Verge
He enters the coffee shop just after five and nods toward the other patrons on his way to the counter. Diversity is rare this early, and he’s seen them all before. Three of the usual four are there, each having risen prior to the rest of the city for their own unique purpose. He’s never spoken to them, the motives behind their shared predawn ritual left undisclosed, but over time they’ve developed a certain kinship that means some tiny gesture is at least obligatory. They respond in kind. It’s acknowledgment, not invitation for dialogue. None are there for mindless chatter.
He stops in the soft light of the refrigerated display case. Susan, beautiful and somehow stuck working as a barista from 4 A.M. to Noon at thirty-five, greets him warmly. She pours his coffee and stabs an unnecessary splash stick into the spout. It’s habitual. He’s never taken his coffee to go. She knows this, but he’s never corrected the oversight. Her convivial nature allows these minor transgressions. She runs through her usual set of questions, eventually inquiring about his story. He’s not asked about his writing often, so he prattles on too long about plot, subplots, conflict, and theme. She listens carefully, as if it all truly matters to her. He’d like to think she’s really interested. Of course, this may only be an appeal for tips, or perhaps she’s taking the opportunity to hone her customer service skills. Regardless, the smile she flashes throughout his monologue gives a welcome stroke to his ego, and three of his quarters clang into the tip vase. They say their goodbyes, and, after tossing away the splash stick and doctoring his dark roast with cream and sugar, he claims his usual worn leather love seat and melts quietly away.
He stretches and glances at his phone’s cracked display. 7:30. The time has passed quickly. It always does. He packs up, the zest he began the day with fading, and embarks on an interminable three minute drive to the office.
He arrives and swipes his ID card across the front entrance security box. He’s half hoping it doesn’t recognize him and bars him from the building, but a bolt snaps open. He considers leaving his laptop at the door and running for the hills, but he doesn’t have the courage to follow through. Instead, complete apathy sets in, and he enters. The lock snaps shut behind him, trapping him inside with all the other nine-to-fivers. He zigzags through endless halls, trudging bitterly toward his workspace. He reaches it and collapses into his ergonomic feaux leather office chair–his tiny, confined, soft-walled haven sad but welcome. Others pass on the way to their own cubicles. They’re well-rested, ready for work, and excited about the prospects of a new day. Customary greetings and salutations are exchanged. Questions are asked whose answers mean nothing and are often ignored. He smiles and plays along, abhorring this routine. Some, he knows, are sincere. There’s a pervasive glee emanating from them he can’t understand, but he won’t begrudge them their joviality. He hopes they’re all truly happy, but knows there are others out there like him, adrift and treading water in this sea of office minions, business casual bureaucrats, and spike-heeled corporate ladder climbers. Even more appalling are the ones who’ve abandoned themselves to this fate, the ones who think that this is it, that if they can just push through to the weekend, they’ll be okay, the short two-day respite all they ever have to look forward to. It’s a sad and miserable microcosm. He tosses out one last “good morning” and turns toward his computer before anyone else approaches. He places headphones over his ears, shutting everything out but the despair.
_
She wakes at 7:30, as late as she can sleep and still make it to work by 9:00. She permits herself one snooze, then rises, uncertain what good the extra nine minutes has done her. She washes her face, brushes the knots out of her hair, and pulls it back into a ponytail. She knows, at forty, it’s worn its welcome, but she can’t seem to let it go. She examines her neck and jowls in the mirror, scanning for a new crease, sag, or blemish, and grins when she finds none. The reflection isn’t what it used to be, but it appears younger than it is. More importantly, it disguises her threadbare soul. She applies only a bit of make-up, highlighting her better features and masking the imperfections only she notices. She again inspects herself and is pleased with the improvement. One day, maybe soon, she won’t be so easily satisfied.
