Over the next 48 hours, Portia dealt with getting her real estate agent, Sheila Jenkins, to list her Merrit Island condo with the beautiful river view and left Sheila with the responsibility of organizing the movers and the legals.
“Just get rid of the thing,” she’d said, after getting Edgley to agree to foot the bill for any losses she incurred on the sale. Edgley wasn’t thinking very straight when he agreed to the deal because his shoes were glued to the anti-static mat under the desk and he couldn’t reach down to untie them without hitting his head on his desk, which he’d already done twice.
Edgley hated his engineers for treating him so badly, but he spent his time thinking about stock options and golden parachutes.
For Edgley, cashing out had become a personal obsession. Maintaining the value of the stock options was central to everything he did. If you asked him to burn down the building because it would enhance the value of the company in the minds of Wall Street opinion brokers, he would do it. If, on the other hand, you needed to replace the toilet in the men’s washroom on the second floor, you were likely to have to beg for it like you were getting a raise; and later Edgley would try to redeem the favor you owed him for replacing the broken toilet.
It was this kind of sure-footed management that inspired the engineers to begin deconstructing his office furniture.
However, Edgley’s desk was still a solid oak monument and his computer screen flashed on while he was trying to work his feet out of his well-tightened shoes.
“Hello, Edgley,” said his computer.
Edgley looked up. He saw Rujul “Jules” Dharam, the senior programmer and lead engineer for the Waste-REL project.
“Jules,” said Edgley, visibly shaken. “How? How did you do that?”
“Do what, Edgley?” asked Jules.
“You know, just show up on my computer without me first clicking or anything.”
“Edgley,” said Jules. “You don’t tell me your secrets, do you?”
Edgley decided not to pursue that line of inquiry further. Jules was supposed to be dead. Jules was supposed to have been killed in a bombing in Bangalore, which was supposed to have been set off by radical extremists who believed in a loving and compassionate God who wanted that specific restaurant blown-up.
Of course, in this case, it was Edgley who’d wanted that specific restaurant blown up, mostly because Jules Dharam was in it. Jules was going to expose the incompetence and corruption at the heart of the privatization of space. He was going to talk to World News Stream (WNS.news). In fact, Jules’s death had been treated as mere collateral damage because a very big video star, news reporter Tanya Fielding, had been blown up in that restaurant. It had helped Edgley immensely when an actual radical extremist group took responsibility for the explosion and insisted that their compatriots in prison be released or they’d do it again. The ploy was unsuccessful as the government of India did not release the political prisoners, however the prisoners did receive a really serious beating which made just about everybody except the prisoners feel better. The video of the beatings were streamed live and watched by more people than Tanya ever attracted when she was alive.
“Jules, I thought you … I mean.”
“What’s wrong, Edgley? I can sense stress in your voice.”
“I was just hoping…” Edgley faltered. Jules alive. He had been planning to tell Portia that, “Surprise, surprise the lead engineer on the Waste-REL was dead. I didn’t know. Unfortunate incident in India...the Tanya Fielding thing, remember? Yes, he was there… sad isn’t it? But here is Jules Dharam, on the videophone program thingee. What to do?
“I uh, I thought you were dead? Great to see you, though, uh, a miracle, really,” Edgley pulled back his cheeks in a vain attempt to smile. If Jules is alive, he needs to not be alive. Got a pretense to get him here – use it! “Ckik… ckuh… can you come back to Florida for a few days? The crewmembers of the Waste-REL want to meet with you in person.”
“Why would I do that, Edgley,” said Jules. “It seems to me that when last we spoke you were no longer interested in my services.”
“I was no longer interested in paying for your services. You charge a pretty penny.”
“Yes, but it wasn’t an American penny, so why did you care?” asked Jules.
“It all adds up,” said Edgley. “Look, Jules, I need you here and I’m prepared to pay you for the privilege.”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Edgley,” said Jules. “You see, I am dead.”
Edgley stared at the image on the screen, his fear rising.
“I’m quite dead,” said Jules. “And we both know why I’m dead, don’t we?”
“I… I don’t know what you’re talking about…” said Edgley.
“Oh, come on now, Edgley,” laughed Jules. “We have no secrets from each other.”
Jules appeared on the SPECTACL lying on Edgley’s desk. Instead of appearing in the head’s up display, the SPECTACL projected Jules’ 3D head beyond the two glass panes. Edgley looked at the projection, his mouth agape.
The SPECTACL Jules winked and nodded saying, “I go where you go and I know what you know.”
Edgley was perspiring and his heart was racing, but he couldn’t pull his feet out of his shoes or his shoes off the mat. “You’re a ghost!”
“Oh, yes,” said another Jules, now appearing on the computer monitor as well. “I’m the ghost in the machine.” The Jules in the SPECTACL smiled. “I’m everywhere and nowhere and you can’t get rid of me.”
Edgley pulled on his feet with such force that he nearly dislocated his right knee, but his left foot wrenched out of his shoe and the knee banged against the desk, painfully.
“Oh, that’s funny!” said the Jules in the SPECTACL, laughing. “Having some trouble with your shoes are you?”
“Go away! Go away! I don’t want you here!” Edgley was using both hands to pull on his remaining leg, using the shoeless foot against the side of the desk. He was beyond the edge of panic. “You’ve been doing this to my office! You did this to my mat and to my chair! My office is haunted! Heeeeeeelp!! HEEELP!”
Ms. Webster raced in, slamming open the office door. There was Edgley, one sock-covered foot on the desk, desperately pulling on his other leg with both hands and staring, wide-eyed at his computer, his face red with fear. “GET IT AWAY FROM ME!” he screamed.
“What is it?!” asked Ms. Webster, rushing to her boss's side. As she rounded the desk, the Juleses disappeared and a picture of the Waste-REL came up instead, underneath it read “Deathtrap” in thick black letters.
“Quick, go down!” demanded Edgley and he grabbed Ms. Webster by the shoulder and forced her to her knees. “Undo my shoe laces!”
Ms. Webster was flustered and agitated and fearful and thinking about lawyers and harassment.
“Dammit, woman, untie my shoe lace – my shoes are glued to the floor!”
“I didn’t do it!” she said, pulling on the lace. Edgley fell backwards onto his credenza and into the vertical blinds behind his desk. He batted the blinds away crazily and jumped out from behind his desk, pulling down two of the hanging strips of cloth and tripping over Ms. Webster as he fell. On his back, Edgley crawled away from his computer, his SPECTACL and his desk.
“It’s haunted I tell you! Haunted!”
Ms. Webster straightened her hair while standing up and observing the computer monitor. The word DEATHTRAP flashed over and over again. She looked to Edgley, who was lying on his back in the corner, behind the potted plant, completely freaked out. She thought to herself, maybe the engineers have gone a little too far this time. But then she looked at Edgley again and had to cover her mouth with her hand to hide the smirk.
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