Mayday

I.

The message from Dee, written on a scrap of paper torn from a Sunkist memo, let Ted know that his son's little league game had been moved from seven o'clock to six. He stared at the paper, Dee's careful printing a blur of ink. He picked it up and traced along the frayed edge with his thumb as he moved to angle his chair to face the window. The sky was a brilliant blue speckled by fluffy clouds. Rumor had it the temperature was perfect – balmy with the occasional breeze.

Ted folded his arms and shivered. The vents pumped the artificial air into his office in a way that, according to Dee, was what she imagined a New England winter to be. She made a point of draping a cardigan around her shoulders every time she entered the room.

He stared at the skyline and thought about the week that was stretched out before him. There would be no meetings, no Pete, and it was likely he wouldn't even be patched in on the Burger Chef calls. Dee would be the only person aware of whether or not he was in the building.

Ted heard a noise in the hallway and blinked, rolled his head side to side to work out the kinks in his neck. He realized the sky wasn't so blue now; it was the color of a fresh bruise and the clouds were heavier and gray. The sun had dropped low and its orange light glared off the skyscrapers. Ted rubbed his eyes with the heel of his hands, not surprised he'd lost track of time.

"You are still here."

Ted glanced at the doorway. "Pete. Don't you have a flight to catch?"

"Tomorrow morning," Pete said. He walked to the center of the room and eyed a plate of food on the desk. One half of a bagel was slathered in cream cheese – white on white on white. Pete wagered that the bagel was yesterday's breakfast. He grinned and said, "You can still buy a ticket."

Ted shook his head. "I've got enough here to keep me busy," he said, and they both looked at the mostly bare, clean surface of his desk. "You'll be fine. You'll have plenty of creative in the room with you."

"No doubt," Pete told him. "But I thought you'd jump at the chance to go."

Ted's eye twitched. He reached for the glass of tepid water on his desk and took a sip. "Next time," he said. "Give everyone my best."

"Will do." He lifted his hand in a brief wave. "See you in a few days." Pete turned and crossed the floor. He stopped under the doorway and looked back at Ted. "Can I bring you anything from New York?"

Ted's breath caught in his throat. He reached for the folder on top of a neat stack near the edge of his desk. He opened it in front of him and said, "Have a good flight, Pete." He waited a beat and got up from his chair. Ted stood in the doorway and watched Pete exit the office, his arms full with Burger Chef paperwork to pack in his suitcase.

The silence – knowing he was the only soul on the floor – was a relief. Ted wandered into the hall and to the small space they called a break room. He picked up the coffee pot, smelled the remnants, and set it back down. He turned and saw a rather large box on the table. He turned over one flap and saw that it was addressed to the agency, and the postmark was New York. Ted peeked inside and realized it was some of the Burger Chef creative that had been mailed to Pete when the agency was still fighting for the campaign.

He didn't know if Pete had meant to take it with him. Ted carried the box to Dee's desk and began to write her a note about trying to reach Pete before his flight. He sat down and reached into the box, removing mock-ups of print ads and pages of typed tags. There were notes scratched in the margins and he touched the words written in Peggy's familiar script. He saw the campaign unfold – how it started with images of families and the idea of making a homemaker's life easier, how it evolved to cartoon characters welcoming diners to the restaurant, and eventually settled somewhere in between.

A loose sheet of paper slipped out from between two small art boards. Ted grabbed it from the floor. It looked like Peggy and someone else – probably Stan – had devised holiday promotions for the restaurant. There was "Frankenburger" for Halloween and the idea of Santa putting burgers in the stockings of the good boys and girls, and a competitor's product would go to those on the naughty side of the list. Ted laughed out loud, his shoulders moving up and down. The sound startled him in the quiet space; it was foreign to him.

He studied the paper, the scribbles and scratch-outs. It reminded him of working with Frank Gleason. Ted missed being actively creative. He missed being a part of the action. What was his role in the agency? Was he a manager? A body to occupy an available office? A name and title to satisfy the west coast clientele?

Ted packed the material back into the box and wondered what Frank Gleason would think of him. Where is your optimism? he would probably ask. When did you become the morose one?

x

Her office reeked of cologne, weed, sweat, coffee, whiskey, and the Blackjack gum Mathis chewed. Peggy bent down and picked up dozens of rolled up foil wrappers that carried the licorice smell. She deposited them in the trash and headed back to her chair. But the idea of sitting down again and staring at Stan's boards or the blank sheet of paper in her typewriter made Peggy's skin crawl. She stood in the middle of the room, feeling like the walls were closing in.

