Evelyn had been working on the story for over a week, and she was now sure she had enough evidence to file. Corruption in high places! Corruption in low places! A scoop for Upscale, the Magazine of the Highly Placed! If it wasn't exactly the stuff Pulitzers were made of, she hoped it was worth at least a nice bonus at Christmas, or maybe even a raise.
Evelyn stopped at the front desk before she hit the elevator. "Any messages, Sharon?" she asked. Sharon, the receptionist, giggled inanely to herself. "Messages? Sharon? Any for me?" Sharon slowly lowered her head to look at the pink slips of paper on the desk in front of her. Then, she slowly raised her head to look blankly at Evelyn. Sharon indiscriminately picked up a bunch of messages and unconcernedly handed them to Evelyn.
"Thanks, Shar." The phone rang. Sharon looked at it in wonder.
As Evelyn stepped into the elevator, she noticed that there were no words on any of the messages, only doodles of various office personalities. "Pretty good artist," Evelyn decided. "Lousy secretary."
As she got off the elevator at the editorial floor, Evelyn heard loud, crazed shouting. Everybody else seemed to be casually going about their business, so Evelyn decided to ignore it, As she passed by Associate Editor Ronald Jaffe's office, a desktop calculator flew through the glass window, destroying it utterly.
Evelyn poked her head through the open space. "Having a bad day?" she asked jaffe, who was cowering behind his desk.
"Goway!" he shrieked. "All plotting against me! Even my most trusted calc...cal...calc.lator is against me! Stop it!"
Evelyn sighed. Bad trip was more like it. When she got to her desk, Evelyn found a note in neat block letters that read: CLEARING OUR SINUSES IN THE BATHROOM. IF YOU'RE NOT FEELING WELL, JOIN US. It was the usual anonymous offer for her to share some illicit substance or other, and, as usual, she threw it into the wastebasket by her desk.
Evelyn's VDT was barely warmed up when Rudolph, copy boy and office gofer, appeared at her desk. His right shoulder twitched madly, but he gamely tried to ignore it. "Miss Inter....er...ur...urbano?" he asked.
"Yes, Rudolph?"
"Mister...er...er Fitz would like to see you in his office r...r...r...at once."
"Thanks. Don't you think you should take something for your shoulder?"
Rudolph smiled, also twitchily, but with warmth. "I did take something," he told her. "How do you think I got this way in the first place?"
Leroy Fitz was the Publisher of Upscale; an invitation from him was to be ignored only at dire peril to one's career. Evelyn made her way upstairs at once and, politely knocking on his door, let herself into her Publisher's office.
"Ah, Miss Interurbano," Fitz greeted her, not bothering to rise, "I believe you know Colin Gunn, our security chief."
Evelyn nodded. Gunn was known around the office as "Top" because his stash was always the best. He didn't acknowledge her presence. In fact, he appeared to be very, very still. On Fitz' desk was a large apparatus which Evelyn recognized as a lie detector machine.
"I would like," Fitz explained, "for you to take a voluntary lie detector test. There are one or two questions we want answers to..."
"What if I refuse to take the voluntary test?" Evelyn asked.
"If you refuse to take the voluntary test, you will be involuntarily fired." Evelyn thought for a moment, then agreed. "I like cooperative employees," Fitz commented. "Mr. Gunn, if you'll please get started...Mr. Gunn?" The security chief wasn't moving. Fitz shoved him, and Gunn grudgingly came to life. "If you'd please administer the test to Miss Interurbano," Fitz sternly suggested.
"Yeah, sure," Gunn responded, his voice devoid of any emotion. He picked up a wrist attachment and attempted to place it on Evelyn's head. It didn't fit. "Is this really necessary?" Evelyn asked.
Fitz looked at Gunn in disgust as Evelyn shooed him away. Gunn gratefully returned to his seat. "Not if you're willing to honestly answer my questions."
"Like what?"
"Like, have you ever taken a controlled substance?"
"Well..."
"Ahh..."
"Once," Evelyn admitted, taking a big breath, "at a party three or four years ago. Somebody was passing around a joint, and I thought I'd try it to see what all the fuss was about. I was sick for hours. Needless to say, I decided not to try -"
"So, you've actually had marijuana?" Fitz asked, eager to confirm the obvious.
"Yes, but that was a long time a -"
Fitz cut her off. "Would you like to quit now, or will you force me to go to the trouble of firing you?"
Evelyn was stunned. "Why? What did I do?"
"You are a known drug user!" Fitz exclaimed.
"But..." Evelyn exclaimed back at him, "that was years ago! What about the staffers who are abusing...using drugs today?"
"When they admit that they are users," Fitz reasonably stated, "they will be given the same choice you were."
"When they admit it!" Evelyn shouted, angry. "All you have to do is - look, I have rights, you know. You have to have just cause to fire me."
"Oh," Fitz mused, "we will. We will."
"You're going about this all wrong," Evelyn argued. "If you think somebody has a drug problem, you should set up a rehabilitation programme or something for them. This kind of action -"
"You don't understand," Fitz told her. "I'm only concerned with putting out a good product and running a clean operation." Fitz' voice began to rise with emotion. "Lie detectors are only the first stage. Soon, I'll bring in the drug-sniffing dogs. Yeah. And police helicopters and inspection of staff members' lockers without notice! Drugs are a cancer, Miss Interurbano! We have to drive them -"
Gunn giggled for a moment. Fitz looked at him blandly. "It's just good business," he assured Evelyn as she rose heavily.
"I guess you'll have my resignation in a few minutes," she said, "but, for the record, you're making a mistake. Corporate image is not worth harassing employ -"
"Yes, yes. Goodbye, Miss Interurbano."
"Goodbye, Mister Fitz."
