Officer Tang had a problem.

Unlike her colleague, Officer Escobar, she had no talent at not seeing problems.  Nor was she a person who could patiently wait around for problems to go away of their own accord, no matter how often other members of the LCPD told her that it really does happen.  Problems, she firmly believed, exist to be solved.  And when an unsolvable problem came along, one that stared her in the face every single day, it created an imbalance in her universe that was far beyond the power of baked goods to right.

As is often true of impossible situations, this one could be blamed on an old, dead white guy.  When the illustrious Bartholomew Phineas Taylor—tycoon, philanthropist, and all-around character—had finally died, his will specified that his Crescenton Subway System should be left, “to the people of this fine city, in perpetuity, to use as they see fit.”  Some historians argued that this was his most generous act, while others liked to cite a quote of dubious origin in which he stated that he had done it because he “never understood the point of the whole damn thing.”

Numerous legal precedents had established that, as the subway belonged to the people, just about anything they did in it was permissible, so long as it did not interfere with the running of the trains.  The standard joke was that you could get away with murder, which was appropriate, for there was an urban legend that old B.P. Taylor had originally had the tunnels dug so he could discreetly bury some of his competitors.

Officer Tang had no intention of letting anyone get away with murder, or any other act that could definitively be called a crime.  Loitering, sadly, did not fall into this category, not even when it persisted for weeks or months.  She did not blame the homeless for their predicament; she knew that most had no other choice.  But that did not make it any less wrong.  “A place for everything and everything in its place,” was one of her mottos.  People belonged in homes, where they had addresses and phone numbers and could be kept track of.  Just as pigeons belonged in parks, though if she had her way, there wouldn’t be any pigeons, either.

The fact that the woman had become something of an attraction added insult to injury.  It was only natural that she drew attention to herself.  Her presence raised so many questions: Who was she?  Where had she come from, and why?  Could she be exploited like some sort of sideshow freak?  One group had tried having her predict the outcomes of football games, but they gave up when she said the Cleveland Browns would win the Super Bowl.  She never answered any personal questions—and, perhaps out of reciprocity, no one ever gave a satisfactory answer to the questions she asked.

But to Officer Tang it just seemed like they were showcasing her failure.  She went on vacation for one week—one measly week!—and by the time she got back the Old Woman of Simon Park Station had shown up.  And, until the woman violated a freaking commandment, there was nothing she could do about it.

It would not have comforted her at all to learn that the woman would have liked nothing better than to leave, that she was, in fact, devoting every effort to getting away.  These facts would only have irritated the officer further, although she would have been hard-pressed to tell you exactly why.

As it was, Officer Tang walked her normal beat, driving injustice out of dark places and defending the innocent travelers on Crescenton’s underground rails.  Perhaps she was a little harsher with the criminals she could actually arrest, and perhaps she paid a little bit more attention to the old woman than was healthy.  She would have said that she was merely doing her duty as one of Crescenton’s finest.

What is the purpose of a summer law clerk?  Peter devoted much of his time to trying to answer this question, at least when he wasn’t on YouTube or playing Minesweeper.  “To gain experience,” his academic advisor had told him.  It sounded good on paper, but the primary field in which he was gaining experience was wasting time, and, as a typical American suburbanite, he had been an expert in that field since high school.

Mr. Abrahamson, a partner and the official supervisor of the summer clerks, said it was all about schmoozing.  The only way to get ahead in business is through your connections, so a clerk’s most important job was meeting people.  Peter did meet people, at dinners with clients or at Happy Hour on Fridays.  Unfortunately, these events typically involved free drinks and old bombasts like Wachowsky, who eclipsed lesser personalities like a heavy metal concert next to a poetry recital, so he couldn’t be sure how many of the people he met remembered him.

Mostly he interacted with his fellow clerks, and he didn’t even know them that well.  They carpooled every day, but it wasn’t the best opportunity to strike up a conversation.  Driving in downtown Crescenton during rush hour is a harrowing experience, comparable to skiing a double black diamond course on a mountain made of pure ice, without skis.  It requires full concentration.  Other than that, his main opportunity to get to know them was in the regular baseball tournaments, and baseball wasn’t Peter’s game.  He didn’t like to lose, and he especially didn’t like to lose when the bet was that you had to buy the winner’s lunch.  Peter couldn’t even afford one Surf ‘n’ Turf Special; two was out of the question.

