“Well, well . . . yeah. Okay.” I shook my head. I had to get used to the idea. Despite hating my job maybe more than anything in the world, societal pressure kept me locked into the idea of being ‘stable,’ whatever that meant. I remembered working with my dad for a little at his boring office job, hearing the hatred he had in his voice, the snide comments from co-workers about so-and-so having brown bag flu. The thought of people talking about me behind my back, hating me, filled me with a potent sense of dread.

  “They believed me, don’t worry. I do a really good impression of that droney, bored sounding voice you do on the phone, like you’re trying to be the vocal epitome of drying paint.”

  “Do I really—?”

  “Don’t worry about that. I got something to tell you. It’s big. Something I’ve been working on.”

  “You’ve been working?”

  “For years.”

  I settled into my chair. “Okay,” I said. “I’m listening.”

  He stood in front of me. “First off, though, let me just congratulate you on your day-off. Nothing better than a do-nothing Thursday, am I right? I feel bad that you always go to work when you can put your PTO to use and maybe just relax for a minute. It’s a good feeling, dude. Anyways, yeah. I’ve been working.”

  “So. Let me start with a question: have you ever had one of those days that felt just a little more real than another?”

  “The thought never really occurred to me.”

  “Sure, and the thought never occurred to me until I thought about it, so you are forgiven, young padawan. Of course you don’t know shit about that. It’s not a part of your reality, yet. This idea, I mean, the idea that some days are more real than others.”

  “What does that even mean?”

  “That’s a great question. And it’s one I’ll do my best to answer, but I have to warn you, the details, out of necessity, will be fuzzy, indistinct, and subjective. It might frustrate you to a degree, because really, it takes mostly intuition to decide how real a day is. Over the last nine months, I’ve been cataloging the days that I thought weren’t very real. So, like, I have a spreadsheet, man. Huge-ass Excel spreadsheet where every day is accounted for in the last nine months with a list of keywords.”

  I was starting to feel scared. “You sound crazy, dude. Do you want to go somewhere? I could drive you.”

  He held up a hand. “Believe me, dude. I’m not crazy.” He lowered himself slightly, as if he were trying to appear less threatening. “I’ve already gotten myself checked out a couple times. I actually have the outpatient work right here. They say I have problems with depression and intrusive thoughts, but no hallucinations. I’m sane. Pretty normal they said. You can see the papers if you want.”

  “I might take you up on that,” I said, eyeing my friend carefully.

  Ollie took a deep breath. “You know what? You’re right. Be right back.” He left the room and came back with a tan folder. “You’ll notice I’ve been three times in the last nine months, last time was last week, on the first day I called out of work. It was sort of prep for me telling you this. I mean, I get it, you know? This shit sounds crazy and I knew the first thing that would come up if I talked to you about it would be: ‘dude, you sound crazy.’”

  I flipped through the files quickly, probably more quickly than I should have. It was embarrassing doing this, even if Ollie was my best friend, it felt like a breach of trust. But, it was as he said: depression, depression and anxiety once, and depression and intrusive thoughts.

  “You’re not hallucinating,” I said, finally. “According to these esteemed professionals.” I tried to sound funny about it. “Lay it on me, keep going.”

  “I’m calling it a Tidal Reality. Because really, reality isn’t just a static force. It’s not just there and then it keeps going, it’s more like a tide that goes in and out. Reality has an ebb and flow to it.”

  I considered this, trying to understand what he was saying. I held up three fingers. “How many fingers am I holding up?”

  “Twelve,” he said, deadpan. “Today is real, if you’re wondering. Totally, 100% real. I go through my checklist every day to see what’s going on.”

  “So, on the days that are unreal, is that when you call out?”

  “Yes! Exactly! I knew you’d get it.”

  “Um, why? I don’t understand.”

  “Because they don’t matter. There’s no real consequences to those days. They just happen and then vanish from our collective memory. I bet you couldn’t remember anything that happened on an unreal day. You know how days at work slip together, right? How everything just kinda becomes this sludge? Well, yeah, that’s the Tidal Reality at work.”

