The Last Pyramids of Baltimore

Marla sat at the hotel bar, tracing the line on her palm with her thumbnail. She didn't believe in palmistry—had made a career out of dismantling pseudoscience as an adjunct anthropology professor—but desperate times called for desperate gestures.

The corporate trainer across from her, a man with unnaturally orange skin and slicked-back hair, was still talking. He'd been explaining the commission structure for forty minutes.

"It's not a pyramid scheme," he said, for the third time. "It's a reverse-funnel incentive matrix."

Marla nodded, swirling her drink. She'd fallen for this once before—back in 2019, between teaching gigs, when desperation had made her believe that selling essential oils could be a career. Now, at forty-two, with tenure-track positions disappearing like temples in the sand, here she was again, listening to another man explain why she wasn't being exploited.

"You're smart," he said, leaning in. His eyes were flat, devoid of curiosity. "You've got an academic background. People respect that."

She thought of her dissertation: on riddles as tools of social control in ancient Egypt. The sphinx had demanded answers, devoured those who failed. This man was no sphinx. He had no riddles, only scripts.

"What happens to the people at the bottom?" she heard herself ask.

He smiled, rehearsed. "They're not at the bottom. They're entrepreneurs building their own businesses."

Marla finished her drink. She thought about the unopened crate in her apartment: the artifacts she'd never catalogued, the field notes she'd never published. The department had dissolved in March. Her unemployment was running out.

"My grandmother was in one of these," she said. "Sold kitchen gadgets. Lost her house."

"That was different."

"Was it?"

He checked his watch. Another meeting. Another recruit.

Marla walked out into the Baltimore heat, her palm still tingling where she'd traced its lines. Some riddles had no answers—only the choice to keep walking into the desert or turn back toward whatever remained of the life you'd built.