The Ask

by Sam Lipsyte

  "That's what she is."

  "It's the end of us, Charles."

  "I'm doing fine, Milo."

  "Didn't Adorno say that to write think pieces for mainstream magazines after Auschwitz is barbaric?"

  "No, he didn't."

  "What about Schopenhauer?"

  "What about him?"

  "Give me the capsule."

  "The what?"

  "The takeaway."

  "Pardon?"

  "You're not the enemy, Charles, but fuck you."

  "You're incredibly drunk."

  "To tell you the truth, I'm not even clear on whether I'm standing up or sitting down right now."

  "Then maybe you should sit down."

  "No," I said. "I think that would be a bad idea."

  Twenty-seven

  That sleeper fiend, my hangover, had given notice at the smelting plant, deposited his family under the floorboards of his garden shed. He stood over me now in Claudia and Francine's guest room, his eyes fish-dead behind the barrel of his skull-mulching gun.

  "Please don't shoot," I moaned.

  "It's nothing personal."

  "But why?"

  "Why what?"

  "Why are you here?"

  "You sent for me."

  "I did?"

  "You're an alcoholic."

  "No," I said, "I'm just a heavy drinker."

  "Maybe," said my assassin, "but who's got the gun?"

  I stood dazed in the shower for forty minutes, half dozing, half soaped, loosed wet, scorching farts, muttered things like "Christ," and "swill," and "malaise." When I'd wasted enough water to hydrate an Eritrean village for a year, I remembered the climax of the previous evening, the appearance of Don, his truncated challenge, those stylish goons under stern Floridian command, Michael Florida himself hauling Don out, and to where, exactly? Worry got me onto the rose-embroidered bath mat and into my clothes. I called Don's cell and left a message. I called Purdy's cell and left a message. I texted Purdy to find out if he had gotten my message. Then I staggered over to Claudia's wicker lounger and collapsed.

  Later, misery beaten back into temporary cover with a pot of coffee and some Valium from Francine's dresser, I made my way to Jackson Heights, stabbed Don's buzzer, sat on the stoop to wait. A basement door banged open and a young guy in a basketball jersey stepped out.

  "Hey," I said.

  The man waved.

  "Nabeel?"

  "Do I know you?"

  "No. My friend lives here. Said your name once."

  "Oh, yeah? Why did he say my name?"

  "Just talking is all. Telling me about the crazy boiler."

  "The boiler."

  "Yeah," I said. "So, you like basketball?"

  "Basketball?"

  "Your shirt."

  "Shit, man, it's a shirt. Not a statement."

  "Sorry, just making conversation."

  "Don't do that. And why are you smiling? You stick out. You see anybody smiling around here?"

  Nearby an old lady in a calico dress knelt on the sidewalk, slid a dog turd into a Ziploc bag. Though maybe it was some other order of turd, as I saw no dog.

  "No," I said. "I don't."

  "I rest my case."

  It was not clear to me what, for this kid, constituted a case.

  "I'm waiting for a buddy of mine," I said. "Seen him?"

  "How would I know if I'd seen him?"

  "You'd know," I said. "He's got metal legs."

  "Sure he's your friend?" said the man.

  "What do you mean?"

  "The guys here last night, they said they were his friends. Don's been pretty quiet. Suddenly he has a lot of friends."

  "Who was here last night?"

  "Like I said, some guys."

  "Have you seen Don today?"

  "No."

  "Let me into the building, I need to see him. You can come with me. I need to see that he's okay."

  "I can't do that. My uncle would be pissed."

  "Please," I said.

  "I can't do it."

  "How much can you not do it for?" I said.

  "I can't do it for between one and fifty-nine dollars."

  I slid three twenties from my wallet.

  "Here."

  We climbed through the hot stink of the stairwell.

  "Don," said Nabeel, knocked hard on the door. "Don!"

  The way he called the name, the intimacy of tone, made me wonder if they'd talked some, if Don had told him anything about Purdy.

  "You ever rap to Don about his life?"

