The Intern: Chasing Murderers, Hookers, and Senators Across DC Wasn't In The Job Description (2 page)

Pretty, conservatively dressed in a tweed blazer and a pair
of jeans, she could have been twenty-five or forty.  I couldn’t make up my mind
whether she would be overly serious or not.

Glancing down at the table, I caught a glimpse of the
nameplate I’d made the day before. “Hi, Ann.”

“Hi,” she said, “You’re …?”

“Trent, I work here.” I never told anyone my intern status
unless I had to. “How was your trip?”

Her lip curled. “Crowded. I hate flying NationAir because
it’s so cheap,” she said. “But I love the hotel.”

I had booked the flight but had nothing to do with the
hotel. She didn’t need to know either thing.

From reading the panelist biographies sitting in front of
everyone, I learned she hailed from Nebraska. So I started a conversation about
the Midwest, which eventually worked around to Midwestern punk bands like The
Replacements and Husker Du, and I had a friend for the panel. Nothing is more
important in Washington than having someone you can write notes to.

As the panel was called to order, I grabbed the pad of paper
in front of me and uncapped the ballpoint pen—I had set the paper and pens out
when setting up the room. I scribbled the first note and slid the page toward
Ann.

Who is your favorite Charlie’s Angel?

Her eyes met mine and she smirked. She replied and slid the
page back.

Kate Jackson. Duh.

While Nancy Cho, the young Asian panel chair, went through
the panel ground rules, Ann went straight for the juicy meat.

Any truth to the rumors about the torrid affair over in
Education?

I struggled to keep a laugh from breaking out. It wasn’t the
free-wheeling Arts department providing the best gossip of the moment, but the
snobby, reserved, and conservative Education department. I scribbled a response
with glee.

The scuttlebutt is they were caught going at it in the
mail room last week during lunchtime.

Neither of us were green enough to commit names to paper. 

The panel reviewed applications for dance organizations to
find those who were both interesting and financially stable.

Nancy dragged the stack of applications directly in front
her. “Do we have consensus of what the panel is looking for?”

One member practically banged the table. “Financial
stability.”

The person to their left nodded. “No one should be granted
money unless they are stable.”

Rather ironic for them to want the applicants to be
financially stable when they were asking for money.

Ann leaned forward. “We tend to give most of the money to
the bigger organizations. I’d like to see the smaller groups benefit for a change.”

The comments became a free-for-all.

“We need more cutting edge. The avant-garde.”

“Ballet, for goodness sake. Can we focus on more traditional
dance for once?”

The mustachioed agent across the table interjected
nonsensical statements. “Dance … creative expression … freedom of movement.” He
waved his hands in the air.

Nancy checked her watch. “Let’s get started, shall we?” She
grabbed the first file off the top of the stack and read from the application.

As the morning wore on, I sat and listened, learning what
got some people lots of extra money and got others shit-canned. Nancy checked
her watch with increasing frequency and read the applications faster and
faster, cutting short the discussion after each one with a call for decision.

Interesting.

Ann’s face turned red when Nancy cut her off in the middle
of yet another comment. She wrote furiously on her tablet and slid it across to
me.

Gina Parks, the current dance flavor of the month, is
performing tonight.

Understanding dawned. Nancy had been an amazing dancer
before becoming badly injured. She rocketed through the grants—without giving
them enough consideration—in hopes she could somehow make it to Gina’s
performance. Highly unlikely, unless she could convince the group to decide the
applications by the rock-paper-scissors method.

Nancy grabbed the next application and read through it, her
granny glasses sliding to the end of her nose. “I don’t think we need to take
the time for discussion on this. All in favor of passing?”

A woman across the table stood with such force, her chair
nearly toppled. She planted her hands on the table and leaned toward Nancy.
“That’s enough. I am not going to stand by and watch as you rush your way
through the application process.”

Nancy looked like a snake just up and bit her, and a tendril
of hair escaped her tight bun.

