by Renee Hart
And it was all Tessa's fault.
* * *
“I don't understand,” Samson said after she explained the situation to him. “I thought you said you'd seen all those reports? All of the inspectors requesting further investigation, but with no followup?”
Tessa sat on Samson's couch, holding a mug of tea in her hands. He'd spiked the tea with a splash of liquor, and it was starting to help calm her down. “It turns out,” she said, “the Quality Assurance department uses a completely different filing system. They collect the reports my department enters into the main databases, then they maintain a separate database for their own reports. I found the file directories for that database, and it's filled with all kinds of reports that show the investigations they've conducted and the actions they undertook to correct the problems.”
“But what about the lady you spoke to?” Samson asked. “The one that said no one had followed up on her report. Did you say there were like three years of reports that this QA department had never followed up on?”
Tessa laughed, a wry smile on her face. “Oh, yes. There's three years of reports they never followed up on. Because my department has a three year backlog. Ironic, isn't it? Here I was thinking there was some grand conspiracy to keep things hidden, and it turns out it's just because my department can't keep up with the paperwork. All of the reports that we have entered, if there was a request for a followup investigation, they took care of it.”
“Oh.” Samson chewed on his lower lip, looking down at the ground. “Well. Damn.”
“Yup.” Tessa sighed. “I'm so sorry I got you involved in all of this. I had no idea what a mess it would turn out to be.”
“So, what do we do now?” Samson asked. “Talk to this reporter? Maybe explain to him that we were just chasing a wild goose?”
“I'm not sure that would even help.” Tessa threw herself back against the couch cushions. “If we try to convince him there's nothing to hide, he'd just think there's something to hide. And the more we make Dunham look guilty, the more likely it is that people will start losing their jobs.”
Samson sat next to her and patted her knee. She leaned her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes. “We'll figure something out,” Samson said.
“Are you sure?”
“No,” he said. “But it seemed like the thing to say.”
Tessa nuzzled against him, trying to banish her thoughts and her worries, at least for the moment. The only good part about this whole fiasco, she supposed, was that it had brought Samson and her closer together.
* * *
Over the next few days, Tessa tried to stick to her work and mind her own business. She couldn't think of any way to fix the problems she'd caused, so she was determined to do her best not to make anything worse. No more zany schemes, no more deception, and no more trying to poke her nose into things that clearly weren't any of her business.
The one thing she did keep doing was watching out for any new reports that were coming in from the Pennsylvania sorting facility. It would be easy to intercept them, since no one tended to look at new reports the day they came in. It was more than a week after her visit to the facility that the report she'd been fearing finally came in.
She brought it over to her desk, along with her normal stack of files awaiting data entry. She flipped through the pages, thinking at first that everything was fine. The report had been filed by Elizabeth O'Conner, the woman Tessa had spoken to on the phone. Everything Elizabeth had recorded looked perfectly normal. There were no notes about contamination, making it seem that Elizabeth's previous concerns had been unfounded. Which Tessa already knew, after the test results she'd gotten back from Gregory.
On the last page of the report, where the investigator listed their personal notes and comments, was where Tessa found something that set off alarms in her head. It was a note about the surprise visit to the facility, along with a complaint that Elizabeth hadn't been notified about the surprise inspection.
At the end, Elizabeth noted a rather personal grievance:
I would like to note that it was both discourteous and unprofessional for Mr. Morgan and his assistant to visit our facility without notifying me, considering how the results of any inspection reflect upon both me and my work. And considering I was the one who requested further investigation to begin with, I believe I deserved to be informed of what was happening. I will be requesting a review of appropriate company procedures through the Quality Assurance department, and filing a formal complaint with Human Resources.
Tessa buried her face against the pages, wishing she could just crawl under the reports and drown.
She was screwed. Her career was over. As soon as Elizabeth's grievances were filed, Mr. Morgan would find out that someone had impersonated him during the visit to the Pennsylvania facility. It would be traced back to Tessa, and she'd be fired.
She sat at her desk the rest of the day without doing any of her work. She just didn't see the point.
Chapter 11
That night, Tessa knelt in her garden, with her hands shoved into the loose, fertile soil. She'd forgotten to wear her gloves, and the black dirt stained her fingers and got stuck under her nails. She knelt there, unmoving, tears welling in her eyes. She couldn't think, couldn't focus. Even her garden didn't seem to be able to relieve her stress that day.
It was a chilly day, and no one else was in the garden. Though Tessa felt like there was someone watching her. She glanced over her shoulder, seeing no one. Until she looked into one of the apartment windows and saw her elderly neighbor, Mr. Jones, looking out at her. He often sat in his apartment and watched the gardeners, though since she was the only one out there, he was watching only her. There was a sad, sympathetic look in his eyes. Like he knew the pain she was feeling.
He raised a hand to her in a small wave. She pulled her hand from the dirt and waved back.
A few moments later, it started to rain. The water came down in a harsh downpour, soaking her almost instantly. She got up and hurried to her apartment, only to find the back door was locked.
