Dangerous life of a male secretary

I am a male secretary and everyone looks at me like it’s my fault, now someone is trying to kill me. I had been experiencing terrible stomach pains, unable to keep anything in or eat, night sweats and delirum I decided to check myself into the hospital. I’d been there a week, basically feeling like a lab rat subjected to any embarrassing probe, urinal spills in my bed, brain scans, and bitchy nurses stingy with the painkillers. Just when I decided I had had enough and would rather die on the city bus than in that itchy bed, my five Doctors, three residents and psychiatrists inform me that they finally might have figured out what was wrong with me. They said they found significant traces of arsenic in my blood. The same poisonous culprit rumored to kill Napeoleon Barparte and of course I was no French dictator, so I was scared shitless. Who could possibly want me dead?

The unsusal suspects was obvious one of the female secretaries I called the Sirens, from Homer’s Greek mythology, creatures with the head of bird and body of a female that lured mariners with the irresistible charm of their song to their destruction on the rocks surrounding their island. They were once five of them and they ruled the 3^rd floor of Scope, Kensing and Co. law building like popular high school cheerleaders. First there was the libarian, Judy. She was the executive assistant to the Senior Partner Issac Scope of Scope, Kensing and Co She There was the frigid blonde with bleach blond ambition hair and moderately size fake tities. She was the youngest. She wore short designer skirts with important looking designers jackets and blouse. Her shoes were that of a single girl trying to lure rich men, naked feet and proprobably read too many Candice Bushnell and Gigi Levangie books. She spoke with sharp edges and the look in her eyes was always hungry.. it was so obvious she wanted to be the wife. She frighten me the most. She reminded me of National Geographic deadly predators who appear regal and refined but in a fraction of second their angry claws could rip through your flesh with intense pleasure. Second was the hypochondriac. She carried a satcher full of prescription bottles that made the mysterious sound of a rain stick when she came rushing into the office in the morning. I once made the mistake of asking her for aspirin for a headache. It took her thirty bottles to find Chlordiazepoxide, which she said was just as good as long as I avoided operating heavy machinery. She was the assistant to John Kensing of Scopr, Kensing and Co. For thirty years she had been a middle school teacher for the mental retarded in which she winked was the best preparation for her current job. I sort of like her. She was the grandma type, in her late fifties with orange crème-cile hair. She spoke a lot about her seemily perfect grandchildren. She carried their picture everywhere just incase someone might ask what Johnny or Bobbie was up to this week. Third was who I referred to as chicken little because everyday for her the sky was fallen. Her hair was always a mess and clothes ruffled like she was constantly chased into the office and around the cubicles by a pack of ravenous wolves. She spoke and moved fast. She was tall and thin as a papercut. She didn’t eat but nibbled like a rat at crackers, slices of chest and her left over grapes looked like honeycombs. She had the most to prove. Honestly, she was waiting for the frigid blonde to get knocked up or Hypochriac to overdose so that she could be one of the lead secretaries. Lastly, there was the diva. We were 2 out of 5 blacks in the entire firm of a 117 employees. There was the part time receptionist, janitor and a property lawyer. It was a minor detail that only minorities recognize. The diva wore evening gowns to work not dresses. She always looked like she was either going to a prom or wedding. In the winter, you could see her a mile a while switching down the street in her floor length mink coat with a devious smirk on her face like she attacked a grizzly bear and skinned it herself.

I started getting sick right after the promotion. Judy, the head of the sirens went crazy. It was rumored that her husband was leaving her for another man. One monday morning, Mr. Scope complained that he asked for two spoons of crème in his coffee and not three and she went upside his head with the three hole puncher. Normally, she would had been using the industrial three hole punch that allows you to punch holes in at least fifty pages at a time but it had been missing for weeks and reported stolen to secuirity. It was mr. Scopes luck that the entire office was forced to used the travel size three hole punch that only allows you to punch hole in five pages at a time or he probably be dead. Judy disappeared, whether carried out the office kicking and screaming by the police. With Judy gone, her position for fifteen years was finally opened. Everyone thought Little Chicken would be the idea person inherit the crown of the queen of secretaries. It was a shock, that Mr. Scopre would consider me, a temp, male because decided he that he was done with females for awhile would get the lead position. I didn’t even want the damn job. I just knew that when I was child I never said I wanted to grow up be somebody's corporate bitch.

