Louise and The Men of Transit

First Report

"Jim, I've written the report," Louise said confidently as she laid the printout of several sheets of paper on his desk then stood back and clasped her hands behind her back.

Jim looked questioningly up at her, "Report?"

Louise nodded vigorously, "Yes, you asked me to write up a report on 'mind your space' to show The TTC Way works for customers."

Jim looked down at the sheets she'd clipped together neatly with a silver paperclip, its long side exactly parallel to the long side of the paper. He pushed the report aside with his hand, splaying the sheets apart. He returned to reading the stack of paper in front of him.

Louise charged on, "I executed what you asked, to prove you know your customer. I'm confident 'mind your way' works for everyone." She continued to stand beside his desk, her genuine smile revealing her enthusiasm. She pressed on, "I read the memos on The TTC Way. I went through the task forces set up to come up with it and the marketing department's read on it."

"Good for you," Jim said to his stack of paper.

"I studied the concept of 'mind your space.' I wanted to see what the team members who came before me —"

"Came before you?" Jim asked his stack.

"The TTC is a team. That's how I see us, we're together here for the customer as a team. I meant the members of the team who thought about the concept. I wanted to know everything about how they came up with it. I wanted to know their thinking behind it. I pulled apart all their memos and reports and meeting minutes to study them."

Jim slowly looked up at her and stared.

Louise nodded, "I attacked it like I do my computers. I take them apart, study their components, then I can really understand them." She wrinkled her brow and mused, "I don't have much experience with real-life use of computers, though, except for my Father's." She cleared her throat and straightened to attention. "So I went out into the real world of the TTC community, met customers in the 'mind your space' community of the Yonge, I mean, Line One."

Jim's eyes grew rounder.

"I felt that I needed to make it complete. The report, I mean." Louise relaxed as she beamed down at him, "As close to the real-world application with my computers that I could get."

Jim blinked, confused.

"I observed my Father to see how he used the computers that I rebuilt. Sometimes, it didn't work out so well." Louise made a rueful face.

"I bet," Jim said.

"It was a new experience for me. But I'm eager. I want to be a productive member of the team." Seeing Jim still staring up at her, she rushed on, "Finch station opened on the twentieth anniversary of the subway opening." Louise flushed. She cleared her throat, "I mean, my real world ride was interesting. I went northbound from —"

Jim shifted. His lips pressed together in a hard, straight line. He interrupted her, "Yes, yes. I can read all that in the report." He returned to his own stack of papers.

"Oh, but it was so interesting," Louise bent down, her hands suddenly finding themselves on the right edge of his desk. Her eyes shone and zeal radiated from her face as she began to tell him about her ride. "I wasn't sure about it. The first time I took the subway, it was scary. All those people. I mean, customers. I'm really trying to learn the lingo. I've put a map up on my wall —"

Jim hunched over his stack of papers, his head firmly staying in profile to her. His eyebrows began to draw towards each other as his eyes intensified their focus on the black text on white paper in front of him. His shoulders rose like blades out from his back. Louise didn't notice nor that Harold had stopped eating and was slowly swivelling his chair around to take in the tableau. Jim snapped his head up. Harold quickly returned to his fries, picking them out one by one from their little paper boat. "Enough!"

Louise shot backwards. She blinked. Her cheeks sagged.

"I. Will. Read. It. When. I. Get. To. It," Jim pumped out through gritted teeth. "It should be Andy you give this report to," he added in a calmer voice, pushing Louise's report further away with the back of his hand, almost twisting the top sheet out from the grip of the paperclip. "Not me."

"Oh," Louise said, raising both her open hands to her mouth. "I'm so sorry."

Jim went on: "He's the one who hired you. He should supervise you. We," Jim gestured to Harold and himself, "didn't ask for a diversity hire. This is an upper management move. Nothing to do with us. We do our job and do it beyond expectation. We don't need you to tell us what to do. We've been working here for years and have learnt the system inside and out. We know our customers. You don't. You even admitted it. You've never taken the subway."

Louise whispered into her hands, "I did. Once. Twice last week."

"We," Jim pointed to Harold and then to his own chest, "have been taking the subway for years. Admittedly, I need a car now. But that's because this department is overrun with responsibilities. We're a key part of Barg's social media platform branding. We have important branding responsibilities, and I don't need to have my time wasted by your thoughts on something you know nothing about."

Jim waved at her with an impatient hand, "Give this to Andy."

Louise flew her hands towards her errant report. White patches blared out from her reddened face. She soothed, "I will. I will. I'm so sorry, so sorry, Jim. I thought, I thought that since you'd given me the task, I should report to you. But I see now it was my fault. I should've asked you. I'm so sorry."

Mollified, Jim nodded at her graciously. "That's right. As I said, you're Andy's diversity hire. You don't know how things are run. He should've taught you our way. I'll give you that. He should be in soon. Give the report to him."

At that moment, Andy flung the door open and strode in, rounding the front of his desk to sit in his chair, his eyes firmly on his destination: his mute jet-black computer. Louise hurried over to Andy's desk, shuffling the report in her hands, trying to neaten their edges into line. She halted in front of Andy's desk and waited for him to see her.

"Yes?" he queried, keeping his eyes fixed on his black-rimmed flat display.

Louise placed the report down on his desk, turning it so it faced him right way round for his eyes. "I have a report for you on 'mind your space.'"

Andy lifted his head with squirrelled brows. "Mind our space? Report?"

"Yes," Louise leaned on to the front edge of his desk eagerly, the flush in her face receding. "Jim asked me to write about it."

"I see," Andy leaned left to look around Louise at Jim. Jim hunkered down in his chair to focus intently on his computer display as he flashed it on. Taking charge, Andy grasped the report and said, "I'll take care of it. Thank you, Louise." He tossed it to his left onto his desk as he returned his attention to his display and began rapidly depressing his black keys.

Louise hesitated, shifting her weight from foot to foot.

"Anything else, Louise?" Andy asked his display.

"Uh, no. No, just . . ."

Andy suddenly stood up, he smiled at her, "I'll read your report. But I must go." He dashed around his desk, around behind her. She swivelled to follow with her eyes his path out the door. Louise stood lost in the sudden silence. She glanced over at her report, left alone on Andy's clean desk, its sheets splayed out again. She reached forward and neatened up her report's edges. She paused. She shifted her report over closer to his computer. She paused again. She lifted it and placed it on his black keyboard that sat on the metal grey of his desk waiting for his return.