We talk for thirty-eight minutes. She tells me about the neighbor’s dog that keeps digging under the fence and how she’s started leaving treats on the other side because, quote, “If he’s going to commit crimes, the least I can do is make sure he’s fed while he does it.” I tell her about the packaging project and how I’m experimenting with a new biodegradable polymer that might solve the moisture problem we’ve been having with the safety device casings.
She listens to the polymer part with the same enthusiastic confusion she brings to all my work stories. “That sounds very important, honey. Is the poly...morphine...thing working?”
“Polymer. And yes, I think so. Early results are promising.”
“I’m so proud of you.”
She says this every call. Every single one. And every single time, I have to swallow past the lump in my throat because Joni Morgan says “I’m proud of you” the way other people say “thesky is blue,” like it’s a simple, obvious fact that she can’t imagine anyone questioning.
“Thanks, Mom.”
“And the people at work? Everyone’s treating you well?”
I think of the laughter in the hallway. The conversations that stop. The wordhumanspoken like a diagnosis.
“Everyone’s great,” I say.
“And you’re eating enough?”
“Yes, Mom.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
We say goodnight, and I love you, and I hang up and sit on the edge of my bed in the quiet of my apartment.
The books on the windowsill catch the lamplight, their cracked spines a little rainbow of someone else’s love stories.
I pick up the one on top, a paperback I’ve already read twice, about a girl who falls for someone impossible and somehow it works out anyway, and I hold it against my chest for a moment before opening it.
It’s fiction.
But it’s a nice fiction.
And right now, that’s enough.
MONDAY MORNING.
I’m early again, because I’m always early, because being early is one of the few things in life I can control. The design wing is empty except for me and the cleaning crew, who wave at me as I pass because we’re on a first-name basis at this point. I know that Carla has a daughter in middle school and that Joram is saving up for a trip home to the Philippines and that Bea makes the best empanadas in the western hemisphere and brings them in on Fridays.
I wave back, settle at my desk, and open my computer.
There’s an email at the top of my inbox.
From Human Resources.
Subject: Meeting Request — Immediate Attention Required.
My stomach drops.
I read the email twice. Then a third time, because the words keep rearranging themselves in my head into configurations that all point to the same conclusion.
I’m being called to a meeting. Today. At 10 a.m.
The location is not Human Resources.
The location is the executive floor.
