She took almost pornographic glee in this, the way I just fell on my face in front of anyone who held sway over me. There I was pinned down and squirming into a telephone with her jamming fingers into my ribs and making faces while I tried to talk to my boss’s boss’s boss.
He was saying spreadsheets and buzzwords and she had her hand clapped over her mouth with her face all gone red while I fought to be smart, which maybe I was but it never came across over the phone. It was like the warm hum of electromagnetism broke the language centers of my brain, leaving me backing into sentences and tripping over unneeded and unfunny asides.
I was thinking to myself good Lord just fire me already so I can get drunk and stop ironing shirts in the morning, but he wanted to know about sales indexes or something on a Saturday afternoon. I saw myself becoming this slowly, over a span of decades, with her laughing all around me and dancing from one foot to another. Her gray at the temples but tickling me on the phone, acknowledging how ridiculous I still felt after so many years to be taken as a serious adult. This was the kind of connection, her seeing what I couldn’t say out loud about myself, well I guess she understood me better and better.
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