Chapter 1: Ad #1
My one hand grips the crest of her left hip while the other pulls her right shoulder toward me, a cited balancing act. On Monday mornings, the lights stay off. On Thursday evenings, the lights stay on. Molly and I share a scheduled lack of romance. For the eleven or so minutes it takes to justify why I turned over in the first place, I’m reminded of the consequences of fraternizing with local girls from Heartwood Hills.
Molly purrs again, this time a calculated interjection. There are enough mechanical moves for standardization, but an ever-growing list of rules jeopardizes my most basic of human needs. Her hips regardless align nicely against my inseam and the anticipated mitosis begins. The momentum sends ripples throughout my body. My cells threaten to split. I continue to thrust assured that both heaven and hell reside inside me.
As Molly’s neck pivots toward the bed frame, my favorite image, my phone flickers from across the room. A few more thrusts I reason until Molly is boldly locking eyes with me as if to say, “Aren’t you going to get that?” I reluctantly release my body from hers and crawl off the bed to retrieve my phone from the nightstand. She appears relieved.
It’s 7:04 AM.
Already in the office, it’s Marissa, the Director of Sales at Production News.
Her voice is rugged with a flare of sincerity. Trying to disguise her sense of urgency, she asks, “Can you get here?” A rushed pause barely lingers, “Now?”
It’s 7:05 in the morning and I still haven’t climaxed.
Marissa talks in circles, exaggerating the unknown and minimizing the facts. I learn that President Stewart has requested an emergency staff meeting. I end the call. An emergency meeting? I couldn’t dream of anything more delightful.
Captured by the resonating silence, Molly poses, “What was that about?”
I mutter an airy five-word response, step one leg into my slacks then the other, buckle my belt and head for the door.
Before turning the knob, Molly expels timidly, “Tomorrow?”
Tomorrow is Tuesday. I know that I have no desire to attribute more time with her but I cowardly say, “I’ll see” before closing the bedroom door.
A typical 20-minute drive on any given day is cut in half by dodging red lights and erring on fast right turns. I may just arrive before 7:30. I hope. The sooner this day is over, the sooner the next is. I signal to merge back into the right lane, a mere tic-tac-toe game, when the infamous lights of Heartwood Hills Police storm like Monday’s rush hour behind me.
Parking my Corolla a few feet ahead of the closest strip mall intersection, I retrieve the necessary documents from my wallet and glove box. I consider some apologetic repertoire, but decide the truth may win. It’s Monday and I’m being harassed into work early.
I roll the window down, letting the late summer showers splash into my car.
“Hi, Officer.”
“You know why I am pulling you over.”
Caught off guard by his hostility, I slide my hands into my lap to relay defeat, “Yeah…look…I just got called into work early for some bogus meeting. I think they are going to let a number of us go.”
The officer offers zero empathy. His jaw remains stiff while replying, “I don’t care if everyone loses their jobs today. If you run them over, they won’t have a job to mourn because they’ll be dead.”
I’m angry because he’s right. I’m angry because he’s taking this far beyond the facts.
He adds, “Slow down and obey the rules of the road. Your existence is putting everyone at risk.” Bad days turn into good days and good days eventually turn terrible. Officer Douche hands me a ticket for $350.
My heated hands grip the wheel and I steer back onto the road. Two minutes bring me to the parking lot of Production News. I assume everyone is stationed in the downstairs conference hall and descend the main stairs when I get there. There’s a mouthful of silence packed tightly from one end of the room to the other. I quickly find some standing room toward the back, hoping not to be noticed. My colleagues are as tall as bowling pins, their faces wiped of every expression except fear. Sean is the Vice President of Distribution and currently positioned in a seated squat awaiting President Stewart’s arrival. His position makes me think he’s prepared to collapse to the ground.
Catching my uneasiness, Marissa’s magnetic, brown eyes lock with mine from across the room. Her arms are crossed, pressed firmly into her small, lifted chest. We talk without saying anything. Comfort is far from here. She gestures, “I’m scared. Are you?”
President Stewart enters and strides toward the lectern at the front of the room. Conversation halts as the space between all of us compresses. Stewart, a dumpy guy in a thrift store suit maneuvers his gaze from left to right.
