Chapter 32: Discontent

November 12, 2001, Chicago, Illinois

🎤 Albert

“That’s dumb!” I protested. “It’s safer for them to be here than anywhere except on base!”

“You know that,” Dad replied, “and I know that, but some REMF Admiral in DC doesn’t know that. Or, more likely, some civilian employee of the DoD.”

“Well, whoever it is needs to grow a pair!” I declared. “We don’t hide from terrorists, we hunt them down! You told me that freedom is supposed to be scary and that the US has become a nation of wimps afraid of our own shadows.

“I have said that,” Dad agreed.

“Well, I have half a mind to take Nicholas and Jesse and go talk to that base commander!”

Dad laughed, “Take Birgit.”

“I was hoping the base commander would survive the encounter!” I said soberly.

“Good point. I think you’d need to go to DC to find whichever person in the DoD made the decision.”

“It’s just stupid. I’m going up to my room until dinner.”

“OK.”

I left Dad’s study and went up to my room and fired up my computer. I opened chat and was happy to see that Aimee was online.

CmdrAlbert: Hi.
WarriorChick: Hi! What’s up?
CmdrAlbert: Some idiot REMF said we can’t have recruits at our house on Thanksgiving.
WarriorChick: Part of the new security measures. We’re all on heightened alert because of the WTC, the anthrax letters, and the war in Afghanistan.
CmdrAlbert: You know our house is safe! And Dad said putting all the recruits in one place in a large hall was like Hickam Field on December 7th, 1941!
WarriorChick: He has a point, but you know logic never figures into military decisions.
CmdrAlbert: 🙄
WarriorChick: LOL! That’s me just about every day, especially if I read new directives from the Pentagon.
CmdrAlbert: I told Dad I was thinking of taking Nicholas and Jesse to talk to the base commander, but I doubt it would do any good. Dad suggested taking Birgit, but I said I wanted the base commander to survive the encounter!
WarriorChick: Can you imagine Birgit as a Marine?
CmdrAlbert: Oh HELL, no!
WarriorChick: Think of it from the enemy’s perspective.
CmdrAlbert: Yeah! 😛
WarriorChick: How about I fly there on Friday after Thanksgiving and we fly cross-country somewhere?
CmdrAlbert: Yes!
WarriorChick: Then plan on it!
CmdrAlbert: Cool. I’ll tell Dad. And Winter is calling me for dinner.
WarriorChick: Later!
CmdrAlbert: Over and out!
WarriorChick: Just ‘out’, if you’re done transmitting!
CmdrAlbert: Sorry! Albert out!

I shut down my computer and headed downstairs to dinner. I wasn’t surprised when Birgit was ranting about ‘stupid idiots’ in the military or Defense Department. Dad got her calmed down enough to eat, but I was suspicious that she was going to do something, even though Dad counseled strongly against it.

🎤 Birgit

“Because they’re dumb, that’s why!” I exclaimed as we left the house for karate.

“Yes, they are,” Dad replied. “But you heard what Aimee told Albert - there are all sorts of new security measures in place.”

“So?! I want to talk to this base commander!”

“I think you’re better off calling our Congressman or one of the Senators, but I doubt it will make any difference. I suppose you could try calling the White House.”

“Oh, sure. ‘Hello? White House? May I speak to the Idiot in Chief?’”

Dad laughed, “That might not be the best approach.”

“Oh, please! You think he’s a moron and I think he might even be a bigger «jävla idiot» than the average boy!”

“Might?” I asked.

“You have your moments, Dad!”

“What happened to your dad walking on water?” Mom asked.

“He does! He just sinks occasionally! And it’s always a girl who brings him back to the surface!”

“Unreal,” Mom said, just barely audible.

“It’s good to be the king!” Dad declared, causing all of us to laugh, including Mom.

“We all love you, Dad!” I declared.

“And I love all of you. How about a compromise?”

“What?” I asked suspiciously.

“I’ll help you and Jesse write a letter to the President, our Senators, and our Congressman. I’d really prefer not to have you arrested.”