A typical day begins with a cold and raining Chicago February. Outside, the sky is a miserable sick looking gray and I hide behind dark sunglasses because it’s the perfect excuse to not make eye contact with strangers on the crowded Chicago "L". I hate public transportation. It just feels unnatural that so many people are awake and rushing towards jobs they would quit in a heartbeat if something slightly better came alone. To make things worse, on the "L," this baby starts screaming lucid shameless shrieks that claw at eardrums, refusing to be ignored. That damn baby, flings himself to the floor, tears at his clothes, bangs his head, spits and kicks everything in sight, including people. I tell myself if he kicks me, I’m going to kick it back. His dishevel mother, panicking, can’t help but feel the inches of anger directed at her. It’s eight o’clock on miserable Chicago Monday morning and nobody wants to deal with the demon child or hear his cries. Shit, we’re all crying on the inside. But the baby, doesn’t care or know silence, just raw emotion. I feel jealous. I, like the other sheep, pretend to be polite and understanding when I want to tear my Brooks Brothers uniform from my body and fling myself on the floor and scream. I want to be naked. I don’t want to go to work. I don’t want my life, but I’m too lazy and a coward to change anything. I envy the baby because I know I will never scream in public again.

I know I shouldn’t be thinking such thoughts, so suddenly I feel nauseous, but like a good boy who eats his vegetables, I swallow the feeling of the chunky vile resentment rising to my throat. Maybe today will be the day I quit. I get to my job and it’s still there, mocking me and pretending to be indestructible. A naughty fantasy about dynamite and wrecking balls gets my dick hard, but when I push through the revolving door and walk towards the elevator, the thrill goes flaccid. My place of torment is a law firm where everything is beige or off white like it was personally I step on the elevator with the crowd and press the button for my floor. I close my eyes to savor those last few seconds of freedom before the metal doors to my hell open and I become a slave again. I don't even have to open my eyes to know that it’s my floor. I turn off my music and remove dark sunglasses. I pry my eyes open and just like a veteran Broadway star, I know the show must go on. I wait for the metal curtains to pull themselves back. Suddenly, I'm nervous and my mind goes blank. I panic in silence trying to remember my lines. I breathe in hard and out quickly. I violently pull my facial muscles to something that closely resembles a smile. I try to convince myself that if I'd just relax, don't fight it; it'll all be over with quickly. I can feel the resentment rise again and acid turn in my stomach. I put a mint in my mouth and try to awake that sparkle in my eye. The metal doors open and I step off the cliff. I become somebody else. Everybody pretends.

Where I went wrong is that I went to college but a lot of good that did me. It was a public state university, which basically meant if my check cleared, they'd give me a degree. It was a monstrosity of a college with forty thousand students. It felt more like I had gotten into an assembly line than college. Mostly everyone commuted and complained about the relentless bureaucracy or how the class schedules were always so inconvenient. I think it was a school requirement that none of the math or science professors spoke or understood English. I also felt that in order to save money the school hired ex-convicts from the local correctional facility to work in the cafeteria. They were always angry and would threaten your life if you asked for an extra slice of cheese on your hamburger or disturbed their four-hour lunch break. I really didn't learn much in college.