The woman took advantage of Nancy’s moment of surprise. “The
applications we are reviewing took months, sometimes nearly a year, to prepare,
and we are obligated as the panel to give
each and every one
due
consideration.” Red spots appeared on her cheeks. “These are not simply words
written on the form, but the culmination of hopes and dreams, and I refuse to
crush anyone’s dreams lightly.”

James Rogers, the large man in traditional African dress,
stood up and clapped his hands. “All right,” he boomed. “Everyone out in the
hall.”

That was not what I expected.

His words were not a suggestion. I followed James, and Ann
came out a moment later. Three other panelists walked dutifully out into the
hall. What was going on?

“Make a circle,” James said, a hint of a smile on his face.

We did.

James then led us through half an hour’s worth of African
tribal dances: moves to honor the sun and moves to honor the parents. Some
looked like yoga, others more closely resembled modern dance. These were the
first dance steps other than the box step I had ever attempted, and although
some of the others picked up quicker, I soon had most everything under control.

Slowly, quite reluctantly, the other panel members filtered
out, including Nancy, who was the last to succumb. We clapped and shimmied and
saluted our elders and made everyone on every other floor come out and see just
what in the hell we were doing. Some members of other departments even joined
us. I laughed and realized this was the perfect time for one of the uptight
senators, who made us their whipping boys, to come by and observe the NEA; it
would have confirmed all their suspicions.

With all of the arguing, and all of the dancing, and all
before lunch, I realized working at the NEA wasn’t so bad after all.

Two

I
 skipped the early part of the
afternoon meeting of the panel. Nothing would be half as interesting as the
morning, so after lunch I went back to my desk in hopes of putting some kind of
packet together for Joe. 

When I sat at the desk, I sighed. Mine was the typical
intern space—it had everyone else’s junk, and half of the lights didn’t work.
I’d have to move piles of junk around just to get to the junk I needed. The
papers dealing with Regionarts, the largest stack, I might add, were buried
under the notes, memos, and instructions for the panels.

The phone rang. I eyed it warily. Could I pretend to be at a
panel and simply let it ring? The loud, angry tones grated on my nerves and I
couldn’t concentrate. I grabbed the receiver. “Trent Norris.”

A reedy, male voice came through the speaker. “Thank
goodness. Isn’t anyone working at the NEA today? I must have called ten other
people before you picked up.”

I couldn’t decide whether to be in awe of the persistence or
the stupidity of trying that many numbers.

“I need to speak with the Chairman regarding Regionarts.”

Of course. Every other call I had received over the past few
weeks concerned Regionarts and requests for the Chairman. I cleared my throat.
“I’m sorry, but the Chairman is away on travel right now. Is there something I
can help you with?”

I cringed. Why didn’t I simply stop with the Chairman being
away? Now they’d want to explain the entire issue to me—one I’d heard more
times than I could count—on how vital it was to keep the Regionarts program
alive.

“Maybe you can help, Trent. I need to know whether the
Regionarts program is still being fully funded.”

The question everyone wanted to know. I trotted out the
party line. “The money for the program is absolutely safe through the end of
the century. Not even President Clinton can touch it.”

The caller paused, and I imagined him staring at the phone
like he’d heard that line of claptrap before, and he probably had.

“Well, I’ll write the Chairman a letter, so she’ll know how
much support there is for this project.”

I rolled my eyes. “The Chairman is quite aware of the great
support the program has. Thank you for your support.”

No matter how many times I said those words, they never
worked. Much to my chagrin, the Chairman would never see their letter, and the
sender had wasted their time because I would write the reply in her name like
some bureaucratic Cyrano.

Those letters were now on the graveyard that was my desk. As
I sifted through them, I realized I had no idea what Joe really wanted despite
having a good bit of material already from my letter-writing escapades. If I
had been a new intern, untrained in the ways of every office, I would’ve
trudged in, bothered Joe in the middle of whatever he was doing, and asked him.
Even realizing Joe probably had as little idea about what he wanted as I did,
it might’ve saved me time. However, I was no rank amateur. I had been through
the minor leagues of internships, working for journalism groups, environmental
groups, small-town politicians, and outdoor musical theatres which catered to
the elderly set.

