Here tis:
It was from the way she wiggled her chalk at the monitor screen, the careless way it slipped around and got that disgusting margarine yellow powder all over her fingers. She always had such a firm grip on the chalk. She had such control when she wrote on the board. Her loops were always perfect. Her crossed Ts are immaculate. I always had a sort of crush on her handwriting. I am just saying that if some sort of scholarly sadist forced me to marry someone’s penmanship it would be hers. On any normal day in the lab, she would obsessively wipe the chalk dust off of her thumb and two fingers with a Kleenex. The way she would fold up the tissue diagonally before wiping the chalk off thin feminine fingers, I thought that was cute. Her fingernails are my favorite length on a woman. A little bit longer than the finger and then end in a soft point. They are understatedly elegant on a woman, infuriating when seen on male hands. Men with overly groomed nails should not be trusted with secrets, money, or children.
I was still hazy from the drugs but she was also talking much too fast. She didn’t normally talk like this. She always had a very metered pace of communication where I could tell she deliberately picked each word specifically for the situation. She never said anything she didn’t mean to say. I wasn’t even listening to her anymore, I couldn’t stand to hear her rattle on. This wasn’t my Cynthia. Dr Cynthia van Slyke was somewhere else. She was somewhere drawing conclusions, or composing a theorem, or lecturing students most of whom could never understand her utter brilliance. This woman before me with shoulder length dark brown hair falling out of place, not wearing her lab coat, this was not the woman I was in love with. That chalk. She was losing it. We had lost it.
Dr Van Slyke clacked away at a keyboard, bent, hunched over, the green numerals on the computer screen casting a glow on her sexy red-framed large-lens glasses. Her eyes darting across the screen from one end back to the other. I lumbered over to the water cooler. I didn’t like seeing Dr Van Slyke like this. It made me uncomfortable and worry. My head was swimmy and my vision was bleary and even though I was doped up like a grunge singer I still felt like I had been crushed by a tractor. My insides felt shredded. They must have really kicked the shit out of me. I have no memory of the incident though. Cynthia found me on break room floor slumped over with my back against the wall. I grabbed at a paper cup and pulled out ten conical paper cups on accident. I tried to cram them back up in the dispenser tube but my arms are too heavy and my fingers aren’t doing quite what I tell them to do, so the clump of cups just crumpled against the rim. I held the clod up to my mouth and bit the bottom most cup out and dropped the other nine cups into the little plastic trash can. I flop my hand and cup benaeth the nozzle of the water cooler and puch on the little handle with the other. The little dixie paper product fills quickly and an air bubble dances upward through the jug like a soul to heaven. “Bottoms up” I say before splashing the water in my mouth dry from being drugged and sleeping in an odd position. The water is invigorating as it slides over and breaks free every parched tooth and dry patch of my mouth, glued together by the condensed breath that is my saliva.
Dr Van Slyke is now standing next to the big auxilary printer, a noisy waist-high relic from the erosion studies program abandoned in the early 70s. We've only kept it around as a back up and because although it's painfully slow and maddeningly loud it's so old that it will never break. She's holding a wide piece of tractor feed printer paper close to her face. She quickly moves through the connected accordian sheets of read-outs. I shoot down another paper cup of water.
“Steve is gone, isn't he?” I asked.
“Do you even need to ask?” she said, with her head held up, facing the opposite corner of the room than I was in.
“Well, what the heck happened? Nothing looks out of place” I said.
She turned around to face me.
“What happened? You should be telling me what happened. You were just supposed to come in and catalogue the last of the plasma samples, and check that there was no problem with the incubator. What happened Dale? You tell me what happened” she said.
I had to think about it.
“I...after we talked yesterday I went for a jog, went home and took a shower, stopped by the Chinese place on Stockton right below campus, and came here to the lab, but I can't remember anything after I got here” I said “but I feel like the incredible hulk kicked me in the stomach about twenty times.”
“Well Dale if they did beat you up there aren't any signs of a struggle in here. This place looks pristine” She said.
I walked over to the incubator.
“I was thinking the same thing. Well, the incubator is empty. Damn,” I said “Did you call the campus police?”
“And flush three and a half years of research down the tubes? Dream on” she said.
“Weren't you concerned about my safety?” I blurted out, “that I was okay? That I was going to live?”
“Frankly doctor, no” she replied.
