Effected Intent
by
Alan D. Ross
Copyright 2008 Alan D. Ross
Smashwords Edition
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Contents
Chapter 1: Just another Day at the Office
Chapter 7: When Steve Met Robert
Chapter 9: Bill Gets a Part Time Job
Chapter 10: Steve Starts Work on the Project
Chapter 11: Robert’s a Loose Cannon
Chapter 13: Robert and Steve Make Progress
Chapter 15: The Ties That Bind
Chapter 16: Bill Finds Something Odd
Chapter 17: An Evil Plan is Born
Chapter 18: Bill Finds More Information and an Ally
Chapter 22: Pulling it all Together
Chapter 23: Final Planning and Korea
Chapter 24: Darren Gets Enough
Chapter 27: Last Minute Planning and Go Dark
Chapter 29: Wrap Up and a Hint
This book was a long time coming, first conceived in the spring of 2003. A lot of the background on Bill was written in the fall/winter of 2004-2005 and then it sat. I thought of working on it during National Novel writing month in 2007 but wrote Dead Man’s Hand instead.
During May of 2008 I was able to work on it and by early June it was almost thirty thousand words. The rest was finished during nanowrimo this November and just wrapped up.
Hope you like it!
Alan
Chapter 1
Just
another Day at the Office
Bill was sitting at his desk, half watching the clock and half programming the new payroll system interface. His desk was in the middle of the office; luckily he wasn’t stuck in some cube farm. The sun was shining behind the trees and the sky was bright and clear, making him daydream about the outdoors. Adjusting the buttons on the payroll screen, his mind wandered. He went to the kitchen to make popcorn and stretch his brain.
Don Nelson was in the kitchen. “Hey Bill, how’s everything?”
“Using popcorn as bait for conversation. What’s new and exciting?”
“Kids stuff. It’s baseball season, so we’re always running to games or practices. Amelia got smacked in the face by a line drive the other day, she is really proud of her black eye. Joanie’s flower shop is busy since it’s wedding and prom season. She’s going to have to hire additional help next year.”
“Maybe I’ll design some software to run the business more efficiently,” said Bill. “I could develop a web site so Joanie would be free to focus on arranging flowers.”
“You know how she feels about computers. She was unhappy when we upgraded her cash register to accept credit and debit cards. She’s still not used to that thing.” Bill laughed and nodded his head. He’d heard plenty of stories about Joanie and her difficulties with the cash register, alarm system, phone system, et technical cetera.
Don made more small talk but appeared to be preoccupied, so Bill let the conversation drop. Don headed back to his office so Bill did the same--back to work on the payroll tool.
Bill put his headphones on and launched an internet radio site. He tuned in to the sports talk zone, which was filled with basketball playoff and baseball season discussions. The two hosts were pontificating about which NBA team was the greatest of all time; and, of course, they were at odds so they could generate the appropriate level of controversy and irate callers. The hosts were debating between the Lakers’ dynasties, with one host picking the Kareem/Magic era and the other selecting the Shaq/Kobe era. Callers were joining the show, yelling about the Celtics and Bulls and just about any other team. Bill thought the Bulls of the 1990s were the greatest team ever.
Adding a logo and confidentiality statement to the interface, Bill entered test data to see how the program was working. He plugged in an imaginary salary of $87,450 annually and then put in standard state, local and federal deductions. He checked the numbers, found the data was accurate, and stared at the screen. He wondered what it would feel like to make that kind of money, what he would be able to afford. His mind started wandering to all the things he could buy with that kind of money. He snapped back to the present and opened a spreadsheet that documented all of the test cases for the new program. Some time must have elapsed, because the yo-yo sports talk hosts were now arguing about which NBA player had the biggest afro and the tallest socks back in the 1970’s. He clicked the radio over to a classical music station and entered the test data.
Bill stretched and checked his e-mail. He generally kept his it closed during the day so he wasn’t distracted when he was programming. Bill told people around the office that he would only check mail a few times a day and if there was something urgent, they should come over and ask him. His e-mail was mostly updates to projects and spam so he spent a few minutes cleaning up his mailbox, enjoying the classical music in his head. He browsed to CNN and checked on the news, but quickly closed the browser as all of it focused on death and destruction. At least the web wasn’t as sensational as the local television news, with all of their news clips of fires, car crashes, and body bags.
Bill was checking his test case document, getting ready to enter the next set of data into the program when a visitor stopped by. “Hello, William.”
“Hi Mom, what’s happening?”
Kathy Wheeler took a seat and sighed deeply, “Been a really long day, starting to get calls from the media and I think it’s only going to get worse. Do you want to trade jobs with me for the next couple of months?” she said with a smile.
“Sure, let me talk to the press, I’d have a field day with them. I wouldn’t have a job when I was done, but I’d have a lot of fun in the process.”
“Oh yeah, you’re so tough, you’d end up winning some kind of award for the way you dealt with them.”
Bill just smiled back, knowing that the truth was somewhere in between. Kathy Wheeler wasn’t really old enough to be Bill’s mom. She was an attractive, 40-something woman who could still turn heads. Kathy ran the office, though her official job title was “administrative assistant.” She had the most inate people sense Bill had ever known, with an ability to deal with all types of personalities and still keep her cool. Bill almost felt corny for thinking about her that way, but she meant so much to him over the past eight years that they had worked together. She always treated him well and had really earned the nickname “Mom.”
