Red Cave

Walter

1979

"If communism took over America like it did, goddamn, uh, Russia and China, my son Richard would've wasted years in college to become a doctor only to earn the same as a homeless busboy," James Wilson, one of Walter's coworkers, says while leaning against Walter's desk with his arms crossed. "How is that fair?"

He's tall, muscular, and wears large black glasses. His hair is permed and gelled, and he has bushy sideburns that match his caterpillar eyebrows.

Walter and Crosby nod, glancing at each other from their cubicles, with Walter on the left and Crosby on the right.

"And Walt, isn't your little girl, Judith, in medicine school too," Crosby Andrews asks, and they look at the mahogany-framed family picture on his desk. Walter hadn't told anyone about her being in an asylum, so when his coworker mentions her, he begins to think of her. "Imagine her disappointment knowing her wage would be the same as everyone else's. I mean, what's the point in going to school? Hell, I could buy my way into presidency from driving a cab for a year."

Crosby's a pudgy, fair-skinned black man with a bald spot in the middle of his short, curly hair, and like James, he wears thick glasses.

Walter and James share a glance, the corners of their mouths twitching as they suppress smiles. Eventually, they crack and belt out obnoxious, hyena laughs. Crosby wrinkles the skin between his eyebrows, and his eyes bounce from one to the other.

Through his fit of humor, James says, "Now you know damn well, colored men won't run this country."

Crosby rolls his eyes at his cynic comment, turns his knees away from the aisle, then returns them under his desk. He continues typing on his typewriter, shaking his head. Some keys refuse to budge until he presses them harder.

"Hey, wait a minute now." Walter abruptly stops laughing, and his expression is stern. James wipes his left eye with his left hand's index finger while staring behind himself. "That's white folks talk. I'm all for us paving the way for our next generation, and the sooner people like you realize that we can, the stronger our community will be."

"I'll believe it when I see a black man taking over after Jimmy Carter," he leans over to tell him. Their manager, Alexander, walks toward them from behind James with a hard gaze. He has one hand in his slacks' pocket and a white mug in the other.

"I must be losing my mind." Their supervisor projects his voice despite there being relative silence around them. James flinches upright, and he drops his arms. Walter turns to his typewriter, and Crosby clears his throat. "Because I don't remember this being happy hour."

"Sorry, sir." Alex raises his mug to his thin lips and sips his dark coffee. He scans them over the brim of his drink, and when he lowers it in front of his beer belly, he glares at James.

"Get back to work, boy." Without a word, he walks to the cubicle in front of Walter's and sits in the leather chair. He flips to another sheet of paper before sliding his pencil from behind his ear, and Alexander flicks his eyes to Crosby. He drops his baby blue eyes onto his typewriter to avoid the dark look his boss is giving him, then the man finally looks at Walter. "Your wife is on the line in my office. Congratulations on the new baby."

He knows she's not pregnant, and, to his knowledge, neither is his stepdaughter, Stacey. No one outside of their immediate family knows that Judith's in an asylum, so he understands why she lied.

Everyone's grieving for her, though she's alive, but only Walter hides his sadness behind a stoic facade. He refuses to show weakness when others expect him to be strong, but every day he struggles to put on his tie. Knowing the pain his daughter was in, and not having anyone to confide in makes him feel like a balloon slowly filling past its capacity.

Walter steps into the aisle and adjusts his black tie while glancing at his friends. As his final order, while glancing at the two, Alexander says, "Wilson, Andrews, don't lose your jobs shucking and jiving like you're in the fields. So long as you're employed here, you work like everyone else."

He continues down the aisle, shifting his dark eyes from one person to the next in their cubicles. Clicking ink pens and typewriter keys fills the air with tension as he surveys his employees, and Walter walks in the opposite direction.

He approaches the room overlooking them, and upon entry, he notices papers cluttering a large oak desk around a typewriter and a spin-dial rotary phone off the hook.

He stands behind the desk, in front of the chair, and bends his knees to sit before swiftly returning upright.

No, don't sit. It'll just give Mr. Finch another reason to write me up.

Walter brings the handset to his ear and clears his throat. He hears the television droning and says, "Hey, Sher, what's going on?"