
“I can treat customers however I want,” I snap. “As long as I’m willing to accept the consequences.”
Laura puffs up. “Rubin, what we’re trying to say is...”
“What does it fucking matter what you are trying to say? Allow me to quit willfully before you can spit out that I’m fired.”
Sarah looks at me in shock. Laura looks at Sarah in shock.
I stand up. “Fuck all’y’all,” I say. “Good bye!” I’m practically skipping as I go out the door, trailing various members of management who need to walk me out.
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