Mike Buford's Last Life

I’m standing on the corner of 48th and 8th outside of Duffy’s Ale House, waiting for Buford to light a cigarette, knowing that, like most things he attempts, eventually he’ll succeed. But it won’t be easy. Not because it’s complicated, but because Buford complicates the uncomplicated. He creates pitfalls and snags and obstacles if only because Buford won’t attempt anything unless it’s handled like one exhaustive, endless, mind-numbing game.

“You have to fuck them to win, Muck,” Buford says, cigarette dangling from his rubbery lips. And they are rubbery. Not soft or hard or chapped. They look like pink tires on an F150.

He flicks the lighter again. “The only way to win at this job is to pull someone’s card. Hold that card up and make sure they know you’re the one who pulled it.”

Work has been Buford’s playground for almost three decades. His favorite pastime. Maybe his only pastime. As far as I know, selling air for a cable sports network is the one thing Buford actually enjoys doing - aside from getting fucked up. His kids are grown. His wife is always busy running her boutique clothing store. His dog is on her deathbed.

One more spark and, finally, a bright cherry appears at the tip of the cigarette. Buford drags so hard his cheeks collapse, making him look like an angelfish. A plume of smoke releases through his nostrils and suddenly he’s a dragon.

“You’re a shapeshifter,” I mumble.

Buford laughs, then coughs violently, like a lawnmower running over a rock. “Damn right, I am,” Buford says, wiping sweat from his forehead. “Actually, I’m a wizard.”

Whatever that means.

Buford sucks his teeth and taps a string of ashes off the cigarette. “You gotta turn it around, Muck,” he says, unbuttoning his collar, revealing a patch of wiry, gray chest hair. “There's only so much runway before you hit the ravine.”

After his sixth or seventh drink, Buford likes to give unsolicited pep talks. And since his sixth drink was ten minutes ago, it’s no surprise that he’s dragging out the figurative soapbox, salt and pepper hair tussled, sweat-stained Brooks Brothers oxford barely containing his beachball gut, ready to deliver a sermon.

“If you let them win, they’ll grind your bones into chalk. Ever see the bottom of a furnace at a crematorium? Dust, little bits of bone. That’s you. Soon. So don't let them beat you.”

“Okay,” I reply.

“Okay? Do you even know how to win?”

Clearly, I don’t. And Buford knows I don't, but it’s all part of his sermon, so I play along.

“Tell me how to win, Mike.”

Buford grins. It’s almost gratuitous. Then with surprising agility, he grabs my shoulders and squeezes. Hard. He squints, like what he's about to say will take extreme concentration. In a low and steady whisper, he says, “You fuck them to win. That’s how you come out on top, Muck.”

Then he cackles, breath a mix of sour milk and coffee grinds.

We’re supposed to be at a client lunch, only Buford’s 'client lunches' rarely involve lunch or clients, so technically we are. Semantics aside, it’s not a good look. Management knows what he’s up to, but tolerates it because he consistently hits his budget. But at some point, the money he brings in will be less important than dumping an expensive, offensive, substance-abusing salesman, and he’ll get permanently booted from the server.

I don’t know the game at all, but I do know that a sixty-year-old salesperson taxiing on the runway to heaven or hell or nowhere with only heart disease and COPD as luggage, he should probably change the way he plays the game.

But I don’t say this.

“Time for your renaissance, Muck,” Buford says, tucking his shirttail in. “Because I know this business better than I know my wife’s fat ass. And I know my wife’s fat ass better than my own fat ass. So trust me when I tell you, I'm doing something right. You know how much money I brought in last quarter?”

I do, because as his sales assistant, I book all his deals, but pretend I don’t so he can hear himself say it.

“Twenty mil. Twenty-fucking-mil.”

I nod.

He stares blankly, then roars, “They should give me a trophy!”

A passing family flinches at this giant fat man's exclamation, giving us an extra wide berth. His roar devolves into a laugh. Then I laugh. Just two drunk idiots laughing on the corner, burning daylight.

"Always stay wet, Muck," Buford says with a sigh. "Drying out makes your bones brittle."

Despite Buford's simplification, success if fleeting - there’s nothing tangible about this job. In the end, air is an invisible commodity, and creating demand around something invisible isn't easy. The only thing I know for certain about the air business is - it's expensive, advertisers fight over it, and Buford take home a small fortune selling it.

Buford’s supposed to help me learn the nuances of how to sell it, but all of his tactics are antiquated. He's become a fossil that alien engineers uncover while excavating the foundation for a space elevator. He's also done evolving. Instead of groveling for a tutorial on the newest digital advertising products, Buford skips the training sessions, goes to the bar, drinks ten tequilas, gets on the LIRR, and tumbles down the stairs at the Far Rockaway station trying to get home to his wife's fat ass.

Unfortunately, he's the only person who's shown an interest in helping me learn the rules of the game before I run out of lives or quarters, literally or figuratively.

