Nice Girls Finish Last by Sparkle Hayter

red vinyl in the semicircular banquettes has been patched over a few times. McGravy and I like it for its old New York flavor, for its habitues with red carbuncular noses, lots of tattoos, and names like Billy One-Eye, Spider, and Fat Pat, for its two kinds of wine, Mountain Chablis Red and Mountain Chablis White, which come in cardboard boxes with spigots.
    â€œCan’t stay long, Robin. I have a date with Candy and then I have to pack for another road trip tomorrow,” McGravy said, taking a judicious sip of his soda with lime.
    In the past few years, he had given up drinking and smoking, although he held on to his red meat, refined sugar, saturated fats, and love of forty-ish former chorines named Candy and Frosty, grande dames of the lash-fluttering class. What can I say? Some men just like those real girly girls, you know, the kind with the feather-fringed dressing gowns and little fluffy dogs they carry around like handbags. McGravy loved ’em, and they loved him back, and they took good care of each other. It’s nice when it works out, you know?
    â€œIt’s good to have you back, Bob,” I said. “Even if you’re only in town briefly.”
    â€œI wish I could say it’s good to be back. I leave for two weeks,” he said, “and the place goes wacky. Someone is shooting at my anchormen, ratings are down twenty percent, and cutbacks are coming.”
    â€œMaybe they’ll shoot enough anchormen and you won’t need to make any cutbacks,” I said. “Sorry. My sick sense of humor.”
    Bob didn’t even smile. Instead, he took off his horn-rimmed glasses and rubbed his eyes in a fatigued, battle-weary way.
    â€œListen Robin,” he said after putting his glasses back on and nervously patting the white comb-over that hid his bald spot. “I asked you to meet me for a reason.”
    All the good nostalgic feeling left me suddenly and I felt a sick chill. He asked me here for a reason. This was it, the talk I’d been dreading, the one where I’m told the company appreciates my years of service, but their needs have changed and there’s no room left for me in the new order, that I’d be “happier elsewhere” but they’d keep me on the payroll in some blow-job position until my contract expired. Naturally, this delicate task would be entrusted to McGravy, because he knew how to handle me.
    I took a gulp of my light beer and, fortified, said, “What is it?”
    â€œThere are people who think you’re unstable. I’m sorry to …”
    â€œWhat ‘people’?”
    â€œIt’s not important. I was asked to speak to you because someone has been playing pranks on some of the executives, and your name came up when they were making their list of suspects.”
    No doubt my name was near the top of their list, along with Louis Levin’s. I’d heard about these pranks and was insulted anyone would suspect me of perpetrating them, since they were so amateurish. For example, someone sent away for Rogaine information on behalf of our less hirsute executives, and someone dropped VD pamphlets into the mailbox of an executive who had recently left his wife. Pathetic and downright mean.
    â€œIt isn’t just the pranks, Robin. It’s a history of behavior the executives think is … odd and insubordinate.”
    â€œBob, everyone is odd, some people just hide it better than others. And I have been on my best behavior the last couple of months. I did most of the work on that vigilantism series … I nailed Nicky Vassar …”
    â€œAnd all that is taken into account. God love ya, Robin. I’m sorry about this. I didn’t want to bring it up at all, but …”
    â€œIt’s okay.” Actually, I was relieved it wasn’t the “happier elsewhere” speech—yet.
    â€œI just want you to keep up that good behavior, okay?” he said, and I