People in Season (6 page)

‘She’s a trouble maker,’ Ava mumbles. ‘That intern. The one with the awful hair. She keeps pushing that silly doctor gossip.’

‘I don’t blame her,’ Joanne laments. ‘I wish we could use it. That riot story went nowhere. The Gards were calling about that bloody lost girl you centred the piece on, by the way. You need to get back to them.’

‘We helped enough, getting her story out there, maybe they can do something for her now, you must realise that. And you’d have had it buried just to get some smutty medical scandal on the front. That doctor story would have had this place bombarded with lawsuits.’

Joanne doesn’t hear this, ‘How can they not know what happened to her?

‘Who?’

‘The girl you took that photo of. The one you said we helped, Ava. They want our assistance tracking her down!’

‘Translation – please solve the case for us.’

‘It’s not a case. It’s damage control. They don’t want to look bad.’

‘Yeah right, next they’ll be asking us to give their uniforms a make-over. Well, it’s not for us to find out. We’ve done our part.’

‘Says the woman who started the story!’

‘Anyway if she hasn’t been reported missing she must be fine. Her parents probably don’t want any publicity and haven’t come forward to announce they were there. Honestly, you’d think we could respect the last good people in the world that don’t want to milk attention out of a disaster.’

Frowning, Joanne finds her e-smoke battery has run down. ‘Tell that to the Gards. And do you think they’re going to find anything? This is just going to fizzle out to nothing. One more riot that caught our attention for a minute. Just a clap of thunder. I’m tired of the snacks you people keep bringing me. I want a story with meat. Type something up to kill it. Say the cops have several leads and are pursuing them in earnest. Hopefully something terrible will happen in the world tomorrow and we can move on from it all.’

‘Alright, fine, and what are you going to do about Susan?’

‘What?’ Joanne asks, frustrated. ‘Who the bloody hell is Susan?’

‘The intern who keeps causing trouble!’

‘Jesus, Ava, I don’t know. She hasn’t done anything that bad has she?’

‘Pretty sure she’s the one who’s been stealing food from the fridge.’

‘She could stand to lose a pound or two,’ Joanne finds herself agreeing and with it, a stone drops into a well. Business is a mercenary affair where I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine is the definition of friendship. Ava wants the girl gone and Joanne wants Ava to remain a pillar of support in this turbulent time. The reasoning for it, whatever the girl did to offend Ava, is the last thing Joanne wants to discover. She has survived this long in the media world because she has learned the hard way that, counter intuitive to her profession, sometimes it’s more important to not know what is happening. To remain ignorant is to remain innocent. This credo exists like a poison in her veins. So, as she realises that somewhere in the course of their griping she has struck a deal with Ava, she stops herself from wondering what motivations might be at work and tucks in her chin to sheepishly mutter, ‘I need a drink.’

Ava walks over to a filing cabinet and finds the sparkling wine Joanne keeps hidden at the back. Seeing the bottle, Joanne excitedly takes two mugs from her drawer and lets Ava serve double measures.

‘I’ll tell the newsdesk you said to give the girl her notice. They’ll email it on to her in the morning.’

‘Can she sue us?’ Joanne takes a swig to resign herself.

‘She’s just an intern.’ Ava brings the mug to her mouth but doesn’t swallow any of the liquid. Licking her lips, she sees Susan leave the social agent’s office as he calls for another candidate.

‘Look who’s up next.’

Bobblehead Barry! A knobby hand slams onto the desk, placing a bobble-headed figurine in front of the social agent. Following the hand to the arm and the arm to its conclusion, Francis finds a matching face for the toy in Barry Danger. Skin tight on the man’s skull, his lips are stretched into a severe grin.

‘You can keep that. I’ve a drawer full of ‘em.’

‘Thanks,’ Francis delicately examines the thing, afraid perhaps that the head might fall off, bobbling about as much as it is while it laughs at a joke he’s not let in on.

‘I had an advice column running for a while and we were going to send those out to people who wrote in. Well, turns out nobody wanted my advice. There’s a warehouse in Naas storing crates of the things.’

‘It’s even got the same funny suit as you.’

Barry grips the collar of his outfit, a brown gridded jacket, slacks mismatched with a shiny purple vest, and puffing his chest out proudly, he peacocks the style while the sweat stained cuffs of the shirt stretch a finger’s length out of his jacket sleeves. The ensemble seems to have been pieced together in a number of different charity shops but, in his own assured way, it’s become a brand. The matching icon confirms it.

‘Or do I have the same suit as it?’ Barry waggles a finger.

‘Excuse me?’ Francis asks.

‘It’s a mystery. One of life’s little oddities, isn’t it?’

‘Funny gimmick though.’ Placing the bobblehead on the desktop, Francis adjusts it so that he doesn’t have to look at the thing. ‘You could give them out to top commenters and such?’

‘Then I wouldn’t have any to give to my good friends, Doctor Mullen,’ Barry winks at the social agent, who takes it as a warning that this interview won’t be any easier than Joanne’s.