“Damn.” She patted her jeans, searching for her keys. Then she remembered. In her emotional daze, she'd forgotten to take them out of her purse, which was sitting inside.
She tried her bedroom window, but of course it was also locked. She had a friend on the other side of town who had a spare key, but of course her cell phone was inside the apartment too, so she couldn't even call for help.
Tessa stood out there in the rain, her shoulder slumped, until her tears started to flow freely. They mixed with the rain on her cheeks, invisible against the storm. She couldn't get her thoughts to clear, and in that moment, nothing really seemed to matter anymore.
Then suddenly, the rain stopped falling on her head. The storm still raged around her, but no longer touched her. She looked up and saw a red umbrella being held over her head. The rain drops splattered against it and slid off, playing out a staccato rhythm in the night.
“Not a good night to be out in the weather.”
She turned around and saw Mr. Jones there, holding the umbrella, protecting her from the storm. “Lock yourself out?” he asked.
She nodded, wiping her face on the back of her damp sleeve. “I'm an idiot,” she said. “I left my keys inside, and...”
“Come on,” he said, taking her hand. “Let's get you inside and get you dry. You can use my phone if you like.”
“Thank you.” She let him lead her into his apartment, which was warm and cozy after the cold rain. The furniture was old and worn, most of it looking like mismatched pieces bought from yard sales or the Goodwill store. The lights were subdued, almost as if Mr. Jones were afraid to see himself in the light. Red cloths covered several of the lamps, giving the apartment the feeling of eternal dusk.
“Here,” Mr. Jones said, handing her a towel. “Make yourself at home. It's not often I have company.”
“Thank you, Mr. Jones. I really appreciate your help.” She wiped her hands on th
e towel, scrubbing off the rain and the dirt.
“Oh, call me Terry,” he said. “We're neighbors, after all.”
She gave him a grateful smile, though she didn't feel like she deserved his neighborly aid. She'd never spoken to him much, beyond the occasional chat while getting her mail.
She used Terry's phone to call her friend, then settled in to wait. It would be at least thirty minutes until her friend could get there, particularly with the storm. Terry made a pot of tea and set out a plate of gingersnaps.
“So,” Terry said as he settled into the recliner across from her, “you seem like a woman who has some troubles weighing her down.”
“Was it that obvious?” she asked with a wry laugh.
He smiled and blew on his tea to cool it off. “Well, after the life I've lived, I know a thing or two about troubles.”
Tessa hesitated, then decided to finally ask the question that she'd had on her mind since she first met him. “Is it true you were in jail?”
He nodded, a sad look in his eyes. “Thirty five years. Half of my life, wasted. All because of a stupid mistake.”
“Do you mind if I asked what happened?”
He got a distant look in his eyes, as if looking back across the long years. “I had a problem with drugs, back then. But the real problem was how I let that problem affect everything else.” He looked her in the eye. “You see, I let myself do a lot of stupid things, all because I couldn't face my real problem. I was arrested for armed robbery, and for accidentally shooting a man when the gun went off. I just thank God the poor fellow wasn't too seriously hurt.”
“Oh, wow.” Tessa looked down into her tea mug. “I can't imagine.”
“Most people can't.” He chuckled. “The thing of it was, I know now that if I'd made the right decision, admitted that I had a problem, I could have stopped things from spiraling out of control. I was deluded back then. Didn't want to admit that the drugs had a hold on me. I thought I was in control of them. That I could do whatever I wanted. And I ended up hurting people, and ruining my own life in the process.”
Tessa thought about the mistakes she'd made over the past few weeks. They paled in comparison to what Terry was describing, though there was one similarity. She hadn't wanted to admit that she was in over her head. One mistake had led to another, and now the consequences were starting to spiral out of control.
“How do you fix something like that?” she asked. “I mean, once you can see that it's all out of control, how do you stop it? It's not like you can go back and undo the things you've done.”
He looked at her, weighing her, and she was sure he knew she was really talking about her own problems. “The answer is a lot simpler than you realize. You just need to come clean. I thought I could cover up my problems. Hide from them. Take matters into my own hands. And I just kept making things worse. But if I'd gone to someone, to my friends, to my parents, and admitted that I had a problem, I could have gotten help.”
“But weren't you afraid of the consequences?”
“Sure I was.” He laughed, shaking his head. “I was afraid that I'd end up in jail. But guess what? I ended up worse off, with a longer sentence than I would have had for just the drugs. If I'd accepted my mistakes and been ready to face the music, instead of running from it, then yes, I would have suffered the consequences. But running from those consequences made things so much worse in the long run.”
Tessa hung her head. She knew that Terry was right. Maybe, she thought, she could minimize the damage if she just came clean. She might still lose her job. But if she could stop the situation from getting any more out of hand, then maybe she could protect the jobs of her coworkers.
“I know it sounds cliche,” Terry said, watching her carefully. “But honesty really is the best policy. Lies always catch up to you, in the end.”
