First Draft, Part Six

The water cooler is in the corner by the windows - grand, wall-wide stretches of glass that look out onto the expanse of skyscrapers and pollution that fill the city and give it life and give it death. Tim pulls a paper cone down from its holster, fills it with water, gulps it down, still hunched halfway over. He re-fills and re-gulps, then re-fills again. On his third cup he stands up straight. He takes his time; he takes a sip. He looks at the world outside, at the gray sky, at the gray streets far below, at the gray rain that he thinks has only just begun to fall.

The buildings in the city all used to have different names than the names they have now. Tim used to know them, most of them. His father taught them to him years and years ago. He was a businessman, Tim's father, with an office in the old Draper building. He used to take Tim to work with him some summer days, and he'd rattle off the names of the buildings as they walked past. Warren Brothers, Viceroy, Hart & Landers and more. And now the Hart&Landers building is the SunCola building. And the Warren Brothers building is the First Bank Center. And the Draper building that once was the tallest building in the state...Well, that's still the Draper building. But not for much longer. It can't be much longer, I'm sure.

Tim stares at the Draper building, just a few blocks away from the Sanseko Industries building where he is now. He remembers wearing a tiny suit and tie as a child, and the way he followed his father through the office and pretended his lunchbox was a briefcase full of important files. He kept out of the way well enough as a boy, and none of the other men minded having him around. Most of their square jaws cracked into grins when they saw him approach; some of them ruffled his hair and called him, “Buster Brown.” But sometimes a meeting was too important for him. Sometimes a client would come, and Tim would have to hide under his father's desk, silent and secret, until whatever business that needed to be done was done. Those were Tim's favorite times. He would wedge himself in between his father's socks and the thick, oak paneling of the desk, and suddenly the whole world would change. He would be a hero cornered in a cave, waiting for the right moment to steal some treasure, or save some damsel, from under the monocled eye of a mustachioed villain. Or he would be a spy in a deadly foreign land, collecting secret information about “unit cost” and “shipping expenditures” to bring back home to Uncle Sam. Or he would be, or he would be, or he would be...Something. Back when I could be anything, he thinks. Back when I wasn't what I became. This...

Tim finishes his cup of water and drops it in the trash bin next to the cooler. He leans closer to the window. He stares out through the curtains of rain. Little gargoyles run up and down the corners of the Draper building, but Tim can't make them out. He leans closer to the window, until his forehead bumps against the glass. It's bulletproof up here, he was told – up on the 39th floor. You could run and hurl yourself at it, full speed, and the worst that would happen to you would be a cheap bruise. Tim tilts his head downward, hears a small squeak: skin sliding on a smooth surface. Below, apart from the indistinct gray of sidewalk and weather, he sees a yellow line of cabs, all stuck, all waiting for the light to change.