"9-5"

There exists a time of night—in unassuming cities, in high suites—when the glass windows are black, and the cool fluorescent light from fifteen feet above takes away all sense of time passing, and everything aches with the glow. It gets deeply silent. You realize you are in a pocket of something… not so warm as eternity, not so grand as forever. Maybe just the opposite; maybe there is a set of hands on the back of the clock. That time of night, there might never be another morning. There might never have even been a dusk. The world becomes fully contained in the vast subway car of the room, with its green velvet couch and flat surfaces, and squares. You find yourself reminded of semi-formed childhood memories, incidents when you were still tiny enough to be carted around on your mother’s shoulder, maybe some random night—there was a telephone call, she had to pick him up, she couldn’t leave you alone. And so she popped the cotton cap over your soft head, grabbed her keys and drove to some office where your father had been working overtime plus. Car dealership lights; that’s what these are, fifteen feet over my head. And it must be nearing two-ay-em, but it feels like this night is never, ever going to cease.

The hangover is not a hangover. It is not the coke sputtering out, either; I rode that particular wave down before midnight. Maybe it’s the blood loss? Oh, you think? A lagoon has formed on the tiles, which are off-white and black. And red all over. But no, no… He made damned sure I was active before he left, or at least tracking toward transformation.

I had a wife, once. How many losers and psychopaths have milked that little factoid about their lives? There is no life to this town—we are all morticians, and the floor-to-ceiling windows let you look the corpse over. There are so few lights to see…

Nothing bad happened to my wife, by the way; she packed the dog when the drug moved in, and left when the entourage arrived. That was the crowning achievement of my 1986, and one year later I am essentially dead. Hold the lilies and luncheons, though. This is only my first step to recovery.

The v—the devil who bandaged my canary’s wing goes by the name of Tobias Lofton, president and founder of SolTech Industries. He has a Spanish air about him, by which I mean he hails from Madrid. My corporation officially sold itself into his loving, tender care four months ago; my corporation, which he proceeded to suck dry of all its former identity, used to manufacture mirrors for General Motors. Anytime you looked behind you, we were there, closer than we appeared. Ha.

Then Lofton swooped down in that ghost-white Learjet, with his hypnotizing accent and Shakespearean goatee. He partied with us, brought his entourage along, sharing the spoils of his international war on Other People’s Profits. Papers were signed, strippers were paid, and mid-grade cabernet flowed like tokens from the loosest slots in Vegas.

Right now, as I gaze across myself sprawled on the counter here, sitting awkwardly, half-in the kitchenette sink, it still makes the same sort of perfect sense that earned my CEO’s signature on the death warrant. Did we know we were cattle? Do you think cattle know that they’re cattle? And this… tick… on our ear, this tick that turned out to be a monster from the underworld, how long did he stalk us? How much due diligence would have satisfied him, this being who leaves nothing up to chance, who has nothing left to fear and no watch to wind any longer? I wish he had at least explained that to me. My corporation was probably just a midnight snack, but hey—he set me up for life, so maybe I should quit my crying.

My shredded chest and splintered sternum are putting themselves back together again. I wish I could videotape this; give a copy to my doctor as a farewell present. My health insurer, too. They’ll never see another dime of mine. In about… oh, another hour… my eyeteeth will fall out, and the new ones will grow in, the retractable ones. Lofton said to prepare myself for the first time I use the bathroom—what I see in the mirror won’t be what everyone else is seeing. He emphasized that I should keep a photograph of myself somewhere secure, like in a safe deposit box. Many copies, he said, in many different boxes. Then he said, with the most haunted facial expression I have ever seen, that he wishes someone had invented cameras when he was young. From the way he spoke, I guess I reminded him of himself, or at least of what he can remember.

Despite my earlier ruminations, there are no hands on the back of the clock. Lofton said swaddling myself in enough blankets and sheets ought to hold me until sundown, until I can make better arrangements. Then he will return, with his entourage, and we will speak of the future in the language of sharks.

I wish my ex-wife could see me now. She will, soon, probably on television. I never imagined I would have a “rise to fame”, but he swears it will come, and not just as a face. Real power. I am climbing the Jacob’s ladder—or at least walking the rungs of its shadow. They are leading me toward seven figures. Do you hear me? Seven figures! And I am going to make partner, baby, if it’s the last thing I do.