Page 97 of Fate, Interrupted

“Just the corridor. If they push again, it won’t be there.”

And like that, the evening is operational. Routes. Timing. Staffing. Realignments that don’t need to be written because everyone at this table already knows them. The warehouse is twenty feet below us and might as well not exist. That’s the part that never stops being remarkable, the ease of the pivot. How violence and dinner conversation occupy the same evening, with no seam between them.

I sit with my wine and watch it happen, and I think, not for the first time, that this is what I grew up inside of, and sometimes I can’t tell if that makes it easier or harder to see clearly.

Logan sets his glass down. “I’ll have someone check on the driver tomorrow. Make sure he understands the line.”

“Make sure,” Elias says.

“He will.”

Henry exhales softly. “You know, there are easier ways to handle territorial disputes.”

“That depends on whether the other party is interested in receiving them,” Elias says.

“Fair,” Henry says, reaching for his wine with the agreeable shrug of a man who has made his point and doesn’t need it to win. “Speaking of things that went sideways today.” He sets his glass down and leans forward with the expression he gets when he’s about to deliver an observation he’s been saving.

“Benny found a snake by the dumpster,” Henry says.

Logan looks at him. “A snake?”

“Black snake. Maybe four feet. Minding its own business.” Henry takes a drink. “Benny, however, was not minding his business, because Benny decided the appropriate response was to handle it.”

“Handle it how,” I say.

“With the laundry cart.” Henry’s expression is perfectly serious. “He was going to relocate it. Humanely. His word. He had a plan.”

“Did the plan work,” Logan says, in the tone of a man who already knows the answer.

“The plan resulted in Benny on top of the dumpster,” Henry says, “the snake inside the laundry cart, four hundred dollars of clean linens on the ground, and six grown men standing in a semicircle debating what to do next for approximately twenty minutes.” He pauses. “The snake left on its own, eventually. Slithered out of the cart and into the alley. Completely unbothered. Benny had to be talked down.”

“Talked down,” I say.

“From the dumpster,” Henry confirms. “But he wanted someone to put a board across to the next dumpster in case the snake was hiding underneath.”

Logan puts his glass down. “So, did someone put a board up for him?”

Henry looks at him. “No. Nobody wanted to find out which one of them was going to be on top of the dumpster next.”

Logan makes a sound that almost becomes a laugh and decides against it. I let out a laugh, because why not, and Henry looks briefly pleased with himself in the way he does when he’s made the room unclench with no one noticing he was trying.

Even Elias’s expression changes, fractionally. I give him the acknowledgment he’s earned.

“Well, I sure as hell hope he’s not still on top of the dumpster,” Logan says.

“No, he’s down. Marco had to bring his truck around so Benny could jump into it,” says Henry.

Elias, who has sat through most of this exchange with the focused patience of a man allowing a controlled amount of chaos before returning to order, sets his wineglass down. “Next time, let them know there’s a snake pole standing up in a corner of the shift office. It’s humane and safe, and no one has to climb on top of dumpsters.”

“Got it,” Henry says.

And just like that, the room returns to what it is: a meeting with our boss.

Elias leans back in his chair and flexes his arms slightly. “I want to let you all know that I need you at the Ninth Street facility at three p.m. tomorrow. Whittier is coming in for a meeting to discuss this ongoing vandalism. Seems it’s causing him some political headaches. We need to know which direction the wind is blowing. Any problems with that?”

He looks at each of us, his gaze lingering on me.

“No sir.”