The Ask

Three

Home, hidden by the refrigerator, I hovered over the garbage bin, gulped down a bottle of Vitamin Drink. We still dreaded the day that little Bernie, asquat now on the kitchen floor spooning oatmeal into the body cavity of a decapitated superhero, might spot this iridescent liquid, demand a sip. Vitamin Drink may or may not have contained vitamins, but it was too polluted for the tykes. They needed wholesome nectars humped back from the wholesome food empires in Manhattan. This sugary shit was for the dying. I was dying, surely, sugary-ly.

I made to speak before I did.

"A call. A message. From work."

"What?" said Maura. "Work? What work?"

Maura sat on a stool, fresh from the shower and still unclothed, pecked at her laptop.

She had been raised in one of those happy, naked families from Vermont. I looked at her body now, remembered Bernie's weaning, that era of inconsolable sobs and farewell fondles. Maura's breasts, large and milk white when they'd been full of milk, had darkened, pancaked a bit, but they were still beautiful, and I was not just saying that, or thinking of saying that, to be kind.

"Wait," said Maura, "what?"

It was her I'm-downloading-a-crucial-file-from-the-office tone.

"A call from work on my voice mail," I said. "From old work. Vargina and Llewellyn. They want me to come in."

"Why would they want that?"

"I don't know."

"Wasn't firing you enough? Is this a legal thing? Do you need a lawyer?"

"I said I don't know."

I leaned out from my trash niche. Bernie pointed at the bottle in my hand.

"Daddy, what are you drinking?"

"Coffee, Bern. Why, do you think I need a lawyer?"

"Do lawyers have foreskins?" said Bernie.

"I'm talking to Mommy," I said.

"I have a foreskin."

"I know, Bernie."

"You don't."

"True," I said, opened the refrigerator door, sneaked the bottle back into the door rack.

"How come I have a foreskin, Daddy?"

"We've talked about this, don't you remember? Your mother and I decided that-"

"Hey, that's juice. I want some, Daddy! I want some juice!"

"Shit," I said. "Sorry. Bernie, it's not juice. It's for grown-ups. It's like coffee."

"You said it was coffee."

"That's right."

"But it's pink!"

"It's pink coffee, Bernie. It's what I drink. It's what grownups drink."

"Do superheroes have foreskins? Like my guy?"

He held up his headless hero.

"Yes. No. I don't know. Probably. So, who would I call, Maura? They want me tomorrow."

"Do they, Daddy?"

"I don't know, Bernie. It's possible."

"Do foreskins help you fly?"

"Maybe," I said.

"All I'm saying," said Maura, "is you don't have to play it their way. That's all you've ever done."

"Excuse me?" I said.

"Give me some juice!" Bernie called again. "I want it!"

"Ask nicely."

"Please."

"But it's not for kids, Bernie."

"Don't confuse him like that," said Maura. "Daddy's going to give Bernie some pink coffee juice that's not really coffee. Would Bernie like Daddy to give Bernie some pink coffee juice that's not really coffee? Daddy, would you please give Bernie some pink coffee juice that's not really coffee?"

"Fine!" I said.

"Fine!" said Bernie.

He flicked his guy and a cold gob of oatmeal slapped my cheek. I could see this was the beginning of something. Like sudden sympathy for Goliath. What was the phrase? Tell it not in Gath? How about we start telling it?

"What?" said Maura.

"Was I mumbling again?"

"Who's Goliath?" said Bernie. "A superhero? Is he a bad guy? A masher?"

"He's a masher, for sure," I said. "Whether he's a bad guy depends on your politics."

"What's politics?"

"Well, let me see. It's-"

"Does Goliath have a foreskin?"

"Not for long. Not when David's done with him."

"Who's David?"

"A foreskin collector."

"What are you telling him!" said Maura.

"Nothing," I said. "He should know about the Bible. He lives in a fucking theocracy."

"Jesus, language, Milo."

"Daddy! Juice!"

"Okay, Bern, but first, how about some water?"

I filled a cup from the tap. Bernie batted it away, lunged toward the refrigerator.

"Give me pink coffee juice, Daddy!"

"Okay," I said. "Okay."

I dumped out the tap water, took the Vitamin Drink from the refrigerator. Back turned, I mimed a long pour, added a drop for color, refilled the cup from the tap.

Bernie stared up at me.

"Let go, Dad," the boy seemed to be saying, but his beautiful mouth wasn't moving.

