When Monday morning came, Walter sat up in bed and seriously contemplated quitting his job for perhaps the thousandth time in the past two weeks.
He would need to pay his bills, sure. But if it meant he did not have to go back to that job, he would be just fine to do away with most of his bills anyway. Except for maybe Eleanor, if he even needed to pay for her. He presumed that call girls required payment up front, which she certainly did not seek prior to their encounter. But this presumption was admittedly based only on what Walter had seen in the movies. For all he knew maybe some of them invoiced their clients. Moreover, even if their relationship was rooted in authentic emotion, he worried that his being unemployed might impact his perceived viability as a suitor overall.
Walter wondered whether Eleanor had ever wanted to date a rock star. He guessed that she might have at some point in her life. Maybe just a teenage crush. Maybe something more. He wondered what music she liked.
He also wondered if she ever thought of him at all.
If he ever came up in the mundane stream of thoughts that narrated her days.
He would go see her. It had been too long. Maybe she thought he didn’t like her anymore. He would call her on his way to work.
He had decided it best to instate a two block rule, requiring that he achieve at least that distance, in any direction, from his apartment before he would ever call her. He figured it best to keep Veronica sheltered from this entire circumstance until he had a better sense for what, exactly, the entire circumstance was. And keeping all communication with Eleanor out of his home, he figured, was best for everyone at least until the circumstance was more clearly defined.
And if he was going to walk two blocks from his home anyway, Walter reasoned that he might just as well keep right on walking to work. So it was that Walter decided to get out of bed and to keep his job for at least one more day.
Once he had escaped Mills Street, he found himself dialing.
“Hello, Wally,” Eleanor answered.
Walter hated that nickname. But it didn’t sound all that bad coming from Eleanor. He wondered if she was wearing her glasses.
“I’ve been thinking about you,” Walter replied, nipping in the bud any concern she might have had that he was no longer interested in her.
“What have you been thinking about me?” she taunted back, the confidence in her tone clearly revealing that she had harbored no concerns about his infatuation with her waning.
Her response seemed almost professional in tone.
Or was it just the product of deep, intense infatuation on her part?
Either way, Walter was admittedly not the most experienced man in the world when it came to dirty talk. As such, he was not sure how best to answer this question. He’d said dirty things before, sure. But more typically in the throes of coitus, and even then his comments were not usually of the terribly provocative varietal. They were typically more gestures of support and encouragement to his partner. And even with this type of talk, he found himself regularly concerned, particularly in hindsight analysis, that he might actually have sounded a bit like an awkward, sweaty pervert. Of course, when he didn’t say dirty things at all, he was left feeling like a complete dork. So he really couldn’t win either way. Which was the reason for the minor panic setting in over what he was convinced was really little more than a fairly novice dirty talk question coming from Eleanor…
“I’ve been thinking about when we were together,” he eased his way in, experimenting with sort of implying the dirty things. He reasoned this might be a happy medium and a good starting point. But not to leave too much unsaid, he added, “It was really hot.”
This last bit of editorial, however, made him feel like both a dork and a pervert simultaneously.
“Yeah?” answered Eleanor, in what Walter feared was merely an attempt to positively reinforce him for his effort.
“Yeah,” answered Walter, freezing up. He decided to just get to his point. “I want to see you tonight. At seven.”
“I can’t tonight, Wally,” Eleanor explained, only moderately apologetically.
“Oh,” Walter’s heart sank as he wondered whether better dirty talk might have garnered better results.
“But what’s your lunch break look like?” she redirected. This counter-proposed encounter time was in direct conflict with another rule that Walter had constructed to assist himself with navigating this unclear circumstance. He had decided against any workday trysts. He acknowledged that their timing was convenient, but he further reasoned that he would be prone to rush were he balancing simultaneous obligations. And when Walter rushed, he made mistakes. Additionally, having a hard stop on the encounter would probably keep Walter from relaxing into it as much as he otherwise would, which threatened to denigrate the overall quality of the experience, and the return on investment if it turned out he was a paying customer. Either way, a rushed session would cause him to get less time and lower quality for the same risk and, possibly, cost.
“I can do lunch,” Walter said.
“Yay,” Eleanor cheered.
As he hung up the phone, Walter noticed a broad grin had stretched across his face. He tried to hide it, but he could not.
The first thing Walter noticed upon arriving at the office that morning was that it looked summarily unchanged. He did not know why he would have expected it to be any different, but it did make him realize that he had been hoping that it would be.
But the floor was still gray concrete.
The desks were still metal and made in the 1970s.
