by Jason Murphy
Abuela dropped the box. Clark caught it before it hit the floor. The men from the shadows emerged, lifted the old woman from her chair, and disappeared down a back hallway.
Clark scratched the price tag from the box with his fingernail. Pain lanced through his back.
The emu. It pecked at him. It pecked at everything.
Someone threw a plate of fajitas at it. It bellowed in defiance.
Clark hunched his shoulders and ducked his head, trying to protect his face.
Marissa sprinted past him, ducking a chair swung by a bloodied waiter.
But the emu was faster.
With a single strike, it took Marissa’s right eye.
She didn’t make a sound. Her legs went out from under her. Her hands flew up over the bloody socket. She hit the floor on her back, head cracking on the tiles.
“Holy fuck!” Clark said.
The emu towered over them both, twitching, murderous, and cocaine-crazy. Clark held the humidor up to shield his face, Abuela’s immortality be damned.
Something crunched. The emu squawked once, a wet, choking sound. When Clark dared to open his eyes, Rodrigo was there, his fingers wrapped around the thing’s limp neck. Marissa’s mangled eyeball sloughed out of its mouth and splatted on the floor. The bodyguard dropped the bird’s corpse.
At his feet, Marissa whimpered. Blood trickled from between her fingers.
“Well, those gloves are ruined,” Clark thought.
Marco Cabrera crossed the room in a few strides, hulking, burning with rage. He booted the dead bird. Its carcass slid across the floor into a pile of folding chairs.
“Baby. Baby. Baby,” he said as he scooped up his daughter and raced out of the room.
And it was quiet.
Clark was on the floor, curled into a ball with the Habbanatu Serratum held close to his chest. Rodrigo looked down at him. His expression never changed. Flat. Cold.
Rodrigo nodded at the box. “I played an Elven Ranger.”
He wiped his hands on a cloth napkin, dropped it, and left the mighty Vandermeer the Mystic, master of the occult, cowering on the floor.
Clark scrambled. Down the hallway, he pinballed off walls, dodging panicking servants and fleeing family. He went up the stairs, tripping and stumbling in his hurry.
He grabbed the bags from the closet.
Onto the roof.
Drop down into the garden.
Across the lawn, behind the hedges.
And over the western fence.
***
REZ
All human interaction can be condensed into an email. And when Marianne Reznicek was declared god-queen of the known universe, that was going to be the rule: Put it in an email.
No small talk. No family dinners, and for God’s sake, no weekly sales meetings. No drilling down from a high level into a deep dive. No need for Rez to put on makeup, shave her legs, or fix her hair. No fake smiles. or learn to use their weird, double-speak dialects.
Just send an email.
Not a conversation. Not a phone call. Just an email.
Over email, Rez’s boss couldn’t smell the tequila on her breath. She popped another Altoid. It didn’t help.
Bat your eyes. Take notes. Laugh at their stupid jokes. Speak the native tongue.
Rez looked up and down the row. Cubicle after cubicle, bodies hunched over desks, microphone headsets tethering them to their phones. Colleagues recited hollow platitudes to customers while browsing shoes or watching cat videos.
She snuck a sniff of her wrist. Yup. Tequila, coming out of her pores. Not even the good stuff. It was always the cheap shit that decided to stick around.
From her drawer, Rez pulled out the emergency lotion. Coconut mango. Slathered on her hands and dabbed on her neck, the tropical aroma drew stares up and down the aisle. That ought to do the trick.
Rez looked out over the second floor of Balefire, Incorporated. There were many hells like it, but this was hers. Tiny gray coffins with squeaking gray chairs. Gray phones. Gray laptops. Gray half-walls, just high enough to tack up a tasteful picture of your dog or alma mater, but not so high that the person on the other side couldn’t see you sniff yourself for tequila-whiff.
On the third floor, the cubicles were full height. No offices, of course. No doors, but cubicles with walls, the peak of luxury. Or so she heard. She wasn’t allowed up to the third floor. That was for Tier Three representatives only. Tier Three had not only a breakroom, but a lounge with a Ping Pong table and Ms. Pac-Man. Tier Two representatives lost the microwave in the breakroom after someone zapped some tuna.
