The End of the Book: A Novel

Chapter 13

131 13 When I brought over lunch on May 1 and my father didn’t show up at his apartment, his voice saying I might not see you tomorrow kept coming back to me. I even stepped out on the balcony and looked down toward the riverwalk , but he hadn’t jumped, no sirens were closing in, and I scolded myself for imagining he’d ever do such a thing. Headed back to work, I saw him stepping out of a cab. One foot, two foot, cane, launch. He never took taxis, so I had to ask, “Where have you been?” He paid the driver and held his hat against a swift breeze. “I sold the Mercury. Grand theft auto, more like. Those lug nuts at the used-car lot— they fleeced me, then couldn’t be bothered to ferry me home.” I was shocked by this development, but tried not to let on. “I thought driving was your new form of exercise,” I said. “They should have taken my license long ago. It says all you need to know about the State of Illinois that I’m still on the road.” “Not any more, apparently.” “That car was a needless expense. I can get around fine.” He looked bowed and pale, even thinner than usual. “I left some grape leaves and hummus in the fridge,” I said. “I can follow you up, if you’d like.” He put a shaky hand on my shoulder. “I appreciate the solicitude. Really, I do. I’ll tell you what. You can get the door. That would be a help.” So I let him into the building, and we parted ways. I felt at once relieved that my father was no longer driving and uncertain of what would come of this. At the office, I was surprised to find Dhara waiting in my bullpen. She was talking to Eddie Hartley, who sat on the edge of my desk in a greenand -yellow John Deere T-shirt and an experimental beard that made him 132 look like a shepherd in a seventh-grade nativity play. “Lord Byron,” he said. “We’ve been looking for you. Late lunch?” “I get my work done.” I usually put up with his banter, but the very sight of him, his bony ass on my desk, his Red Wing boots kicked up on my chair, made my eyes sting. “Do you mind?” I said, and he hopped down, his uncapped curls flopping over his brow. “You should be thanking me.” Eddie jiggled the mouse on my desk, and the screen stayed blank. “You left your computer on, dude. Less of a gentleman might have switched your keyboard language to Icelandic or dragged porn sites into your startup menu. I shut you down to protect you from sinister forces.” “I’d like to think my team members are more mature than that.” “Who are you kidding?” Eddie said. “Every workplace is a den of pranksters . No one’s above the fray. In the Oval Office, at this very moment, the president of the United States is sitting on a whoopee cushion.” I turned to Dhara, and was happy to see that she wasn’t smiling. Perhaps the puckish charms of the engineering manager had finally worn thin. “I’ll leave you two alone,” Eddie said. Then he bent down a little so he and Dhara were eye to eye, and in the most earnest voice, as if he were playing two characters and had just done a quick costume switch, he asked, “Are you sure you’re okay?” Dhara nodded. “I’m fine. I’ll get over it.” After Eddie disappeared, I asked what was wrong. “So much for Silicon Valley,” Dhara said. Her eyes were red and she was sniffling. I could count on one hand the number of times I’d seen her cry. “I didn’t even make the short list. I came back from lunch to an e-mail: three lines, from the marketing manager’s secretary.” “I’m sorry, honey. I’m stunned.” In fact, I could hardly believe that one of the stars of our office had been shut out so soon. “Maybe we should go to the snuggle room,” she said. “I don’t want people to see me like this.” The snuggle room was the only secluded spot in the office—the joke was that if you were searching Imego and wanted privacy, this was the last refuge. Around the corner from...