“Me, too,” Mom said.

“Fine,” I agreed, though I was getting VERY tired of the idiots in charge of the country.

🎤 Steve

“Hi!” Kayla, the smoking hot cheerleader with blonde hair and blue eyes exclaimed when I opened the door just after we returned from karate.

“Hi,” I replied.

“Are you coming to the pizza party on Friday?” she asked hopefully.

“I really wish I could, but I’m pretty sure it’s a bad idea.”

She pouted, “But Kelly, Kristy, and I all want you there! It’ll be lots of fun!”

I smiled, “I’m absolutely sure that’s true, but I can’t imagine your parents approving of you having a party with a thirty-eight-year-old man.”

“We sure aren’t going to tell them! It’ll just be the cheer team and you!”

“I got that picture,” I chuckled. “And I’m flattered. But honestly, given the risks, I have to decline.”

Kayla pouted again, “Bummer.”

“Sorry.”

She stepped closer and spoke quietly, “I’m seventeen and I promise I won’t tell anyone if you have pizza with me!”

I now had a pair of new euphemisms in my catalogue - ‘have pizza’ and ‘pizza party’. Given Kayla was short, bubbly, and cute, with blonde hair and piercing blue eyes, I wouldn’t mind a ‘pizza party’ with her.

“You’re truly interested in a much older guy?” I asked skeptically.

Kayla nodded, “You’re good looking, in great shape, and totally cool! I’ve also seen you at your karate school and you’ve got some great moves!”

“Let me think about it,” I said. “And, Kayla, ‘not telling anyone’ would have to include your friends on the cheer team.”

She smiled broadly, “I promise! How about two weeks from Friday? My parents will be out until really late.”

“Ask me the Monday after Thanksgiving,” I said. “And either way, you’ll need to have an STI test before then.”

“Cool!” she exclaimed, licking her lips and winking. “I can do that.”

We both said goodbye and I went back inside, closing the door, and went back to Kara and Jessica in the ‘Indian’ room.

“I turned down the pizza party,” I said.

“Coward!” Kara teased.

“Kayla was sad, but then she invited me to a private pizza party.”

“Of course she did!” Jessica smirked. “You wouldn’t be ‘Tiger’ if that hadn’t happened!”

“Did you agree?” Kara asked.

“I told her I’d think about it. She’s seventeen, so there’s no problem with the law.”

“And of course she’ll have her STI test,” Jessica said.

“I actually mentioned that and said she should do that before she asks again on the Monday after Thanksgiving.”

“So you’re going to do it?” Kara asked.

“Maybe. I’ll think about it as I said. I think the question in my mind is whether she can actually keep quiet about it, or if she’d blab to her cheerleader friends. She promised not to tell anyone, and I did make it clear that absolutely included the cheer team.”

“Fresh, legal, High School girl?” Kara asked. “Seems like a lock!”

“We’ll see,” I said. “Let’s go spend some time with the kids before bed.”

November 15, 2001, Chicago, Illinois

“Any changes you think we need to make to my ‘all staff’ email?” I asked.

Stephanie, Julia, Cindi, and I were sitting at the low table in my office doing a final review of all the materials, including the additions to our website.

“I think everything is fine,” Stephanie replied. “You’ll post your two available positions today?”

“Yes. And I have a face-to-face interview with a candidate Bob sourced from a headhunter later this morning. I don’t think we’ll have any internal applicants for the software engineering role, though it’s possible one of the UI engineers in Colorado might throw their hat into the ring. I do think we’ll see at least two applications for the first systems engineering position, and I might open the second req early to accommodate that.”

“Who?” Julia asked.

“I’d rather not say until they actually do throw their hat into the ring, but we have several people in consulting and on-site support who have the necessary skills and qualifications.”

“Well, that’s a Cindi problem, not a me problem!” Julia declared. “I already lost you and Penny, and that’s not good for Dave’s team, though I can’t argue with the overall benefit to the company.”

“Dave giving you grief?” Cindi asked.

“A bit,” Julia replied with a smile. “but not anything I can’t handle!”

