Chapter 15
Fifteen
Lou’s is hopping.
I was worried we’d picked the wrong venue for an underground union meeting, but Lola assured me everyone’s too busy living
their best lives to pay attention to us.
We’re lucky to snag a table, even if it is the obnoxious U-shaped booth near the entrance rather than my preferred booth in
the back. I’ve ended up pushed to the middle of the curved bench, Lola claiming the outer edge beside me, Naomi urging Efraín in before
she takes the other end, as far from me as possible, which is strange, but nowhere near as strange as how Efraín unpacks his
backpack before Max takes our order.
I watch him arrange enough loose binder paper to fill a dozen notebooks, not to mention three Decomposition Books, a stack
of probably-actually decomposing manila file folders, and his iPad.
Lola nudges my arm. “Order?”
After a decade as de facto hostess, waitress, and sous chef, Max knows my order—coffee, always, and the salmon melt on Saturdays—but I vocalize it anyway.
I worry my lip, wondering if I should prompt Efraín, but Lola’s already not-quite-whispering in my ear that she took care
of it.
Efraín looks so intense when he’s hyperfocused, oblivious to the world around him except for the ways in which he’s trying
to change it. A portrait of the activist as a young man with raging ADHD. He has his hair up in another too-cool-for-art-school
half bun, an art pencil tucked behind his ear, while he’s marking up a pamphlet with another pencil. He’s whispering under
his breath—rehearsing in a way I’ve never seen him do for school. Maybe he does this before the rousing, inspirational speeches
he must give at his rallies, but I wouldn’t know, would I?
Guilt roils under my skin. I turned down invitation after invitation before he stopped asking. Except he asked me to join
his union, and I’m here, aren’t I?
I’m even the one who texted the group chat late last night and suggested everyone make a social map in advance of our meeting.
Speaking of which . . .
“Does everyone have their social maps?”
Efraín looks up from his papers, surprised, like he forgot we were here at all. He’s still for a moment, before directing
his mild irritation at me.
“Sorry, did you want to give an inspirational speech first, or can we just get to work?” I ask, already reaching for my tablet.
“Yeah, you know I love your speeches, Ef, but I can’t be here all night,” Lola says. “I’ve got a date.”
“Fine,” Efraín relents. “Let’s get to work.”
Naomi pulls out a pad of graph paper, while Lola digs through her jumbo tote. “You know, homework is a bit much for baby socialist
fight club.”
“It seemed like the most efficient plan,” I say defensively.
To my surprise, Efraín backs me up. “We need to focus on recruitment before we organize another action. Social mapping is
the first step.”
Lola’s eyes flick between us. “Did you two read some secret job description for unionizing that Naomi and I didn’t get?”
“Not a job description, but a playbook,” Efraín says, shuffling through his tornado-swept clutter, reaching for a crumpled
packet with a familiar globe logo in the corner.
“He means the Industrial Workers of the World Handbook,” I clarify, just as Max shows up with our drinks.
Efraín blinks at the rhubarb iced tea Lola ordered for him, then frowns at me.
“You were right before—I did my own research,” I inform him before sipping my coffee.
Research felt like the least I could do. I sat out the first union action until management came for me, too, and yesterday’s
post-HR meltdown single-handedly delayed this meeting. I just wanted to prove I could do one thing right.
“Social mapping,” I explain, “is about charting the interpersonal topography of the workplace. Who’s friends with whom, who hates whose guts, and who’s whose ride-or-die.
It’s very Mean Girls cafeteria montage, but we have to identify cliques and social leaders.
If we can recruit those people, they’ll bring their
friends. If we alienate them, we’ll ostracize ourselves. So—” I must sound ridiculous. What do I know about spheres of influence
outside of Cold War history books?
“Catch the big fish to reel in the rest,” Lola says.
“Without poisoning the water supply,” Naomi adds.
“Or,” Efraín says, “any metaphor that doesn’t involve murdering wildlife for human consumption or—”
“Would you prefer the Cold War? Because I—”
“Okay, let’s just defund the metaphor police already,” Lola says. “Should I share my map first?”
After dinner, we decamp to the tiny attic-turned-studio-apartment upstairs for privacy. This studio is where Mom, Naomi, and
I first lived when we moved to Egan’s Creek, so I’m well-acquainted with its persistent moth problem. It’s been cluttered
with storage for years, boxes of Opa’s family keepsakes, Ma’s cassette collection, and other intimidating artifacts I dread
sorting through. But nothing here has ever intimidated me as much as this.
