The Consultant Read online

  Now Patoff was sending him hundreds of emails.

  And showing up at his house.

  The solution to his nightmare was turning out to be a nightmare in itself.

  He closed the door, locking it this time before heading back up to his office to read through the consultant’s messages.

  Rachel arrived home shortly afterward, and he left off with the emails—all of which appeared to be dry descriptions of survey methodology that were of little use and no interest to him—in order to tell her that he was home early because he wasn’t feeling well. As he’d known, as he’d wanted, she fussed over him and had him lie down on the couch while she made him some hot tea. She quizzed him about his headache and whether he had symptoms of anything else. He told her it was just the headache, but he did not tell her about the stress he was under or describe his strange encounter with the consultant. He wished he could talk to her, wished she were more involved in his professional life, but their relationship didn’t work that way. His business was his business. Rachel would have made a great mafia wife: she cared about him, but she didn’t want to know the details of his work.

  If Josh were still here, he’d be able to talk to him about what was going on.

  But Josh wasn’t here. Everything was on his shoulders, and Matthews decided that the best strategy with the consultants was to just let everything run its course. Patoff was right; CompWare did have a contract with BFG. But that didn’t mean that he had to implement any of the consultants’ recommendations. He could tell Patoff thank you, then toss the entire report directly into the trash can. Or, more likely, he could take the raw data BFG had assembled and pass it on to another consulting firm to see what their recommendations would be.

  CompWare had a whole host of options, and he didn’t need to decide on any of them now. Just by hiring BFG, the freefall of CompWare’s stock prices had stopped, and perception in the markets and among their business customers was that after restructuring, the company would re-emerge stronger and more competitive. In the meantime, their games were selling better than they ever had. So he had a buffer. He had some leeway.

  But the consultant still made him feel ill-at-ease.

  FOUR

  Craig was ten when his father died of a heart attack, and while the loss was devastating, he’d honestly thought he could handle it. After all, his dad had been there not only for the important early years but for most of his childhood. At ten Craig was old enough to remember all the time they’d spent together, all of the things they’d done. He knew his father’s memory would always be with him. So it came as something of a shock a few years later, in junior high, when the Social Studies teacher announced that they would be doing a genealogy project and he suddenly realized that he had forgotten the sound of his dad’s voice. Sitting in class, he could not even remember with any clarity his father’s face, although there were still pictures of him throughout the house. The realization frightened him, engendering a deep sadness that made him want to cry, and it left him feeling completely alone even in a room full of thirty kids. He went home that day after school and not only looked carefully at all of the framed photos displayed throughout the living room, family room, dining room and bedrooms, but took out the albums from the hall closet and looked through the pictures in there as well.

  It didn’t help. The man in those photos was a stranger to him, someone he’d met in the past but didn’t really know. Somehow, all of those memories of moments, all of those emotions and recollections that he’d thought would be with him always had slipped away, unnoticed, and now he was left with a hole in his history where his father should have been.

  That hole had never really gone away, and it was probably why it was so important now for Craig to spend time with his own son.

  So Craig resented it when Scott Cho called a department meeting Wednesday afternoon and told everyone that if consultants were going to be nosing around, judging the department, they all needed to protect themselves by coming in earlier, leaving later and putting in weekend hours. As far as Craig was concerned, his free time was his own, and while both he and Angie had gotten where they were by being overachievers, they’d both backed off after Dylan was born. Their priorities had changed. Angie worked only on weekends now, and last year when she was offered additional hours on Thursday evenings, she’d turned it down flat. Yes, he still sometimes put in ten-hour days, and he was never far away from his phone or email, but he’d given up working Saturdays and he liked it that way and didn’t want to go back.

  He wasn’t the only division head to object on family grounds, and when several of them brought up the fact that they would have less time to spend with their children, Scott told them, “I’m in the same boat. But we need to do this for the sake of the department. Just make sure you spend quality time with your kids.”

  “That whole ‘quality time’ argument is bullshit,” Craig said. “Kids want quantity, not quality. They don’t care what they do with their parents, they just want to spend time with them, and the more time the better.”

  “Not necessarily.”

  “Really? Do you remember when you were a kid? Would you rather have had a jam-packed two hours with your dad where you did fun exciting stuff, or would you rather have spent the entire day with him, just being together, going to get the oil changed on the car, stopping by the hardware store to buy some nails, mowing the lawn, doing whatever?”

  “I see your point,” Scott conceded. “But this is only temporary, until the consultants leave.”

  “And how long is that going to be?” asked Elaine Hayman, the lone woman among the division heads. “A week? A month? Six months? A year? Some of these consultants hang around and drag things out, trying to squeeze every last dime out of the companies who hire them.”

  Scott sighed. “Look, all I’m asking is that you make an effort to show your commitment to the company and put in some extra hours. This is not up for debate. I want every one of you to come in this weekend. I don’t care what you do, but I want you here. It’s non-negotiable.”

