This morning when I woke up, I knew at once something was different. There was - how should I put it - a strange feel to the Me I'd known for thirty years.
Even as my shock faded, I sensed what the difference was. I felt harder, stronger, more confident. But there was something else. Call it a new kind of silence that I now heard within me.
Robin Jones's careless insult to me the day before had finally pushed me over the edge. After years of being the silent, uncomplaining type, my sleeping mind had screamed, "Enough!"
Then the alarm rang - 6:30 a.m. as always. Rise and shine. Time for shower, shit, shave and girding my loins to face the barbaric quotidian rat race.
As the alarm erupted in its usual nine seconds of madness, I threw back the covers, rose, and turned to look down at the bed. I lay there, hair uncombed and a small puddle of saliva on my chin. I even wore the flowery pajamas I'd gone to bed in.
It was the old me, the mousy me from another life. Even if I hadn't found the pajamas atrocious, I would have known at once that the thing on the bed had died during the
night. Like a cicada's old shell, this carcass was useless, and I suddenly saw my life as never before.
Now I felt contempt for the meek, spineless nonentity I'd been. All my life I'd imitated a doormat, a thing acted upon rather than acting. With each second, I felt more and more reborn. The new silence deepened and grew within me.
Unlike my old mute timidity, this silence was a soundless calm in which I felt more and more complete, confident, and powerful, more and more eager to strike back at my abusers.
Still, reborn or not, I had to dispose of me. Tie up the loose ends, you might say. But before I could consider the best way to do it, something unexpected happened. The body on the bed started to fade. In thirty seconds, it was gone. Or rather, I was.
# # #
I showed up at work, Metaphase, Inc., and sat down at the desk that looked just like those of 40 other flunkies. Except for potty and lunch breaks, we sit in the same multi-partitioned pusshole from 9 to 5, hypnotized by the frost-sheen of our monitors, which we use to shift meaningless documents to meaningless accounts and, in general, keep the corporate belly of America rumbling. Think of a cookie-cutter cube farm inhabited by anonymous losers, and you just about have it. For the past seven years, two months, and six days, it had been my fate to be a zombie here, a sitting, breathing illusion of life.
Only that was about to change.
Disposing of three or four routine items on my monitor, I thought about the new me. The old soft doormat was gone. Something inside me had hated the Robin Joneses of the world and the worm I'd become and had wanted to be reborn with a new chance at the Good Life. Instead of being prey, I had wanted to become a predator, a meat-eater instead of corporate fertilizer.
My subconscious mind had finally decided I'd been screwed enough and it was time to change. But what about the millions of other drudges, nonentities who shared my misery? They ate, they slept, they excreted. Why hadn't the same transformation happened to them?
Maybe it has happened to a few, a small inner voice said, speaking with that new kind of silence I was getting used to. Yes! I thought. Maybe this change has occurred to other people who've grown disgusted with their lot. If so, then I belong to a small group who've had the strength of will to restructure their minds and lives.
Oh ho, but so far you haven't changed much, the voice said. Look at you. You're still sitting at the same desk sweating out your soul for a miserable, biweekly pittance of $1268.42. What's restructured about that?
I frowned, then exited an account and started searching, going places I would never have dared before. And as I searched, I felt myself come more awake to my hard new purpose. Soon I hit walls that denied me access, but there was at least one way in which the new me resembled the old: I had always known how to hack. All I had needed was the guts to do it.
Now I had them.
"Open sesame," I whispered, as I tried a little of this and a little of that, searching for a password. Metaphase, Inc. proved to be as tight as a virgin's knees, but I set up a key words mix and match code gleaned from our corporate manual and cracked their system in less than five hours. Then I just followed my suspicious nose where it led me. Robin Jones - the slimy bastard was eight months younger than me, yet he was already a division manager. No guy makes it that high that fast unless he's crooked.
What I found made my eyes widen. Robin, that fat little bird, had eaten a few unauthorized worms. I whistled and read on.