It takes her ten minutes to decide on an outfit. Like the snooze, she’s allowed for this in her carefully regimented day. She picks through her wardrobe, running her fingers across fabric she knows like her own skin. There’s a solace here, surrounded by the things she had once carefully chosen and found so necessary. She isn’t sure why. A large part of her is shamed by the excess. She flips off the light and stands alone in the dark, the chosen ensemble folded neatly over her arm. Eventually, she exits.
_
He followed along with the conversation, not really listening, but hearing just enough to understand the situation. It sounded like a job for programming, thank God, but he knew they’d ask his opinion at some point, he being the client’s data management contact. His answer is prepared, but he mock-listens another eight minutes before he’s consulted. He clears his throat.
“Have them transfer the data via email. Programming, make this priority until the issue has been resolved. I’ll be in constant contact with MGC, so it’s imperative that you keep me abreast of your progress. MGC is an important client. Let’s be cognizant of this.”
Imperative. Abreast. Cognizant. The higher-ups in the room would eat that up. He was the consummate professional. Consummate. That was good, too. He stowed it away for later.
He glances at the project manager, hoping the answer provided is sufficient. He longs to escape this shiny corporate chamber and wander back to his low-lit cave. Meetings are the one thing all in the office despise. They await the PM’s reply with bated breath, anxious to be granted release. For a brief moment, he almost feels a part of them.
Eventually, the PM nods and speaks. “It’s a start.”
Meeting adjourned.
_
She is content with her day. She enjoys her job. It’s not what she envisioned doing with her life, but, really, looking back, what did she ever envision? She never lent a career much thought. All she ever wanted was to be a good mother and wife, to maintain a happy home. She hoped to find a man who desired the same. Together they’d share that old-fashioned American dream. She sorted through the masses until she found him—at least she thought she had. He was talented, driven. He would do great things, things that would allow her to be what she desired. He had worked so hard, toiling away daily at this story and that script, refining his skills often with classes and workshops. She waited patiently, hoping he would catch a break. He was chasing a ghost. He hadn’t a modicum of success. Now, years later, he languished away at a desk job he despised. Though exhausted, he still managed to write daily, his path somehow still clear before him. He carried on through years of disappointment and heartbreak. She marveled at his tenacity and determination, yet towards her, he had floundered. Why? Marriage took effort he was clearly capable of, but he had relegated their relationship to the periphery. She thought often about where she would be if she’d passed him over and continued her search, or selected another option prior. Had she considered the possibility or probability of their lives together? Though she was doubtless to blame for some of what they had become, it was his cold selfish nature that finally severed the little connection that was there to begin with. She could have walked away a long time ago. Maybe she should have. That’s not what she did.
Instead, she became more career minded. The change in tactics eventually landed her here. This place challenges her. It allows her analytical talents to, if not shine, at least shimmer. Maybe someday she’ll head in another direction, but until then, and, even if things never change, she’ll be okay here. It’s the one place she feels necessary. Leaving is always difficult. Today, like every other day, she chats with a few co-workers on the way out, stalling as long as possible. When she can dither no more, she boards one of the four glass elevators and sinks back down to reality.
_
They’d gone a long way toward resolving the client’s problems by the close of business. Everyone agreed a happy hour had been earned. He found it necessary. The first and second shot relax him. The third and fourth allow him to become an active member of the group. The beers in between cause him to forget, even if briefly, the things that constantly weigh on him.
_
She nearly makes it to the onramp before traffic slows to a stop. Not bad, considering the usual downtown gridlock. She speaks with her mother to pass the time. They have the same conversation four days a week. Only the most rudimentary information passes between them. Her mom eventually asks about him, granting her the opportunity to open up. She tells her he’s okay. The answer is always satisfactory.
“Great, honey. That’s good to hear. Tell him I said hello.”
Her mother digs no further, though the truth is just below the surface. He’s not well. She’s not well. Her mother knows, but she doesn’t want the responsibility of that conversation. Her mother wants grandchildren, though it’s been made clear they aren’t an acceptable topic of discussion. To fight back, her mother reprimands her with a feigned ignorance about everything else going on. There’s an uncomfortable silence before they continue, the truths that teeter precariously between them nudged aside but not forgotten. Mercifully, the call ends after four more minutes of minutiae.
