The deal was to work as follows…
Charleston’s salary was to go from 32,500 dollars per year to 250,000 dollars per year. Charleston was to report to work at 8:30 a.m. every morning (a half-hour earlier than he used to) and stay until 6:30 p.m. each night (an hour-and-a-half later than he used to). He was to report to work on the eighty-seventh floor, which to the rest of the world was not to exist. He was to cue the red light any time that he took the elevator by pressing a button on a remote device that would be provided for him. For the device, Charleston would have to put down a 200-dollar deposit, which he was embarrassed to have to pay from his meager savings since his new salary had yet to take effect. Charleston was to share the existence of this device with no one. Charleston would have his own desk and his own office, both of which would be located on the eighty-seventh floor, which, as already stated, to the rest of the world was not to exist. His work would be “largely unsupervised but heavily, and frequently, evaluated. Perhaps as often as every day (if necessary),” explained page thirty-seven of the contract. Charleston would be entitled CEO of Thundercom Corporation. The extent and matter of his duties would be detailed by Timothy Spall in person and at a “later” date, in addition to being discussed in total in the “Duties” chapter of the contract, which Charleston was welcome to peruse in advance of his training. Charleston was always to wear a suit to work. He was to answer no questions posed by “any of his coworkers or any other inquirers” about the specifics regarding his employer or his employment. He was permitted to share with the public only his title and the hours of his workday. His responsibilities, which Timothy Spall would “later” detail, were wholly confidential.
Furthermore…
Charleston was to speak with no one, not even Timothy Spall, and most certainly not Mr. Twytharp, about his being at all aware of ever having had or presently having any knowledge at all of anyone or anything called by the name of or referred to as “Mr. Twytharp.” Nor could Charleston “in any context, pertinent or otherwise, discuss, as real or imaginary, those human and physical traits possessed by Mr. Twytharp.” While this was, ultimately, all that Charleston took the contract to be saying, the contract nevertheless said so in 212 in-depth, intricate pages, most of which he was unable to get through before drifting off to sleep that night. When he awoke the following morning, he was surprised to discover that, in his intense reading efforts, he had actually read only to page twelve. He had not time to read any more, either, before he hurried off to his very first day of work as CEO.
As the elevator doors opened onto the eighty-seventh floor, which—to any person’s query—did not exist, he was greeted by an, as always, impeccably dressed Timothy Spall who, as promised in what Charleston read of the contract, stood (in this “later” moment) ready to explain the nature of Charleston’s new position.
“But in order to explain your new position,” explained Timothy Spall, pointing to the cogs on the far wall of the humid floor, “I must first explain those.”
Timothy Spall, then, stepped directly and economically across the large, empty concrete space that was the eighty-seventh floor, which in its nonexistence looked like a massive version of Mr. Twytharp’s office (but for the huge metal contraptions that hung on the far wall toward which Timothy presently stepped.)
“These,” explained Timothy Spall, “are giant cogs.”
“I see,” said Charleston, after a silence and so as not to offend.
“And your job as CEO,” Timothy Spall went on, “is to watch them and to report any potential or actual damage as it might or does occur, respectively.”
Then Timothy fell silent.
Charleston stared at the cogs, superficially delighted but subdermally confused. Even from this distance, Charleston still could not tell whether these cogs did indeed and absolutely turn. After a substantial stint of silence, Charleston noticed that it was silent. So he looked to Timothy Spall for clarification of this silence but noticed only that Timothy Spall was gazing upon him as though it was Charleston’s turn to speak.
So Charleston spoke…
“Might I ask a question?”
“Certainly,” replied Timothy Spall, “this is your training.”
Timothy was in a suit identical to that suit which he had worn on the previous day. He was, again, absent any sign of perspiration or even momentary discomfort.
“Who performed this task prior to myself?” asked Charleston in the most nonconfrontational manner he could devise.
“You are the first,” explained Timothy Spall eagerly.
And then it went silent again.
So Charleston, again, spoke…
“What do these cogs do?”
“That’s unimportant to your duties,” replied Timothy Spall. “But, if you must know, they turn.”
Silence…
“Shouldn’t I know how they work? In case they break and need to be fixed?”
“That’s unimportant to your duties,” reiterated Timothy Spall. “As I said, you report any damage. That does not include fixing damage.”
“But how will I know if there has been damage if I do not know how these giant cogs should work?”
“A good question indeed,” countered Timothy Spall. “These cogs, though, as a result of routine and quality maintenance, have not malfunctioned once, ever, in the thirty-two years that Thundercom Corporation has been in existence. So we don’t foresee any malfunctions occurring in the future.”
