Walter looked past the High Officer into the room beyond. They were separated from the room by a large glass window. On the other side of the glass - in the room - were three blond-haired children sitting before an old man in a rocking chair. The old man was telling a story.
“What happens,” Walter said, “to them once the operation is completed?”
“I cannot say for sure, but most likely they will be terminated.”
“Oh,” Walter said.
“Do not let it worry you. We have been in operation for a very long time now. Most, if not all, of them will have terminated by other, natural, means long before we are finished.”
“Oh, of course. They die.” Walter said.
“Yes. Now if there are no further questions, I have many other observers to initiate,” the High Officer said.
“Of course. No. I have no further questions.”
“Good.” The High Officer turned and left the observation room.
###
Walter sat in the observation chair and looked through the glass into the room. The room seemed so small to him. Tight. For a moment he imagined himself in there, surrounded by those four dimensions. Trapped. He could hardly bear the thought of it.
He knew, intellectually, it wasn’t the same for them. The people in the room. For them it was a wide open space full of fields, forests, oceans, mountains, cities, homes... Sitting there looking through the glass he could almost see it from their perspective. This, as the High Officer had made clear, was why he’d been chosen for the assignment. He was sensitive. He was more like them than most.
Beyond the glass the children were dancing in a circle begging the old man, their grandfather, for another story. The old man slowly rocked in his chair and said he was tired. “Go on and play, I told ya,” he said. “I’ll watch you from up here on the porch.” But they didn’t seem to hear him. They begged and danced. “Go on now,” he said again.
“GO PLAY!” screamed a voice from inside the house. Walter could see a large, middle-aged woman lying on a well-worn sofa. She was eating a bowl of beans and watching a television program in which contestants bet on whether or not they had fathered any of the various children on the stage. “LEAVE POPOP ALONE AND GO PLAY!” she yelled. The springs beneath her creaked loudly with each syllable.
The children stopped dancing and looked toward the door. “See, you done got your momma yelling at ya. Y’all go on and play now”, their grandfather said. “If you’re good, I’ll tell you a story later.”
“Okay” the children said and ran around the side of the house.
Walter kept his attention on the old man. He rocked in his chair, slowly, humming a tune. Finally he closed his eyes and after a while the chair came to a halt.
Walter turned his focus to the woman. She had finished the beans and now the bowl sat resting on her breasts. At first Walter thought she was asleep as well, but when the television switched to a commercial she sat up. On the screen was a young, attractive, well-dressed woman. The woman announced that she, too, had once been sad, directionless and unemployed, but after discovering that she could train to be a nurse’s assistant in only fourteen months she turned her life around. After completing the short program, she began a fulfilling career helping others and making good money too. The woman said if she could do it, then so could anyone. She said not to delay but call today. Walter saw the large woman lift the bowl and place it on the floor beside the sofa. He watched her crane her head to look out the front door. And when she saw the old man was asleep, she reached behind her for the phone on the end table and begin dialing.
“Hello, Trade School International, how may I help you?” a female voice on the other end of the line said. Walter could see this woman - an operator - had dark skin and was sitting in a room crowded with cubicles. Other dark-skinned people - mostly women - were taking calls all around her. They were in conversation about many different topics and with many different inflections and accents. Walter realized that for the people in the room there was a great distance between the large, light skinned woman on the sofa and the dark skinned people on the phones.
‘Yeah, I...uhm...I saw your t.v. commercial about the nursing school,” the large woman said.
“Oh, yes. It is a fine program,” the operator said. “Let me get your information and we will send out everything you need to apply.”
“Oh, okay, you mean you’ll send it to my house? In the mail?”
“Yes. Directly to your door.”
“Is there any way we can do something on the phone, though? Do you have to mail it?”
“There is quite a lot of information, ma’am. You will want to look at it. Perhaps discuss it with your family.”
“The lady on the commercial made it seem like all I had to do was call.”
“That is the first step, ma’am and you have done that.”