Francis had scrutinized her as gingerly as he could, searching for safe spots among the mass of sensitive nerves, but he might as well have tied her down and screamed the questions. Though she’d tested high in the UPDSRT, she was falling below average on the comparative report. By the end of the interview she was defensive to the point of going mute and he had to make do with the behaviour he’d observed up to that stage. It wasn’t like a boss to decline an opportunity to talk. Coming off the back of that, and facing a journalist who could more aptly be described as a professional troll, he has chosen a less invasive tact, though his tablet is still held between them.

‘I’m not a doctor.’

‘Counsellor?’

‘You know I’m not a counsellor, Barry. Just a social agent.’

‘That’s right, but-see, I’m not really sure how a bloke becomes a social agent. I would’ve guessed there were psychology classes involved somewhere along the line.’

‘An arts degree helps,’ Francis exhales tiredly. ‘Generally you get into a branch of the civil service and work your way up. Social welfare’s a good entry. It helps to know the right people. Not that I ever did. After that it’s like any other job. Do what you’re told, don’t be late, and learn to fill in the right forms.’

‘Another civil servant trained to check the right boxes,’ Barry nods to the tablet.

‘Circles, actually.’ The screen is clogged with them. ‘And we should get started filling them in. Are there any old rivalries in the office?’

The question is met with a chuckle.

‘Are you good at this job, mate?’

‘I suppose we’ll find out.’

A humble response. Before he can parry, he’s questioned again.

‘What other places have you investigated? Just curious. I’ll answer your question if you do mine.’

‘This isn’t a negotiation,’ Francis says. ‘It’s up to you how you act in here.’

‘You’ve never been in a newsroom before.’

The tablet lowers slightly.

‘Come on, Mullen,’ Barry chides.

‘You’re aware this is the first media outlet to be processed.’

‘Yeah. Where else have you worked though? Social Welfare?’

‘Over the past year I’ve been processing the County Councils of Leinster.’

‘Different to here.’

Considering this, Francis reluctantly jokes, ‘There may have been a noticeable difference in IQ levels. It did tend to make contesting parties easier to spot.’

Barry Danger, with a stiff rigor mortis grin, signals that they’ve arrived at his point. ‘Let me tell you something then, mate. You’re going to need a new questionnaire to figure this place out. Rivalries?’ he scoffs. ‘I took a donut from the fridge last week without asking whose it was and within an hour someone in the office had started a community group against me saying my articles are full of hyperbole and egomania, that I’ve got a small Johnson and am probably taking all my frustration out on the world because of it. Who started it? Bloody hell, pick a head, they’re all suss.’

‘You didn’t try to find out whose donut it was? Apologise and appease the situation?’

‘No, I took another one the next day though. When you have a group like that onto you you’d better make it worth their while, right?’

‘How would you feel if you were chosen for the scan?’ This is Francis going for a jab.

‘Inconvenienced,’ Barry yawns.

‘That’s all?’

Leaning forward to return the jab, Barry places his fingers on the tablet the social agent holds, and lowers it, gently, so that it’s level on the desk and there’s no wall between the men. ‘I’ve got one for you. Humour me a minute, you might find this interesting.’ The change in Barry’s demeanour is so drastic as he takes a turn for the serious that Francis assumes he’s leading up to a joke. ‘I’m walking down O’Connell street one day and I see a lady get her leg clipped by a bus, do a three-sixty in the air, and hit the road, hard, landing on her shoulder. The driver of the bus, he mustn’t notice, taking a nap or something, because it keeps going, right? Why else wouldn’t he stop? And nobody else on the street seems to notice either. They’re all sleepwalking too, dreaming about a brand of toothpaste that’ll keep their smiles pearly white, and me, Mister Brown Teeth, I’m the only one who’s awake. That’s a nightmare in itself, isn’t it? It must be true though because none of them see the woman on the middle of the road crawling off at a turtles pace for fear of being run over by another bus that doesn’t bother to stop.’

Francis waits quietly for Barry to reach a conclusion, hands poised to lift the tablet.

‘So, I jog to help her.’

‘Of course you did,’ he says, relieved. ‘Anybody would.’

‘Nah mate, I didn’t run. I jogged.’

‘It’s a shock, seeing something like that...’

‘No, I just didn’t want to be late for meeting a friend.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, I jogged, like I said, steady pace, hoping a bloke across the way would get to her before I did and I wouldn’t be delayed. Lucky for me he did, and lucky for the woman on the ground, he knew first aid. I stroll up to them and he tells me to call an ambulance. Part of me wants to tell him to use his own bloody phone but I’m hating myself enough as it is. Really, new heights of self-loathing. I’m on the outside of it all, floating above the three of us, shocked to find I’ve got a bald patch now and thinking what a prat I am in general. I see myself down there, ringing nine-nine-nine, passing instructions on how to position the poor woman and reporting back to the emergency line on how she’s doing. I see myself doing this. I see me watching the man who’s helping her and I say, Alright, you’ve got this, I’m going to jog on – and the man – he looked at me, calmly, like you’re looking at me now, except with all the spite a person can have for the world and see it embodied in another human being. Nah, don’t worry about it, he says. Just fuck off.’