  “It’s not that doing the same thing every day makes it hard to distinguish specific days?”

  “No, that’s what makes it hard to distinguish the Tidal Reality. Because both are happening at once. With both of those things happening—you almost have no chance at figuring it out. It was basically a miracle that I did.”

  “And how did you decide this was a thing?” I felt like going along for the ride. Ollie had a way about him where, even when he was talking absolute bullshit, he still managed to have me hanging on his every word.

  “By total chance, man. Just ridiculous, stupid chance. I started to notice things when I broke my routine during monotonous days. Like, you might not know this about me, but I’m a pretty keen observer of human nature. That sounds dumb, I know, but seriously. I remember stuff about people. There was one day I came in a little late and it was as if everything went off its rocker. You’ve had days like that, right? Where you miss one key step of your routine and suddenly everything feels like it’s going to topple over? Well, that’s what happened to me. I sat down across from you and you looked up at me and usually you say, ’Sup, dude,’ but that day you said, ‘Morning, Ollie.’ Now, that’s not a big deal, right? Sometimes we change up our greetings and at the time it didn’t do much for me, it just made me think: ‘huh, sounded a little off.’ But then afterwards, I began noticing all these other things. Kayla almost always curls her hair before work, but that day her hair was straight. The break room didn’t have any decaf made, and when I asked Roger about it, because he has hypertension, he just shrugged and said, ‘eh, I can live a little.’ I started keeping a journal of all of these deviations, no matter how small. Do you see?”

  “No, not at all. Are you saying we’re not real? Are you saying there’s some grand conspiracy against you and we’re all changing our routines slightly to make you crazy? Because honestly, it might be working.”

  He chuckled, but it was a pained chuckle. He knew he was losing me. “No, not at all. Not at all, man. You’re not doing anything I wouldn’t do in your situation, or rather, have done in your situation. Let me try to explain this, because it’s weird. Birds are able to fly north and south because of some sort of magnetic switch in their brain. It’s like instinct, right? Think about that. How does that shit even work? Well, I think, and I know not everyone is like this, but if you went to a strange place, would you have a sense of where north was?”

  I thought about it. As a kid, I was always frustrated when I gave cardinal directions to my little sister and she often went walking in the opposite way. “Yeah,” I said, pointing.

  “Thank God,” he said, rubbing his forehead. Apparently, this was a key win for him. “That’s good. I would’ve totally lost you if you couldn’t. It’s called magnetoreception though, some people think it’s a lost sense. So, I guess, think of that fleeting feeling you get when you just know where North is. Now, it’s not so hard to believe that that same sense, or maybe a similar one, can sense when your timeline has changed, and as a provision, or maybe a release, your brain just says: ‘fuck it, man!’ So, you try something different. Maybe that deep awareness that something is off lets you change up your muscle memory and allows you to say ‘Morning, Ollie,’ instead of ‘Sup, dude.’ Or maybe it lets you drink regularly caffeinated coffee because you know it won’t matter tomorrow when the Tide rolls back. Or maybe you change your hairstyle. The point is, your body is telling you: the world you know isn’t right, so stop living by its rules.”

  I thought about this for a minute and then sighed. “Ollie, man. This shit is fucking crazy.”

  He nodded. “I know, man. I really know. But also know this: the next unreal day is tomorrow, and I want you to be prepared for what’s going to happen.” He paused for a moment, swallowed. “That’s a Friday, by the way.”

  7

  BY THE TIME tomorrow came, I was tired and totally sleepless. I wasn’t stupid, I knew the importance of Friday. I could read all the writing on the wall. Friday equaled something bad. It meant Ollie might be going too far, doing something too bad for even me to get on board with.

  But also, as I lay awake in bed all night, it hit me that it meant every conversation he and I had would be put under a microscope, and somehow, I too would be made to be an enabler, an accomplice, whether I ever pulled a trigger or not.

