4. Metabolism Overview and Enzymes
METABOLISM OVERVIEW AND ENZYMES
*Samantha*
I spent the rest of the morning in a state of low-level dissociation, the kind where you run experiments and pipette reagents with the slow, sputtering detachment of a glitching DNA sequencer whose firmware is three updates behind.
Perhaps it was my lack of sleep, but every time I thought about Andreas’s offer to be my baby daddy, or his attempt at a hostile marriage takeover, or him in general, I spent no less than fifteen minutes staring into space and thinking about his face or his hands or his eyes, and reliving our moments together this morning before I caught myself.
Another side effect of Andreas’s unexpected visit was the reemergence of my burning hatred for his family.
I’d tried to forget, but the best I’d managed was letting go of my childhood in its entirety, like those years were a kite caught in a windstorm and the only way to be free was to let go of the string.
For some reason, I couldn’t seem to pick and choose which parts of my past to hold on to.
At eighteen, I’d decided to throw it all away and start afresh.
But now here I was, marinating in the injustice of it all, how they’d stolen my father’s company and ruined my family ...
Then I’d blink and come back to myself in the present. Basically, I’d never been more grateful for the monotonous rituals of the lab.
My research project—my baby, my nemesis, the thing keeping me from sleeping, socializing, or remembering to send good friends happy birthday texts—was bioremediation of ocean plastics via genetically modified microbes.
If you find that impressive, don’t. There are lots of scientists trying to do the exact same thing.
Basically, if I could convince the right microorganism to eat the right plastic, and not, say, eat the entire aquatic ecosystem along with it or excrete hazardous toxins as biowaste, we might be one step closer to saving the planet’s oceans before they became one giant floating landfill.
My day-to-day reality involved mutating a microbe that could, under strictly controlled conditions, dissolve polyethylene like it was fondue cheese.
Getting it to do so in an actual marine environment, without triggering a new bubonic plague, was the tricky part.
Today I was running a third (or maybe fourth, I’d lost count) pass at sequencing some candidate plasmids to see if yesterday’s late-night gamble with the CRISPR kit had stuck.
It had, in that the bacteria were very much alive and very much eating the control plastics at an alarming rate.
It hadn’t, in that every organism that I’d genetically modified was now a different, nightmarishly resistant superbug that would likely haunt my dreams for the rest of the semester.
This was why our entire floor had security—badge access and state-of-the-art cameras—and even the offices were off-limits to anyone who didn’t have a PhD in genetics, hope to have a PhD in genetics, collaborate with a PhD in genetics, or work for someone with a PhD in genetics.
I’d almost convinced myself that this latest failed attempt was merely another important datapoint in my research journey when a knock at the glass wall of my cubicle startled me into an upright posture.
Dr. James Nieminen stood there, perfect posture, perfect jawline, even his glasses were so clear and free of fingerprints I suspected he changed them out for a new pair daily.
Unlike most of the assistant professors, who either dressed in “I have tenure” cargo shorts or “I’m hip and relevant” hoodies, Nieminen wore business casual.
He was the only person I knew who could make a button-down shirt look like a tactical garment.
I forced a polite, if not particularly sincere, smile.
“Hey, Sam,” James said, lingering in the doorway. I didn’t miss the way his gaze moved down to my chest, then up. “You got a second?”
“Sure,” I said, even though I really didn’t.
And I didn’t know what he hoped to get a glimpse of by checking out the vicinity of my boobs.
I currently wore scrubs and a lab coat, having changed out of my T-shirt and jeans when I arrived.
Perhaps this was just a habit for him with all women. He never did this to men.
Nieminen leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, his stubby fingers gripping his elbows, and smiled the kind of smile you only saw on toothpaste commercials. “How’s the ocean plastic project going?”
“Swimmingly,” I deadpanned, then regretted the pun. “I’m making incremental progress. One day closer to creating an organism that will save the world, or at least delay the heat death of the oceans by a few fiscal quarters.”
He laughed a little too loudly. “That’s great, that’s great. I always say, if the world doesn’t appreciate the subtlety of your genetic engineering jokes, they deserve the microplastics.” He laughed again, even louder.
I nodded, even though ... what did that even mean?
