Colson Whitehead - Apex Hides the Hurt

“Nice interview in the paper,” she said. “Didn’t know you were such a fan of Aberdeen.”

“Shit.” He’d forgotten.

“But then, who knew Jurgen was a reporter? When I worked at Aberdeen, he was this scrawny surfer guy who worked in the PR department. Always playing those first-person shooter tournaments after hours, when everybody went home.”

Fighting instinct, he asked her, “What was it like?”

“A press release for Lucky, but everything they run in that paper is like that. It’s a company town. That was the fifth time I’ve read that article — no offense — though each time there’s a new hook, or person they’re interviewing.” She tapped his arm. “You came off great. It made your job sound really interesting. Names are important,” she said, and for the hundredth time he was given a secondhand version of a public radio piece from last year, a behind-the-scenes look at the naming of a new kind of hubcap.

Most people had first heard about his profession from that piece, which had been strong-armed into existence by the PR wing of Montgomery-Tilt, just after they started an in-house nomenclature department. There were two things that people remembered about the radio piece, months later. The first was the famous nomenclature shaggy-dog story about the car company that couldn’t figure out why their new luxury sedan wasn’t selling in this one particular foreign market. They finally figured out why: in the local patois, the name they’d given the vehicle was slang for — excrement! The story was standard dinner-table fodder for namers everywhere, laying out a central issue of their profession with rueful clarity, and it was a sad day for the entire industry when this anecdote was stolen from them. “It’s like Prometheus giving fire to the lowly humans!” as one of his colleagues put it.

The second memorable item was the small bit at the end concerning the names of God. It stayed with people. In carefully modulated tones, the narrator discussed belief systems in which there were names so powerful that they could not be spoken aloud or written down. Pronouncing the true name of God, in certain precincts, would implode one’s mouth. Elsewhere, scribbling down the name of the Supreme Being would summon an earthquake the instant the last letter was formed. Or some other calamity in that vein. Such was the power of the true name of God. And G-d, too. In Some Cultures, if someone discovers your true name, it will kill you as quickly as if they had eaten your soul. There were colorful, popular legends about the secret names of demons and genies that, once known, bound them to the service of mortals. They would have to do your bidding, perform feats, grant your tawdry mortal wishes. Genies who adamantly refused to do windows would relent once you burned the proper incense and uttered the solemn syllables of their true names. “Names are very hallowed things,” Beverley said with gravity, hoping for a reaction.

How were you supposed to get paid if you couldn’t even write down the name on an invoice? Sure, sure, harnessing the dynamic force of a name was central to his work. Freedom, New Prospera. Heck, Apex. People want to get in there, inhabit it, roll around like pigs in a good name. He said, “It’s a living,” and told her he had to get back to the hotel.

“I’ll see you at the barbecue?” She pulled her sunglasses down an inch so he could see her eyes.

“You’re going?”

“Everybody’s going to the barbecue,” she informed him.

Was loneliness a brand? Loyal customers, jumbo size, lifetime supply. He turned to leave and she called after him, “I’m going to need that back, you know.”

He hoisted the manuscript into the air and bowed.

. . . . . . . .

Soon after he stubbed his toe, the nominations for that year’s Identity Awards came down. He was at his desk when Roger Tipple strolled over to his office to give him the good news. Tipple’s self-satisfied stride, his gathering smirk, the quality of light through the windows at that time of year — these things dominoed into déjà vu and he knew he’d been nominated in a category or two. The last few years, he’d been the man to beat.

Tipple shook his hand across the desk and exclaimed, “You’ve done it again!” The nominations wouldn’t be announced officially for a few hours yet, but Tipple had the inside dope. That year he was up for Best ReImagining and Best Name for what he’d done with Apex, and the company as a whole was up for Best Identity Firm. It didn’t need to be said that this last nomination was due in no small part to his hard work on numerous company accounts. Nor did it need to be said that two subclauses in his contract had just kicked in, and come bonus time he’d be a happy man. Tipple pumped his hand again.

He leaned back in his chair. To be recognized as the best in your field. What name do we give to that feeling?

Apex.

He worked at half speed the rest of the day, which meant he was still lapping his colleagues. Sometime after lunch he decided Loquacia fit the new anti-shyness drug. He’d just started seeing Bridget, and he called her to tell her the good news, but stopped short of inviting her to the awards ceremony, as it was four weeks away and he didn’t know if he would still be seeing her at that point. Occasionally he’d look up from his desk and catch someone looking at him from out there in the cubicle badlands — Tipple was making the rounds, spreading the word. An e-mail came down from on high, telling them to meet in the conference room at four o’clock. There wouldn’t be anyone left who didn’t know the good news at that point, but they’d sip champagne from the paper cups with well-manufactured gusto. At four o’clock he took a step toward the door of his office and stubbed his toe on the leg of his desk.

The toe. The toe had been stubbed, and stubbed well. In the days following his accident he learned an astounding fact. Apparently the toe had been strangely magnetized by injury so that whenever there was something in the vicinity with stubbing polarity, his toe was immediately drawn to it. His toe found stub in all the wrong places, tables and chairs of course, but also against curbs, stools, against imperfections in the sidewalk that made him trip but left no visual evidence when he looked back, as passersby chortled. Even through the thickest shoes, excruciating vibrations harassed the sad little digit. He began to loathe low perpendiculars. When he stubbed his toe while stepping into the shower, a thin ribbon of blood snaked from beneath the Apex bandage for a few seconds and then disappeared into the drain. It was blood from an invisible wound. He decided his toe had developed an abuse pathology, and kept returning to the hurt as if one day it would place the pain in context, explain it. Give it a name.

As a consequence, he was in some agony, and hadn’t noticed that he’d started to favor his other foot until he got to the conference room and Bart Grafton asked him, “What’s up with your foot, man?” Grafton told him he’d been limping for the last few days. He responded that it was nothing. A few minutes later, after Tipple delivered the news to the assembled, his co-workers cheered him, and he mustered a smile. The champagne fizzed in the paper cups. The paper cups were part of an enchanted supply that never ran out, replenishing itself underneath the kitchen counter between festive office gatherings.

They were good times.

. . . . . . . .

When he got back to his room, he watched half a sitcom, beat off, took a shower, and removed the sarcophagus lid from the unabridged “A History of the Town of Winthrop.” Sounded more like a subtitle. Which begged the question.

He didn’t know what he was after. This version lay differently on the page. There were more quotes from residents, excerpts from diaries, and newspaper stories. Assorted herbs and spices, but nothing besmirching the good name of the book’s benefactor. More of a redirecting of the spotlight. Only room for one on this dais. If the history of the town Winthrop became the chronicle of the family Winthrop, well, they were the ones forking over the dough. With historians and grocery clerks, the customer is always right.