Making the Galaxy Great

Jason was alone in the bed when his alarm sounded at 6:30 the next morning. For several minutes, he simply stared at the ceiling, feeling the weight of the bedspread and the gentle cushioning of his pillow, as they beckoned him ever so gently back to slumber.

It seemed strange, and somehow wrong, to simply get up and go to work as if his life were back to normal.

He’d seen aliens!

He’d actually been in a secret base full of wonders that virtually nobody in the world knew about. How was he supposed to simply go to work at a frustrating job with a moronic boss after seeing such things?

Then the snooze alarm zapped him awake like some sort of Dalite weapon.

After a quick shower, he skipped shaving and headed down to the kitchen. There, he discovered that Evie had not left. Instead, she appeared to have been playing some sort of game with his coffee grinder and coffee maker. There were coffee beans on the counter and the floor, and some sort of dirty liquid in the pot. Evie stood amid the mess and held up her hands to signal surrender.

“I was going to surprise you with coffee. But I only know how to use the machines where you pop in the little cup.”

Jason laughed and his mood rose like the sun. “You know what? There’s a bagel shop about three blocks from here that has great coffee. It’s fair trade and expensive but really good. Why don’t we just go there?”

“Are we driving together?” she asked.

My car. I forgot all about it.

“Agent McCauley said they’d drop off a car for me since mine was damaged. Let me look outside.”

“And how exactly was you car damaged?”

Uh oh.

Jason had to think fast. “Apparently one of the drug dealers busted one of my tail lights the other night when they ran into me. I didn’t really notice it in the dark. McCauley said they’d fix it because it was, you know, collateral damage.”

When Jason walked to the front door, he found a small, sealed manila envelope — on the floor below the mail slot. Inside the envelope was a car key. Jason looked at it and his heart sank.

“How can they do this?” he called out to the gods.

He threw open the door and stared at the tiny, two-door hatchback sitting in the street almost directly in front of him.

Evie leaned against him and peeked around. “Whoa. A few notches below your car. I wonder if it even has a radio?”

Jason scowled. “It’s a fucking Barbie car. It probably has pedals.”

With Evie following at a safe distance, he drove the tiny car tentatively to the bagel shop, as if it might fall apart if called upon to exceed 30 miles per hour. At least breakfast was enjoyable, despite some more probing by Evie about what happened to Jason after he’d left with McCauley. She still wasn’t entirely comfortable with his cover story, but she did seem to be comfortable with him, which made him oddly uncomfortable. Why couldn’t she have been content to seduce him and then discard him because he was too old? How was he supposed to carry on with his extraordinarily desirable coworker when he harbored secrets which, if accidentally spilled, could bring the force of the US government down upon him?

Shortly after he finally arrived at work, something happened that was almost as unexpected as seeing an alien spacecraft in a secret hangar under a lumber yard: Morris Ambling came to Jason’s office, instead of phoning Jason to come to his.

“So,” he said, rubbing his hands together, “you survived all that excitement the other day. First we were worried that you were in trouble with the FBI, but—”

“That wasn’t the FBI,” Jason interjected.

“But then,” Ambling continued unabated, “we were afraid you’d been kidnapped. I think someone may have shot a gun out there, you know.” He waved vaguely toward the outside wall of the building.

“A gun?” Jason asked.

This time Ambling did stop. “My car. Windshield totally shattered.”

“Maybe it was just vandals with a baseball bat,” Jason suggested. “That’s been in the news.”

“I don’t think so,” said Ambling without explaining why he didn’t think so. “But speaking of news,” he went on, “I hear you and the new girl in AP are . . .” He made a circle with his left hand and jabbed his right finger in and out of it several times.

Jason was embarrassed for himself, for Evie, and for the entire human race. Yet there was no point in denying that he and Evie had done the nasty, so he simply frowned. “I’ll go see HR—”

“For what? A medal?” Ambling grinned in a way that made Jason not want to have sex again for the rest of his life. He looked down and busied himself straightening a couple of folders on his desk.

“I probably need to catch up on emails . . .”

Ambling was visibly disappointed. He clearly wanted to speak more about Jason and Evie. “Ah well, yes. You probably should. So, we’ll see you at 2:00 in the conference room.”

Jason felt his scalp tingle. “For—”

“The presentation from Barnes —”

“Barnes & Bottwick, yes!” Jason interjected. “The new ads.”

“Gwen said she’s feeling really good about the new creative,” Ambling told him, running a hand over his newly darkened hair. “We had dinner last night.”

Jason was emphatically aware that Ambling and Gwen Glass, their account executive from Barnes & Bottwick, probably had a lot more than just dinner.

“I’ll be there. Can’t wait.”

“And you’ll have the new demographic what’s-its she asked for?”

Morris was referring to a demographic profile of the typical Buster’s beer customer, which he had already provided to Barnes & Bottwick months earlier but that Gwen claimed not to have received. It showed that their customers were slightly older, better educated and better paid than the typical buyer of mainstream beers.

Jason restrained himself from frowning, rolling his eyes or otherwise projecting negativity and told Ambling he would bring the report. Again.