James lingered, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “So, hey, I was just wondering, are you going to the department holiday party this year?”
It was the beginning of November. “The one in, like, December?”
“Yeah! It’s never too early to plan.” He ran a hand through his dark hair, the movement calculated for maximum effect to show off his bulging biceps in his short-sleeve shirt, but my attention affixed to his hand.
The palm was entirely too big for the size of his fingers.
“Last year was such a blast. I thought maybe we could go together.”
Blinking away from his disproportionate digits and up to his face, I floundered for an excuse.
I had nothing against James personally other than a mild sense of dislike. He was, objectively, smart and very good-looking, and he had the kind of research budget that made junior grad students swoon. But I’d never seen him be particularly kind to anyone unless he wanted something from them.
And, maybe this was me just being petty, but he’d interrupted my lab meeting last spring to debate the etymology of the word pseudogene in such a way that I’m pretty sure he expected me to remove my pants on the spot. The memory still left a bad taste in my mouth.
More importantly, James had a not-insignificant probability of being on my dissertation panel next year, and my entire academic future would be at his mercy for at least another twelve months.
Presently, I played it as cool as possible. “Oh, you know, I haven’t really thought that far ahead. December feels very theoretical to me right now.”
James grinned, undeterred. “I get that. You’re very focused. It’s what I admire about you. But you should come. Let loose a little. We’ll go together.” At the last minute, he lifted his hands. “Just as friends. No pressure.”
No pressure, I repeated in my head, feeling as if I’d heard the phrase at least one million times in my life. “I’ll think about it.”
He took a step inside, lowering his voice like he was about to share state secrets.
“You know, if you ever want to talk about your research, or anything really, my door is always open. Especially now that I finally got rid of my last postdoc. She was a total drama queen, you know? But you’re different than other women. You’re very mature.”
“Thanks,” I said, deserving of an Olympic medal for not cringing.
Ladies, beware men who tell you things like, “You’re different” or “You’re very mature.” If a man says you’re different from or more mature than other women, then he’s just insulted either all women or you. And neither makes him attractive.
He smiled again, showing all his teeth, and I wondered if he’d practiced that in the mirror. “Great! So, I’ll see you around, Sam.”
I nodded, saying nothing.
He left, and I exhaled a long-suffering sigh.
Returning to my notes, I did my best to concentrate, but my frustrations about Andreas’s visit and his evil family and the unfairness of my parents’ fates were now intermingled with the aftertaste of James’s cologne, which was some mix of spearmint and musk that lingered .
Actually, it loitered.
Less than five minutes passed before a familiar voice floated over the partition.
“Are you hiding from Dr. Nieminen?”
I spun in my chair to see Dmitry Bortnik, fellow grad student and unintentional expert in the art of the slow approach.
Dmitry was a year ahead of me, a Russian expatriate with high cheekbones and the kind of unhurried confidence that made him the natural enemy of all horny straight-male assistant professors.
“Not hiding,” I said. “Strategically waiting until he’s distracted by someone else’s pheromones.”
Dmitry snorted, then ducked into my cubicle, balancing a mug of something black and tarry with long, elegant fingers. “He talks about you all the time, you know. In the grad student lounge. Says you have ‘the most graceful pipetting hands’ he’s ever seen.”
“Gross,” I muttered, but I was also a tiny bit pleased. As a hand aficionado, I never turned down a compliment about my hands.
Okay. Fine. Yes. I have a hand kink. I admit it.
I’d always been a hand woman. Some women liked eyes, some butts, some biceps, still others forearms, smiles, thighs, or six-packs. Not me. I loved me some well-proportioned man-hands. The kind I could imagine on my body, the kind that could grab fistfuls of me without any part spilling over.
I also took ridiculously good care of my own hands and owned a paraffin wax machine because I couldn’t afford manicures but refused to have dry cuticles.
Dmitry grinned. “He’s not wrong, though. You have good hands. Very steady.”
“Stop.” I tried to play it off, waving his words away, but I blushed. Obviously, I’d never told Dmitry about my hand fetish, so these compliments were hitting a bullseye he didn’t know existed.
“Fine, fine.” He perched on my desk, ignoring the pile of ungraded quizzes I’d been using as a coaster. “You look terrible, by the way. Trouble sleeping?”