# # #
I dropped in on Jones shortly after noon three days later, when he wasn't schmoozing with other young execs over a three-martini lunch. I just walked right in,
past his secretary's desk and into his corner office with its panoramic view of the city spread out below like a giant feast.
He glanced up from his desk, looking like the plump, bespectacled bird he was. "Yes, what is it?" he asked.
I took a seat before his desk. "Robin, you don't even know my name, do you?"
He frowned at my familiarity. "I don't believe I do."
"No, of course you don't. That was perfectly obvious from the way you shoved me aside yesterday so you could make the elevator. There was no need even to say ¿Excuse me,' was there? After all, you were a big shot and I was just a nameless grunt."
He frowned. "Look, Mr. . . . "
I grinned. "Just call me Mr. Hyde."
"Mr. Hyde?"
"Yes. I left Dr. Jekyll at home today."
I crossed my legs, savoring the moment. My mother, God rest her soul, always called such behavior "impudence," and she cured me early of any tendency in that direction. Now I was making up for lost time.
Jones's face shifted into command mode. I could read it as well as I could read his tricky dealings.
"You're from Accounts, aren't you?" he said.
"Yes."
"What makes you think you can just come -"
"Let's skip the bullshit, Robin," I said, tossing a stack of papers before him on the desk.
He looked. "What in hell -"
"Let's start with Systems.exe," I said. "It's supposed to be a subsidiary account to cover advertising expenses, but I checked both it and your e-mails and found you've been siphoning it off to bankroll your market speculations. Oh, you haven't tapped in that much. Only thirty-odd thousand, but I doubt your superiors would be pleased, especially since you're not authorized to go there."
His specs flashed outrage. "That's nonsense! I don't know what -"
In my previous life, his indignation would have intimidated me. But back then I would never have had the nerve to challenge a superior in the first place. Now I simply snorted and cut him off again.
"Take a look at the password of the person who made the withdrawals. Eagleman. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't ¿Eagleman' a bit ambitious for a ¿Robin'? Rather careless, I would say."
Of course he blustered. "¿Eagleman' - that's a hell of a stretch, don't you think?" He reached for the phone. "You're about to be fired, my friend!"
"I don't think so," I said. "If you're smart, you'll look at the rest of the evidence."
In ten minutes, I had Robin practically bawling. "Dammit, I only took a measly thirty-four thousand. Both times I put it back in three days! I'm not Enron or WorldCom for Chrissakes. Nobody was hurt! Nobody lost a single penny!"
"Ah, but it's stealing, my friend. I bet you got a hot stock market tip and made out like a bandit. By the way, that's the one thing I couldn't find when I checked your files. How much did you clear, if you don't mind my asking?"
His eyes went crafty. "Perhaps . . . we can share."
I shook my head. "It's not what I want." I glanced about his spacious office, which resembled a palace. Gleaming faux-mahogany desk, deluxe lighting fixtures, thick soft carpet. Plus the view. Ah, it was the lap of luxury, and I wanted to sit in it!
"What do you want?" he asked. His eyes looked hunted now.
I flicked a speck of lint off my sleeve. "For starters, I want an office like this one, a new title, and a $30,000 raise."
His mouth opened, quivering. "That's impossible!"
"I want it immediately," I said. "If there's any delay, I will make sure all your superiors receive thorough documentation of your malfeasance. And that's not all. I'll do the same for your friends and family, for your parish priest and everyone on your Christmas list." My eyes went cold. "My friend, I'll make your whole damned world go away."
He ran a hand through his hair, ruffling it, making himself look even more like the helpless little bird he was. "Look, I'm willing to deal. But you must realize, an
immediate promotion of that magnitude is out of the question. $30,000? Half the brass would be down on me like a ton of bricks."
I smiled, listening to the counsel of my silent voice. "Okay, so we make it twelve thousand and downsize the office a little." I chuckled. "Now, about my title and job description . . ."
