Meg Cabot - Big Boned

Simon Hague, the director of Wasser Hall, Fischer Hall’s bitterest rival (in my mind), due to its having its own pool in the basement (and also to its not bearing the unfortunate nickname of Death Dorm), lowers his hand and says, in his usual insufferable (to me, anyway) whine, “Um, fine, right. You say that. That no other members of the staff are in jeopardy. But what is anyone doing to ensure that? I mean, how do we know that none of us is next? How do we know other members of the staff aren’t being targeted?”

Several other hall directors nod their heads. Tom draws a small doodle of a man who looks a lot like Simon. Then he draws his head exploding.

“So,” he whispers conversationally. “How’s the man?”

I blink at him. “You mean Tad?”

He rolls his eyes. “No. I mean the one you actually like. Cooper. How’s he doing? I haven’t seen him in ages.”

“He’s fine,” I reply… a little bleakly, I’ll admit.

And, okay, I know we were at a meeting about my boss, whom I’d found dead a few hours earlier, and it was tragic (as we knew all too well), a man killed for no reason, and in his prime, and all of that.

But I need some dating advice. And who better to ask than a gay man?

“Tad asked me this morning if I could take time off this summer, then told me he has something he wants to ask me, when the time is right,” I whisper. “And I don’t think he’s talking about a share on the Jersey shore.”

Tom looks appropriately horrified.

“What?Are you serious? You’ve only been dating him, what, a month?”

“Try three,” I whisper back. “And you’re one to talk. Or are you not basically living with the New York College basketball coach?”

“That’s different.” Tom is indignant now. “We can’t get married. His parents don’t know he’s gay.”

“Now, Detective Canavan, from the Sixth Precinct, assures me,” Dr. Jessup says, looking a little bit shiny along the hairline beneath the fluorescent lights (the library’s original chandeliers were removed, along with its asbestos ductwork, and replaced with a dropped ceiling back in the seventies), “that he and his people are doing everything they can to find a quick resolution to this tragedy”—Tom waffles over whether or not to add a hatch mark, but then finally does so—“but he seems quite certain that no one is targeting members of the—”

“Why doesn’t someone just come out and say it?” The hall director of a building down on Wall Street, which the college had to purchase because there was no more room left on campus, stands up and glares at everyone else accusingly. “We all know who did this. And why! It was the GSC! Sebastian Blumenthal has to have been behind it! Let’s not kid ourselves!”

Bedlam ensues. Most people seem to be of the opinion that Sebastian had to have done it. This belief seems to be based solely on the fact that Sebastian has long hair and appears to bathe irregularly.

This causes Reverend Mark to observe that a certain savior could also be described this way, but that he never killed anyone.

This remark so delights Tom that he looks up toward the dropped ceiling and mouths,Thank you, God. Then he shouts, to no one in particular, “But what about his murse?”

Dr. Jessup wanders around the room, trying to get everyone to calm down by insisting that in this country, citizens—even long-haired, unwashed graduate students—are innocent until proven guilty, but to no avail. Several of the male assistant hall directors offer to go out and find Sebastian and beat him to a pulp (they, like me, are working on attaining their bachelor’s degrees, in criminal justice, hospitality management, and physical training, respectively). Finally Drs. Kilgore and Flynn attempt to achieve order by standing on their love seats and clapping their hands and shouting, “People, people! Please! People! We are professionals in higher education, not common street thugs!”

Of course this has no effect at all.

But Tom grabbing the fire extinguisher off the wall and setting off a burst of CO2 in the middle of the room certainly does. Since this is how he routinely busts up parties over at the frat building, where he lives and works, he does so with an almost comically bored expression on his face.

“Everybody,” he says, in a monotone. “Sit.”

It’s amazing how quickly everyone hurries to do so. Tom may know more Judy Garland songs by heart than anyone else in the room, but he’s also a six-foot-three, two-hundred-pound former Texas A&M linebacker. You don’t want to mess with him.

“People, please,” Dr. Jessup says, now that Tom has restored order. “Let’s try to remember where we are… and who we are. When the police have the evidence they need in order to make an arrest, they will. In the meantime, please. Let’s not make things worse by rushing to conclusions and pointing fingers where there’s no conclusive proof.”

Seriously.

I wonder, though, if I ought to warn Sarah to say something to Sebastian after all. The kid really should be laying low, considering what I’ve just witnessed. At least, if he knows what’s good for him.