Now Charleston stared at Timothy Spall in silence and for a long moment until, finally, out of the six hundred questions firing throughout his being, one question seemed to present itself for communication. And though this question was perhaps arbitrary, Charleston nevertheless asked it.
“Who does the maintenance?”
“The maintenance men,” Timothy Spall replied frankly. “Every Friday at three o’clock p.m. But they won’t bother you, they’re very professional.”
Although, and perhaps because, he was so thoroughly confounded, Charleston could conjure no more questions at the current moment. Timothy Spall read this upon Charleston’s face. So Timothy Spall wrapped things up.
“That is your desk,” he said, pointing to a nearby bare desk that sat near a wall and faced the giant cogs. The desk was accoutered only by a heavy, obsoletish, deep red phone. “If you have any questions, please write them down and I will answer them for you when I see you next.”
Timothy Spall then turned to leave but stopped five footsteps from Charleston and turned back.
“Oh, and please, as your contract clearly states, do not instigate any communications whatsoever with Mr. Twytharp. If he wants to talk to you, then he will talk to you. In which case, you should respond.”
In his abundant confusion, Charleston conjured another question. It was a question he had originally had yesterday, but he was having it again today and the question was nevertheless unanswered. So he decided to ask it.
“Are these cogs even turning?” Charleston thought to ask, although he knew not what he hoped to gain by asking it.
“Absolutely,” replied Timothy Spall.
Charleston could not tell, though, whether Timothy Spall was joking. Charleston had never before, however, witnessed Timothy Spall joke. Which could mean that he was not joking now. But it could also mean that he was joking now and Charleston was just unfamiliar with Timothy Spall’s jokes.
“Your paycheck will be available one week from Friday and then every other Friday thereafter,” explained Timothy Spall.
Timothy Spall then left. He exited into Mr. Twytharp’s office. And it was quiet but for the almost imperceptible sound of the gradually turning cogs and the low, hot hiss that filled the whole eighty-seventh floor, which, if asked about, did not exist. Charleston placed his briefcase, in which he had decided to carry his contract at all times, on the floor next to his desk and was seated.
The room was unimaginably gray, maybe even more shades of gray than Charleston knew to exist. The walls were bare. The concrete of the walls was textured, so as to create shadows in the depressions of the surface. There was but one light source in the room’s center. It was a fluorescent light. And it was large.
Perhaps, thought Charleston to himself, I should start wearing suits with some color.
But he soon decided against this idea inasmuch as he would look so oddly colorful everywhere else in the world. And it would be just plain impractical to keep a separate suit or two here at the office. There wasn’t even any place to change, really. There did not seem to be a bathroom, even.
After only forty-seven minutes of watching the cogs, Charleston could see that this was going to be a most difficult job. His chair was uncomfortable and his eyes were already tired. His mind was anxious and rattled and full of mundane thoughts. And this is not even to mention the discipline required to endure the emotional tedium of watching cogs turn slowly. The room needed a plant, or at least someone with whom to talk. The room needed more light. All of these things were suddenly making Charleston irascible. Charleston had never before known himself to be such a petulant man. (On a more positive note, however, Charleston now had visual, verifiable proof that the cogs were turning. He had noticed a blemish on one of the cogs, a blemish which had started pointing towards the floor and was now positioned a good five degrees to the right.)
At minute forty-nine, Charleston conjured the first question that he wanted to ask of Timothy Spall, but, much to Charleston’s annoyance and chagrin, there was nothing present upon which to record the conjured question.
Since the surface of his desk was meticulously bare, Charleston opened the desk’s upper-middle drawer. In this drawer, there was one single, dull-tipped and heavily chewed-upon pencil nearly three-quarters of which had already been shaven away. Charleston took this pencil and placed it atop his desk. Charleston then opened the drawer on the left side of his desk. It was, however, entirely empty. As were the other two desk drawers. This brought about Charleston’s first dissenting thought—which was a long time coming after the absurdly unhelpful training session.
If it is so important that I write down my questions, asked Charleston to himself and bitterly, then why have you not provided me with ample material provisions to carry out my duties?
This would be question number two, if Charleston could find some paper upon which to record his questions. Charleston stood and looked out over the large, empty room. But the room was as barren as his desk. In fact, there was not even a trash can from which Charleston might take trash upon which to write.
Charleston could not very well go ask Mr. Twytharp for some paper. And Charleston did not dare knock upon Mr. Twytharp’s door to ask for Timothy Spall. This led to another question…
How do I contact Timothy Spall?
This would be question number three, if…
Then Charleston got an idea. He pulled out his wallet and rummaged, eventually discovering a dry cleaning receipt that he smoothed out on his desk. Upon the receipt’s blank back and with the pencil nub he had found, Charleston wrote…
(1) Might I bring with me reading material to peruse/read while supervising the cogs?
