similar beetle.
My Manager immediately thought it was my fault, and erupted into flame.
Leer stared at Scarskirt, who was staring at the metallic table top. "I thought we talked to you about this," Leer said to me, still looking at Scarskirt.
"No, you didn't," I said, but the moment belonged to them.
My Manager forced me to put my beetle in my own ear, a clear waste, and an act that gave me nightmares: of a burning city through which giant carnivorous lizards prowled, eating survivors off of balconies. In one particularly vivid moment, I stood on a ledge as the jaws closed in, heat-swept, and tinged with the smell of rotting flesh. Beetles intended for the tough, tight minds of children should not be used by adults. We still remember a kinder, gentler world.
After this initial communication problem, the situation worsened.
My Manager's Existing Issues
Twice a year, my Manager would summon me to her office on the fiftieth floor. A member of Human Resources would meet me at my office and attach a large slug to my spine through a specially-designed slit in the back of our office uniforms. This would allow me to walk to the elevators and then up and out to the Manager's office with no memory of the experience. When it was time to return, the HR representative would reattach the slug. It always felt sticky and smooth at the same time. And wet, like an oyster.
What was Management trying to hide between floors three and fifty? I don't know, but as with the beetle intended for children, I would have nightmares after these meetings. In the nightmares, I was falling forever down a shaft lined with thousands of decomposing bodies. Plastic bodies. Human bodies. Bodies of leopards and of rats, of baboons and of lizards. I could smell the rot of them, sense their spongy softness. And yet my horror would be mixed with delight: so many animals in one place. A sparrow sometimes settled on the tiny patch of yellowing grass outside of my apartment, but I never saw more than that in real life.
Every meeting with my Manager was the same. In her office, the walls decorated with pleasant if banal scenes of woods and splashing brooks and green fields out of some fantasy land, she would be sitting behind her desk, smiling. Her hair would be fresh-cut, falling in straight blonde waves. The bland paper of her skin would be newly replaced by the kind of colored crepe paper common to the festivals of bygone eras. I would always catch the elusive scent of some decorative perfume. For some reason, this smell frightened me.
"Hello, Savante," she would say, although this was not my name.
"Hello, Manager," I would reply.
Up close, her eyes were like the glistening grit you find at the edges of drying asphalt. In the quiet, I could hear the leaf in her chest - just the slightest whispering shift of dead plant matter against plastic as it touched the sides of her ribcage. I wondered if each time another piece disintegrated into the dust at the bottom of her chest cavity.
"Do you love me?" she always asked.
I could remember a time and a world where such a question could never have been asked.
Did I love her?
Between meetings this became the question that filled my life. Ever since she had become my Manager, my raises had become smaller and smaller. The last raise had been a huge leech shaped like a helmet. It was meant to suck all the bad thoughts out of your head. It smelled like bacon, which seemed promising. I had invited Mord and Leer over to my apartment and we'd fried it up in a skillet. I'd gotten a week's worth of sandwiches out of it.
And so as I sat in her office, I'd think: Is it because of how I answer this one question?And: Does she think she is giving me good raises?And, finally: IfI tell her I love her, will it go better or worse for me?
"Do you love me?"
I always replied, "No, I do not love you."
Her response varied. Sometimes my reply pleased her. She would hum and sing and even burble in a contented way. Other times, my
My Manager immediately thought it was my fault, and erupted into flame.
Leer stared at Scarskirt, who was staring at the metallic table top. "I thought we talked to you about this," Leer said to me, still looking at Scarskirt.
"No, you didn't," I said, but the moment belonged to them.
My Manager forced me to put my beetle in my own ear, a clear waste, and an act that gave me nightmares: of a burning city through which giant carnivorous lizards prowled, eating survivors off of balconies. In one particularly vivid moment, I stood on a ledge as the jaws closed in, heat-swept, and tinged with the smell of rotting flesh. Beetles intended for the tough, tight minds of children should not be used by adults. We still remember a kinder, gentler world.
After this initial communication problem, the situation worsened.
My Manager's Existing Issues
Twice a year, my Manager would summon me to her office on the fiftieth floor. A member of Human Resources would meet me at my office and attach a large slug to my spine through a specially-designed slit in the back of our office uniforms. This would allow me to walk to the elevators and then up and out to the Manager's office with no memory of the experience. When it was time to return, the HR representative would reattach the slug. It always felt sticky and smooth at the same time. And wet, like an oyster.
What was Management trying to hide between floors three and fifty? I don't know, but as with the beetle intended for children, I would have nightmares after these meetings. In the nightmares, I was falling forever down a shaft lined with thousands of decomposing bodies. Plastic bodies. Human bodies. Bodies of leopards and of rats, of baboons and of lizards. I could smell the rot of them, sense their spongy softness. And yet my horror would be mixed with delight: so many animals in one place. A sparrow sometimes settled on the tiny patch of yellowing grass outside of my apartment, but I never saw more than that in real life.
Every meeting with my Manager was the same. In her office, the walls decorated with pleasant if banal scenes of woods and splashing brooks and green fields out of some fantasy land, she would be sitting behind her desk, smiling. Her hair would be fresh-cut, falling in straight blonde waves. The bland paper of her skin would be newly replaced by the kind of colored crepe paper common to the festivals of bygone eras. I would always catch the elusive scent of some decorative perfume. For some reason, this smell frightened me.
"Hello, Savante," she would say, although this was not my name.
"Hello, Manager," I would reply.
Up close, her eyes were like the glistening grit you find at the edges of drying asphalt. In the quiet, I could hear the leaf in her chest - just the slightest whispering shift of dead plant matter against plastic as it touched the sides of her ribcage. I wondered if each time another piece disintegrated into the dust at the bottom of her chest cavity.
"Do you love me?" she always asked.
I could remember a time and a world where such a question could never have been asked.
Did I love her?
Between meetings this became the question that filled my life. Ever since she had become my Manager, my raises had become smaller and smaller. The last raise had been a huge leech shaped like a helmet. It was meant to suck all the bad thoughts out of your head. It smelled like bacon, which seemed promising. I had invited Mord and Leer over to my apartment and we'd fried it up in a skillet. I'd gotten a week's worth of sandwiches out of it.
And so as I sat in her office, I'd think: Is it because of how I answer this one question?And: Does she think she is giving me good raises?And, finally: IfI tell her I love her, will it go better or worse for me?
"Do you love me?"
I always replied, "No, I do not love you."
Her response varied. Sometimes my reply pleased her. She would hum and sing and even burble in a contented way. Other times, my
Similar Books