Midtown is on fire – the late summer humidity makes the sidewalk dance. But Buford still wants to tango. Despite rivulets of sweat pouring down his fat face, he starts up again. "Here’s the only advice you'll ever need in this business - play the game your way. It’s a stupid game. If you try to rationalize how we make money, you'll go crazy. So don’t. Just play the game."

I nod.

“And fuck them to win."

Again, I nod.

Buford frowns. "You think I’m kidding?”

“No.”

“What?”

“I said no.”

“No, what?”

“You asked me if I thought you were kidding.”

“Well, I’m not.”

“Okay.”

He sighs and stretches his back, which distends his gut. A series of grotesque cracks and pops follow, which only reinforces my belief that he’s living on borrowed time.

Buford flicks his cigarette into the drain and says, “Media people, man. We're just a bunch of C-average students who think we got screwed by Harvard admissions.”

Which aligns with what I've seen so far while working at ABS - most salespeople act like they’re about to perform an emergency appendectomy, not join a conference call to discuss air for forty minutes.

This observation doesn't change my concerns about how I'm navigating the game. As a new player, maybe getting fucked up with a man only a few years away from social security isn't the best strategy.

But to voice this openly would enrage Buford, so I ask, “Should I be worried?”

Buford winces. “Have you not listened to a single fucking word I’ve said?”

I shrug.

He blows a wet raspberry and waves his hands wildly, swatting imaginary gnats. “As long as you’re attached to money - to me - stop worrying. When the money dries up, that’s when you worry.”

Then Buford rips a long fart, laughs, and says, “Muck, I don’t know about you, but I am feeling pretty good right now.”

***

I met Buford the day after new hire orientation. My supervisor, Glenn, escorted me to Buford’s office like a breeder delivering his latest purebred.

When Glenn knocked on Buford’s door, Buford ignored it. Glenn knocked again. Buford screamed, “Cabbage, MJ, I'm farming cabbage!”

I looked at Glenn. He smiled sheepishly. “My last name is Jackson, and so I guess, Michael Jackson, MJ?”

The coronation of Glenn's nickname isn't too different from how I became 'Muck'. When Glenn introduced me to Buford as his new assistant, Buford asked, “What’s your last name, Johnny?”

“Macauley.”

His giant paw smacked the top of the desk. Papers and pens flew everywhere. A little hula figurine did a little ditty.

“I knew a Muck once!” He yelled, followed by that sickly laugh. Then he offered us a beer. I thought he was joking. In hindsight, he probably wasn’t.

A week later, Buford revealed his version of the client lunch. When he saw that I wasn’t going to tell him to slow down, hit the brakes, breathe, they became habitual. Pretty soon, Glenn – and others - took notice.

Glenn pulled me aside and told me I couldn’t disappear for hours at a time. He threw around terms like: probation, evaluation, reevaluation. It seemed like a veiled threat.

So when I told Buford about Glenn’s warning, he groaned. “MJ’s asshole is so tight, when he farts, his asshole whistles. Tell him to lighten up.”

“Obviously, I can’t do that.”

But Buford brushed me off. “If you don’t take a stand, these monsters will push you to the brink. Play it my way, Muck. Your way will get you nowhere.”

To be fair, Buford did stop dragging me out of the office every other day. Which allowed me to focus a little more, even if I still didn’t fully understand what it meant to be 'good'. The barometer for who was good and who ‘got it’ and who was winning and losing - all of it changed weekly.

Without Buford, I sat alone at lunch. Drank coffee alone during breaks. I was a pitiful sight. I started to miss being out on the range chasing down steer with a big fat moron whose pockets overflowed with cash.

Poor me. Drowning but doing nothing to stop it except blame water for being wet.

So, I started tagging along with Buford again, desperate for camaraderie. Only I didn’t understand that Buford’s game was recalled fifteen years earlier, and it was only a matter of time before corporate tracked down the outstanding merchandise. And most likely, if I had gone further into the abyss with him, I'd be considered dysfunctional by association.

***

Except a week later, Buford is let go.

The first thing I learn the day he gets shitcanned is how carefully corporate calculates their hits. They don’t want anyone to have time to think. They want everyone to feel cozy and content right up until the moment the metaphorical pistol touches the back of their head.

So now that's it's over, the ghost of Buford sits inside his office and stares at the ceiling. A few coworkers stop by, pat his back, give awkward half-hugs. Some even shed tears, which is the second lesson I learn – these emotions are rooted in relief not sympathy – Buford’s death means they get to keep playing the game through another bonus cycle.

But it’s quickly apparent that Buford won't be the only casualty today. By noon, around four dozen salespeople, marketers, and operations managers get cut. They all wander the floor dazed like plane crash survivors trying to find their way out of a cornfield.

Everything is tense and I have no idea what to do. Normally I would ask Buford, but obviously I can't. So I hide in my cube and pretend to be busy. When I go into the kitchen for a coffee, a woman cowers in the corner, sobbing quietly into her cell phone and telling secrets to someone about how it ended. Walking back to my cube, I see people packing stuff inside their offices. One man holds a giant bronze plaque at arm’s length, studies it, then dumps it into a trash can, which tips over.