(2) Why don’t I have any paper? Should I furnish my own? And, a corollary question, how important are my questions to the company?
(3) How do I contact Timothy Spall? If something does go wrong with the cogs and all?
Charleston then took the receipt and the pencil and placed them in the top right corner of his desk. He looked at his watch. He had been at work for less than two hours. And in that time, he had done veritably nothing. He was angry that it was not later in the day. Charleston had never before known himself to be such an angry man.
When lunchtime finally came, and it did not come quickly or easily, Charleston thought of a fourth question—or a fifth, if you consider the corollary question in question two to be an additional question in its own right. And that fourth, or fifth, question was this…
(4) Who watches the cogs while I am at lunch? And, again, a corollary question, if no one watches the cogs while I’m at lunch, then how important could it really be that the cogs are watched at all?
Charleston recorded this question. Then he put his receipt and his pencil in his upper-middle desk drawer, where he figured they would be safe.
Charleston took the elevator down to the second floor, where the Thundercom cafeteria was located. As he stepped from the elevator, he came upon Helena Birnbaum, who had just stepped off of one of the other elevators herself.
“Hello, Mr. Sutterfeld. And congratulations,” said Helena.
Still ruminating upon his fourth or fifth question, Charleston aimed to enlist Helena’s help by asking, “Who is watching the front desk while you’re at lunch?”
Had Charleston asked Helena this question three days ago, she would have read nothing subversive into the query. But Charleston was now the CEO of Thundercom Corporation. So Helena, in response to Charleston’s circumstantially insensitive query, grew extremely nervous and acutely aware of what she suddenly saw as a profoundly foolish and unprofessional choice on her behalf.
Conceding her own guilt, Helena responded to Charleston’s query with a small, defeated…
“No one.”
Charleston was delighted with this response. For, if the receptionist for the entire company could leave her desk unattended, then indubitably the cogs, themselves clearly comparatively nonessential if not downright superfluous, could go unattended as well. After all, it was her job to greet and direct all incoming queries into an enormous multinational corporation. This task was colossal. Charleston’s job was tiny. Charleston’s job all took place entirely from one chair and with absolutely no contact with the outside world.
“Excellent,” replied Charleston, elated by Helena’s response. “Thank you,” he offered as well. In hindsight, Charleston would see how this entire conversation might well be misinterpreted. But for now, he felt nothing but tremendous affirmation.
Blushing, Helena boarded the elevator and hurried back to her desk. Although she was hungry, she feared hunger far less than losing her job, which now seemed somewhat inevitable inasmuch as she had been all-but-outrightly branded inessential, and this by the CEO of the company.
I suppose, thought Helena Birnbaum, I should have been nicer to Mr. Sutterfeld when I had the chance. From now on, I will call him Charleston. It’s more personable. And it’ll make it more difficult for him to fire me if he sees me as a person, and a personable person at that.
Charleston purchased a salad for lunch.
He noticed Curtis Ames sitting off by himself and decided to join him.
“Hello, Curtis” said Charleston as he set his salad down and was seated.
“Hello, Mr. Sutterfeld,” replied Curtis Ames.
Charleston had never before noticed Curtis using his surname, so Charleston just took it to be a joke. In truth, however, the presence of the CEO at his lunch table made Curtis suddenly quite nervous. The two ate in silence for a long moment before Charleston finally asked, “Do you feel that your job at Thundercom is essential?”
Charleston’s question was, again, derivative of his own insecurities, but was, again, taken by the interrogated party to be a query insinuating the general tenuousness of said party’s particular position with the company. And while Curtis and Charleston were friends, Curtis did not dare presume that their friendship superseded the tenets of business. Further, Curtis could not help but interpret Charleston’s question as an extension of their friendship and, as such, a forewarning of an imminent doom transpiring in the chiaroscuro world of business.
Charleston, concluded Curtis, is warning me that my job is anything but secure.
“Okay, then,” replied Curtis, to knowingly inform his friend that the message had been clearly received.
Charleston had no idea, however, how this was a suitable response to the question posed. Unless Curtis meant to say that he felt moderately invaluable. But to quantify essentiality is to enumerate that which is, by definition, innumerable.
Perhaps, reasoned Charleston, he did not hear my question.
“Do you feel your job here is essential?” Charleston repeated, enunciating.
This was far more serious than Curtis had initially thought. In fact, it seemed that Charleston was all-but-outrightly telling him that his job was lost. He felt grateful for a friend who would stick his neck out like this. It was rare. Especially when a man has so much to lose, so far to fall.