  "Rap? What kind of word is that? Are you a cop?"

  "No."

  "So why are you asking this stuff? It's weird."

  "I just want to help Don," I said. "Did he tell you anything?"

  "Don invited me up for beers a few times."

  "Did you talk about anything?"

  "We talked about pussy. Maybe he said something about the war a few times. But really we talked about pussy. We had good talks. We each had our insights, you know? So, what's the deal?"

  "Pardon?"

  We stood there for a moment, silent. A TV roared, a toilet flushed, somebody maybe dragged a child into a room.

  "Open the door," I said.

  "I don't have the key."

  "Of course you do. He could be OD'd in there."

  "If he's dead, he's dead."

  "He could be alive. People hold on for hours. A day, even. But nobody comes. Open the fucking door."

  "Okay," said Nabeel.

  Then the door swung open and Don stood before us, his pants held up in his fist.

  "Milo," he said. "Come on in. I'm just finishing up a shit. Make yourself at home. Nabeel, you're welcome, too."

  "No, I should go," said Nabeel.

  I followed Don into the apartment. He slipped back into the bathroom, shut the door. The room looked brighter and bigger than last time, the red drapes heaped on the floor, the apartment stripped. He had never owned much, but now he was down to the card table, one folding chair, a saucepan, some smudged water glasses, a spoon. Papers lay curled under the radiator. I picked one up, a pencil sketch, a fairly good one, of a World War One-era military officer with a bushy mustache, his legs sheathed in shiny black boots. Phone numbers and email addresses and odd bits of math sprouted in the spaces around and between the soldier's thighs. One number was circled, the same figure I'd seen on the cashier's check in Lee Moss's office.

  I picked up the spoon, saw burn marks on it, heard Don's girls creak on the floor behind me.

  "Could have used that spoon in the john just now. Colon needs a serious scooping."

  "Thank you for not sharing," I said.

  Don flopped on the bed. "We're going to scoop shit and we're going to cook dope," he said. "The trick is to use different spoons."

  "The teachings of Lee Moss," I said.

  "That dude," said Don.

  We sat in silence for a moment.

  "So," said Don, "did you come here to tell me what a fool I was last night? Because I already know. Some others from your crew have already been by. It's all been explained."

  "They're not my crew."

  "Oh, no? Well, I don't care anymore. I'm leaving this goddamn city."

  "To go where. Pangburn Falls?"

  "That's right, Bangburn Balls, baby."

  "Don, there could be more for you in life than that."

  "Than what?"

  Don stared at me, tapped his knuckles on the wall behind his head.

  "I don't know," I said.

  "No, you don't. Why would you even say that kind of thing? Did it ever occur to you that unless you have money, every place is equally shitty? You know, those guys, my father, they just wanted to pay me some money to shut me up. Like hell I'll take it, but at least it's understandable. It's scumbags of one breed dealing with a scumbag of another. But you, what are you about? What are you selling? Or are you buying?"

  "I've never been clear on that."

  "Don't work it out on me. And
don't try to humanize me, you fuck. It's insulting. Why did you come here?"

  "I wanted to make sure you were okay."

  "I'm never going to be okay. Now leave, leech."

  Back at the Mediocre suite, I slouched at my workstation and wondered how I'd gone so wrong. Where was my dignity? Also, where was my computer? I noticed now that my workstation lacked its primary instrument of work. The telephone looked forlorn by itself on the desk. I slid a pad and some pencils beside it, wrote: "Ask about your computer. And ask for more Post-Its. It's your time."

  Horace walked by, hummed the theme song from a TV show canceled before his birth. I remembered the show, my devastation at its demise. It was maybe the first time I understood there were powerful people far away who could destroy your world without even knowing it.

  "Milo, toosh dev warrior king, what's the fine word?"

  "Hi, Horace," I said. "Where's my computer?"

  "Repair guy took it to fix."

  "Why couldn't he fix it here? And it wasn't broken. Who told him it was broken?"

  "Calm down. Afraid he'll find the naughty stuff?"

