Something Happened

Ha, ha.

(It can go on forever.)

It can go on forever.

'Shouldn't I be?' I ask.

'Shouldn't you be?' he asks.

'What's up, Jack?'

'What's up, Jack?' I expect to hear him reply to me in my own voice, as in a nightmare (as I often hear myself lashing back at my wife or daughter in their own voices when I am too riled up and discombobulated to think of a more mature way of hurting).

'Have you been out somewhere sniffing around after a better job?' I hear him inquire instead.

'Better job?'

'You won't find one without my help.'

'Should I be?'

'You wouldn't even know where to look.'

'What's wrong with my position here?' I feel myself beginning to perspire.

'You're starting to sweat,' he says.

'I'm not.'

'It's on your face and coming through your shirt. Why do you give me asinine denials? You know I wasn't asking you what was wrong before when I asked you what was wrong. I didn't mean wrong. I was asking you what was right. I was being sarcastic. You've been acting funny. And I don't mean funny when I say funny. I mean strange. And I don't mean strange, either. I mean buoyant. You've been doing a lot of whistling around here lately.'

'I didn't realize.'

'And you don't stay on key. You must think you're the only one in the company who ever heard of Mozart. You've been making yourself pleasant to a lot of people here I don't like. Kagle, Horace White, Arthur Baron. Lester Black. Even Johnny Brown, and you make more money than he does.'

'It's my job. I do work for them.'

'Fawning? Let me handle all the fawning for the department. I'm better at it than you. They enjoy watching me fawn. Nobody cares about you.'

'Kagle?'

'Kagle's through,' he snaps impatiently with a glow of satisfaction. 'He spits when he talks and walks with a limp. I could have his job. I probably could. I wouldn't take it. I don't want to sell. Peddling is demeaning. Peddling yourself is most demeaning. I know. I've been trying to peddle myself into a vice-presidency and haven't been able to, and that's most demeaning of all, when you peddle yourself and fail. If you tell anyone I said that, I'll deny it and fire you. The company won't fire you, but I will. I will, you know. Red Parker.'

'What about him?'

'Steer clear of him. He's been going downhill ever since his wife was killed in that automobile crash.'

'I feel sorry for him.'

'I don't. He wasn't that fond of her when she was alive. He drinks too much and does no work. Steer clear of people going downhill. The company values that. The company values rats that know when to desert a sinking ship. You've been using his apartment.'

'I wash up. I bring my wife there too.'

'You've been acting like a simpering college fool with that young girl in the Art Department.'

'No, I haven't,' I reply defensively. (Now my pride is stung.) 'Jack, that's only kidding.' (I can feel my eyes welling with tears. They must be moist as his own.)

'She isn't pretty enough. Her salary's small.'

'You flirt.'

'I have a reputation for arrogance and eccentricity to protect me. You haven't. You're only what you're doing. I have rose fever. If I look like crying, it's allergenic. What's so funny?'

'I wish I could use a word like that.'

'You can't. Not while I'm around to use a better one. You can't think as quickly as I can, either. You don't have style enough to be as eloquent and glib as I am, so don't even try. That girl won't help you. Go for wealthy divorcees, other men's wives, and attractive widows.'

'Widows aren't that plentiful to come by.'

'Read the obituary pages. You're smiling again.'

'You're funny.'

'But you aren't supposed to be laughing now. Slocum, you're in trouble and you don't seem to know it. And I don't like that.'

'Why am I in trouble?'

'Because you work for me. And you've been too 'fucking' cheerful for my taste.'

'I thought you didn't want that word.'

'You don't seem as much afraid of me as you used to be.'

'I am, right now.'

'I don't mean, right now.'

'Why should I be afraid?'

'And I don't like that. It makes me afraid. The last thing this Jack Green wants is someone secure enough in his job with me to walk around whistling Mozart's Great Mass in C Minor — I looked it up. Don't grin. You're as easy to impress as the rest of them. What baffles me is how you know it.'

'I know a girl who —»

'I can be that pretentious here. You can't. I don't want whistlers working for me. I want drunkards, ulcers, migraines, and high blood pressure. I want people who are afraid. I'm the boss and I'm supposed to get what I want. Do you know what I want?'

'Good work.'

'I want spastic colitis and nervous exhaustion. You've been losing weight too, haven't you? I've got spastic colitis. Why shouldn't you? I take these pills. I want you to take them. Want one?'

'No.'

'You will, if you want to keep working for me and ever make a speech at the convention. God dammit, I want the people working for me to be worse off than I am, not better. That's the reason I pay you so well. I want to see you right on the verge. I want it right out in the open. I want to be able to hear it in a stuttering, flustered, tongue-tied voice. Bob, I like you best of all when you can't get a word out because you don't know what that word should be. I'm not going to let you speak at the convention this year either. But you won't know that, even though I'm telling you. You won't be sure. Because I'm going to change my mind and let you prepare and rehearse another three-minute speech on the chance I might not change my mind again. But I will. Don't trust me. I don't trust flattery, loyalty, and sociability. I don't trust deference, respect, and cooperation. I trust fear. Now, that's a fluent demonstration of articulation and eloquence, isn't it? You could never do something like that, could you?'

'What's wrong, Jack?' I repeat lamely, almost whining, with a weakness that makes me abject. 'Why are you doing this?'

'I have the best paid department in the company. You're stuck here.'

'I know that.'

'I get criticism for the high salaries I pay.'

'I know that.'

'Unless I decide to fire you. I'm stuck here too. Do you know that also? I want inferior people with superior minds who feel in their bones their lives would be over if they lost their jobs with me. And I want that to be true. Now it's visible, now it's coming right out in the open where I want it. Now you're afraid. Yes. Go ahead, Bob, relax — hide your hands in your pockets. They're trembling.'

(I would kill him if I dared.) 'Why do you want me to be afraid?'