“What are you working on, son?” Kathy asked.
“Fiddling around with the new payroll program, working through test cases and trying to figure out a way to increase my salary by, oh I don’t know, eight thousand percent,” Bill grinned.
Kathy laughed and said, “I think you’re worth every penny you’re getting paid.” They both laughed and shook their heads. “You know it’s going to work, why bother testing it?”
“With the new federal regulations around auditing of all computer systems and applications, it’s best to make sure everything is tested and documented. In fact, I would like both you and Don to do some testing once I’ve made progress so I can include you as references in the regulatory paperwork.”
“Kathy! Kathy, where are you?” Don’s voice boomed down the hallway. “I need you in here right away!” Bill and Kathy both broke out in quiet laughter, knowing that it was guaranteed to be something minor, and that Don couldn’t survive ten minutes without Kathy.
“Coming, dear,” replied Kathy, trying to hold in the laughter. As she walked away from his desk, Bill said “See ya later, Mom, good luck with Don.” She waved and walked to Don’s office. Bill worked on the next test case, trying some additional pay periods to make sure the software’s logic comprehended months with five Fridays, since Friday was payday around here.
“Yes, Mr. Nelson, what can I help you with?” Kathy asked.
Don starting ranting and raving about some e-mail that he had just received from his boss, demanding to know where the first budget numbers were for next year. “When are we going to get started on this?” he asked Kathy, a bit frantic.
“I’ve already sent them over to Amy. She probably hasn’t passed them to Mr. Peterson yet.” Kathy calmly informed Don. “I’ll go call her and see what’s happening. I’ll be back in a couple of minutes, try to continue breathing.”
Don pretended that he wasn’t nervous and went back to his e-mail. He sure was glad that those numbers had been sent. Even though it had been several years since Don almost lost his job, he wanted to make sure that he didn’t put himself in that position again. His wife’s flower shop was making money but they have a big mortgage, a couple of car payments and two kids with braces. In other words, they were living the American dream, and he didn’t want anything to happen to it.
Don got up from his desk and walked out to ask Bob what was happening with the office equipment upgrade. They had finally obtained budget approval to update the ten-year-old Xerox machine, fax machine and phone system. Bob worked with Bill to select a multifunctional device that would handle all of the scanning, printing, faxing and copying needs, eliminating the need to upgrade their printer at the same time. This had allowed them to spend a bit extra on a phone system that was integrated with the environmental controls for the building and included a complete voicemail system. Bob was charged with all maintenance for the office, including equipment, plumbing, electrical and any other needs. He told Don “The MFD will be here tomorrow and we should be up and running before lunchtime.”
“What is an MFD?”
“A multifunctional device; the beast that will replace our printer, copier and fax machine and also scan documents. It set us back about twelve thousand dollars, remember?”
“Great, let me know if you have any problems.” Don headed over to get an update from Kathy.
Bill completed his next test and updated the testing document. So far everything was going as planned so he had plenty of time to work any bugs out and get the new system in place. His mind starting wandering, thinking about the comment he’d made to Kathy about modifying his paycheck. He wondered just how difficult it would be to actually do it and ran through a couple of different scenarios in his head. He realized that in such a small office environment, any kind of anomaly would be easily detected by the human controls in place. He continued along with the mental exercise anyway, devising a plan whereby he would create a new vendor in the system. From there, he could enter a purchase order to the vendor for some services to be rendered, like computer software audit. Then, he could issue the funds and divert them into his bank account. He realized that this plan would not only be detected by audit but would also likely require collusion with another person to make it happen. Instead of trying to figure out how to complete it, his mind went to work on the solution to the problem to keep it from actually happening. The most appropriate controls would be to limit who had access to the various functions of the program, protecting it from abuse. Another feature that should be included was an audit function, where all activities would be logged and stored in a location for review. This would also mean that individuals would need to have their own accounts to the application so activities could be distinguished. Bill sighed, wondering why he always did this to himself. He took down some notes and decided that he would need to do some scrubbing on the application to add this additional functionality. He decided he’d better take the time to properly document everything so he didn’t forget. He looked at the clock and realized that it was getting close to quitting time.
Don found Kathy on the phone and started pacing back and forth in front of her desk. She ignored him and continued with her conversation. “Yes, Amy, I’m sure I sent it. Check your e-mails from me and you’ll find a message from last Tuesday that has all of the information attached. The message was sent around 2:15 pm. See it? No problem, glad we sorted this out. Say hello to Mr. Peterson for me.”
Don smiled and said, “Thanks again, Kathy.” He headed back to his desk and Kathy decided to spend the last half hour of the day ordering office supplies.
As she began searching for pens and pencils, Margie Brown walked into the office. “Margie! It is so great to see you! And look who you brought along with you!” Kathy exclaimed as Margie and her newborn son, Joshua, came into the office. Margie had been on maternity leave for three months, and this was the first time she’d been back.
“Figured I better come in before next Monday or it will be too much for my system to handle.” Margie had a difficult pregnancy and ended up spending the majority of her final trimester on bed rest. Between that and her maternity leave, it felt like she’d been gone forever.
