"We stopped having fun, Jane. That's all that happened. I started to bore you. Back then I didn't provide enough excitement, enough Sturm und Drang in your life."
"You weren't dull, Stone, but sometimes you could be maddeningly smug."
"That may be about to change. Now that I'm an unemployed freelancer. And I just ran into a blast from the past. Who knows what my life is about to be like?" He turned to leave. "By the way, give my best to Jay. Hopefully, he'll be the last managing editor I'll ever have to suck up to."
“Take care, Stone." She was getting up. "You can fight
this, you know. They had me write up some kind of bullshit breach‑of‑contract brief, in case you wouldn't go quietly. But it's full of holes. I know, since I deliberately wrote it that way."
"Hey, thanks anyway. It's not worth it. I'm not going to fight to keep a job I never liked all that much in the first place. Every time I wanted to do some serious journalism—like that piece about using the Internet to store everybody's medical records—Jay always found a reason not to run it. I've only got so much dignity to lose."
He turned and strode out of the office, deciding to forego any more farewells. Besides, he had better things to do. Get somebody from the mailroom to carry the boxes—the shards of his erstwhile, so‑called career—to the lobby, where he could get a cab. Take the files home, stash them, and then get going.
Wednesday, April 8