Hotel Living by Ioannis Pappos

Author:Ioannis Pappos
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2015-05-11T04:00:00+00:00

PART II

After Erik

TEN

July 2006

THERE’S A HEAT WARNING OUT,” the driver says as we cruise along the Jersey Turnpike back to Manhattan.

“Got any limo-bar peanuts?” Justin asks him.

The driver studies Justin in the rearview mirror. There’s no bar in the car.

Justin glances at his watch. “It’s after nine. I need a burger, boss,” he tells me. “I need some alcohol immunity before I get to those girls downtown. Wanna come along?”

I get that Friday-night air in his voice, but it’s Wednesday, which reminds me of his calling card—martial arts, partying, and seventeen-year-old girls—and the fact that we have nothing in common.

I reach for my cell phone and speed-dial the office. I get Andrea’s voice mail and I start summarizing the presentation we just wrapped up. It was my first big pitch without a VP in tow, so I work in a couple of self-deprecating expressions, Washington’s favorite way of signaling confidence and comfort when describing a kick-ass meeting: “. . . if I could still think straight at the time . . .” I hear myself babbling, “. . . which, of course, was the most unintelligent thing I could have said . . .” By the time I hang up, I’m disoriented. It may be the haze or just my exhaustion—I’ve already put in forty, fifty hours this week. I rest my head back and fall in and out of sleep.

“Boss, the girls are fun,” Justin insists. “Tatiana is nuts. You should totally come.”

I have a slight fever and I need a drink, badly. I worry about the note I got yesterday that I have to vacate my sublet by the end of the month, and about the fact that I have been officially and irrevocably beaten out of a four-year on-again-off-again relationship, when I was always on. I haven’t slept ten hours since Sunday, trapped in an Ambien drowsiness that I have come to like; it dulls the pain some. I don’t want to talk to anyone, and I definitely don’t want to hear how good I still have it.

“Not a hundred percent,” I tell Justin, but the idea of being alone scares me too. Numbing myself and watching others is how I deal with rejection.

Justin faces me. “You owned the room today, Stathis. You were technical but philosophical. I think they really liked us.”

“They were easy on us,” I mumble.

“Nah, you nailed that Black-Scholes question. Andrea would’ve frozen. How do I get to be a manager like you two years out of business school, man?”

It’s been three years, and his sucking up is pre-drinks, so he’s trespassing. I look at his tight suit. “Wear a fucking suit,” I say.

“It’s McQueen,” he shoots back, fingering his sleeve.

“I know how much you make,” I say, looking out my window.

“Barneys Warehouse! Know what, I paid for it like fifteen seconds before the blackout.”

“And?” I don’t get it.

“The registers went down, boss.”

I can see him, all proud, paying for his Esquire kill seconds before New York time-traveled back a hundred years. I’d tell him to try Dunhill next, but I’m getting desperate for downtime.

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