“So let’s cut the chitchat,” said Kathy. “Let me go wash my hands so I can hold him!” Kathy ran to the restroom and immediately everyone surrounded Margie and Joshua, oohing and ahhing about the baby boy.
“He looks so strong and healthy, congratulations, Margie” said Bob.
Don cooed, “What a beautiful baby, Margie. I’m really glad you came by the office to let us meet him. I almost remember those days.” Everyone laughed. “You know that if you need some additional time off that is no problem at all.”
“Thanks so much, Don. I really appreciate all you’ve done already. I know if I spend any more time home there is no way I’ll be able to come back. I could spend all of my time caring for this little guy,” Margie said. By this time, Kathy was back, standing with her arms out ready to hold the baby. “Careful with his head,” reminded Margie.
“I will, even though it’s been a long time, I still remember.” As Kathy took the baby into her arms, he started crying.
“See what you’ve done, Kathy?” Jerry joked as he stepped over and began making funny faces. Jerry was the office clown, but ironically had the serious job of working on all campus policies and disciplinary actions. He used his sense of humor to lighten the mood and to offset the serious aspects of his job. Jerry was blowing up his cheeks and making a monkey face, which was quite comical on his five-foot-ten-inch, two hundred and eighty pound, bald frame.. Everyone was laughing and the baby was startled enough to forget why he had been crying. Kathy smiled and talked baby talk to Joshua.
“Would you mind holding the baby a few more minutes so I can talk to Don?”
“No problem,” said Kathy, “just don’t go too far ‘cause if he gets hungry, there’s nothing I can do about it!” Margie laughed and walked with Don to his office.
Bill approached Kathy as the crowd dwindled and folks got ready to head home for the day. He looked at the baby and wondered if he would ever have a son to hold. “It’s been a while since you’ve had a baby to hold.”
“It’s second nature for a mother.” Kathy knew that as soon as one of her kids had a child she will be all over that grandchild. She was really glad that both her son and daughter had chosen to stay in the greater Cleveland area. They might have aspirations to move to warmer climates, but were both so entrenched with friends and family that it seemed unlikely they would ever move away. She wondered if Tony or Kristine would have a child first, but since neither of them was currently involved in a serious relationship, it might be a while. She enjoyed holding Joshua, feeling the soft skin and looking at the little miracle.
“Would you like to hold him?”
Bill got a bit nervous and said, “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea. I’m not sure if Margie would want me to.”
“Nonsense. Go to the restroom and wash your hands so you don’t get any of your germs on him.” Bill walked to the restroom about the same time Margie came out of Don’s office.
“How’d that go?”
“Don was surprised but understanding. He really is a pretty good guy,” said Margie. “He had no idea that Joshua doesn’t really have a father, but after the initial shock of what I’ve been through ran through his brain, he asked what he could do to help.” Margie was on the verge of tears and Kathy asked her to sit down. Bill was coming; Margie got quiet and looked at her feet.
“Is it ok if Bill holds Joshua? I already made him wash his hands, so Joshua should be pretty safe”. Margie didn’t divert her attention from her feet but simply nodded her head as Kathy handed the baby to Bill.
“Why don’t you show Joshua around the office while Margie and I have a quick talk?”
Bill grabbed the baby, careful to cradle his head and making sure the blanket stayed wrapped tightly around him. He said “C’mon little guy. Let’s show you around and see what kind of people we can introduce you to.” He chuckled to himself and walked down the hall toward Don’s office.
“So what did you ask Don to do?”
“I just told him that I need him to be flexible with my work schedule because of my childcare situation. If it weren’t for my sister-in-law I have no idea what I would do with Joshua. I also told Don the real reason I needed to come back to work was because I needed the money in order to survive.” Margie was crying now, but trying to hide it.
“Let it out, Margie, things are going to be ok, you’ll see.” Margie was having trouble hearing what Kathy was saying, let alone believing it. She tried to pull herself together as Kathy slowly stroked her hair and talked calmly to her. “You know that I’ll do whatever I can to help you, dear. And my Kristine will pitch in when she can. Joshua has more people to love him than he can even imagine.”
“I wish he could have his father. I wish I never met his father. Oh hell, how can I say that when he gave me Joshua. Who knows if I would have ever had a child otherwise.” Margie wiped her eyes and continued. “I have tried to reach him a few times, but he thinks that all I’m after is his money. I told him that I don’t want anything from him except occasional support for our child, and I hope that he wants to take an active role in Joshua’s life. He said, ‘You know there’s no way I can do that, Margie.’ That’s all he said. He hasn’t said a word to me since.” Margie got quiet as Don and Bill walked back toward Kathy and Margie.
“Babies are fascinating,” said Don. “All three of my kids were so alert and each day seemed to bring new life and experiences to them. It is so amazing how much they seem to absorb. It’s another thing to remember how short this time is, even though when you’re living it, like Margie, each day can seem eternal.” Bill thought about this for a few seconds and didn’t respond. He didn’t know what to say, he was just basking in Joshua’s energy and he knew that words would only cause that bond to sever. He handed Joshua back to Kathy and said hi to Margie. Margie looked away, tears still in her eyes.
“Time to wrap it up, people. Let’s shut down everything and head home,” said Don. “Thanks again for stopping by, Margie. See you Monday, and remember what I said, anything at all.” Margie couldn’t reply, but nodded a thank you to Don. Don went to his office to collect his laptop and briefcase.
