The Children's War

by C. P. Boyko

  Daize. “Might it be better to mail them?”

  Sid. “Well, perhaps. I suppose if they’re all in one place when receiving the news, there’s increased chance of trouble. We’ll deliver them during the day. We can use the new courier service.”

  Daize. “Sure.”

  Sid. “Then that’s everything now.”

  Daize begins to stand.

  Sid gestures for her to remain seated. “You can stay for the meeting. For taking the minutes.” He looks at his watch and begins pacing again. “I won’t bend over backwards to kiss owner ass for one tenth a percent. We’ll reach ten twenty-five by year-end. They should know the ordeal that we’ve had. Even getting these bums to all work a full day has been, lately, a feat. For the union I need not apologize. Maybe it seems a concession, but it cost us no money. And now they just tiff with themselves. If they can’t get a raise, it’s not me, it’s the union to blame. I perhaps should myself have imposed it: that haven of sinecure; nest of red tape and committees fissiparous; creep-hole of delegates, stewards, and cronies! By God, I detest them, the unions! Their members deserve them, the knobs. To be asking for raises, with sales low as this? Their delusion’s astoundingly deep. Course, the owners, those glorified landlords, are worse. They want ten and a quarter percent, while still more competition from all the world over, obtuse to the industry’s glut, yet comes slithering in every month. I can’t give the shit hardly away. My old buyers are ordering less, and they ask me for discounts on top. And those pinchfart suppliers, and the shipping consortiums, they live in the same world of dreams, renegotiate contracts at twice what inflation is. We have accomplished no less than a miracle, all things considered. So no, I won’t grovel, nor will I abase myself; no, not for tenths of percentages. Ten twenty-five! We did less than that last year.”

  Daize. “Less overall, and in any one quarter.”

  Sid. “They perhaps will opine that I earlier should have resorted to layoffs. But those are my kin, in a manner of speaking; my people. I feel I’m responsible for ’em. They’ve some of ’em been with the company longer than my twenty years. Unashamed, I admit that I care. If mistake I have made, it’s I’ve been insufficiently cruel. I’m old-fashioned—outmoded, perhaps. If I’m hard as a boss, if my thumps I don’t curb, if my words I don’t blunt, it’s because I know people improve under pressure. But deep in my heart, I’m a softy. A director directs, but he also protects his employees. Commanders command, but they don’t send their men to their deaths for no reason. Dismiss me, court-martial me, over a tenth a percent, if you must. I’d take positive pride in so gross an injustice; I’d wallow for years; I could gnaw on the marrowy bone of my martyrdom through to my dotage, with relish. So fuck ’em. I care not one shred what they think. They know nothing about how to superintend. They can suck out the shit from my ass. Am I right?” The intercom buzzes. “Right; all right. Thanks, Daize.” He answers the intercom. “Yes?”

  Receptionist. “Ms. Ottavia Farr-Mp, the shareholders’ representative, is here for the meeting, sir.”

  Sid. “Send her in, by all means.” To Daize. “You can stay; take the minutes.”

  Daize. “Sure.”

  The receptionist opens the door for Ottavia Farr-Mp, who enters.

  Ottavia. “Good afternoon. Well?”

  Sid laughs. “It’s a pleasure to see you again, Miz Farr-Mp. You remember Daize Glied . . .”

  Ottavia. “I’m sure that I must.”

  Daize. “How do you do.”

  Ottavia sits at the head of the conference table. “If you’re quite ready.”

  Sid. “Well, perhaps we should wait just a few minutes more till the others arrive.”

  Ottavia. “This is everyone.”

  Sid. “Were the owners not able to come, then?”

  Ottavia. “They sent me; I’m their representative. I speak for them all.”

  Sid sits. “And Rebecka, and Tonio, and Glen—how’ve they been?”

  Ottavia. “If their personal well-being is what you refer to, it’s no business of mine, and still less of yours. If their financial well-being, it is no business of yours, except insofar as it pertains to this factory, which is what we’re here to discuss, starting now, or so I do hope.”

  The intercom buzzes.

