Fulcrum

By the time we closed the bar that evening, the makos had grown to mythical dimensions and Ed's escape from the maws of this beast had become a feat of dexterity worthy of being entered in the lores of diving.

No one was fooled, least of all any of us. But the stories passed the time and the company felt good. After all, everyone's tomorrow was just another working Monday.

This Monday, once it got going, definitely meant to run off track. I had just begun hosing down the pig house when I was called to the administration building, immediately, to see the boss.

The office door stood open and John Bascombe was on the phone but he waved me in, gestured at me to close the door and then continued to condescend to someone on the other end of the line. I looked around the office as though I were fascinated by his tank of tropical fish, his golf pictures and, on the desk, the prerequisite gold frame with a sour looking faded blond woman and a couple of towheaded, steel-braced pre-adolescents smiling at each other diptychally. It was better than looking at him.

He slammed the phone down with a grunt, swivelled his chair and glared through his bifocals as though he were wondering what I was doing there. Then he slid forward until he sat squarely behind his eight foot dark wood desk, cocked the elbows and steepled his hands before his face. That was too much even for Bascombe and I gave up. He won this round. "You asked to see me?"

"We absolutely cannot have the management bothered like this. What do you think we are, a dating service or something?"

"Excuse me?"

"If you'd let your friends know your address they wouldn't have to interrupt work hours. It smacks of shoddy commitment. I've warned you about your absentee record and I'm seriously wondering if you're at all interested in being a part of our team? Here at The Ranch we consider ourselves a family to which everyone does their best to contribute. We take pride in our work. But you -- "

"What're you talking about?"

"This woman! She comes in here asking for you, looking as though she hadn't bathed in weeks. And she refuses to leave. Oh, well. I've put her into the lounge so if you please get her out of there and make sure a thing like this doesn't happen again.

"And while you're at it, may I remind you that long weekends don't happen for six months or we have to consider terminating your contract."

"Pompous ass," I muttered but not before I closed the door behind me none too gently. "What woman?"

Bascombe, operations manager, could be relied upon to be disagreeable. He was the ultimate corporate man and he lorded it over his employees with sadistic pleasure. He had a point, though, about my record and I figured the reason they hadn't fired me long ago was because either they couldn't' find anyone else qualified (and was that a joke! Qualified for what? Herding tourists, making sure they didn't get bitten or hurt themselves? Feeding a disconsolate lot of wild animals, the most dangerous of which was a belligerent ostrich. Qualified, right!) Or else, more probably, it was because Bascombe didn't really want to fire me. He liked to bully people better even than firing them.

I pushed open the door to the lounge, a cold, impersonal windowless box in gray-green with a few upholstered chairs lined up along a wall, a water fountain, and a square table with old magazine on it. In the far corner by the water fountain I saw a dishevelled blond-streaked head bent over as if in pain. When the door clicked shut the woman looked up by twisting her head, not lifting it.

"Maggie?"

I sat hard on the first chair I encountered. The woman I saw in front of me was haggard, her hair limp and her clothes were torn and scuzzy. But I remembered that round face, though without the streaked wrinkles. I remembered those green eyes, only they had glittered and twinkled six years ago in the tropical heat of a Puerto Vallarta beach.

"Susan, sorry to drop in on you like that. But I didn't know your home address."

"How did you find me -- never mind, we can discuss that later. You in pain?" I gestured at her position.

"Well, yeah." She straightened up with a wince. "Ulcers, or too much coke for too long."

"So, what's up?" I didn't know where to start and hoped she would have a plan, since, after all, she had come looking me up. I was not in the mood for a nostalgic reminiscence session and she didn't look as though that was what she was after.

"I been thinking of you and wanting to look you up. Oh, what the hell: I need a place to hang for a couple of weeks. Can you put me up?"

"I ... my place is really small ..."

"Please? I won't be in your way. Or, at least for a few nights till I can get myself together?"

"Oh, sure. But I don't get off work till five and you probably shouldn't ..."