It’s strange how certain topics get lofted into the air, and begin to catch fire due to their momentum, when you’ve mentioned your own recent preoccupation with them to no one. Of course, skeptics will claim that it’s only because you are currently paying attention to this subject, that these perceived coincidences do not exist. But while that’s certainly true to some extent, and there are also unseen threads connecting chain reactions invisible to you, this can’t possibly explain away everything.

Edgar’s over in the managers’ office at Southside, one afternoon immediately following the Sean incident. He’s listening to Dale and Barbara playfully bicker, from the desks at opposite ends of the room. The whole reason he has drifted over here is because, while he can technically VNC into this computer from his office on the other side of the wall, to use the Hobart ScaleMonster program, it ends up being a bigger hassle than just walking next door. If he doesn’t lock the keyboard or black out the screen, a different person will continually drift into this room, one approximately every three minutes, and attempt to work on this device themselves. Some, like Craig, will mess with him on purpose, as a joke, but for the most part they seem kind of oblivious, as though not even noticing a cursor bouncing around and typed words magically appearing on the screen. But then if he does lock the keyboard and/or black out the screen, then they simply reboot the machine.

He’s sitting here typing away, while these two volley their argumentative banter, and thinks that there’s one thing which has completely disappeared from the office equation: jokes about your significant other. Edgar has worked off and on in offices for much of the past fifteen years, wrapped around his stints as a meat cutter, and this was once a commonplace comedic thread, everyone sitting around bemusedly grousing about their spouses and boyfriends and girlfriends. It’s just gone now, and the thought makes him vaguely sad.

If there’s one company in the entire business realm where you could get away with such a thing, that would be here. On Halloween, Tonya had emailed him a meme and nothing else, no explanation or even a what’s up? It was a picture of someone dressed as a bloody tampon, with the word FAIL boldly stamped across the top. Thus informally began their season of whatever the hell this is.

Granted, Edgar would prefer hooking up with her again, but he’s also kind of enjoying this mystery. After moving beyond that transitional phase of her calling to make plans but then canceling, this has just about represented the extent of their interactions: there are official work emails, and there are the meme emails, that’s it. They have barely even bumped into one another at Liberty Avenue since. And yet their meme exchanges have only gotten racier. For his birthday, she sent him one of a naked Ron Jeremy — on his stomach, butt in the air, thank God — and he responded with one of Gandhi, with a caption bubble coming out of his mouth as he explained that while it is common to undress one another before sex, this is not true afterwards. The lesson here, as I understand it, is that nobody helps you once you’re fucked.

Regarding these two here, he thinks that Dale and Barbara at least argue like a married couple, if nothing else. This exchange is much more playful than some, but that sentiment still remains. One day they were screaming at the top of their lungs, which was only punctured by an even louder crash that caused both Edgar and Duane to come jogging over from their nearby offices, ask if everyone was alright. But it turned out that Dale only backed into a bookshelf and sent it toppling to the ground, contents flying.

“You two are like an old married couple,” Edgar finally tells them, today, during the first silent moment available.

Barbara howls with laughter and says, “aren’t we, though? This is what happens when you’re in a cave with someone for over a year!”

“Yeah,” Dale muses, “the only thing missing is the bad sex.”

Now Barbara is snorting, and tears are streaming from her eyes, as she cackles and claps her hands together, declaring, “well paint me pink and call me Porky!”

The new marketing girl, Valerie Swanson, happens to stroll in somewhere between Dale’s last line and Barbara’s, is shooting all three of them unsure smiles, eyes wide. “What did I just walk into?” she questions.

As she sits down at her own desk, Dale points over at Edgar and insists, “it was him! He started it!”

Valerie, despite having almost no interaction with Edgar thus far at this job, cracks, “I can believe that.”

“Hey now, I try to keep things professional at work!” he replies.

“What, like that shirt?” she slings back at him, instantly, in reference to this wildly patterned, blue and white Hawaiian number he threw on this morning. Giggles and adds, “that’s real professional.”

“You like this? It’s pretty sweet, isn’t it?”

“Edgar and Valerie are too nice to be working here,” Dale tells Barbara, “they’re the anomalies. You two are the only ones.”

“Well, as far as you know we are, anyway,” Edgar says.

“Dale says I’m always nice,” Valerie boasts, in a sweet voice, rocking side to side slightly in her chair.

“Hmm. He’s obviously never seen you first thing on a Monday morning, then,” Edgar muses. And attempts to refocus his efforts on the intended job at hand, this ScaleMonster program.

“Edgar has the perfect job,” Dale sighs, leaning back in his chair, hands crossed behind his head, “he doesn’t have to deal with anybody else.”

“That’s why I’m so nice. If I had to deal with people, I’d probably flip out every now and then.”

“I’ve had jobs before where I didn’t deal with any people. I loved it,” Valerie observes.

