Chương 2
A woman in the waiting area lifted a magazine to hide her face. The magazine was upside down.
Devin slid his phone into his pocket.
Rachel saw him do it.
“Deleted?”
“Yes.”
“Show me.”
He unlocked the screen. The video was gone from the main folder. Rachel checked the recently deleted album, removed it there, and handed the phone back.
Devin’s ears had turned red. “I wasn’t going to post it.”
“Good.”
“It was funny, though.”
Marcus looked down at him.
Devin reconsidered. “In a respectful way.”
“There is no respectful version of that sentence,” Rachel said.
Gloria led Marcus down the corridor. The tray made a faint metallic sound with each step. He followed at a distance large enough to suggest that the hallway belonged to two unrelated people traveling in the same direction.
Rachel went after him. At the door to room three, she looked back at Devin.
“Wait here.”
He nodded.
The door closed.
For a few seconds, he stood alone beside the reception desk while Nia returned to her chair and the waiting room resumed its quiet machinery. Shoes crossed polished flooring. A printer clicked behind the desk. Someone’s phone vibrated twice. The upside-down magazine turned right side up.
Devin took out his phone again.
The file was deleted, but the Titan House social app had automatically saved a low-resolution draft. He found it in the campaign workspace. The video began with Gloria’s voice and ended on Marcus’s embarrassed smile.
Devin watched it once.
Then twice.
The clip did what every social media manager wanted a clip to do. It explained itself instantly. It was human. It was unexpected. It made a man known for dragging weighted sleds across parking lots look like somebody’s ridiculous older brother.
The campaign’s planned footage—a handshake, a hallway walk, a carefully phrased statement about preventive care—would be clean and forgettable. This would make people stop scrolling.
He opened the team chat.
Got an actually human moment. Rachel killed the original, but the app saved a draft. Posting a cropped version to close friends for feedback.
He selected a private review list containing eleven Titan House employees.
Then he hesitated.
Rachel had said delete it.
Marcus had said nothing.
Devin told himself that silence was not permission, but it was not quite refusal either. He told himself Rachel’s instinct was control. He told himself the brand needed warmth. He told himself that everyone on the list worked for Titan House and knew better than to share internal content.
He posted it.
Inside room three, Gloria set the tray on a rolling stand and asked Marcus whether he had ever fainted during an injection.
“No.”
“Felt faint?”
“No.”
“Left before one?”
Marcus looked at the beige wall.
Rachel sat in the corner, her black quilted bag resting against her knees. “He once climbed out a bathroom window at an urgent care.”
“That place had poor customer service.”
“It was on the second floor.”
“There was an awning.”
Gloria pulled a chair closer. “You can joke, or you can answer. Both take about the same amount of time.”
Marcus remained standing. The private room was small and painfully neat. A box of tissues sat beside a plastic model of a human heart. The soft ceiling light reflected off the tray. Nothing in the room was threatening. That made his reaction worse.
“I don’t faint,” he said.
“What happens?”
“Nothing happens.”
Rachel’s gold watch caught the light as she adjusted her sleeve. “His face goes gray. He stops hearing people. He gets angry if anyone touches him.”
Marcus turned to her. “You don’t need to provide a documentary.”
“She needs to know.”
Gloria did not reach for the syringe. “Does that sound right?”
He drew a breath through his nose.
The air smelled faintly of disinfectant and hand lotion. Underneath it was something else, or perhaps memory had supplied it: the dusty sweetness of the peppermints his mother kept in her purse during long appointments. She would give one to Rachel and tell Marcus he was too old to need a reward. Then she would press one into his palm when Rachel wasn’t looking.
“I don’t like being surprised,” he said.
“Nothing will happen without you agreeing.”
“I agreed when I came.”
“That was outside the room. I’m asking you now.”
Rachel looked at him. The impatience in her face softened, but only slightly.
Marcus sat.
Gloria explained what she would do in plain language. No performance. No soothing voice. No promises that he would feel nothing. She gave him choices about where to look and whether Rachel stayed.
He chose the ceiling.
Then the hallway alarm sounded, not loudly, just a short electronic tone. Nia opened the door and apologized. A physician needed Gloria for another patient.
“We’ll take five minutes,” Gloria said.
Marcus stood too quickly.
Gloria pointed at the chair. “That was not an evacuation order.”
“I need water.”
“There’s water in the corner.”
“I prefer lobby water.”
Rachel stared at him.
Gloria removed the tray from the room. “I’ll come back.”
Marcus left before she finished the sentence.
He walked past reception, past the waiting chairs, and through the automatic glass doors with the purposeful stride of a man who expected the world to mistake speed for intention.
Devin jumped up. “Are we done?”
“Yes,” Marcus said.
“No,” Rachel said at the same time.
The doors opened onto the circular driveway. A black SUV idled at the curb. Marcus headed toward it.
Rachel caught his arm. “We have a meeting upstairs.”
“I need air.”
“You need the injection.”
“I said I need air.”
“You always need something that is not the thing in front of you.”
The driver looked straight ahead.
Devin stayed several steps behind them. His phone buzzed in his pocket. Then again. Then several times in quick succession.
May you like
Marcus lowered his voice. “Not here.”
“Where, Marcus? Because we tried the lobby and you hid behind me. We tried a private room and you fled during a door alarm. Where is the acceptable place for reality?”