An organizer’s primary recruitment, a one-on-one is, theoretically, just a guided conversation.
Based on social mapping, organizers select targets and persuade them to join the union.
There are rules, best practices, and a paint-by-numbers instructional acronym.
But knowing what AEIOU stands for will only get you so far unless you practice.
Now Efraín’s got that let’s-go-storm-the-castle-and-guillotine-everyone-in-it look in his eyes, and I’m a dead man.
Over on the orange corduroy couch, Lola and Naomi look like they want to make popcorn.
Efraín and I scoot two screeching chairs across from each other in an ominous parody of those gut-scraping performing art
school exercises that always end with someone crying or stabbing their scene partner with a pencil.
Efraín sits down across from me, pencil still tucked behind his ear. I need an antacid just imagining who’s going to end up
crying or stabbing. I flick my thigh with my thumb and forefinger.
Efraín’s looking at me. Really looking, with an intent I can’t read. “Pretend I asked you to coffee,” he says, low and insufferably calm.
“I pulled you aside after working the same counter and said we should hang out sometime.”
Although I am deeply skeptical of this roleplay’s verisimilitude, I play along. “So, we’re at Lou’s after work. The booth
in the back.”
“We have our drinks. We’re alone.”
“I still have no idea why you asked me to have coffee. You’re not even drinking coffee.”
“Elisha,” Efraín says, pointed but blunt all at once. “Do you know why I wanted to have coffee with you today?”
Right. Roleplay. Remember the script. “You wanted to hang out. Outside of work.”
“It’s hard to get to know someone at work.”
“You’ve known me since kindergarten.”
He doesn’t quite frown, but his eyebrows scrunch together. It’s the look he gets when he’s about to say something unbearably
obnoxious, intentionally inscrutable—something custom made to piss me off—about how, sure, he’s known me since kindergarten,
but he doesn’t really know me.
“You’re right,” he says, deceptively true neutral. “I’ve known you since kindergarten—that you’ve wanted to work at NSX since kindergarten.”
“I didn’t watch Nuclear Seasons until second grade.”
Efraín rolls his eyes, utterly unimpressed with my pedantry. “Didn’t you show up as Art Spector for Halloween that year, with
the bow tie and the glasses, and people kept asking if you were the eleventh Doctor?”
“Matt Smith didn’t wear glasses.”
“Yeah, I remember you giving the same five-minute lecture to every kid, parent, and teacher who asked.” He pauses. “Not Mr.
Delgado, though.”
“That’s because Mr. Delgado recognized me. He even recognized the bow tie as the one Art wears in ‘The Best Nanoseconds of
Our Lives.’ ” I smile, remembering our elementary school janitor. “Did you know he worked on the show when he first moved
here? Odd jobs around set—”
A whistle cracks through the air.
“I’d be all for this heartwarming homosocial bonding moment, but we’re on the clock,” Lola says. “You’re both failing this active listening thing real hard.”
This is what happens when you set two neurodivergent kids loose: conversational chaos, tangents galore, every detail a road
worth traveling.
But we’re not here to talk. We’re here to work. Or talk about work.
“Sorry,” I say. I know how this script goes. “I’ll shut up and let you . . . agitate me.”
Efraín’s just looking again. His eyes hold none of the sadistic glee I expected given blanket permission to provoke me. Maybe that’s the problem;
it’s not pigtail pulling without the chase.
All business, Efraín says, “You’ve wanted to work at NSX for years. How’s it living up to your expectations?”
Despite knowing this is literally the first question in the book, it stings, right at the corners of my eyes, because that’s
what Ma asked after my first day. Was it everything you dreamed it would be? There’s still only one socially acceptable response. “It’s fine.”
“Just fine?” Efraín asks, languorous, a glint in his eye. “This is your dream job, and ‘fine’ is all you have to say about
it? You, who could spend an hour describing the symbolism behind Art’s bow tie patterns?”
“This isn’t my dream job.” I used to think I wanted to be Art Spector, until I realized consulting sci-fi detective wasn’t a viable career path. “It’s just a summer job.”
“You wanted to work at NSX. This isn’t just a summer job for you, so why is it that all you have to say about it now is that it’s just ‘fine’?”
“For someone who doesn’t believe in the American legal system, you sure know how to cross-examine a hostile witness.”
“I’m just asking why you’re settling—” Efraín stops short. “No, sorry. I’m asking: What do you like about working at NSX? What would you change?”
“Wait, so when I don’t answer the way you like, you just revert to the most generic one-on-one questions imaginable?”