New Hope For Small Men: Chapter 20

by Grant Bailie

The other problem with working third shift was trying to sleep in the daytime when he got home, while the cable installers screamed and swore and honked their horns. He tried to sandwich his head with his pillow, but he only had one pillow, so it was more like a falafel than a sandwich, and the sound still came through and the endless stream of “fucking fucks,” and “fuck this,” and “fuck that.” One man in particular went on for some time about being off the fucking clock and there was no way he was going to get in the truck again even to move it to a more reasonable parking spot because he was off the fucking clock. His supervisor did not care that he was off the fucking clock. He wanted him to get the fuck over there and move the fucking truck.

Eventually Robert gave up and sat in the chair by the window, smoking a cigarette and watching the men argue. The truck was moved from one spot to another and more men gathered arguing and laughing in the street below. They did not seem to work much. Very few of them ever got in their trucks and drove away to add or remove cable service, or fix a line or anything. The smoked and swore and laughed at jokes that Robert assumed to be crude and cruel.

And Robert thought of all the people who at that moment were waiting between the hours of nine and five for their service call.

He considered yelling down to them that he worked for the same company, and could they please keep it down so he could get some sleep, but he considered it in the same way that most people, at some point in their life, consider running a knife across their wrist or stabbing it into the palm of their hand; he considered it but he knew that he would never do it.

In the afternoon, Mr. Carleton knocked on his door.

“You look a bit ragged,” he said and Robert told him that he had worked the third shift and had not slept yet.

“I’m sorry. Did I wake you?”

“No,” he said. “I was awake. Come in. But I’m out of tea.”

“Water will be fine,” he said and took his usual spot.

Not only did Mr. Carleton never look down toward the of the street, but he never even seemed to even hear the voices from below, rising up like a stench to obscure the poetic image of loving birds or pertinent clouds or whatever else he was seeing.

He sipped his water and did not speak. Someone from below was telling someone else about a girl that they once knew who liked to be fucked in the ass, who only liked to be fucked in the ass and had to be begged for any other kind of fucking that was not fucking in the ass and while ass fucking was all well and good he liked to fuck in the pussy every now and then.

Mr. Carleton did not even flinch.

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