On the flipside, Buford hasn’t packed anything. Staying true to his brand, Buford pours shots of Johnny Blue into plastic cups, offering them to the attendees of his wake.

I try to sneak back to my desk without Buford seeing me, but fail miserably. He screams, “I see you, Muck - get your ass in here.”

Standing in his doorway, I wear this half-smile, half-frown, unsure of how to proceed. Buford sees through it and scoffs. “What, you’ve never seen a dead man drink scotch before?”

Then he cackles. Others laugh too, but it seems more out of relief.

When Buford eyes meet mine, I see that they’re streaked with tears.

Under his breath, he mumbles, “This is it for me.”

I have to stop myself from agreeing, because it’s clear to anyone with a functioning brain that he'll never land another cushy gig like the one he just lost. Maybe he’ll get his real estate license and sell raised-ranches to newlyweds in Syosset or Morristown and net a fraction of what he makes at ABS—if he’s lucky.

Buford clears his throat and holds a cup toward the drop ceiling. “Tell you one thing, guys - I’m not leaving this place sober. That’s for damn sure.” Then he dumps the shot down his throat.

A few people slink out. I take a cup, tap his, and drink it.

Buford smiles. “I always said you were a good shit, Muck. Don’t forget that.”

***

Later, when the hatchet man has his fill, the recently deceased leave the office en masse, heading to bars around midtown. Their sympathizers follow in a funeral procession.

Buford does the same, only he’s already stumbling, so it takes him longer to get moving. Passing my cube, he looks defeated. And drunk. And ready to burst into tears. But he makes a point to stick his finger in my chest and bark, “We’re going to Bobby Van’s. Pronto.”

Then he shuffles off toward the elevator bank, a Bloomingdales bag overflowing with frames and folders and phone chargers bouncing off the industrial gray carpet.

***

At the bar, people are sad, but more than anything, they’re mad. They want a revolution. They want to be the Che Guevara of the 29th floor. The oligarchs are the problem, not their loyal servants. They rant about things they believe will fix everything, if only the executives would listen.

But I know that none of them will do a damn thing.

They work comfortable jobs to float McMansions and cars and college tuitions to SUNY Rochester, so none of them actually want to disrupt their cosmic balance. When they sober up, they’ll find that their rebellious spirit has abandoned them, and they'll go back to punching keyboards and embrace whoever fills the cavities left behind by those they were committed to avenging.

Regardless, I humor them, nodding my head and frowning and doing all the appropriate things the situation dictates. But I don’t feel anything. The more I listen to their bullshit, the more I agree with management’s position. If employees keep playing the game their way instead of the way they’ve been told to play it, where does it end?

Buford sits a few stools down from me, burying whiskies at a breakneck pace. With each sip, he slumps further on the stool, like the whiskey is vaporizing his bones. Without warning, he grabs the back of my neck. As his grip tightens, I try to shrug him off, but he’s dug in like a tick. Then he starts mumbling, “Avenge me, avenge me, Muck.”

And I reply, “What the fuck are you talking about?”

He leans back, bloodshot eyes popping from their sockets. He bangs the countertop and screams, “Avenge me!” then starts laughing and wheezing and lets go.

For a second, it looks like he’s about to hit the deck, but perks up, stares into the mirror behind the bar, and fixes his hair. When he turns back toward me, he looks surprisingly lucid. He taps his glass against mine, spilling whiskey all over my pants, but doesn’t notice. “You know what happens now, Muck?” He asks.

I shake your head.

He frowns, a devastating frown, as if the weight of everything that happened was fluid but has now solidified and is too heavy to bear. He says, “You’re gonna fight the monster. And you’re gonna lose. Unless of course, you fuck them to win, which of course you won’t.”

A tear runs down his cheek. Buford sniffles, swats it away, then turns to someone else standing nearby and begins to talk more nonsense.

I watch him, marveling at how he was able to survive this long. Excel, even. Then I look around and see so many people who fit the same template. Which maybe I fit too. For now.

And then it dawns on me, surrounded by unremarkable people drinking themselves stupid – we're just cannon fodder. All of the real players are on the mountaintop deciding our fate. And the only way to avoid being blown to smithereens is to become one of them.

It’s a reckoning, as mundane as a reckoning can be, but still a reckoning.

I tap Buford’s shoulder. He spins around, busted capillaries in his nose and cheeks glowing. I give him a hug, ignoring the stench, sweat, dampness of his shirt. He pulls away and looks terrified.

I say, "Thank you, Mike."

But he doesn't say anything, only shrugs.

“I finally learned how to play the game. How I want to play it. And win."

Again, no response. His jaw hangs open a little, white spittle building at the corner of his mouth.

So I lean in close, and whisper, “I become the monster who eats people like you.”

Then I’m gone. Out the door and into the fresh air which feels so crisp and warm I want to shout and dance and maybe grab someone passing by and twirl them in circles. But I don’t. I have too many things to focus on now.

I don’t have time for silly games anymore.