The call with Wes Howard happened at two. I was under the blanket, with my cell phone lying between my ear and the pillow, my hand holding an unseen pen against an unseen pad of paper, but it happened as it had to. Evidently, as it was fated to.
Before two Jenny returned with some food, a grilled cheese sandwich and a few carrot sticks, but I had to wave it and her away. The very smell made me nauseous. Thank you. I love you. But not now. Take it away. Please, Christ, take it away.
Also before two I had some time to think about a few things.
I thought about Ruthie MacDonald, and the strange shifts in tone she had just used in our phone conversation. Had there been some secret message in there? When she had said “Everyone here is very worried about you,” I remained convinced that she had, in fact, been referring only to Mary, and that “worried about you” was a euphemism for Mary’s rage and disappointment with me. I was a failure in Mary’s eyes, too weak and fragile to even complete a day in the office. But then came “I’m glad you’re feeling better,” and then it had been clear that Ruthie was not just referencing herself, but was, in fact, referencing herself to the specific exclusion of Mary, that she was secretly pulling for me, and that she had my back in whatever final confrontation was looming. Or was I reading too much into it? In my addled state, I had no definitive way of knowing.
I also thought about Paul Webster, and the almost threatening tone that he had taken in our short phone conversation earlier that day. He had known a lot about what was going on in the office, not just the departures of Susan and Michael and, of course, Gerald, but also the way things were piling up on top of me as a result and, likely, the way Mary was using the situation to force me to the point of utter failure. Paul had seemed to offer me a way out, probably similar to the one he had offered Gerald, but there had been something dark and sinister in his words. I didn’t trust him. “If you play your cards right,” he had told me, “you may be the one sitting in that corner office of hers.” That seemed almost farcical to me. A desperate play from the outer darkness. Best ignored. Designed, perhaps, to push me even closer to Mary.
I also thought about Bethany Bishop, and both the gruff interaction we had had that morning in the break room, and the difficult conversation we had had a few days before, when she had said Wes Howard was spreading lies about her, and I had said that Gerald had said some nasty things about me. There had been a time when the two of us would have supported each other against such challenges, but it felt very much like that time had now passed. The two of us had been drifting apart over the last several weeks, and that seemed smart and good from where I was currently sitting, but it left a whole basket of doubts and fears swirling around in the pit of my stomach. Was she going to be the next one to go? And when she did, would the weight of what was left behind crush me once and for all? Those were dark and scary thoughts, but with my call with Wes Howard moments away, I found myself helplessly wondering what kind of lies he had been spreading about her, and whether those lies had anything at all to do with me.
At two, I dialed Wes’s number, and settled back into my cocoon.
“Hello?”
“Wes? It’s Alan Larson calling.”
“Alan! Well, what do you know? We speak at last.”
I had no idea what he meant by that, but I tried to turn the discussion towards the upcoming leadership meeting.
“Straight to business, eh? Well, sure. We can play things that way if you want.”
I didn’t know what other way we could conceivably “play things,” and I didn’t want to. “I heard you had some changes to the committee rosters that we should implement before the meeting.”
“You’re goddamn right I do, Alan. I’ve got a lot of fucking changes I want you to make.”
I had heard about the cursing before -- that Wes was known to use it when almost no one else did -- but even so, it surprised me. It wasn’t just a casual part of his speech pattern. There was something dark and sinister about it, the words punctuating his speech like they thrilled him.
“Uh huh,” I said in response. “What are they?”
He then began to read them off to me. He was obviously referring to the packet of committee rosters I had sent him. I could hear the punctuated flipping of pages as he cast his judgment on the obscenities that he saw before him.
He would begin with something like, “You’ve got Neil Richards coming in as the chair of the Bylaws Committee,” as if putting that particular person in charge of that particular committee had been my idea, and not the result of the slow, inexorable turning of the organization’s wheel of leadership ascension. He then would disparage the person. “Neil Richards couldn’t find his own asshole with both hands and a funnel.” And then he would order a change with a tone of obviousness that clearly questioned the competence of the people around him. “Kathleen Meyer is your gal for the Bylaws Committee. That woman might be the only person in this whole organization who has even read the fucking bylaws.” And, of course, in nine cases out of ten, the person suggested wouldn’t even have experience on the committee Wes was appointing them to lead.