The chairs were still lopsided and squeaked when reclined in or rolled around.
The air was still dusty.
The back half of the hangar was still chock full of boxes of hotel amenities, forming a wall right behind the handful of work stations.
Mr. Sheprick’s office was still nestled along the west wall of the hanger, its door still in its perennial three-quarters-shut position.
Beau Chalmers was still trying to make himself look busy.
The other two salesmen, whose names Walter just could not remember, were still actually busy.
The shipping department, more specifically Meg Halmish, was still fairly idle but for sudden small flurries of activity.
Walter’s desk was still strategically stacked to represent a work-load greater than that which he truly handled.
And Beau Chalmers still lit up every time Walter walked in the door.
Today he actually stood up and came across the hangar toward Walter, wrapping his work-friend in a big bear hug.
“You got lipo!” Beau yelled out in an almost celebratory tone.
“I did not,” muttered Walter quietly, before realizing that his response should really at least match Beau’s in volume so as to dissuade everyone in earshot who had just heard Beau’s proclamation. “I did not!” Walter yelled this time, protesting far more than would be reasonable even if Beau had been wrong, which he was.
“You can’t lose weight that fast, buddy,” Beau casually disregarded Walter’s exclamation. “It feels like a century since I’ve seen you.”
“I had a tumor,” Walter spat back, still a bit too loud to seem like a truthful explanation.
“Are you okay?” Beau asked suddenly soberly grave, his volume brought down to a personable, reasonable level.
“Benign,” explained Walter. “It was benign,” he repeated still loud enough to be heard by all even though he was directing the totality of his attention to Beau.
“What was the cause?” Beau insisted, now seemingly on the verge of tears.
“No cause. Just happened.”
“There has to be a cause. Is this an uncommon thing?”
“I don’t know, Beau,” Walter barked, not having prepared himself for a Goddamn inquisition. “Things like this can just happen. I didn’t look into the whole history of it.”
“You’ve got to know the history of it. It could happen again. Could it happen again?”
“I’m pretty sure no.”
“Is that what they said? Or is that what you are saying? Who is saying that?”
“That’s what they said.”
“They said, ‘Pretty sure.’”
“Yeah.”
“That doesn’t sound like something a doctor would say.”
Walter could never decide which side of Beau Chalmers he found less tolerable, the side of him overly concerned with all of life’s dramas or the unyieldingly apathetic side that permeated all aspects of his professional activity.
“I need to clock in, Beau,” Walter diverted the conversation.
“Sure. Yeah,” Beau replied as though the air itself could, at any instant, spark a brand new gigantic tumor somewhere underneath Walter’s skin. “Do you want me to clock you in?”
“I’ve got it.”
“Because I can clock you in.”
“I’m not an invalid, Beau.”
“Okay. Yeah. I’ll be at my desk,” Beau said.
But he did not move.
He just stared, waiting for Walter to move. Or to say or do something.
So Walter headed toward Mr. Sheprick’s office to clock in.
Beau still did not move.
He just watched Walter go.
Once Walter reached Mr. Sheprick’s office, he side-stepped into the one-quarter-open door.
“Welcome back, Walter,” Mr. Sheprick said cursorily, peering over well-worn reading glasses and stacks of long sedentary files from behind his desk in his dusty office.
“Thank you,” Walter replied, equally pat.
“I hope your medical situation is positively resolved.”
“It seems for now.”
A silence set in and Walter could see that all niceties that were going to be exchanged had now been traded. So he picked up his time card and clocked himself in.
Not two seconds later, Mr. Sheprick began, his tone suddenly severe…
“I’m going to tell you first.”
“Excuse me?” Walter replied.
“Sit down, Walter,” Mr. Sheprick insisted.
Mr. Sheprick never asked anyone to sit down, as was evidenced by the stacks of files occupying the three chairs on the visitor’s side of his desk. He parried most attempts at conversation, casual or business-related, in favor of people just getting to work. Of those conversations he truly could not avoid, however, nearly none of them, in his mind, merited a significant enough time commitment that it made sense for both parties to be seated. This, apparently, he considered one of those most unlikely conversations. As Walter transitioned some files to the floor, he struggled to recall the last time he had actually sat down in Mr. Sheprick’s office. It was perhaps three years ago. Not since he had been asked to negotiate the renewal of the Wells-Bergamot Corporation’s contract.
“Our business model is old, Walter,” Mr. Sheprick started in the second that Walter finally lowered into one of the chairs.
“Excuse me?” asked Walter, unsure of where this was going but suspecting the general direction of this conversation would not be a good one.
“I’m old,” Mr. Sheprick added.
