The Voting Machine

Resignation

My mood grew darker. I started thinking thoughts that made me feel guilty and terrible. Maybe Gina wasn't the only one who made the wrong choices. There was a time when Gina kissed me once and I told her I couldn't be the one for her. I told her I'd given my heart to Suzy. But I wasn't the same man I used to be.

Now I was weak and selfish and confused. And so I found myself imagining how my life might be different if I was with Gina instead of Suzy.

Maybe I'd been lying to myself about my love and devotion to Suzy. Maybe I'd been doing this because I didn't want to deal with my attraction to Gina. Gina was the type of person who could help me now. She was sophisticated. She was savvy. She was a survivor. She was the only one I worked with who saw the future and found a way to thrive. She was one of the brave ones that Chet talked about: the ones who

stared terror in the face: the ones who flew fearlessly into the Second World.

Gina had lived through the kind of hardship and desperation that many women will never know. Now she was an international executive, the queen of the Second World. In my tortured mind, I found myself wandering in places I'd never dared to go before.

Was I really better off with a partner like Gina who could help me build a career and be successful? Maybe it wasn't just me who would be better off. Maybe Suzy and the baby would be happier too because I'd have the skills to send them good money even if I no longer sent them love? Wouldn't Suzy rather have a successful ex-husband than a faithful husband who was a loser?

My mother told me something on her deathbed. "A real man finds one true love, Temo. He finds her and he never leaves her. That's why you say the vows on your wedding day. I want you to find one woman to love with all your heart and never let her go. She and you will be together on earth and in heaven. That's the kind of man I want you to be."

My mother didn't want me to abandon my wife when things got tough. She didn't want me to do what my father had done to her. My father believed that marriage was just another temporary state, that we were ultimately all on our own in this world.

Lovers couldn't orbit each other for eternity like planets circling around the sun. Lovers collided in time and space and then went in their separate directions. I spent my life trying to avoid turning into my dad. But part of him was inside of me. There was no avoiding this reality.

The new routine continued for a few weeks with me working night shifts setting up training videos in the Second World. One evening I came home from one of my secret runs to the bar to find Suzy crying on the couch next to her computer.

"What's the matter?" I said.

"You know what's the matter!" she said. "It's her again. Why do you let her do these things?"

She showed me an e-mail on the screen of her laptop.

From:

To: Suzy McCarthy

Date: March 14

Subj: Better off

Suzy,

You are a good woman and I always respected you. You were the perfect wife for Temo at one time. But situations change. People change. You and Temo are different people now. Temo would be better off with a woman who understood his situation. He would be better off with a woman who could share his dreams.

Let Temo come to India to be with me. I can get him a good job that will support you and the baby. You know it would be best for him. Everyone would be better off this way.

I couldn't believe what I was reading. Suzy continued to sob. The baby was wailing too now.

"Suzy, I had no idea about this."

"Are you in love with her? You want to be with her instead of me?"

"No," I shouted. "I don't know why she did this. I don't know how she got your e-mail."

"I told you she was crazy. She's nothing but trouble for us."

"Suzy, I am so sorry. I had nothing to do with this."

"You can't work for her anymore. Tell her now. You're quitting."

"OK, Suzy. I'll quit. But you know that means I could be unemployed for a very long time."

"You rather lose your job or your marriage?"

I went outside into the parking lot of our apartment to get away from all the screaming and the crying. I called Gina's world phone from my cell.

"Temo?" she answered in India. I could hear the car horns of Bangalore traffic blaring in the background.

"What the hell is the matter with you, Gina? Why did you write that e-mail to Suzy?"

"I don't know what you're talking about, Temo."

"Don't lie, Gina. I saw the e-mail myself. You told her I should leave her and be with you."

"I didn't write an e-mail to your wife."

'You're not being straight with me. You're holding something back, just like you did before," I said. "What do you want from me, Gina? Why did you bring up all the personal stuff on our video call? You talked about making the wrong decisions. I told you before, Gina. I can only love one woman forever."

Gina was quiet for a long time. "I know what you said, Temo. I don't know if you still believe it. Anyway, I didn't write any e-mail to your wife."

"I saw it myself."

"Whatever you saw wasn't real, Temo. It sounds like she's playing games with you."

"She would never do that. I am quitting, Gina. This is too weird."

"You can't do that, Temo. I need you."

"Why?"

"It's hard to explain. You just have to trust me."

"I can't do that."

We ended the call without saying good-bye. I submitted an e-mail resignation to Gina and Chet that very night. Security immediately cut off my network access to the Second World. The next morning, Sampson came to collect my company laptop and cell phone. The ex-surfer gave me a bear hug in the parking lot below my apartment.

"You're the last one from the old days, Temo. The building is a ghost town now."