Bill headed to his desk to shut down his PC, put notebooks and pens away in the drawers and made sure that everything was straightened up. He walked back to Kathy’s desk and Margie was gone. “Where did Margie go?”
“She was too upset to talk anymore, thought it best to leave while she had some composure back,” Kathy said as she finished shutting down her computer and grabbed her purse. Don and Kathy said, “Goodnight, Bill, see you in the morning.”
“Have a good night.” They left, and Bill rang the buzzer. He took a last look around the office as two armed guards came through the door and took him back to his prison cell for the night, where he was serving a life sentence for killing his friends.
Kathy was the first one in the office. She liked to get in early, make coffee and settle in without the phone ringing and people asking for things or engaging in idle conversation. Today was Friday, and she was happy because it was the last week she would have to manage both the office and the accounting for the prison. In Margie’s absence Kathy had really stepped up and really had been doing the work of two people.
She saw her voicemail light, ignored it and walked to the kitchen, where she unpacked Bill’s daily lunch. Kathy always packed something special on Friday, because she knew he would be stuck eating prison food all weekend. Today’s special was steak and baked potato, Bill’s favorite, with mint chocolate chip ice cream for dessert. Friday was also doughnut day, so Kathy brewed coffee. She ran into Bob on the way to her desk, plucked a doughnut out of one of the boxes he was carrying, curtseyed and said, “Perfect timing.”
“Good morning to you too,” Bob chuckled.
There were voicemail messages from the Plain Dealer, Beacon Journal and one of the local TV stations. Kathy decided to start with the TV, since they tended to take the first answer and report on it. She called the reporter Jim Reynolds and said, “Hi Jim, this is Kathy Wheeler returning your call.”
“Thanks for calling me back. We have received several anonymous tips about what’s been going on over there and I want to give you a chance to set the record straight. Is it true that you have had seven cases of prisoner abuse in the past six months?”
“There have been some prisoner complaints, but nothing that has been substantiated by our review boards. You know that our prison has one of the best records for fair treatment of inmates, Jim.”
“We have heard from several friends and relatives who claim to have seen physical evidence of abuse.”
“There’s not much more I can tell you, Jim. There have been no substantiated abuse claims in the past six months.”
“Alright, Kathy. I’m going to keep talking to people and if I have any more questions, I’ll call you back. Have a nice Friday.”
“Same to you, Jim. Bye now.” Kathy had similar, but less pleasant, conversations with the newspaper reporters, who lacked additional stories and were trying to create one out of the alleged reports of violence. Kathy became the self-appointed public relations officer a few years ago when she realized that it didn’t make a lot of sense for her to play middleman between some prison official and the media. Time to grab some coffee and give Don an update, Kathy decided.
Bill was standing in his cell, waiting for the guards to come over and escort him to the office. His morning routine had been the same for the past eight years: breakfast with the population and then an escort to the office. Most of the other prisoners left Bill alone, but there were a few that liked to pick on him about his little “office aid” job, and some had much worse things to say. Bill was used to the abuse by now and knew it came with the territory. This morning the block was quiet, so he was just passing time by thinking about the weekend. As the guards led him down the hallway, he figured that he’d pass most of it reading and working out.
He buzzed into the office and headed straight for the kitchen. One of the best perks of having this job was getting doughnuts on Fridays. Bill grabbed a couple and a cup of coffee and headed to his desk. So begins another day in paradise, he thought as he powered up his computer.
Kathy was bringing Don up to speed on the discussion she had with Jim Reynolds. Don was listening, nodding his head, and asked a few questions before he told Kathy that he had a meeting. Friday was staff meeting day. Don called in to his staff meeting in the morning, and then the local staff meeting took place immediately after lunch. This was the worst possible time of day to have a meeting, and Don knew that everyone would be anxious to get it over with as quickly as possible. Kathy left the office and headed over to see if Bill was in yet.
“Morning, Billy, how was the commute?”
“Traffic was a bit heavy, but I managed to arrive on time.”
Kathy chuckled. “I brought in your favorite for lunch today, so don’t eat too many doughnuts. And when you’re awake enough, please stop by. I have a work question to ask you.”
“I can help you with it now if you’d like. What’s on your mind?”
“I was thinking that it would be nice if there was a way that I could store and identify reports about the prison and then be able to query them. It is difficult for me to respond to reporters when they have access to information that’s not at my fingertips. It’s not an official request and, if you want, I can run it by Don to make sure it’s okay for you to work on.”
“I’ll think about it a bit and let you know. Don’t bother asking Don about it until I get back to you,” Bill told her. Bill took out a notebook and started jotting down some thoughts and a sketch to solve Kathy’s problem. His mind was always running so if he didn’t write it down, he’d either forget about it or build the wrong tool. Bill got back to work on the payroll program, because he needed to give a demonstration today during staff. He had now documented several test case results and had also implemented username and password controls to limit access to the application and various functions within it.
