It was a knife for butter, so I knew he wasn’t serious, and she pushed him off and said, “You are such a cock, Wilson,” but she was laughing and then said, “And don’t be mean to him,” which was generous but made me feel like a child even though I was the oldest.
Wilson said, “But seriously, if I go to Qatar, you’ll put me up? We’ll hang?”
“Yes. Although we do not have as luxurious accommodations, I will try to show you the hospitality your family has shown me,” I said.
He nodded and smiled. “I’m just fucking with you. The only thing that’s going to cut her is a surgeon’s knife.” He compressed his hands over her breasts. “Give her a nice pair of D-cups.”
George pushed him off again, but Wilson asked, “What do you think, Karim? Does she need an upgrade?”
Although her chest was in fact very minimal, and the rest of her body was so thin that I could see light blue veins everywhere, I said, “I do not know.”
“Why not?” he asked. “You don’t swing that way?”
Jeromy said, “Come on, Wilson,” but he ignored him.
“I have not been observing your girlfriend in that mode,” I said.
“My girlfriend?” he said. “She’s not my girlfriend. She’s my sister.” He kissed George with his tongue for several seconds until she again pushed him away. “This is what we do with our sisters in America. We keep it in the family. Family’s important, don’t you agree?”
The room and the house were quiet. “Family is very important,” I said.
He put his hand on George’s behind. “And you do this with your sisters in Qatar?”
“No,” I said. “We treat our sisters with respect. If you truly had a sister, maybe you would understand.”
Then we heard rapid footsteps like a clock ticking quickly and Jeromy said “Shit” and in a few seconds Mr. Schrub opened the kitchen door with force. He was wearing the same clothing as before and looked as if he had fallen asleep in his office.
“How did you get home?” he asked Wilson.
“Drove,” Wilson said.
His face was as red as the hawk’s shoulders. “You’ve been drinking?”
“No,” Wilson said. “I had one drink. Maybe two.”
Mr. Schrub breathed in deeply through his nostrils. “Would you mind taking a taxi home?” he asked George. She looked very afraid and said she didn’t mind, and he gave her a $50 bill from his wallet and asked her to call for it and wait outside.
I didn’t know if I should leave as well, but I was afraid to ask. I moved to the kitchen door but Mr. Schrub said, “You can stay, Karim.”
Then he turned to his sons and commanded them to sit down. They both looked at the table as he spoke. I don’t remember all his words, but at a high volume he told them that they should call a taxi if they had even one drink and he wasn’t bailing them out for any more DUIs and they were irresponsible and he was fed up with them. In the middle of yelling at them he picked up the knife, which I had placed on the table, and he didn’t pay attention to it in his hands, but when Wilson interrupted him once to say he was 21 years old and legally allowed to drink, Mr. Schrub yelled even louder and bent the knife approximately 30 degrees with his hands and Wilson didn’t say anything else.
Mr. Schrub said one more thing that surprised me: “I’m furious with you two. You’ve really let me down.” I wondered if this was something all fathers said to their children, or if it was just that my father and Mr. Schrub had similar philosophies, even though my father said he wasn’t angry and Mr. Schrub said he was.
He walked to the door and stopped. “And if I ever, ever hear you talk to Karim, or anyone else, like that again, I’ll be much more than furious.”
Then he exited to the upstairs and I waited for 45 seconds while Wilson and Jeromy were mute before I returned to my bed.
I couldn’t get the voice recorder now, and I couldn’t fall asleep, so I looked out the window in my room at the light from the moon, which was half dark, and at the stars, which are invisible in New York and which I miss seeing when we visit our cousins in Al Khor. I’m not the class of person who believes that my mother is in the stars and observing me from there, but it’s profitable to remember that sometimes your problems are minor and the universe is infinitely larger and ultimately careless of what happens on earth, especially to one person, which can simultaneously make you feel alone.
I still didn’t fall asleep for several hours, and I woke up when Irma knocked on my door and told me it was time for brunch.
Everyone was waiting for me at the dining room table, and I apologized. Wilson and Jeromy both looked more fatigued than I was, so I didn’t feel as guilty.
“How late did you stay up?” Mrs. Schrub asked.
Mr. Schrub quickly looked at me, then looked down, and Wilson also did. It was as if I knew all their secrets but couldn’t say anything, even though I was the one with the real secret. “I stayed up late to read The Grapes of Wrath in my room,” I said.
Mr. Schrub and Mrs. Schrub had drinks of tomato juice with vodka. Mr. Schrub was in a positive mood and made many jokes which even I understood.
Wilson and Jeromy said good-bye after brunch. I shook their hands and they avoided my eyes. Mrs. Schrub told me the car to return to New York could leave as soon as I was ready. My opportunity to get the voice recorder was the opposite of golden. I packed my luggage slowly, because I was hoping Mr. Schrub might leave the house before I did. But I went downstairs and his office was still closed. When I was a few feet past the office, the door opened and Mr. Schrub asked to borrow me for a minute.
I again became panicked that he had discovered me. But he said, “I apologize for the scene last night, and for my sons’ behavior.” I said he didn’t need to apologize, and it was almost as if I could hear the voice recorder a few feet behind me.
Then he said, “Well, in better news, I have a proposal for you. My business people emailed it over this morning.” He showed me two stacks of several papers. “I don’t fully understand it, but apparently they want you to de-encrypt Kapitoil and allow our programmers access to the code, so they can make modifications to the algorithms, too. You’ll still be the point man on all this, and you’ll get a corresponding bump in salary.” He pointed to the number. It was double my current salary. “As far as I can tell, it’s a win-win for everyone.”
He gave me one of the stacks, as they were duplicates. It looked normal to me, and the money would be hard to reject. But more than that, this was my chance to compensate for what I had done last night. “I will sign it,” I said.
Mr. Schrub smiled and said he had a special pen for contracts, and he retrieved a Mont-Blanc pen from a holder on his desk. “Careful, it leaks easily,” he said.
As I was about to write my name, I noticed in the right corner of the front page the date and time it had originally been printed: November 12 at 9:16 a.m., which was Friday morning. Mr. Schrub said they had emailed it to him this morning. Sometimes computers have incorrect dates, but it made me pause.
Then I had an idea. In fact it was a double idea, but I didn’t have time to visualize the stars at night.
I started to sign my name, and I pressed very hard with the pen when writing the K. A large quantity of ink spilled and made the area for my signature a black puddle.
“I am sorry,” I said.
“No harm, no foul,” said Mr. Schrub. “I’ll print you up a fresh back page.”
Mr. Schrub worked on his computer. I walked back to the bookshelves to give him privacy. But I moved to Democracy Through Prosperity on the bookshelf.