“What?” asked Walter, now uncomfortable as well as unable to conjure a safe response.
“Things change. The speed of business has changed. The cost of business has changed. The look of business has changed. I’m not certain how sustainable or relevant we are anymore.”
Walter could not be sure, but if Mr. Sheprick was starting to say what he suspected Mr. Sheprick was indeed starting to say, then Walter had dreamed of this day for years. Namely, the day that brought with it a blameless and mandated way to escape from this deeply unsatisfying line of employment. Walter took in a deep pull of the dry, dusty air around him and waited for confirmation before allowing his heart to soar from his chest…
“I’m not sure that Sheprick Consolidated is much longer for this world,” Mr. Sheprick added.
And there it was. If not an end, the promise of one in the not-too-distant future. Unexpectedly, however, Walter found these particular words from this particular man cast his heart quite heavy rather than weightless and surging skyward.
At first Walter suspected, as anyone feeling sadness in his current circumstance might, that he must in truth feel a much deeper connection to his work than he had heretofore suspected. Perhaps it was the people, at least those whose names he remembered anyway. Or maybe it was the intrinsic value of the work itself, adding a layer of meaning he had taken for granted. Or maybe it was an unspoken joy he took in subconsciously knowing that travelers the country over were able to remove wrinkles from their clothes thanks to his hard work. Perhaps there was even something in the title of salesman, in the clarity of the role, that he considered somewhat noble if not downright but silently heroic. Or maybe it was the money.
But none of these things seemed quite the thing tied to the increasingly leaden sorrow anchoring his heart.
“We have been through a lot, Walter,” Mr. Sheprick went on.
And that was when the most unthinkable thought surfaced in Walter’s mind. So stupefying that he had to repeat it three or four times to himself just to make sure he was honestly thinking what he thought he was thinking. And even then, he had to repeat it one more time to make sure he was not actually being ironic and missing his own humor. But sure enough, he found no irony present. He was indeed saddened by what seemed to be the inevitable and imminent loss of his job for one reason and one reason alone: without gainful employment, he would not be able to support Twin in his pursuit of an MBA.
“You’ve been here with me for many years,” Mr. Sheprick continued. “So I wanted you to know first.”
Walter continued to put this thought through its paces, stretching it this way and that, considering it from various perspectives, considering the possibility that it represented some sort of psychic schism. But the deeper he considered his inability to help Twin, the greater his sadness grew.
“I’m going to have to downsize, Walter. I wanted you to know.”
Walter stopped breathing. He was speechless. He was sweating. He was running through his mind other businesses he knew where he might be able to land a sales job quickly.
“Did you hear me, Walter?” Mr. Sheprick asked the completely silent man sitting in front of him.
Walter looked up.
“I’ll pack my things,” Walter said, disgusted with himself for not putting up any sort of struggle.
“What?” asked Mr. Sheprick. “Why?”
“Why?” repeated Walter. “What?”
“Did you not hear me, Walter?” Mr. Sheprick barked again.
“You said you’re letting me go,” Walter muttered, confused.
“No,” Mr. Sheprick corrected, flatly. “I’m giving you the Wells-Bergamot contract to renew.”
“Wait, what?”
“If we can secure the revenue from the Wells-Bergamot…”
“So there was a comma in that sentence?” Walter interrupted.
“What sentence?” Mr. Sheprick answered, confused.
“I’m going to have to downsize…comma…Walter. Like you were telling me that rather than I was the object of it.”
“We don’t use punctuation when we speak. Do we?”
“I mean…functionally, I think so. I think tone and cadence communicate the information that’s normally communicated by punctuation.”
“Well…either way, I’m not laying you off. Or at least, not if you can renew the Wells-Bergamot Corporation’s contract.”
“Wait, what?” said Walter again, circling the conversation back once more as his heart began lifting its way back to its normal position in his chest.
“As you know,” Mr. Sheprick began again, “they constitute nearly thirty-nine percent of our total revenue. Once you sign that renewal, it will be easy for me to justify keeping you on and letting others go.”
Mr. Sheprick leaned forward in his chair and handed Walter a thick file with yellowing papers jutting from it in every which direction.
“You’ll need to go to Milwaukee.”
Inasmuch as he hoped to be successful in this endeavor, and inasmuch as that success would ultimately lead to others’ demise, Walter was suddenly quite glad that he could not remember the names of one-third of the people that worked at Sheprick Consolidated.
“Thank you, Mr. Sheprick,” Walter replied. “I really appreciate you thinking of me and giving me this chance to not get fired over the others.”
