by R. J. Amos
Wasn’t it?
On this day it felt like the researchers at this lab thought it was worthwhile. The lab was humming. White-coated bespectacled students were watching bubbling reactions, or passing solutions through silica-packed columns. The washing up racks were full of glassware and both rotary evaporators were going full pelt removing the solvent from newly formed products. It looked like Susannah’s research group (and therefore her career) was reaching new heights.
I took a deep breath and knocked on the office door.
‘Come’ came the curt instruction, and I followed suit.
Susannah’s desk was covered with printed journal articles, old exam papers, piles of textbooks, instrument read-outs and empty coffee cups. Red pen in hand she looked up at me over a paper she was filling with a scrawl of red marks and comments. I wondered who the unlucky student was and how much they would have to do to get it right.
‘Hello? Oh hello Alicia, what are you doing here?’
‘Oh good, you remember me.’
‘Of course I remember you. Summer work and honours years are not that easily forgotten. How are you? What are you up to now?’
‘Well, that’s a bit of a long story. Do you have a few minutes?’
Susannah put down the page and turned to face me properly.
‘Sure. Have a seat.’
I pulled out the seat and found it was covered with yet more paperwork. I picked up the stack, looked for somewhere to put it, and at Susannah’s suggestion, piled it onto an already precarious pile of paper on the desk.
‘I really must get to that. Now, tell me what’s going on.’
‘I actually came to ask a favour. And it’s a bit of a big one. I’ve been working on the mainland – a post-doc for Prof Lefky, and one for Jamie Sorenson (you know him, right?) and a few other things. But then, well ...’
I stopped then, and took a deep breath. I had known that I would need to tell Susannah the story, but I just hadn’t realised how hard it would be.
‘You know how it has always been just Mum and me? Well, Mum got sick. Pancreatic cancer. So I dropped everything and came home.’
‘Oh Alicia. Oh I’m so sorry. How is she now?’
I shook my head. I had thought I would be able to say it but the words stuck in my throat. And Susannah understood.
‘That’s very hard. How long ago?’ Susannah reached over the desk and put her hand on my arm.
‘It’s been a few months. I’ve been, well, it’s been ...’
‘Of course.’
I wiped my eyes and tried to pull myself together. How did I not see that I would have to go through this? Or maybe that’s why I had put off the return to work.
‘I don’t want pity, or to put you under pressure, but I was wondering if there was any work going here? I’m happy to do some research assistant work or something casual but I have to get back into it again, and I can’t quite leave Tassie yet.’
Susannah nodded.
‘I’d love to help you out, but I don’t really know what I can do. You know that money’s always tight.’
Yes, I knew that full well. There is never enough money, never any spare. I wondered if I was asking the impossible. But then, if you don’t ask ...
‘What sort of research have you been doing lately? Maybe we can find somewhere that you will fit.’
We cleared a space on the desk (yet more piles of paper) and wrote notes and drew diagrams, sharing her research and mine. Susannah had called in her students to explain aspects of their work or to describe their latest dilemma. Talking science again was invigorating and I felt like I had jumped back into the pool and immediately remembered how to swim and just how good the water felt.
‘Maybe you could give a seminar Alicia, although it’s really the wrong time of year for that. Everyone is going to conferences or on leave right now. If you can wait until February we might be able to set one up for you.’
‘That would be great, thanks,’ I said but my heart sank. February! It was only mid-November. February was so far away. Things really didn’t happen quickly in the university setting.
It had been a great talk, good for the brain, good for the self-esteem, but unfortunately not so good for getting me immediate employment.
But Susannah had been helpful in every way that she could. It was she who had managed to get me a registration for the conference in December. She had been truly fantastic and I felt a bit guilty for not making more of the opportunity job-wise by talking more with prospective employers at the conference.
And here she was, helping me out again.
‘This really needs to be done asap. It’s government work, mass spectrometry. Eoin would do it usually but he’s on leave right now – out of the country as far as I know. And I thought of you because of your CV. You can do mass spec. Right? And NMR if we need it?’
‘Sure can. It might take me a little while to orient myself to the instrument but it should be fine.’
‘Right, well, I’ll give you more information when you get in, but if we could see you first thing this morning that would be great. You didn’t have other plans did you? This is pretty urgent.’
Apart from investigating a murder? Unofficially investigating a murder? Getting nowhere fast with trying to investigate something that possibly wasn’t murder?
‘No, not really.’ It would be much nicer to do some work and get some income and feel like I was helping someone out.
I pulled on jeans and a shirt and made sure that I was wearing shoes that covered my feet completely. It had been a while since I had been in the lab. I did a quick search of the obvious places in the cottage but couldn’t find my favourite safety glasses. I would have to make do with whatever scratched and uncomfortable pair the university was happy to lend me. Ah well.
I had work. That was good news. Even if it was just a little bit of work. I wanted to tell someone. I wanted (to be honest) to tell Mum. So who else could I tell? Who else cared and knew where I was at and would be happy for me?
