Dexter looked over at the cell phone when it rang. He was just getting ready to get into the shower. Wishing that he would get one morning without being interrupted, he answered the phone.
"Hello, Mark."
"Are you on the crapper?" Mark asked.
"No. I'm about to shave," Dexter answered thinking he could put the phone on mute and shave before showering.
Mark said, "Shit ... It rains a little and every asshole forgets how to drive."
"What do you want?" Dexter asked while picking up his electric razor.
"I want you to..."
There was a weird noise on the speaker, and then silence. Dexter continued to listen, but there was nothing coming over the speakerphone. He glanced over at it to see if there was a problem only to discover that the call had been disconnected. He shrugged his shoulders and started shaving. Mark would call back once he realized the call had been interrupted.
Dexter finished shaving without getting a call back from Mark. He glanced at the phone wondering if something was the matter and then took a shower. There wasn't a voice mail on the phone when he finished bathing. He headed down the hall knocking on the doors of the kids to wake them. It was a little early, but he could live with their complaints.
In the kitchen his wife was talking to the group from Ireland. He poured a cup of coffee and sat down at the table. He watched Janet go through the motions of preparing breakfast. It wasn't much work. She just tossed a couple frozen bagels into the toaster, and waited for them to pop up.
He hadn't noticed how old she looked. She was in her late thirties, but looked more like she was fifty. Her voice had taken on a sharp edge to it. He blamed it on her job. Her hours were almost as long as his and she did the housework on top of her job. He would have helped more, but it seemed like he was always at the office or on the computer trying to get caught up on work.
He answered a couple of e-mails from people who worked for him. One of the developers claimed to have worked through the night and was going to stay at home that day. He would have to check to see if the guy's claim was true. It was just as likely that he had worked a couple of hours that night and claimed an all nighter, just to have a day off. He had done it before. Dexter hated managing people.
Janet put a plate of bagels slathered with creamed cheese in front of him with a grunt. He picked up one and took a bite out of it. The kids showed up and poured their typical breakfast bowls of cereal. His wife sat down, and started eating a bagel. She took small bites so she could swallow if she suddenly needed to make a comment to the party at the other end of the line.
He finished his bagels. Getting up from the table, he dropped his dishes into the sink. He texted goodbye to his wife and headed out the door. He was running a little early and hoped the traffic wouldn't be too bad. Maybe he could get into the office early and get caught up. It had rained a little the night before and traffic was running a lot slower than usual.
He managed to get into the office late. It wasn't really late since it was only a few minutes after eight and the working day officially started at nine. That didn't matter, since eight had become the defacto starting time. His office phone was ringing and he had a dozen e-mails waiting for him. There was a reminder to have all of his people turn in their time sheets. He forwarded the e-mail to the sixty people who worked for him knowing that a handful wouldn't get their time sheets in and he'd have to track them down later.
He checked to see if the developer who was taking the day off had done any work the previous night. He pulled up the logs on the source code control program and noticed that the developer hadn't checked out any code since eight the previous day. He then recalled that the guy had worked the whole weekend when one of the production machines had core dumped. That little problem had ruined everyone's weekend. He had spent the whole weekend fielding calls from developers, production support, and management about the problem. He decided not to pursue the issue.
He went back to his e-mail and noticed that he hadn't gotten anything from Mark. That was unusual. Mark was 'the great communicator.' He liked to tell people what they knew they were supposed to be doing that day four and five times in the morning, then call four or five times during the day to make sure they were doing what they were supposed to be doing, and then four or five more calls in the evening to make sure that everything was done. He should have had two e-mails reminding him to call India that night.
He got an e-mail telling him that he had exceeded his quota for e-mails. He looked down and saw that he had over sixteen thousand e-mails of which two thirds of them were unread. He sorted his inbox and eliminated all of the automatically generated e-mails from the source code control program, the time sheet program, and all of the meeting invitations and reminders. That got rid of ten thousand e-mails.
He archived the thousand e-mails from his boss that had collected over the past three months. He knew that a thousand e-mails sounded like a lot, but his boss tended to send him ten e-mails a day and copy him on another ten e-mails. That was a hundred e-mails a week from his boss.
He then deleted the hundreds of e-mails that were company junk mail. He wondered how anyone could possibly wade through those e-mails and get any work done.
