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The mail doesn’t stop, and Barney is right. Barney is always fucking right. In the space of ten cigarettes (Charlie has stopped relying on the concept of time and is now simply counting every anxiety-reducing smoke), Barney has informed Charlie of several major conspiracies. Crazy shit which no sane person would ever believe – like Donald Trump becoming president, or an airborne virus wiping out millions of people and changing the way we live forever. Ludicrous, but oddly convincing, coming from Barney. And Pepe. Pepe fucking Silvia. A real piece of work, Barney had said. A wild card, not unlike Charlie himself. Hard to get in touch with, but an integral part of the company dynamic. Slippery little sucker. Slippery like an eel. Charlie would love to bash an eel like a rat. That’s how they do it, you know. Yank ’em out of the tank and bam. Bashed eel. Dead eel. Delicious. Delicious like denim-boiled eggs. Fuck. What was he thinking about again? Time for another smoke to swat the swarm of hornets that’s threatening to swallow his brain whole. Much better. Where were we? Barney. Right. Barney is right. Barney is always fucking right. Where the everloving shit did he go?
As if in answer to Charlie’s thoughts, Barney appears by a stack of burned mail. “You should go see Carol,” he says, handing Charlie a fresh bottle of Wite-Out. Charlie takes a long, deep huff as Barney continues. “She’s the key to this whole affair.”
Barney sounds a lot like the teachers from Charlie Brown. Perhaps that’s how Charlie himself sounds to other people, too. Maybe nobody has ever truly understood him. They’re just smiling and nodding, or tactfully ignoring the crazy rat-bashing janitor the way one might hurry past a hobo masturbating into a Styrofoam cup.
Charlie snorts, remembering his brief visit to HR – an office so empty there may as well have been a goddamn tumbleweed blowing around it. Barney knows full fucking well Carol is nothing more than a fantasy, like the inside-out clowns that visit in the night if you run out of glue to huff before bed.
Maybe it’s time to talk to Mac. Bring him up to speed about the roster of fictitious employees populating this goddamn ghost town. Is Mac fake, too? That can’t be right. Charlie remembers a whole-ass childhood with the guy, throwing rocks at trains on Christmas Day, and that one time in their teens when Charlie got cunted out of his mind after downing his mom’s Vanderbilt eau de toilette, Mac was there to-
Charlie feels a pinch in his lower abdomen. He hasn’t thought about that particular incident for years, despite the fact that for the longest time, he couldn’t sleep until he’d thrust his hand down his long johns and replayed the sordid scenario in his mind – from its humble beginnings to its fulfilling and sticky conclusion. It never happened again, of course, the pair of them skirting around the issue like opposing magnets. But goddamn, Charlie wanted it. Did Mac?
Maybe it’s time to talk to Mac.
Where the everloving shit did Barney go?
****
The mail doesn’t stop, and neither do the insects buzzing around his mind as Charlie explains this entire shitshow to Mac. Mac isn’t getting it, and he doesn’t see Barney, either. Goddammit, it had all sounded so plausible before. Maybe he does sound like a Charlie Brown teacher, after all. Was he named after Charlie fucking Brown? When he popped out, happy as a clam, did he make goofy mute trombone sounds instead of crying like a normal baby? Shit. He takes a drag of his cigarette and stills, the upbeat bassline of Day Bow Bow penetrating his thoughts for reasons known only to the brain hornets.
“You’ve lost your mind. You’ve lost your goddamn mind, Charlie.”
Mac looks scared. Has he looked Devil-Woman Janet in the eye? No. That can’t be right. He’s scared of Charlie. He’s scared for Charlie. The last time Mac had that expression was right before-
There’s a gentle woosh of white noise in his ears as little fragments of the forbidden incident float into his consciousness like tiny iridescent bubbles. Bottle. Swan. Floral. Pungent. Burning. Dizzy. Shapes. Just shapes. Mac. Mac up close. Mac’s anxious expression. The warmth of Mac’s breath and the cool grounding sensation of his hands cupping Charlie’s cheeks. The sweet, sweet clarity of his lips pressed against Charlie’s. And then... and then...
His thoughts adrift in a liminal space between past and present, it takes far too long for Charlie to register that it is happening again. It is happening again.