  Sid. “But of course. Just one moment, please.” He crosses to the desk and answers. “Yes?”

  Receptionist. “Matheson Church and some others here to see you, sir.”

  Sid. “We’re just now in the midst of the shareholders’ meeting. They can wait till tomorrow.”

  Receptionist. “Yes, sir.”

  Sid. “No more calls, interruptions, or visitors, please.”

  Receptionist. “All right.”

  Sid returns to the table. “My apologies.”

  Ottavia. “Now perhaps we can with the pleasantries dispense, and proceed to matters fiscal.” She withdraws a page from a folder. “Ten point sixteen net percent profit is point zero nine net percent short.”

  Sid. “I’ll explain.”

  Ottavia. “The figure alone speaks with adequate eloquence, thank you. I’m not here to chide you, or to shrive you. I’m no shareholder, but I doubt that they have any interest in explanations or in excuses. I’m here to tell you—it won’t take long—that you’ve done yourself a disservice. Ten and a quarter was a waymark only, not a destination. You have neglected it to your own cost. You’ll find it harder now to reach ten and a half by year-end.”

  Sid. “And a half!”

  Ottavia. “Correct, by year-end. That is, and has been, the shareholders’ goal.”

  Daize. “In the fourth quarter, you mean?”

  Ottavia. “Most certainly not. For the total year.”

  Sid. “That’s impossible.”

  Ottavia. “The shareholders, I gather, believe it to be possible. In any case, your failure to reach it will not prove that it wasn’t; it only will prove that you weren’t able to do it.”

  Sid. “It’s undoable. No one could do it. This product, this equipment, this staff! If you’d any idea what we’ve struggled with lately—”

  Ottavia. “I’m not remotely even curious. It is you who is responsible for operational considerations; it’s what you’re paid for. It bores me even to say this out loud. Do your job, or the shareholders appoint somebody who will. That’s all there’s to it.” She closes the folder, leaving the paper on the table.

  Sid. “Let me get this thing straight. You are threatening me with replacement . . .” The intercom buzzes. “Goddamn it.” Sid crosses to the desk.

  Ottavia. “It’s not a threat, just a statement of fact.”

  Sid speaks into the intercom. “Wha’d I say? Hold my calls! We’re’n the middle of this.”

  Ottavia. “We can end it here.”

  Sid. “Now just hold on a minute or two. I have been with this company twenty-plus years, I have built from the ground up this factory; now you intend to replace me because some fantastical margin which can never be met won’t be met?”

  Ottavia. “You don’t understand; communication only flows one way between you and me. I’m the shareholders’ representative to you, and not your representative to the shareholders. Talking to me is a waste of your breath. Hearing you’s a waste of my attention. As for the product, we know of this-size factories reaching eleven point five.”

  Sid. “You don’t surely mean this year.”

  Ottavia crosses to the door. “This year, this world, this industry, this life. Though it’s not my job to say so, you should try to do better.”

  Sid. “But why didn’t they say to begin with that ten and a half was the goal?”

  Ottavia. “I’m sure I don’t know. But if you would like a piece of advice, which comes not from the shareholders, but from me as a private individual, you might consider making a habit of exceeding the expectations you’re given,
instead of underperforming, making excuses, and hoping to be forgiven, like a schoolboy who shirks as much homework as he dares. Goodbye, and see you again in six months.”

  As she opens the door, Matheson Church, Lea Pensilby, the receptionist, the female janitor (still holding a bag of garbage), and others stumble into the doorway.

  Sid. “If you’d wait just a minute . . . Oh, out of her way, you damn fools!”

  Ottavia. “Excuse me. Goodbye.” Ottavia exits.

  Sid. “Now you all can get out of my office.”

  Matheson. “We have some things to say first, Mister Babcock.”

  Sid. “You can say them tomorrow. The morning. Now buzz.”

  He pushes them out the door and closes it. He and Daize exchange a look. Knocking at the door.

  Sid. “For the sake of the holy!” He yanks the door open. “The hell do you want?”

  Matheson. “We’ve come to say the union membership’s decided that the time has come for us to take job action—to proceed to strike.”

