Stepping In For His Father
Peter Atkinson and his reluctant substitution for his father at the Jamison Foundation
Peter Atkinson was sitting in his offices on the 66th floor of the Empire State Building doing what he had reluctantly been forced to do since his father fell ill two years before. He was an assistant to the President of the Jamison Foundation, and he hated the long hours and constant conflict, of overseeing dozens of projects worldwide. The offices had expanded to two floors in the building in the ten years since its founding. On the 33rd floor were the executive offices where the founder James Jamison and the four vice presidents kept their offices. He had only been downstairs four times in two years to visit them. His offices were on the 66th floor, less opulent and more working class, with less expensive decoration. He felt more comfortable there than in the stained-paneled offices of his superiors.
His days were filled with phone calls, budget reports, grant requisitions and occasional plane trips to various sites around the world to oversee operations of projects from archaeological digs in Mesopotamia to cancer research in several labs around the country. What he wanted to do, what he wasn’t allowed to do, was teach music, the great passion of his life. His sister Rebecca had become a paediatrician, but he was required to follow in his father’s footsteps and one day not only work in the foundation but take a position of responsibility in the parent company Jamison Electronics, a “mega monster” electronics firm as he would often call it, manufacturing everything from radios, to televisions, to computers to VCRs to DVD players in over a hundred locations around the world. It all began with the patents of one man named Leonard Matthews, whose television in the 1940s took on the Radio corporation juggernauts and succeeded in finding a niche for itself. His father had often told him stories of television’s glory days, before new technology had transformed the world and before James Jamison had founded the foundation to be at the forefront of transformation in this new technological age. Their newest venture was in the pharmaceutical business, promoting a new drug for schizophrenia and autism called Nuzopax. Produced by a new Jamison Foundation-controlled laboratory in Portland, Oregon called Division 9 Laboratories, it had shown promising results. The current head of this laboratory was a neuro-biochemist named Mitchell Isaacson who had a PHD in biochemistry from Johns Hopkins University and a medical degree from Harvard Medical School. He was also the son of one of Jamison Electronics Board members, Alan Isaacson, who was a classmate of his father at Columbia University.
Peter hated all the name-dropping, all the references to credentials, all the mutual backslapping which surrounded him at the foundation and in his quiet moments when no one was looking, he would remove a classical guitar which he had hidden in a cupboard in his office, and he would play Bach and Mozart melodies as a respite away from work. That night it was nearing nine o’clock and he still had hours of work to do, he had taken out his guitar and he was playing Paul Simon songs in his darkened office when the phone began to ring. He sat the guitar down and answered the phone.
“Hello, is this Peter Atkinson?” his father spoke in struggling raspy breaths.
“Yes, Dad. I’m here.”
“I need you to do a favour for me.”
“What’s that, Dad?”
“I need you to call the Iraqi Ministry of Antiquities and arrange a package to be sent to our laboratory in Chicago.”
He could hear his father struggling to speak.
“No need to strain yourself. I’ll call them. You shouldn’t be worried about these things. Just save your strength.”
“It’s important. Very important.”
“Everything you ask me has been important. I will take seriously everything you ask. Just rest, Dad, I’m taking care of things as I promised you.”
“I just don’t want there to be any problems.”
“There won’t be problems, Dad. Good night.”
He hated most of all these special favours his father asked because he sensed that something wasn’t right whenever his father asked him, though he didn’t dare to question what was going on.
After he hung up the phone he felt anxious, though about what he hadn’t a clue about. He couldn’t concentrate on his work. So, he decided on this rare evening that he would go down to the 33rd floor to see if anyone else was still working. He took his jacket from this chair and put the guitar back into the closet and he walked the long corridor to the front lobby, through the double wooden doors to the bank of elevators and he pressed the button to go downstairs. He put his jacket on inside of the elevator and when the 33rd-floor doors opened, he could see the floor was mostly dark, but there was one office still brightly lit, the office of Richard Amberson, Vice President for corporate finance. Though he had only spoken with him a couple of times in the past two years, once at a company reception and the second time at a seminar on global warming he had decided to pay a visit to him to see what kept him so late when all the others had gone home.
As Peter walked down the hallway, he could see the office door was slightly open and he could hear the sound of fingers on a computer keyboard and a barely audible radio playing soft Hawaiian music. He knocked softly on the opened door and Richard Abraham was occupied. He knocked a little louder and finally got Mr. Abraham’s attention.
“Mr. Abraham, I’m sorry to bother you. It kind of heartens me that I’m not the only one working here this late. I’ve spent many nights here past nine o’clock.”
