A Better World, page 6
Linda was about to get out, too, when she noticed Russell beside her, his top hand draped diagonally over the one beneath it, spindly fingers splayed. He looked tired. Exhausted, even.
“You okay?” she asked.
He squinted at the giant house. Except for the bird scat on the lawn and shelter, it was unnervingly pristine. Dayworkers constantly cleaned and repaired, but they were quiet about it. You had to look to notice them. “A little of column A, a little of column B.”
“The soccer game?”
“A lot of things.”
“Like what?”
“I’m glad we’re here, but it’s hard.”
“Yeah.”
On plenty of occasions over the years, they’d argued when they should have joined forces. Life is stressful. Eventually, you have to let the pressure out. Sometimes the safest target is the person sleeping in your bed. But maybe they’d matured, or maybe they both understood that the stakes were too high to fuck around, because since the Bussel Rowen incident, they’d been very much on the same team.
“Are you upset about the dirty birds?” she asked, hoping to cheer him by making light. “The meaningless politeness? The competitive soccer? The thing they call Hollow, that they claim isn’t a religion, but kind of sounds like a religion?”
“Yes.”
“Which one?”
He was the kind of person with permanently wet eyes. Even she had a hard time discerning whether he was about to cry or just being thoughtful. “I keep missing everything. I keep getting everything wrong,” he said, a reluctant confession.
“How?” she asked.
“Everything I do, every interaction I have, feels like it’s a second too early or too late. It’s as if I’m just slightly off the same dimensional plane as everyone else.”
She nodded, because she understood the feeling, this unrealness, though she wouldn’t have described it in terms of dimensional planes.
“Everything here feels off, doesn’t it?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she agreed. The cutesy pamphlets were off. The gratitude prayer hands were off. The pathologically polite people masking what was beginning to feel like real cruelty were off. Then again, the world was falling apart. Living inside high walls with abundant food and energy and water and watching hypercompetitive teen soccer games felt a little like being a circus elephant balancing on a beach ball, trying to run in place while the entire big top burns to the ground.
The vibe, inherently, was wrong.
“I’m having trouble at work,” he said.
“How?”
He shook his head, the muscles of his face tugging in contradictory directions: a grin, a grimace, a scowl. He was unmoored, she could see. “At the office. It’s all smiles. You know those smiles.”
She nodded.
“I can’t break through.” He sounded frustrated with himself. Ashamed, even.
“You were at the office until almost two in the morning last night,” she said. “Are the rest of them clocking those hours?”
He stabbed the radio dial with his finger. Static played through the speakers, and he stabbed it again, quiet. “I don’t know what they do. They don’t tell me. Half of them are supposed to be subordinate, but they don’t act it. They’re nice about it—they pretend to agree with me. Then they do whatever they want. I told everybody we weren’t taking lunch; I wanted the data back on a clinical trial the London office is running on Omnium safety. Then I went to the john and when I got back, they were gone. The papers I’d left on my bench were gone. My computer was off, and my work hadn’t been saved. I lost hours. I had to do their work and mine. It’s still not all done.”
“You’re kidding me. That’s insane.”
“I’m not kidding. It happened.”
“Can you talk to Heinrich?” Heinrich was his supervisor, who reported to the board of directors.
“There’s something Heinrich told me yesterday. He dropped it like a bomb.”
This couldn’t be good. “Bombs away.”
“There’s a lawsuit against Omnium. The hearing’s in October—it’s the reason I’m reviewing this data. Heinrich said that the outcome will define my future here. I’m sorry—our future.”
“What does that mean?”
“In the annual review. If I haven’t helped them successfully defend their case, we’re out.”
“Then you have to win the case,” Linda said, her voice echoing shrilly inside the car.
“Yes, but how?” Russell fiddled with the radio again. His hand slipped and the volume went high: It’s hard work to stay this fit but it’s worth it to be a part of the festivities, said a squeaky, high-pitched male voice. And then came the disc jockey: And there you have it, from the mouth of Keith Parson, our very own Beltane King!
It was jarring and too happy. Russell turned the dial back down.
“The lawsuits don’t hold water, but I need the data to back me up before we can get them dismissed. The problem’s getting the data.”
“And Heinrich won’t help you?”
“I think this is the test. I’m supposed to show I can deliver without Mom and Dad cutting my greens for me. If I screw it up with bad testimony, they can always appeal the judgment, hire someone else to do my job—someone inside, that the staff likes. The person under me, Nanny… did you meet them? I don’t think so. Well, it turns out they thought they were getting my job. Everyone did. I think the entire department is mad about it. I’m just some outsider. What I’m saying is, we might not even make it to the first review. We could lose our deposit.”
“Oh,” she said.
Russell’s fists stayed tight. “I’m doing something wrong. I don’t know what it is, but I’m saying the wrong things or I’m not saying enough or… I don’t know. I’m not good with people. I try. I really do. It’s the EPA all over again, Linda.”
She scooted over the center console in order to be close to him. In her mind, she committed this act with fluid grace. In reality, she flopped. Russell tried to help and got kneed in the thigh. Then they were sharing the shotgun seat, both smooshed together. It wasn’t funny. Not a tension breaker. He looked annoyed, which she had to admit was a reasonable reaction.