  That put an end to the meeting, and Craig walked out of the room with Elaine. He’d already decided that he wasn’t going to inflict his own weekend requirement on Lupe, and Elaine said that she wasn’t going to make her secretary come in either.

  “I am,” Sid Sukee said from behind them. “If I have to be here, Carrie has to be here.”

  “Jerk,” Elaine muttered under her breath as he passed by.

  “I heard that,” Sid said, not turning around. “And I don’t care.”

  Craig smiled. “What do you expect from someone in charge of phone apps?”

  Elaine laughed.

  Ahead, the consultant emerged from an office and strode down the corridor toward the elevator. Craig watched him. There was nothing loose or natural in the man’s movements. Every step was deliberate, intentional, even when his gait gave the appearance of spontaneity.

  “Hello, Mr. Patoff,” said a familiar-looking woman whose name Craig didn’t know.

  “Hello, Natalie.” He smiled at her. “But call me Regus.” He waved to other employees as he continued down the hall to the elevator, greeting many of them by name.

  He might have been friendly, but he was not anyone’s friend, Craig thought, and he wondered how many people realized that.

  “That guy’s a creep,” Elaine whispered. “I don’t trust him.”

  “Thank you!” Craig said.

  The consultant got into the elevator, smiling blandly out at everyone on the floor as the doors closed.

  “What do you think’s going to happen?” Elaine asked. “I heard that we might have to file for bankruptcy if there aren’t major cuts.”

  “There are a lot of rumors floating around,” Craig told her.

  “Yeah, but what do you think?”

  “If they hired consultants, there are going to be cuts. And, according to Phil, these consultants have done some serious damage to other companies they’ve been brought in to, quote u
nquote, help. He did a little research of his own and said BFG is known for recommending major layoffs. Among other things.”

  Elaine’s mouth was a thin angry line. “I’m sending out résumés. I’m not waiting.”

  “I really think our department might be safe. I’ve been thinking about it, trying to analyze the situation, and they need us. I think they’ll cut elsewhere.”

  “They don’t need anyone. And who’s to say they won’t fire us and bring in newer, younger people for a fraction of our salaries?” She shook her head. “I’m sending out résumés.”

  It probably wasn’t such a bad idea, he thought as they parted. It might even give him some leverage if his job was threatened. They might want to keep him if they knew someone else wanted him.

  His stomach muscles were tight and tense as he returned to his office. He told Lupe that Scott had ordered all of the division heads to help the department put on a good face by coming in to work this weekend.

  “When do you need me here?” she asked.

  “I don’t,” he said. “I’m not asking you to come in.”

  “My job’s on the line, too,” Lupe said. “So if I have to be married to CompWare while they’re doing their study, I’ll do it. I’m coming in.”

  “It might not be such a bad idea,” he admitted.

  “What time?”

  “Make it mid-morning. There’s no real work for you to do. There’s no real work for me to do. But we’ll make sure we’re seen, parade up and down until some higher-up notices us, then we’ll bail.”

  “But Mr. Cho—”

  “If Mr. Cho or anyone else has a complaint, I’ll just tell them that we got our work done quickly and it didn’t take us as long as everyone else because we’re more competent and efficient.”

  Lupe giggled.

  “Don’t worry. We’re not wasting our whole Saturday here.”

  At home, Angie fixed him with a hard stare when he told her he would have to put in an hour or so at work on Saturday. They were in the kitchen, and with Dylan close by in the living room, taking down the Hot Wheels tracks he’d set up earlier, she kept her voice low. “I know I’m off this weekend, but you promised to take him and one of his friends to the children’s museum.”

  “I’ll still have plenty of time.”

  “That’s not the point. You promised. He’s expecting to spend the whole day with you.”

  “Which friend did he pick?” Craig asked.

  “Zack.”

  He grinned. “I guess I’m lucky I have to work.”

  She frowned at him. “That’s not funny. You know Dylan’s been looking forward to this all week.”

  “I know. But I told you, I’ll go into work early and be back before the museum even opens.”

  “He expects you to spend the day with him. When you make a promise to your son, you need to keep it.”

  “What do you want me to do? Scott told me I have to come in. He wants the consultants to see how dedicated and committed we are.”

  “Are the consultants even going to be there on the weekend?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” he admitted.

  “But you need to go anyway.”

  Craig took a deep breath. “He was also talking about coming in earlier and leaving later each day.”

  “Jesus Christ, Craig!”

  Dylan poked his head around the corner of the doorway. “Are you guys fighting?”

  “No, sweetie,” Angie told him. “I’m just mad at Daddy’s work.”

  “We’re both mad at them.”

  “Well, I can’t get all my Hot Wheels back in the box,” Dylan said. “Can you help me?”

  With a nod of her head, Angie gave him permission to leave, and Craig took it. “Of course,” he said. “And after that we’ll read, okay?”

  “Okay!”

