Quite A Man
The story of Nathan Wilson could be the most interesting story that has ever been told. Like the time he saved the children from the oncoming Crimson Bolt, a train operated by the Red Railway Co. that travelled between Detroit and Chicago. Or perhaps the time he brought one of the horses on his family farm —a horse named Lampshade, due to the bushy, white mane that hung down over the animal’s shoulders —back from the dead. You could also speak of the time he had escaped from the clutches of pirates in the Indian Ocean, or when he brought down a rhinoceros with a pellet gun.
“We only have one other candidate to speak with,” the man conducting the interview had told me. His name was Pede; I asked him if I and the other candidate were the only ones. He nodded. Pede picked up the phone in his office as I prepared to leave and asked his secretary to schedule the interview with Nathan Wilson tomorrow afternoon at one o’clock.
I sat outside the small office the following afternoon. No one came or went between ten thirty and three o’clock other than Pede’s secretary, who left at noon for lunch. I returned home. My phone remained silent. I reread my resume a dozen times, looking between every line for anything that might hold room for expansion, but found nothing that might compete with my rival. I had been to Wichita once. Cincinnati, too. I had explored the Midwest at the leisurely pace of a Midwesterner, but I struggled to find where I had saved children from impending trains or brought animals back to life. I had stepped on a caterpillar once when I was seven, but I couldn’t bring it back. I buried him underneath the bush in the backyard. My older brother told me that was stupid.
I sat on the end of the couch in the living room. It had been my seat for the better part of two years since my wife and I had bought it. She left about three months ago. I never sat on the other two cushions. I have touched the screen of my phone seven times since I spoke of the caterpillar. It’s getting dark and I need to close the blinds on the front window, but instead I touch my phone again.
I looked over my resume again. I moved the cursor over to the list of skills I had added just last week and deleted them. I began typing: “Can’t bring things back to life,” “Burying caterpillars.” I clicked “Save” and closed the document. I touched my phone again. I watched TV for a couple of hours. And then I went to bed. I think I left the blinds open. My phone rang at ten thirty-three in the morning. They said they had decided to go with another candidate.
“Nathan Wilson,” I said.
“I’m sorry, I am not at liberty to say who we have decided to go with,” the secretary said.
I called my wife to tell her that I didn’t get the job. She didn’t answer. I left her a voicemail. I told her there was no shame in losing to Nathan Wilson. She texted later and asked who he was. I told her everything I knew.
“Quite a man,” she texted back.
I set the phone on the coffee table and sank into my seat at the end of the couch.