She pivoted toward the door and swung it open. The rush of cool air was welcome, but Peggy's eyes landed on the computer – the space she once occupied with her team, the space that was littered with their work and their history. Her mind went to Ginsberg, as it had been nearly every second of every day since he was wheeled out on the stretcher. Peggy heard his voice – We have to procreate… I'm from Mars… - and didn't know how she had missed it; that all of his soliloquies on the broken radio and planets and the computer were calls for help. She took a step back and slammed the door shut.

Seconds later Stan popped the door open. "You okay, Chief?"

Peggy's nostrils flared. She took a deep breath, her chest expanding, but she held it in. Her lungs burned. When she finally exhaled, loudly and gracelessly, she was lightheaded.

Stan glanced at her sloppy desk, at her typewriter. "Got anything?" He moved to sit on the couch and said, "I'll pretend to be the suits from Burger Chef. Do a dry run."

"I don't have anything," she said. She held her arms out, brought them down, her palms smacking against her thighs. "Nothing."

"That's not true," Stan said. "The work we've done is some of the best I've ever seen come out of this office. Or the one you were in before and before that. Basically, Pegs, it's-"

Peggy slouched down into her chair and said, "You can stop. I know we have a good campaign here, Stan. But I have to pitch it in two days and I can't… I can't even…"

He got up and stood on the other side of her desk. He braced his hands on the edge, leaning down, speaking softly. "It makes sense you're nervous. But you've done this hundreds of times."

She swallowed. She looked at him. But next to Don. Or Ted.

Stan offered a small smile that was barely visible through his beard.

"It's not that I'm nervous or don't know what to say, Stan!" she shouted.

"When was the last time you slept?" he asked. "For more than a few minutes at a time?"

Peggy shook her head. "Doesn't matter."

"Sure it does." Stan circled around her desk and sat on the edge, swinging his right foot. The toes of his boots hit the leg of her chair. "You look tired. You sound tired. I think if you go home and sleep you'll come in here tomorrow and be able to organize a killer pitch and-"

"I can't fucking sleep, okay? I can't breathe in here. I can't go out there," she said, jutting her arm out to the side, pointing her fist at the door and to everything that was and wasn't on the other side.

Stan slid off the edge of the desk to his feet. "I loved the guy. But you can't get spooked, kid. You can't let it live inside you."

Peggy pushed her chair back, putting space between the two of them. She stood and folded her arms. It was funny to hear that coming from him, and it burned her skin from the inside out. "He didn't come to your apartment. He didn't try to ki… to kiss you. He didn't give you the fucking box."

He looked down.

She began stacking the artwork into a pile. She closed her notes inside a folder and fit the cover over her typewriter. "I'm leaving," Peggy told him.

"I'll walk you out," Stan said. He turned and left the room, leaving the door open.

Peggy gathered her things and walked out into the hallway. She heard Stan banging around in his office, opening and closing drawers. She turned around, away from the computer. She looked at Stan's closed door, noticing the absence of a nameplate beneath his. Peggy's chin quivered.

The door creaked open and Stan asked, "Ready?"

She shook her head. "Changed my mind," she said, heading back into her office. "Have a good night." She closed the door and sat behind her desk. Peggy stared at the phone. She wanted to call for help – get this vision out of my head, put the right words in my mouth. She held her hand over the receiver but didn't pick it up. She knew what number to dial, but she didn't think there would be a voice on the other end of the line.

x

Ted sat at Dee's desk with the box on his lap. He put everything back except a piece of paper ripped from a notebook. One side was doodles but the other side was Peggy's handwriting. Ted knew for a fact that Lou Avery wasn't much for brainstorming sessions, not like the ones he held at CGC and took to SC&P. But the sheet of paper was a list – beef, fries, condiments, cheese or no cheese, tables and booths, kid's menu, fast, not expensive, take it home or eat there, on the way home from church or school.

He set the box on the desk but held onto the piece of paper. He reached across the desk and pulled the phone to the edge. Ted dialed and listened to the shrill rings. Nan answered cheerily and he said, "It's me."

She sighed, her breath rattling in his ear.

Ted told her, "I am coming home for dinner. But I have to take care of one more thing. And I wanted to let you know right away that something's come up. I'm needed in New York. I have to leave in the morning."