After college, I was desperate and stumbled on the underground world of temping or as I like to refer to it: corporate prostituting. My pimp name was Heidi. She was a perky blond. Actually, they were all perky and blond or had some type of blond ambition with names like Jessica, Wendy and Holly. Heidi, my perky blond pimp didn't care if I had work experience or could barely type or had any computer skills because she said I had "personality!" She said her clients were looking for a virgin with a "can do" attitude. She actually used those words. It didn't take long for Heidi to put me on the streets. She said she found me an assignment at a cushy Law Firm. She said the assignment was only suppose to last a couple of weeks

The day I interviewed I knew I wouldn’t get the job. I am a black male who doesn’t smile which is often mistaken as militancy. I don’t have a nurturing bone in my body and abhor punctuality. I’m a rebel with no fucking cause. I was sure they would see through me. Everyone at the interview reeked of Mozart and Chopin while I was desperately trying to hide my love for gangster rap. The first thing they told me was that they were looking for someone polished. I was recovery from a two-day hangover. I couldn’t possibly believe that I would fit in. I pondered how I was going to hide my addiction for surfing for porn on the web, internet gambling or nightly binge drinking and strip clubs. I guess I fooled them. Thank god for altoids, Listerine, Visine and affirmative action.

For two years, I got stuck in the back of the maze of cublices. I was the grunt boy. . For three years I was only referred to as the “help” and I begin feeling like the aging hooker who would do every little freaky thing the wife refused and pretend that I was happy. I had become the corporate slut nobody wanted to marry. I wanted to get married. I wanted benefits and vacation days. I wanted to be the wife and not the scanty bitch being fucked on the side. I just felt like if I was going to sleep with the fat sweaty bastard of corporate America, I wanted the ring and my papers.

One day, when I was still a temp I decided to take my supervisor out for lunch and get her opinion on how I could better assimilate myself into the corporate culture. My supervisor was another secretary but on the Executive level. Her name was Karen and she was a very attractive black woman. On Surface, Karen was very polished and refined but when no one was looking (the white people) she quickly became ghetto. I was naturally intrigued by her fakeness and wanted to learn how I could be more like her.

It was a sunny day and a Friday when we were scheduled to meet at the generic restaurant everyone at the company used for meetings. Twenty minutes before our date, Karen sent me an email telling me to meet her in front of the building, stating in quotes and capital letters that she felt like "BEING BAD!"

We caught a cab to a soul food restaurant that wasn't too far from the office. She giggled in the car that the place had the best catfish and the strongest long island ice teas. She was right. On an empty stomach, I was drunk with one sip and ready to quit my job and take up my long forgotten dream of a male stripper.

We were on our second Long Island ice tea and basket of catfish, laughing hysterically when I suddenly realized why I asked her to lunch in the first place. Before I could begin or inquire, she started telling me everything that she felt was wrong with me. "You know what your problem is" she spat at me in micro pieces of catfish, "You don't know how to play the game." Her words conjured a memory of when I was seven years old and forced by my Grandpa, supposedly for my own good, to try out for "Little League" baseball. I remember the hot sun and the heavy feeling of shame because I threw like a girl and was afraid of the ball. My coach was, to put it mildly, was eccentric and liked insulting his players with daytime soap opera references. "He thinks he wonder woman twirling like as the world turns, boy just stand still and catch the damn ball." "If you don't stop crying I'm going to general hospitalized your ass." "Stop being so damn young and restless and get out there and hustle." "Oh my lawd, all my children going to shorten the days of my lives."

Karen was still talking and I had forgotten all about her. I turn back the channel and she was saying that she could tell that I probably went to college but I still came across too "black." She whispered the word "black" like it was a dirty secret. It hadn't occurred to me that I was somehow supposed to lose my blackness in college like getting cured of leprosy. She smiled coyly and touched my hand in that "I'm black too" type of way and then quickly withdrew. I found myself gripping the table to stable myself for her next "I know what's wrong with you." She took a big gulp of her wicked Long Island ice tea and tried to convince me that she was on my side and was only trying to help. She added that because I was a young black male, I naturally came across threatening. She also said that if I didn't try to polish that roughness or did a better job convincing the white folks I was a “good nigga”, the kind that belonged in the house and not outside in the fields, I was going to find myself out in the hot sun picking cotton, emptying trash cans and digging ditches. I could feel the vomit rising to my throat. I wrote on the notepad that I brought to take notes in all capital letters “GOOD NIGGA.” She didn't stop talking even if my eyes told her to shut the fuck up. I decided to order another Long Island ice tea because I suddenly wasn't drunk enough. I made a mental note to remind myself to never skip work and go out drinking with her again. I guess she felt she wasn't finished, so she reached back over to my plate and grabbed a couple of French fries out of my basket and shoved them in her mouth. She grabbed my hand again with her greasy fingers and said "I know that you're gay." I tried to grab my hand back but she wouldn't let go. She said that most male secretaries are gay. She said that the problem with black gay men was that they weren't out with their gayness like white gay men. She said that black gay men just love the down low and being secretive. She said that I should try to be less black and more gay. I'd heard of the term "gay for pay" before, but she was just making it dirty and sick. I imagined myself returning to work on Monday in hot pink daisy dukes and Manolo Blanik heels. I found it odd, that she didn't even bother to ask me if I was gay. I wondered if everyone else thought the same.

