Kevin said he was “really proud of me.”
Alarm bells sounded in my head. Something was very wrong here. Kevin is not my dad. He is not even my stepdad. He is my coworker. I am an adult.
The only adults who get to be proud of me for little or no reason are my parents. If I committed a public act of unspeakable evil, they would not condemn me; they would give me the benefit of doubt against a sea of angry strangers. That is the unconditional love built into all good parents. Even so, my parents would never stoop so low as to say, “I’m really proud of you.” They live their pride quietly by leaving me alone. That is how adults show respect.
Deli guys don’t show respect. They are known for busting each other’s balls. My coworkers are either 19 years old and have their entire lives ahead of them, or they are divorced and in their 50s and have nothing left to lose. I am an anomaly because I am equidistant between both ages and just passing through. I can still crack jokes at my co-worker’s expense however, and can take insults in stride.
I was hoping that this was the opening line of an insult. Kevin leaned in as I weighed some chicken salad. I didn’t look at him, I focused on the numbers on the scale getting as close to .75 as possible. I narrowed my eyes and winced as I awaited the verbal impact of his explanation. Kevin’s voice was not sarcastic. It was sincere.
“You’re doing such a great job here,” he said. “Despite your Asperger’s.”
“I don’t have Asperger’s.”
Kevin was mortified. “Oh, I thought they said you have Asperger’s?”
Who is they? My only work enemy pretends I don’t exist. We have a truce, and ignore each other in mutually. (I still say ‘good morning.’) He’s an angry nerd with principles and wouldn’t spread a rumor behind my back like a woman; he’d humiliate me to my face, in front of the other guys, to score points. I couldn’t think of anyone who would get the idea that I have Asperger’s, or think about me at all, and Kevin didn’t remember his sources.
I am in my element behind the deli counter. I can talk to my coworkers as much as possible as long as I look busy. And most of the time I am busy because it is busy. But it is easy and there is little at stake, which makes it stress free and banter heavy. My favorite environment is low stakes, low stress, non-stop goofy banter. My banter can be deadpan, yes, but my humor has teeth. Deadpan is not monotone. It has timing. I am too sharp tongued to have Asperger’s.
I’m closer in age to Kevin but prefer to banter with the 19-year-olds. Some of them play video games and watch anime. I used to play video games and watch anime. Kevin is too old for anime or video games. He remembers life before the internet.
Kevin was trying to save face. “Oh—it’s because I have Asperger’s,” he coped.
I agreed with him to help him save face, but Kevin does not have Asperger’s. When I introduced myself to him on the first day he answered with his entire life story and ended with “I don’t even need this job. I have retirement and a mutual fund.” He is more of an adult that I am.
Kevin is sycophantic with management, and an effortlessly smooth talker with customers his own age (52). I heard from Alessandro (19) that he has difficulty controlling his temper. Kevin threatened Alessandro a few times, like when he snatched the disinfectant hose from him and yelled, “This isn’t a game!”, or when Kevin said he would come to Alessandro’s house. He doesn’t have a car anymore.
Kevin and I only overlap for one hour of work four days a week. When I do I see him, he makes a quip that I am usually unprepared to answer with anything other than a ‘haha” or a “yeah” or a “cya!” Sometimes my response needs to be sentence length, and I answer with a cliche to get away quickly. Pretending makes me feel awkward. I’d rather just be monotone. I try to avoid him not because I don’t like him—he knows where I live—but because I need to be “on” and “ready,” and talking to him is like talking to an adult who is trying to be ‘cool,’ and it is a contest of who ‘knows more’ and who is ‘supposed to be here less.’ The problem is, Kevin is cool. He is just not my kind of cool.
Joe is an old school Italian guy around Kevin’s age, and I asked him if he thought I had Asperger’s.
“Fuck no bro,” he said rolling his eyes. Joe wears a different Goodfellas shirt every day and knows how to filet tuna and can describe all of the different cuts of meat and how not to damage the concrete. I don’t know his backstory. I know that his mother is too old to make tripe anymore and his dad god rest his soul owned a deli and lost a lot of money gambling in Brooklyn in the 70s. Joe and I share political ideology but never talk about it. Sometimes he makes dirty jokes that I can’t hear and when I ask him to clarify but he just smiles and says ‘never mind.’ He plans on working here for 22 weeks, then mouthing off to a customer to get fired and collect unemployment.
That is my kind of cool.
Maybe Kevin’s lawyer advised him to claim Asperger’s in court to get his sentence reduced, or to get visiting rights with his daughter, or a lower restraining order from his ex-wife. I don’t know.
What I do know is that I don’t have Asperger’s.