Page 72 - WTP VOl. VIII #6

Everyone in Seymour’s office hated him. Not just hated. Despised was more like it. But they were all idiots, and he didn’t need them to like him. After ten years of working in the claims processing unit of the insurance company, he quit. He didn’t tell anyone he was leaving until lunchtime. Then, he was gone by 12:05.
At exactly 11:59, he told his supervisor his parents were elderly and needed care. No one knew both
his parents had been dead for years. The supervisor scratched his head and asked Seymour to give two weeks’ notice before leaving, but Seymour said no.
He had to go now. He didn’t even bother collecting his office things—a framed picture of moose by a river, a mug with the singular letters “N.R.A.” in thick, black print. No one would know whether they were his or just abandoned by someone else no longer there. It was like he had died in a car crash on his way out for an errand.
He was bald and slight. His arms were short—unusu- ally short—and he wore his long-sleeved shirts tucked under at the wrists, hiding the buttons on the inside, thinking that would disguise the fact. Hiking boots ac- companied his trousers because everyone else at the office wore dress shoes. At sixty-one, he was almost at retirement age but not quite, and when the few who had the courage would ask if he ever thought of retir- ing, he would shake his head and say, “I won’t live long enough to see retirement.” They would look at him, be- wildered, and he knew what they were thinking: Was it cancer? A brain tumor? And he would frown on the outside and laugh on the inside because they wouldn’t have the courage to ask what he meant. They couldn’t ask what he meant. He might file a harassment charge against them if they did.
He was fond of the outdoors. Even in the snow, he hiked and camped. He hunted bear and moose be- cause they were large and unpredictable. He climbed mountains and jumped out of planes and drove race cars on a track, all things that entailed risk. All things that showed what a tough guy he was. A tough guy tough guys would admire.
He prided himself on not having settled down. There was no wife or steady girlfriend. No kids or pets or
a house to maintain. He lived in a rented apartment
off Washington Avenue, on the outskirts of Portland, Maine’s largest city. He had only himself to think about.
With the stock market at a new high and his invest- ments sound, he asked himself, why not? It was that day, he decided to quit his job effective immediately.
When he exited his office for the last time, he took a right onto Congress Street. The windows from the buildings shone in the brilliant afternoon sun. A Key Bank. An upscale jewelry store advertising Rolexes in the window. A gourmet pizzeria known for its ultra- thin crusts. Buildings with intricately carved facades abutting modern office spaces and tourists every- where, strolling with cameras around their necks, munching on lobster rolls purchased from street vendors. He stretched his arms up to the cloudless summer sky. His neck and back released.
Why did he leave?
I heard his parents were ill.
He’s been here for 17 years—no party? No cake? No card?
No notice? How inconsiderate of him.
He turned his face to the sun, which was uncomfort- ably warm but it made him smile. Back at his office, he left things for select people he knew would be mystified by them. For the administrative assistant
in the claims unit he left a saturated teabag taped to the last page of her wall calendar. He drank lots of tea and reused the same teabag for days before it disinte- grated into frayed particles mixed with hot water. He knew she was repulsed by this.
He thought of how she would notice a wet bump under her calendar and then she’d peel back the pages for August through December until she found the teabag. And then she’d wonder what it meant and would know he had put it there.
For his supervisor, he left a photograph of some people in a park. He’d taken it 20 years ago, or
maybe it was 30. He didn’t know the people any- more. His supervisor wouldn’t know the people at
all. He circled a blurry man who was in the center of the picture. He couldn’t remember the man’s name. There was nothing particular about the picture he could recall, which was why he’d chosen it. He circled the man with a black pen and placed a sticky note over the picture with an arrow pointing at the circle. “Thanks for the game!” he wrote on the sticky note.
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