To be fair, he had only been doing the job for two weeks.  Presumably any hidden meaning would not reveal itself until he had been there for at least a month.  Still, he felt unsatisfied.  And on this particular day, he chose to voice his dissatisfaction to the empty Clerk Cage: “I feel like there’s something missing from my life.”

There was one person in the city of Crescenton who would have been overjoyed to hear those words.  Unfortunately, whatever other fantastic talents she may have possessed, being able to understand softly spoken phrases from three miles away and through layers and layers of concrete was not one of them.  And, after all she had been through, it was amazing that she still bothered to listen to anyone at all.

There have been some complaints recently about our newest Friday feature.  Rest assured that I am not simply jerking you around (at least, not intentionally).  There are, so far, two separate storylines, with two separate sets of characters.  They are, however, not entirely unrelated; both take place in the city of Crescenton and its surrounding suburbs, which make up Laragheny County, Ohio.  They may be thought of as two patches, largely discontiguous up to this point, but perhaps some day to be woven together.  As my sewing skills are not the greatest, those of you out there who are expert quilters will have to bear with me.

It seems likely that some of the confusion may be due to the occasionally inelegant way in which I have chosen to divide the stories (story?) up between different weeks.  As a solution, I offer a new page (listed above as “WSPS”) which contains all the entries so far, for those who would like to get caught up and for those who would like to see if they can guess where this is going.

But a few of them had a soft spot for the clerks, possibly because they too spent much of their time sipping mixed drinks at the Lime or sampling seasonal ales at the Danny Boy, so every once in a while something trickled down.  “It’s just a proofread for Victorino,” Peter explained, holding up a gold doubloon so encrusted in grime that only the most desperate treasure hunter would be excited to see it.

His coworker made a face.  “Yikes.  I don’t know what’s worse: his pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey-style punctuation or his misuse of ‘than’ and ‘then.’”

“At least it’s not a Wachowsky,” said the other clerk, having returned from the bathroom.  His tie was adjusted to the perfect balance of casualness and self-importance.  “Can you imagine proofing something he wrote?”

“Wachowsky’s aren’t that bad.”

“I don’t believe it.  Have you heard the man talk?  It’s like a machine gun mated with a thesaurus from the 19th century.”

“Wachowsky dictates everything to his secretary, and she’s been doing it for fifteen years, so she’s the world’s foremost Wachowsky-to-English translator.”

“That’s not the only thing she’s been doing for fifteen years, if you know what I mean.  You ready to go?”

“Yeah.  Keep fighting the good fight against Victorino’s grammar, Pete.”

“What else are us clerks good for, right?”

Slowly, the two competitors returned to “real life.”  Controllers clattered on the desk.  The TV winked out, and the brilliant blue and green of the ballpark were replaced by the dull brown and gray of a cubicle.  They were no longer ballplayers, nor were they spectators; they were summer law clerks, doing what summer law clerks do best: killing time before lunch.

They were well-prepared for the noonday meal, and had been for much of the morning.  Ties loosened?  Check.  Sport coats removed and ready to be slung over shoulders?  Check.  Boss consulted to make sure they wouldn’t miss anything?  Well . . . they had cell phones in case he really needed them.  It wasn’t like they were firefighters or some other profession that needed to leap into action at a moment’s notice.  All that remained was to decide on a destination.

“The Lime?”

“The Lime.  Hey Pete, we’re going to the Lime for lunch!  You wanna come?”

One cubicle over, Peter Hamlin was staring at another screen, a far less entertaining one.  “No thanks.  I’ve got to finish this.”

The first half of his response was not unexpected.  Peter did not dislike his coworkers, nor was he anti-social, nor was he opposed to a little drinking in the middle of the workday (not for a job like this, at any rate); he was opposed to the price.  Daily dining in downtown Crescenton, especially at places like the Lime of the Ancient Mariner, was beyond the financial capability of someone who had only a summer law clerk’s salary to support him.  Someone who, say, did not have parents who bought him a European sports car for his sixteenth birthday.  Someone who knew of trust funds only as distant, abstract concepts, in the same way that a Siberian may have heard of “summer.”  Not that he was bitter.

