Week 01 Day 05 - Henry finished

George sat at his desk. His thoughts were scramble; there was no point in starting any work. Every thirty seconds he checked the periphery of his office, half expecting to see a hulking figure, covered in shadows, trudging down the hallway swinging a defective surge protector over his head. When someone finally did enter the hallway George was relieved to see it was Bess and not Henry. Bess checked the list and pile of discarded surge protectors occupying the hallway; once she had returned to her office George approached her.

How'd it go?

Good, I got everyone in pump the stations, plus the electricians. I also ran into Katie, there was one office where she couldn't reach the outlet. We're going to have to get some of the field guys to come in and move the desk.

Yeah, I had one like that too; I think it was Donald's office. I wrote it down somewhere.

Ok, so we'll do them both on the same day. Other than that did you have any issues?

No, I guess not. I met Henry.

Henry?

Yeah, Henry "I work in the basement like a total creep" Henry.

Really? He's supposed to be working nights only. How was that?

It was terrifying to be quite honest.

I bet, did he threaten to murder you? That's been his go-to recently.

Yeah I'm pretty sure he did. He told me he wanted to show me his "dark corners."

That's gross.

Yeah, it's really gross.

Well, I'm sorry about that, I would not have sent you down there if I thought there was even a remote chance of you meeting him. I should have at least explained the situation, but Henry's not exactly something we're proud of. It's just one of those things that gets out of hand and over time no one really does anything about it, until there's nothing you can do about it. I mean, you know how hard it is to fire someone from the city, especially someone that has any sort of mental issue, which Henry's already claimed.

So they just put him in the basement?

No one could get any work done. No one wanted to ride in a truck with him, let alone trusted him to drive one. He couldn't work in a communal space like the front office, or the shared cubicles, and his position doesn't warrant one of his own. We tried letting him go once, and about a month later he showed up at HR with a letter from his lawyer describing his mental ailments and how he’s been discriminated against. Since then HR won't touch him. And, on top of all of that, he's never actually done anything. He's just unpleasant. I mean, what did he tell you, that he wanted to show you his "dark corners?" What does that even mean?

Well in the moment it meant, "I'm going to bash your head in," but I get your point.

The problem is not that Henry is handicapped, it’s that he's not handicapped enough. He's just barely able to feign stability, so he gets overlooked, or pushed to the back of the line, however you want to phrase it, he's viewed as a non-priority. It's like picking fruit at the supermarket: you look for the best apples, the ones with the least damage. If you see an apple that's rotten or been dropped or squashed, you let someone know and that apple gets taken out of the bunch, or cleaned up, whatever. That may not be the most sensitive comparison, but I think you get the point, that apple gets immediate attention. The problem is that Henry is neither of those. Henry’s the apple you pick up because it looks good initially, but when you turn it around you find a huge bruise. And what do you do with those apples? You put them back on the display for someone else to deal with.

I see your point.

Anyway, I wouldn't worry about it, like I said Henry's relatively harmless, and he's supposed to be working night shifts, so it's highly unlikely you'll run into him again.

Yeah, it's not a big deal, just a little weird.

Trust me George, I understand.

George left Bess's office and walked to the men's bathroom. Despite the reassuring words George could not totally shake the agitation he'd felt since the encounter with Henry. It was as if someone was just around the corner, watching him. George washed his hands and splashed some cold water on his face. His watch read four o'clock, which was the first truly comforting moment of his day. Only one hour left until the weekend. He walked back to his office with an improved spirit. When George passed Bess’s office he noticed that she had already stepped out again. George entered his office and pulled his desk chair out from behind the computer. Before he could sit down though he saw placed in the middle of the seat a surge protector, caked in dust, its electrical wires stretched and frayed at both ends. George picked up the unit and wiped the front clean to reveal a piece of masking tape with the word HENRY written on it.

Week 01 Day 04 - Henry continued

Richard stood tall at the edge of the fluorescent spotlight with his right hand extended toward George. Long, hard shadows were cast over his entire person, with only his big, meaty outstretched hand completely exposed. Even at this distance George could tell it was covered with callouses. He wore a towel around his neck and peripheral light from the office refracted in a hundred directions off his damp and disheveled hair. George kept his distance.

Yeah, George Blizzard, I work with Bess, I was just switching out your surge protector; I don't know if you got the email, but they were recalled. Did you say your name was Richard Brown?