After lunch, neither one of us went back to work. She kissed me two times on the cheeks and said that we must go shopping one day. I pretended like I had an errand to run so I wouldn't have to catch a taxi with her. I also thought about quitting my job because I knew that soon she would want me to do her hair or redecorate her apartment.

Five hours later, I was more drunk and sipping on a small bottle of Absolute vodka while crying uncontrollably in the dressing room at Hugo Boss. I was supposed to be trying on a pair of flat front light wool suit pants to go with the Classic Oxford dress shirts that I purchased from Brooks Brothers. I wasn't having a break down because I’d spent a ridiculous amount of money trying to be more gay and less black, but because I felt like I failed myself. It was like I had forgotten something important or to be somebody important, and yet I couldn't remember who or what or why anymore. I just knew that I was tired of fighting. I felt like Kunte Kinte in the movie "Roots." I felt like that damn whip had gotten too powerful and I couldn't resist anymore. I was tired of being beaten. I was too damn old to start over. I had to say "Tobey." And at that exact moment I looked at my watch to document my time of death. I guess it was arrogant of me to believe that I could ever be happy.

The instant I became more gay and less black, everyone started speaking to me like I wasn’t a threat. I paid a male escort to attend a Christmas party with me. Everyone said we looked perfect together. I told them we were planning to adopt children, some kid with a crack problem but we were sure with daily doses of Jesus he could be saved.

It was just my luck the libarian went crazy the next week.

The other female secretaries immediately didn’t trust me. They probed. They asked tricked questions like what curtains I think went best with hardwooden floors or if I think Capri pants are back in for the fall. I found myself study Vogue and Martha Stewart living magazines. They look at me like I walked into their immaculate, aromatic, ladies only bathroom naked and drunk, and started pissing on the floor. I'm the only male out of fifteen secretaries. They hardly make eye contact with me. They only speak with a head nod or awkward smile. It's like I make them nervous. They just can't seem to figure me out. On their desks and computer monitors are pictures of graduations, weddings and births. They don’t seem to have a life. They are always trying to fed you sugary donuts or some concotion they baked the night before. They’re conversation is redundant, something about a daughter in love with the wrong man or a flawless and prodigious grandson who’s coming to town. I listen with blank eyes and a rehearse smile.

At the office, there is always somebody’s birthday, anniversary, promotion or new pictures of somebody’s baby. The older secretaries go wild over such celebration. They reserve the conference room and order ice-cream. I hate the mandatory celebrations. We gather in the conference room and for thirty minutes I suffer through dry conversations about kids, hemorrhoids and mortgages. The agony was the teasing of a rusty knife that threatened to kill but instead it just annoyed. Every other week, someone is passing around the picture of somebody’s toddler. Nobody believes in birth control anymore. I wonder how they would react if I passed around the results of my latest STD results. When the pictures come springing out all the secretaries huddle like football players and giggle. I sometimes cautiously enter the huddle trying to blend in, but they immediately become frozen. They say things like “We don’t want to bore you.” It’s obvious they don't want me there. I don't even want "me" there, but I try to pretend to care because those are the rules. I smile in the morning because those are the rules. I say things like "Good Morning" and "Can I help you?" because those are the rules. I don't take a “number 2” pencil to their necks and watch them bleed like the red sea because those are the rules. I just smile sadly and return to my desk defeated.