“I will begin looking right after lunch,” explained Curtis Ames.
Charleston, again, had not a clue as to what this could possibly mean. He was starting to worry that Curtis Ames was unwell. To be polite, however, Charleston simply said, “Okay.”
The two then ate the rest of their lunches in silence: Curtis Ames considering future employment options and avenues in his mind, and Charleston piecing together the various odd fragments of his day.
It just so happened that Curtis Ames had left his newspaper in his car, which was odd inasmuch as Curtis Ames never left his newspaper in his car; rather, he always brought it up to his desk. Furthermore, Curtis Ames never read his paper at work because he was always busy working. Just in case, though, his day grew slow or lax, which it never did, Curtis Ames brought his paper from his front lawn and placed it on the floor beside his desk. And today, of all days, the one day that he needed to read the paper (specifically, the classifieds section), was the one day upon which the paper was not on the floor beside his desk.
He considered, for a moment, not getting the paper. But he had told Charleston he would start looking for jobs right after lunch. And if he waited until after work to start looking, then Curtis Ames would not have done what he had said he would do for his friend who was sticking his neck out for Curtis’ sake. So Curtis, although he had work to do, went down to his car and retrieved his newspaper, which was warm, as the car was hot with trapped afternoon heat.
Newspaper in hand, Curtis Ames rushed back into the Thundercom building. As he did, however, he came upon an unusual sight: the typically cheery and warm Helena Birnbaum was slouched over and crying. She normally had perfect posture that thrust out her moderate but well-shaped bosom. In passing, Curtis Ames often admired Helena Birnbaum’s pronounced bosom and the trendy, but respectable blouses she wore atop it. Curtis Ames had always wanted to talk to Helena Birnbaum, but he had never had the chance…
“Are you all right?” asked Curtis, his heart fluttering with nervousness.
“Oh, yes. I’m fine,” replied Helena without looking up.
“Because you look troubled,” said Curtis.
“I’m crying,” explained Helena.
“Exactly. That’s what I’m saying.”
“Well, I’ll be fine. I’m just…I’ve some things on my mind is all.”
Helena wiped her nose with a tissue.
“What is on your mind?” queried Curtis.
And with this, for the first time during the span of their first ever conversation, Helena looked up, her face wet with trails of former tears.
It was silent for a moment.
“Well, Mr…” Helena began and stopped.
“Curtis,” offered Curtis.
“Well, Mr. Curtis, I…”
“Oh, no. It’s just Curtis. Curtis Ames. Extension 2282.”
“Well, Mr. Ames…”
“Please, call me Curtis.”
“I’ve reason to believe I’m going to be fired,” explained Helena plaintively.
“Me, too,” blurted Curtis, excitedly.
“Oh, you’re just saying that.”
“No. Really. I just had lunch with the new CEO, and…”
“Charleston?”
“Mr. Sutterfeld. Yes. And he just…insinuated…” explained Curtis, “that my job might be insecure.”
“Me, too,” demanded Helena.
“Oh, you’re just saying that,” insisted Curtis.
“He told me that, too, but in a roundabout way.”
“I’m looking for jobs,” explained Curtis, lifting the newspaper from his hip to the space in front of Helena.
“Is it that serious, do you think?” replied Helena.
“I don’t know, but I figure…better safe…’”
As they spoke, Curtis could not help but observe how pleasant and pretty Helena Birnbaum’s features were. She had always caught his eye, but he had never really had the chance to see her features in service of communicating her ideas. It made Helena seem somehow even prettier than she used to seem.
“What did he say to you?” asked Curtis Ames.
“Charleston?”
“You call him by his first name?”
“I’m starting now,” replied Helena. “It’s more personable.”
“It certainly is that,” figured Curtis.
“And I just figure…better to be personable than…well…not.”
Helena Birnbaum was not sure what, exactly, she meant by this.
“I know what you mean,” said Curtis Ames. “Just because he’s the CEO…”
Curtis Ames did not finish this sentence, but Helena understood what he was getting at.
“Yeah,” she said.
“It’s just politics probably. That’s why he has to seem more removed,” concluded Curtis.
“Are you going to get a new job?” asked Helena.
“I’m going to start looking.”
“Maybe I should, too.”
Then it was silent. Curtis Ames had missed nearly twenty-seven minutes of work. But he did not seem to mind too much, on account of the impending loss of his job and on account of Helena Birnbaum’s features.
“I should get back to work,” said Helena.
“Would you like to go out some time?” replied Curtis.
Helena blushed.
Then she acquiesced.
“Okay, Curtis Ames,” she said.