He was left with a couple thousand e-mails from the people who worked for him. Sixty people generated a lot of e-mails particularly when every e-mail was addressed to two levels of management. These were the ones that he read because he had to read them. Most of them were complaints, technical issues, and requests for time off. The three firms in India and China generated nearly as many e-mails as his sixty people.
He stared at his desktop, thinking that he needed a vacation. He needed a real vacation ... one that was better than his last one to Hawaii. That had been a disaster. They hadn't seen many of the sights. Between him and his wife, there wasn't a day when they hadn't been on three conference calls. The time difference had his wife on the phone at three in the morning local time. It was kind of hard to have a late evening out, sit on a conference call for two hours at three in the morning, and then go off to pursue tourist activities when the tour buses left at eight in the morning.
The kids had sat around most of the day complaining about being bored. Will was irritated about not being able to play his computer game with his friends. Sarah was upset because the time difference cut out six hours a day of texting with her friends. He wasn't sure if any of the kid's friends actually existed since he had never seen any of them.
About the time his wife was ready to do something, he was on a conference call. His calls to India coincided with dinner time which meant they had to eat early, missing the shows, or late, getting the bums rush when the place was ready to close. The trip had ended with a huge argument about having wasted thousands of dollars. They returned home tired and exhausted.
He remembered taking camping vacations with his parents when he was a kid. They had a pop-up tent trailer that they would hitch up behind the family station wagon. They would travel from one campground to the next, spending a couple of days at each place. His job was to set up the trailer by leveling it with the jacks. Once the trailer was level, he had to put in the aluminum supports for the sleeping platforms and the tent.
He had always complained about having to set up the trailer while his dad walked around stretching after having made the drive, but he'd give his left nut to have a simple vacation like that at the moment. His dad didn't get any business calls while on his vacations. They didn't have cell phones in those days.
His thoughts were interrupted by his desk phone ringing. He answered it. It was the Director's secretary ordering him to come over to the Director's office. There wasn't anything he could do to get out of the meeting. When the big guy called, you went. After hanging up, he glanced at his watch and swore. "I hope this isn't any of that Service Economy crap."
He called Jim, one of his project leads, to tell him to run the status meeting while he was with the Director. There was no telling how long his meeting was going to last. The Director had two moods: one where he was curt and one where he rambled on forever. Dexter hoped that the Director wasn't in the latter mood.
Mr. Morris, the Director, was waiting for Dexter with a frown on his face. Dexter wondered what he had done to earn that frown.
Mr. Morris gestured to a chair and grunted, "Sit down."
"What can I do for you?" Dexter asked while taking a seat.
"Mark was in an accident this morning on his way to work," Mr. Morris said.
"Is he all right?" Dexter asked. That explained the sudden end to the telephone call that morning.
"He's dead," Mr. Morris said bluntly.
"That's horrible. I was talking to him and the call got cut off," Dexter said feeling sick to his stomach. He realized that weird noise at the end of the call must have been the accident that killed his boss.
"Well, that puts us in a bind," Mr. Morris said.
"When's the funeral?" Dexter asked.
"Don't worry about that. I'll represent the company at the funeral," Mr. Morris said.
"I worked for him for ages. I should show up and pay my respects," Dexter said staring at the Director.
Mr. Morris said, "We can't afford to have a bunch of people leaving work to attend a funeral. I'll represent the company."
"Well..."
"If you want to do something, send around an envelope and collect some money for flowers," Mr. Morris said.
"I'll do that," Dexter said thinking that wasn't enough.
"In the mean time, I want you to take over his responsibilities until we can hire someone to take his place," Mr. Morris said.
Dexter stared at Mr. Morris wondering if he had heard him correctly. He had been waiting years to get a promotion, but this didn't sound like a promotion.
Wanting a little clarification, he asked, "Is this a temporary assignment?"
"Yes. It is just until we can hire someone to take his place," Mr. Morris answered.
"How long are we talking about?" Dexter asked.
"That's kind of hard to answer. The company has a hiring freeze on and we can't bring in anyone until the freeze is lifted. You might hold that spot for a year or so," Mr. Morris said.
"Why not promote me into the position?" Dexter asked.
"We think it best to bring in outside people for positions of that level. We like having a new perspective brought into the management ranks," Mr. Morris answered.
Dexter didn't know what to say. He had just been told that it was basically impossible for him to get a promotion. He asked, "Will I get a raise commensurate with the added responsibilities?"