  Sid. “You’re not serious.”

  Lea. “If demands aren’t met. We’ve come to read you our demands first.”

  Matheson. “We’ve suffered long enough indignity, abuse, and inequality. A dawn begins to newly rise; we workers, these, the people, are its flaming harbinger—the sun’s first gaudy, not-yet-scorching rays. But full ungentle noon will straight succeed this soft matutinal diplomacy, if this time you don’t give us what we want.”

  Lea. “Matheson, just read ’im the demands now.”

  Sid, to Lea and the receptionist. “It’s not possible; tell me that you haven’t joined.”

  Lea. “We are representing sixty-seven—sixty-eight percent of clerical, of janitorial, and support staff.”

  The receptionist nods.

  Janitor. “That’s right.”

  Sid. “It’s outrageous to me. What complaint in the world could you possibly have?” To Matheson. “As for you, I allowed you your union, and this is the way I’m repaid?”

  Matheson. “You gave us nothing. Unions form, they aren’t bestowed. They coalesce, self-organized. They swell up from the poisoned ground, don’t drop from out the toxic sky. They’re nature’s force, immunological reactions to oppressiveness. We made the union from ourselves, we made ourselves the union. No one could have stopped us—least of any, you.”

  Sid. “I most certainly could’ve!”

  Matheson. “The tide has turned, and leaves exposed what was submerged: our power. History is on our side. Inexorable gravity—”

  Lea. “You permitted them to form a union, but what good is it? Negotiations stall. Two months already passed, and still no closer to a contract. Small surprise, when you refuse their each and every asking.”

  Sid. “I refuse them because they’re ridiculous, Lea.”

  Lea. “Oh, just read ’im the demands already.”

  Matheson consults a piece of paper. “The first of our demands is this. We ask—insist—that management and foremen will begin to treat us with respect.”

  Sid groans. “And just how are you measuring that?”

  Matheson. “From this point on, they’ll tell us what needs doing, not what to do. Our supervisors will assist, and guide, and supervise, not spy, and reprimand, and punish. They will treat us not like children, but like colleagues. And for every word correcting us, we want two words of praise. They will address us by our first names. As for us, we find the sirs and ma’ams demeaning, and we will not use them anymore. The same applies to all those deferential honorifics: Miz, and Missus, Mister. We will smile when we are smiled at, or we feel like smiling, not on your command. We’ll be allowed to go to toilet as the need arises, too.”

  Sid. “It’s a line of assembly! It cannot be stopped for a piss!”

  Lea. “Forewomen and foremen can cover for ’em.”

  Matheson. “Respect. That’s first, our item number one.”

  Sid. “Is this really your goal with the union? To make of politeness a law? And to legislate craps?”

  Lea. “Go on, Matheson.”

  Sid. “Oh, continue, I beg.”

  Matheson. “Demand the second is democracy. From now on, every worker’s thoughts, ideas, opinions, views should be solicited on every matter bearing on our work environment, production quality, our work hours, hiring, firing, benefits and holidays, and company direction . . .”

  Sid. “You, in short, want to manage the place by yourselves.”

  Lea. “No. Discussion. Input. Contribution. Take into account our attitudes, and give consideration to our judgements.”

  Matheson. “We want an end to hierarchy, want decisions made collectively. There’s not an inessential person here; we each have part to play, and each unique perspective. We want to see this fact substantified in votes for every man and woman. No pronunciamentos, edicts, or decrees, but surveys, referenda, plebiscites, and factory-wide consultation shall henceforth determine our directive bulk.”

  Sid. “So the helmsman should ask of the cooks in the galley and the engine-room stokers what way he should steer.”

  Matheson. “Allowing for analogy, why not? We’re all upon the selfsame ship, which not one knot of speed achieves, indeed, which naught—N-A-U-G-H-T—that’s nothing—yes, which nautically naught achieves without the all of us aboard. Why shouldn’t we have all some say about the course we plot?”