Walter saw the confused look on the operator’s face as the line disconnected. She looked across the aisle to her manager who’d been listening on the call. He removed his headset and began typing. Walter saw her squinting, but she could not read his computer’s screen. He knew she was worried. This was her first week on the job. Working nights was hard for her, but he could see how determined she was. He saw the slum where she lived. An aged father laying on a mat on a dusty floor. Her son erasing yesterday’s assignments to make room to write today’s. He wanted to tell her she need not worry. Her manager was simply typing an email to his mistress.
“She just hung up,” she said, “there was nothing I could do.”
“It happens,” her manager said looking up, “you have another call.”
Walter turned his attention back to the old man. He was awake now and standing at the screen door looking into the house. “Nursin’, school?” the old man said. “Did I hear that right? That’s the damned funniest thing I’ve heard in a while. Look at you fat as a cow thinking you’re gonna be a nurse! Hell, you can’t even hardly take care of these kids.”
The large woman sat the phone down into its cradle and look down. “Daddy, I was just thinking -”
“There you go, thinking again. How many times have I told you, girl, you ain’t got no more brains than a sack’a’shit. Nursin’ school! And who would look after these kids if you were at Nursin’ School? Huh? Sure ain’t gonna be their daddies...whoever they are. And it sure ain’t gonna be me.”
“Alright, Daddy, I’m sorry. I was just -- “
“You ought to stop thinking about school. It’s your kids that’s gotta go to school. At least they ain’t completely stupid, ‘specially that boy. Maybe they can make something, but you need to stop dreaming that you will. Ya hear, me?”
“Yes, Daddy. I know.”
“I’m going back to my chair. Run in the kitchen and bring me back my bottle.”
“Daddy, you said you’d tell the kids a story tonight. I don’t want you to be--”
“I know I did, and I will. I won’t be nothin’ too much to tell them kids a story. Now do as I say. Get on, girl.”
The old man walked back toward his chair and Walter rose from his and began pacing. Through the window he could hear the large woman grunting as she pushed herself off the sofa and trudged into the kitchen. She swore under her breath as she flung open the cabinet above the stove and reached for the bottle of brown liquor. The kitchen floor groaned as she turned back toward the front door. Before she could start toward it, though, she glanced out the window and saw her children playing around the clothes line. The were darting in and out between the bed sheets and clothes hanging from it. She leaped to the window and pushed it open. “YOU KIDS KEEP AWAY FROM THERE! YOU HEAR ME! I’LL WEAR YOU OUT IF YOU DIRTY UP MY CLEAN SHEETS AND THINGS! GET AWAY NOW!”
Walter turned to the window and looked upon her face. It was red and splotchy with lines under her eyes and along her forehead. A scar ran along the left side of her double chin. He saw her eyes water and watched her rub her face on the yellow curtain framing the window. Then she turned and carried the bottle to her father on the front porch.
Walter looked away from the window and began pacing once more. He was new at this and he knew he had to make a good impression, but this was harder than he’d thought. What was he supposed to be doing here? What was the point of all this? He didn’t know. He didn’t think the High Officer knew either. He looked at the control panel to the right of the window. There were very few controls on it. His job was to watch and not to interfere. Still, those above him and given him some power. Power he could use if he saw fit. He’d have to answer for it, of course - even at that moment the System knew what he was thinking - but by then what was done would be done.
He looked at the window as the old man grabbed the bottle from his daughter’s hand. He saw her, head lowered, walk over to a swing at the end of the porch and slowly settle into it. He saw the kids running around to the back of the house. The oldest girl was chasing the younger children, swinging a rotten board over her head. He watched them all and his hand moved over the control panel. It would be easy. He didn’t know if it was right, but it would be easy.
He paused, thinking for a moment. What did the System know anyway? But, then again, what did he? Was he a judge? His job was to watch. To feel. But that’s where it ended. Didn’t it? He didn’t know. It was only his first day. Maybe it would get easier after a while. He looked back at the window, exhaled, then shoved his hand into his pocket and returned to the observation chair, seated himself and resumed his work. He watched and hoped it would get easier.
###
The operator was now on the line with a man.
“Yes, sir, men are certainly allowed.” Walter saw her sorting through documents on her computer until she found what she was searching for. She began to read, “We have found that many patients, particularly elderly men, prefer to be tended to by male medical professionals.”
Walter did not follow the man’s side of the conversation.