Rez had a big red X on her permanent record from calling Lucas a sniveling ass-goblin. Management laughed because it was true. Lucas was a sniveling ass-goblin. But still. She was a woman and not supposed to be funny. If you tried to be funny, you were weird. If you were assertive, you were a bitch. If you dressed nicely, you were clearly fucking your way to the top. So Rez remained at Tier Two, with the same squeaking chair and the same flickering fluorescent lights on the same row as the sniveling ass-goblin, Lucas.
A red flag popped up in her inbox. Euclid. Any emails from Euclid were flagged. Euclid was Rez’s ticket out of here. They were a whale account, big spenders with fat margins, so they got the white-glove treatment. Praise from Euclid would override her big red X, and boom! She’d be up to Tier Three with a blast of holy trumpets and the angelic host singing Who Let the Dogs Out?
Euclid wasn’t even her account—not technically. It was Brenda’s, but Brenda had had an incident, so Rez stepped in.
“Get out of my chair!”
Rez nearly jumped out of her pantsuit. Brenda was having another fit. Another episode. At the end of the row, she hovered over Lucas, her face twisted into haggard rage.
“It’s my fucking chair, Lucas!”
She jabbed a bony finger at his monitor. The image flickered. In her defense, it was a nice chair. While the rest of them put in fruitless requests for chairs that wouldn’t twist their spines into sclerotic knots, Brenda had a fancy chair. Then she had her incident. Lucas claimed her chair and Bluetooth mouse. He didn’t waste a moment to pick clean the bones.
Lucas turned to Stu, the doughy lifer across the aisle, instead. “Is it cold in here?” Lucas asked. “I’m cold.”
Stu snorted. “Pussy. God, you’re like a woman.”
“Fuck you, bro.”
They laughed into their spreadsheets and inboxes.
Ass-goblins. Both of them.
“The chair is ergonomic!” Brenda screamed.
A reminder popped up on Rez’s screen. 11 a.m. one-on-one with Wayne. She throttled the quick burst of adrenaline that followed. An interview. She could charm this asshole. She was queen bitch of this goddamn mountain, and Euclid belonged to her now.
Bat your eyes. Take notes. Laugh at their stupid jokes. Speak the native tongue.
She popped two more Altoids, checked her makeup, and strode through the camp of ass-goblins like the Valkyrie she was.
***
Wayne’s lips were moving. He smiled, showing off his gleaming caps. He leaned in and nodded. Rez wasn’t listening. The blood rushing in her ears was a freight train.
The letter opener on the desk—who the fuck has a letter opener anymore?—could go right into his neck. The mess would spurt all over his shitty tie and silk shirt.
If she rammed his chair at the right angle and hit him just hard enough, he’d crash through the window. He probably wouldn’t die from two stories up, but things would be shitty for him for a very long time.
Her fingers. That was the thought she couldn’t shake. Her fingers, right through his eyes, the soft path to the brain. He’d probably squeal.
Meetings turned her mind to murder. Brutally efficient and sexy as all fuck John Wick-style murder.
We’re going to need to get buy-in from their IT department near one-hundred percent, team.
John Wick. Right in his throat.
How’s it going, Wayne? Oh, you
know. Just another day in paradise.
John Wick. Broken wrist. Snapped femur.
How was your weekend, buddy? Aw, man. Livin’ the dream!
John Wick to the testicles.
And now, the spirit of John Wick was strong within her. Murder wasn’t a big deal, not like the true crime shows said. Death wasn’t the end. She knew that quite well. Life was a privilege. And right now, Wayne had way too much privilege.
“We really appreciate your focus and commitment to the team, Marianne,” Wayne said, smiling like he was selling her a gently used Volvo. “I know this status quo is net-new to everyone. Do you have any questions for me?”
The freight train roar quieted enough for her to speak.
“Oh. Lots,” she said.
“Shoot,” Wayne said. He propped up his feet to reveal playful socks. Way to fight the corporate system with your flamingos, Wayne.
Rez swallowed her scream. “So even though I’ve been working with Euclid since—”
“Since Brenda had her episode.”