She had gone back to rifling through the readouts. She seemed sexy to me once more.
“Yes, I guess the police would have to make a report, and we can't have knowledge of our research here get out into the public” I said.
“No, certainly not” said she.
“What does the nightly log look like? There's no way into the incubator without logging into the data matrices” I said.
“Everything has been erased” she said.
“The erased the whole log matrix?” I said.
“They erased everything. The log matrix, the data modules, they even stole the boot disc. They took the main printer off line. It's as if steve and the project never even existed” she said.
“Except the auxilary log read-out” I said.
“Yes, the auxilary read-out is all here. According to this sheet you input your clearance code and came through the door at 7:41, accessed the plasma module at 7:54, then someone else with a high level clearance that I don't recognize came through the door at 9:13, at some point after that the auxilary printer went haywire printing all of these wing dings. I assume that's when everything was erased from the computer” she said.
“I’m going to make coffee. Do you want coffee?” I said.
“Yes, fine, I’m going to make a phone call” she said.
I shuffled down the aisle between the stainless steel worktables covered in equipment and took a left past the big freezer and pushed the bar on the door into the break room. This is where I have my favorite room in the whole world. Cynthia and I have had some of our greatest conversations in here. This is where our bond has really become strongest. This one time she was in such a rush to finish her supper and get back to work that her glass fogged up with steam from her cup-o-noodles, it was so cute. So many breaks have we spent together in here talking about Steve and the future and what the world could be if only people gave geniuses like Dr Van Slyke a chance to make some positive change in the world. Let the real thinkers have the keys and take the world for a spin. Upstarts like Ronald Reagan have been talking a lot lately about new mornings for America and other social hogwash like that. They don’t want to make any real change. The people want things to be the “way things used to be” except if they did any real thinking they’d realize they weren’t every really like that. Why am I staring at the Microwave clock?
I grab the door of the cupboard on its side with the tips of my fingers and peel it back. The handle disappeared six months ago. Four point one million dollar state of the art medical laboratory, you’d think they could afford to replace a thirty five cent knob. Okay, so what do we got here: box of Mueslix, extra napkins, bag of catsup packets, coffee filters, take one of those, box of Sweet-n-low, take a couple of those thank you very much, non-dairy creamer, a bunch of mismatched hot cocoa packets rubberbanded together, almost definitely expired, okay here we go got a big ol’ can of…Maxwell House. Damn it. It doesn’t really matter, I know that all coffee pretty much tastes the same as long as it’s not burnt or cold but jesus, Maxwell House has to be about the wimpiest coffee out there. I pour the old coffee out of the coffee pot into the sink and fill it with tap water and pour that water into the top of the Mr. Coffee. Yuban has the scary panther with those yellow eyes that peer out of the blackness. And the panther screech? I don’t think any animal has a more frightening call than that. Yuban, that’s my favorite. I open the upper chamber on the Mr. Coffee and remove the plastic basket, dump yesterday’s clump of wet filter and wet grounds into the trash can below the sink, drop the fresh white paper cupcake liner of a filter in the basket, eyeball a couple of spoonfuls of coffee into the filter, shover the basket back into the Mr. Coffee. Then there’s chock-full-‘o-nuts, what a great name. And what a way to pack in that odd punctuation. Then there is that coffee with the mustachioed peasant with the donkey, which ever one that is, that’s pretty cool. You don’t see too many spokes-donkeys or spokes-sharecroppers anymore. With my weak unresponsive thumb flip it to “BREW” and I know it’s working because the switch lights up all glowing orange. But Maxwell House? It sounds like a fraternity for rich jagovs. It sounds like a Canadian dental school. It sounds like a building where children with downs syndrome wear unitards and sing upbeat songs. Which is fine but I don’t want to think of that as I wake up in the morning. Ah, a new day is upon us, what will the retarded children finger-paint today. Probably their own clothes.
“AHHH! Dale!” Dr Van Slyke screams from the other room. I hobble out towards her. She is standing by the door, next to the dangling receiver of the touch-tone phone.
“I made two calls before I realized…” She started to weep. There was old dark blood smeared on her left cheek and right hand. I couldn’t stand her like this. Crying like a child, weak.
“Compose yourself for Christ’s sakes, you’re a doctor and a woman of science” I barked at her in a way I was unaware I was capable of.