My boss, I'm his first male secretary and I know he's not too comfortable with it. I try to smile and appear perky like the other grandma and blond silicon secretaries but it’s very difficult considering I’m a black male who doesn’t smile. I grew up in the ghetto with cockroaches and bullets and smiling would’ve got you bullet in the head. It just feels blasphemous.

My boss has this picture of himself on his desk in one of those silver family frames mostly used for graduations or weddings. Instead of the cliché, it is a picture of him holding a dead baby deer in a headlock while his right foot stomped down on the mother's head. There are no captions or subtitles with the picture, but I get the sickest feeling that he killed Bambi. My boss, he would never ask me to get his coffee. He always ask the other female secretaries.

My boss is so fat he could sell shade. He also has crossed eyes. My boss sweats like a keg of beer and breathes like a diesel engine and for some sick sadistic reason --he likes to record his speeches while he's on the treadmill. When I have to transcribe them I feel violated. It's just criminally wrong to have to listen to his sweaty fat voice first thing in the morning. I have to keep rewinding and slowing down the heavy breathing, so that I can understand his words. His husky voice seeps through the headphones like bacon grease. I often think about filing a sexual harassment against him because makes me feel like a sex operator who has a client that likes to get off by citing the takeover of World-Iron.

My boss is always asking me inappropriate questions like if I caught that basketball or football game last night. I don't know how to tell him that I don't watch sports, so I find myself studying the sports section before work or buying copies of Sports Illustrated to casually place on my desk just to keep the lie alive. My boss calls me names like "buddy" or "bud" with every sentence as if I'm his friend. I'm beginning to think that he thinks that's my name. My boss, Dan, is from Georgia where it's pronounced "jaw her!" My boss, when he calls out my name, I'm not a grown man anymore with my own apartment and drinking problem but a small child or adoring pet, all bright eyed and wagging my tail as I anxiously wait for my Master to give me a command so that I can get a treat. When I hear my name, I jump from my seat and race to his office knocking down anyone who gets in my way. I find myself giddy with nervous anticipation and I don't know why. My boss, when he's talks to me he doesn't look me in the eyes. It makes me feel as if he is embarrassed for me because I'm a man supposedly doing a woman's job. My boss tries to comfort my masculinity by hitting me in the arm or going into long rants about sports and cars or grabbing his nuts when he talks about the "hot" receptionist with the big knockers. I just nod helplessly. I'm always nodding helplessly. My boss and I, we always get to a point of complete uncomfortable silence. He’s always nervous around me and it makes me nervous. Maybe it's because he knows that in a fight I would easily kick his ass.

Right after I got out of the hospital the last time, my boss called me into his office. He said that firm had developed a new position. It had an important sounding title: executive secretarial database administrator. He sold it as the firm was desperately trying to upgrade to the 21^st century and go computers. I really didn’t understand what he was talking about, but he said my salary would increase by 35% and I get my own office. He then got up from his desk, went o the door, cracked it open to see if anyone was listening or in listening range. He put his hand on my should and squeezed like if he was testing a peach to see if it was ripe. He knealed down and whispered in my ear, “Female secretaries stay secretaries, male secretaries get promoted.” He laughed in that way that’s not really funny but like he choked on his power. I felt dirty. I felt like a child that had been touched in his private say no to strangers place. I felt like I needed to tell someone, but was conflicted. When I was eight years old, the next door neighbor Mr. Rogers, who kind of looked like a black santa claus with the silver beard and hair, would often invite me over to watch television. After shoving candy and ice cream down my throat, he’d pay me ten dollars to sit on his lap for just ten minutes. I didn’t think much of it. I liked the candy, ice cream and mondy so I figured as long as he didn’t touch me, he wasn’t doing any harm. I kept my mouth shut. I didn’t tell anyone. I stood up and shook my boss hand and knew I would tell anyone. After my second promotion in less than six months, I stopped getting sick. I moved into my office stayed away from the free coffee and donuts. Chicken Little inherit the crown of queen of secretaries and for awhile we lived happily ever after.