By 4:39 p.m., Charleston began having his first little fish-nibble doubts about his ability to perform his duties as CEO of Thundercom Corporations.
I might not, he thought quietly to himself, be able to do this every day.
As he thought this thought, a surge of disappointment arose in his heart and in the base of his lungs. A pang perhaps. But quickly atop this pang it occurred to Charleston that today was only his first day as CEO, and that any person on the first day of any given job likely has doubts as to the longevity of his efforts in light of the seeming insurmountability of the task at hand.
My feelings, Charleston tried to console himself, are likely to be expected.
So Charleston stayed seated and kept staring forward.
Between lunch (12:30 p.m.) and leaving (6:30 p.m.) on the first day, Charleston had added only one more question to his list of four (or six, depending on how one viewed it) questions. And that question was this:
Do you have any suggestions as to how I might do my job more effectively?
He thought of this question at 5:12 p.m.
At day’s end, Charleston left his questions in his desk drawer where Timothy Spall might easily find them at his leisure.
On the evening after his first night of work, Charleston placed a notebook in his briefcase and his briefcase on the floor in front of his front door where he would not forget it in the morning before his second day of work. Charleston had a nice dinner, listened to his radio some, and slept. Then he rose, showered, dressed, ate breakfast, and picked up the briefcase, and consequently the notebook, that he had left on the floor in front of the door where he would not forget it in the morning before his second day of work.
The walk to work was pleasant. Charleston did, again, wear a suit to work—as his contract had stipulated requisite. As a result, the morning walk was warmer than it had previously been when, as an assistant consultant, he had worn slacks and a dress shirt.
But, Charleston, ever the optimist, told himself that, in the winter time this will be quite an amenable wardrobe.
Charleston stopped only to pick up a newspaper, which he had never done before, since his previous job was much more encompassing of his attentions.
Charleston was not necessarily going to read the paper during work; rather, in lieu of the answer to his first question, Charleston was buying the newspaper merely as a possible source of perusal during his workday.
The paper cost fifty cents. The novelty of such a fee struck Charleston as lovely and made him smile.
Fifty cents, thought Charleston, his mind boggled thinking about how many papers must have been sold every day to make such a price point viable.
The first thing Charleston did once he was at his desk on the second morning of his new job was to transcribe his questions from the dry cleaning receipt to the notebook he had placed in his briefcase the night before. As he removed the receipt from his desk drawer, Charleston was reminded that yesterday’s questions were all still unanswered, prompting yet another question: When will my questions be answered?
This would be question number six—or eight, depending upon how one views it—just as soon as Charleston got everything else transcribed.
Before Charleston even began his transcription, however, he realized that certain questions had now become themselves questionable. Like question two and its corollary. Since he now had paper, was this question any longer valid? Would it not seem simply like nitpicking to ask for paper if he already had paper? Although, the import of the logical consequences of the question Charleston still saw as pertinent inasmuch as the ramifications of the question, or questions, depending on how you view it, would serve to elucidate Timothy Spall’s, and possibly Mr. Twytharp’s, perception of the definition of the role that Charleston was to play within the company. But was the elucidation of these ramifications worth the risk of seeming to antagonize his higher-ups on what was only his second day as CEO? Or, more importantly, would such elucidation be considered rude?
After some consideration, Charleston decided that, in his transcription of the questions, he would move this question from position number two to position number six (after the new question became question five). Thus, while he was going to leave the question intact for now, if he later decided to remove the question, he could do so inconspicuously.
The transcription took but an uneventful minute, after which Charleston sat back and started his central task of watching the cogs. And although Charleston had indeed done much between leaving work yesterday and returning to work this morning, suddenly it seemed as though nothing at all had happened between this very moment and 4:39 p.m. yesterday, except that yesterday there had been only one hour and fifty-one minutes before Charleston could go home whereas today there remained nearly nine hours and fifty minutes. Moreover, the thought of last night’s evening away from work no longer seemed like such a substantial, utopian reprieve.
“Dear God,” muttered Charleston, “what’ll I do?”
But this question, like all the others he had been asking, went unanswered. And suddenly and silently, it was all too much. This suddenness and silence brought about Charleston’s first official act of rebellion.
Charleston, faced with a serious judgment call in light of the as-yet-unanswered question number one, made the executive decision to begin reading his newspaper.
If Timothy Spall is to later inform me that my reading is objectionable, reasoned Charleston, then I will simply stop my reading.
Charleston even devised a system by which he would, every third paragraph, glance up to check on the cogs.
Although the intention and thought put into this plan were ample, Charleston found his success in carrying out the plan to be abysmal. Charleston began reading and the next time he looked up not only had he read twelve paragraphs but he was also saddened by the nation’s abysmal economic forecast and the political stratification of classes brought about by politicians in their ever-important efforts to get elected and reelected.
