The Introvert by Michael Paul Michaud

Author:Michael Paul Michaud [Michaud, Michael Paul]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781626945463
Publisher: Black Opal Books
Published: 2016-11-24T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 17

I met Donna at a bar called Rodion’s which was close to where she lived and we took up a booth and drank some beer. She told me that she’d started putting lay-downs through to my extension when people called in for vacuums even though they were supposed to go to whoever wasn’t busy because she’d been insulted that Mr. Peters had insinuated that she would show favoritism in my direction. I told her that it might not be good to get back at the boss by doing exactly what he said she might do and also told her that the other salesmen might complain and that she might get in trouble.

“It’s a shitty job anyway,” she said.

“Why do you say that?”

“You’ve read the company handbook, haven’t you? Such brainwashing company bullshit. ‘The Company is Your Friend?’ Jesus Christ!”

“The Company is Your Friend” was the tenth and final rule of The Company Culture Handbook. I’d actually been rather fond of the company culture up to that point, but then “Nobody Likes a Challenger” was the ninth rule and meant that you shouldn’t undermine people’s beliefs, no matter how wrong or irrational they might be. We were taught to just agree with them but then later to try to change their view without them actually knowing it, so I didn’t say anything more about it to Donna at that time.

We drank some more beer and Donna asked me if I loved her, but I was still thinking of the incident from two years ago and didn’t much feel like talking about love so I said I didn’t want to talk about it.

Then Donna started to cry, so I figured it was the wrong thing to say, even though it was the truth, so I told her that the subject just made me uncomfortable and she stopped crying a moment later.

“I love you,” she said.

“I see.”

I thought of how I was still repeating what the police officer kept saying and it made me want to laugh, but I felt it might not be appropriate in the circumstances since she’d just been crying and was now confiding her feelings to me, so I resisted the urge to laugh and instead took a sip of my beer.

“Don’t you have anything to say about it?” she said.

“Like what?”

She didn’t answer right away and it looked like she might cry again, but she didn’t. Donna cried an awful lot and especially when she’d been drinking, and I thought about how we were quite different in that respect because I don’t remember crying once in my entire life. I thought this was funny and it made me want to laugh, but then I thought maybe it was sad that I never cried and that depressed me sufficiently enough not to laugh but still not enough to cry, but I thought maybe it would have been ironic if I had.

“Don’t I mean anything to you?” said Donna.

“Of course you do.”

Then she started to cry again anyway and I thought I’d said something wrong again until she started to talk.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.