As soon as the words left Walter’s mouth, he knew they were ill chosen. But he was riding an emotional rollercoaster; he was going to make some mistakes. Besides, Mr. Sheprick was an awkward man, desensitized to awkwardness in others. So Walter decided not to call further attention to his misstep by bothering to correct it.
“Okay, Walter,” Mr. Sheprick said because there was really nothing much else to say.
Walter paused.
While his sadness had subsided, it interestingly had not been replaced by the type of joy one might expect, but by a calm but cautious type of optimism instead, an evenness that acknowledged a long road ahead.
“Get to work, Walter,” Mr. Sheprick added, flatly.
Walter stood up, nodded to Mr. Sheprick, and left the room intending to do exactly as he had been instructed.
“Hi, Walter,” Twin’s shrill voice jarred Walter from the stack of dusty, yellowing, wrinkled papers that thickened the lifeless mass that was the Wells-Bergamot file. He looked up to find Twin and Veronica standing a foot in front of his desk. He also found the rest of the office staff staring, mouths agape, at whomever or whatever it was standing in front his desk.
“What are you doing here?” Walter managed to ask, albeit in a somewhat panicked tone.
“Twin wanted to see where you worked,” explained Veronica. “So we figured we’d drop by and take you to lunch.”
Walter checked his watch. Somehow it was already nearing mid-day. He turned back to Twin and Veronica but could not quite conjure a concise or deft manner of publicly explaining why it might not have been the most prudent decision to bring Twin by the office.
“This must be Veronica!” Beau Chalmers interjected, a profound excitement in his tone.
There was so very much explanation required of Walter right now, but he could not manage even a word.
A flattered Veronica extended her hand…
“It’s nice to meet you.”
“I am Beau Chalmers,” Beau went on. “But you probably assumed as much.”
Veronica scowled and looked to Walter, who was still considering the literally countless options that might constitute his next move.
“Beau,” Beau repeated, insistent. “Beau Chalmers.”
“I’m sorry. Off the top of my head…” Veronica started.
“Walter and I are good friends. So I just figured…” Beau cut in.
“We should go,” Walter finally chose a path forward, mundane and short term though it may be.
“Walter?” Mr. Sheprick’s voice sounded as he emerged from his office. “Who is this?”
And before Walter could even attempt to divert the topic, Mr. Sheprick’s stare and approach made it all too clear that he was not referring to Veronica, but to Twin. So Walter began fumbling with yet another attempt at conjuring some sort of explanation as Mr. Sheprick came to stand right in front of Twin and extended his hand.
“That…” Walter blurted out more by reflex than will before realizing that he would need to complete the sentence with additional words. So he considered different pairings of words before resigning himself to the simplest explanation at hand, which also happened to be the truest, “…is my brother.”
Twin smiled broadly upon hearing these words, producing more of a violent, piercing grimace than what one might think of as a smile, before proudly reaching out his crooked mass of a hand and confidently shaking Mr. Sheprick’s well-formed one.
“You have a brother?” Beau Chalmers decried, the crevasse of his heartbreak expanding only wider with the shocking truth that all this time Walter not only had a brother, but that this brother was, as Beau would later term it, a “special-needs person.”
“I admire the longevity of your business, sir,” Twin began, lighting Mr. Sheprick right up. “Veronica tells me you’ve been successfully operating for more than four decades.”
Walter had never seen Mr. Sheprick light up, let alone light right up.
“Well, thank you,” Mr. Sheprick smiled. “It might not look like much, but a lot of blood, sweat, and tears went into this place. What did you say your name was, young man?”
Twin looked to Veronica.
Veronica looked to Walter.
“His name is…” Walter wracked his brain.
All he could think about was the fact that Twin would potentially be using Walter’s identity to go to business school. But no parent would name their two sons the same thing. So whatever name he picked, he wanted to make sure it was different, but not too far removed, from his own.
“His name is…” Walter started again, but still with no end to the sentence in mind. This time, however, a word escaped his mouth. A word he had not necessarily decided upon before speaking it, but a word that nevertheless fulfilled his hastily assembled internal criteria. “…Wallace.”
“Wallace Braum,” Mr. Sheprick repeated. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, sir.”
“Wallace?” Beau Chalmers repeated, as if to assure Walter that this name had absolutely never come up in their conversations.
“Wallace,” Veronica repeated as well, affirmatively, “is actually in the process of applying to business schools right now.”
“An MBA candidate,” Mr. Sheprick said, gleefully impressed. “I learned more in pursuit of my MBA than in any other single endeavor in my life.”
