The Futures(64)

“Of course. I was glad to.”

He searched, it seemed, for a crack in my expression, a sign of sarcasm or timidity. Finding none, he reached inside a drawer and withdrew a manila envelope.

“This deal is going to make history. And 2009 is going to be a record-setting year for us because of it. But you probably know that things are tight in the interim. I debated whether I ought to give this to you. But I wanted you to have it as a token of Spire’s appreciation. Of my appreciation.”

He slid the envelope across the desk. “I doubt I need to say this,” Michael said, “but it would be best if you kept this quiet for now.”

After I left his office, I went into a bathroom stall and sat down on the lowered toilet lid. I paused, for a moment, to make sure I was alone. I ripped open the envelope. Inside were several stacks of crisp hundred-dollar bills. I counted them slowly. It took a long time. I counted them again, to be sure.

Twenty thousand dollars in cash. There was no note.

*

I spent Thanksgiving Day at the office. I deleted old e-mails, checked over some models I’d been working on, read a backlog of market reports. I was already impatient for the holiday moratorium to be lifted, for work to resume. Around midday, my cell phone started vibrating. I smiled when I saw the name on the caller ID.

“Arthur!”

“Hey, Evan! Happy Thanksgiving.”

“You too. Jeez, man, I thought you were dead. How are you?”

Arthur was even busier than I was, and I figured my unreturned e-mails and calls were a symptom of that. A funny reversal of roles had happened by the end of college. Freshman year, Arthur lived in my shadow. Physically and metaphorically—being an athlete came with a certain amount of built-in respect. I was the one who knew about the parties on Saturday nights, whose name was recognized by other people. But by senior year, Arthur was the bigger man on campus. He’d grown into himself. He was president of the debate society, elected to Phi Beta Kappa, tapped for one of the elite senior societies. Arthur Ziegler was going places.

The noise of a full household echoed from the other end of the line. I remembered the Thanksgiving I’d spent with him, freshman year, all the cousins and aunts and uncles. The cramped dining-room table groaning under the weight of too many dishes, voices shouting to be heard over the Buckeyes game on TV. Four years had gone by: was that possible? He surely must have noticed the comparative silence coming from my end. It was the first time that day it occurred to me how depressing this must look to someone else. And then he asked: “Hey, so where are you today? Are you up at Julia’s?”

“No, actually—no. I couldn’t get away from work.”

“They don’t even let you have the one day off?”

“It’s been crazy lately. But it’s all right. You know how I feel about her parents.”

He laughed. “How is Julia? You guys are still dating, right?”

Did he know how close to the truth he was cutting? “She’s fine.”

“Just fine?”

I felt something tightening inside. To be honest, that was the real reason Arthur and I hadn’t talked much since school ended. The night before graduation, we’d run into each other at the pizza place on Broadway. We got our late-night usual: one slice of cheese for him, two pepperoni for me. We wound up in my bedroom, talking, reminiscing. I was sitting in my desk chair, and Arthur was perched on my bed, swinging his feet above the floor. I was halfway packed, posters stripped from the walls and the closet rattling with empty hangers. The next morning, in a few short hours, we would don our caps and gowns and assemble for the graduation procession. Arthur was talking about the Obama campaign, how his work would put him on the front lines of history. He sometimes turned a little grandiose when he was drunk.

“Are you nervous at all?” I asked.

“No. This is what I’m meant to be doing. I know it.” He drummed his fingers against his thighs and nodded, lost in his own thoughts. Then looked up at me, his eyes narrowing. “But what about you?”

“What about me?”

“Are you nervous?”

“For what?”

“Well.” Arthur swept his hands across the room. “Everything. New York. Your new job. But mostly, dun-dun-dunnn—moving in with your girlfriend.”

I laughed. “Nah. Not really.”

Arthur went quiet. A heavy expression descended on his face.

“Well, maybe you should be.”

“What does that mean?”

“I just mean,” Arthur said, “it’s a serious step to take. Moving in together. Are you really ready for it? Sometimes I wonder whether you’ve thought it through.”

“Wait. Wait, what? I don’t remember you saying any of this when I was actually making this decision.”

“Well, honestly, I kept hoping you’d see it on your own.”

“See what on my own?”

“What a colossal mistake this is.”

I jerked my head back and laughed. This had to be some kind of joke.

But Arthur took a deep breath. “She’s just—well. Look, I’m not trying to offend you. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything. But Julia can be difficult, right? I know how it’s been with you guys. And I worry that without some space between you, some breathing room, she could drag you down into the morass with her.”