“Is that what we’re calling it? An episode? Really?”
He straightened in his seat and cleared his throat. ‘Well, I try not to get involved in people’s personal—”
“An episode that Lucas caused.”
“Now Marianne, I thought we agreed that this kind of discussion was bringing down the team. Just a friendly reminder—we need you to be an ambassador for Balefire. Best foot forward, every day.”
Rez bit her lip. She couldn’t conjure a sentence that didn’t begin with fuck.
“You’re right,” Wayne said, and the plastic smile returned. “Your work with Euclid has been outstanding, and they have nothing but great things to say about you. But you know we’re a family here, right? We work hard and we play hard. But you really don’t play well with others. You know what I’m saying, don’t you?”
His voice was playful, like he was convincing the table to splurge on mozzarella sticks.
What the hell? And bring us some nachos, too! The training wheels are off, folks! Devil may care!
“Sure,” Rez managed to say. “I just don’t—”
“You could be a little friendlier. Get to know everyone. Work on your soft skills.”
The freight train was coming back. Rez shifted in her seat.
Wayne leaned in. His smile didn’t falter, but his eyes darkened. “I’ve always been impressed by you, Marianne. You’re so put together. You’re a really promising member of the team. If you ever need some one-on-one mentoring, my door is always open.”
The freight train was howling. John Wick was the conductor.
“Why don’t you come out for drinks with us? It would be real classy if you showed up to celebrate Lucas getting the Euclid account. Work hard, play hard. And I know you like to play hard, right?”
Was this happening? Surely, she was crazy. She hadn’t heard him right. She’d misinterpreted.
“I mean, you’ve come in hungover like twice in the last month, right? I’m not judging. It hasn’t affected your work, so … play hard, darlin.’”
Wrong, Wayne. So wrong. It was way more than twice.
“I have plans tonight, unfortunately,” she said with a tight smile that no one would have mistaken for anything but a warning sign.
“Too busy to go out drinking with us?”
“Yeah.”
“Doing what?”
“Drinking.”
Wayne’s smile shattered. He took it in, nodded, and stood. “Okay then. Why don’t you get the Euclid quarterly report to Lucas? With offloading this account, I’m sure you’ve got the bandwidth.”
The faintest smile, slim as a razor.
“Thanks for coming in. We’ll circle back on this tomorrow. Feel free to ping me if you have any questions.”
Rez’s own smile spread, a white-hot mania burning behind it. “Sure! I’m going to do everything I can to make this transition as seamless as possible. Euclid is going to be our number-one fan, Wayne!”
Wayne stepped back behind his desk, trying to put it between him and Rez’s murder-smile. He nervously fiddled with his pen and mumbled, “Thanks.”
But Rez was gone, striding back through the gray sea.
What am I drinking tonight, Wayne? Blood. I’m drinking motherfucking blood!
***
The machine-gun fire of Rez’s fingers at the keyboard drew stares up and down the aisle, and that was just fine. Let them all know she was mad. But she kept smiling. It was wholly unconvincing, full of teeth and spite, and in moments, the gawkers stopped poking their heads over the cubicle walls. They slunk back to their desks and only cast furtive glances her way.
The login to the Euclid account blinked red. The password didn’t work. Rez tried it again. Red. She double-checked the Post-it Note Brenda left under her keyboard. Still red. She stopped smiling.
Lucas was there, right over her shoulder, leering.
“Yeah, I went ahead and changed the login,” he said.
John.
Wick.
Rez summoned her smile. “Okay. Great. Can you just log me in for a second so I can get you the quarterlies? It will just take a moment. Then you can start kicking ass, like I know you will.”
He arched an eyebrow then shrugged. “Sorry. You know we can’t share passwords. Company policy.”
Her teeth squeaked as they ground. “Well, if I can’t get access to their reports, I’ll have to do it manually and that—”
Lucas nodded in mock sincerity. “That would take all night. Yeah. Sorry about that. But I’m going to need that report so I can hit the ground running with them for the con call I’ve got tomorrow morning. Thanks, Reznicek. You’re a boss.”