“Is that right?” Twin, now Wallace, asked with pro
found interest.
“It opens up possibilities to your thinking that you otherwise would not have even known existed. And it allows you to see risk as a gradient, rather than as a simple presence or absence.”
“That sounds absolutely wonderful. It is my hope that creating a broader historical and contemporary business context for myself will allow precisely those things to occur for me.”
“But you’ve got to love business,” Mr. Sheprick added.
“Oh,” Wallace explained, “it is my deepest and truest passion.”
Wallace, of course, spoke these words with a plaintive and sober yet impassioned earnestness that Walter, of course, had never personally managed to manifest into any of the countless words he had ever spoken his whole life over.
“It is so refreshing to hear that passion in the next generation,” Mr. Sheprick replied, a slight quiver in his voice and possibly the glaze of a tear in his eye. “If there’s any way in which I can help you achieve your goals, please do let me know.”
Mr. Sheprick shook his head and cast a disgusted look in Walter’s direction. “Why wouldn’t you mention this to me sooner, Walter?” he all but spat.
“I didn’t want to trouble you, sir, with…” Walter started.
“Nonsense,” Mr. Sheprick cut in. “There’s no such thing as trouble amongst true businessmen. Never trouble at all.”
“I don’t mean to pressure you, my love,” Veronica explained over lunch at Frill Café, where Walter this time ordered the smoked fish plate and Wallace ordered a French onion soup that, of course, looked even better than the smoked fish plate.
“But?” Walter expedited.
“We really do need an answer,” she stated what she thought was obvious.
“It’s just that I am scheduled to start today with my GMAT tutor for the entrance exam,” Wallace explained. “I know we’re moving sort of quickly. It just feels so right.”
“When you look at the projections in the report,” Veronica piled on, “you can see that it’s not really that big of a risk for us.”
“But…” Walter started, only to trail off. He could not bring himself to talk about the Wells-Bergamot contract and all that hinged upon it. Nor could he openly admit that his failure on this project was a distinct possibility, and subsequently so was the loss of his job. “The whole thing,” he offered instead, “makes me a bit nervous.”
Wallace reached out and placed his hand atop Walter’s.
“I don’t want to make you nervous,” Wallace said, kindly. “We will wait.”
“No,” Veronica chimed in.
“It’s okay, Veronica,” Wallace insisted.
“It’s not at all okay!” Veronica yelled. Suddenly and for the second time, the lunchtime patrons at Frill Café were all staring unkindly at Walter Braum. “This is life! Life is risk!”
“Please, Veronica,” Wallace gently prodded.
“Some risks,” Walter started in a somewhat sharp tone, hoping that his conviction would greaten the likelihood that this thought would wind up somewhere that made sense, “are quiet struggles. But those are some of the biggest motherfucking risks in the world. Because your whole life can pass you by while you’re tending to them.”
“What,” Veronica replied, “are you even talking about?”
Walter was not sure what he was talking about, exactly. But it felt like there was a kernel of something true somewhere in there. “I’m just saying,” Walter replied.
“What are you just saying, Walter?” Veronica kept right on. “Because we need an answer. And I really think you need to support your brother.”
Walter looked over to his brother who was just then taking a piping hot spoonful of soup into his jagged, damp, dark mouth. The heat of the broth as it hit his mouth caused Wallace to recoil, his lips spreading open and his tongue projecting forward as the soup poured down his chin and dripped onto the table and all over his lap while he made a sort of semi-grunting sound. By the time Walter looked back to Veronica, she was already using her napkin to wipe away the slovenly mess while Wallace bore down to ride out the pain, teary eyes blinking repeatedly as he sucked cool air in through his mouth.
Walter knew that he wasn’t going to say no to the odd little bastard and his all-but-certainly boundless future success. Saying yes to Veronica, though, required some serious self-discipline.
“I’d just like you to acknowledge that this is a risk for me. One that I’m willing to take for Wallace, but one that…”
“So you’ll do it?” Veronica cut him off before yanking Wallace out of his chair and into her overeager embrace. “He’ll do it!”
“Thank you, Walter,” Wallace struggled to say from deep within Veronica’s celebratory smother. “Your belief in me means everything.”
Walter could not help but feel a durable and significant joy at seeing Wallace so happy. A surge of pride, even, swelled in his heart that his decision had such an impact. He knew as surely as he had ever known anything that Wallace was going to crack the business world open, build it back up, and leave it reinvented and all the better. And this would be Walter’s small part in making that happen.
At the same time, Walter could not help but also feel a not insignificant amount of resentment regarding Veronica’s pure and unbridled elation over his decision. He could not remember Veronica ever hugging him like that. Not even once in all the time he had known her.