Well, Jan, of course. But we hadn’t parted on the best of terms.
At least, I hadn’t parted with her on the best of terms. Did she even know I was upset with her? Obviously she’d know by the way I’d stormed out last time we met that I was upset, but upset with her? Maybe not. Maybe if I just … if I just went into The Lemon Tree and ordered a coffee. I could see how she felt about me by her reaction and then I could let her know the good news.
There was no-one else that I could just talk to like Jan. Trudy would be asking about future plans, about how this would help my career. Jan would just listen and be excited for me.
Trudy would be too busy to chat to me before work anyway. No, Jan was it. I’d give it a go.
‘Alicia! Hey, great to see you.’
Well, that was kinda nice. A nice greeting. Maybe she didn’t think I was upset with her.
‘Hi Jan, how’s it going?’
‘Want the usual?’
‘Yes, but to take away thanks. I have work at the uni today.’
‘You have work? That’s awesome. Well done.’ Jan turned the handle on the steamer and got to work on my coffee straight away.
‘Thanks.’ I moved towards the coffee machine so we could keep chatting.
‘What kind of work?’
‘Analysis of some sort. Not really sure actually, I only know that it has to be done asap. I know I’ll be doing Mass spec though. And maybe NMR.’
‘Oh. Good. You know those terms mean nothing to me.’
‘It’s this analysis where, hmmm, how do I explain it in thirty seconds?’
‘How about you drop around at the end of the day, tell me how your first day back at work went, and explain it to me then?’
‘That would be brilliant. I’m sure I’m going to need someone to debrief with. Thanks Jan, if you’re sure?’
‘Of course I’m sure. I wouldn’t have asked if I wasn’t. And I’m going to be curious all day, so make sure you come.’
I
t was so nice. Nice to be friends with Jan again. Great to feel like we were connecting. Maybe I’d read too much into everything before. Maybe she didn’t think I was insane after all. Or maybe she was just happy that I’d changed the subject. I didn’t know, but I really liked the idea of chatting to someone about the first day back, having someone to debrief with. I was sure there would be a lot to say.
I parked my car a couple of blocks away from the university like I had always done as a student. I had always been too poor to pay for the little parking there was available on campus – and old habits die hard. Walking my regular route, my memories of student life came back to me. There, on my left, was the law school. I remembered being able to tell which students were law students. They were always dressed smartly and the girls carried tiny handbags. They had to dress as if they were going into a courtroom I had been told, and the dress sense set them apart.
Arts students were dressed in a much more avant garde fashion. They were the girls with the green hair, the flowing dresses and Doc Marten boots. Or the boys dressed in long trench coats and top hats.
The science students tended to wear jeans and clever t-shirts with slogans like ‘2 + 2 = 5, for extremely large values of 2’ or ‘Obey gravity! It’s the Law!’ which they apparently thought funny (I still think they are funny, but I’m a geek). But the real way to tell a science student was by the large backpack they were dragging around, filled with notes and textbooks.
Walking up the hill past the engineering school to the chemistry building with the big smoke stacks sticking out of the roof took me right back to my undergrad days. My years of earning an income and making my own way in the big city faded to almost nothing. It was hard to believe that over ten years had passed since I was taking down notes in uncomfortable chairs in large lecture theatres, running up to the laboratories on top of the hill to make it on time for my biochemistry labs, or eating sandwiches with my friends on the lawns in the sunshine.
But now here I was, an adult, a scientist, a researcher, and I needed to know that again. Needed to know who I was again. Needed to be with my people, my tribe, other scientists.
‘Thanks so much for this Susannah. I don’t want to sound over the top but it’s great to be doing some paid work again.’
‘No, you’re really helping us out. With Eoin on holidays, and the coroner asking for a quick result, it was great to have you on tap, as it were.’
‘Hang on, the coroner?’
‘Yes, oh yes, I haven’t really told you yet, have I? How about you close the door just for a second.’
This sounded serious. Closing the door for privacy had happened maybe twice in my whole university career. My curiosity was well and truly piqued.
‘The situation, as I understand it, is that someone has died, and when the post-mortem was done there was no obvious cause for the death. No evidence of heart attack or aneurism or anything. The pathologist has sent us a saliva sample and the police found a glass vial that we’re hoping to get information from. They are both in the fridge in the lab. I’ll get them for you in a second. There’s only a few milligrams of sample so it’s not going to be an easy analysis but if you could just do your best that would be great.’
‘This wouldn’t be related to Professor Conneally’s death, would it?’ I had to ask.
‘Officially? I can’t say.’
‘Unofficially?’
Susannah gave the slightest of nods.
I felt an unholy glee spread through me. It was murder. I knew it.
Before you ask, I didn’t give a big whoop and dance around the office. I kept my face straight – it wouldn’t do to show unsightly enthusiasm. A man had died, had been killed, this was serious business. But still, the sense of vindication was brilliant.
I got myself under control and put my professional mask firmly in place.
