Written by Dan Berick
The usual fortune of complaint
Blinking hard to clear eyes flooding with tears in the clinical purple-orange of the fluorescence.
The draft interim financials waiting patiently on the screen.
So many things lost. So many things, so many days, so much time. All of it lost.
Get it together, John. Can’t let the kids in the office see you losing your grip.
“There’s Big John, the spreadsheet master.”
Knowing they mean no harm, thinking it might even be a sort of affection. It might? Listening
to their laughter, their chatter, eddying in pools around the cubicle.
So many things, so many days, so much time, since that first office job, that first company ID
card, that first nameplate on the fabric panel (“Harvest Tan™”) of that first cubicle. No bridging
the gap between this tired age and that half-forgotten youth.
The alarm chiming, 5:30 on weekdays, 7:00 on weekends. The raincoat, the train, the stop for
coffee, the office. The somewhat-larger-than-standard cubicle now (“Seadrift™”), the team-
leader location at the end of a row. The lumbar support pad, the company-logo screensaver. The
company-logo travel mug. The login codes. (“Your login code will expire in 7 days.”) All the
inevitable expirations. The insistent demands of the numbers on the screen.
The calls, the emails, the instant messages. Happy to help. Thanks so much. No problem. Be
right back to you. Just following up. Sure thing. Hope all is well. Thought this might be of
interest. FYI. Please see the attached. As you requested.
Best regards. Regards. All best. Best.
Talk soon.
Until the logoff, the raincoat, the train, the apartment. The food delivery. The one small glass of
something, maybe. The bed.
Like a melody, that haunts you night and day
“How’s it going, Doctor J? When’s your niece coming to visit?”
The high school graduation picture of Anna, the only child of the only sibling. Pretty girl in a
bright green nylon cap and gown. The braces, the fake diploma scroll. Uncle Jack was a
favorite when they lived nearby. The events and surprises and visits, before divorce and college
and age and distance and whatever else.
The boys at the office endlessly commenting on her picture, the only personal item in the
somewhat-larger-than-standard cubicle in the team-leader location at the end of a row.
“She got a boyfriend, John? She looking to meet a handsome young finance all-star?”
“Is she really related to you, Big John? Because—no offense—I can’t see it.”
The “happy bday uncle j xo” text. Not this last birthday, the one before. Or maybe the one
before that. Living her life now. No point in a new picture.
And lights and companions depart
Jangling past him, banging down the aisle to their cubicles, or to the HR & Benefits cluster
where the pretty girls always seemed to work. Hearing the laughter and the stray bits of chatter
drifting back in the flow of the HVAC. “Yeah, I went with my buddies, it was a blast.”
The boys and their buddies—college buddies, golf buddies, poker buddies, game night buddies,
biking buddies. Office buddies.
Too old now, anyway, but it was always the same. Always being that one extra piece in the
package, nobody knows what it’s for (“Just put it back in the box and throw it out.”). Always
being the crystal that supersaturates and falls out of solution. Always hearing about the guys and
their buddies.
The distant sweetness of their chattering laughter, evaporating as they subside into their cubicles.
It was a blast, Jack.
That’s one small step for a man
The logoff, the raincoat, the station. The headlights of the train, peeking coyly out from the end
of the tunnel. The first car grinding its way to the platform.
.
Dan Berick is a poet and fiction writer based in Cleveland, Ohio, whose fiction explores love and loss and loneliness and their unexamined reflections in the quotidian lives of the quiet people around us all. Dan is also a lawyer, a husband, a father, and a graduate of Columbia University and the University of Chicago. His recent work has appeared in The Storms, The Interpreter’s House, and One Art: A Journal of Poetry. Instagram: danberick