Charleston was happy, however, to find that it was already 8:45 a.m. And in light of the fact that nothing had gone wrong with the cogs in thirty-two years, Charleston resumed reading and resolved to himself to pick up a paper every morning before work.
After all, he reasoned, I’d probably hear something if anything did go wrong with the giant cogs.
With his new reading regiment underway, lunch came much more quickly than he had feared it might. He had to concede, though, that it was still a struggle to get to 12:30 p.m.
On his way to lunch, Charleston stopped to wash the newspaper ink off of his hands before heading into the cafeteria. The sight was similar to yesterday’s and Charleston, again, felt like having a salad.
Today, Charleston was seated by himself at an empty table. He put dressing on his salad and had not even taken a bite when Jane Dubwray set her tray down and took a seat across from him.
While Charleston typically avoided Jane at all costs, he now felt a certain gratitude towards her. After all, she had sort of been the impetus for his trip to the fourth floor, which had, in turn, been the catalyst for his trip to the eighty-seventh floor, which, at that time, did not even exist. Thusly, she had also contributed to his discovery of the joy of reading the newspaper.
“Hello, Jane,” Charleston said, for the first time ever unprovoked.
“Charleston, I can’t believe your sudden success. Do you think something like this could happen to me?” asked Jane excitedly.
“Well,” pondered Charleston, “I don’t see why not.”
“That’s what I thought, too: I don’t see why not.”
It all happened easy as a pretty girl walking down the street, thought Charleston. So why couldn’t it happen again? Why couldn’t an even prettier girl walk even more easily down a different street?
“Have you been adjusting all right?” asked Jane.
“Oh…well. It takes some getting used to.”
“But you always were such a hard worker.”
“Why thank you,” replied Charleston, truly flattered even if he wasn’t sure how accurate her observation truly was.
“And I’m not just saying that, either,” Jane followed up.
“I don’t suppose you would,” countered Charleston.
And Jane smiled.
And Jane was truly flattered.
The two sat then, for a stretch, in silence. Until…
“Are you going to be looking for a new job?” asked Charleston.
He had remembered how Jane had been feeling unfulfilled at Thundercom. As an acquaintance and as CEO, he felt it his responsibility to inquire, to show interest in the company’s employees. And while this question struck Charleston as a benevolent act, it sent ice water through Jane’s veins.
“What?” was all Jane could think to say.
“A more fulfilling job,” clarified Charleston.
The ice water in Jane’s veins then turned immediately into ice.
Why, thought Jane to herself in disbelief, did I have to confide in the man who would only one day later become the CEO?
All that Jane could say was: “I’m fulfilled.”
Charleston frowned.
All that he could think to say was, “Huh?”
As soon as I get back from lunch, thought Jane, I am going to start looking for another job.
Charleston and Jane ate the rest of their lunches in silence.
Charleston did not want lunch to end. He did not want to go back to work, even though he did have more of the newspaper left to read.
By 2:58 p.m., Charleston was seriously contemplating resigning his post as CEO of Thundercom Corporation. He had spent his afternoon reading about a space shuttle that had blown up in outer space, a budget cut affecting farmers in the Midwest, and an objectionable tax being considered that would raise the cost of coffee by ten cents per cup if purchased retail and twenty-seven cents per pound if purchased in bulk. He had been intermittently checking the cogs, too, but once he had tired of reading, at 2:52 p.m., Charleston took to simply staring at the cogs, which he did successfully for all of six minutes before his anger returned, now in a more tangible form. From 2:58 p.m. to 2:59 p.m., Charleston noticed an agitating tremor that was shaking in all of his major organs and growing larger. This tremor built uncontrollably. It was on the verge of becoming a scream when, from behind him, Charleston heard the sound of the elevator bell followed by the opening of the elevator doors.
Charleston was delighted.
At first he was sure this sound must be announcing the presence of Timothy Spall. And Timothy Spall might finally bring with him the answers to Charleston’s questions. And answers to questions would surely communicate to both Charleston and to Timothy Spall that Charleston had indeed been working hard and doing well at this hard work he had been doing. And for some reason, Charleston felt sure that this would somehow make him feel better, would make his anger subside. Then Charleston panicked…
He had yet to decide whether or not to ask the sixth question (which had been the second question and which could be considered the eighth question depending on how one looked at it). Soon thereafter, however, both Charleston’s delight and his panic were assuaged by the mere curiosity that he had never before seen Timothy Spall take the elevator—this created serious doubt in Charleston’s mind as to whether the elevator actually contained Timothy Spall at all.