I've had that same one for probably the last ten years, hasn't done me wrong yet. Hell, even if the damned thing stopped working it’s not like I use the computer much anyway, I'd probably be better off without it.

Well apparently certain model numbers were unexpectedly catching fire. It's just a precaution. I thought you didn't work here anymore; Bess told me that you were experiencing some pretty bad migraines, and just kind of disappeared. I was actually looking for Henry.

Richard adjusted his posture. He seized both ends of the towel in his left hand, placed his right hand on his hip, and cocked his head back slightly.

I'm Henry.

You're Henry? So, you're not Richard?

Nah that was just a joke.

Ok. Kind of a weird joke. What would you like me to do with this surge protector, I could install it for you, but I feel like you've probably got a better understanding than I do of how to get to the old one.

I'll take care of it Mr. Blizzard, just set the new one on my desk right there.

There's no hurry to get them switched out, but when you do just make sure to give the old one back, we're holding on to them for now.

Sounds good Mr. Blizzard. Hey, how about I show you around my office? Got the whole place to myself down here. Some really nice dark corners, no one to interrupt.

I've got to get back to work actually, a couple more surge protectors to swap out before the day is over.

George positioned the replacement surge protector on Henry’s desk and proceeded to the stairs. He was less concerned with lying to Henry about his remaining workload than he was worried about getting an intelligible sentence out of his mouth. George crossed the passage of darkness between the edge of light where Henry still stood and the over exposed staircase as calmly as possible. George took the stairs two at time. When he reached the staircase platform Henry called out:

Mr. Blizzard, you never told me where your office was.

You can just bring it to Bess’s office; she’ll take care of it.

If it's all the same, I'd like to return it to you Mr. Blizzard. That's ok, I'll find you.

George opened the door and didn’t stop moving until he was back at his desk.

Week 01 Day 03 - Henry continued

George crossed the concave threshold of the locker room floor. A foot away from the door he slipped on a small puddle of water, noticing afterwards that there was a slight trail of water coming from the last shower stall. He reached the door, placed his hand on the lever-style handle, turned and pulled. Behind the door was the same cinder block walls that served as the foundation for the rest of Public Utilities, except these weren't painted or sanded. They were raw: gray and coarse. The stairs leading down were narrow, affording only enough space for one and a half people. The florescent lights above were already on, but George looked for a light switch anyway. When he couldn't find one, George assumed the lights were tied into the building's main lighting rig and ran on a set schedule.

When George reached the bottom of the stairs the entire basement opened up. There were no walls in sight, and the only other structure besides support pillars was a single cubicle, the same used throughout all departments, illuminated by a pair of fluorescents. The cubicle consisted of three six feet wide by six feet tall partitions covered with gray fabric, and lined with black trim. The overhead lights created a spotlight irradiating everything inside of the cubicle, but leaving the surrounding space pitch black. The whole scene was only a light flicker away from potboiler horror movie set.

Hello?

Henry, hello?

The basement appeared to be unending, potentially spanning the entire square footage of Public Utilities, but because of the lack of lighting George couldn't tell. He was again left standing, not sure of what to do next, when he suddenly remembered the surge protector in his hand. He entered the cubicle, quickly taking stock of its surroundings, or lack thereof. What was surprising to George about the workstation was not the lack of personal belongings, but the overall cleanliness of the area. It's not what he expected from an exiled to the basement office space. The more George looked around the more he became uncomfortable. The cubicle began to look staged, like Hollywood's idea of a cubicle. It was a cubicle created to say, "hey, nothing to see here, just your average workplace cubicle, look at this picture of my kids, they're not my real kids, but they could be."

George's nervous curiosity had turned into an intense desire to leave as quickly as possible. He set about switching the surge protectors, which given the lack of electronics present in the office shouldn't take long. George pushed Henry's rolling chair out from behind the desk and crouched down to look for the power strip. It wasn't immediately accessible, but he did see the power cord for the monitor. It ran behind a file cabinet used to support one side of the desktop. George got on his hands and knees, ducked his head under the desk and began following the power cord with his right hand behind the file cabinet. 

If you find anything valuable back there we're splitting it fifty-fifty.

The awkward joke came from behind George's back, about twenty feet away, and sounded more like a threat than an ice breaker. The words "fifty-fifty" were echoing throughout the empty basement as George retracted his arm from the crevice, crab walked from under the desk and stood up.

You're George right? My name's Richard, Richard Brown.