“What exactly is Wallace’s condition?” Mr. Sheprick called Walter into his office to ask not ten minutes after Walter had returned from lunch.
Walter inhaled a long, slow breath, in the hopes that in that time a good answer to this question might magically appear in his mind.
It did not.
“It’s no condition,” Walter started, yet again unsure of where his thought would end up. “That’s just…his state…of being.”
“There’s no medical explanation?”
“That just is…how it is.”
“He’s your older brother?”
“Why would you think that?”
“Relative maturity.”
“No,” said Walter, insulted. “We’re twins.”
“Twins? So that could have been you?”
“What?” said Walter, mildly indignant even though he wasn’t sure why. “No more than I could have been you.”
“Depending on different factors and whatnot, couldn’t you have developed like that just as easily as he did?” Mr. Sheprick elaborated.
“No,” Walter answered definitively even though he had no idea the plausibility of Mr. Sheprick’s hypothesis. “I mean, who knows what factors make one person different from another, let alone—?”
“Geneticists,” Mr. Sheprick interrupted plainly.
“—why we are who we are to begin with,” Walter finished his thought. “At a certain point it’s all a mystery. So…”
Walter trailed off, confident that making his point any further would have no ultimate impact upon Mr. Sheprick’s opinions on this or any other topic for that matter.
“There must be something the doctors can tell you,” Mr. Sheprick returned to his initial point of inquiry. “I have a great doctor if you’d like to meet with him.”
“That’s okay.”
“It’s not a problem. He’d be glad to help. Old friend of mine. Granted, he’s also looked up my ass, so that’s not really a friendship, per se. But you get my meaning…”
“I don’t at all,” Walter insisted, troubled not only by the mention of Mr. Sheprick’s ass, but also by the fact that in all the time that Walter had known Mr. Sheprick, the man had never before offered to assist Walter with anything, not once, big or small, until now. “But that’s okay. We decided long ago that the search for an answer would really just preclude our efforts to move forward, to live life, to grow, to learn.”
“Preclude,” Mr. Sheprick repeated. “Good word.”
“Thank you,” Walter offered. He had learned the word from Wallace, of course.
“I was thinking,” Mr. Sheprick started again, “Wallace might like to work with you on the Wells-Bergamot contract.”
“Oh, no,” Walter barked. “I’ve got this.”
The Wells-Bergamot contract was now far more than just a contract to Walter. It was a symbol. It was a gesture. It was a gift. It was his to land and, in turn, to give.
“Just as a pre-internship of sorts. I couldn’t pay him, of course. And he wouldn’t really get course credit for it as he’s not in his MBA program just yet. But I was thinking I might be able to get him a tutor in exchange for his efforts.”
“A tutor?”
“For his entrance exams. A friend of mine has a son who does this sort of work. And I’m sure he would be happy to help.”
Walter found it hard to believe that Mr. Sheprick had this many friends. Apropos of no hard evidence toward such a premise, he had always assumed a secularly ascetic lifestyle for the man, with room for little more than his family and his business.
“That’s not necessary,” Walter explained. “I think he has a tutor. And besides, I would like to handle Wells-Bergamot on my own. So compensation is really not relevant.”
“What can it hurt?”
“I would just rather…”
“He might have some really fresh ideas.”
“No thank you. I should get back to work,” Walter said, halting this conversation and choosing to assume that Mr. Sheprick had conceded every point of disagreement that had just arisen.
When Walter came home that night, dinner was on the table and ready. Wallace had found a recipe for some French pastry and he and Veronica had spent the afternoon perfecting it.
It, of course, looked delicious. As did the accompanying rack of lamb and creamed spinach side.
This all, needless to say, soured Walter’s disposition, which was already sharp given the days unexpected events.
“Mr. Sheprick seems like a delightful man,” Wallace observed through drool-y, crumb-y bits of the flaky dough. Veronica heaped deep portions onto Walter’s plate.
“He’s not,” Walter explained.
“Why do you do that, Walter?” Veronica chimed in, clearly upset.
“Do what?”
“Look critically upon everything in your life.”
“She said to Walter, critically,” Walter parried.
Veronica slammed a plate of lamb onto the table.
Walter looked to Wallace.
Wallace looked to Veronica.
Veronica looked to Wallace.
Wallace offered her a supportive, reassuring nod.
Something about their knowing glances reminded Walter of a most grave oversight on his part. An oversight that plummeted his heart into his stomach and shot Walter through with anxiety. An oversight he would need to be at least two blocks from his home to attempt to reconcile.