“Hold on” I said. I picked up a wet-nap from the box near the entrance and one of the tall metal stools from in front of the microscope, brought it over and set her down in it. “Have a seat, clean off your face and hand with this. And don’t wipe any more blood off of the phone.” I hurried over to get a clean vial and swab. “I’m going to take a sample of the blood.”
“Yes, that is a smart idea” she said distantly.
There was smeared blood on the receiver. In the corner some had blood had pooled and the top had crusted over like the skin that grows on a refrigerator pudding. I poked the swab into it and spun it around like a fork into spaghetti. It was wholly satisfying, like knocking a Frisbee out of a tree with a pinecone, or absent-mindedly checking a pay phone return slot and finding coins. I placed the swab into vial and sealed that into a plastic baggy.
“Cynthia, why would there be blood on the phone?” I said. “I’m pretty beat up but there’s no blood on me. There isn’t any sort of mess in here. No sign of struggle. Unless…do you think something happened to Steve?”
“That would defy all logic” she said looking right at me. “Why would someone steal Steve just to kill him?”
“Well, where would blood come from?” I said.
“Oh” she came to a sudden realization. “All of the blood samples are gone as well.” “Perhaps a vial broke and there was an oversight with the cleanup?” I said.
“Why would they have even made a phone call from the scene of the crime? Something must have gone wrong. They must have broke a vial and panicked and made a phone call” she said.
“I wish we could just call the police” I said.
“Look, you know as well as I do, that is not an option. In our research we have broken laws and breached our ethics code countless times. If any of this were reported to the authorities we would undoubtedly be disbarred and thrown in prison. So, Dr. Richardson, the only authority we will be calling is Dean Baker and may I remind you that if any word of this gets out to anyone it doesn’t just jeopardize us and our work but the entire institution” she said.
I knew all of that. I just didn’t know what to say. Besides, it’s just so thrilling to see Dr. Van Slyke when she starts to get worked up like that. Her arm and neck muscles tense up and pulse. It’s hypnotizing.
“Did you start the coffee machine?” she asked me pointedly her head tilted slightly to the left.
“Come on. Let’s sit down and figure this thing out. I’ll get you a cup. Half a sweet-n-low, a dash of non-dairy creamer and one ice cube right?” I asked. I didn’t need to ask. I knew the answer. It is my pleasure making coffee for her. I’m always so happy when she finishes it. That’s how I know she liked it. When Darhvil was still here and he would bring her a coffee after she left I would always find her coffee mug half empty sitting in the sink. Darhvil was a highly accomplished, a highly accomplished asshole.
“I’m going to say it Cynthia. Darhvil did it. That’s my gut feeling” I said, opening the cupboard and setting down two coffee mugs on the counter.
“Well aren’t you a regular little Nancy Drew?” said Dr. Van Slyke pulling out and sitting in a chair at the break room table.
I tore the top off of a little pink packet and poured less than half of the powder into the Smilodon californicus mug with a detailed drawing of a Sabre-tooth tiger on it. I dumped the other half and three other packets into the other mug.
“Look he knew everything about the project, he may still have had access to the laboratory and Dr. Chaturwedi certainly had an axe to grind with the administration” I said, pouring the coffee into each mug, sprinkled a dash of non-dairy creamer into hers and sluicing it into mine. I pushed the Smilodon mug in front of her and took my seat.
“Dr. Chaturwedi was also morally opposed to our work” she said, decidedly swirling her little red stirrer straws around in her coffee, then taking a sip and saying “ahh, that’s good.” My heart sank a little bit. She doesn’t trust me to stir her coffee properly.
“He was dismissed because he was trying to sabotage the project” I said, leaning back in my chair trying to look smart and commanding, “what better way to sabotage the project than by taking Steve?”
“True” she said, “but why would he steal the data?”
“Maybe he’s going to the authorities with it, as evidence” I said, “that little jerk would love to see us discredited in public.”
“Well, if he did that then why risk stealing Steve? If Steve dies, then that would be on his hands and he might get ruined in the scientific community, or if Steve is alive it’s science’s responsibility to keep him alive and growing, which we know that Dr. Chaturwedi dows not want.” She said.
“Who else could have done it? Who else even knew that this project existed? Dean Baker and Professor Gomez-Villagomez. Am I missing anyone?” I said.