Don swiveled his chair around so he could look outside. He was thoroughly bored by his staff meeting, paying enough attention so that he could hear his name if there was a question. The weekend was here and the weather was nice, so he knew that it would be the usual--unning the kids around all weekend and trying to squeeze in some yard work. Don wasn’t against working, but as he got older he found that he’d rather just hang out and relax on the weekend. That’s one of the challenges of having kids when you were older: you get to a point where you run out of steam. Don and Joanie had spent the first seven years of their marriage trying not to have children and the next six trying as hard as they could. Don was almost 40 when Scott was born and nearly 45 when Ricky was born. He had a lot of friends that were getting ready to retire, with their kids finishing college or already in the working world. Don figured that he would probably have to work about another 47 years to pay for everything that was coming.
“Don, can you please give us an update on the vendor consolidation project?”
“Uh sorry, please hold on a second, my computer is acting up.” Don scrambled to open the document. Typical that he would zone out just when he needed to be sharp. “If you take a look at the document titled Vendor Consolidation rev 6, you’ll see that we are recommending selecting a single supplier for each major consumption area. This will increase efficiency and enable us to save money because we can leverage the purchasing power of all seven prisons in our system.”
“What happens if there is a strike or if one of our major suppliers goes out of business?” Mr. Peterson interrupted Don.
“Our contingency plan will be to have secondary suppliers identified and terms negotiated. We also recommend increasing storage at each site in case something does happen.”
“Where am I supposed to keep extra items? My prison is already overcrowded! Do you include a budget for additional storage?” Joe Thomas sounded like he wanted to jump through the phone and choke Don. “I think we should force all of our vendors to keep three days inventory on hand and make them eat those costs.”
“I agree with both Joe and Don in this matter,” said Mr. Peterson. “Let’s take a vote to ratify the recommendation of moving to single suppliers with the agreement that all selected suppliers will keep three days inventory on hand. Any opposed?” There was silence. “Okay, so that measure has passed. I have one more topic for today and that revolves around the use of prisoners as labor. Our unions are getting upset with us for the number of prisoners we are using in the labor force. Due to cost constraints, we would like to increase the number of prisoners in the workforce. The union wants to limit the number at each prison. We are stalled in our contract negotiations.”
“Could we give them a nice raise with the concession that we can continue to use prisoner labor at an agreed-upon threshold?” someone chimed in.
“That has been suggested and they are considering our offer. I’m wondering if we could push for non-union positions to be filled by prisoners. Don, you have had someone working in your office for several years. Can you talk about your experience in this area?”
“We have been using prisoner labor for the past ten years. Generally prisoners are added to labor crews to help with general maintenance and landscaping activities. There are some exceptions, such as Bill Miller, who have worked in our office. Bill has actually been with us for over seven years and has been a prisoner here for almost fifteen. Most prisoners who end up working in office related jobs are at the end of their sentence and the job offers them valuable experience for the outside world. Although Bill is serving multiple life sentences and wonders if he’ll ever leave the prison, he is also one of my most valuable employees. I doubt if I could replace him on the open market.”
“Thanks, Don. I would encourage all of you to think about prisoners in non-union positions that can be filled using non-union labor. If we can make this deal with the union, and renew the contract, this will be one method where we could cut costs. Any questions?”
There was silence on the phone. Everyone was anxious to get to lunch and ramp down their weeks. The meeting adjourned without further activity. Don hung up the phone and took a look at the items that he needed to pass down to his staff after lunch. He jotted down a few things and then hit the door, because he had errands to run. He swung by Kathy’s desk and asked if she needed anything while he was out.
“A million dollars and a new Mercedes would be nice. If you can’t get either of those, there’s nothing I can think of.”
“If I find a running Mercedes with a duffel bag in the back seat, I’ll bring it back for you,” Don joked. He headed down to the office and asked Bill if there was anything he needed to help pass the weekend a bit faster. Don said that he was going by Borders and didn’t mind stopping in.
“I could use the newest Dr. Dobbs Journal. I’m all set for books right now, thanks.”
Don wrote down the magazine title on his notepad and stuck it in his breast pocket. Some folks in the office called him Colombo behind his back because he always found a way to wrinkle his clothes, often forgot to shave for a day or two and because of the notebook. It was a very fitting description, which caused a lot of laughs in the office. Don headed out the door and was greeted by a beautiful spring day. He wished he could just start his weekend now, but figured to make the most of the lunch hour.
As soon as Don took off for his weekly errand run, the office congregated in the kitchen. Don was known for his extended lunch breaks on Friday and the staff took advantage of it by either doing some running around of their own or getting together in the kitchen for a nice leisurely lunch and game of cards.
The queue at the microwave was long, so they used two tables during lunch: one for eating and the other for the weekly gin rummy game. They didn’t play for money, just for office bragging rights. Bill had snuck in a minute before everyone else, so he was heating up his lunch. Friday’s lunch was the last good meal he’d have for a few days, so he always relished it. Kathy had been bringing Bill food every day for many years, and when she was out of the office someone else always took care of him. The value of being able to eat real food most days of the week was something that Bill really couldn’t measure. This brought him closer to the outside world than the work did. In the early days of his work in the office, he would go back and have lunch with the general population in the prison cafeteria. Once in a while, someone would get fast food and bring something back for Bill. Over time, this grew into a fairly regular habit until Bill was spending about half the time eating real food. Then he and Kathy got closer until Bill adjusted his eating habits and only ate a minimal amount of prison food. He shared his prison food, using it to get favors from some of the tougher inmates. Bill hadn’t been picked on in many years, aside from the usual “office aide” or “office bitch” comments he sometimes heard. It was easy to ignore these comments-- a lot less difficult to ignore aggressive physical contact, which is what he was scared of the most in his early years at the prison.