  My day off was spent talking back and forth with Ollie who seemed at ease with the idea of doing something drastic to prove his point, although he wouldn’t say what it was. I thought about calling the police. But, it was easier said than done. Ollie was my friend, and he hadn’t actually done anything yet. As far as I knew, he didn’t own a single weapon. He’d never hurt anyone before. All he had was a dumbass theory. But there was another reason that kept me from calling anyone for help—Ollie was remarkably calm and unstressed. He didn’t seem particularly worried about what would happen tomorrow, only repeating that I should wait and see. And for some reason, although I was worried out of my mind about what that could mean, I didn’t think he meant for anything awful to happen.

  When I got out of bed, Ollie was already dressed and waiting for me. “Made you coffee,” he said.

  “Thanks.”

  “You okay, dude?”

  “I didn’t sleep much.”

  “Ah shit,” he said. “Sorry, man.” He took a sip of his coffee cup. “I know this shit can be pretty overwhelming. Don’t worry though. It’ll be good. Nothing that happens today will be able to ripple past the Tidal Reality.”

  I winced. I hated hearing him say it, as if it were real. It wasn’t real. It was stupid. I ground my teeth. “Dude,” I said. “Please don’t do anything stupid. Seriously. Please.”

  He shook his head, slapped me on the shoulder. “C’mon, man. Just relax, please. Remember that tomorrow, everything will be reset. Like Groundhog’s Day, sorta.”

  On the way to work, he played the radio loud and sang nonsense words to songs he’d never heard. He was trying to make me laugh, get me to loosen up a bit. When we pulled into the parking lot, my hands were shaking, and he gave me one last pep talk.

  “Alright. So, you have a mission today. I need you to be observant of all the little things. I’m not doing anything today until I know for sure the Tidal Reality is at its peak, okay?”

  “What am I noticing?”

  “Anything, small things. Stuff that seems different than usual. That’s all. Can you do that for me? Treat it like a game, alright? We’re gonna try to rack up some high scores today.”

  The wording made me freak, internally. But I had to remind myself that nothing bad was happening yet. There was no sign that our talks about death and disaster were going to rear their smiling faces and lick their slavering jaws. Nothing had happened.

  When we went inside, Ollie greeted reception with a “Holla, girl.” And when we passed, he said, “Did you see that?”

  I looked back at him with a dumb stare.

  “She didn’t even notice. That’s a weird thing not to notice.”

  My heart was pumping in my chest. “I don’t think it was anything, dude. She was reading something. She was busy. She didn’t hear you.” My whispers were becoming harsh.

  “Nah, she heard me alright,” he said. “Of course she did. But don’t worry, we’ll have more to investigate.”

  When we got to our desk, I began to work in earnest. Unfortunately, that was more challenging than it sounded. Looking across the desk, Ollie was sitting back, drinking coffee from his thermos. I had half a mind to tell him to get to work, but I stopped because I realized that it would be out of character. It made me wonder why I wanted to work in the first place. Why did I care if Ollie worked? I was nervous, of course. Scared.

  But, also—thrilled. I decided to let go.

  I smiled to myself and pushed my keyboard away. I suddenly got it. That bastard. “Okay,” I said. “You win. I’m playing.”

  Ollie grinned. “Yes! I knew you’d get into it.”

  I chuckled to myself, shaking my head. This was a game. He told me straight away that it was a game. How could I be so stupid? There was no Tidal Reality. There was nothing here but Ollie trying to make a shitty situation better. We were at work. We hated being at work. So, he invented a game. I wanted to clap for him, because it was genius. I sat there for a moment, admiring my friend, admiring how he turned people watching into our new escapism.

  “So, what have you seen so far?” I asked.

  He pulled up something from underneath the table. “I’ve been keeping notes,” he said, showing his notepad. He wasn’t lying, it was full. He was taking this really seriously, I realized, with a bit of jabbing weakness. He’d been writing nonstop for his first hour of work, as if he were trying to make a quota. He continued, “Olivia is eating at her desk. Carl, the dumbass, is talking to Raj by the watercooler—and he hates Raj—told me himself. I think the clocks are like a quarter second slow today. I’m not sure, every time I count the seconds out, I’m pretty sure it takes an extra second for it to move four seconds on the clock. It’s usually right on, you know? I count it every day. It’s one of those small things. Anyways. Kayla is using her left hand to write today. Did you know she’s ambidextrous? I actually noticed that at the party, we talked about it for a minute while you were mingling. She favors her right hand for most everything though, she says, even though she can do it all with both. But yeah, today she’s using her left. Look at her.”