Week 01 Day 02 - Henry continued

George was unaware of a basement in the Public Utilities building. He maintained the databases for the sewer pump stations and didn't have much experience in the water distribution area; opting instead to familiarize himself with the pump station supervisors and electricians. George stared at the drawing for minutes, trying to visualize everyone he'd met from the past month and cross-reference that with the name Henry, but nothing clicked.

Hey, Bess.

George called out from behind his desk, somewhat unintentionally. When there was no response he stood up, still trying to place the exact location of the handdrawn stairs, and walked out of his office and into the hallway.

Hey, Bess. Does water distribution have a basement?

Bess was gone, already on assignment replacing surge protectors. George stood in the hallway for a minute and looked at the white cinder block walls. He thought about the construction of the building, the structure of the cinder block walls. He began to imagine the unfinished basement Henry worked in. The same walls except instead of painted white, left raw. Coarse, pock-marked cement from floor to ceiling. George found the two boxes of surge protectors and the list Bess had written. He picked it up, scanned it quickly, but found no Henry. He put the list down, went into Bess's office, and found a map tacked to her cork board. No Henry there either. All rooms were numbered sequentially according to department and location, but no Henry, no basement, no stairs; not in water distribution, not in the sewer pump stations, and not in the control center. George headed back into his office and double checked the map Bess had handed to him. Henry was still there. Henry with one green dot. Henry with one green dot down a flight of stairs.

George didn't want to be caught having done nothing when Bess got back, so he tabled Henry, shoved the map in his back pocket, grabbed a pen, his keys, and security badge, and loaded up with four new surge protectors: three being carried in his left hand, with the fourth tucked under the same arm. He exited the hallway and headed towards the always-locked door that separated the administrative offices from the operations offices. He held his badge against the mounted sensor to the left of the door, triggering a beep and retracting a lock. George pulled the door open and quickly stepped through.

Being midday, most of the offices were empty, with the occupants at lunch, or in the field. These were the easiest to change out. George could take his time, he didn't have to answer any questions, or make awkward small talk while wrestling with seven different electrical cords knotted together and caked with dust. Offices that weren't empty were typically filled with two kinds of occupants: ones that were willing to help, would do the replacement themselves, or just took a break and left, and ones who were jaded, entitled and goddamnit if they're not going to sit right there and make sure you unplug and plug everything in the right order I don't understand why the city wastes money on shitty products anyways and don't turn off the computer cause I'm working on something important, which typically meant watching a video on youtube. When it comes to technology people are easily intimidated. Changing out a power strip is common sense, but when a computer is plugged into that power strip the equation changes for a lot of people. 

George walked back to the bench with a handful of recalled surge protectors in his hand. He and Bess had somehow managed to avoid each other throughout the whole process, although judging by the list of names George could tell Bess had been coming back and Bess could tell the same of George. George pulled out his map and scanned all the green dots, double checking for tick marks indicating completion. The only one left was Henry, and George wasn't entirely convinced he wasn't just a scribbled note for an unrelated service request at this point. Regardless, George examined the hallway closest to where the cipher had been placed, it contained a series of offices at one end, which George had already visited, the water testing lab occupied the other end, and in the middle sat a men's locker room. George was somewhat familiar with the lab having helped the inspectors unjam their printer once and move furniture another time; he knew there was only two doors: the one from the hallway, and the one leading outside. That left only the locker room, which admittedly, George had never been too, because he never needed to, and a casual stroll through the men's locker room may have seemed a bit odd. George grabbed a single surge protector and head for the locker room.

The locker room door read simply: Men's Locker. Not wanting to be caught off guard George steeled his nerves, looked right then left, and started to take a deep breath in, when he noticed a figure move towards the lab door. Caught off-guard, and not wanting to look like a weirdo staring at the men's locker room door, George high-stepped clownishly, emitting a slight yelp, and opened the locker room door. He was immediately greeted by a half wall of lockers, a single path was enclosed on all sides by lockers and split in half by five foot long benches. George weaved in and out of the benches as he made his way towards the end of the lockers. After four passes the lockers opened up to a bathroom area. The left wall provided a series of four showers with their beige curtains accordioned open. The right wall supported two enclosed stalls next to a lone countertop set with two sinks and a mirror. However George was focused on the back wall which held only one feature: a pale-blue, steel door with nickel plated lever-style handle. Taped to the middle of the door was a sign that read: WATCH YOUR STEP.