“Then I think we’re good,” Stephanie said. “Steve, send out your email right away, and Cindi, you’re authorized to send out the press release at 1:00pm.”

“I’ll be out this afternoon,” I said. “I’ll be reachable by mobile if there’s an emergency.”

“No party today?” Julia asked.

“Elyse was adamant,” Stephanie said. “And my brother elected not to force the issue.”

“Is this Bob’s doing?” Cindi asked.

“No,” I replied. “We’re pretty much down to just mine at this point, though Penny gets to tag along because we share a birthday. Bob’s only concern was it not looking like favoritism, but because it was only Founders, and has dwindled, it’s not a big deal. And he’s OK with teams celebrating birthdays so long as they include everyone who wants to be included.”

“And we do publish the birthday list each month,” Stephanie said. “We’ve never published years, so per Bob, there’s nothing wrong, so long as we honor any requests not to publish someone’s birthday, which we have, for example, when Monica worked here. I’d say we’re done.”

The three women left my office and I went to my desk, read through my email one last time, ran a final spell check, even though I hadn’t made any changes, and clicked ‘send’. Once the mail was sent, I called Bob and asked him to please post the two open positions to our intranet site. It took less than fifteen minutes before Kimmy let me know someone wanted to see me.

“Hi, Noelle,” I said. “I was expecting you.”

“Really?”

“Really. Go see Bob, fill out a transfer request, have it approved by Eve, and then we can talk. I’ll be out this afternoon, so just work with Kimmy to get on my schedule.”

“Thanks!”

Later in the morning, just before my scheduled interview, Aisyah called, and as I expected, told me she wanted to apply for the role. I gave her the same instructions as I had Noelle, though Aisyah would need Cèlia’s approval to request a transfer. In both cases, that was merely an acknowledgment from the director to whom they ultimately reported that there were no disciplinary or performance concerns, and that the person wasn’t involved in a critical project. If the person was involved in a critical project, then a discussion with, and approval from, the Vice President of the division was required, and would usually involve a longer transition.

At 11:30am, Reed Leonard, a candidate for the software engineering role, arrived and Kimmy showed him in. She verified our lunch orders and promised that the food would arrive at noon. That allowed me to conduct a thorough interview, have lunch, and leave with Elyse at 1:00pm.

“According to our HR director, this is the third position you’ve applied for at NIKA,” I said. “I admire the persistence.”

Reed smiled, “Well, the first time was for a web UI position, but I couldn’t move to Colorado Springs at that time because I was caring for my mom after my dad passed. The second time I made it to the finals for a consulting role to do development at a brokerage firm client. I figure third time is the charm!”

“Just so we’re clear, this is mostly front-end web development. I’ll be doing most of the back-end engineering.”

“UI is my thing,” Reed said. “I do have a question about what happens when the development is complete.”

“Well, as I see it, that takes us at least until the end of next year, given all the features we plan to roll out. The two of us can do it, though we’ll likely get an intern in the Spring, and I plan to do this in phases. Eventually, though, we’ll have all the features implemented and the code will be mature, at which point we’ll wind down active development and do more maintenance and updates. When that happens, you can apply to transfer to another group within the company. Those transfers nearly always happen, so long as there are tasks for which you have appropriate experience. I can’t make any specific commitments, but the consulting team has positions open on a fairly frequent basis.”

“PC and Mac support?”

“Yes. IE5 on both platforms. Netscape Navigator usage is below ten percent, so it’s tough to justify exerting much effort there. Our customer base, with a few exceptions for graphical design firms, is all on Windows. We do use Linux or Unix servers for our main software offerings, given the pricing advantage over Windows CALs.”

“Apache, PHP, and MySQL on the back-end, right?”

“Yes, plus postfix for email transport. There might be some C code, but it would only be if performance were a serious problem or there was something we simply couldn’t implement with HTML and PHP. Switching topics, tell me why you’ve wanted to leave your current position for close to two years, and why you haven’t.”