“First, fuck the EPA. They were too stupid to know the gem they had in you,” she said. “Second, I had this thought at soccer. Since we moved here, I thought people were just standoffish, you know? They’re not used to new people. Plus, we’re more than new. We’re not transfers from Palo Alto or some other company town. We’re literal outsiders.
“But always before, I talked to one or two people and that’s it. I took it personally, which is funny, because I keep telling Hip and Josie not to take this shunning personally. But that’s impossible. It feels terrible to be left out… It occurred to me today that they’re all acting the same, like they’re following instructions. They excluded us from the pregame, even though, for the sake of having a winning team, they should have sucked it up and invited us. For the sake of the lawsuit, they should be helping you. Honestly, it’s weird nobody’s invited us over yet, just in case we turn out cool, or you get promoted to something crazy important. It’s just common sense. Nobody’s that cold without a good reason. So, I’m wondering: Do you know what the pamphlets say about golden tickets? Are there a limited number?”
“I read both. I think there’s just two pamphlets on that? Neither said,” he answered.
She made a raspberry. “Those frickin’ pamphlets. What idiot wrote them? I swear to God, it’s like they’re taunting me… Is it possible they don’t like new people because it’s musical chairs? Helping us might help them out of a job? Only it’s not just a job? It’s everything they’ve ever known? We get tenure, and then not just one person, but possibly a whole family who’ve lived here for generations loses it and has to live outside? They’d have to be terrified of something like that.”
His hands loosened and he laid them flat. “That would make a lot of sense.”
“I’d haze us if those were the stakes,” she said. “I’d do worse.”
“No, you wouldn’t. You invited every lost duckling you ever met to our house for dinner back home,” he said.
“If I’d lived here my whole life and was scared, I might,” she said. “Anybody might. They think the outside is Armageddon.”
“It is, a little. So, what do we do?” he asked. They were sitting close, and it was dumb, but she felt happy. Most of their marriage, she’d been a kind of interchangeable cog in the Russell Bowen ambition machine. But since Black Friday, they’d plotted together. They felt like a real team. In moments like this, she could forget the bad stuff, and remember the Russell she’d first met at Sluggs Bar, who’d been too nervous to look in her eyes, so instead he’d fascinated on the moonshine bottles behind her. You’re unconventionally attractive, but attractive nonetheless, he’d said. She’d laughed, then realized he was serious and told him, Dude, I’m regular attractive!
“We tried nice. That hasn’t worked. I think we push back. You said Heinrich doesn’t read your reports. He just passes them to the board of directors?”
Russell nodded.
“Then put it in the report. The work you assigned, and how much of it didn’t get done. Name names and see what happens.”
Russell looked horrified. “Name names?”
“Why not? If that doesn’t work, ask to hire an assistant. They’ll hate that. They don’t want more people—it’s too expensive. Say you need one, though, because your own team’s lazy and you intend to meet all the deadlines.”
“I won’t make friends that way.”
Linda shrugged. “Heinrich sounds like middle management. The top people didn’t get this far without cracking a few eggs. They’ll see what you’re saying. I’d do it.”
Unburdened, Russell sighed with fondness. “I know you would. I thought you were going to break Amir Nassar’s nose.”
“He had it coming.”
“He did,” Russell agreed. “I’m almost sorry I stopped you.”
“Ohhh,” she said. “I wanted to sucker punch him so much. I mean, get over it, dude. It’s a soccer game. Live your own life.”
“Yeah,” he said. “But then you’d have punched a guy in front of a hundred witnesses.”
“I wasn’t really going to do it.”
They chuckled.
The sun’s yellow rays shone down through a hole in the passing clouds like a spotlight over their new house. Even from far away, she could hear the kids screaming as they wrestled. You’d think they’d have outgrown the half nelsons, Irish toothaches, and noogies, but when they were on their own and no one was looking, they played together like puppies.
She considered her family, and where they might go from here. Maybe the Great Lakes, though she’d heard that unless you had roots there, you weren’t wanted. You were considered a refugee. Maybe Canada, but they kept a tight border. She could always get a job with Fielding back home. But they would lose so much if that happened. Between the pollution and the guns and the Glamp, the city was literally rotting. How many years would PV add to their life expectancy? Ten? Fifty?
“Whatever happens, we’ll be okay.”
“How?” He looked at her with those bright green eyes that hadn’t changed since their youths. She’d thought, when she met him, that he’d grow into himself. He’d fill out. Learn to feign ease in social settings. But that never happened. Even at forty-two, there was something youthful and gentle about him.
“We’ll manage. We did it before.”
“But it’s worse now. There aren’t any jobs. The air’s worse. There’s nothing.”
She didn’t want to cry. It would only upset him more. “I don’t know.”
At last, he took her in his arms. “I’m sorry to burden you,” he said.
“Don’t be. I need to know these things. It’s important you told me. You used to not tell me things and I hated it. This is better.”
“No,” Russell said. “I mean, I wanted this to be easier for you. For the kids, too.”