“Mark,” Dr. Kilgore says, templing her fingers (a clear indication, Sarah would be quick to point out, that she thinks she’s superior to all of us). “I wonder… don’t you think now would be a good time to lead us all in a moment of silence in Owen’s memory?”

“Absolutely,” Reverend Mark says, leaping up from the arm of the love seat onto which he’d sunk once again, and then bowing his dark-haired head. Everyone in the room, including me, joins him.

“Oh, Heavenly Father,” the reverend intones, in his deep, pleasant voice. “We ask that You… ”

Tom, who’s lowered himself back down onto the carpet beside me, gives me a nudge. I glance at him from beneath my hair. “What? This is supposed to be a moment of silence, you know.”

“I know. Sorry. But I forgot. What is this?” he whispers. “Your third boss this year?”

“Yes,” I whisper back. “Shhhh.” His newfound snarkiness is a testament to how comfortable Tom feels in his new job—and romantic relationship.

And I’m happy for him. I really am.

But the snark can also be a little trying.

Tom is silent for another two seconds. Then:

“You should quit,” Tom whispers.

“I can’t quit,” I say. “I need the tuition remission. Not to mention the money. Shhh.”

Silence for another three seconds. Then:

“Don’t quit yet,” Tom whispers. “You should wait until you’ve had eight bosses. Then you should quit. And you should be like,Eight is enough! ”

The real horror doesn’t begin until after the routine announcements that follow the moment of silence. Tom will be acting as interim-interim hall director of Fischer Hall until a replacement interim hall director can be found. (I long to high-five him when I hear this, but as I feel all gazes turn in my direction when this is announced, settle for looking sadly at my shoes. I am, after all, the person who found my boss’s body this morning. None of them has to know I sort of hated the guy.)

The dean of student affairs, we are assured, will be sending around a mass e-mail acknowledging the passing of a staff member—though not referring to the tragic (hatch mark) nature of the death—and urging the entire college community to take advantage of counseling service’s grief workshops.

A memorial service—date and location to be announced—is being organized by Reverend Mark. Dr. Veatch’s soon-to-be-ex-wife and family (Owen had a family? People who actually liked him?) are on their way. In light of the tragedy (hatch mark), they will be accommodated without charge at Wasser Hall in the VIP guest suites (those bastards—by which I mean Wasser Hall, of course, not Dr. Veatch’s family. Seriously, though, they are such suck-ups over there. Like it’s not enough they have a pool—and no murders. They have to rub it in by having VIP guest suites, too?) normally reserved for visiting dignitaries and people on whom the college is bestowing honorary degrees (last year: Neil Diamond. The year before: Tippi Hedren).

That’s when Drs. Jessup, Kilgore, and Flynn make their last and final announcement… the one that strikes cold, hard terror to my—and, as his reaction illustrates, Tom’s—veins: that, because we’ve obviously been so torn apart by this tragedy (hatch mark), as well as the recent divisiveness involving the GSC, a team building exercise is in order.

Tom and I fling each other panicky looks. Team building exercise?

“Sweet Mother of God,” Tom breathes. “No. Anything but that.”

Unfortunately, Dr. Kilgore, with whom both Tom and I have had the misfortune of working closely in the past, overhears this. She sends us both a glance so sharp, it stings.

“Participation,” she says, her enunciation crisp, “is mandatory.”

But apparently not for college presidents, since President Allington abruptly excuses himself, saying he has an important appointment (with a scotch bottle, if he has any sense at all) and leaves. I expect Muffy Fowler to follow him out—she’s not part of housing staff, after all. But then I notice she’s managed to get her three-carat cocktail diamond snagged on the front of Reverend Mark’s sports jacket, and she decides, oh, what the heck, she might as well stay, since it might be a hoot.

Seriously. These are her exact words.

The team building exercise turns out to be even more horrific than either Tom or I could have anticipated. Dr. Flynn brings out a pile of unclaimed newspapers he’s snagged from behind the front desk downstairs. Then we’re told to divide into teams of five, and each team is handed a stack of newspapers. Tom and I instantly grasp one another, so we can be on one another’s team—“She’s been through so much already today, she really needs me,” Tom assures Dr. Kilgore, when she raises a skeptical eyebrow at this, since the goal of the exercise is to get to know staff members with whom we might not otherwise be well acquainted. Somehow, our other teammates end up being Reverend Mark, Muffy Fowler, and—because she assigns herself to our team, undoubtedly to keep an eye on Tom and me—Dr. Kilgore.