FUCK YOU MONEY

a warthog and a meerkat were waiting in line at a Blue Bottle. the warthog was dressed in white Vejas sneakers, black Alo 7” circuit shorts, a black Uniqlo Airism tee, and a dark gray Arc’teryx Beta LT jacket. the meerkat wore a faded pair of jeans, Nike MD Runner 2s, and an orange Gildan ribbed neck longsleeve.

the barista sang out briskly that an iced latte with oat milk was ready for pickup. both animals stepped forward, each thinking that the drink was theirs, and caught the other’s eye. 

“holy shit,” said the warthog. “meerkat .. ? is that you ? how long has it been?!?!?”

“my childhood friend!” said the meerkat. “where the fuck did you pop up from?”

the two animals hugged — that full, beautiful, blooming hug that only strong men can give, and which they only give to other men. they ordered another coffee and walked outside.

“warthog .. !” began the meerkat. “who’d have thought? let me get a good look at you! you look the same! who’d have thought? both of us! and so far from the watering hole! what are you up to? i’m working now. they give me 20 days of PTO. so i’m on vacation, i came here. what about you? how’s life? you’re working somewhere? climbing your way up?”

“yeah, i work nearby,” said the warthog, gesturing vaguely outwards. his office was two blocks away, and he lived two blocks away from his office. a whole life in a half-mile grid. it would be cozy if he weren’t so lonely. this guy was on the verge of downloading Bumble BFF. there must be some way to disrupt the dull drum beat of day after day, quarter note after quarter note: work, situationship, nerves, then listlessness¹. but now his friend was here, and he felt like singing. 

they talked until dark. each wondered privately whether the other was free for dinner, but decided against asking. instead they made plans to meet again tomorrow, same time, same place — Blue Bottle, 2PM. 

the next day the warthog was wearing the same shorts and shoes as yesterday and a rumpled Turnbull & Asser button down with vertical blue and white stripes. his shirt smelled slightly of bad laundry, the honestly shameful stink that develops when you leave your clothes in the washer for too long. the meerkat, however, was wearing a dark blazer, slacks, loafers, and cologne. Nautica Voyage.

immediately the vibes were off. the meerkat was awkward to the point of being standoffish, standoffish to the point of being hostile. and yet somehow simultaneously servile, shrinking, subsiding, laughing way too hard at the warthog’s one-off jokes, insisting on holding the door, asking increasingly bizarre questions about “operations”, about management. finally the warthog asked what was wrong. 

“you said you worked in coding,” said the meerkat, accusingly.

“i mean, yeah,” said the warthog. “i work in tech. it’s literally the only thing i know how to do. don’t you remember how shit i was at spanish?”

“yeah, but you didn’t say that you were a millionaire”, said the meerkat. evidently he’d done some googling last night. “hee-hee-hee. Multimillionaire. you founded that company. what’s it’s called. that company —”

the warthog rubbed the space between his eyebrows. “founded’ is a weird word. i had an idea when i was 23. people happened to find it useful. at 23, there were four reasons why i would stay up late working, and none of them reflect a particular nobility of spirit. (1) i wanted my ex girlfriend to feel bad for dumping me (2) i wanted the admiration of my peers (3) i wanted more money because i wanted my life to change but i didn’t know how i wanted it to change and more money seemed like a reasonable and normal way to change your life (4) i had nothing better to do. i can’t express enough the extent to which i truly didn’t know what i was doing. every career decision i’ve made has felt like filling in random bubbles on a multiple-choice exam. i really don’t know how this works. of course, i mean, on some level i do. i know how projects get finished. i know that you wake up, you have an idea, you try to make it work, you fail, you eat dinner, and when you get home you put the remains of your dinner in the fridge. but —” 

the warthog began to try to express himself a little further, to try to wrestle out the interior confusion and wonder he felt at having found himself in the moving center of the city (all this money, these ideas! imagine!), but, looking up, written on the meerkat’s face he found not misunderstanding and confusion but admiration and respect. and not just admiration and respect, but the most sweet and cringing veneration.

suddenly the warthog felt vertiginously lonely and nauseous, as if he were looking on the meerkat from a great height. he made no further efforts to steer the conversation towards their respective parents’ health or their shared childhood. instead they spoke mainly of the upcoming national election, on which the warthog assumed a lofty knowledge.

at the end of the afternoon the two animals, instead of waving or going in for a hug, offered each other their hands to shake.

1. (the answer is, of course, italy or japan)