“Really? See, I don’t think I’d like that,” Barbara offers.

“Oh yeah. As long as I have a computer, I’m fine,” Valerie says, chuckling.

“That’s what I’m saying,” Edgar says, and they make eye contact for possibly the first time, during this roundtable exchange.

A short while later, Valerie is over in his office, asking about his process for the monthly sales flyer. Across the desk from him, in the Ochestra computer’s chair — most commonly occupied by Arnie, or else the “patients” who drop into it to complain to their “therapist,” Edgar — with the upcoming ad opened and his work-in-progress sales price file pulled up on his screen, so that both can see it. Valerie will be posting it to their website as well as emailing all employees, moving forward.

She says she wants a file with all the UPCs and PLUs involved each month, which Barbara never requested, and he agrees that this is a good idea. He’s explaining that he will probably wait until the day before it starts to send it to her, however, due to the assorted chaos involved with this process. Nobody sends him any list of what items are involved with these sales — he has to drift down to either the back dock or the office and grab a flyer from the massive box they receive each month, and unearth these items in their database himself. Once or twice he has attempted getting a major jump on this, weeks ahead, but this has wound up being counterproductive, and he now prefers only starting this a few days out.

Inevitably there are some items they’ve never even carried before, anywhere from one to three per flyer, so he’s got to track these down and add them to the system first. Occasionally he’s not even able to find them anywhere and must ask the merchandisers where these will be coming from. There are commonly new flavors brought in at the last minute, too, even for product lines they have been carrying, so if he’s too early with assembling the sales batch, then he winds up having to create a second one anyway. Of course, new varieties are frequently ordered during the month in question, as well, and this inevitably leads to at least one complaint per instance, an employee who can’t understand why this brand new creation wouldn’t magically already be ringing up at, say, the advertised 15% off. Thus Edgar has to remember to check this for every new item batch, every day, to make sure none of the sales prices apply to them, or otherwise face the tyranny of the complainers.

Not that he lays all this out for her in such detail. It’s nothing she needs to know, she would probably find it boring and confusing, and anyway, he’s always careful to phrase things in a manner to avoid bitching about people who aren’t present. Edgar therefore summarizes his reasons as “because there will be, you know, some last minute additions,” and leaves it at that.

They’re discussing this when Dale pokes his head into the doorway, grinning at them. “Is Edgar sweet talking you?” he asks.

“Always,” she says, with a smile.

“You gotta watch him. He’s a player,” Dale advises.

“Pssh. Everyone knows I’m the biggest dweeb on the planet,” Edgar scoffs.

“THAT’S HIS GAME!” Dale declares, jabbing an insistent finger at Edgar but looking at Valerie, “that’s his game, the oh, pity me approach. Don’t believe him.”

“Yeah…although, I don’t know, he did just use the word dweeb,” Valerie considers.

“See? That’s what I’m saying,” Edgar agrees.

“Don’t believe a word he says,” Dale insists.

This stuff’s funny and all, and Dale jumps into this topic often for some reason, with no encouragement or information whatsoever. But Edgar thinks he’s beginning to see what’s happening here, in this instance and likely many others — Dale is hijacking a not the least bit flirtatious conversation as a means of flirting with Valerie himself. Which, you know, she’s a good looking girl and all, but Edgar was actually getting into the nerdy details of discussing this flyer business and wasn’t even thinking about that.

He’s still kind of smitten with Tonya, anyway, despite months of inactivity. That whole bird in hand business surely applies, even if he’s only barely holding onto one wing at this point.

Although it’s possible they are getting a little bit too brazen with their electronic correspondence. Sending the most outrageous memes imaginable has not proven a problem, which just maybe leads them to believe that typing such words into the body of an email won’t, either. They’ve never heard anything about having an email filter, for example. And maybe this is just coincidence. Maybe someone happened to glance over Tonya’s shoulder, for example (in this safe confines of his room, Edgar’s certain this never occurred on his end) or maybe she even accidentally left her email open in the Liberty office.

Whatever the case, just maybe she sends him an emailed joke featuring the word cock, and just maybe he with replies with a comical response involving the word pussy. By the end of the business day this same afternoon, an email will besiege their inboxes — not just theirs, for it is sent to all merchandisers, department heads, and office personnel, with store managers and upper management merely CC’d — the first ever of its kind. A friendly reminder from their crusty, paperwork swamped HR lady, Doris, cautioning them that they should keep their emails professional at all times, and avoid using outre images or language.

Tonya texts him shortly thereafter, asking if he’s seen this message. Which of course he has. And this is possibly a good thing, sure, as this has led to their first phone interaction in who knows how long. Moving forward, they agree, they will probably communicate in this manner, too, for anything non-business related. This warning doesn’t prove that there is in fact any sort of email filter in place, but there’s no need to take chances.