“Do I not tend to my responsibilities?” Walter fired, rhetorically, as he pushed his plate bitterly away and schemed his fastest way out the door.
“No one is saying that you don’t,” Veronica answered, equally sharp in tone.
“I take care of everything.”
“No, you don’t,” said Veronica.
“So who cares if I’m not fulfilled, right?” Walter went right on. “I presume that’s just a shortcoming on my part.”
Walter got up and threw his napkin down on the table beside his plate.
He then turned and left the apartment.
Veronica was tired of saying things.
So she fell silent and she let him go.
“He’s just made of different stuff,” Wallace eventually explained, sympathetically. “Not better, not worse,” Wallace added. “Just different.”
“I am so sorry,” Walter explained into his cell phone, two blocks and one step from his apartment. “I completely forgot. Veronica showed up for lunch unexpectedly and…”
“You think I want to hear about Veronica, Walter?” Eleanor fired back through the phone. Walter hoped that this disdain was perhaps revelatory of genuine feelings harbored for him.
“You need to pay me,” Eleanor added after a moment and a sigh. “Even if you don’t use the time, you need to pay me.”
Walter went numb. His heart fell from his chest, onto the ground. His mind searched for ways to prove that this was not happening.
“I really wanted to see you,” Walter explained, in complete earnest.
“I don’t care,” she barked back, coldly. “I’m a businesswoman, Walter.”
“Look, it’s not about the money,” Walter found himself saying. “I can pay. I guess I just thought that maybe we were…”
“Then pay.”
“Of course. I will. Yes. But I think this is an opportunity to maybe clarify that I’ve been wondering all this time if maybe what we have is more than…”
“Stop talking, Walter.”
Walter did.
But then he started again…
“I really like you, Eleanor.”
Eleanor had nothing to say to this.
So Walter pressed on.
“I don’t mean just…professionally. I mean that I…have affection…for you. And I don’t just mean that sweetly. I mean it…” Walter reached for a word but couldn’t conjure the one that meant what he was trying to convey, so instead he said, “I mean it with feelings. And sometimes I wonder if you might mean it with feelings, too?”
“Just pay me double next time,” Eleanor concluded and hung up the phone.
By the time Walter returned home, Veronica was in the bedroom getting changed for bed. She was walking around in nothing more than her panties, her fist-sized breasts jiggling with each step, her slightly flabby butt cheeks crescent-mooned by the bottoms of her underwear, her hair still wet from the shower.
All of these things got Walter a bit aroused. Which, in turn, gave Walter a general sense of self-loathing.
“You look nice,” Walter said, as he started changing out of his work clothes.
In immediate hindsight, he could see how this comment might have been more appropriate had Veronica actually been wearing something more than just her underwear.
“I just took a shower, Walter,” Veronica explained. “I don’t want to have sex right now.”
“I just thought,” Walter defended, “we said we would do it.” After enough silence accumulated between them to officially qualify as a lack of response, he added, “Would have sex, I mean.”
Veronica’s continued silence somehow clearly affirmed that she had completely understood his initial meaning and had not required any elaboration at all.
“What does the shower have to do with it?” Walter finally added.
“I would need to take another shower after,” Veronica snapped.
“You wouldn’t have to.”
Veronica had, by now, pulled on a loose, tattered T-shirt to sleep in.
Walter sometimes found Veronica in her bed clothes even sexier than Veronica in the nude. This time was one of those sometimes.
“Wallace thinks I’m wonderful,” Veronica explained to Walter, her tone shifting vulnerable.
Her words, or maybe it was her tone, made Walter realize that while he presently very much wanted to have sex with Veronica, he simultaneously did not want to feel particularly close to her at all. Not in a mean way. He just did not want emotional things right now. He wanted physical things. He often just wanted physical things. But Veronica more or less never really did. She always wanted Walter’s heart. Which was often much more difficult to give than Walter could stand. For Walter, sometimes loving someone meant being able to not have to feel that love all the time, as strange as that might seem to someone like Veronica. Not that he felt hate in place of the love, although maybe sometimes he did in passing moments. Resentment, too. But for the most part he just wanted to feel nothing sometimes. So he could think about other things, too. Like getting tasks done at work. Or just relaxing into lunch. Or daydreaming, even. Walter felt strongly that these things were somehow just as important to a relationship sometimes as when he did feel his love. Just because he might not actively feel something in a particular moment, it does not mean that thing does not exist. But Walter could not say this to Veronica. He was certain she would never understand him. Not that he had ever really tried to explain this to her. But this thought, once fleshed out, didn’t seem like the type of thing that would really make sense to anyone other than him, even if it did feel true.