The insect tapping of journalists typing dominates the room, muffled as it is through the door. Barry, apparently, has ended his story and as explanation for it only offers a broad shrug of his shoulders. Francis opens his mouth to comment. Instead his chair strains a squeak and he screws up the features of his face.

‘You regret this?’

‘Not really.’

‘That’s what bothers you. You think you should feel bad about not acting more responsibly.’

‘It should bother you too, Mullen. Think about it. If I get scanned, and I’m not UPD, what does that mean?’

‘I couldn’t say...’

‘You couldn’t say,’ Barry hoots. ‘And that bloke who helped her, you wouldn’t be surprised if he tested positive, would you? He could be off the scale, pure malevolent psychopath and it wouldn’t make you bat an eyelash.’

‘No,’ the reply is curt and the tablet is once again picked up to indicate that they are going to go back into interview mode. Barry roars with laughter at this, like Francis has just hit the punch line of the joke he had set up, so the social agent finds himself raising his voice to speak over the assault. ‘The processing exists for exactly these reasons. You can’t measure a person’s condition by their actions alone. For all you know he was helping so he could steal her purse. That’s an extreme example, but if he was untouched there are any number of reasons he might have gotten involved. It’s more likely he just wanted a bit of excitement, or if he was particularly narcissistic, a story to tell of what a gentleman and saviour he is.’

‘Jesus, Mary and Joseph, that’s some way you have of seeing the world. I won’t be doing any good deeds around you.’

Bewildered as he feels entrapped, Francis insists, ‘I just meant if we’re assuming he was UPD, those could be the motivations at work.’

‘And you’re happy to do this job, to mark people up in your rows of numbers on a scale of how healthy they are for a given group.’

‘You’re being glib and you know it,’ Francis tries full-stopping the exchange.

‘I’ll tell you what I think,’ Barry says, determined. ‘Some people are untouched, and the rest of us are just arseholes.’

‘There are those who would say more people are arseholes in an environment that rewards untouched behaviour, that you can hardly expect a crowd of people to engage the world with a moral sense if example isn’t shown from the top down.’

‘There’s a danger society gets warped when you let the wrong people get to the top?’

‘Exactly.’

‘Or that the wrong people get to the top because the world is already warped?’

At this, Francis once again realises he’s been led down a path he doesn’t want to go, and huffs with a shake of his head to try and deny it, but Barry, plucking the bobblehead off the desk in front of him, twists it around to face Francis, it’s manic skull wobbling side to side with a mocking grin. The English journalist matches it’s expression.

‘That’s the game, isn’t it? Did bobblehead have the suit first or did I get the suit to match the bobblehead? Which of us wears it best, do either of us really like it and should I be suss if I don’t? Not even a counsellor, you said? Bloody hell. Aren’t you worried you’re working with very small pieces in a very large puzzle? UPD on a media site. So what? What could they do that the rest of us approved personalities don’t already? You think I’m a journalist. That I have a say in what goes online. You’ve got it wrong. Data processing, that’s what the news is here. Our criteria for a story is keep ‘em cheap and keep ‘em safe. Nothing that might provoke repercussions. I get the news from the community, or the wire, branches of government, PR departments of whoever can afford them. All I do is reword the things. Joanne can’t even give me the time to leave my desk and check if any of it’s true. And most importantly, you must remember, give the people what they want. They’re not watching the news for complicated stories, mate. They need sound bites to latch onto so they can join in the banter down the pub and their hunger for ‘em is relentless. The system is there so the system must be fed. You want to know something? I’m amazed my job even exists. Surely Joanne can just get some software that grabs the day’s press releases and rearranges them for any given publication. Set it to liberal or conservative, have it tailor stories for your customer’s taste. A computer offended on your behalf. Wouldn’t that be something? I’d still need to sit at my desk and watch it work though. Couldn’t have it spouting gibberish. We’d need to have it read comments on articles and speak to what the audience wants, exaggerate attitudes they show and have it spout it all back at them, or better yet, say something that gets their hairs up, rankle them and stir it up some more,’ Barry stops abruptly and lets a burst of surprise illuminate his face. ‘Sheppard and flock both. That’s what we are.’

The social agent across the desk gulps audibly.

‘Well I’m going a bit off topic.’ Sounding genuine for the first time in the interview, Barry appears to have discovered a thought he hadn’t planned in advance. ‘All I mean to say is, we don’t have as much influence as you think we do.’

‘You’d have us frozen in inaction because the world is absurd?’

‘No, Mullen, I don’t suppose I would,’ Barry says weakly. ‘I guess I’m just resigned to being a spectator. You’re a player though. I’m watching you with no small amount of interest, make no mistake about that. I think you’re like me. You’ve got doubts, Mullen, and you’re in a job where the people you’re up against haven’t an ounce of them. I don’t envy you.’

Though Francis absorbs the statement, he manages to raise his tablet to hold between them once more.

‘And what will you do if it turns out you are UPD?’