The second half of his answer, however, was positively startling.  His colleague regarded him with a face that was three parts shock to one part pity, well-stirred.  “You have work to do?” he asked, as if work were buried pirate treasure or the Loch Ness Monster.  Admittedly, buried pirate treasure is rarer than work for the 12th floor at Huston and Thomas (often referred to as the “Clerk Cage.”)  On the other hand, people actually go looking for buried treasure, so the two end up being found about equally frequently.

Peter had not had any delusions about standing in front of a jury and arguing a case as a mere summer clerk.  He had, however, been under the mistaken impression that he would spend his time doing research and other inglorious but necessary tasks.  The problem was that Huston and Thomas determined annual bonuses by how many hours its employees billed, so the regular associates were reluctant to pass on even the more menial assignments.  There were the bigwig partners, of course, for whom bonuses meant little, but they were never given the menial assignments in the first place.  Their primary duty seemed to be going out to lunch, work that was difficult to delegate.

Day 229:

“Two outs, runners on first and third.  Parr coming to the plate.”

“Rivers has thrown thirty pitches already this inning.  Does he have one more out in him?”

“No one warming up in the bullpen.  That’s showing confidence in your closer.”

“Here’s the pitch—”

DOINK

“Easy out.”

“Hang on . . . this could be trouble.”

“The wind’s carrying it out!  Castillo’s not going to be able to catch up!”

“Oh you have got to be kidding me.”

“Johnson, playing a deep right field, charges—”

“C’mon, c’mon.”

“Runners off at the crack of the bat.  Rogers has already crossed home plate, and the speedy Ricardo rounding third—”

“C’mon!”

“Johnson dives . . . AND MAKES A SPECTACULAR CATCH!”

“Yes!”

“Unbelievable.  No way Johnson gets to that ball in real life.”

Dizzy, as satisfied as a director can be with the performance of a mere human actor—when will they perfect android technology?—emerged from behind the camera once more.  She nodded to her brother, pumped the keys on her well-worn trumpet, coasted easily through a couple blues scales, and charged straight into her audition piece.

Peter had his own audition to go to, and an important one at that.  Of the dozen or so law firms to which he had applied, Huston and Thomas was the only one that had called him back.  Crescenton had no shortage of law students looking to get their names out there, and a lot of them had fathers who “knew a guy,” so competition was fierce.  But when he heard his sister start to play, he plopped right back down on the old couch to listen.

This was yet another reason why he had trouble understanding the need for an introduction: whatever her personality might have been, he didn’t see how anyone could deny his sister’s talent.  Though he would never admit it, her playing always moved him deeply, and it takes a lot to pluck the heartstrings of a man who decided he wanted to be a lawyer at age ten.

Just as she avoided the cheap thrill of the four-letter word in her speech, her music did not rely on the simple attention-grabbers.  There were no blaring fanfares, no blindingly fast technical riffs (not that her technique was lacking); Dizzy’s specialty was smooth lyrical passages that carried the human soul as irresistibly as a river in flood season.  One moment he was almost choking up, and the next he was grinning inanely, and if you asked him why he could only say that it was all in the music.

But perhaps there was another reason.  Maybe listening to his sister play called up old memories, evoked nostalgia for . . . but that part of his life was behind him, and it was all for the better, probably.

Of course, it was only after she finished that they discovered that Dizzy, unaware that the camera had continued to record while she introduced her brother, turned it off when she meant to turn it back on.  This discovery led to a thorough examination of the camcorder, a veritable tempest of 100% original profanity, and a repetition of everything they had thought they accomplished.  The delay did not make Peter late for his interview, but, luckily for him, it did keep him from arriving until just before it started.  Sometimes all the preparation in the world is no match for a good old-fashioned adrenaline rush.

“Hi.  I’m Pete, and this is my sister . . . okay, you’re going to have to give me a minute.  Our mother named her Louisa, but then halfway through her life she suddenly decided that she hated that name, and she started insisting that we call her Miley.”

“After Miles Davis,” the off-camera voice noted, as if this was a sore point.

“Right.  But then a few years later that Hannah Montana show became popular, and she decided she didn’t want to be Miley anymore.”

“Can you blame me?”

“So she changed her name again, this time to Dizzy, because she falls down a lot.”

“It is an homage to Dizzy Gillespie.”  It would not, however, be unfair to say that Dizzy was not a skilled athlete, or even a skilled walker, nor would it be incorrect to add that even an Olympic gymnast might have trouble balancing with that much hair.