“As have I,” Mr. Abraham answered.
“But you must have a family and other responsibilities,” Peter acknowledged.
“I do, but my wife takes care of many things.”
“You’re fortunate then. I haven’t found anyone yet, just too many things going on.”
“You’re a young man, Mr. Atkinson. You have time.” There came an awkward pause.
“I’m very busy,” Mr. Abraham continued.
“As am I.”
“Do you have a specific question?” Mr Abraham asked.
“I have one.” He paused. “I received a requisition for funding for project 33, no details, no name, no location. Who would I speak to about clarification?”
“You’d have to talk to Mr. Jamison. I have no clue about any project 33.”
It was a passing question and Peter didn’t even know why he asked. But it had been annoying him since the papers first came across this desk. But the last thing in the world he wanted to do was to speak to James Jamison about anything, even though technically he was supposed to be working for him. His direct superior was Mr. Abraham, and he ever rarely talked to him. Most of this job consisted of signing paperwork and making the various phone calls his father asked for.
He returned to his office, turned off the lights, locked the front doors and left the building for his midtown apartment. He told himself as he left through the Empire State Building lobby door, “I hate this job.”
Across town, it was eleven o’clock when Dr. Carmichael opened the front door of his apartment, and he was determined to go to sleep as soon as possible. However, he first wanted to find a secure place to put his mother’s notebook. He felt a little uneasy about his encounter with Anthony and the statements that most of Anthony’s funding came from a private donor particularly unsettled him. As he set down the satchel on a table in his parlour, for the first time in his life he felt real paranoia, he looked at the flimsy lock on his front door and resolved that he would purchase a stronger lock the next day.
He couldn’t push from his mind the image of men with guns coming for Jonathan and he could find no plausible explanation of how such a message was even possible. This certainly wasn’t the world he was living in four days ago. He began to ponder the possibility he was in a lucid dream, but it didn’t feel like a dream, and he couldn’t remember even having such a vivid dream.
For fifteen minutes he walked around his apartment contemplating where he would put the notebook. Each successive choice seemed less secure than the prior one, so he decided to rest before he continued his search and assessment. He took the satchel to his bedroom and put it inside his closet.
Then he went into the bathroom to wash his hands and face, a ritual he performed every night before going to bed, and his phone began to ring. He rarely received phone calls at his residence. He did not have much of a private life and his first impulse was to ignore the call, but he finally resolved to answer it often a fifteenth ring.
“Hello,” he answered with a perturbed timbre.
“Eldin, it’s Peter Atkinson at the foundation.”
“It’s a little late isn’t it?” he answered.
“Sorry to be calling you so late, but you know I keep late hours.”
“You should tell your father to get you some help.”
“I am the help.”
“How is he doing?”
“Not great He’s on oxygen almost 24/7 now.”
“We all told him to stop smoking ten years ago.” He paused. “What can I do for you?”
“Rumours are flying around that you have some extraordinary boy at the hospital,” Peter told him.
“Has your sister been talking to you?” Dr Carmichael asked.
“My sister hasn’t said a word. You know our situation. She doesn’t approve of what we’re doing.”
“So, what are you doing?”
“You know I can’t talk about that. This is the last thing I want to be doing with my life.”
“You know my advice; I’ve told you before. Tell your father to find someone else.”
“It’s not going to happen,” Peter spoke with resignation in his voice. “So, what can you tell me about the boy?”
“Who’s been filling your ears with nonsense?” Dr Carmichael asked.
“People tell me things,” Peter responded.
“He’s a kid with symptoms of autism who I’m running an assessment on. Not the first time and won’t be the last. You know the routine.”
“But they say he has some pretty special abilities.”
“Whoever they are, they’re prone to exaggeration” he paused. “If you need the full picture, tell your spooks that you’ll speak to me directly.”
“So, you’re denying he has abilities?” Peter asked.
“I’m not denying anything. He has abilities as do about ten per cent of those on the autistic spectrum. The human brain sometimes over-compensates for neurological deficits. I promise you once I have made a full assessment I’ll give you a complete report on what I’ve found. Peter, stop being a flunky for your father. You’re entitled to a life. I’ve got a long day ahead of me tomorrow, I must go to sleep. Go home, play your music.”
“I can’t go home. I have more phone calls to make.”
“Who would you be calling at this time of the night?” Dr Carmichael asked.
“It’s not night everywhere. The Foundation has projects all over the world.”
“Where is Mr. Jamison now? Can’t he use a telephone?”
“I don’t know where he is,” Peter answered.
“Goodnight, Peter,” He hung up the phone.