Later, in bed, Maura and I cuddled in the way of a couple about to not have sex. It never appeared to bother us much, unless we watched one of those cable dramas about a sexless marriage. Then we'd curse the inanity of the show, its implausibility, switch over to something where the human wreckage was too crass and tan to touch us.

"I still don't understand why they want to meet with you," said Maura.

"I don't, either. Maybe they realized they forgot to take the shirt off my back."

"It's not funny. That girl's father. I don't know."

"What more can they do to me?"

"Oh, I'm sure there are all sorts of things we'd never even think of."

"That's very calming. Thank you."

"I'm just saying. You never learned to protect yourself. You always rail against the evil and exploitation in the world but you still act as though everybody has your best interests at heart. I never got it. You're like an idiot savant without the savant part."

"I still have faith in the basic goodness of humanity. Shoot me."

"Don't be so sure that's not the plan."

Vargina had reserved the conference room. A tray of turkey wraps sat near the edge of the table. They looked like university wraps, from the cafeteria downstairs, not the deli across the street. They had no avocado.

Llewellyn and Vargina sat across the table. We took turns popping the tops of our sodas, listened to the sounds reverberate in the wood-paneled room. The word "reverberate" reverberated in my mind, which I could now picture as a wood-paneled room.

"It's nice to see you again," said Vargina.

"Hear, hear," said Llewellyn. "So, hoss, what have you been doing to yourself?"

"Excuse me?"

"Just shitting you," said Llewellyn. "Seriously, how's it going?"

"I didn't see Horace when I walked in," I said to Vargina.

"He's at a lunch."

"A lunch?"

"He's working on an ask."

"Horace? He's a temp."

"No longer," said Llewellyn. "He's looking like a little earner."

"Very exciting possibility, Horace's ask," said Vargina. "Very worthy. The lady is a major admirer of our dance program."

"Where's the money from?"

"Her husband's company. Private security. Military catering."

"Blood sausage, anyone?" I said.

"Oh, please," said Llewellyn. "We can't wash the bad off anybody's money, now, can we? But we can make something good out of all the misery. That's what you never understood."

"I understood it. I'm just not sure I believed it."

"Oh, some kind of martyr now, are you?"

"A martyr has to give a shit."

"Get over yourself, Milo. You're a sad man. A born wanker. You were born into the House of Wanker. You're a berk, and you probably think I'm just saying your last name."

Llewellyn's Cambridge year was the stuff of office legend, thanks to Llewellyn, but I'd always suspected he lifted most of his lingo from the British editions of American men's magazines.

"Wanker," I said. "Don't know that word. Is that a Southern thing? What is that, Richmond? Newport News? Is that like peanuts in your Coke?"

"You have a provincial mind, hucklebuck."

"Pardon?"

"It's a global globe now," said Llewellyn. "We sink or swim together."

"It's a global globe?"

"That's right."

"Moron."

"Gentlemen," said Vargina.

"Why am I here?" I said. "I thought I was fired."

"You were," said Vargina.

"You are," said Llewellyn.

"Then what's going on?"

"We have special circumstances," said Vargina.

"You have special circumstances," I said.

"Yes."

"I have not-so-special circumstances," I said.

"If you help us with our circumstances," said Vargina, "we might be able to assist you with yours."

The door opened and in walked a large man with a moist pompadour and a tight beige mustache. Dean Cooley was not a dean. He was Mediocre's chief development officer. Several groups worked under him, and he spent most of his energy on the more lucrative ones, like business, law, or medicine. His art appreciation did not reach much past the impressionistic prints from the Montreal Olympics he'd mounted on his office wall. He'd been a marine, and then some kind of salesman, had started with cars and ended up in microchips and early internet hustles. Here in the cozy halls of academe, as he had put it during our first team talk, he meant to reassess his priorities. Meanwhile he would train us maggots how to ask asks and get gives. Cooley was a hard-charger who often began his reply to basic office queries by invoking "the lessons of Borodino." He was the kind of man you could picture barking into a field phone, sending thousands to slaughter, or perhaps ordering the mass dozing of homes. People often called him War Crimes. By people, I mean Horace and I. By often, I mean twice.

"Dean," said Vargina. "This is the man we were telling you about. Milo Burke."

"Nice to meet you."

We'd met a dozen times before, at lunches, cocktail receptions. He had stood beside me while his wife explained a project she'd embarked upon in her student days, something to do with Balinese puppets and social allegory.

"I assume you are wondering why, after being terminated for cause two months ago, we've asked you to come in," Cooley began.

"A fair assumption," I said.

