Hope Idiotic | Part VIII
Hope Idiotic is a serialized novel. Catch each new part every week on Monday and Thursday.
LOU FINALLY BEGAN MAKING A LITTLE BIT OF MONEY WHEN HE BROKE THROUGH TO THE CHI STAR, a free daily paper owned by the Franklin News. It was designed to be a newspaper with training wheels in hopes that as the young readers aged, they would make the switch from the free commuter rag to a more mature newspaper subscription. It was the struggling newspaper business’ effort to survive by adapting the drug trade’s tactics; get ’em hooked for free when they’re young.
The Star was a terrible paper. It only had a few actual news stories. All of them were chopped versions of what ran in the grown-up paper that day. A few columnists wrote gently about dating in the city, the local transit authority and Chicago sports. A lot of column inches were devoted to pop culture and celebrity gossip. And there were write-ups about bars and restaurants. This was where Lou ended up.
He pitched a story idea to the food editor to review a popular downtown sports bar, which boasted having the hottest chicken wings in the nation. So hot, in fact, that patrons had to sign a waiver before taking a bite. Lou would eat a full order of the wings without having to ring what was called the fire alarm — a hand bell to signal for a platter of sour cream, ice cream and a glass of milk to cool his mouth. Then he’d set a record on Golden Tee.
The story was well received. The editor liked him and gave him more assignments: Write a piece about the best place to watch the NCAA Final Four tourney. Write a piece about bars that host Wii game nights. Write a piece about that new restaurant in an old Chicago public library that serves a fusion of Greek and French food.
It was nice seeing his name in print again. It was nice knowing that people were reading his words and liking them. His hot-wing story was the most read and emailed for nine weeks straight on the Chi Star website. And Michelle was proud of him, too. She liked that under his byline it read: Special Contributor. She didn’t understand that it only meant he wasn’t considered a real writer of the paper. He didn’t want to burst her bubble.
He was finally busy working. He was running around Chicago nearly every night, hopping from bar to bar, staying long enough at each one just to get the vibe of the place. It took about five minutes to do this. Most places were the same. They all had TVs; they all ran two-dollar PBR specials on Thursday; they all had the best sweet potato fries in town. The restaurants were no different. Each one was doing something that had never been done before, and every head chef had some connection to the television show America’s Top Chef, though not a single one of them had been a winner.
Once he filed his story, each place became as forgettable as the next. And after a couple months, the time and money he spent driving around town and parking for those few minutes or dropping the $2.50 for each CTA bus or El ride was hardly worth the paycheck. The Star wouldn’t even reimburse him for his reviewed meals. He was losing money on most stories. And these weren’t the kind of stories he wanted to write either. The editor didn’t want narrative. While she loved the excitement in his first piece about the wings, she wanted him to write more to the voice of the overall paper. That was, keep it uninteresting. Place. Specials. Clever line about the neighborhood it was located in. That was it. That was modern-day print journalism in a big city.
He had hoped that punching these reviews out would give him a boost to other sections of the rag and introduce him to other editors so that he could work on the stories he actually wanted to work on; even land his own column eventually. But the opportunities were stunted. His pitches to other papers and magazines weren’t being picked up, and Janet Brine at the Inquisitor wouldn’t respond to his emails or phone calls.
Despite the incoming paychecks, he was still desperate for more. The thrill of the byline and the small checks didn’t provide his girlfriend-landlord with her required monthly nine hundred dollars.
One Saturday, while Michelle was at work, Lou had lunch with an old friend from Brushmore. Over tacos, he expressed his desperation.
“I could probably get you a job,” his friend Debbie said. She was an inside sales trainer at ProCore, an online job-listing company. ProCore was hiring account managers, and she thought Lou would be perfect for it. “You have a great personality and it’s a really laid-back, fun place to work.”
“But it’s a sales job.”
“Inside sales job, yes.”
Lou hated sales. He wasn’t good at sales. He was great at marketing, but not sales. Being good at sales takes a whole different kind of weaseling.
“What is inside sales?”
“You don’t go out; you make phone calls from the office. It’s not hard, and you can make a lot of money. Some people, their first year, make more than sixty grand.”
“Sixty grand? In the first year? Set up the interview.”
✶
HE QUICKLY REALIZED THAT GETTING A JOB AT PROCORE DIDN’T REQUIRE MUCH SKILL. To be effective, ProCore needed manpower to make the calls. In sales, the word no is heard far more often than yes, so the more people making phone calls to more potential clients, the better the odds of closing a sale.
