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Paper Pusher Expert

Dodi

Jake will be here any minute and I’m not even packed. I dump the contents of my laundry basket onto the sofa and turn down the volume of the TV to a companionable murmur.

“He said he was going to the roof for a smoke? I didn’t even know he smoked. That was the last I saw him. Well, until I found him on the pavement…”

It’s a two-night trip, so mathematically that’s six pairs of underpants, five socks, and an entire box of condoms, unopened, still piping hot from the pharmacy. I imagine a security guard unzipping my bag in full view of Jake. I bury the box at the bottom of my carry-on and layer it with my underwear.

“…from a height of five hundred feet, death would have been immediate upon impact…”

I decide not to bring pajamas. Sleeping is not on the itinerary. If I need to wear something to bed, I’ll borrow one of his shirts, and I’ll leave a giant lipstick smudge on it somewhere. I’ll leave lipstick smudges in a lot of places this trip.

He’s so pale. I bet he turns all blotchy and pink during sex.

The outfits are harder to pick. Something understated, corporate, and concealing for the seminar, obviously, but I count two nights on the town. I pad into my bedroom and pull dresses off the hangers and throw them on my bed. He’s already seen the red one, and the tan bandage one. The rest are black, black, black, and another black—

“…the police ruled suicide. The victim had been the target of an internal corporate investigation, which had ultimately found him blameless, but his wife says the stress…”

He likes me in black, though. And black is an appropriate color for the purpose of this trip. Somber. Funerary. Sexy. The color of mourners and dominatrices. I select two.

The laptop will stay at home. I finished my last assignment ahead of schedule. Surely I can take a break for two nights. I’ve been a servant of two masters for long enough. Well, three. My neighbor had been willing enough to reprise the role of sitter.

“…patently the stupidest theory I’ve ever heard. The Paper Pusher is an urban legend.”

It’s a compact bag. Just big enough to stuff a dead man into, and a few outfit changes, too.

“No. That’s absurd. It wasn’t a murder. You know what they found up there? A paper airplane. The idiot was on the roof test-flying a goddamn paper airplane when he fell. If that’s not time theft…”

I barely manage to zip my bag closed, and my eyes fall on the entire purpose of this trip, still sitting on the coffee table. Jesus . I unzip my bag and start over.

“Are you telling me people don’t fall to their death in other cities too? Maybe you’re saying each city has a Paper Pusher. Or maybe the Paper Pusher goes on working vacations. Ha!”

I press my fingers into my temples. I’ve waited so long to take this trip. I can’t decide if it’s better or worse that Jake is coming.

The documentary is almost over. True crime has always been my drug of choice when life gets too real. I sit on the sofa and crank the volume. I’ve watched it fifty times, but something’s been teasing at my brain these past few days. I study the men’s faces fading in and out, one after another, studio portraits, clipped family photos, close-ups of obituaries, every one of them a fall death in the downtown core, some dating back fifteen years.

“Police are still reluctant to draw a link between these deaths, but it’s impossible to accept they are unrelated. The only thing we know about the Paper Pusher for sure is he’s still at work.”

The view changes: the foot of a downtown skyscraper appears, and the camera slowly pans up, the building rising proud and erect like a shiny glass phallus.

“You fucking idiots ,” I whisper at the TV. “It’s obviously a ‘she.’?”