Following the sound, I trace the trajectory. That’s when I see her, sitting up on the floor. Not unconscious… awake… Joey… The way the light shines behind her, all I see is her shadow. And the wisp of smoke that rises from her pistol.
She climbs to her feet, races for the wall, and smashes the butt of her gun against the glass case of the nearby fire alarm. The shrill alarm screams through the silence and within a minute, I hear sirens in the distance. Joey spins around and heads for my brother. Oh, jeez…
“Charlie!” I shout. “Charlie!” I try to sit up, but my whole arm is on fire. None of my fingers move. My body’s shaking as it goes into shock.
Back by the entrance, half a dozen Disney security guards come streaming into the warehouse. They all come running at me; Joey stays with my brother. “Please sit still, sir,” one of the guards says, holding my shoulders to keep me from squirming. Next to Charlie, four other guards kneel down, blocking my view.
“I can’t see him! Let me see!” I shout, straining my neck wildly. No one moves. They’re all focused on Shep’s lifeless body.
“He’s got V-tach! He needs mexiletine!” I scream in Joey’s direction. She’s doing CPR, but the more I thrash around, the more the room starts to turn. The world tumbles and somersaults on its side. My lifeless arm elongates like a rubberband above my head. The guard says something, but the only thing I hear is static. No, don’t pass out, I tell myself. I look up at the ceiling. It’s already too late. Life turns black and white, then quickly fades to gray. “Is he okay!? Tell me if he’s okay?” I yell at the top of my lungs.
Another dozen officers race into the warehouse. They’re all shouting static. And as gray blurs to pitch, lifeless black, I never get my answer.
88
Just like Charlie predicted, it’s the staring that’s the worst. Forget the whispering, and the unsubtle pointing, and even the way they walk past me as the gossip burns its way through the office. All those I can live with. But as I sit in the oh-so-pristine first-floor conference room and gaze through the plate glass window that separates me from my former bank co-workers, I can’t help but feel like the monkey in the zoo. Scurrying through the maze of rolltop desks, they’re trying their best to play it cool. But each time one of them passes – each time someone steps off the elevator, or races to the copy machine, or even sits back at their desk – their head turns for a split second and they hit me with that stare: part curiosity, part moral judgment. Some pepper it with shame; others add a smidgen of disgust.
It’s been two weeks since the news hit, but this is their first chance to actually see it for themselves. And even though most of them have made up their minds, there are still a few who want to know if it’s true. Those are the hardest ones to face. Whatever else Charlie and I did to save the day, it still was never our money.
For almost a full hour, I sit there and take the beating of their stares and whispers and awkward pointing. I try to make eye contact, but that’s when they look away. On most days, only the lowest of the worker bees are caught in the hive of rolltop desks by the front entrance. Today, by the end of the first half-hour, almost every employee in the bank has found an excuse to come down and check out the monkey behind the glass. That’s why they put me here in the first place. If they wanted to make it easy, they could’ve snuck me through the rock star entrance around back and whisked me upstairs in the private elevator. Instead, they’ve decided to put on a show and remind me that my private elevator days are over. Like everything at Greene & Greene, it’s all about perception.
The traffic peaks when Lapidus and Quincy finally make their entrance. They don’t say anything to me directly. Everything’s done through their lawyer – a nasty mosquito with a high-pitched drone. He tells me that they’re withholding my final paycheck until the full investigation is complete, that my health benefits are terminated effective immediately, that they’ll seek legal recourse if I contact any current or former bank clients, and as a cherry on top, that they’ll be contacting the SEC and the banking regulatory agencies with the hope that it’ll stop me from working at any other bank in the future.
“Fine,” I say. “Are you done?”
The lawyer looks to Lapidus and Quincy. Both nod.
“Wonderful,” I say. “Then this is for you…” I slap a letter-sized blue-and-white envelope onto the desk and slide it across to Lapidus. It’s blank on top. Lapidus glances at the lawyer.
“Don’t worry, it’s not a summons,” I tell him.
Flipping it over, Lapidus notices his own shredded signature across the back flap.
It’s the only reason I came back here today…
He opens the envelope and unfolds my business school recommendation letter.
… I wanted to see his face. And let him know I knew.
He keeps his eyes on the letter, refusing to look my way. The discomfort alone makes every second worth it. Folding it up, he stuffs it back in the envelope and heads silently for the door.
“Where’re you going?” Quincy asks.
Lapidus doesn’t answer. He and Quincy may’ve never been involved with the money and everything that happened, but that doesn’t make them saints.
The meeting itself takes a total of six minutes. Four years to build this life. Six minutes to scrap it. The lawyer asks me to wait here while they gather my things.
As they leave, the door slams behind them, and I look out through the glass window into the lobby. Throughout the room, two dozen employees once again look away. The bandaged cut on my stomach stings every time I shift my weight. And my once broken nose stings every time I breathe. But this stings worse.
Twenty-five minutes later, nothing’s changed. The zoo’s still open. I throw a nod to Jersey Jeff; he pretends not to see it. Mary comes out of the elevator and refuses to acknowledge I’m there. For four years, I killed myself for the partners, made money for the clients, and immersed myself in every nitpicky detail the bank had to offer. But in all those years, I never made a single friend.
Trying not to think about it, I stare down at the inlaid mahogany conference table. It’s the same table that I sat at to close my first client, which got Lapidus’s attention and moved me from the first floor up to the seventh. Today, as my eyes trace the pattern of the antique mahogany, I angle my head and spot a nasty scratch that runs like a scar across the center of the table. I never noticed it before. But I bet it was always there.
Eventually exhausted by the waiting game, I stand up to leave. Yet just as I push my chair out, there’s a loud knock against the conference room door.
“Come in,” I say, though the door’s already swinging open.
As it slams into the wall, I study the familiar figure who’s carrying two cardboard banker’s boxes. Unsure of what to say, Joey hesitantly steps into the room and lowers both boxes to the table. One’s filled with management books and my cheap imitation banker’s lamp, the other’s filled with Play-Doh and the rest of Charlie’s toys.
“They… uh… they asked me to bring you these,” she offers, her voice unusually quiet.
I nod and flip through the contents of the box. The sterling silver pen set I bought with my first bonus. And the leather blotter I bought when I got my first raise. Naturally, the Art Deco clock I got from Lapidus isn’t there. I’m guessing he pulled it off the wall last week.
“I’m sorry they wouldn’t let you up there,” Joey explains. “It’s just that after everything that happened, the insurance company asked me to-”