Week 01 Day 01 - Henry

George shifted the car's transmission from drive to reverse, palmed the headrest of the passenger seat, turned his head clockwise from twelve to four, and backed his car into the farthest possible parking space from the entrance of the Public Utilities building. George reached for the ignition as Dylan, Danko, and Manuel reached the apex of Goin' to Acapulco; he held his hand in place as "goin' to have some fun, yeah!" played from the car's speakers. With a quick twist of his wrist the keys were free and the car's interior was silent.

George spent the majority of his day sitting at a desk in a windowless office staring at a computer screen. He welcomed any physical activity he could get. The desire was manifested in walks through and around the sprawling, newly-renovated, building, frequent trips to the bathroom or vending machines, general loitering, and parking as far away from the entrance as possible. As George navigated through the parking lot he began to plan his routes through the 50,000 square foot building. 

The Public Utilities building was deceptively large. A mediocre building on the outside, one that goes unnoticed as you speed by at 55mph, but once inside you realize just how overwhelmingly big it is. This is due primarily to the building being one story and not very wide, but what it lacks in width it more than quadruples in depth. The building feels like it goes on for miles with each door leading to a corridor that leads to another set of doors that leads to even more corridors. Some doors reveal offices, other server farms or telecommunication hubs, storm shelters, conference rooms, open cubicles, locker rooms, kitchens, store rooms, and control centers.

George's office was sandwiched between his bosses office and the large conference room at the end of the hallway. It required a minimum of three turns to get to from any of the twelve outside entrances to the building. George interviewed for the position in the large conference room and had walked by the office twice. He assumed it was some sort of closet as any nameplate or room number previously assigned to the room had been taken down. Until recently the office had been occupied by a man named Richard Brown who stopped showing up to work after suffering from severe headaches for consecutive weeks. The corridor displayed no decorations aside from the blue and white nameplates with matching room numbers. The only object besides the three metal doors was a single bench sitting opposite the two offices. As George turned into the hallway he noticed two unopened boxes sitting on the bench and that his boss's door was open, so he poked his head in.

Good morning.

Good morning, how was your weekend?

Oh, it was good, too short you know, how was yours?

It always is. Mine was good too, relaxing, I tried to do as little as possible. I don't know if you noticed, but the surge protectors came in.

Ah, so that's what those are.

Yeah, I'm working on a map right now. Me, you, and Katie will split them up, so we can get it done quicker.

Ok, sounds good, just let me know.

Two weeks ago the office manager sent out an email to all of Public Utilities that informed of a recall on surge protectors. George and Bess, being the only two "technology" people in the office, were tasked with identifying the defective units and replacing them. George unlocked his door and pushed it open with the toe of his foot when he heard Bess leave her office, presumably to make copies of the map she had divvied up. Bess had been working for Public Utilities for over 20 years and was able to look at a map of the building and tell you how many surge protectors/computers/desks/keyboards/dirty posters/etc. where in each room from memory alone, the map was for George who was still learning the layout of the building, and Katie who had been confined to the control center for four years until she earned a promotion last year. George had just finished booting up his computer when Bess returned with the maps.

Here are the maps. I figured Katie could get the control center and the sewer collection offices around it. That leaves the sewer pump station offices and water distribution. Do you have a preference?

I'll take water distribution.

Ok, so I'll grab the sewer pump station offices. I've also made a list of all the offices that need replacements. We'll leave the boxes here and when you're done you can come back to grab some more and mark off the ones you've replaced. You can put the old defective ones in the box of the replacement. We'll just set them to the side until we figure out what to do with them.

Ok.

George began studying the map as he walked back into his office, excited at the possibility of spending a significant amount of time outside of it, especially in an area he hadn't thoroughly explored. He laid the map flat on his desk and ran the palm of his hands over it from the center out, smoothing any imperfections. Sure enough Bess had marked off three different sectors and located each recalled surge protector. The water distribution sector had been marked with green highlighter. George clearly had the lion's share of work to do, which was fine with him. George studied the map, ignoring the offices with no marks and noting the rooms with one or two green dots: B101, B105, B110-114, and so on. When he reached the top of the map George noticed something he hadn't seen initially: instead of a numbered office with a calculated green dot, there was a crudely drawn sketch of stairs on the outside of the map's perimeter. To the right of the stairs was an arrow pointing down followed by the name Henry, and next to Henry was one green dot.