Bill dug into his steak and ignored the chatter around him. He savored each bite and thought about how he was going to pass the weekend. It had been some time since he’d had a visitor, and he was hoping that someone would make the drive down from New York since the weather was so nice. He didn’t really blame his family for the infrequency of their visits; it was a long day to see him for thirty minutes. Kathy sat down next to Bill and asked, “How is everything?”
“Perfect as usual, Mom. I swear that one of these days I’m going to pay you back for everything you’ve done for me. Not sure how, where or when, but it will happen.”
“For what, a little bit of food? You know I can’t stand cooking for myself, so you actually keep me cooking. You’re also a very patient guinea pig when I try new recipes.”
“Just remember, if I ever get out of this place, you’ll have nothing to worry about. Now I’ve got to get down to some serious card playing, I have my reputation to protect.” Bill cleaned up his dishes and sat down at the card table. “You guys ready for your weekly beating?”
“Sure Bill, you are probably the world’s best gin rummy player,” laughed Rich James, aka “Superfreak.” “We should all just quit since you sat down.” They dealt Bill in and continued with their game and joking around. Friday lunches were almost always the best of the week, since everyone knew that another week was done. Bill was in the middle of his second hand when Don came into the kitchen. “Hey Bill, can I have a word with you?”
“You’re in trouble!”
“Probably be grounded all weekend!”
“Don’s going to take away your birthday!”
Bill said, “Blah, blah, blah,” and headed over to his office. Don handed him a fat Borders bag, and Bill said, “What’s all this stuff?” He looked inside the bag and saw the magazine, but also saw the latest Matt Scudder book and a journal.
“I know how you’re always scribbling things down here and there. This will give you a chance to organize your thoughts and know where everything is.”
“Thanks a lot, Don, I will see if I can get my Mom to send down some money so I can pay you for this.”
“Nonsense, you know how I love Borders. Shopping there for you gives me an excuse to buy a bunch of things. I also know that you’ll pass me that Scudder book, so I can read it when you’re done. Looks like a really good one, more action with Mick Ballou and the farm.”
Lawrence Block was Bill’s favorite author and the Matt Scudder series were some of his favorite books. He savored those books when he got them, but limited himself to a chapter a day, at the most. Bill scanned the back cover and got the gist of the plot. He took out his journal and headed over to the room for staff. People started filtering into the room.
Don believed in effective meeting management, a residue of one of the prison management classes that were required every year. His meetings were generally efficient and communicative. He didn’t keep much from his staff and didn’t mind ending the meeting quickly. Everyone was prompt, so they got right down to business.
“At staff today we spent a lot of time discussing the union contract negotiations and their impact on our bottom line. The union is pushing for us to stop using prison labor for all union positions, and we’re trying to negotiate a fixed number of jobs per prison. We have offered them a raise in order to compensate for some ratio of union to prison workers. The union will be voting on our offer soon, and hopefully there won’t be a strike. Things get pretty ugly when there is a strike in the prison. We also discussed a new vendor system where we will eliminate duplicate vendors for similar products or services, instead selecting one vendor per product. There was also a discussion about prison labor for non-union positions, and we spent some time talking about you, Bill.”
“No wonder my ears were burning. I’m not losing my job, am I?”
“Not as long as I’m in charge here. The bottom line is that we’re going to try and fill non-union positions with prison labor where it makes sense. Nobody get nervous or start spreading any rumors--there will be no cuts in the current labor force--but as positions become available, we will look to see if we can fill them from the ‘population.’ Is that clear?” There was a general nodding of heads and a few murmurs. Nobody liked to think they could be replaced by a common criminal. “We all know that Margie is coming back Monday. Please note that she will have a more flexible schedule due to Joshua. If anyone has a problem, please come see me directly. The only other thing on the agenda today is the demonstration of the new payroll tool that Bill is developing. He’s going to show us all how to use it to enter our hours, view year to date information, etc. Show us what you’ve come up with so far, Bill.”
Bill turned on the overhead projector and connected a laptop to it. “While this old thing warms up, I want to give you some background information. It has been difficult for Kathy to do two jobs in Margie’s absence, and one of the headaches for her has been time cards. They take a lot of effort and people always need to come back to her with questions. The new system needed to be easy to use, for people like Don, and also needed to be comprehensive, so if you’re buying a house or have other questions you can view year to date or historical information easily.”
“What about privacy?” asked Jerry Thomas. “I don’t want everyone knowing how much money I make.”
“We all know that you make way too much money,” joked Kathy.
“I have built in accounts for everyone, and only Kathy and Margie will have access to view or modify other people’s information. The system logs all transactions and Don will get a report of weekly activity.” The projector was ready, so Bill showed the desktop of the computer on the screen. “I’ll install the application on all of your systems once the final version has been approved. All you have to do is double click the icon and the program will start. Let’s run through an example, using me as the guinea pig.” Bill entered a bunch of information and then clicked save. “The database is now updated, and next Friday I should get a check for $2,300 after taxes.” Everyone laughed.
