The CFO

I have a friend and for now I have decided to refer to him as Onslow

who works for a big company that required most of the employees

who had been working from home for a couple of years during lockdown

to return to the office, so my friend Onslow actually brightened while

narrating how he ran into a coworker in the restroom and as they stood

there urinating the coworker mentioned to Onslow that earlier he found

himself in line behind the chief financial officer who was waiting to buy

coffee and crumb cake and speaking a little too loudly to a colleague who

works on a lower floor, and this executive, this CFO, blurted out to his

colleague who is an African American woman how sorry he was because

last night on the news in a rundown, his words, part of the city, a reporter

covering the murder of a young girl choked up and, sobbing, said it is

all just too much to come to work every day and investigate one horrific

story after another with the same outcome, and when the colleague asked

what same outcome? knowing full well what same outcome, her chief

financial officer who is a ruddy gray-haired white man in his fifties turned

ruddier and, according to the coworker of my friend David I mean Onslow,

offered to buy coffee for his colleague from the lower floor and muttered

something about sadness and solutions, and even though neither the chief

financial officer nor David I mean Onslow nor his coworker really understood

the intention of the question about what same outcome, you know and I know

what the same outcome is and as long as David and his coworker and their

CFO continue standing in line for coffee and cozying up to urinate side by

side and flushing crimson from ear to ear and satisfied in their due diligence,

then I have a sneaking suspicion the reporter who reported the same outcome

will report the same outcome every day until those coworkers and their CFO

focus their attention and rally their resources the same way they do whenever

a white girl goes missing.

Rich Renner is an Emmy award-winning producer whose work has appeared on screen, stage, and literary publications. He is a volunteer organizer of the Collingswood Book Festival. Rich lives in New Jersey.

Instagram: @thebookwren4