"No. This is just a temporary assignment," Mr. Morris answered.
Dexter was shocked. He said, "I guess I'll have to identify someone to take over my position."
"No. You'll have your old job responsibilities. After all, this is a temporary situation," Mr. Morris said.
"For more than a year," Dexter said wanting to make sure that he understood things correctly.
"Yes," Mr. Morris said.
Dexter said, "That doesn't sound very temporary to me."
"It is," Mr. Morris said.
"No raise?" Dexter said.
"Correct," Mr. Morris said.
"How about a bonus?" Dexter said.
"For what?" Mr. Morris asked sounding a little surprised by the suggestion that Dexter get a bonus.
"For doing two jobs," Dexter said.
"It is good for your career," Mr. Morris answered.
Wondering how it could be good for his career, Dexter said, "And there's no possibility of getting the position permanently."
"That's right," Mr. Morris said. He shifted a little uneasily realizing how it sounded.
"Why not?"
"We don't promote people at your level. You can't bring in the external perspective that allows the organization to grow and change. We've found that people tend to propagate the system as is," Mr. Morris answered.
"I never thought about it that way," Dexter said fuming. How many times had he accepted additional tasks and special projects on the promise that he'd get promoted?
Mr. Morris said, "So you'll take it?"
"No thanks," Dexter said.
His stomach lurched even as the words came out of his mouth. He wished he had his pink pills with him. He knew that he was probably kissing his job goodbye. He'd rather work in a shoe store than work under those conditions.
"What do you mean ... no thanks?"
Dexter said, "I don't want it."
"You've got to take it," Mr. Morris said. He couldn't believe that Dexter was turning him down. He thought Dexter had a greater sense of responsibility than that.
"Why?" Dexter asked.
"Times are bad. You've got a job," Mr. Morris said.
"That's right. I've got a job. I don't need two," Dexter said.
He was unable to believe the words coming out of his mouth. Never in his career had he ever talked to his boss like that. He was mentally going over the severance package that he could expect if they fired him.
"It's just temporary," Mr. Morris said.
"For more than a year? That doesn't sound very 'temporary' to me," Dexter said. He crossed his arms and stared at Mr. Morris.
"The company needs you," Mr. Morris said.
Dexter replied, "The same company that is sending one person to the funeral of an employee who died while talking business over the telephone."
"Mark is dead. He doesn't care how many of us go to his funeral. The company has real needs that have to be met," Mr. Morris said.
"I'm sorry, but I want more than one person I work with to show up at my funeral when I die," Dexter said. Based on how his life was going, he'd have four people at his funeral – his wife, his children, and his boss. He decided that he would go to Mark's funeral anyway.
"What's that got to do with anything?" Mr. Morris asked.
"Everything," Dexter answered flatly.
Realizing that he wasn't making any progress, Mr. Morris said, "Think about it before you do anything that can't be taken back. I'll see you tomorrow morning and I'll expect an answer then."
"Okay," Dexter said.
On stepping out of the Director's office, Dexter pulled out his blackberry. He deliberately turned it off. He headed for the parking lot thinking it was time that he update his resume. He pulled out is cell phone and texted his wife that he was heading home. She replied that she would be late.
The traffic home was nowhere near as bad as he encountered during his normal commute.
Upon reaching home, he paused to look around at the outside of his house. The yard was a mess. There weren't any flowers in the flowerbed. There were a few ragged looking bushes. There were bald patches in the lawn. It had been ages since he had edged the driveway and walkways. The siding looked old and one of the corner pieces had come loose. As bad as the front yard was, the back yard was even worse.
He went into the house and looked around it. The walls should have been painted a couple years ago. The furniture looked old and worn. It wasn't that anything was dirty; it was that everything looked tired. He realized his wife hadn't waxed the wood furniture in ages.
He got out an old t-shirt and started dusting the living room. For the rest of the day he cleaned house while thinking about Mr. Morris and the company. Mark is dead. He doesn't care how many people come to his funeral. The more he thought about it, the angrier he got.
Years spent following corporate procedures and policies had been for nothing. He had swallowed shit that would have choked a French sewer. He kept thinking about how he could make a few local changes in his job that would make his life easier. Meetings? He could get stop attending three quarters of them without a problem. That would give him an extra forty hours a week, right there.