Years ago, she’d been in the habit of ruining good things—like screwing strangers to prevent them from becoming friends. Recognizing that she liked him that first night they met, that his opinion of her had mattered, she’d taken him to Sluggs’s bathroom stall and screwed him two whiskeys in. Then she’d cleaned up like it had meant nothing to her—left him alone in the stall and ignored him the rest of the night.
You’d think a guy would be furious after something like that. But he hadn’t scared easily. He’d stuck around that night, and many nights thereafter.
“It doesn’t work like that,” she said. “You’re not some kind of money machine.”
“I know that logically,” he said. “But it is my job. To make the money.”
“No. Your job is to be Russell.” She kissed him. She’d always liked his lips. They were especially soft. He kissed her back. It lasted, and deepened, until it began to feel unseemly: two middle-aged parents making out in their own driveway.
“To be continued,” he said with a raised eyebrow. He could be so nerdy. She found it charming.
Gauntlet
They figured, if they were going to find a way out of this, it would be easier if they plotted together. That Sunday, Russell showed Linda the Omnium studies he’d compiled for use as testimony. These were classified—meant for his department only—but he needed the advice. “Am I right that the sample sizes are too small here?” he asked.
“They’re a joke,” she agreed. “Jesus, there’s no data on ethnicity, gender, or even their state of health at the onset of the study.”
“That’s why I assumed there was missing data,” he said.
“I wouldn’t bother with any of this. Just get all the landmark studies that set precedent, and maybe order some new ones. Then you’re in direct contact with the labs. You can cut out all the underminers in your office. You’ll need the board to push the court case. Tell them even some Podunk expert witness from the panhandle would tear this crap apart. You had no choice but to order new studies. Nanny lives in fantasy land if they thought this made any sense at all. I’m shocked, actually. The only way an opposing science team would go along with this data would involve a bank deposit.”
“You think?” he asked.
“Oh, yeah. I think.”
“But they don’t need to bribe anyone. Omnium really is safe as apples. I don’t get these studies they delivered. They must know it’s all junk. They’re supposed to be the smartest people in the world.”
Linda shrugged. “Nepotism. This company—this town—has been around for eighty years. Maybe they used to be the smartest people. Now they’re inbred.”
He looked at her for a beat, trying to figure out whether she was joking.
“I might be serious. I’m not sure,” she said. “But if this is the kind of work they’re dealing with, it makes sense they’d need someone like you, from outside. You’ve got better cards in your hand than you think.”
* * *
That Monday, she went to her morning hospital shift. They’d plotted a plan here, too, deciding she should ask for more work, maybe get on her own golden ticket track.
“Do you have any tips on fitting in around here?” she asked the PA, Greg Hamstead, after they’d cleared the whiteboard of a paltry two patients. Kids here didn’t have emergent health troubles. The hospital was clean and modestly sized, had a small-town feel though the technology was high end.
“Tips?” Greg asked. There were a lot of Hamsteads in the directory. She guessed he was third generation. “People come. People go. Try to be the people who stay.”
“And how would I do that? I’m seriously looking for guidance, here. I welcome constructive critiques.”
“Don’t worry so much.”
“Why not?”
“Causes wrinkles.”
Linda made a sour face, because there’s useless advice, and there’s the abyss.
Right before her shift ended, a harried man with wild eyes scuttled through the doors. He walked top heavy, his back bent as if carrying a great burden.
“Poop,” said Greg.
Poop?
Linda recognized the guy as the same one she’d seen at the soccer game. This time, he wore baggy jeans and a sweater, but his countenance carried that same buzzy anger. Even from a distance she could see that his eyes weren’t focused. They may as well have been turned inward. The expression blind fury came to mind.
He bypassed admissions, a mandatory stop for all visitors, and headed straight for the elevator. The security guard rushed to intercept him.
“No you don’t!” the wild-eyed man shouted. His anger was a palpable thing that filled the hospital floor like poison gas. “I know you keep them here. I KNOW IT!”
From Linda’s experiences with violence on the outside, the scene was a punch before it happened. Someone would be hurt. There would be blood.
The guard spoke calmly, his words inaudible to Linda. Like a hand steadying a trilling alarm, he muffled the man’s shaking rage. The guard continued, practically hypnotic, as the man’s posture slumped even deeper.
“No,” the man groaned. He covered his face with his hands and began to weep. It was a disconsolate and finite sound.
The elevator door opened. Limply, the man allowed the guard to lead him inside.
“What’s that about?” Linda asked.
Greg appraised his sensible white sneakers, which were laced to the very top eyes. “Guy named Percy Khoury. He lost his kid last January. It happened in the tunnels. He gets confused, comes here looking for him. Thinks we’re hiding the kid, that we kidnapped him. He walks the whole town and the tunnels, too. It usually means he’s off his meds. You’d think they’d have come up with something better than lithium in the last hundred years. Patients hate lithium. He’s our lead nuclear engineer, or, used to be. People have been patient—he’s a hard guy to replace. Not everybody likes spending all their time down in the tunnels. And he’s stronger than you’d think. He went rogue one time. Took four of us to hold him down.”