She slips a CD into the dash slot. Something inside snatches it from her and draws it all the way in. Music begins to play as she settles into her seat, readying herself for the long haul. A truck thumps up beside her, its muffler clearly having seen better days. Inside is a man ten years her junior. He’s already noticed her, a sly grin plastered across his face. She smiles back. The ponytail has earned itself another day. Traffic begins to inch forward. She turns her attention back to the road, aware of and enjoying her neighbor’s continued ogling. Something near the steering wheel sparkles in the sun, reminding her who she is. She drops her hand into her lap and peeks down at it. After all these years, it still takes her breath away. He’d hired a jeweler to design the exact ring she wanted. The diamond, an heirloom given to them with the blessing of his family, fit perfectly into the white and yellow gold setting she had sketched out. It was a perfect union. She remembers how often she used to show it off. It gave her such pride. Now it had lost its luster.
_
He arrives home having consumed a false sense of enthusiasm. The alcohol’s clearly been good to him. He grabs a beer from the fridge, lingering a moment in the cool air before retreating. The quiet of the house is deafening. Dread begins to set in, despite his effort to avoid it. He snatches another beer, heads for the den, and scans the room for the remote control. When he doesn’t immediately see it, he leans over the sofa and tosses decorative pillows around until he finds it smashed between two cushions. He falls into his recliner, turns on the TV, and flips through the prime time selections. A subliminal-like montage of everything wrong with America flashes in front of him—reality nobodies made rich (or richer) by their penchant for lunacy and absence of dignity, celebrities who take the podium at award shows and force-feed their opinions to the masses, news stations unabashedly biased and laced with agendas, talk shows that exploit the destitute for amusement, manipulative advertisements that placate our desire to have it all for the low, low price of whatever. Eventually, he gives up trying to find something of substance and stops on a football game. It provides just the sort of distraction he had been hoping for. He wants to eat, having only had an appetizer at the bar, but he fears sobering up. He’s walking a tightrope. It’s a delicate balance, one he’s developed carefully that will allow him, when he finally lies down, to slip through the fingers of introspection and fall gently asleep.
_
She eats alone in the kitchen, the TV in the background airing a program about rich housewives. It provides a welcome white noise. She enjoys a second helping from the family-sized casserole she’s made. She drinks a second glass of wine as well, and, for good measure, gulps down a third for dessert. After placing the leftovers in the fridge, she pours herself a fourth glass, but thinks better of it and leaves it on the counter. She wants to be okay if he arrives for her tonight. It’s why she still wears the ring, why she still prepares such large meals. She stares into the television a moment before turning it off. For years she wondered why anyone would need a TV in the kitchen. Now she knows. She flips off the kitchen light, fleeing the darkness there for that of her bedroom.
_
The post-game interviews begin at 11:30. The losing, eight-million-dollar-a-year quarterback talks about how hard the loss will be to swallow, how he won’t be able to sleep that night thinking about it, and how the pain will stick with him for some time. Such bullshit. He turns the television off. The game had been a rout and provided only the smallest of diversions, but it had been enough. The sudden silence is dense, constricting. He despises it. It reminds him that soon he’ll have to wake up and do all this again. He rises, moonlight guiding him toward a familiar destination. He opens the door and again stands in the cold light. He reaches for another icy can, but decides against it, closes the door, and heads to the bedroom. The darkness there is complete. He sprawls across the duvet, fully clothed. He’ll sleep, but not until his troubled mind has exhausted itself. He doesn’t want this life, and is unsure why it’s become what it has. It’s bent, broken. There’s a bitterness that seethes under the surface. He holds no sway over it. It renders him powerless. He sits up, intending to get that beer after all. It’s his usual defense and would put a stop to this. He reconsiders and lies back down.