“Thanks Bill, the program is really coming along. Let’s go around the room and see if there are any” There was an update about the new office equipment and some miscellaneous talk about upcoming vacations, doctor’s appointments and other usual small talk. Bill was busy jotting in his new journal. The meeting adjourned and everyone headed back to their desks. Only a few more hours and the week would be over!
Bill worked from some sketches he had made in the journal and began to transfer them to Microsoft Visio. He had developed a flowchart and logical diagram for Kathy’s request earlier that day and was just wrapping it up when she stopped by.
“Don’t forget your afternoon snack, son. Brought in some strawberry rhubarb pie today—with ice cream, of course.” Kathy smiled and turned toward the kitchen.
“Not so fast, Kath. Come take a look at this.”
Kathy headed over to Bill’s desk and said, “Very pretty, but I have no idea what it is.”
“That’s your new information storage and retrieval system. All I need to do now is code it and make it pretty for you.”
“The one I just asked you about this morning? I told you it wasn’t a big deal. It would be really useful, but don’t go out of your way for me.”
“Oh yeah, this from the woman who feeds me 90% of my annual calories. It’s the least I can do, and I’m happy to do it.”
“You’re one smart cookie, Bill. Seems you can do anything. A jack of all trades. In fact, that’s going to be your new nickname. Jack. Now come over to the kitchen for some pie, Jack.”
Bill’s mind went one thousand miles away in a flash. He mindlessly nodded as she walked away, but he couldn’t move. It had been a really long time since anyone had called him Jack. He just sat there, silently mouthing the word. Jack.
The lab bench was crowded but organized, with a definite method to the madness. A number of beakers were lined up on the matte black soapstone, some with clear liquid and others with dyes.
Steve was wearing a crisp blue lab coat and his own safety glasses, not the cheap ones that the company provided. He was muttering and scribbling into a lab notebook, trying to understand what had gone wrong with the experiment. Another couple of weeks out the window, and he would have to synthesize more polymer and start again.
The other chemists who shared the lab knew to stay away when Steve was in this mood, he would bite the head off anyone who interrupted him. There were three others who shared the lab but didn’t feel part of the same team as the loner. All would have preferred him to get his own lab, but the manager of the team kept trying to make Steve more of a team player.
Steve looked closely at the beakers, focusing on the dispersion of the dye in those that were colored. He was trying to find visual clues as to why the material had failed to behave as expected. All three beakers showed some clear dispersion from one area, a weakness along the surface of each of these spheres. Steve wondered if it was from the sealing point of the spheres where the dye had been injected. He was completely lost in thought, mumbling to himself as he took notes.
Rob Bailey stormed into the lab, completely oblivious to Steve’s train of thought and mood, and blurted, “Another bad round, Steve?”
Steve clamped his teeth together as hard as he could and slowly turned his head, fire in his eyes. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before responding to his boss. “Some trouble with the batch, yes. I came in this morning and found that the solution had turned color in three of the eight samples, which means the degradation period missed the predicted result by a few days. I was making some observations, but haven’t come to the root cause of the failure yet. Can I get back to work?”
The other chemists had to turn their head to hide the snickers. It didn’t matter how many times it happened, it was still funny to watch Rob trying to get Steve to change his behavior. Steve was in his fifties, so change wasn’t likely. In fact, the opposite was true. Every time Rob had to confront or correct Steve, the chemist ended up deeper in his shell. There were times when he became stone-faced, and wouldn’t even acknowledge what Rob was saying.
“There is something else I wanted to talk to you about. I was supposed to go over to the middle school tomorrow and give them a talk about science and a little demonstration. I have an urgent staff meeting tomorrow and want you to cover the school visit for me.”
“Tomorrow? Do you have your talk or demo prepared?”
“I don’t have a script or anything, I was just going to describe the kind of work we do, how chemistry improves daily lives, and talk to them about the need for more science and technology professionals. For the demo I was going to just do a basic reaction of baking soda and vinegar--the old homemade volcano trick.”
“Why me? Can’t someone else cover it? These guys are all better with people, and I’m not very fond of kids, especially teenagers.”
“That’s precisely why I picked you, Steve. This is a good opportunity to work on some of the skills we talked about in your last review.”
“Opportunity? That’s one way to put it. Ok, if I’m stuck with it, I’ll put something together today. What time is the appointment?”
“Nine o’clock.”
“Ok, I need to get this wrapped up so I can start working on the demo for tomorrow, I’m going to think of something a little better than the science fair volcano! Maybe one of the little tyrants will actually appreciate it.”
Rob shook his head and left Steve to his angst about talking in public, let alone on short notice, and to teenagers. He had been managing Steve for a few years now and thought that Steve had come a long from where he was at the beginning, but still had a long way to go. Rob didn’t have much history on Steve other than the fact that he was a Vietnam veteran, and had a very negative war experience that made him a serious introvert. Even though the war ended thirty years ago, it was still in the mind of his most brilliant chemist, and Rob was convinced that he could change him with persistent steps.
It took Steve a few minutes to get refocused, especially because he had a new, urgent assignment in front of him. Steve extracted a failed polymer sphere from a beaker and looked closely at the surface. It didn’t appear that the leak was from the insertion point, but instead seemed that the leak was due to a thinner surface on one part of the exterior of the sphere. The dispersion should have created an equal surface, but obviously hadn’t. At least he was able to figure out the “what,” so now he needed to think about “why.” The next batch was going to be based on PGA (polyglycolide) instead of PLA (polylactide), because there might be a problem with the way the PGA was polymerizing. Since the target use of these materials was inside a human body, there were some strict limitations to the types of materials that could be used.