“Yes, sir...Yes...We’ll get that right to you...Yes...Just let me get your address.” She began entering the man’s information into her computer. “Oh, yes, sir, you should receive it right away...Yes, it’s Karreen. Yes, sir....Smith....Thank you, very much, sir and good luck with your new career.”
When the call was complete Walter noticed the operator’s manager signal her not to take the next one. “That was not bad, but the name is pronounced, Karen”
“Oh,” she said. “What did I say?”
“Karreen.”
“Oh. I am so sorry. Karen. Karen. I’ve got it now.”
“Good.”
Walter turned his attention back to the porch. The youngest child was nestled on the swing with her mother. The boy leaned against the porch rail near his grandfather and bounced a small rubber ball against the house. The oldest was inside watching television.
“Boy,” the old man said with a slight slur. “you had you any of the good stuff yet?”
“What’s that granddaddy?” the boy said catching the ball.
“Boy if you don’t know, you ain’t had none. Ain’t there no girls at that school? Got to get some while its young, boy. That’s the good stuff.” The old man tipped his bottle and emptied it into his mouth.
“Daddy! That boy’s only eleven years old. Don’t be talking to him like that,” the large woman said.
“Shit, girl, don’t you tell me what to tell him. It’s my house ain’t it and you are a GUEST in it, don’t be tellin’ me how to talk.”
“He’s my boy, daddy, he’s too young for all that girl talk.”
“GIRL IF YOU DON’T HUSH YOUR DAMN MOUTH!” The old man yanked up his bottle and flung it across the porch toward the swing where it smashed against the wooden armrest.
“DADDY...!” the large woman yelled before being cut off by the screams of the little girl. Walter noticed the blood welling up from the gash in her leg. “OH, HONEY,” the woman shrieked, lifting her and cradling her as best she could. She used her own shirt to cover and apply pressure to the wound. “Daddy, you coulda killed her!” Tears rose up in her eyes as she looked down at her frightened child. “it’s ok, honey. it’s ok. Momma’s gonna take care of you. Don’t cry now. it’s ok.”
“Should’a kept your damn mouth shut,” the old man said grinning. “Bet she will next time, ain’t that right?” he said to the boy.
“Yeah, I guess so,” the boy said, but Walter could see the look of concern in his eyes as he watched his mother struggling to carry sobbing his sister into the house. “Sure was a lotta blood though.”
“Oh, hell, she’ll be fine. Don’t worry about her, now. Why don’t you go get me my cigar box from the shed. Might even give you one if you hurry up.”
Walter rose from the observation chair again. Is this how it was for them? So separate from one another? In space. In time. In mind. Such distance. How did they survive it? Again, he walked to the control panel. Maybe it wouldn’t get any easier. Maybe this was it. His hand reached forward. What would they do to him? What punishment would the System order? Did it matter? What punishment could be worse than this? Sitting here. In this chair. Watching. Moment after moment after moment.
“Nothing could be worse,” he said aloud as he reached down and pushed the button.
###
The phone rang.
“Hello. Trade School International. How may I help you?”
“Hello? Who’s that?”
“Hello? Yes, ma’am? Trade School International.”
“You called me back?”
“Oh, no, ma’am. I received a call on my end. Did we speak before?”
“Rang on mine too. Yeah, I called a little while ago.”
“Oh, yes, of course, we were disconnected, I believe.”
“Uhm, yeah, must’ve been.”
“Well, ma’am, could I send you the information about our program, nursing wasn’t it? It is really a very fine program.”
“Hmm... You know, maybe you ought to.”
“Good. If I could just--”
“You know? Yeah. Yeah! I don’t care if it is his house. I don’t care what that old bastard says. I just don’t care anymore. I just gotta do something with my life, you know? Not just for me. I gotta do it for my kids.”
“Oh. Yes, ma’am. This is a fine opportunity. Very fine. If I could just--”
“Yeah. Fine opportunity. Yeah, that lady on the t.v. said so too. And it doesn’t take too long?”
“No, ma’am. Fourteen months for what is normally a two year degree.”
“That’s pretty good, I guess. Yeah, you know what? I’m gonna do it. You go ahead and send that stuff to me.”
“Yes, ma’am. Very good. If I could just get your name and address?”
###
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