Jerk

I bite my lip and shrug. “It’s your right to feel that way. I can respect it.”

“Uh … thanks?”

“I just remember that day in the gym, when we first met. I remember the sweet look in your eyes. I wonder if I might have judged you too soon. Maybe it wasn’t fear or cowardice that made you relinquish that bicep machine to that other guy. Maybe it was compassion.” I bite my lip. “Jonty wasn’t a bad guy. He … was rather quite beautiful, in his own way.”

There is silence. Then: “What the fuck …?”

“Have fun with your date, buddy. I hope someday you find one you don’t have to kick out by morning. You deserve someone like that. I care about you, man.”

Then I hang up and peer to the side at the large window of the restaurant next to me. My reflection stares back, hair sopping wet and dripping, eyes curious and faraway.

19. The Mirror

Mr. Milton paces in front of the room, his fingers twitching irritably as they grip his mug of coffee. He takes one slurp of it after asking all of us his latest million-dollar question.

The question being: “Who do I need to fire?”

This is coming after a recent report that our all-new “getting some” marketing angle isn’t testing well. The fitness company that hired us doesn’t like any of it. The test groups are mixed at best, either being repulsed or amused for the wrong reasons. No one is happy.

Least of all Mr. Milton, who continues to pace the front of the room, and asks us yet again: “Who do I need to fire?”

It’s been about a week since the party I went to with Danny when I ruined everything. I’ve spent a lot of time in my own head. My phone’s been on silent. I haven’t spent a single night out with Jonathan. No dates. No texts. Ignoring every ding of my dating app.

Just me, myself, and I.

And it sucks.

Especially now, sitting in this room, while my boss continues to interrogate us. My eyes keep finding Prisha across the table from me, who hasn’t looked at me once since the day I tore her down in this very room. I felt a stab of pride that day.

And now when I think about it, all I feel is shame.

Who am I becoming?

She’s toying with a pen in her hand, her notebook opened in front of her, full of notes and ideas and brilliance. Everyone else in the room is anxiously picking at their fingers, or gnawing on their lips, or otherwise desperately not wanting to be seated at this table, made to answer for our abysmal work.

And on and on Mr. Milton drones, with his same stupid question no one dares to answer. “Who do I need to—?”

“Me, I guess.”

Everyone turns their faces, startled by my sudden answer.

Mr. Milton as well, who quirks an eyebrow my way. “Excuse me?”

I shrug. “You keep asking the question. I gave you an answer. The whole idea came from something I didn’t even mean to suggest when I insulted your penis. Or was it your sex life? The marketing campaign is a failure before it’s even left the ground, and that’s all because of one very simple reason.” I spread my hands. “It sucked.”

Mr. Milton’s eyes are stony and blank. He says nothing.

I glance at my tablemates. “Why were you all so hard for my idea, anyway? Were you just caught up in the moment of me making fun of our boss? Talking back to the douchebag who’s given us a thankless hell of an environment to work in for the past few years? Honestly, my idea was juvenile, and there was only one person at this table with balls enough to say it.” I peer across the table at Prisha.

She meets my stare with surprise.

“Prisha had the better idea,” I go on. “She had the smarter angle. People love fads. People like to follow trends. Make being fit a fad. Make being fit a trend. The demographic we’re targeting don’t trust the ‘gorgeous and sexy’ to make decisions for them anymore. They’re smarter than that. They want to own their own health, their own standards of beauty, their own bad-assery.” I smirk. “Sounds to me like Prisha was on to something golden, something we should’ve listened to.”

Prisha squints suspiciously at me.

I peer at Mr. Milton, who has stopped pacing to frown at me. “So I guess the answer to your pressing question is: you should fire me. If not for providing the bad idea, then for talking to you in the manner that I did then—and am now. Regardless of how poorly you treat us, I shouldn’t return the behavior. As you once pointed out to me, you’re the only one who gets paid for your attitude.”

A frigid silence passes in which no one seems brave enough to say a word, let alone even breathe. Juan looks like he shit a brick in his chair. Prisha seems pensive and uncertain. Mr. Milton has changed the expression about twelve times on his face, now settling on a sort of pursed-lip look, like he’s sucking on something bitter.