Steve had previously worked on various projects and programs, mostly in support of polymerization of plastics for use in the automotive and aerospace industries. Over the past few months, he had thought about developing bio-reabsorbable materials that could safely be used in the body and would deteriorate at a known rate. He was working on creating a product that could be injected into the body and release vaccines or other medicine on a predefined schedule. This would alleviate several problems that had come up in the medical industry including people forgetting to come in for updates on medicine and incorrect dosages due to handling lots of meds. These issues took a lot of time and money for doctors, patients and pharmacies.
The marketing team met with a couple of pharmaceutical companies and initial interest was very high. Steve had filed several patent applications, working with the legal department to insure that the entire domain would be covered before disclosing, since he didn’t want the pharmaceutical companies to pick this up on their own. Over the past few months Steve had worked with lots of different materials, working to first develop an effective set of polymers that would be bio-absorbable or bio-reabsorbable. He focused on inert materials that were easily sterilized, provided no inflammation or incompatibility characteristics and could be metabolized in the body without a trace. He felt that the right material was close at hand. It was painful, because in order to have meaningful data, the experiments he ran lasted over a month. The dye was expected to show up on the twenty-eighth day at the earliest and the thirty-second at the latest. So far, he’d not yet made it to twenty-eight days, since something went wrong with the sphere part of his sample. Many of the tests were working within the control time frame, so he continued to tweak settings and hope that the next batch would provide the first set to release in the acceptable window. Once repeated, the test could be demonstrated to one or more of the pharmaceuticals.
He cleaned up the experiment and all of the equipment, leaving his part of the lab in typical immaculate condition. Steve’s complete disdain for messes led him to believe that his co-workers shouldn’t call themselves professionals when their work spaces and equipment were in such an abysmal shape. The same was true for the shared office area the chemists had; it wasn’t hard to know which desk belonged to Steve. While others brought in photos, artwork, calendars and other things , his area was sparse and uninviting. It was probably the only desk in the company that was regularly dusted and double locked, using not only the standard locks, but also a bar with a heavy duty tamper-resistant lock.
Steve hung up his lab coat and sat down at his desk to prepare the talk and think about a demo. He would never admit it, but he was a bit excited to be able to come up with something that would wow the kids. The talk was going to be pretty basic; he would bring in a few parts that were in use and describe how chemistry had help to make the parts better and cheaper. He thought about how he was going to try to get them interested in science but didn’t think that there would be anyone worth a damn in the class, so that part was probably going to be a waste of breath. He turned on his computer and opened the word processing programto type up some speaker notes. Speaking in front of any audience was something that made him dizzy and physically ill before, during and after.
“Steve, don’t mean to bother you but was wondering if you were going to join us for lunch today?”
“Hi Denise, I’m busy working on an ‘opportunity’ for Rob, will have to eat at my desk today.” Steve immediately turned back to his work as though Denise had already left the area and gone to the cafeteria. The company offered subsidized lunches and quality food, but Steve preferred to bring his lunch most days, rather than deal with people. Once in a while, he surprised his co-workers and went to the café with them. He even went out with them a few times a year on Fridays, which was the designated ‘off-site’ lunch day.
It didn’t take long to complete the speaker’s notes, which Steve sent to the printer so he could read while he ate. He never did anything on the computer while he ate, since he despised crumbs in his keyboard. The notes were fine, so Steve started working on the demo, really wanting something good. He thought about what middle school age kids might find cool, but realized he didn’t think about kids often. The other chemists had come back from lunch, so he asked, “What kind of chemistry-related things do middle school kids like?”
“My kids like anything that blows up or makes fire,” Denise said.
“Probably not the best thing for a school demonstration.”
“What about glow sticks? All of the kids I know are crazy for them,” Tom Salmon offered.
“That’s a good idea, I should be able to do something this afternoon for that, thanks,” Steve replied, already looking up the formula for the reaction. He remembered that it was a combination of hydrogen peroxide and some kind of ester, which turned out to be phenyl oxalate ester and a fluorescent dye. He had no shortage of dyes around from the current polymer sphere experiments, so he was able to mix up several quick tests. He thought purple would give the best effect. Simply mixing the chemicals in front of the kids wouldn’t be good enough; he needed to add some drama and intrigue to make an impression. If he combined the glow stick chemicals and a quick setting epoxy,that should be good enough. The biggest trick was going to be separating the chemicals, so he could perform it like a magic trick. He thought that a glass ampoule inside of a beaker would provide the separation and let him provide some additional mystery. Steve had some ampoules in the lab that would probably do the trick so he tried one as a test. He filled the ampoule with the ester, dye and hardener, which were the smaller ingredients by volume. He then cemented the ampoule to the bottom of the beaker with some super glue and made sure there were no leaks. He poured the peroxide and resin into the beaker and then used a glass stirring rod to break the thin glass of the ampoule and start mixing everything together. The reaction created a swirled dye within the hardening epoxy, and before long he was unable to stir the solution.
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