“No one else that I know of” she said, “Maybe you are right. He has the only motive that I can think of. Maybe he made a mistake, criminals do it all of the time. I haven’t even told Dean Baker about this. I’m going to head over to his office right now.” She stood up and looked at her reflection in the microwave, tucking a few stray strands of light brown hair behind her ears.
I took long sip of my beige coffee and set my mug with the picture of a cartoon boy devil with a trident and a devilish grin below the words “Lucky Devil” down on the counter. I set it down loudly and stood up to get Dr. Van Slyke’s attention.
“I’m going to go down to the records department and see if I can’t track down old Dahrvil” I said.
“Why don’t you clean up that blood first? That seems slightly more immideate” she said.
Sunshine sporadically licked my face through the magnificent oak and conifer lined winding private road from the laboratory to the eastern edge of the campus below. The light grinding of the small tires of my bicycle against the asphalt shot out and it's echoes bounced around the empty space filling it and made my ride feel important. Like the hypnotic oar splash/ ship creak/ berzerker grunt sound cycle of a viking war ship or a symphony of airplane engines en route to the firebombing of some Nazi stronghold. One thing that I love about riding down this road is the way the wind blows upward through and suspends my hair in mid air as I float down it, it's probably the closest I'll ever understand of flying. Normally I toss my lab coat into the laundry service bin on the way out of the lab but toady I forgot to and the tails of my white lab coat are flapping in the breeze on my ride. Okay, okay. Who has access to this road? Dr. Van Slyke and myself, Dr. Chaturwedi did have access, campus security does although they are not supposed to be on the road unless they have specific permission from the admin or receive a call from us, the laundry service comes up here on tuesdays to take and replace labcoats and towels, janitorial comes on sundays, the groundskeepers were up here that one time to remove the fallen tree from the road, and Dean Baker and probably the rest of the administration have access. Dog gone it my mid section hurts. What ever drugs are in my system must be wearing off.
When the road flattens out after about a quarter mile there is a large metal gate on a motorized track. I steer my bike over to the metal box that is situated for drivers side usage I unclip my name badge from my sweater and run it over the magnetic sensor until a small green ligth turns on and then I have one minute to type my five digit security code in. The motor clunks to a start on the gate and it shakes itself across the road open. I get off of the bike and walk it over the track. I don't want to get a flat on these little tires and then be forced to lug this bicycle back to my apartment or worse up the hill to the lab.
From here the road makes gentle curves through the sprawling campus. Back near the gate are the abondoned orchards leftover from when the institution had less of a biological focus and had an agriculture department. The surviving trees now gnarled and bent and beautiful still produce fruit, although it is somewhat sporadic. The apple trees are always fecund, but the apples themselves are only tasty if we've had a cold winter the previous year. The pears are delicious, but only for a two week window. The persimmons look great, but I've yet to acquire the taste for them. There are two cherry trees, one that makes dark purple cherries and one that produces yellows, but I've never had one of either that tasted good. This orchard area of the campus is one of my favorites because there is never anyone back here and it's just so picturesque, like an old painting, think pre-civil war. I'd love to surprise Cynthina one late summer day with a picnic here.
Past the orchards the road swifts by the groundskeeper's quarters and garage. The house is a beautiful old place, I'm gonna guess built before world war I. The garage is actually more a barn where the groundsmen store tools and supplies. Sometimes they leave the big door open and when I pass by I can see them wrenching on a golfcart or welding something. There are no cars in front of the house. I'll have to swing back by here later and see if the groundskeepers have seen anything suspicious.
Down the road another half mile through corridor of elms is the practice football field. There is all kinds of funny equipment here that they sometimes practice on. The have old tires to run through and they somehow got some orange road cones for running drills, but my favorites thing they have is this big land sled. The man with the moustache and the sunglasses gets up on of it and starts blowing on his whistle then the football players crouch down real low and run into it and just push the sled around the field. I always hated sports. I'll go to a game every now and then when the university offers us free tickets. I actually saw Bill Lambeer play when he was on Notre Dame, he's a famous player now......
Unfinished ending
*1. Steven (originally S.T.E.V.E.N.) was a sabretooth tiger fetus that the lab brought to life unethically/illegally.
*2. Dale was knocked out and they placed Steven in Dale's midsection to gestate. Hence Dale's stomach pain.
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