  "I wouldn't be dumb enough to use an office computer," I said.

  "Me," said Horace, "I've got the whole system beat."

  "How's that?"

  "I'm back to actual magazines. Keep some in my desk, even. Who would ever bother to look? My hard drive is pristine. Not a dirty cookie in sight. I jerk it in the men's room with real glossy stock on my knees. Like my father, and his father before him."

  "That's very clever," I said.

  "If a vengeful theocracy took over this country tomorrow, they'd have nothing on me. Probably put me on the morals squad."

  Horace walked off and I picked up my desk phone, dialed.

  "Greetings. You have reached the voice mail of the Unknown Soldier. Please leave a massage. Happy endings preferred."

  I'm not sure what I meant to say. I hung there in silence, waited for something unleechlike to arrive.

  "Savitsky," I said. "The officer with the boots in the story your mother liked. His name was Savitsky. It's from a story by Isaac Babel. I read it in a literature class in college. Maybe your mother read it there, too. Goodbye, Don. Take care."

  And that was, somehow, officially, that.

  Just as I hung up the phone it rang again.

  "Don?"

  "Milo?"

  "Vargina."

  "Do you have a minute?"

  "Sure."

  "Conference room."

  It occurred to me that calling from the Mediocre line was probably not wise. I'd only just found out six months ago there were surveillance cameras in the suite, and only after Horace directed a sieg heil toward a drilled hole in the ceiling tiles, received an email reprimand a week later. Maybe they tapped our phones, too. I'd always scoffed at conspiracy hobbyists, paranoid stylists. The corporate complex wasn't organized enough for master plans, I'd argue. We're all just flawed people with our flawed systems. But things had seemed rather organized in recent years. You had to wonder. Maybe the leaders of the global elite did all have secret lizard heads. Maybe my mother had a secret lizard head.

  A whole trove of cockamamie theories deserved another look. Perhaps, for example, Lena had told me I was only moderately talented because she felt compelled to speak the truth. Maybe Maura still desired me but for her own sanity could stay in our marriage only if I chose to confront my rage and resentment. There was even a chance happiness had something to do with acceptance, and something to do with love.

  No, this was ridiculous. These notions were all part of the trick, the scam. The asks had me nailed from the get-go, ever since they installed the selfware, back in Milo Year Zero. That's how the whole long con got started.

  The conference room felt smaller than it had on my coronation the day before. A berry spritzer tallboy sat half collapsed on the conference table.

  Another dented can.

  Somehow Vargina and I ended up seated beside each other, the way some couples arrange themselves in restaurants. I'd never understood the appeal, though now I wondered if Maura and I should have given it a whirl. Maybe it granted you a whole new perspective on coupledom, or at least served as a welcome breather from having to look each other in the eye, glimpse all that mutilated hope.

  Vargina re-angled her chair.

  "This is weird," she said.

  "You mean how we're sitting?"

  "No, what I need to tell you. Your computer isn't broken, Milo."

  "That's what I was trying to tell Horace. I was just thinking that…"

  The truth sank in as I spoke. I tried my best to resemble a man in whom the truth had just been sunk, to the hilt. I owed Vargina that much, if only for elevating this encounter with use of the conference room.

  "I'm fired again," I said.

  "This time there's severance."

  "Why? Why now?"

  "I don't know the full story, Milo. Call came in from Cooley about it. Your absence was necessary for certain things to go forward."

  "That's a nice way of putting it."

  "I'm a craftswoman. And don't feel too bad. Sometime next month there's going to be a big bloodletting. Our endowment is in worse shape than anybody will admit."

  "So, I'd be fired in a month anyway?"

  "Probably."

  "I can't do this anymore," I said.

  "That's what we're saying."

  "Sleep tight, you world, you motherfucker."

  "Are you finished?"

  "Yes," I said.

  "You'll be okay, Milo," said Vargina. "Here."

  Vargina pushed an index card across the table. It was a recipe for egg salad.

  "I watched my husband make it. He can never know. Nobody can ever know."

