The Switch

6

Twelve small glass tumblers were arrayed in two rows. Six different Guatemalan coffees they were considering buying, two tumblers for each. There was a whole elaborate ritual to “cupping,” as it was called. And scientific accuracy. Tanner dipped a spoon into the dense crust formed by the water-infused coffee grounds, put his nose right down in there, an inch away from the surface, and sniffed. He got the fleeting floral aroma, from the most volatile molecules escaping. He did that for each of the six coffees. Meanwhile Sal sniffed the other six. Any noncoffee person watching the proceedings would think this laughable. But you didn’t skip step one in the cupping ritual.

Tanner nodded at Sal, who then began removing the grounds from the tumblers, using two spoons. Then his mobile phone rang. He pulled it out. Sarah. “Will you excuse me?” he said to Sal.

“We should let it cool a couple degrees anyway,” Sal said, busy with his two spoons.

Walking away from the long table, toward the office, he answered it.

“Sarah.” He was standing in a far corner of the warehouse, amid boxes of grinders and brewing machines, equipment they’d lend new customers, an incentive.

“Listen, Tanner, I’m sorry to bother you at work.”

“That’s okay. Good to hear from you. Where are you?”

“I’m at an open house.” She sold real estate, houses and condos. She became a real estate agent in the impoverished days when they were just starting Tanner Roast, all expenditures and no income, and hadn’t stopped. She liked it. “I can’t really talk long.”

“You still staying at Margaret’s?”

“That’s why I called.” Her sister Margaret had a small one-bedroom apartment in Central Square in Cambridge. Sarah had to be sleeping on the couch, and it had to be an annoyance to her sister. In the best of times they had a contentious relationship. “You’re going to be getting a call today from a company, a real estate company. They’re going to need you to send them a couple of my 1099s. Proof of income.” As one of the two original investors and an officer of the company, Sarah was given a salary, which wasn’t a lot of money.

“What’s this about?”

“I can’t stay at Margaret’s any longer. We’re driving each other crazy.”

“Come on home, sweetie.”

He looked back at Sal, bent over the tumblers, removing the crust. He wondered if his voice carried. He hadn’t told anyone at work about Sarah moving out. It was none of his employees’ business; he liked to keep work and home separate.

“I’m renting an apartment in Cambridge.”

“Come on, Sarah, that’s ridiculous. Come home and let’s talk. We can sleep in separate bedrooms, if you want.”

“I’ve already signed the lease. I gave them a deposit.”

“You can stop the check. You’re a Realtor — you know people in the business.”

“Tanner, I’ve gotta go,” she said, and she was gone.

One night a month or so ago he’d unlocked the front door, sniffed the air, and smelled nothing besides the faint odors of the lemon furniture oil and the Murphy’s Oil Soap Sarah used on the wooden floors. The slightly musty smell of the old house. But the strange thing was what he didn’t smell. No food cooking. No dinner. The house was still and quiet. The kitchen lights were off. Maybe she’d ordered out and it hadn’t arrived yet.

“Sarah?” he’d called out.

No answer.

“Sarah, you home?”

Nothing. She wasn’t home. Strange. He looked around a little longer, bewildered, until he was sure she was gone.

He knew why.

They’d had a fight, sort of, the night before. “Sort of” because Tanner didn’t actually fight; he was incapable of it. His parents had had a turbulent relationship, fought constantly and loudly. When Tanner was little he’d run upstairs to his bedroom and put a pillow over his head so he wouldn’t have to hear it. He vowed never to be like them. He didn’t argue or fight with people, never had, didn’t know how. He let his aggression out in sports, but that was it. He avoided conflict whenever possible.

Whereas Sarah tended to be volatile. She was a highly flammable substance. She and her sisters argued all the time. Occasionally she’d try to goad him into an argument, but it was like trying to strike a damp match. There were no sparks. He wasn’t combustible. He had dozens of prefab anger-dampening responses: Well, then I guess we just disagree. You may be right. I get why you feel that way, and I’m sorry.

So they’d had a disagreement the night before, a semi-argument. She wanted kids, and he wasn’t ready. This was an argument that was probably playing out in ten million other homes around the world at any moment. She liked to use a code word, a euphemism for having a kid: “expansion.” As in: “When are we going to talk about expansion?” Tanner would explain to her that he wanted to get Tanner Roast stabilized and on a steady path before he committed to starting a family.

But Sarah’s biological clock was ticking. She was thirty-three, and she wanted to have several kids, and if they didn’t do it soon it probably wouldn’t happen. Whereas he kept insisting he needed to know he could keep the company solvent without having to lay anyone off. Sarah said that was his way of avoiding committing to the marriage, to her. And so on.

She’d gone to bed angry.

The night she didn’t come home, he called her.

“Michael,” she said when she picked up. Being demoted from “Tanner” to “Michael” was already disconcerting.

“What’s going on?” he said. “I don’t understand.”

“I’m staying at Margaret’s.”

“Why?”

A long sigh. “So what is it with you? Is the company, like, your child? Is that it? Is that why you don’t want to have a baby with me?”

“I never said I don’t want to have kids. Sarah—”

“No, you said you’re not ready. You’re never ready.”

“I just want to get the company on its feet. In the black. Right now it feels like it’s going down the tubes.” Why did she not understand this? “I want kids. Come on back, we’ll try.”

Is the company your child? Actually, Tanner Roast was like a family. And he was the dad.

Now he wandered back to the long table and the tumblers of coffee.

“Everything okay?” Sal asked.

“Absolutely,” Tanner said. “So what do we have here?”