Glass Shatters (19 page)

June 13, 2006

Age Twenty-Eight

C
harles arrives at the beige building an hour early. He checks his watch, paces back and forth. His shirt is freshly ironed, his slim tie hanging just below his navel. He knows that it’s perhaps inappropriate to have shown up this early for his first day of work, but he can’t help himself. He’s excited, ecstatic. He can’t believe he’s been given such an amazing opportunity. Charles has spent the past six years ricocheting between research positions— nonprofit start-ups that have gone instantly broke, university labs corrupted by campus politics, biomedical giants overrun by bureaucracy and ethical corruption. But this could be it. He feels it throughout his body. This could be the beginning of the rest of his career.

It’s a small lab called Genutech staffed by only a dozen scientists, funded by a group of highly wealthy investors committed to supporting the most cutting-edge biogenetic research. The philosophical ideology behind the company is that autonomy and purpose are the cornerstones of innovation, innovation that will benefit both society as a whole and the investors. Employees are thus given total free reign over their own projects, with the only stipulations being that they present their findings every two months and that each project is pursued with the underlying intent of giving back to the community and/or improving conditions for humankind. Moreover, the chief researcher at the lab is Peter Schiff, a kingpin in the field of biotechnology. Charles can’t imagine a more perfect way to provide for his family, for Julie and Jess, Julie who has spoken about having another child and Jess who is about to start preschool.

Charles attempts to delay his arrival—he feigns interest in a newspaper left in the lobby, goes to the bathroom, takes a long swig from the drinking fountain—but after fifteen minutes or so, he can’t help but take the elevator up to the lab. He tries his keycard once and then twice. The magnetic strip seems to have no effect. Just as he’s about to attempt it a third time, somebody opens the door, a short, round man with circular glasses and a flustered expression.

“I’m sorry, can I—”

“I’m Charles, Charles Lang? I start work here today. I mean, I’m early, but I’m supposed to start in about forty-five minutes or so.”

“Ah, Charles! Welcome, welcome,” the man says. His face spreads into a wide grin. “My name’s John Doherty. Please, come in. It’s a busy day, but please, let me show you around a bit, you know. Everyone’s out at a business meeting so introductions will have to come later but you’re bound to have other questions, I’m sure.”

Before Charles can say another word, John is already bustling back and forth around the lab, naming who works in which office, what research tools are available, etc. Charles is thrilled to see the brand new aquariums lining the walls. He requested them on a whim. He has a feeling that he’s going to use them, that they are going to be very important, although he is not sure why or how yet.

“So,” John finally says, “what else? What else can I tell you? What else do you want to know? Most of us work in the labs off of this central area, but because you’ll be using the aquariums, this will be your primary space.”

“What’s Peter like?” Charles says. “How approachable is he?”

John’s expression darkens. “To be totally honest, I would recommend against that.”

“You would recommend against approaching him?”

“Yes, that’s what I’d recommend.”

“But he’s the lab’s chief consultant and researcher. Everyone says he’s brilliant. And his papers are phenomenal.”

John looks back and forth. The lab is empty. “Look, Peter is charming, but he’s a total fake. He’s cheated his way up to the top. He ‘borrows’ other scientists’ research, if you know what I mean, and then publishes before them. I’m surprised you haven’t heard the rumors circling about him. It’s why he has such a high turnover rate.”

John’s confession catches Charles off guard. “I had no idea. Should somebody be told about this? Somebody in a position of authority, who can take legal action—”

“And accomplish what? Peter’s the money behind this organization. Sure, we have other investors, but Peter’s trust fund could keep Genutech going for another hundred years. Peter may have lied and manipulated to get where he is, but he’s also given me the best research position I’ve ever had. I can’t afford to lose it.”

“So what—we just pretend that we don’t know the truth?”

John shrugs. “That’s what I’ve been doing. It’s up to you. If you stay, though, I’d keep the details of your research to yourself. You can give Peter the very broadest of strokes, but no specifics.”

B
EFORE MY CONSCIOUS MIND HAS EVEN COME BACK INTO
focus, I’m running down the hallway. I heave open the door to the stairwell and rush down the steps, the soles of my shoes barely touching the concrete. I spill into the lobby, nearly tripping over several businessmen sipping their morning coffees.