_
She doesn’t sleep. She remembers everything-every word spoken and left unspoken. She remembers begging and pleading, the counseling they both attended, the counseling she drug herself to when he refused. She recalls his yelling, something she had resorted to on occasion as well. She’s long since abandoned her efforts. When he went silent, she knew he was finished. Nothing would make a difference. His first blank, wordless stare had been a punch in the gut she’d feel forever. He had a way with words. She used to beam at his well-timed compliments and impromptu terms of endearment. When he declared his love, she always asked “why?” and eagerly awaited his response. It was never disappointing. For years now, they had spoken only when necessary. She knows the next real conversation they have will be devastating. The inevitability keeps her up at night. Respite used to be so easy, but now she tirelessly awaits their fate, her bed a lonely haunted place.
_
He was still awake an hour later, that last beer he didn’t drink solely responsible. She was miles away, in her own little world, probably not sleeping either. He had been unable to speak candidly with her for some time now. It had been years since his needs had been nurtured or considered. He pled for them to be met often, vociferously when required, but the results were always temporary. The desire to speak still reared its head on occasion, but what could he say? They’d both made an oath years ago to take one another ’til death parted them. Had he been too quick to judge others? Was the life they lived another example of a fraudulent America? They had been a sham for years. Theirs had become a false union, the truth bundled up and hidden from the rest of the world. Should he just end things for good? If he spoke, would she even hear? Would it matter? A familiar knot hardens in his chest. If he doesn’t speak soon, even if only to the surrounding all-knowing walls, his bitterness will defeat him again, and maybe for good.
But the words won’t come.
Minutes later he rises, tugs the covers aside, and slips beneath them. He wants to speak, but he’s not done punishing himself. He hates himself for what he’s become. The knot in his chest tightens, nearly incapacitating him. Tears form in his eyes. He gives in to the pain and, somehow, the words escape him. His voice cracks as he speaks.
“I’m sorry.”
The knot loosens. He turns onto his side, wondering if she’s heard.
She has. Something catches in her throat. His words haven’t affected her this way in some time. She closes her eyes, takes a deep breath to calm herself. She knows she won’t cry. She had dried up, her supply of tears exhausted long ago, when she thought they could still make a difference. So many things had been said for so long, but never this. Now it was her turn. What did she want? Did she want to continue down this path, as difficult as it may be to traverse? The answer, she realizes, has never changed. She replies calmly to the darkness.
“Me, too.”
The stillness overtakes them again. The fan in the neighbor’s outdoor AC unit kicks on, its familiar rattle welcome. It gives them both a chance to recover. They know more should be said, but the words will have to wait for another time.
He reaches for her in the dark. His fingers brush against the inside of her thigh, just below her panty line. In better times, his fingers would linger there, but it’s not a place he feels welcome anymore. He pulls them away to signal his error. Now that he has his bearings, he moves his hand higher, resting his palm on the slope of her thigh. It’s cold there, but familiar. He feels, just for a moment, something he hasn’t felt in a long time. He’s unsure exactly what it is, but it’s a welcome departure. He closes his eyes.
His fingers feel foreign to her. She had nearly jumped at that first touch. More surprising, it made her feel something she didn’t think possible, something vaguely sexual. Odd. She had used that against him for so long—giving and withholding it as it suited her—that she’d forgotten her own longings. She was shamed and was glad his hand retreated, but pleased when it came to rest elsewhere. Though she finds his touch cold, she allows it. Her dry eyes become wet, but she stubbornly wills the would-be tears away. His touch, his words—what do they really mean? She considers briefly before realizing she’s forgotten to take out her ponytail. She tugs out the band, slips it over her wrist, and, after shaking her hair out, rests her head back on the pillow. She shuts her eyes.
Eventually, they sleep. His hand never strays from her, the coldness between them slowly growing warmer. The AC unit clicks off, and the silence returns. They don’t hear.