David Wallace - Broom of the System

The other aforementioned identifying feature was the white skeleton of General Moses Cleaveland, which found itself in shallow repose in the cement of the sidewalk in front of the Bombardini Building, its outline clearly visible, of no little interest to passing pedestrians and the occasional foraging dog, the latter’s advances discouraged by a thin bit of electrified grillwork, the General’s rest thus largely untroubled save by the pole of a sign which jutted disrespectfully out of Cleaveland’s left eye socket, the sign itself referring to a hugely outlined parking space in front of the Building and reading: THIS SPACE RESERVED FOR NORMAN BOMBARDINI, WITH WHOM YOU DO NOT WANT TO MESS.

Frequent and Vigorous Publishing shared the Bombardini Building with the administrative facilities of the Bombardini Company, a firm involved in some vague genetic engineering enterprises about which Lenore in all honesty cared to know as little as possible. The Bombardini Company occupied most of the lower three floors and a single vertical line of offices up the six-story height of the Bombardini Building’s east side. Frequent and Vigorous took a vertical line of narrow space on the western side of the Building for three floors, then swelled out to take almost all the top three. The Frequent and Vigorous telephone switchboard, where Lenore worked, was in the western corner of the cavernous Bombardini Building lobby, across the huge back wall of which, cast through the giant windows in the front wall of the lobby, the Erieview shadow steadily and even measurably moved, eating the wall. Time could with reasonable accuracy be measured by the position of the shadow against the back wall, except when the black-and-white window-light flickered like a silent movie during the fickle shadow-period of mid-day.

Which it now was. Lenore was hideously late. She hadn’t been able to get through to Candy Mandible on the phone, either. The Shaker Heights Home’s phones were apparently on the fritz: F and V’s number had put Lenore in touch with Cleveland Towing.

“Frequent and Vigorous,” Candy Mandible was saying into the switchboard console phone. “Frequent and Vigorous,” she said. “No this is not Enrique’s House of Cheese. Shall I give you that number, even though it might not work? You’re welcome.”

“Candy God I’m so sorry, it was unavoidable, I couldn’t get through.” Lenore came back behind the counter and into the switchboard cubicle. The window high overhead flashed a cathedral spear of sun, then was dark.

“Lenore, you’re like three hours late. That’s just a little much.”

“My supervisor wouldn’t take it. I’d get fired if I pulled anything like what you guys pull,” Judith Prietht shot off between calls beeping at the Bombardini Company switchboard console a few feet away in the tiny cubicle.

Lenore put her purse by the Security phones. She came close to Candy Mandible. “I tried to call you. Mrs. Tissaw called me out of the shower at like nine-thirty because Schwartz had answered this call for me. I had to go to the nursing home right away.”

“Something’s wrong.”

“Yes.” Lenore saw that Judith Prietht’s ears were aprick. “Can I just talk to you later? Will you be home later on?”

“I’ll be off over at Allied at six,” Candy said. “I was supposed to be over there at freaking twelve — but it’s OK,” seeing Lenore’s expression. “Clint said he’d get somebody to cover for me as long as I wanted. Are you all right? Which one is it?”

“Lenore. ”

“She didn’t…?”

“It’s unclear .”

“Unclear?”

“My supervisor, you gotta have reasons for being late, and submit ‘em in advance, and they have to get signed by Mr. Bombardini,” Judith said amid beepings and rings. “But then we have a real business, we get real calls. Bombardini Company. Bombardini Company. One moment.”

“She’s being particularly pleasant today,” said Lenore. Candy made a strangle-motion at Judith, then started to get her stuff together.

Their console sounded. Lenore got it. “Frequent and Vigorous,” she said. She listened and looked up at Candy. “Bambi’s Den of Discipline?” she said. “No, this is most definitely not Bambi’s Den of Discipline… Candy, do you have the number of a Bambi’s Den of Discipline?” Candy gave her the number but said it probably wouldn’t make any difference. Lenore recited the number and released.

“Bambi’s Den of Discipline?” she said. “That’s a new one. What do you mean there’s probably no difference?”

“I can’t figure it out, I don’t see nothing wrong,” a voice came from under the console counter, under Lenore’s chair, by her legs. Lenore looked down. There were big boots protruding from under the counter. They began to jiggle; a figure struggled to emerge. Lenore shot her chair back.

“Lenore, there’s line trouble that I guess started last night, Vem said,” Candy said. “This is Peter Abbott. He’s with Interactive Cable. They’re trying to fix the problem. ”

“Interactive Cable?”

“Like the phone company, but not the phone company.”

“Oh.” Lenore looked listlessly at Peter Abbott. “Hi.”

“Well hello hello,” said Peter, winking furiously at Lenore and pulling up his collar. Lenore looked up at Candy as Peter played with something hanging from his tool belt.

“Peter is very friendly, it seems,” said Candy Mandible.

“Hmm.”

“Well I can’t see nothing wrong in there, I’m stumped,” Peter said.

“What’s the problem?” Lenore asked.

“It’s not good,” said Candy. “We I guess more or less don’t have a number anymore. Is that right?” She looked at Peter Abbott.

“Well, you got line trouble,” said Peter.

“Right, which apparently in this case means we don’t have a number anymore, or rather we do, but so does like the whole rest of Cleveland, in that we now all of a sudden share a single number with all these other places. All these places that share our line tunnel. You know all those numbers we were just one off of, and we’d just get the wrong numbers all the time — Steve’s Sub, Cleveland Towing, Big B.M. Cafe, Fuss ‘n’ Feathers Pets, Dial-a-Darling? Well now they’re like all the same number. You dial their numbers, and the F and V number rings. Plus a whole lot of new ones: a cheese shop, some Goodyear service office, that Bambi’s Den of Discipline, which by the way gets a disturbing number of calls. We’ve all got the same number now. It’s nuts. Is that right what I said?” she asked Peter Abbott. She got her stuff and got ready to leave, looking at her watch.

“Yeah, line trouble,” Peter Abbott said.

“At least now you’ll have calls. At least now you’ll have something to do for a change,” said Judith Prietht. “Bombardini Company. Bombardini Company.”

“How come she’s not messed up?” Lenore gestured at Judith.

“Different line tunnels,” Peter Abbott said. “Bombardini Inc.’s lines are actually it turns out in this tunnel pretty far away, a few blocks west of Erieview. The calls just get into here via a matrix sharing-thread transfer, which is a real complicated plus ancient thing. Your lines are in a tunnel right under this building, under the lobby, out under that guy’s skeleton.” Peter Abbott pointed at the floor.

“So then why are you up here instead of down with the lines?” Candy Mandible wanted to know.

“I’m not a tunnel man. I’m a console man. I don’t do tunnels. They sent some guy from Tunnels down there early this morning. It’s gotta be his problem. I can’t find nothing up here with what you girls got. This’s a twenty-eight, right? I haven’t lost my mind?”