  I did. Just as Ollie said, she was writing with her left hand. I wasn’t sure if I should be annoyed at this or excited. It was a game. “Okay,” I said, trying to remain calm, fun, and carefree. We’re having fun, I reminded myself. “So, I did notice one thing today.”

  Ollie looked up from his list. “Oh, yeah?”

  I swallowed. It wasn’t anything big. Nothing big at all. But I’d noticed it, for sure. I felt stupid noticing it at all. “The numbers,” I said, pointing to my computer screen. “They’re all sequential.”

  “What?”

  “See for yourself. One, two, three, four, five, and so on and so forth.”

  His eyes widened. “That’s insane.” He leaned back in his chair. “You fucking genius.”

  “Not bad for a beginner,” I said, but there was a tremor in my voice.

  “Why would they be sequential, that doesn’t make any sense?” He was talking to himself now. “You can do that shit with any simple function, that’s Excel 101. They don’t need us to generate—well, fuck, it’s just counting, really.” He took a deep breath and stared me deep in the eye. “You done good, kid. Real fucking good.”

  “Thanks, man. But it’s just a game, right?”

  Ollie reached for something under his desk. “Hey, man, do me a favor—stay cool until tomorrow, alright?”

  “What does that mean?”

  It took me a second to see what he had pulled out. “Just trust the plan.”

  “What does that—oh shit, is that a fucking gun?”

  He placed the barrel to his temple.

  “You’ll see,” he said, and then pulled the trigger.

  8

  OLLIE’S HEAD EXPLODED. At least that was what it looked like at first. Before he died, he had that same wish me luck look he always had before he was about to do something daring, cavalier, stupid—like the face of an Old Hollywood star about to pull one over on the audience one final time.

  Except now, his face was cratered in on the side, his neck was limp, and I was covered in a fine mist of his blood. Chunks of bone were on his keyboard. Thick slugs of flesh and brain matter crawled from the gaping wound.

  And everyone was screaming. Everyone. Me, I was screaming. I was crying.

  I didn’t know what to do. I stood up, I guess, I rushed over to him, I guess. And then people were pulling me away.

  “Ollie!” I shouted.

  And they said, “No, no, don’t touch him. Stand back.” But instead of letting me stand back they pulled me back.

  The gun had fallen to the office carpet and we all just let it lay there. I tried looking at it, just so I didn’t have to look at Ollie.

  Someone called 911. Someone told us to evacuate now, to not touch anything. I was pushed out by empathetic hands. It was as if I were floating at sea. Gentle waves took me away, and I had no idea what was happening. I was utterly without agency and in a blink of an eye, I was out in the parking lot. People, co-workers, touched my shoulders in stunned silence. When the police arrived, people whispered questions to me: “Are you alright? Are you hurt? What happened?”

  And I couldn’t say anything. I was too sad, too scared. Too overwhelmed in the moment. Somebody hugged me and I was falling into their arms, burying my face into their shoulder, and I was sobbing violently, like a maniac. When I could finally speak, they took my story down as quickly and quietly as they could, away from the others. They turned me around when the body came out on a stretcher. The officer taking my story told me, “Hey, no one will blame you if you need to see someone.”

  And like a child, I sniffled and nodded and clumsily stuffed the card for a therapist into my wallet.

  “It’s really no big deal, especially for something like this. He was your roommate, you said?”

  “Yeah,” I said, numb.

  The cop whistled. “Tough break, man. I’m sorry for your loss.”

  I didn’t feel like I had any real agency. I was pushed between crowds, hugged back and forth, spoken to like a child. Finally, it came to an end as the fervor lost its luster.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9