“Thirty years ago, Production News was Central Buffalo’s insight to the daily, the offbeat, and the essential. It launched on the 2nd of January by three men who aspired to tell stories about our citizens and their pride. David Keller, Paul Woods, and Jeff Stewart were entrepreneurs of future times. Jeff, my father’s premise for starting the newspaper we know today was to depict the world in a lens of possibility. It was never about the news to him. It mattered more what the news would allow a community to achieve.
I don’t believe that the situation we face today reflects overlooked news stories. This is our town, our people. What happens in this city will always be at the top of our reporting priorities. When Highland High erupted in bloody turmoil from the inside out, Production was the first to highlight the sacrifices made by faculty and the love that rebuilt our town. Every apocalyptic winter storm that knocked down our doors and brought us shoveling into the night captured our town’s backbone.
Without these tributes, our paper wouldn’t have heart.
Our competitor, The News Group, has taken a different approach. One of their front covers spotlights foreign policy, the lives of the rich and bizarre, an interest in life away from the lines that govern what we hold near to our hearts.”
Stewart pauses until his words are absorbed.
“We must make our value known again. The news is here. Now what are we going to do?”
Stewart bows his head and walks off the stage. His executive cabinet quickly shuffles behind him in single file. The intensity in the room heightens as the worry sets in. One of the accountants in finance bolts for the door. Everyone looks at each other and begins to exit in layers, littering back into their offices where their worry can paralyze their actions.
I get to my cubicle and take gaze at the ceiling. I hear Marissa’s footsteps rushing toward me. I lower my gaze in time for her arrival. I don’t even have to ask before she begins.
“You know what this means don’t you? Stewart was talking about sales. Oh my god. I can’t believe…”
“Marissa, can you just calm the fuck down? He didn’t say anything. Sales weren’t mentioned.” I had to interrupt her, but she’s in no mood for interruption.
“You think there’s nothing to worry about? What’s your plan then?”
I hadn’t thought about the longevity of my position under the present circumstances. I managed the classified section which was equivalent to managing nothing at all. Some days I checked in with the Customer Service reps to talk about the Bills or for grabbing a beer after work. I submitted our monthly report to Marissa. If I felt like it, I answered a call and took an ad myself.
“I don’t think it matters actually,” I reply.
Clearly not getting the reaction from me for her to react more, she stomps back into her office and shuts the door. I look down and notice a voicemail on my phone from Molly, a voicemail that I’ll ignore and ask her to come over on Thursday. Thursday will be another night of playing charades under the sheets of someone she wants, but I’ll never be.
Not looking forward to the next day, I scurry home. In dejected repeat, the night has been lost and an alarm I’m not prepared for wakes me. The only difference between the two days is that Molly’s body isn’t here to consume the other side of the bed.
Tuesday
I know I’ve lived this day before is all I can think when I take my badge to the front door the next morning. The office barely stirs. Contrary to what Stewart has tried to instill, there is nothing to do until he tells us so. There hasn’t been a follow-up email, an official news release or meetings for the division leaders. Marissa is taking it better than I expected. She breezes by with cupped hands for her coffee and places her coffee mug at the edge of my desk. Cool, light waves hang around her face. Calm looks good on her.
“Can you work the phones today? It might help with sales,” Marissa asks. Not a problem, I both think and reply. “Since you’re leaving early, try to make the time you’re here worth it.”
“What do you mean?”
“You said you would need the afternoon off to visit your grandmother. She’s still in the nursing home, right?”
The worst part about Marissa is that she remembers everything. She takes to arbitrary truths with precision and care. Each time she looks out for me old sunsets crackle in my distorted memory of the past. Our brief romance severed shortly after the fall of last year. She was worried about our careers, hers, really, and told me it couldn’t work. We agreed to remain professional in our interactions and to never mention our relationship to anyone else. Her diplomacy and visible anxiety in the workplace made it easier for the most part to displace the images of us together.
“Right. Thanks for the reminder.”
My phone rings from the sales line. Marissa spins on her heels and walks back toward her office.