He was assigned to a team of nine other desk jockeys and a team manager, a twenty-four-year-old named Brian. Lou was given a cubicle, a headset and a P.C. He was expected to have a minimum of two hours of talk-time logged by the end of each week. Talk-time was calculated by calling and chatting up the companies on the sales rep’s given call list. It may not sound like much, but when the average phone call is only an eight-second-long rejection, two hours can seem impossible. He was also given a financial goal to meet each month. If he didn’t meet his number by the end of the month, he wouldn’t receive a commission. Even if he missed his goal by a dollar, he’d miss out on the commission money. He was, however, promised a base salary of 25,000 dollars a year. After taxes, it worked out to about seven hundred and fifteen bucks every two weeks.
Lou was one of the oldest people employed there. He was surrounded by Big 10 recent grads who flocked to Chicago to strike it rich in the big city before they were thirty. They filled their cubicles with collegiate pennants, discussed their fantasy football leagues at great length and debated over who was more the villain on John and Kate Plus 8. Most of these kids wanted to build a career in sales, and this was a perfect first job for them. The average stay of any desk jockey was two years, though some stuck around to be team managers, like Brian. And while these kids weren’t bad people, Lou didn’t really care for any of them and their standard brand of standard thinking. However, there was one co-worker he stomached and rather enjoyed.
The ink on Leslie Bronson’s bachelor’s degree was barely dry when she and Lou met that summer. She was nice girl with a vicious sense of humor, a small chip on her shoulder and a résumé of bad relationships. She loathed reality TV and found Lou’s general discontent and sharp tongue comforting, entertaining and funny. Her one flaw was that she was a staunch liberal democrat, a real party hardliner.
“It’s blind faith like that, that will continue to destroy this country, Leslie,” he said. “You’re as bad as the conservatives you loathe. You’re not thinking, but feeling because Obama makes you feel good about things.”
“And isn’t that what we need right now? Someone to pull this country together?” she said.
“Of course. Look, I like Obama. He seems thoughtful and reasonable. But we have to question all politicians, all government. The man isn’t Jesus Christ.”
“I don’t believe in Jesus Christ.”
“Why not?”
“Lack of evidence.”
“That’s exactly my point. Come on, Leslie, you’re smarter than this.”
“At least I’m aware of my blind faith. That’s far more than many other people can say.”
“That’s fair.”
Unfortunately, Lou and Leslie were often short on their required weekly call time. Their cubicles were next to each other and their conversations took precedence. But that was the only thing that kept Lou from hanging himself in the men’s room with his mouse cord.
“Hey, Lou,” Leslie whispered while he was on a self-loathing call with a lead. He put his finger up, signaling for her to wait a minute.
“I understand you’re not hiring now. You’ve never hired anyone? Never? How do you… Oh, well, sure, that’s the best way to do it. Hire people you know. That’s still hiring… Well, if you ever need… I will. Thank you. I understand. Not a problem.” Lou pulled his headset off and dropped it on his desk.
“Another sale, huh?” Leslie said, smiling.
“This trucking company has only hired four people since it began. Well, six, I guess. The husband and wife run the place, and the four drivers are cousins. He actually told me to go fuck myself.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. But it was the nicest I’ve ever heard anyone say it. I think I even thanked him.”
“I have a problem,” she said.
“What?”
“The Tenant wants to have dinner. Aaaaaand I’m pretty sure he wants to get back together.”
Lou was one of the oldest people employed there. He was surrounded by Big 10 recent grads who flocked to Chicago to strike it rich in the big city before they were thirty.
The Tenant was Leslie’s ex-boyfriend. By not using his actual name, she de-humanized him, which helped her get over the heartbreak of it all a little quicker—a smart move emotionally. They dated in college and moved to Chicago before splitting up for petty reasons, some of which being Leslie always leaving the lights on in rooms she wasn’t using and the Tenant never doing any grocery shopping. She moved out, unwilling to stay in their once happy home and let him stay at the apartment, though only her name was on the lease because his credit was so terrible. And since he wrote checks to her for the full amount of the monthly rent, enabling her to pay the landlord, he became the Tenant.
“If he’s buying, take the free meal,” Lou said. “You don’t have to get back together.”
“What if I want to?”
“I don’t think this guy is bad news. I think you’re both idiots. But here’s the thing, Leslie, stay young. Stay single. You won’t ever have relationship problems if you never have relationships.”
“That might be the most terrible but intelligent advice I’ve ever received.”
Despite the work friendship he had with Leslie, Lou hated going in to work every day. Even when he tried, he sucked at his job. He lacked that sales-weasel gene needed to close the deal. But he needed the little bit of money and the health benefits. Luckily, from the first day on the job, the company totally covered this benefit for every employee. Not a single cent was taken out of Lou’s seven-hundred-and-fifteen-dollar paycheck for healthcare.
Still, he was in career purgatory. But he figured it would be temporary. He regularly reminded himself that he only had to stay there until he found a gig doing what he really wanted to do. And when his first paycheck came, Michelle insisted he take them out for a nice dinner to celebrate. By the time the dessert menus were delivered, she was accusing him of giving up on his goals, and her pride turned to disappointment.