  Sid. “There was never a ship in a mutinous state that so much as left port. And desist with the tub-thumping demagogue’s word-pyrotechnics. You’re not on the soapbox.”

  Matheson. “My righteous indignation is a fuel that feeds my fiery eloquence. Could I control me, modulate me, bowdlerize or summarize me, I would be revealed the panderer you paint me. All unchecked, uncheckable, my logorrheic rage escapes me left and right, at night or day, at work or play, in public or alone. So long as our demands remain unmet, I’ll vomit speech like birds at dawn belch song.”

  The others have come further into the office. The receptionist wipes dust from a framed certificate. The janitor peers at the sheet of paper on the table. Daize snatches it away.

  Sid. “Keep your hands to yourselves! This is my office still!” To Matheson. “So it’s mutiny, anarchy, chaos you want; duly noted. Now finish your spiel and be done.”

  Matheson. “A common misconception. Anarchy’s not lawlessness. It’s only bosslessness. We’re done with rulers, masters, potentates . . .”

  Sid. “But you cannot have rules without rulers! You need to have orders for order! And men do no work without foremen! The boss, like adversity, brings out the best in employees. For each self-propeled, independent, industrious worker, there’s ten would-be shirkers—those scrimshanking, goldbricking, dog-fucking, featherbed slobs you must constantly watch, and who need to be goaded, and threatened, and yes, sometimes punished. —Your speechification infects me, goddamn you.”

  Matheson. “It’s there you’re wrong. When freed from tyranny—”

  Sid guffaws. “When from tyranny freed!”

  Matheson. “The worker, when from their oppression freed, does, like a cramped and pallid flower from which a stone’s been lifted, stretch and grow towards the sky in natural, productive self-expansion. What makes work work? Outside force imposed—it may be duty, hunger, fear—that makes work necessary. Do but lift that pressure, render optional what was obligatory, and your work becomes your play—and no one ever tired of play. We shall work better, harder, for sheer joy, when work’s a choice and not an odious chore.”

  Sid. “You’re deluded! You really think anyone comes for their shift if they don’t need the money? What keeps the world turning’s not actualization of selves, but the hunger of stomachs.”

  Janitor. “Next thing, he’ll say he’s doing us all a favor keeping us hungry.”

  Sid. “It’s a factory, not the soul’s playground or gym. I’ve no
clue why I even am listening to this.”

  Matheson. “Because you must. Our fourth demand is noise reduction.”

  Lea. “Third. You missed the third demand.”

  Sid. “Two’s enough. I’ll begin by reducing your noise. You can vacate my office now. Out! I will talk to you all—or to three, at the most—in the morning.”

  Matheson. “We’re not yet done. You know what happens if we leave.”

  Receptionist. “Mr. Babcock . . .”

  Janitor. “It’s a job action.”

  Sid. “I’m not calling a vote here! Vamoose!”

  Matheson, to Lea. “Let’s show him.”

  Sid. “No one listens and everyone talks. Noise! Noise! Noise! That’s democracy for you. If any of you’d ever served on committees, or sat on a board of directors, you’d know that it’s noise, not decision, that’s collectively made. Because everyone speaks, no one hears, and the loudest shouts carry the day. Yes, democracy’s only disorganization. What the hell are you doing?”

  Lea has slid open the window. Noise from the shop floor. Matheson steps to the window.

  Matheson. “Maltreated, unappreciated drones! You toiling, abject, subjugated throng! Suppressed by equals, and by lesser men surpassed, you slaves in all but name, arise! Defy! Throw off the half your shackles, so to show it can be done—to show they’re made of mind, not steel!”

  He makes a grand slicing motion. Some of the machinery grinds and clatters to a stop.

  Sid. “What the fuck have you done? Ignoramuses! Fools!”

  Lea. “That’s reminder why you’re listening to us: because our strike is really ready.”

  Sid. “It’s been years those machines were last stopped.”

  Matheson slides the window shut. “We haven’t finished.”

  Janitor, to the receptionist. “Straight hot how! We’re just getting started.”

  Sid, muttering. “Pack of Luddites. Benighted, ungrateful, uncaring . . .”