After about three or four of these, I attempted pushing back.
“Wes, William Gilbert isn’t even on the Conference Planning Committee. Maybe you should pick someone with some experience with what the committee does.”
I was greeted with an icy silence.
“Wes?”
“I don’t remember asking for your fucking opinion, Alan. So, did you get that one or not? I said Bill Gilbert to chair the goddamn Conference Planning Committee. All right?”
Okay, then.
Things went on like that for a brutal half hour. During it, I felt able to slowly swim my way back towards full consciousness, almost like Wes’s abuse was exactly the tonic I needed to get over my migraine or whatever the hell it was. Before long I was sitting upright on the edge of my bed, the phone held in the crook of my shoulder while I wrote down my instructions on the pad of paper on my lap. As for instructions, there were a lot of them, far more than I thought I could pull off before next week’s leadership meeting. But I knew better than to give Wes any sense of that.
“Is that all?” I asked when it seemed like Wes was winding down, when I suspected that he had reached the end of the committee roster packet I had sent him. I didn’t tack ‘sir’ on the end of my question, but I made sure that it was implicit in my tone.
“For these stupid committees, yes,” Wes hissed in my ear. “But there is one more thing you and I need to discuss.”
“Uh huh,” I said, acknowledging a fact rather than a true need.
Wes paused. When he spoke, his voice had clearly shifted. “You’re not going to cause me any problems, are you Alan?” The authoritarian was gone, replaced by a sweet-talking manipulator.
“I don’t know what you mean, Wes.” I honestly didn’t know what he meant. What could I do to cause him problems? It took everything I had just to stay out of the way of the problems he was creating.
“Because I could make life very difficult for you,” he said as if not even hearing me, as if he had prepared a script and he was going to finish it before even listening to what I had to say. “I know what’s going on between you and Mrs. Bethany Bishop.”
With the mention of Bethany’s name my mind started racing. What was he saying? What did he think was going on? Is this the lie Bethany was talking about?
“You’ve been a very naughty boy, Alan. Dipping your wick in someone else’s honeypot like that. I wonder what Mary would do if she were to find out? That might cause you a lot of trouble, but not as much, I’ll bet, if your wife was to find out. She’s pregnant, isn’t she. With your second, if I’m not mistaken.”
I was speechless. He thought I was sleeping with Bethany? I knew that wasn’t true, but it was about the last thing I would want him talking to Mary -- or Jenny -- about. In fact, the very idea that he would talk to Jenny -- about anything -- enraged me. Who the hell did this asshole think he was?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Wes,” I said, trying to keep my voice as neutral as possible.
“No use denying it, Alan,” he said. “The truth of it slips out under whatever tight control you think you have. What a fucking amateur you are. I’ve seen the two of you together and, frankly, it disgusts me. With all the young women in that office of yours, why on earth would you choose to fuck old horseface? Do you have to put a bag over her head when you get down to business? I know I would.”
I felt sick, but it wasn’t the migraine returning. I felt sick to my stomach, like I was going to puke and shit at the same time. It suddenly occurred to me to start recording this conversation, and I pulled the phone away from my face, desperately trying to figure out how to make that happen and realizing that I didn’t have a clue.
“Or take her from behind,” I could still hear Wes saying, his voice tinny and small through the phone’s embedded earpiece. “She does have a nice ass, at least. I’ll give her that.”
“Wes,” I said, putting the phone back against my ear. “I have to go now.”
“Sure, sure,” Wes said smoothly. “I understand. I’ve given you a lot to think about. Just don’t think too much. The cards are what they are, and I have the stronger hand. Stay the fuck out of my way, and you can keep fucking whoever you want. I don’t care. But cross me, and I’ll make sure your whole world comes caving in on you. Okay?”
“Okay, Wes.”
“Grand. Let me know if you have any trouble getting a hold of any of my new committee chairs. Most of them will already be expecting your call.”
And with that he hung up, the phone going dead in my hand.
+ + +
“Dragons” is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. For more information, go here.
This post first appeared on Eric Lanke's blog, an association executive and author. You can follow him on Twitter @ericlanke or contact him at eric.lanke@gmail.com.
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