“Simple. I don’t want to leave, I want to work for NIKA. The recruiter you use has me in their database for any openings.”

“And why NIKA?”

“I heard about you about four years ago from a friend who went to UofI who was a student of Doctor Beth Pater. I read the ComputerWorld article from about a decade ago, and was intrigued. When I received a cold call from the recruiter a couple of years ago, I jumped at the chance, and as I said, he’s kept me updated on openings.”

“What attracts you to NIKA?”

“I read the article in Crain’s and if I were going to run my own company, that’s how I’d run it.”

“Tell me more about yourself, please.”

He did and we had a good chat before our lunches arrived. We continued chatting while we ate, and by the time we finished our meals, I had a very good picture of Reed, who I thought was an excellent candidate.

“I’m going to have Kimmy take you to see Sam, our Principal Engineer, and after that, you’ll sit down with HR and fill out an application and get a complete explanation of benefits. I assume the recruiter told you that we don’t negotiate salary and that our offer won’t be based on your previous salary?”

“Yes. I asked, and he said I was in the right range.”

“You’ll have to trust your recruiter, because we won’t ever ask your previous salary. The application specifically states not to include it and that if you do, your application can be rejected.”

“Pretty much the opposite of every other place.”

“Having a fixed pay scale means that everyone knows what everyone else is making, and knows they’re being paid equitably. It absolutely guarantees nobody is penalized for places they worked in the past, and ensures complete equality between genders.”

“As I said, if I were going to run my own company, this is how I’d do it.”

“Thanks for coming in, and HR will explain how we proceed from here.”

We shook hands and I walked him out of the office. He took off the guest slippers and put on his street shoes, then Kimmy walked him to Sam’s office. I got a clean pair of guest slippers from the cabinet, and put the ones Reed had used into the bag that would go to the dry cleaners for sanitizing.

I had a few minutes to check my mail as well as the news, but there wasn’t anything in Outlook which needed my attention, not anything important on the Tribune, CNN, or Fox websites. I closed everything down, left my office, put on my street shoes, and then left the building. I met Elyse by our cars, she got her bag from the trunk of her car and we got into my BMW.

“I can’t remember the last time you initiated one of these ‘afternoon delights’!”

“A terrible song, but a fun concept! Besides the fact that I love you and care for you, I wanted to show you that the drugs aren’t affecting me as much as you think they are.”

“And just how do you plan to do that?”

“Twice around the world,” I said.

“Been there, done that,” Elyse replied, feigning boredom. “That’s not crazy.”

“I didn’t say that I was going to take YOU twice around the world...”

“You mean...” Elyse asked breathlessly.

“Your strap-on is in your bag, right?”

“It is. And if you’re serious, DRIVE FASTER!”

🎤 Jesse

“Jesse,” Libby said when we went to our lockers after our last class, “this is Adiputeri, but she goes by Adi. She’s a Freshman, and she’s new at the school this year. Her family just moved from Kuala Lumpur in August.”

“Hi, Adi,” I replied.

“Hi, Jesse!” she exclaimed.

“Is it OK if she does homework with us after school?” Libby asked.

I had a sneaking suspicion that Libby had other ideas, and I had told her that I’d consider it. I had nothing to lose, though, because if I were right, and decided against it, I could always say ‘no’. I’d never met anyone from Malaysia, so I wasn’t sure what their characteristics were. Adi was pretty, and kind of a dusky brown, with brown eyes and long black hair.

“Sure!” I replied. “Adi, will your parents be OK with you studying at my house with no parents there?”

“We’ll study at my house,” Libby interjected.

“I asked my dad last night if it was OK to study with Libby and he gave permission,” Adi said.

I almost laughed out loud because she’d told the truth, but not the whole truth, and now I was sure that Libby was interested in Adi. I had no idea if Adi was interested in Libby in that way, or, if things were as I thought they were, interested in me. I still wasn’t sure if a trio was a good idea, or if I actually wanted to do that, but I certainly was attracted to Adi, at least in terms of her looks. I’d have to get to know her better before I could even answer the question I suspected Libby was going to ask.