He winked at her and strolled back to his desk. Stu chuckled to himself. The two of them strutted away to get coffee or jerk each other off in the parking lot.
A few years ago, Rez had taken a Krav Maga class. The gym or dojo or whatever they called it smelled like feet, and she started to worry about getting a staph infection from the mats, so she quit going after a few months, but now she found her hands twitching as she mentally rehearsed the moves.
Throat. Knee. Groin. As he goes down, she helps his skull meet the edge of the desk. Then she makes Stu clean up his brains.
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. In through the nose, out through the mouth. Each fingertip, one after another, touched to her thumb. Breathe in. Breathe out. Her therapist had given her the tools. Use meditation and yoga instead of booze and murder fantasies. She could do this. This shit didn’t matter. It was a paycheck. It helped her buy nice things and go to nice places where ass-goblins didn’t roam free. Breathe in. Breathe out.
A notification popped up on her screen with a ding! It was a calendar invitation for tomorrow morning, from Wayne.
A performance review.
The next exhalation hissed between her clenched teeth. More stares from up and down the row. A performance review in the middle of the quarter? That was never good news. That was never a raise or a Chili’s gift card. That meant getting put on an improvement plan or packing your shit in a box.
And there it was. The trap was set. Compiling the quarterly report was going to take all night. If she didn’t have it, they’d use that against her during the performance review tomorrow.
Rez stood up so fast her chair flew back and smacked into the empty desk behind her, Brenda’s desk. She stormed off, blasting down the aisle. Her coworkers ducked their heads as she passed. The breakroom. The snack machine. Into traffic. It didn’t matter. She just had to walk. After a moment of blind pacing, she found herself in a ghost town of empty cubicles where she could be alone. Was this what happened to Brenda? They fucked with her so much she wandered off into a quiet corner for her brain to explode? Rez gripped the edge of the desk until her fingers ached.
In through her nose. Out through her mouth.
All her therapist’s advice came flooding back to her, lost in the noise of volcanic rage.
/> A body scan. Focus on your toes, Marianne. How do you toes feel? Work your way up. Concentrate. Breathe. Now how does your foot feel? Your ankle. Your calf. Keep working your way up. Breathe.
Motherfuckers.
Listen to the sounds around you. What do you hear? The air conditioner, recycling the stale stink of the cubicles all across the floor. The muted beeping of phones ringing. The soft clicking of a hundred keyboards.
From two aisles over, Rez heard her name, snapping her out of her reverie. The voices were soft and conspiratorial. She followed the sound and kept her head down.
Around the corner, huddled near the coffee maker, were Lucas, Stu, and Wayne: smirks and khakis, department store polos, and bad tennis shoes. They snickered to each other as Rez leaned in to listen.
“What did she say?” Wayne asked.
“She acted straight up crazy,” Lucas said.
“Yeah,” Stu said, “she’s nuts. She looks like she’s about to go off.”
“You ready to hit the lake?” Lucas asked Wayne.
Wayne nodded, self-satisfied. “Oh yeah. And before we have to let her go, we’re going to get her on that boat. In a bikini.”
Fist bumps. High fives. Smug laughter.
The freight train was back. The world ground to a halt. There was nothing else. Just the roar. Her legs were locked. Her face hurt. The only thing that moved was her mouth, opening and closing without a sound.
Something moved behind her.
Rez jumped upright and stifled a gasp.
Brenda pushed her ergonomic chair down the aisle. Rez stepped aside to let her pass.
Brenda scowled at no one in particular as she absconded with the chair. “It’s my chair.”
***
Rez did her best to take the pain away. A bottle of ibuprofen. Lots of coffee, the nice stuff, a hazelnut blend. Whole-grain fig bars and other healthy snacks. A little chocolate for when things got dire. Some downtempo beats to keep her blood from boiling.
None of it worked. Compiling a quarterly report manually was a brain-scrambling exercise in tedium. After the first three hours, the cells of the spreadsheet blurred together. At hour five, she caught herself repeating work she’d already done. At hour seven, she’d catch herself just staring at the screen, her brain switched to rest mode.
