You Don't Love This Man by Dan Deweese Read Free Book Online

often?”
    â€œNot at all.”
    â€œBecause if I mention it too often, I’ll stop.”
    â€œI wouldn’t want to forget,” she said.
    Though she hadn’t looked away from her computer screen, I could see enough of her face to note the raised eyebrows and slightly flared nostrils that she adopts when trying to act calm—it’s the only way I know I’m getting to her. I folded the form and put it in the inside pocket of my suit jacket. “I need your help today,” I said. “And then I’ll sign your transfer request and you’ll be free torun your own show. And I won’t forget, because the form will be right here in my pocket.”
    â€œWhat do you mean you need my help?” she said.
    â€œThe bride didn’t come home last night.”
    She turned, surprised. “Did you call the police?”
    â€œChrist, Catherine. We’re not there yet.”
    The hourglass disappeared, and was replaced by a log-in box. “What should I do?” she asked as she typed in her password.
    â€œDo you have the Kodak moment?” Martinez asked from across the lobby.
    A small iridescent circle popped onto the screen and began to spin and pulse, as if it could see offstage and was greatly excited about what would happen next. “The system has been slow this morning,” Catherine told Martinez. “But we should have it any minute.”
    The circle throbbed and spun, spun and throbbed. It should have been a stone a little man pushed up a hill and then watched roll back down. I stood there, motionless and watching it, for upward of a minute.
    â€œI don’t understand why this doesn’t work,” Catherine said.
    I leaned down close to her. “Kill it,” I whispered. “Fatal error, system down, whatever expression you want.”
    â€œDon’t you want to see the guy?”
    â€œWe get photos every time it happens anywhere in the region, and they’re on the local news all the time—it’s not thrilling. It’s banal. A person wanted money, so he came in and demanded some, and we gave it to him.”
    â€œAre you really that unaffected?”
    â€œNo, I’m just getting angry,” I said. “All of this technology in the branch doesn’t prevent anything . You and I have to go through exact,step-by-step procedures with all of these computer systems, but then when a guy walks in and asks for money, look at the computer—it doesn’t help us. It’s just a little machine that’s confused and doesn’t work well. The only people who are going to help Amber feel better are you and I. The guy is gone, and staring at the computer or filling out forms isn’t going to change that.”
    â€œI understand what you’re saying,” she said. “But we don’t really have a choice. We have to follow procedure, and the procedure is to pull the photos from the computer.”
    â€œAnd it doesn’t work. And I have contempt for things that waste my time,” I said. “What about our old stuff? The old video cameras are still running, aren’t they? Can’t we pull videotape?”
    â€œPhysical videotape? Only one of the cameras still records on actual videotape, and we’re not allowed to pull the tape. We have to wait for bank security to do that. Everything else is digital.”
    â€œSo we can’t touch the videotape without Mom or Dad here, but we also can’t see the photos, because their expensive computer system isn’t actually working.”
    â€œDo you need to take a walk?” she said. “You seem incredibly upset.”
    At a regional managers’ meeting a few weeks before, one of the other managers, chatting amiably about the big new house he and his wife had just bought, had joked that even though he’d worked for the bank for twenty years, his mortgage statement showed that he owed the bank money, rather than the other way