When I was a child, I found a book in the library that was all about scales, from the tiniest to the largest. I thought that was the best book in the building; I did not understand why other children preferred books with no structure, mere stories of messy human feelings and desires. Why was reading about an imaginary boy getting on a fictional softball team more important than knowing how starfish and stars fitted into the same pattern?
Who I was thought abstract patterns of numbers were more important than abstract patterns of relationship. Grains of sand are real. Stars are real. Knowing how they fit together gave me a warm, comfortable feeling. People around me were hard enough to figure out, impossible to figure out. People in books made even less sense.
Who I am now thinks that if people were more like numbers, they would be easier to understand. But who I am now knows that they are not like numbers. Four is not always the square root of sixteen, in human fours and sixteens. People are people, messy and mutable, combining differently with one another from day to day — even hour to hour. I am not a number, either. I am Mr. Arrendale to the police officer investigating the damage to my car and Lou to Danny, even though Danny is also a police officer. I am Lou-the-fencer to Tom and Lucia but Lou-the-employee to Mr. Aldrin and Lou-the-autistic to Emmy at the Center.
It makes me feel dizzy to think about that, because on the inside I feel like one person, not three or four or a dozen. The same Lou, bouncing on the trampoline or sitting in my office or listening to Emmy or fencing with Tom or looking at Marjory and feeling that warm feeling. The feelings move over me like light and shadow over a landscape on a windy day. The hills are the same, whether they are in the shadow of a cloud or in the sunlight.
In the time-lapse pictures of clouds blowing across the sky, I have seen patterns… clouds growing on one side and dissolving into clear air on the other, where the hills make a ridge.
I am thinking about patterns in the fencing group. It makes sense to me that whoever broke my windshield tonight knew where to find that particular windshield he wanted to break. He knew I would be there, and he knew which car was mine. He was the cloud, forming on the ridge and blowing away into the clear air. Where I am, there he is.
When I think of the people who know my car by sight and then the people who know where I go on Wednesday nights, the possibilities contract. The evidence sucks in to a point, dragging along a name. It is an impossible name. It is a friend’s name. Friends do not break windshields of friends. And he has no reason to be angry with me, even if he is angry with Tom and Lucia.
It must be someone else. Even though I am good at patterns, even though I have thought about this carefully, I cannot trust my reasoning when it comes to how people act. I do not understand normal people; they do not always fit reasonable patterns. There must be someone else, someone who is not a friend, someone who dislikes me and is angry with me. I need to find that other pattern, not the obvious one, which is impossible.
Pete Aldrin looked through the latest company directory. So far the firings were still a mere trickle, not enough to raise media awareness, but at least half the names he knew weren’t on the list anymore. Soon word would begin to spread. Betty in Human Resources… took early retirement. Shirley in Accounting…
The thing was, he had to make it look like he was helping Crenshaw, whatever he did. As long as he thought about opposing him, the knot of icy fear in Aldrin’s stomach kept him from doing anything. He didn’t dare go over Crenshaw’s head. He didn’t know if Crenshaw’s boss knew about the plan, too, or if it had all been Crenshaw’s idea. He didn’t dare confide in any of the autists; who knew if they could understand the importance of keeping a secret?
He was sure Crenshaw hadn’t really checked this out with upstairs. Crenshaw wanted to be seen as a problem solver, a forward-thinking future executive, someone managing his own empire efficiently. He wouldn’t ask questions; he wouldn’t ask permission. This could be a nightmare of adverse publicity if it got out; someone higher up would have noticed that. But how far up? Crenshaw was counting on no publicity, no leaks, no gossip. That wasn’t reasonable, even if he did have a choke hold on everyone in his division.
And if Crenshaw went down and Aldrin was perceived as his helper, he’d lose his job then, too.
What would it take to convert Section A into a group of research subjects? They would have to have time off work: how much? Would they be expected to fold their vacation and sick leave time into it, or would the company provide leave? If extra leave was needed, what about pay? What about seniority? What about the accounting through his section — would they be paid out of this section’s operating funds or out of Research?
Had Crenshaw already made deals with someone in HR, in Accounting, in Legal, in Research? What kind of deals? He didn’t want to use Crenshaw’s name at first; he wanted to see what reaction he got without it.
Shirley was still in Accounting; Aldrin called her. “Remind me what kind of paperwork I need if someone’s being transferred to another section,” he said to start with. “Do I take it off my budget right away or what?”
“Transfers are frozen,” Shirley said. “This new management—” He could hear her take a breath. “You didn’t get the memo?”
“Don’t think so,” Aldrin said. “So — if we have an employee who wants to take part in a research protocol, we can’t just transfer their pay source to Research?”
“Good grief, no!” Shirley said. “Tim McDonough — you know, head of Research — would have your hide tacked to the wall in no time.” After a moment, she said, “What research protocol?”
“Some new drug thing,” he said.
“Oh. Well, anyway, if you have an employee who wants to get on it, they’ll have to do it as a volunteer — stipend’s fifty dollars per day for protocols that require overnight clinic residence, twenty-five dollars per day for others, with a minimum of two hundred and fifty dollars. Of course, with clinic residence they also get bed and board and all necessary medical support. You wouldn’t get me to test drugs for that, but the ethics committee says there shouldn’t be a financial incentive.”
“Well… would they still get paid their salary?”
“Only if they’re working or it’s paid vacation time,” Shirley said. She chuckled. “It would save the company money if we could make everyone into a research subject and just pay the stipends, wouldn’t it? Lot simpler accounting — no PICA or FUCA or state withholding. Thank God they can’t.”
“I guess so,” Aldrin said. So, he wondered, what was Crenshaw planning to do about pay and about research stipends? Who was funding this? And why hadn’t he thought of this before? “Thanks, Shirley,” he said belatedly.
“Good luck,” she said.
So, supposing the treatment would take, he realized he had no idea how long it might take. Was that in the stuff Crenshaw had given him? He looked it up and read it carefully, lips pursed. If Crenshaw hadn’t made some arrangement to have Research fund Section A’s salary, then he was converting technical staff with seniority to low-paid lab rats… and even if they were out of rehab in a month (the most optimistic estimate in the proposal) that would save… a lot of money. He ran the figures. It looked like a lot of money, but it wasn’t, compared to the legal risks the company would run.
He didn’t know anybody high on the tree in Research, just Marcus over in Data Support. Back to Human Resources… with Betty gone, he tried to remember other names. Paul. Debra. Paul was on the list; Debra wasn’t.