Chapter 1

“The prisoner is not the one who has committed a crime, but the one who clings to his crime and lives it over and over.” – Henry Miller

The call came in at about a quarter to five. I was sitting opposite of Renée Beauvais, age 28, who, at the time, was preoccupied calculating this month’s production output. Thin black hair was tied back in a ponytail clearly revealing her pale, though beautiful complexion. Baby blue eyes, a small nose and thin, red lips: small cheekbones and a small jaw. She was a petite woman, very skinny and average height with a small chest.

On the other end of the line was Chase Seward, age 26, whose cubicle was in the far-off corner of the room. He was as insecure as any man could get. Short brown hair slicked back with square-rimmed glasses over his hazel eyes. He wasn’t a bad looking guy, but he was very insecure with his looks and his personality, and often portrayed himself to be a very frail, very weak person. He was speaking anxiously and at the same time, frightfully.

“Travis? Mr. Wilhelm wants to see us a.s.a.p. And Renée, too.”

“What about?” I asked, turning in my chair and looking out of my cubicle’s doorframe and across the room towards Mr. Wilhelm’s office. The door was closed, and through the huge glass window frame I could see he was busy writing something.

“He didn’t say,” responded the voice of Chase through the speaker piece. “He just told us three to go to his office immediately.”

I turned back towards Renée, who now lifted her own gaze from her work towards me, her brows scrunching in a curious manner.

“Who is it?” she mouthed softly.

Lifting my index finger as if to tell her to wait a second, I acknowledged Chase’s – or rather, our boss’s – request. “Alright, I’ll tell her.”

Placing the receiver back down, I stood from my chair and pushed it into the space beneath the desk.

“Who was that?” asked Renée, still curious as her eyes lifted to follow my own.

“Chase. He said Wilhelm wants to see the three of us right away.”

“What for?” Renée asked, again ever so curious as she too stood up from her chair and pushed it in.

“Don’t know. He seemed a little paranoid about something.”

“Who, Wilhelm?” asked Renée, curiously confused.

“No, Chase. He sounded scared. Then again, he’s always over-reacting.”

“Yeah,” mumbled Renée as the two of us walked from our cubicle and down the aisle that cut between the two sides of the room. Heads and eyes turned up towards us as if they were watching two losers of a game show take the walk of shame. Chase awaited the two of us at the end, outside of Mr. Wilhelm’s closed office door. He was pacing in a small circle, mumbling something incoherently to himself. As we approached him, I offered a comforting smile, as if silently implying that there wasn’t anything to worry about.

I was about to knock on the door when, from within, Mr. Wilhelm’s voice beckoned us to enter. Turning the doorknob and pushing in, I entered first and held the door open for Chase and Renée, closing it gently shut afterwards.

“Please,” Mr. Wilhelm began in his forced, friendly voice – the one that you’d expect to hear when being harassed by an employee at a car dealership. He spoke with such displeasure in his voice that it was almost painful to listen to. “Please, sit down. Get comfortable.”

He motioned to the three conveniently placed chairs that sat in front of his desk. The three of us took to the offer as he folded shut the beige-colored folder he’d been writing in, placed the pen on the desk beside it and folded his hands. His smile was almost as fake as his voice – and just as painful.

“Do the three of you know why I’ve asked you into my office today?”

Sitting in the middle of Chase and Renée, I glanced to my left and right at them, respectively, as they both looked as equally confused as I was.

“No, sir,” I responded, in my suck-up voice. “May I ask why?”

“You most certainly may, Travis,” responded an eccentric Mr. Wilhelm. “Of course, I am and was going to tell you regardless. But I’m sure you knew that.”

He seemed to be very amused by his own sense of humor, or in my opinion, his lack of one.

“In recent months, I’ve noticed a steady decline in the working habits of you three; you’ve been coming in late fairly often, you’re getting progressively slower with the quota reports, your work stations are a mess. Out of the kindness of my heart...”

Kindness? Now that was funny.

