By Rashed Nabi

Anis was engrossed in his client report when a burst of laughter threw him off. It was his boss, Monsieur Gilbert, next door. Every time Anis heard him laugh, he freaked out.

Anis wondered if Monsieur Gilbert laughed continually because he was truly happy, or if he was just trying to feel happy. Perhaps it was a way of showing who was in charge!

“Tabarnak! Tu es toujours là? You are still here? Staying late to claim overtime?”

Anis jumped to his feet. He was so lost in thought that he hadn’t noticed Monsieur Gilbert at his door. He could never figure out what annoyed Monsieur Gilbert more: staying late or leaving on time. But his teasing told Anis he could leave now.

“Going.” He hurried out with a meek reply.

The disturbing echo of the laughter followed him into his quiet apartment. He went to the kitchen to make tea. To kill the silence, he turned on the radio, which erupted with laughter before blaring into conversation. It gave him such a start that he almost knocked over the radio. In his haste to catch it, he dropped his mug, which shattered on the floor.

“Darn!”

The laughter continued to echo in his head. “Maybe I can beat it by imitating it,” he thought. To test it, he started practicing, first in his head, then whispering, then out loud. “Ha…ha…ha; Ha…Ha…Ha!” Nothing sounded right. He repeated it obsessively, as if trying to master a song, note by note.

It chased him in his dreams. He dreamed that Monsieur Gilbert was conducting a concert. No—he was, in fact, standing behind the timpani—hitting the drums, bang, bang, bang and synchronizing his laughter, “Ha…Ha…Ha.”

As the lights came on to flood the theater, Anis woke up in his sunlit room with despair. “Darn! Back to the grind!”

Later in the morning, when he went to the team meeting, he sat uneasily because everyone seemed to be watching him. He sat cross-legged, then straightened up. Monsieur Gilbert began the meeting with his usual platitudes: the guinea pig of his son, the artwork of his daughter, the garlic grown by his wife. He talked and laughed, and everyone followed the rhythm perfectly. Anis thought last night’s practice had prepared him to join them, but, like a novice musician, he missed every beat. 

His silence exasperated him.

Later, Monsieur Gilbert called him into his office to check in on the client report. He wasn’t disappointed that it wasn’t ready. In a rather amicable tone, he said he would ask Nancy to take over the work.

“She’s probably a pro, je suppose. Et tu sais, she is fun. She flies like a pig.”

He broke out into his signature laughter without giving Anis a chance to react. Anis felt nervous, as always. Monsieur Gilbert abruptly stopped.

“Allez, rigole un peu. Don’t know how to laugh?” He stood up, signaling that Anis should leave.

After handing off his project, Anis had little to do. “New projects are coming after Thanksgiving,” Monsieur Gilbert kept assuring him. For the Thanksgiving party, the team went to a steakhouse on Elgin Street that served Monsieur Gilbert’s favorite ribs. Seated around a long table, the team was absorbed in conversation and yet, managed to laugh back at the boss. Anis sat across from Monsieur Gilbert. He felt like he was about to be accused of something.

The team’s conversation was interrupted when the South Asian server struggled to understand the accent of one of the team members.

“I can’t believe they hire people who don’t understand English,” someone sneered.

Monsieur Gilbert turned toward Anis. “She speaks your English. You can be our interpreter.” He laughed.

Anis remained still.

“You know why these folks can’t go far?” Monsieur Gilbert continued.

“In this tight job market, they can’t compete with their Inglish or Binglish.” He let out his thunderous laugh, and the whole group joined in.

Something inside Anis urged him to react. He gathered courage and spoke with an impassive voice.

“Right! Black Americans do speak English, don’t they? Why are they still marginalized?”

The entire table fell silent as if nobody had ever heard Anis speak. Monsieur Gilbert bristled, but restrained himself.

“Why?” He rubbed his nose. “Been to the South? What they speak, is that English? Mon Dieu!”

He continued on. As he got worked up, his English took on a thick French accent, and his laughter became hysterical. But he was cut short by a fire alarm that shook the restaurant and, amid the chaos, everyone was evacuated.

Anis was lost in the crowd. He debated whether to return to the office. If he did, Monsieur Gilbert might give him another shift; if he didn’t, he could use it as evidence of absenteeism. Last time, he had removed Anis from his project; this time, he might fire him.

“Darn it!” he muttered. “I’ll go home.”

But once he got home, the fear of losing his job unsettled him. He regretted his reaction and vowed to make it up to the boss. He would laugh with the team, no matter what, when the boss cracked jokes and laughed. He rehearsed laughing all evening.

The next day, when he went to the team meeting, he was ready for Monsieur Gilbert’s platitudes. Monsieur Gilbert was the last to come in.

“Bon, les amis,” he started, humble and crestfallen. “From today, I’m no longer your boss.”

Anis was convinced it was just another joke. “Now is the moment,” he thought. “I should laugh now, to appease him.” So he did. But clearly, he hit a wrong note.

In the afternoon, as Anis was getting ready to leave, he sensed someone at the door. It was Monsieur Gilbert, or rather the silhouette of a hopeless creature. “Not gonna miss it this time,” he snapped, and blurted out the favorite expletive of Monsieur Gilbert.

“Tabarnak! Tu es toujours là!”

And then, he broke into wild, uncontrollable laughter that nobody could imitate.