Mac’s hands are a sobering reassurance, firm and cool against his face, and as Mac’s thumbs lightly caress Charlie’s facial hair, Charlie begins to relax for the first time in what feels like a thousand years. The mail doesn’t stop, but the insects of the mind are finally beginning to pipe the fuck down. Mac is Taking Care Of Business, alright.
Mac’s lips are warm and soft, and they taste of cigarettes and comfort. Also, Honey Nut Cheerios, for some reason. Delicious, but Charlie moves past it.
After Mac unbuckles Charlie’s belt, the child-blowing-a-tiny-raspberry noise of his zipper almost makes Charlie giggle, but this is not the time for levity. He reciprocates Mac’s kiss as though his life depends on it, his pants hitting the floor as Mac guides him backwards until Charlie’s ass is resting against Pepe Silvia’s cursed box of mail.
“Relax, dude, I got you,” Mac murmurs into Charlie’s mouth. Charlie opens his half-closed eyes and notes that Mac is eyeing the clusterfuck of red string and conspiracy-laden paper on the wall behind them. None of that matters anymore.
He eases into the sensation as Mac frees his cock from his underwear and begins to stroke with an almost reverential touch. It’s a little more refined than last time, and Mac’s hushed groan as Charlie’s length stiffens in his hand makes Charlie wonder if he’s been aching for it to happen again, too.
Before he gets too lost in the moment, which is pretty fucking hard the way Mac is working his dick, Charlie decides that this time, he’s going to give back. He needs Mac to experience this, needs him to come apart at the seams in response to his touch, he needs Mac, he needs to, he needs-
“Fuck, dude,” Charlie gasps, pressing his forehead against Mac’s as their lips part reluctantly. It’s a challenge to keep it together, but taking Mac with him is now more important to Charlie than all the mail-related conspiracies in the motherfucking world.
As Charlie’s shaking hands fumble with Mac’s zipper, Mac resists at first, pulling his hips away for a couple of seconds before conceding defeat and allowing Charlie to claim his victory. He’s already hard as holy fuck, and Charlie wastes no time with unnecessary tenderness. He’s so goddamn close now; the insects are barely more than a whisper but everything else is amplified and it’s all warm and bright and sweaty and it feels so fucking good.
Mac’s dick is full and heavy in his hand, and as he begins to stroke, he feels Mac’s entire body tremble at the sensation. Somewhere to his left, he sees Barney blurring slightly at the edges, as though he’s viewing him through frosted glass. Fuck Barney. All that matters now is Mac. Mac’s lips, Mac’s hands, Mac’s goddamn everything.
The mail doesn’t stop, but Charlie’s enthusiasm for it has finally taken a back seat. Every intense emotion he’s experienced while working in this heinous minimum-wage hellhole is now aimed directly at this point in time. With their heated foreheads still pressed firmly together, Charlie can feel that sweet release inching closer, ever closer-
Me and you, Mac, just like before. Me and y- Fuuuuuuck, Mac, I-
Out of the corner of his eye, Charlie sees Barney fading into nothingness as his cock gives one final twitch and he comes over Mac’s accomplished hand, hot and sticky and wet. His ungodly moan as he does so is the result of years of pent-up longing. The relief he feels is transcendent.
“Come with me, man,” Charlie pleads, squeezing Mac’s buttocks with his free hand. “I need this, dude. I need you to-”
His sentence is cut short and Mac’s mouth is on his once more, his muffled groans echoing deep into Charlie’s cerebrum and when he comes, his whole body shudders from the release.
“Thanks, bro,” is all Charlie can think to say.
The hornets in his mind say nothing.
****
Seated side by side on the cool mailroom floor, their backs resting against Charlie’s Door O’ Carol, they smoke their last cigarettes in silence. Charlie is gonna miss smoking, but without health insurance it really isn’t worth it. He idly wonders if those pink slips will ever find their way back from Siberia. He supposes it doesn’t matter. What truly matters is Mac. Charlie broke, just a little bit back there, but thanks to Mac he walked through the fire and made it back again in one piece.
He wonders if Mac feels the same way about him, and after some internal deliberation, he decides to break the silence.
“Remember when we were kids and I drank my mom’s Eau de Swan?” Charlie asks with some trepidation, before exhaling a satisfying plume of smoke into the air.
Mac flicks the ash from his cigarette and for the briefest moment, Charlie can see the hint of a smile play at the corners of his mouth.
“No, Charlie,” Mac replies. “I don’t.”