Micro Fiction: Ethan Goffman

Ethan Goffman

1. Context Error

I awoke vaguely prepared to slog through another day feigning patience with idiots who can’t figure out basic computer stuff. I didn’t know how much longer I could keep up the veneer of sympathy. But since I’d faced a couple of complaints when I first got the job, including one from a senior vice president, I had no choice. The whole thing just proved that senior vice presidents aren’t any smarter than the rest of us—probably dumber. The idiot executives were mandating that we spend three days a week at the corporation, although we could do the work just as well from home.

Before I left the house, though, I would have to verify my identity using the new protocol. Clicking on my smart phone, I took a snapshot of my face and uploaded it to Duo Mobile. “Context Error,” it stated. “Sign in on the Universal Website to verify your identity.” I attempted to do so on my laptop, but was sent back to Duo Mobile for verification, where I again faced an error message.

I spent much of that morning toggling back and forth between my smart phone and my laptop, hoping I could charge this all to company time. Finally, I called the company IT number. After a 17 minute and 32 second wait, a calm voice informed me that I must verify my identity on Duo Mobile before I could be helped.

“Duo Mobile is refusing to verify my identity,” I said. “Perhaps I should come to the company headquarters in person. Besides, you know me—I’m Dan Smith. I work right in your department.”

“I still need verification” said the calm, unrecognizable voice. “The new protocol won’t allow us to work with you, even in person, until you’ve verified your identity.”

“That’s impossible,” I said. “I have to verify my identity to verify my identity. It’s an endless loop.”

“I don’t make the rules,” said the infuriatingly calm voice. “I’m sorry, sir. I’d like to help you, but I can’t.”

I flung the phone across the room where it bounced off the wall and landed on my worn carpet. Grabbing the phone from the floor, I sprinted to the door, planning to hop into my slightly used Hyundai, rip across town, and confront the source of that calm voice. (Was it my coworker, Maggie, who had always infuriated me with her lack of emotion? Perhaps she is herself an AI robot.)

I flung open the door to my house to reveal, not my unkempt lawn and pre-owned car, but a blankscape with an enormous error message flashing across the sky. “Please verify your identity,” it said. “We cannot provide you with an appropriate landscape until you do so.”

***

2. The Quest for Greatness

Our friend Sherri had ratted on her brother, Lionel Bernstein, and we were all smirking at his YouTube videos. He dressed like Liberace-meets-Prince, in some videos utterly in purple, with purple face paint, in others enveloped by a flowing scarlet gown the color of fever, or a rainbow sweater with immensely long arms and a rainbow scarf that flowed to the floor. Perched on the piano bench like a lopsided peacock, Lionel Bernstein half sung, half screeched his pieces, always playing the same three or four chords, in slightly different combinations, with random runs of notes for the intro and finale. I don’t remember the exact lyrics, and I truly don’t want to refresh my memory on YouTube. But a typical one went something like: “I’m the purple pickled prince of pomp / Oh so glamorous / on this mad musical romp / my words copulate, so amorous.” He did ones with political messages, too, such as: “The planet is dying / an egg yolk is frying / I’m still getting high and / my guts out I’m crying.” People in our group would select choice moments to laugh at, picking a particularly ridiculous sentence or melodramatic gesture to deride. 

“He’s always sending these out,” said Sherri. “And he gets, like, two Likes, one from our mother and one, I bet, from himself.” I wondered if their aged, arthritic mother was even able to get on YouTube.

“He’s confused,” said Krishna, with a soulful smirk. “He thinks because his name is L. Bernstein, that’s enough to make him great.”

“It’s delusions of grandeur,” said Serena, when Sherri informed us that Lionel had spent $30,000 for the baby grand and God knows how much for the array of outfits. “He thinks if he spends enough money, that’ll make him great.”

I kept quiet during these sessions, once they began opening the meetings of our little philosophy discussion group. We continued to meet every week, as we had during the pandemic. The inertia of familiarity meant that most of us had decided to remain with the group even when life was back to normal, albeit a new normal, never quite the “before” times. It was harder than ever to get out and meet new people. Personally, I could no longer stand a crowded restaurant or a live concert, despising the noise and terrified of catching some disease. Serena had even left the city and was “roughing it” in the woods, although she’d inherited enough money to have whatever she needed delivered.

I felt a certain kinship with Lionel Bernstein. Like him, I was an obscure artist, writing my little stories, publishing on tiny websites, sending them to my friend groups, trying to achieve some level of meaning and respect.

The world remained indifferent. The world would not even bother to laugh at me.

***

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Setu, February 2025