‘So I’ll be doing Mass Spec. And NMR? Would you be able to remind me where the instrument lab is? Nothing much has changed, I’m supposing, since I was here last?’
‘It’s pretty much the same, I’m sure. And I’ve booked the NMR for you for the next couple of days. There really is very little sample. You may need an overnight just to get a carbon, the NOESY and COSY will take ages. And that’s assuming it’s fairly pure. See how you go.’
‘Sure, I’ll do my best. The other thing I need is some lab glasses. Is that ok?’
‘Sure, I’ll just get our lab tech to get you some. His name’s Joshua – did you meet him before? You probably should get to know him at some stage.’ Susannah opened the door and called into the lab but there was no response.
‘Great. He should be here, but he’s been so unreliable lately,’ she complained, ‘not sure what’s got into him. I guess I’ll take you down to the store myself.’
‘Maybe he’s wanting to move on from being a lab tech.’
‘Well if he’s wanting to move on to research, he’s going the wrong way about it, that’s all I can say. I wouldn’t recommend him to any future employer at the moment. He’s never been awesome, but this last week he’s been atrocious.’
‘People are strange.’
‘You can say that again.’
All kitted out with new safety glasses and a pristine white lab coat for good measure, I made my way with the samples to the instrument lab and fired up the mass spectrometer. It had been a while since I had used one but it all looked very familiar and I found myself feeling very much at home. I waited for the instrument to equilibrate, diluted and prepared the samples, and hummed a contented tune.
A fresh-faced student stuck his head in the door at around 11am and invited me to morning tea. So that tradition was still happening. That was good really. Staff and students gathering around one table in the tearoom and talking about nothing in particular. I was happy to have a break and join in. I thought I might even be able to make a few more connections. Maybe one of the other staff in the department would have a position going soon.
I found an unused cup in the back of a high cupboard, and made myself a black tea. Tea bags were provided, but milk was always in short supply no matter which university. I learned to drink tea black a long time ago.
There weren’t a lot of people in the room – quite a few had taken Christmas holidays early, or as Susannah had said, were at conferences. The undergraduate year had ended and there was a festive feel. Someone had brought in a cake. For no reason – they just felt like baking. It was all very pleasant.
Susannah introduced me to each of the people sitting at the table, staff to my right, and students gathered to my left, and I tried to remember all the names. Susannah immediately got caught in an intense conversation with other staff about the requirements of the coding of the staff credit cards. Important conversation for sure, but it wasn’t giving me an opportunity to showcase my skills as a researcher and after listening to talk of scanning receipts and taking photos with smart phones to upload to specific software, I thought the conversation might be at least a little more interesting in the other direction.
‘Now, what were your names again?’ I asked the student sitting next to me.
‘I’m Dan, and this is Liv,’ he said gesturing to the girl sitting opposite him, ‘we work with Susannah on natural products.’
Trim and neat, her black hair braided neatly, Liv was dressed in what I like to call ‘lab chic’ – all sweet and girly, nice floral skirts and pretty t-shirts, matched with great big boots to get around the ‘shoes must cover the whole foot’ rule. Dan, with his blonde artfully-styled hair, green sweater and jeans, looked like a poster boy for an American business college.
‘And are you finishing up soon Dan?’ it was as good a place as any to start with a PhD student.
‘Yep. Well, I hope so. Sometimes it feels like I’ll never finish.’
‘I remember that feeling well.’
‘Every time I think I’m done, Susannah sends me back to the lab for more experiments. I’m hoping I’m close to the end.’
‘You kno
w Dan, it’s your thesis. You decide in the end whether you’re done or not.’ Why did these students make me feel like the elderly maiden aunt?
‘Yeah,’ Dan took a sip of his coffee, ‘I guess so.’ He didn’t sound too convinced.
‘You should definitely take advice from Susannah, I’m not saying that you shouldn’t do that. But you can’t keep going forever.’
‘I know, it’s sort of safe to keep going though, I’m really not sure what I’ll do after this. This is ... kinda easy. I mean, the work’s not easy, but at least I know what I’m doing here.’
‘Why did you choose to do a PhD? Did you want to go into research?’
‘Oh ... I just ... I finished high school and then uni was easy to get into (easier than finding a job) and then honours and then ... well ... the scholarship was easy to get too, and here I am. I’m not sure what I want to do next. Probably post-doc somewhere.’
‘Do you want to travel? Do you have somewhere in mind?’
‘That’s the problem. I know I could go, but my girlfriend is here, and she doesn’t want to leave – she has a job here. It’s all feeling pretty complicated, you know?’
‘So you’re putting off the decision by not finishing.’
‘Touché! I don’t know. I have to finish, I know ...’
‘I hope it goes well for you, whatever you decide to do. I can see how hard it is though. Where are you at Liv?’
‘Oh I’m just in my second year. I think it’s going ok, but I have so much to do. I feel like I’ll never hand my thesis in. I had a talk for the conference, so that’s just taken up all my time for the last couple of months. Or at least it feels like it.’