The Fall of Princes Read Online Free PDF Page A

Little League game or a school play. Hi, Dad. He’s a good man. Grown now, and married.
    The phone, however, will not ring, will never ring, except a call from some telemarketers whom I will engage in conversation until they are sure I am a lunatic and sign off.
    Other than that, what is there to offer you by way of reparations? A tiny parting of the curtain. Her name was Diana. Her name at birth was Dianne, but she changed it. She pictured it on a marquee, on a magazine cover, and Diana just seemed more elegant. Another surprise.
    And mine? My name? It hardly matters. When I go to work now, it’s on the nametag I am forced to wear. Ever since 9/11, wearing a name tag gives me the willies. Once my name was on my license plate. But nobody even looks at my name tag, and the ladies who write my name on my birthday cake have forgotten it before the icing sets. I know it comes late in the game, but the only thing that matters is what I would say after my son called to say Hi, Dad.
    I’m sorry.

CHAPTER THREE
    Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death

    W hen it came time to fire me, it took our man behind Napoleon’s desk, three people from HR, my immediate supervisor, and four lawyers. I could hardly blame them. They had done everything they could. It started with good, sound advice, then formal counseling, then two rehabs, three fat files of “incidents,” as they called them, and finally, a meeting in the Big House where nothing had changed since the cards were first dealt, except that the model of the yacht had been replaced by a bigger model of an even bigger yacht, one hundred and sixty-two feet of teak. All this so that I could be summoned bright and early, seven in the morning, to a meeting where the only thing that was to be said of substance was two words.
    It was on a Thursday. It’s always on a Thursday, so you have a long weekend to kill yourself.
    I stood there, the exact model of the white collar drunk and addict, clean-shaven, buffed nails, whacked out of my skull.
    The silence lasted what seemed like an eternity, not a movement, not a breath, as my grandmother used to say on particularly hot days. Finally, The Man spoke.
    “You’re fired,” he said.
    I didn’t flinch. The sweat on my back was soaking through my $5,000 suit. The HR people took notes, the lawyers looked at their own reflections in their highly polished shoes.
    “Do you want to know why?” he said.
    I didn’t speak or move.
    “Do. You. Want. To. Know. Why.” His voice was rising perceptibly.
    “Of what possible use would that be to me?” I answered.
    “Then get out of my office,” he yelled, causing me, for the first time, to flinch.
    I walked out. The eight secretaries did not look up at me. They were embarrassed. I heard his voice behind me, yelling for real now.
    “Wait! You! Get back in here!”
    I stopped. “No,” I said. “I don’t think I feel like that. I’m not doing it.”
    The secretaries, all eight of them, now looked up at me, horrified. Nobody had ever said no before. Not to that voice.
    “Yes, you are,” he said forcefully. “If you ever want to work on the Street again, you’ll get your ass back in this office this second.”
    I knew he was right. I turned and walked back into the office. He got up from behind his desk and came around to my side.
    He stood in front of me, glaring at me with bald hatred in his eyes. I had a good eight inches on him, but, somehow, he stared at me at eye level. We stood. We just stood, him bristling with loathing, me sweating so heavily it ran down my cheeks and dripped onto my Charvet tie.
    How long did it last? Two minutes? Three? Whatever. It went on for a long time.
    He erupted like Vesuvius, spewing venom and spit as a volcano spews lava. I have never heard a voice like that, before or, thank God, after.
    “NOW GET THE
FUCK
OUT OF MY OFFICE!”
    Manners are such an elusive thing. Once you have them, they are on you like your skin. You have them all the time, every hour of every