  He was mad at CompWare. For screwing up that Automated Interface deal and ruining the company’s reputation. For botching the release of OfficeManager, which was a damn good program. And, especially, for wasting who knew how many thousands of dollars hiring consultants who were going to decide the fates of hundreds of good workers who had dedicated their careers to the company. It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t right, and Matthews and the rest of upper management should have known better.

  Of course, they were the same people who’d gotten them into such financial straits that they needed A.I. to bail them out in the first place.

  He read to Dylan, went over his homework, and after dinner all three of them played the Cookie Game before Angie got Dylan ready for bed. Craig gave him a big hug and a kiss on the forehead. “Good night, sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite,” he said, as he always did.

  Dylan laughed, as he always did.

  Angie had DVR’d one of last year’s Academy Award-winning movies that they hadn’t yet watched, but he didn’t really want to see it, and he told her to go ahead and watch the movie herself; he had some research to do. Following Phil’s example, he went online and looked up everything he could about BFG Associates.

  Phil was right. The firm was a force to be reckoned with. Not only were there major corporations on BFG’s client list (including Automated Interface!), but several municipalities had also hired its consultants to streamline their workforces in an effort to do more with less in these downsized times. He checked the websites of several companies for which BFG had consulted, then looked up statistics on earnings, staffing and other specific before-and-after financial information before perusing some of the ratings sites, where individuals could anonymously praise or criticize a business. BFG did indeed recommend serious layoffs for nearly all of the companies that hired them, but the surprise was that there were few corresponding complaints on the ratings sites. He’d expected to read excoriating denunciations, angry castigations, at the very least snarky critiques, but the few grievances he found were off point and off-the-wall, the work of disgruntled employees whose rants sounded so unhinged that they made the consultants seem sympathetic.

  That was weird.

  He wondered if BFG had a person assigned to reputation restoration, someone who sorted through websites of criticism, threatening retaliation against anything negative.

  Or maybe they owned these sites.

  He had no hard-and-fast evidence of anything, only a feeling that the people whose jobs had been eliminated were not as docile or accepting as the situation made it seem.

  He told Phil about it the next morning as they walked in from the parking lot together.

  His friend nodded sagely. “It’s like Quadrophenia and Tommy,” Phil said. “When I was younger, when I used to read Rolling Stone and all that, when music was the center of the cultural conversation, critics were always saying that Quadrophenia was a better rock opera than Tommy. They argued that the story was better, the music was better, the movie was better. I probably listened to that album twice as much as I listened to Tommy, trying to hear what everyone else heard in it, trying to recognize its greatness. But you know what? I never liked Quadrophenia much. I tried to force myself to like it, but I didn’t. I’m a Tommy guy. It’s a great album, a brilliant story, and I loved the movie.”

  “Your point being…?”

  “Don’t rely on what others are saying, don’t second-guess yourself. Go with your gut reaction. It’s probably right.”

  “That doesn’t really follow from your long, involved and typically self-obsessed example, but okay.”

  “Fuck you.”

  Craig laughed.

  “I agree with you, though. I certainly wouldn’t be so complacent if my ass was fired. And I noticed that, too. It’s hard to find anything negative about BFG. I’ve been trying to stock up ammunition ever since I heard they were hired, but it’s nearly impossible to get details. I even tried emailing a friend of mine who works for Sprint. BFG cleaned house there a few years back, decimated the place, but he wouldn’t tell me anything. Said there was a confidentiality agreement. Of course, his job was saved, so I’m sure he
doesn’t want to rock the boat. Still…”

  They’d reached the building, and their conversation cut off instantly, without prompting on either of their parts, as though they were both afraid that they would be overheard. Or, more likely, spied upon. Craig looked up at the corners of the lobby. There were security cameras visible, and they’d probably been there forever, but he hadn’t noticed them before and had no idea if there were microphones connected to the cameras and, if there were, how powerful those microphones might be.

  Big Brother’s watching you, he thought, and he might have smiled if the idea hadn’t seemed so utterly plausible.

  FIVE

  Ever since that first introductory meeting, Craig had been receiving twice daily email messages from BFG, generic updates on the consultants’ methodology. After the first few, he’d relegated them to spam and started putting them into his wastebasket without even reading them. Today, however, Matthews had sent out an email ordering everyone to pay attention to BFG’s morning message, and Craig discovered that the consultants were going to be starting individual interviews with employees. Attached was an interview schedule for his division, listing the who-what-and-wheres, though there seemed to be no pattern to the schedule. Interviews were not going to be conducted based on any hierarchical or alphabetical order, and, for his division at least, all of them were going to be conducted by Regus Patoff. Craig’s own interview was scheduled for noon, during his lunch hour.

  So far, Patoff was the only consultant any of them had seen, and Craig was starting to wonder if “BFG Associates” was a sham, if there were no associates and Regus Patoff was the sole member of the firm. The idea bothered him. He didn’t like the man, and he wanted to believe that the consultant had a boss, that there was someone above him, someone to control him.

  Why did he need to be controlled?

  Craig wasn’t sure, but it was a sense he had, and that sense was strong.