Faster on My Own: Chapter 7
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Steven had been on the job six months, and no longer had to answer to Bergewicz. Apparently, his father had only wanted to see if Steven had the killer instinct that Mr. Williams valued so highly. Now Steven was in charge of investigating areas of the company that could be either streamlined or gutted.
The elevator door opened and he stepped out onto the office floor. A hush fell over the workers, who hid their faces while hoping Steven wouldn’t think to fire them if he didn’t see them. Every time it happened, he felt like a monster. Each day, he ruined someone’s life. Sure, he did it for the cause. But not even the high pay, which secured him a spacious one-bedroom apartment in Manhattan– he had to look the part after all– could make him think he was anything but a monster.
Steven didn’t know which office, which floor, which lives he was going to disrupt that day. Checking his binder, he saw that he was in the sales department. From the conference room, he tried to overhear any chatter, but everyone was on the phones, so he could only hear snippets of one-sided dialogue and none of it made sense. He shut his eyes and rubbed them, each addition of pressure spawning little glimmers and stars beneath his eyelids.
When he opened them, someone stood at the end of the table. Steven flinched before recognizing his father with one hand on the back of the chair. Mr. Williams strode toward Steven with the rigid step and steady pace of a slasher movie villain.
“Ready for a nap already?”
“No, no. That’s not it.” Steven opened his folder and looked at the documents, but read none of them.
His father stood to his side, looking down on him. Every time Steven craned his neck up to glance at his father, he couldn’t bear the force of his eye contact and returned to the unread documents. “I wanted to speak with you personally. Here, because this is a business matter, of sorts.”
“Sure. Am I not doing well?” This was where his plan could wash out if he just wasn’t capable of playing the part. His dad might be ready to tell him to go home and that would be it.
“You’re okay. For what you were doing a year ago, your performance is adequate. I expect better, and I think you might get there. But we need to talk about your mindset.”
“What do you mean?”
Mr. Williams strolled over to the window and peeked out of the blinds. “Plastic on this one too. How many jumpers have we had this year? Oh well. This morning, I saw you hand twenty dollars to a homeless man, sitting on the sidewalk. Why would you do that?”
“How do you know it was twenty dollars?”
His father circled back around and slammed a hand on the table. The smack of flesh against particle board echoed in the empty room. When his hand rose, a folded twenty dollar bill sat in front of Steven. “What I want to know is, why? What did that bum do to earn that twenty dollars?”
“Nothing. He needed it.”
“Lots of people need things they can’t have. It’s not your job to give it to them.”
“So that’s it? You want me to be more like the guy who takes something from a homeless man instead of giving him something?” Steven grabbed the twenty dollar bill and pocketed it, with the intention of giving it right back to the same homeless man when he left work.
“I didn’t take anything that rightfully belonged to him. That’s the point. It wasn’t his because he didn’t earn it… I don’t know how far you’re going to be able to go here.”
Steven cradled his head in his hands and took a deep breath. His father was, unknowingly, correct. He had given that man the money, not due to his tired eyes or the empathy Steven felt when he saw the flattened box that the man was likely to sit on for the entire day, but to assuage his guilt for the lives he ruined at work all day. If Steven couldn’t stand the torment of firing a few people, how was he supposed to bring the world to the brink of ruin? How would he endure the hard decisions of the revolution?
Before Steven could agree with his father, Mr. Williams said, “I’ve asked your brother to fly in tonight to talk with you. I think you’re on the right track, and I’m sure once you’ve talked with him, you’ll have a clear idea of what you need to do to succeed. That’s all.” He walked toward the door.
“Wait, you don’t have to do that. I agree, my head wasn’t in the right place. Ben doesn’t need to come all this way just to talk to me. Couldn’t we just do it over the phone, if we have to?”
“He’s already on the plane. You two will have dinner together, then come up so your mother can see you two together. It’s all she’s wanted for years and if she gets it, I’ll have some peace and quiet.”
Steven scrambled after him. Half-jogging to keep up with his father’s walking pace, he said, “What if you and I talked about it, huh? I’m sure you have more wisdom to offer me than Ben.”
Mr. Williams stopped, while Steven jogged a couple steps further and turned around. His father said, “We are in the office now, while your brother’s visit is a personal matter. It’s not appropriate to discuss it here, and there’s nothing more to discuss. I would think you’d be excited to see Ben and learn something from him.”
“I am, I am.” It took everything Steven had not to scowl. “It’s just that I don’t want him to have to go through the trouble.”
“I’m sure it’s no trouble. He likes New York. His flight will arrive around 5, then you two will have dinner. Let him pick, he has excellent taste.”
Steven waited for his brother’s arrival to strike him like a lightning bolt. Not only would Ben make Steven miserable for an evening, he would certainly see through Steven’s facade– a facade that he had not built up properly in the first place. All day his brother loomed in his mind, a tower casting a shadow on the rest of Steven’s mental world. As he walked down the block toward his apartment, intending to strip off his tie and dress shirt, to sit in the darkness beneath a blanket of misery in preparation for an ordeal, his phone buzzed. Ben had landed.