  "Thank you, Vargina."

  "No more turkey wraps, Milo. They're gross."

  "I see that now," I said.

  Twenty-eight

  I still had the key to the life I'd been evicted from, and the next morning I took the train out to Astoria, let myself into the apartment. Life was doing fine without me. There was Maura, jabbing at her laptop, always this, the work before work. It wasn't her fault. It was how they had us. There was Bernie on the sofa, watching his favorite show, the one where children mutated into gooey robots, sneered. It was like a parable from a religion based entirely on sarcasm. I'd seen the program before, tried to ban it. But there was no banning it. This wasn't China. This was dead America. If Bernie lucked out, he'd only be as warped as Horace. I could live with that. Assuming I could live.

  "Bernie," said Maura. "Put on your velcros. Daddy's taking you to school. I'll see you at pickup."

  There were not too many school days left. It would be another summer on Christine's concrete apron: blood and corn dogs.

  I gathered up Bernie's sandals, slipped them on his feet.

  "I want to see this show," he said. "Daddy, are you crying?"

  "I have something in my eye," I said.

  "Both eyes?"

  "Yes, Bernie."

  I walked into the bedroom, threw a few things into a knapsack. I took the money Purdy had given me, peeled off some for my wallet, wadded up the rest with a rubber band.

  I dropped the wad next to Maura's laptop.

  "What's this?"

  "I don't know," I said. "Child support?"

  "Do you need to be so dramatic? This is still your home. We're still your family. We're in a rough patch. We're taking a break."

  "Rough patch? That's kind of a worn image, isn't it? I'm not sure what it means. Is it a driving thing? We're driving over a patch that's rough? Or is it like a patch on your coat? A smooth coat except for this little rough flap you ironed over a rip in the elbow? Or maybe the elbow skin is rough. Remember that time you said my elbow skin was like an elephant's? Is that what this is about? Is that what it's always fucking been about?"

  "Language," said Maura.

  "Indoor voice," said Bernie.

  "Let's just patch up this rough patch now,
" I said. "I can't take this anymore. I want us all together."

  "You seem really strung out, Milo. You need some rest. Aren't you getting rest at your mother's house?"

  "Yeah," I said. "Nothing but rest."

  I walked Bernie down Ditmars toward his new school. His little hand slid around in my palm.

  "Daddy, are you sick?"

  "No, I'm fine. Why?"

  "You look funny."

  "I'm just tired."

  We passed a souvlaki cart and just beyond it a man with a chapped face slept sitting up on a bus bench. A pint of gin stuck out of his sweatpants.

  "That's Larry!" said Bernie. "He must be back from Elmira. I wonder if Aiden knows."

  I pushed Bernie past the bench.

  "Bernie," I said. "I want you to be a good boy."

  "Why?"

  "Why what?"

  "Why do you want me to be a good boy?"

  "Because that's the best thing to be."

  "That's stupid."

  I took a knee on the sidewalk, clasped Bernie by the shoulders. I'd seen fathers kneel like this in movies, standard posture for the rushed essentials, the Polonius rundown. A little too in love with itself, Don might judge this moment, but that didn't diminish its necessity. Bernie might not understand what I told him today, but he would carry the words with him forever, and with them, me.

  "Listen," I said.

  "Yes, Daddy?"

  "Squander it. Always squander it. Give it all away."

  "Give what away? My toys?"

  "No, yes, sure, your toys, too. Whatever it is. Squander it. Do you understand?"

  "Not really."

  "Don't save a little part of you inside yourself. Not even a scrap. It gets tainted in there. It rots."

  "What does?"

  "I can't explain right now. Someday you'll know. But promise me you'll squander it."

  "I promise. What's squander?"

  "You don't need to know that yet. Here's what you need to know: The boy can walk away from the ogre's castle. He doesn't have to knock. Some people will tell you that it's better the boy get hurt or even die than never know whether he could have defeated the ogre and won the ogre's treasure. But those are the people who tell us stories to keep us slaves."