The Corporate Pyramid Scheme

The fox stared at me through the floor-to-ceiling glass of Marcus's office—real, taxidermied, its glass eyes catching the morning light like a judgment. I adjusted my fedora, a ridiculous affectation I'd adopted after my divorce, as if a hat could rebuild a shattered identity.

"You're not bearing up well, David," Marcus said, not looking up from his pyramid of cocaine on the mahogany desk. The corporate kind of bear—massive, dangerous, unpredictable. He'd made VP by devouring everyone who'd stood in his path, and now he wanted me to join him for padel tennis at the club.

"I'm fine, Marcus."

"You're forty-five and living in a studio apartment. That's not fine, that's a pyramid scheme of self-delusion." His laugh was a bark, sudden and cruel. "Tuesday. 7 AM. Don't be late."

I showed up. The padel court was his domain, another pyramid where he sat at the apex. He played like he conducted business—ruthless, calculating,每 move designed to humiliate. As I bent to retrieve a ball, my hat fell off, and there I was: exposed, middle-aged, sweat dripping onto the court like evidence of my decline.

"Pick it up, David," Marcus called from his side of the net. "Unless you've decided to finally stop pretending."

The fox trophy in his office flickered through my mind—stiff, stuffed, preserved forever in a moment of capture. I straightened, left the hat on the ground, and walked to the net.

"Actually," I said, "I think I'm done being your pyramid's foundation."

Marcus's face went still. That evening, I applied for a teaching position in Oregon. Some pyramids are meant to be buried.