# # #
Five years, that's all it took to become a vice-president and get a corner office even bigger and higher up than Robin's. Incidentally, I arranged it so the little bird reports directly to me. For old time's sake, I rub his nose in the past now and then.
Just yesterday I finalized a generous stock option package for myself. It was what one accountant called "borderline legal," but I've made so much money for Multiphase, Inc. lately, the deal went through like clockwork. My only real enemy was Andrew Myers, a pious piece of deadwood who technically outranks me. Of course I snooped to find out if the white-haired patriarch was as holy as he claimed.
"This is blackmail," he proclaimed last week in my office. "It would destroy my marriage!"
"Deacon," I said, using my personal nickname for him, "you should have paid closer attention to the Sixth Commandment." I shook my head. "I have to confess I'm disappointed in you. Quite the hypocrite, aren't you?"
His face turned red. "My God, you are ruthless, aren't you? You don't care whose back you step on in your climb to the top."
I smiled and glanced about my spacious office with its luxurious sofas, expensive paintings, and breathtaking view of the city. "Let's just say that one day I woke up and
saw the light, Deacon. I also realized that the true Golden Rule was made out of steel. It says, ¿Do unto others before they do unto you.'"
He leaned forward. "And it never bothers you what you do? You feel no pangs of conscience and no desire to change?"
For a moment the sweet silence within me clanged a little, and I almost disliked my plush accommodations. But then I remembered my flight to Houston tomorrow. Officially, it was little more than corporate housekeeping, but unofficially, I knew my career was about to enter a new phase. If I handled affairs right, and I would, within three months I'd be that branch's new President.
And baby, then there'd be no stopping me. Just watch: by the time I'm 40, I'll be the CEO of Multiphase, Inc.
I laughed and patted Myers' shoulder. "A conscience is for losers," I told him. "And phony old men who cheat on their wives."
# # #
Halfway to Houston, the corporate jet ran into a storm. Couldn't go over, under, or around it. So the pilot sheared sideways and set me down at some jerkwater town in Kentucky.
I was pissed and impatient, but my silent muse counseled calm. Take it easy, it said. You're on the fast track to the top. Nothing can stop you. Just chill out and stretch your legs a little.
As always, I heeded its advice. I entered the podunk terminal and walked its length in forty-seven seconds, missing the jet's soft sofa and well-stocked bar. Then I sat down and waited for the weather to clear and my pilot to get me.
I must have dozed off for I found myself back in my office, listening to Myers ask me again if my conscience ever bothered me. I started to laugh but then, incredibly, broke into tears.
I awoke, feeling I had slept a thousand years. Climbing to my feet, I blinked about at the nearly deserted terminal. To my surprise, my face was wet.
"Hey, mister," an old janitor said. "You all right?"
I swallowed. "Y-yes."
"Huh. What about your friend?"
"Friend?" I rubbed my eyes. "What do you mean?"
He pointed behind me with a mop. "Looks dead to the world."
I turned. There in my chair sat a man. He was sleeping and wore a gray suit just like mine. And his face . . .
No. It must be some mistake.
As I gazed at him, my silent inward voice broke into a deafening scream. I clutched my ears. What was happening? I swung around, but the janitor had wandered off.
Then I started to change.
It felt like a giant hand was working inside me, turning me to mush. Suddenly I felt soft and fearful - just like I used to be.
I remembered Myers' voice: And it never bothers you what you do? You feel no pangs of conscience and no desire to change?
"No," I screamed. "I don't want to change! I don't want to become soft and weak again, a loser that everyone steps on!" I grabbed the man's shoulders and started to
shake him. "Wake up, you've got to take me back! You're too close to your big break to screw up now!"
I stopped. To my horror, the man began to fade, just as the other one had five years ago in my bedroom. Only this time . . .
"I've worked too hard!" I screamed. "Dammit, it's not fair!"
The process quickened. I could see right through myself now, all the way to the bottom.
An hour later, when my pilot came to get me, I was alone, filled with guilt and desperate to atone for all my sins.