And now, thanks to good recommendations and twenty-pound
resume paper, I was in the big leagues. During my other adventures, I had
learned my bosses didn’t want to see me; nothing against me, but they had
plenty to do. They wanted drafts, not questions. If I ended up having to do the
same work all over again, so be it. At least I wasn’t wasting their time. So I
should try something; let him read it, and then probably do it all over again.

I tried more first sentences that afternoon than Charles
Dickens did in his entire career. I knew it would flow after that, but I had so
little clue as to what I was doing, I tried everything but haiku.

Of course, this was between a couple of Tetris games, a
snack break, and reading the daily clips.

The clips were an agency ritual, when we got to read what
had been written about us in the
Times
, the
Post
, and other
papers we didn’t care about as much. The clips in recent days were dominated by
the addition of Gerald Greer, a new columnist for the
Post
, who was
supposed to be covering all kinds of different issues in Washington, but seemed
to center a whole lot on us.

I read the clips, initialed the sheet to show I had read
them, and took them “next-door” to Damon, the red-bearded live-wire who was a
program specialist. 

“Greer’s got another article this morning,” I said as I
handed him the clips.

“Enlightening?” he asked, not looking up from something he
was scribbling.

“Pithy.”

He turned and grabbed the clips. “My friend Jane says all he
does is sit and drink at the Hawk and Dove, trying to pick up pages and college
girls. He’s a lush. Wanted to be a playwright. Guess that’s why he picks on
us.”

The picture of Gerald Greer, with his brillo beard and polar
white hair, clutching some pretentious imported beer while ogling a college
student’s ass somehow made him seem like less of a threat.

“When’d you find this out?” I’d never be able to use the
information, but good to know.

“Saturday night. Saw her at a party, and she commented on
the McHolland article. She knew him from when he used to work for the Boston
paper.”

“The McHolland article was a near hatchet job.” It contained
some truths; there had been some upper-management problems, and the McHolland
Foundation was taking fewer artistic chances.

Damon scowled. “Greer didn’t tell the whole story. He was
way too judgmental. And he wrote nice things about other arts groups, so what
gives?”

Most of my colleagues at the NEA were angry about the
article because the McHolland Foundation was a partner in the Regionarts
program, and they were scared Gerald might say the same things about us.

“I don’t have any idea what he wants.”

Damon kicked back in his chair and stroked his beard. “We
don’t have many perks.”

True. “None of us make enough to bribe him.” We worked for
the government, so we were prohibited by law from even getting free tickets to
go see the shows we supported.

I snorted. “Maybe he wants love.”

Damon threw his head back and laughed.

I looked around the office. Everyone else had moseyed back
to the panel. I grinned and arched a brow at Damon. “Hey, why don’t we go up to
the seventh floor and throw food down on the patrons walking past?”

Damon shrugged. “I’ve already done that. Not much fun,
really.”

My turn to scowl. Fun or not, it spoiled it for me because
he had beat me to the punch. “I have to put some information together for Joe
on Regionarts. Want to give me a hand?”

He snickered. “No, I’ll let you have all the joy.”

Honestly, I couldn’t blame him. I’d have said the same. “All
right. I’d better get back to it.”

I went through some files and called back a couple of people
who had questions about grant applications, but I soon went back to staring at
the electric blue screen of my Wang word processor. I finally shook my head,
gave up, and jotted down a few things I wanted to include on a notepad.

I didn’t get much done the rest of the day. The main reason
was Stephanie.

Stephanie was the woman of my dreams: medium height; soft
brown, shoulder-length hair; subtle, brown eyes; ungodly, long eyelashes; and a
very cute nose. She was a Georgetown law student, originally from Kentucky, and
we met almost a month before while browsing at Mysterybooks in DuPont Circle.