✶
ON THE ONE-YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF MOVING TO CHICAGO, Lou and Michelle designed a nice evening out. The plan was to eat at the newest and far-too-popular West Loop restaurant owned and operated by a currently acclaimed celebrity chef. It had a three-week-long waiting list. It was as if the entire city of Chicago were rock-hard for anything this chef touched.
Lou never bought into hype, especially hype over restaurants. He’d worked in too many, wrote about too many. Besides, his business was all about hype. He was a hype cog, a journalist (and momentarily an inside sales rep) who kept the buzz buzzing. He knew it was all bullshit. Was this chef’s restaurant going to be good? Probably. But the thing about all delicious food, like most things in life, is that it will eventually turn to shit.
But Michelle was a believer like the rest. So after dining, they’d head to their favorite fancy hotel bar for martinis and champagne. This evening was entirely Michelle’s idea—as they all were. She made the reservations a month before so when Lou suggested they celebrate with a quiet night in, just the two of them, she would be ready to spring the plan on him.
“We can have L ’n’ M O.P. time any time,” she said. “You always cook me dinner. Let’s make the night special.”
“Come on, Michelle. I don’t want to share our night with the other idiots in the city. What if the service is bad? You know there’s never bad service at home.”
“Why don’t you want to celebrate?”
“I do want to celebrate. But you know, money is still tight for me.”
“That’s not the kind of thing I want to hear.”
“But it’s true. You want me to lie to you?”
“It’s not attractive to me that you’re still hurting financially. I want to be taken care of. You have a job. I don’t know why you aren’t making more money already. I thought you could make sixty grand in your first year.”
“I’m doing the best I can.”
“Fine. I’ll get dinner; you can pay for the drinks.”
It would be a pricey meal, but the way the two of them drank, the bigger bill would land with Lou. However, the celebration never happened. Instead, Lou got a call from his brother just before the end of the day at work.
“You need to come home,” Aaron said.
“Why?”
“Max is dying.”
The family dog was a fourteen-year-old Britany spaniel. He had cancer in his jaw. It had been there for months, but it was decided that operating would be too hard on the old boy, so it was just best to ride it out. Mostly, Max was fine during those months. You know, as fine as any old dog ever is—slower, sleeping most of the day, but happy and full of love. Thrilled at the idea of going on a car ride. The kind of positive outlook and simplicity that served all dogs and would serve mankind well if we were only so inclined to be more like our best friends.
“What’s going on?” Lou asked Aaron.
“He’s just lying on the bathroom floor. His mouth won’t stop bleeding. I’m trying to stop it with toilet paper and stuff, but it won’t stop. He won’t move. You need to come home.”
“Call the vet. I have dinner with Michelle, Aaron. I can’t come home tonight.”
“Your dog is dying, Lou.”
Canceling with Michelle wasn’t easy. “Are you sure he’s dying? Really?” she said on the phone at work.
“I don’t know. It sounds bad. Mom is going out there tonight, too. We may have to put him down. I should be there.”
“We won’t be able to get back into the restaurant for I don’t know how long.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine. It’s just bad timing.”
Lou got the okay to leave work an hour early and rushed to his childhood home as quickly as he could. He was terrified at the idea of likely having to watch his sweet, old dog die, but he was too frustrated with the guilt Michelle put on him for canceling dinner to really embrace it. If he had had his choice, he’d have much rather been sad about Max than angry about Michelle. When he arrived, Max was right where Aaron had said he had been.
“Hey, buddy,” Lou said when he walked into the bathroom. Max lifted his big brown eyes to look at Lou, and his little nub of a tail wagged just enough that Lou knew Max was happy to see him. There was dried blood on the bathroom tile. Aaron came in with a handful of bloodied toilet paper.
“See?” he said.
No one spoke on the short ride to the vet. Benjamin drove with Sarah up front, while Lou and Aaron sat in the back with Max lying across their laps.
Benjamin arrived home from work shortly after Lou; Sarah was there an hour later. She hadn’t been back to the house or seen her dog in a while and was visibly shocked at how old he looked. She cried. Benjamin’s parents Abraham and Adina lived next door. Max was as much their dog as anything. And Max loved going to Pop and Grams’ house. They came over, too. It was decided that Max should be put to sleep the following morning. Benjamin made the appointment with the Brushwood vet.
They were able to get Max upstairs, and he curled up to sleep in his favorite spot between the wall and Benjamin’s bureau in his bedroom—the one he used to share with Sarah. Benjamin and Sarah slept in the bed. Lou and Aaron slept on the bedroom floor. And that night, for the first time since Lou left for school in Las Vegas, the family was back home, together again.