“...I gave the three of you these last months as a sort-of ‘last chance.’ I was hoping that you’d have shapen up by now; gotten your act together and really proved to me that you’re a vital part of the BioTech family. But I’m afraid – and it pains me to say this – but I’m afraid that I just haven’t seen the work ethic I’d been hoping for. That’s why I’ve called the three of you into my office this evening. I’ve signed the slips already for your releases. You’ll receive this months paycheck in the mail.”

My heart sunk deep into my chest. I looked over to Chase, who seemed as if he were on the brink of a breakdown. Renée, however, was as expressionless as a statue. She seemed neither angered nor saddened at the news – unless she repressed it now and expressed it later when she’d be alone. Either way, right now she seemed unhinged.

“You can work out the rest of your shifts today, but I want your desks cleaned out before midnight. I’m sorry, again. I really liked the three of you, but here at BioTech, we need people who have a healthy work ethic and who follow strict guidelines. I just don’t think the three of you are capable of that anymore.”

The three of us were speechless. Chase stared down at Wilhelm’s desk, his eyes glossy and about to tear. Renée looked down at her folded hands in her lap, keeping her attention away from anyone. I stood from the chair without acknowledging Wilhelm’s comments. Standing silently in front of the chair for a moment, my gaze fixed on the floor, I turned to look up at Wilhelm, his fake smile making my stomach churn.

“Thank you...” I finally acknowledged, though it pained me tremendously to even say those words to that man. He made me sick. “It’s been a pleasure working for you...” Why do I even suck up to him?

Renée and Chase turned their vastly different expressions up at me, both of them turning to shock at my humble approach to the news. I acknowledged both of them with a look of defeat as I turned and walked towards the door and out of the office, back down the walk of shame towards my desk. As I positioned myself back down in my chair, the realization finally hit me. I’d been working here for 14 years: Renée for 13 and Chase for 10. And now, in a few hours, I’d no longer be apart of the BioTech staff. I’d have to find a new job to support my wife and two kids. Simple enough, right?

Renée quickly turned the corner into our cubicle and sat down in her chair, leaning across her desk so that she was almost leaning onto mine.

“Are you insane? Sucking up to him like that?”

She seemed insulted. I don’t blame her.

“C’mon,” I tried to reason. “The guy’s given us so much for so long. And besides, he’s right – we have been slacking lately. He’s just doing his job.”

“Bullshit,” Renée burst out. “His job’s to be a cynical dickhead abusing his power for personal amusement. It ain’t your job to suck him off every time he does it.”

“Just drop it,” I retorted, angrily. “Bitching about it now’s not gonna change anything. Just have to take it in strides.”

Chase rounded the corner into our cubicle now, standing at the frame behind my chair, shaking nervously. When he spoke, his voice stuttered in hysteria.

“I-I-I can’t be-bel-believe this ha-ha-happ-happened.”

Both Renée and I turned to look up at him, at first in sympathy, then in pity.

“Chase, man,” I tried to comfort him. “It’s okay. You’re a bright, good-looking kid. You’ll get another job somewhere else in a heartbeat. Don’t worry about it, pal.”

Renée seemed disgusted at Chase’s lack of confidence and his inability to stick up for himself. She’d probably thought the same thing of me after my little suck-up routine in Wilhelm’s office.

“Listen, kid,” Renée suggested to Chase as she stood up and walked over to him, placing an arm around him and leading him back to her desk, motioning for him to sit in her chair. “You gotta stop acting so damn weak and frail, alright? You’re just gonna get stepped on and walked all over. You gotta stand up for yourself every once in a while, else you’ll never get anywhere.”

“She’s right, Chase,” I added, though it probably wasn’t my place to even speak about standing up for yourself. “You’ll do fine, my man. This is far from the end.”

Renée smiled momentarily as she looked off into oblivious space, as if suddenly losing her train of thought. As she snapped back to reality, she offered unto both of us a proposition. “Yeah. Besides...I’ve already got another position lined up. It’s actually a three-man job – or in this case, two men and a woman. And it pays a fortune. You guys want in on it?”