Page 5 of The Lie Maker

I’d just parked my car to go in for my first day on the new job when she sent me a text, which I only noticed when I took my phone out to check the time. I’d muted my phone the night before and forgotten to flip it back on that morning. I’d missed a call from the place I was about to walk into.

Lana had texted: Got your Funk & Wagnalls?

An inside joke, referencing a long-extinct American dictionary and encyclopedia publisher. I grinned, and thought about composing some witty retort before I headed into the building, but settled on:

Talk soon.

Once the phone was tucked into my pocket and before I went into the building, I did something I’d done out of habit for as long as I could remember. I did a visual sweep of my surroundings. Scanned the parking lot and the street in both directions. It was second nature to me, and I did it without really thinking about it.

I didn’t know where my office was supposed to be, so I went straight to Terry’s.

He was behind his desk when I rapped on the jamb of his open door. “Jack Givins, reporting for duty.”

It was far from glamorous, his office. This wasn’t The New Yorker or Vanity Fair, although, for all I know, they’re a mess, too. His desk was littered with papers and folders, all crowded around a desktop and a laptop. Gray filing cabinets lined the walls, and half a dozen calendars from companies his magazines had done stories on decorated the walls, hanging from pushpins, not one of them turned to the right month. It was the kind of office that, forty years ago, someone would have plastered with centerfolds from Playboy, but even Contractor Life had moved on from those days.

Terry was a small guy, maybe five-four. Slight, with a receding hairline. His thick-rimmed glasses were his dominant facial feature.

“Oh, hey, Jack,” Terry said. “Tried to call you.” He didn’t look well. Like he’d had a bad chili dog the night before and it was just now catching up with him. “Have a seat.”

“Everything okay?” I asked.

A nervous laugh. He glanced at his desktop monitor, then the laptop, not looking for anything in particular. Killing time. “The thing is, there have been some developments.”

“Developments,” I said.

“I’ve been thinking, and I don’t believe this is a good fit for you. I mean, it’s great for us, because you’ve got the skills, you know, but with your background, I think we’d be holding you back.”

“Shit, Terry, you firing me before I’ve even started?”

He kept trying to avoid eye contact. “I mean, if you were to be honest with me, you’d only be taking this job until something better came along.”

“If I gave you that impression,” I said, “then I apologize. It was never my intention. The truth is, Terry, I need this job.”

His face went grim. “Then that makes this even harder. We were doing a review, and we’ve lost a lot of subscriptions postpandemic. That wouldn’t be so bad, but that corresponded with a significant drop in advertising. Everyone’s pulling back. Take Screener Life, for example. That one’s gone off a cliff.”

That was their magazine for projectionists and movie theater owners. It made sense that that one would take a hit, given that film lovers had been fearful, for a couple of years, of going to a movie and catching something from the somebody sitting next to them.

“Only one we got making any money is RV Life. During the pandemic, so many people were hesitant to fly or leave the country, they went out and bought Winnebagos. And with the way gas prices are, that one’s probably gonna be on life support soon. Anyway, what I’m getting around to saying is, I’ve got no money in the budget for your position anymore.”

I sat there, numb. Surprised, for sure, but also, at some level, relieved. I hadn’t been lying when I told him I needed this job. I had under five grand in my checking and savings. I wasn’t looking forward to writing and editing stories about drywall and advances in water-saving toilet technology and peel-and-stick tile, but life is full of compromises, of making decisions we don’t want to make.

“Sorry,” he said.

I stood.

“Okay, then,” I said. I was holding a quick debate in my head about whether I wanted to make this difficult for him. “I’m not sure this is legal, Terry.”

“Yeah, well, I looked into that, Jack, and in this state, unless you’re fired because of your gender or race or a disability, or you’re pregnant, an employer can pretty much fire anyone for any reason and there’s nothing you can do about it, even on the first day.” He tried to lighten the mood in the room. “You’re not pregnant, are you?”

I headed for the door.

“Funny thing,” Terry said, and I stopped and slowly turned. “I guess you figured out I googled you, which is how I found out about those two books you wrote. And some stuff came up about when you worked at that paper up in Worcester. But there’s not much online from before that.”

“Is there a question?” I asked.

“Were you, like, living off the grid or something?”

“Maybe I was just minding my own business,” I said. “You might want to give it a try.”

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