In the morning, Max seemed to feel better. He was moving quicker and his mouth had stopped bleeding. As the rest of the family showered and readied themselves for the trip to the vet, Max walked all over the house sniffing every corner. It was like he knew. Like he was doing one last sweep to make sure everything was okay before he goes.
Outside, it was sunny and warm. Max could never be let outside without being secured somehow, lest he would shoot off like a rocket down the street or through the yards in search of a rabbit or a gigantic mud pile. But that morning, he calmly walked out of the front door and stood in the driveway’s sun for a moment before resting under the large crabapple tree that straddled the two Bergman yards. Pop and Grams came outside.
Pop leaned down and patted Max on the head. “You’re a good dog. You’re a good, good dog,” he said.
“What am I going to do with all of those milk bones you haven’t finished?” Grams asked Max. Then she patted his head and turned to go back inside of her house. She wiped tears with her sleeve. Pop wiped his with his handkerchief.
No one spoke on the short ride to the vet. Benjamin drove with Sarah up front, while Lou and Aaron sat in the back with Max lying across their laps. They all were petting him when the vet administered the poison, and they all choked back wails when the vet said, “He’s passed. I’ll leave you with him, if you like.”
Benjamin, Sarah and Aaron all kissed him on the top of his head where he had a small brown spot that looked like a little yarmulke, which was what the family called it. It was a bulls-eye for kisses. The three of them filed out of the room, Lou stayed back.
Max was the closest thing to Lou to ever die. The death of a pet is never easy, and Lou felt an unfamiliar and deep emptiness in his gut. He stroked his dog a few times and said, “Okay, Max. I’m going to miss you. I hope you feel better now.” Then he kissed him on the yarmulke and said what he always said when he left Max, “Be good, boy. I love you. Be good.”
Lou caught up with the rest of his family in the parking lot. His mom and brother were holding each other and crying. His father, a man who Lou saw cry only once before at his Bar Mitzvah, sat down on the parking curb and bawled.
Max was more than just a dog. He was a symbol of simpler and happier times in the Bergman home. The reality of the broken family was now ever-present. Sarah had moved out. The divorce was final. Lou no longer lived there. Aaron occupied the rooms and hallways like a shiftless zombie, uninterested in everything including human flesh. And now the family dog was gone. Max was the one thing through all the years that had remained constant and good. Max always loved. Always played. Always needed to be loved by Benjamin and Sarah and Lou and Aaron and Pop and Grams. And when Lou and Sarah moved out and Aaron was at college, it was just Benjamin and Max in that quiet house. Max and Benjamin had always been there for each other when everyone else had left for good or bad reasons. But now Benjamin was on his own. The familiar and comforting sound of Max’s tags rattling on his collar as he ran downstairs to play or be taken out would never be heard again. The Bergman family home would never be the lively and happy home it was. And all evidence of it was difficult to find. As his father cried in a heap in the vet parking lot, Lou realized that his father was mourning the loss of the dog and of the family. And so, too, would Lou.
✶
A FEW WEEKS LATER, BENJAMIN WAS DOWNTOWN CLOSING A NEW REAL ESTATE DEAL. He and Lou met for lunch.
“When are we burying Max’s ashes?” Lou asked his father.
“I don’t plan on burying them.”
“What do you plan on doing with them then?”
“Right now they’re sitting on his favorite chair in the living room. I put a toy of his next to them. He loved sitting in that chair and looking out of the window. And always with a toy at his side.”
“But we have to bury the ashes, Dad.”
“And just where would you suggest we bury them?”
“What about under the crabapple tree? That way he’s close to both houses.”
“And what happens when I sell the house?”
“What?”
“What happens when I sell the house? Do I dig him up and take him with me?”
“Are you planning on selling the house?”
“Not right now. But someday, maybe.”
“No. You leave him there. That was his place.”
“He should be at home. That was his place.”
“What about cemeteries?”
“What about them?”
“We have a huge family plot that you’ll likely be buried in. But you never lived there.”
“I feel better having him there, at home. It’s hard. You don’t know what it’s like. You don’t live there, Lou. You don’t know what it’s like to not hear him snore in the night. Or to not see him lying in that chair. Or to not have to be mindful of taking him out in the morning or at night. Or to not have him follow you around the house just because he wanted your company. He lived in my house, and I will decide what to do with his ashes. And for right now, for right now, they’re just fine on his favorite chair.”
“All right, alright, Dad. I’m sorry. Keep Max on the chair.”
There was an uncomfortable silence for a few minutes while they picked at their French fries.
“Pop went to the doctor last week,” Benjamin said.
“Okay.”
“He has lung cancer.”
“But he smokes pipes.”
“Well, I guess you can get lung cancer without ever smoking a cigarette.”
“Okay. Any other breaking news to brighten the day?”
“Nope. Just that your grandfather has cancer. And he’ll probably die.”
“Okay.”
When they both declined water refills, the waiter set the check down.