“Katie? Katie!” I shout as I burst through the glass doors and onto the street. Of course she’s gone. A delivery truck grumbles down the road. A flock of pigeons sways back and forth on one of the overhead power lines. I wonder if Katie DeFazio is even her real name. I know that it doesn’t really matter if I ever talk to her again, that she’s probably told me everything she knows. It’s her resemblance to Julie. I close my eyes, imagine Julie bounding down the sidewalk, leaping into my arms. All I want is for Julie to come back, and at this point I would give anything to just see her one more time.

I decide to take the stairs back up to the lab. I want to feel my calf muscles strain as I take one step and then the next. I want to feel the air expand in the soft tissue of my lungs. I want to feel something other than loss. And I want to know. I want to know everything. I’m tired of being deceived. The stairwell smells musky, like rotting fruit long dried and disintegrated. By the second floor, I’m already soaked through with sweat. I take off my coat and tuck it under my left arm. I continue jogging up the stairs. My shirtsleeve catches on one of the splintered banisters and when I pull away, it rips a hole in the fabric.

I reach the fifth floor. As I approach the lab, I hear an argument from inside, words like swords clanging off one another. I recognize the voices as those of Peter and Steve. Peter is in the midst of a rant, his voice bulldozing through Steve’s tepid interjections. I try to decipher what they’re saying, but it proves impossible without standing right outside the door, and I’m afraid that if I were to do that, I would quickly be discovered. Which is no good given that I’m sure the argument has to do with me.

I don’t want to see Peter. I don’t know what I would say to him. Now that Katie’s left, I feel his betrayal all through me, my body heavy as if the earth’s gravitational pull has suddenly become stronger. I keep seeing it in my head, that self-satisfied grin spreading across his face. I just don’t get it. Why would he have hired somebody to observe me? What could he want that I wouldn’t tell him myself?

I turn the corner down the hallway toward the Human Resources office. Sunlight streams in through windows facing the street. Maybe if I can get some information about Katie, I
can find her again. Maybe she does know more than she’s told me.

I knock. This time a piece by Chopin wafts from under the door, the two melodies on the piano folding over one another.

“Come in.” It’s the same middle-aged woman from last time with that glossy updo, typing at a computer. She looks up at me over wire-framed glasses and turns down the music. She seems a bit displeased to see me again.

“May I help you?”

“Yes, Charles Lang. I’m looking for any information you can give me on Katherine DeFazio? Her address, her phone number …”

The woman wheels her chair around and opens up the filing cabinet. After a moment of flipping through papers, she shakes her head. “I’m sorry, we don’t have a Katherine DeFazio on file here.”

“How about Katie DeFazio? She was a research assistant?”

The woman shakes her head again. “No DeFazios.”

“Um, well how about John Doherty?”

The woman frowns and thumbs through the files. “Hmm, it seems that the only John Doherty who worked here was terminated in the fall of 2007.”

“Terminated?”

“Fired.”

“There’s no other—”

“That’s all I have,” the woman says somewhat sternly.

I put a hand down on the desk. “I’m sorry, I’m not trying to bother you, but—”

“What did you say your name was?”

“Charles. Charles Lang.”

The woman reaches into a cabinet and heaves out a large cardboard box. “I was just cleaning out the office and found this. Lucky you came in today, otherwise I probably would have dumped it in the garbage. Do you want it?”

I take the box and brush off the dust. Underneath is a piece of masking tape labeled “Charles L.”

“Yes. Thank you.”

The woman turns back to her computer screen, dismissing me. I step into the hallway and open the box. Inside there’s a mug, several books, a small DNA model made of rubber and plastic. They must have cleaned out my room after I left. I continue digging, deep into the crevices at the bottom of the box. Underneath I discover two tiny plastic bags. One is labeled “DNA Sample: Julie,” the other “DNA Sample: Jess.”

May 19, 2010

Age Thirty-Two

C
harles feels his coat pocket again and again, checking that the small plastic bags haven’t fallen out. The crinkle is reassuring yet devastating somehow. The stars waver in the night sky, as if they’re not sure whether they want to be one thing or another. The beige building looks average, unexceptional under the streetlights. The windows are dark. The shades are drawn. Charles’s breath catches in his throat as he recalls the last time he was at the lab, the destruction, the humiliation. It’s been four months since he’s worked at Genutech and nine months since they disappeared. Nine impossible months. Nine months of comatose days and sleepless nights, brief moments of lucidity followed by horrific nightmares. Nine months of nothingness. It feels strange to him to be wearing clothes, shoes, a scarf, a coat, disguised as a normal person again. It feels strange to breathe in air that’s outside, that doesn’t have the stale, recycled quality of being indoors.