“Thanks for choosing Production News. This is Drew speaking.”
What sounds like a plane taking off, a barrage of rustling and small crashes fills the background. “Hi, this is Drew,” I say again.
A smoky, deep voice echoes through my headset. “Where are you located?”
“We’re in Buffalo, New York. Is there anything I can help you with?”
“You place want-ads?”
“We accept any type of classified. Legal, for sale…”
“Then I need to place one!”
“Okay, what is the description of the ad you would like to place?” I feel like I am pulling teeth to get some basic information.
“I need a black car. Maybe an Impala. I’ll buy it if I need to. Just have the ad run for today and tomorrow.”
I hold back my sincere judgment. “Okay, how’s this wording?”
--Need Black Impala--
--Price Negotiable--
---Please contact
…Can I get a number for interested readers to contact you?
“555…” Another loud crash. “….7630”.
“Great. Our base rate is $12 and $.50 per word. That brings your total to $16. How would you like to pay today?”
The man who has yet to mention his name reveals he goes by Rod and provides his payment information. He adds before hanging up, “Make sure you run it through today. It’ll expire on Wednesday.”
My last call of the day is over. I want to leap out of the building but I know I’m only leaving to visit my dying grandmother at Care Horizons and eventual deathbed. When I arrive, the women at the front desk, two haggard, menopausal women in their early sixties who know me by first name, automatically buzz me in as they see me park my car in the visitor’s lot.
“Hi, Elaine. Hi, Eileen,” I greet.
“Hi, Drew,” they reply in cheerful unison, their wrinkles smiling for them like this is orgasmic. It probably is.
I climb the stairs to the third floor partly to reduce the time I need to be here. Time is already adding up. And, partly, because I can use the stairs these days. Sex doesn’t count much as exercise when it’s stale.
I brace myself for the hand-holding, the silence, burying my chest into my knees before opening the door. Her ventilator is at the corner of her bed, no doubt using all the electricity in the room. Surprisingly, her right eye opens at the sound of the door creaking.
“Hey Grandma. You look good.”
I wonder if she registers it’s me. I walk over to the side of her bed, and massage her wrists, her fingers into mine. I’m filled with usual, depressing thoughts. Is this the last time? Will her final days be happy? What does one think about staring at a wall in a confined, locked room? Does she know I love her? Will she remember?
She coughs and holds her left side.
Lightly, she mumbles with large, tear-duct eyes, “Maria.”
“What is that, Grandma?”
“Let… it…linger,” she triumphantly exudes before conking off to bed.
I’m left with the confirmation that her last thoughts will be of me and Maria, mistakes clearly meant to haunt me. Another day for the win. In true hunchback of Notre Dame fashion, I skid out of the room in the shape of a coward. I drive away without glancing in the mirror as I pull away.
No remorse for the detached.
Wednesday
I return to work Wednesday morning a few minutes before I am due at my desk but am delayed by a crowd of fellow staff hovering in the entranceway. One of the Senior Directors in Communication is holding what appears to be the morning edition of Production News. Some stand transfixed staring at the front page. Others keep shaking their heads. I wonder if Stewart has made a statement about our expected layoff.
Brushing elbows with at least three people, I find Marissa. She looks out of breath already.
“There was an accident.”
My eyebrows rise, “Okay?”
Although everyone has heard it once before, they gather in closer to hear someone tell it again, permanently embedding it in their lifeline.
“Police officer…last night…They were pulled off on the side of the highway.” Breathing more rapidly, “When they got out of their cars to confront a speeder, another vehicle, at top speeds, crashed right into them. Everyone died on impact. The witnesses said they heard the vengeance of the engine from a mile away as they watched in trance from behind. They don’t know who was in the other vehicle or if it was intentional.”
Paraphrasing everyone’s fear, Marissa concludes as a question, “Can you imagine having a car come speeding at you?”
It was certainly odd and likely the only horrific incident Production had reported in years. What would shake us more is that the same accident had graced the front page of five other papers. Five different states had reported the same granular details at precisely the same time. The accidents were reported in California, Colorado, Illinois, Ohio, and New York as if someone had deliberately drawn a line across the country.