“I don’t think that you think I’m wonderful,” Veronica elaborated upon her intended point, pulling Walter from his stream of consciousness. “You don’t tell me that you think I’m wonderful.”
In truth, it seemed much more likely to Walter that Veronica’s version of love was the correct one. It was much more straightforward than the idea that resentment and frustration were essential components of truly caring, much easier to reconcile than the notion that love means sometimes just getting naked and feeling good. Maybe Walter’s version of love was a crippled and malformed one. He didn’t know. Nor did he know how the hell a person was supposed to know such things.
“I just want you to be happy again,” Veronica pressed even further on as she sat down on the edge of the bed.
Walter understood that Veronica was simply seeking a connection with the man with whom she had spent years of her life. What Walter did not know was why he could not help but answer this perfectly reasonable desire with obfuscation.
“So I used to be happy?” Walter asked. “But now I’m not?”
Walter still cared about Veronica, but he feared that perhaps he did not really love her anymore.
He even wondered if perhaps she didn’t really love him anymore, either.
Maybe it was just as hard for her to see as it was for him.
“What are we even talking about, Walter?” Veronica seethed.
Walter noticed now that Veronica was crying. He did not recall when the tears had begun, but they were unmistakably here. And like a siren’s song, they brought Wallace hobbling in from the bedroom that used to be a storage room that they had aspired to make into an office.
“Veronica?” Wallace asked, as he limp-waddled his way up to her and pulled himself craggily up onto the bed beside her. He took her hand, symmetrical and delicate, into his, uneven and severe. His digits, not able to bend at the knuckle, caused his hand more to sit atop than really grasp hers. But there was something counter-intuitively gentle and affectionate about both the gesture and the image.
As Veronica proved unable to talk through her tears, Wallace looked to Walter and suggested…
“Maybe we should say nothing for a moment.”
Walter sighed at the presence of yet another brilliant everyday decision made by the little shit who seemed to consistently find options in the space and time of existence that would never, not even in a moment of greatest clarity, occur to Walter as possible courses of action. Silence, for example, was more or less the furthest option from Walter’s mind. At best, he might have been able to consider not saying something horrifically contrary to his own best interest, but he wasn’t even truly exploring that as an option right now. Instead, he followed the first impulse that presented itself coherently enough to seem justified, which amounted to foisting his own insecurities and suspicions regarding their current circumstances into the already confusing conversation by predicating them of Veronica instead of owning them as his own…
“Maybe Veronica just needs to say what she really means, which is that she’s miserable and she wants to end this.”
Sure enough, this accelerated Veronica’s tears, her head shaking adamantly.
Wallace took in a sharp breath as his facial features contorted into some bizarre combination of attributes that, interpreted literally, suggested a massive seizure was about to ensue. Belying this surface, however, his expression still somehow managed to convey the shocked disapproval and pained disappointment it was intended to communicate.
“Why do you do this?” Wallace asked Walter, a deep but gentle disappointment in his tone.
“Excuse me,” Walter answered imprudently before he could catch himself, “you little fucking mutant?”
“You can’t do that, Walter,” Veronica yelled.
“It’s okay, Veronica,” Wallace reassured her, climbing down from the bed. “I understand,” Wallace explained gently to Walter, “that you did not choose for me to be here. And I’m sorry that I’m an inconvenience to you. I want you to know that we care about you, Walter. But we will not tolerate your cruelty.”
“You don’t tolerate me! I tolerate you!” Walter corrected.
“Walter!” Veronica screamed. “Stop it!”
Wallace put his crooked hand up to Veronica, gently dissuading her from wasting the energy.
She fell silent.
Wallace swallowed hard, stifling the sting of Walter’s words and the tears they invoked. He took Veronica by the hand and ushered her out of the bedroom, turning back to add one last thing.
“You will look back one day soon and you will not be proud of this behavior. You will look back with hindsight and knowledge and you will be ashamed. But I want you to know that I will never give up on you, Walter. You are my brother. And that means something unbreakable.”
Walter was left in the kind of silence that most people make a lifelong practice of avoiding, if at all possible. An after-the-storm, guilt-ridden kind of silence. A nothing-else-to-think-about-but-what-I-have-done kind of silence.
But Walter refused to remain in this silence. Perhaps out of pride, perhaps out of self-preservation, perhaps out of a burgeoning sense of shame, he insisted on some sort of sound around him, even if he needed to fill it with noise himself.
So he packed up a suitcase and a bag and he left.