"What you need to understand is that the incident with Mr. Rayfield's daughter was very serious. Mr. Rayfield is still angry. You made his daughter doubt herself, artistically. He had to buy her an apartment in Copenhagen so she could heal."

"I'm sorry, sir."

"The whole debacle nearly cost us a new, working telescope for our observatory."

"I do understand that."

"But what you also need to understand is that we are not simply some heartless, money-mad, commercial enterprise. We are partly that, of course, but we are also a compassionate and, yes, money-mad place of learning. And while we're on the topic of learning, we think people can learn from their mistakes. We believe in redemption."

"As long," said Llewellyn, "as it is not tied to a particular ideology or religious tradition and promotes inclusiveness."

"Is that from the handbook, Lew?" said Dean Cooley. "Anyway, the point is, we are a family."

"A family dedicated to furthering science and the humanities in an increasingly meaning-starved culture," said Vargina.

"Well put," said Dean Cooley.

"But may I remind us all," said Llewellyn, "that here in development our task is to raise money for said furthering. We can't hug all day. We've got to get out there and work."

"Also well put. Especially these days. We need every drop of philanthropy we can get. We must fasten our lips to the spigot and suck, so to speak. Which is where you come in, Mr. Burke."

"Pardon?"

"It's an ask," said Vargina.

"A big one," said Llewellyn. "Not quite Rayfield range, but big."

"Why me?" I said.

"Good question," said Vargina.

"Yes," said Cooley. "That is the question, as the Bard might say."

"The Bard?"

"What's so funny?" said Cooley.

"Nothing, sir," I said. "I just didn't know people still used that term."

"Well, I'm a people, Burke. Am I not?"

"Of course."

"If you prick me, do I not bleed, you scat-gobbling, mother-rimming prick?"

Occasionally Dean Cooley reverted to a vocabulary more suited to his marine years, but some maintained it was only when he felt threatened, or stretched for time.

"Yes, sir," I said.

"Trust me, Milo," said Llewellyn. "Nobody wants it to be you. You were nothing but dead weight since the day you arrived. Nobody respects you and your leering got on people's nerves."

"My leering?"

Vargina shrugged, tapped her pen against her legal pad.

"Listen," said Cooley. "I don't give a slutty snow monkey's prolapsed uterus for your office politics. The point is that Burke needs to come back and complete this mission."

"Why?" I said. "Why me?"

"It's the ask," said Vargina. "The ask demands it."

"Excuse me?"

"He says he knows you. His wife is an alumnus of our extension program and they want to be donors, but when he found out you were in our office, he requested your presence. He wants to work with somebody he trusts."

"Who is this person?" I said.

"His name is Stuart. Purdy Stuart. You do know him, don't you?"

"Yes. I know him."

I said nothing more, felt now like the boy in the fairy-tale book I often read to Bernie, the polite farmer's son who stands before the cruel ogre's castle.

Each time Bernie would ask: "Daddy, why does the boy have to knock on the door? Why can't he just turn around and go home?"

Each time I'd chuckle with stagey amusement, say: "Well, kid, if he didn't open the door, we wouldn't have a story, would we?"

Odds were good I was, in the final analysis, nothing but a scat gobbler from the House of Wanker.

"I mean," I said now, "I used to know him."

"Well, that's just swell," said Cooley, rose, petted his mustache with a kind of cunnidigital ardor.

"I'm late for another meeting," he said. "Tell our contestant what he's won."

The door clicked shut behind him. It did not reverberate.

"What have I won?" I said.

"Your old job back," said Vargina. "If you make this work."

"And if I don't?"

"You'll be finished," said Llewellyn. "Forever. Do we have clarity?"

"Obscene amounts."

Llewellyn stood, stalked off. It would not be the last I saw of him, I knew. The ogres, they just lurk behind those gnarled oak doors so ubiquitous in fairy-tale carpentry, wait for gentle lads to knock. Trolls, on the other hand, they must have a paging device. Either way, the odious is ever ready.

Vargina and I sat there for a while, a new, electric awkwardness in the room.

"Can you make it happen?" said Vargina.

"When have I ever disappointed you?"

"Nearly every day that we have worked together."

"Listen," I said. "I just want to apologize."

"For what?"

"For the leering."

"The leering?"

"You know. That stuff Llewellyn said."

"Don't apologize to me. Apologize to Horace."

"Horace?"

"He's the one who reported you. But don't worry. He wasn't vindictive. He just said he didn't understand why somebody would need to be in the closet in this day and age. At least around here."

"In the closet," I said.

"But he's a kid. He doesn't know how complicated these things can get."

"No," I said. "I guess he doesn't."