Tessa set down her tea. She nodded, keeping her eyes lowered. “You're right. You're definitely right.”
When her friend arrived, Tessa thanked Terry for the tea, and for the company. “You should come out and join us sometime,” she said. “It'd be nice to see you out in the gardens. There's a couple of unclaimed plots, if you want one of your own.”
“Oh, I have my little garden,” he said, nodding out the window.
Tessa looked outside and followed his gaze. He was looking right at the Mystery Plot. “That...that one's yours?” She laughed, shaking her head. “We could never figure out who it belonged to! It's so beautiful. Why don't I ever see you tending it?”
He shrugged. “After so many years in isolation, I tend to get nervous around crowds. I go out early in the mornings, before the rest of you are up. Or check in on things at night. It's my way.”
“Well, if you ever change your mind,” Tessa said, “just know you've got a friend out there.”
She gave him a hug, then left his apartment, buried deep in thoughts about the things he'd said.
Chapter 12
Tessa knocked on Samson's door, rehearsing in her head what she was about to say. He answered wearing only a pair of sweatpants, his bare chest glistening with moisture and his hair damp. He was rubbing a towel along the back of his hair, sopping up the dampness from his pony tail. “Hey there,” he said, stepping back to invite her in. “What's up?”
“I think I need to confess.” She walked right past him and sat down on his couch, wringing her hands together.
“Okay.” He shut the door and came over to join her, sitting on the coffee table and taking her hands in his. When she kept fidgeting, he wrapped his hands gently around hers, holding them until she stopped trembling and settled down.
“What do you think?”
“I think it's your choice,” he said. “Do you want me to come with you? I'm a part of this, after all.”
“No,” she said. “No, the worst they can really do is fire me. You, they could possibly press charges against.”
“I'm willing to face that risk if it means supporting you,” he said. “I can't just stand aside and let you take all the blame.”
“But it was my idea.”
“And I helped you with it.” He reached up and caressed her cheek.
She closed her eyes and nuzzled her face against his hand. His touch, his support had meant the world to her while she worked through this crazy situation. But she knew she couldn't risk letting any of the consequences from this fall onto him.
“My mind's made up,” she said. “This was my idea, it was my mistake. And I'm going to go face the music.”
Samson sighed. She looked into his eyes, making sure he knew how serious she was. “All right,” he said. “But is there anything I can do?”
Tessa thought about what she was going to have to face. The likelihood of getting fired. The public humiliation. She imagined being paraded before a board of directors and told she had to explain herself. She wasn't sure she would be able to handle that.
“Just hold me,” she whispered.
Samson moved onto the couch with her and pulled her close against him. She closed her eyes and laid her head against his chest. He stroked her hair and held her tight. his warmth, the comfort of his touch, made her feel like maybe there was a chance that everything could be okay.
* * *
Tessa walked into the office Monday morning wearing her best suit, with her hair done up in a chignon knot. She felt more like she was dressed for a job interview than for the meeting that would end in her termination. But, she figured, if she was going to go down, she would go down in style.
She didn't even bother to go to her desk. She'd stop by later to get the few photographs she kept there, and her coffee mug. But to begin with, she would face her fate and do it with her chin held up high.
She walked right into Mr. Morgan's office and found him waiting there behind his desk. He looked up at her. “Ahh, Tessa. I'm glad you're here, I was about to call you in.”
She froze mid-step. Why had he been about to call her? Had he already discovered what she was about to confess?<
br />
She stepped over to the desk and sat down, her confidence wavering. “Yes?” she asked.
“There've been some leads in the situation from the Pennsylvania sorting facility.”
Her heart hammered in her throat. If he already knew, then confessing wouldn't help her. She'd hoped to take the high ground, with the possibility that maybe her honesty would dampen the consequences. But it seemed like it was too late.
“I wanted to get your take on this,” Mr. Morgan said, holding up some papers. “Since you were the one who first brought it to my attention. I'm thinking we might have been set up.”
“Set up?” She took the papers and looked them over. She recognized a few of them immediately. They were the falsified forms that she'd had Samson fill out, signing his forged “Jebediah P. Morgan” signature. Some of the other pages were printouts of emails, including some from people claiming to be environmental activists.
“I...I'm afraid I don't understand,” Tessa said. “What do these emails have to do with it?”
“The company gets ridiculous things emailed to us all the time.” He gestured to the papers. “Most of the time we just sent out form letter responses, unless a complaint has some greater amount of weight. Some of the more preposterous things we get are threats from environmental groups and wacko liberal hippies who claim we're destroying the environment.” He snorted and shook his head. “They threaten to sue, or to expose us as frauds, that sort of thing. Our official company policy is not to bother responding to such threats. They're completely baseless, and responding just encourages these people.”
“I'm still not following,” Tessa said.
“Read this one.” He reached across the desk and pulled out one page from the stack. Tessa took it and read it over. Her throat started to feel tight as she read it.