The sound of a squeaking wheel began echoing down the hallway and into the cog room, followed by the clank of metal. This brought before Charleston’s mind his seventh question:
(7) During work hours, might I leave my desk?
…which he told himself to write down later.
The metal clank and the squeaking wheel grew gradually closer, and Charleston began to notice two sets of footsteps scuffing along with these other sounds.
Clearly, he thought, it isn’t Mr. Twytharp, for he is always alone, and he makes a mushy sound when he walks.
Finally, around the corner the culprits of the sounds came. And upon seeing Charleston, the culprits of the sounds stopped. Thus, the sounds stopped, too. And there, before Charleston, wearing identical gray jumpsuits were a man and a girl—he in his fifties, and she in her late teens. They were both smeared and spotted with grease. Before them and steered by the man was a sizeable metal tub on thin, rusted wheels. Sticking up and out of the tub were two wooden sticks. It was with his hand on these wooden sticks that the man maneuvered the metal tub.
The man and the girl stared, wide-eyed at Charleston.
Charleston stared, wide-eyed, at the man and the girl.
“Who are you?” asked Charleston, of neither one of them in particular.
“We’re the maintenance men,” replied the man, plainly.
Charleston looked at his watch. Sure enough, it was three o’clock exactly. And although he had not realized it until this very moment, it was Friday—Charleston knew this because yesterday had been Thursday. Charleston looked back at the man and the girl.
“Oh,” he said.
Then it was silent.
Then the man and the girl went to work, pushing their clanking, squeaking metal tub across the floor and up to the giant cogs. Immediately the man removed the two wooden sticks from the metal tub, revealing what seemed to amount to a large swab on the end of each stick. The swabs, moreover, were covered in a slightly opaque and greasy gel. The man and the girl promptly began applying these swabs to the teeth of the different giant cogs. He swabbed the upper halves of the cogs and she the lower, both working counter-clockwise until each arrived where the other one had begun. Then they moved on to the next cog. All in all, each cog seemed to take about twenty-two seconds to maintain.
As he watched them work, a swell of anxiety began pulling at his chest. At first, Charleston considered this occurrence wholly unprovoked. But upon further introspection he realized that having other people in the cog room introduced a multitude of further complications surrounding his job responsibilities. What, for example, if something broke? How would this impact Thundercom Corporation? And to whom would he report this malfunction? Or what if someone got hurt and needed help? What was Charleston to do then? He was contractually bound to secrecy about the existence of this floor, about Mr. Twytharp, and about the specifics of his job duties. How would he even possibly explain anything should it happen? Let’s say, Charleston speculated, this young girl were to get her hand trapped in between two of the giant cogs, the function of which I do not even know in the first place. Were I to call emergency medical technicians, I would most certainly have to tell them where I am. Otherwise they would never be able to find the injured girl. Furthermore, how would I get said girl, trapped in said cog, some sort of help on a floor that does not exist?
The mental image of that girl with her surely gentle hand grinding those massive cogs to a halt suddenly gripped Charleston’s mind. There was, as he imagined the circumstance, little blood involved; rather, most of the damage was beneath the skin where bone was splintered, cracked, chipped, and irreparable. That probably elegant hand would never be like new again, even after countless surgeries and skyrocketing insurance premiums. Knowing in her heart that all of this was ahead of her, she would nevertheless be trapped—her hand malformed and shot through with lightning streaks of razor-sharp pain. Every tremor, every shake, every shift of weight would hurt her only more. Her coworker would flit about in a panic. But she would look to Charleston Sutterfeld, CEO of Thundercom Corporation. And Charleston would have absolutely no idea what the hell to do—other than hope that Timothy Spall or Mr. Twytharp might appear and take control of the situation. This, thought Charleston, is just not right.
Charleston sat down at his desk and took a good, long look at the maintenance girl. Only now was he truly taking notice of her, beneath the gray grease smears and gray jumpsuit. Apropos of no hard, or even soft, evidence, Charleston observed in her someone far too gentle of heart and of mind for as humid and matter-of-fact a place as the eighty-seventh floor, which did seem to exist but might just as well not as far as the entirety of the rest of the world was concerned. She still had dreams to dream up—and boyfriends with which to make mistakes. She had insecurities to learn to live with. She had the best part of ambition, the young part, the part that didn’t yet know any better. She still had significant aspects of her person that were gorgeously fragile.
She could not possibly understand a place like this. He didn’t understand a place like this, and he worked here—and in a fairly prominent capacity, not to mention. This was no place for such an innocent.