“Yeah, and I’m sure he got the nickname by being a paragon of grace and coordination.  But enough about him.  My sister is the only member of our family for at least three generations to fail a class in high school.”

“Not bad.  No one likes an overachiever.”

“She despises machines, or they despise her; we’ve never been able to figure out which.  Either way, it’s not a healthy relationship.  Maybe things would go better if she used the normal method for dealing with computers or cars or calculators that don’t work, but she won’t.  My sister refuses to swear.”

“It is because—”

“Yes, yes, we’ve all heard the ‘because.’  The common swear word has been overused to the point where it has lost all meaning.”

“Exactly.  If I’m going to curse something, I’ll use words that have plenty of meaning.”

He could have argued, as he had many times before, that a sharp, senseless expression of pure frustration is precisely what is called for in some situations, but he was running out of steam.  The annoyed feeling that had driven him to overcome his camera frigidity was fading fast.

“I could go on about her obsessions, compulsions, and neuroses, but someone told me you were looking for musicians, not mental patients.  So from here on I’ll let her introduce herself.”

At first he let the abuse slide, channeling the Buddha as he sank slowly into the creaky old couch.  As the slander went on, though, he felt more need to interject.

If it was the director’s intent to motivate her actor by lighting a fire under him, she was doing a good job.

“He used to pretend he was allergic to foods he didn’t like so he wouldn’t have to eat them.”

“That was years ago.”

“And it took you years to figure out that you couldn’t have anything that had those foods as ingredients, either.  Too bad you can’t be allergic to cake and eat it too.  What else . . .?  His favorite movies are Disney films and chick flicks.”

“The Princess Bride is not a chick flick.”

“But Love Actually?  What’s that?”

“It’s British.  It’s . . . different.  And you’re worse.  You refuse to watch anything other than indie films.”

“Independent cinema is the only true cinema.”  (As has already been pointed out, this isn’t true, but some people never listen.)  “Only outside the system are you free to make movies about real emotions, real people.  All Hollywood cares about is appealing to key demographics.  And speaking of appealing . . . my brother’s last girlfriend—”

The tiger was finally roused.  “I think I get the picture,” he said, rising from the couch and stepping back into the line of fire.  His sister returned to her position behind the camera and eyed him warily—had she gone too far?  “Let’s get rolling.”  Thankfully he was unaware that the camera had been rolling the entire time.

Peter, the skillful compromiser, removed his jacket, draped it gently over the back of the couch, and loosened his tie.  “What’s the sample?”

“Simple.  I’m going to introduce you.”  The girl spun to face the still-rolling camera that she didn’t know was still rolling.  Even from the front her most notable feature was the monstrous quantity of hair.  It overshadowed her small frame like a poodle standing over a chihuahua.  Were you to get lost in that hair, you would have to hope that you brought string or bread crumbs; otherwise you were never going to get out.

He eagerly waited for his sister to succumb to the same stupefying power of the camera lens, but it didn’t happen.  And here’s why: though they both had a lot of experience putting their talents on display in public, their styles were completely different.  Peter was an orator; when speaking, even when debating, it was all one-way.  There was no interaction between talker and listener.  He could give the same speech in an empty room that he could on the floor of the House of Representatives.

But his sister was a performer.  Music is not unidirectional—it bounces of the walls, it echoes, it reverberates.  The audience was as much a part of her playing as her trumpet or her lungs.  So when the camera drove home the fact that her performance had a potentially limitless audience, it didn’t faze her as it did her brother.

“Hi.  This is my brother Pete.  He’s all dressed up because he’s applying to be a summer secretary—”

“Law clerk.”

“—at some big firm downtown.  He recently renewed his driver’s license even though he hasn’t driven a car since he was eighteen.  He was on the golf team in high school.  No joke: golf.”

His sister’s “interesting tidbits”—some might have called them accusations—were intended to be insulting, but that did not make them any less true.  The first was easy enough to explain: the driver’s license was an all but indispensible form of ID, and the car was an expensive, unnecessary (at least where he lived) hassle.  As for the golf team, well, it hadn’t been his first choice.  He tried out for basketball and soccer also, and they offered him a spot . . . on the junior varsity teams.  Peter wasn’t interested in playing anything he couldn’t excel at.