She couldn’t possibly know how quickly, silently, and irreversibly the sweet parts of us can go away. Sometimes as we sleep, they just dissolve, leaving little more than a bruise deep down inside. Sometimes we snuff them out through our own awful decisions. Sometimes we almost dare them to leave.
Or sometimes, and as far as Charleston was concerned this was the most terrifying type of departure, the sweet parts of us go away because of awful things entirely beyond our control. Sometimes we are unwittingly right at the edge of a precipice unknowable, unperceivable, unintuitable. Standing so close but an earthquake, but a lunatic, but a reckless driver in the rain, but a bullet, but a lightning bolt, but a loved one’s death, but an abusive lover, but a lapse in attention, but an accident, but an ugly intention, but a hateful person, but a person who never learned any better, but a self-destructive tendency, but a political issue, but a fundamentalist’s bomb, but a wallet for a mugger, but a sexual predator’s blood made boil, but a disease-ridden cough, but a mistaken elevator ride and a gentle girl’s hand misplaced in a giant cog’s teeth away from being forever no longer the same.
Somewhere way off in the distance, Charleston swore he heard the crack of a thunderclap. Or maybe he did not hear the clap as much as he felt it, a shift in his blood from warm to warmer. The heat from this room finally penetrating his skin, his blood now perhaps hot enough to facilitate the killing off of some particular bacteria or to propagate the exponential growth of some other bacteria somewhere small and previously unperturbed in his biology. Either way or neither way, this blood brought about a shift so deep down and fundamental in Charleston that it went all but unnoticed but for the single fact that suddenly the maintenance girl’s face became the most delicate, precious, and impossible concomitance of traits, became so exquisitely an expression of a human being who was so perfectly unlike any other human being that ever existed, so singular an occurrence in time, so unlikely to ever have occurred just precisely like this. Suddenly, the maintenance girl became to him some one thing worth protecting in this overwhelmingly indifferent world. Sure, he watched the maintenance girl through a still mildly-blackened eye, and sure, Charleston suspected that his recent intense solitude might be hindering the clarity of his perceptions and thoughts, but he still remained resolute in his belief that the maintenance girl and all that she represented were important to him. Either as symbol or as actual being. What was happening here mattered. No matter how gray the walls, the cogs, her jumpsuit, or the lights in this room were.
The sound of the squeaky wheel brought Charleston back to the present. Just as quickly as they had begun, the older man and the young girl had put their wooden sticks back in the metal tub and were wheeling off down the hall. They left as they had arrived, void of salutation.
“Good-bye,” said Charleston after the two, who were already half way down the hall.
The man turned back and nodded. The girl did nothing other than stop walking as the man stopped walking and resume walking as the man resumed walking.
As the two boarded the elevator, Charleston tried to conjure something else to say, but could think of nothing before the elevator doors closed and the maintenance man and girl were suddenly gone, nothing but the hum of restored silence left in their absence.
Charleston was alone again with the giant cogs and time. Gravity had gone back to seeming heavy, again. The slow, oozing crawl that was the reality of the eighty-seventh floor was once again unadulterated.
Charleston retrieved his notebook from a desk drawer and his pencil from another desk drawer. Leaving a space for the sixth question, which used to be the second question and which he had yet to decide whether or not to ask, he wrote down his seventh question, which he had earlier instructed himself to remember to write down. Then he conjured and recorded his eighth question (or tenth, if you want to count the corollaries) as well…
(8) What ought I do in case of emergency—i.e. maintenance girl people are injured?
Charleston was surprised to find himself feeling a sudden sense of pride in his title and role here at Thundercom. Do you suppose, he wondered, even though he had always thought of himself as a man unimpressed by status, she knows that I am the CEO of this corporation?
Charleston then tore a fresh, clean piece of paper from his pad. Upon it he wrote one more question. This one he left unnumbered, though, since he was unsure as to the pertinence of this question to his duties as CEO. That question was this…
What must her name be?
The traffic, car and foot, was unusually light for a Friday, which served to relax Charleston more than he might usually relax on his evening walk home. Also, there was the wind, blowing alternately hot then cold, hot then cold, a beautiful novelty on a perfectly necessary day.
Once home, he could not help but hear in the music coming out of his radio the same delicate quality he had observed in the maintenance girl.
He ordered dinner from a local restaurant that delivers.
He put on fresh, clean bedclothes.
He did not have to go to work for two whole days. And he felt not completely but at least slightly rejuvenated in some small ways.
He lay still under the cool sheets and in the quiet air of his bedroom. No one anywhere the whole city over was saying anything, as far as he was concerned. Or if they were, they were whispering and penitent.
He slept soundly.
Although in his sleep one more question did cross his mind… Who watches the cogs over the weekend?