Lena felt the closest she did to breaking. She did not want to let this woman help her use the bathroom, but if she didn’t, the woman would know she was faking it. You want to know more, Lena told herself. She let the woman help her into the largest stall. The woman took Lena’s hands and guided her in pulling down the soft pants and underwear she was wearing. Then she turned and looked away while Lena peed. When it was over, the woman guided Lena’s hands to the toilet paper. Lena felt nauseated by the experience but told herself it could’ve been so much worse. The observer helped Lena wash her hands.
“I do hope they’re paying you enough for this,” the woman muttered to Lena, “because they’re definitely not paying me enough.” Lena pulled out her phone. “You have to walk for at least ten more minutes.”
Lena moaned.
“I know. But if you could remember this, you would thank me.”
They went back to the hallway. Lena’s feet were cold. It was harder than she expected to keep her face slack, uninterested. She was certain if this woman wasn’t so sure that Lena was “fried,” she would see what was right in front of her. But this woman was sure she was sick, didn’t really see her as a person. She seemed only to care about doing what she had been told to do.
Where were they? It was so quiet.
No street noise, birds, or dogs. No windows. The observer and Lena paused near a room where three women were playing around with what looked like a robotic Bigfoot. One was using her laptop. Another was saying, “Now make him look at Beatrice.” The robot didn’t move. The third woman, presumably Beatrice, was taking what looked like a cat brush and combing the robot’s chest fur. Bigfoot gazed at Lena. Its large eyes were yellow-brown. Its mouth curled down, as if it had just heard some real bummer news. Lena thought no one would believe this Bigfoot was real. He should be filthy, covered with brambles, soaked with mud, not looking like a great throw blanket. Bigfoot gazed up at the ceiling. “I think I messed up a little writing the code,” said the woman working on the laptop.
The woman combing Bigfoot’s hair glanced at Lena. Her hair was dyed green and she was wearing a black headband with pens clipped to it. “Fried?” she asked the observer.
“Yeah.”
“Make sure to have her move her arms, too, after you do the walk.”
“I feel like I’m in Weekend at Bernie’s,” the observer said.
“I’ve never seen that movie.”
“Oh, well. It’s about these two boys who try to scam.”
“We don’t need a recap,” said the woman on the laptop.
“Oh, right. Sorry. We should keep moving anyway.” The observer adjusted herself so that her right arm was around Lena’s waist. Then moved Lena’s left arm and dipped her head underneath it so that it was resting on Lena’s shoulder. “I think this is a little better,” the woman said.
They walked on. The woman opened another door and stepped into a room that looked exactly like Great Lakes Shipping Company. The combination of brand-new and terribly outdated computers. Judy’s dumb STRESSED IS JUST DESSERTS SPELLED BACKWARD! poster. At what would have been Lena’s desk was a copy of the photo she had at her own work desk: she and her mom laughing on their front porch. A bunch of Great Lakes Shipping Company pens in a blue-and-white Cedar Point mug. The dark spot on the ceiling all the study participants said looked suspicious, like black mold, and the observers said was just an old tile that needed to be replaced.
The observer had Lena sit in a chair. She lifted Lena’s arms over and over. Took one and made it turn circles. Lena thought it felt good to let someone else gently stretch and massage her arms. She sighed.
“Soon, I promise, you can go back to bed.”
The woman spoke at her about neural pathways and movement and the brain’s wiring in a way that Lena couldn’t really understand. When she was done with both of Lena’s arms, she helped her up again.
They walked in a few circles around this replica office. The wall next to the break room was covered in neon notecards. There was a picture of each office worker, and below there appeared to be plotlines. IAN COMES OUT TO THE OFFICE. LENA THINKS ABOUT GOING BACK TO SCHOOL. MARIAH TELLS EVERYONE SHE WANTS TO CHANGE HER NAME TO GEODE. TOM FORGETS TO BACK UP A SERVER. JUDY SAYS SOMETHING RACIALLY CHARGED TO CHARLIE. CHARLIE QUESTIONS HIS FUTURE. There were many more, with big and small details. They must’ve been meant for their daily sheets, the things they were supposed to tell people when they were asked about work, about their days.
Lena felt distant from her body seeing the next eight months of her life spread out and annotated like that. There were notes for interactions outside of work: barbecues, a trip to the county fair, happy hours. Maybe nothing in Lakewood had been real. Maybe they had planned Charlie’s party, smashed her windshield, sent the man to talk to her about Bigfoot. Maybe they were all the people she saw every day. But what was the point?
“We’re doing a loop,” the observer said.
Lena wanted to go back to bed. “Potato chip,” she said.
“I’m sorry, but you can’t eat yet.”
They stopped outside a room full of people watching a movie on a big screen.
“It’s still happening,” the woman said to Lena.
“Should we have someone stop Madison?” a familiar voice asked.
“We can’t interfere,” Dr. Lisa said.
On the screen, a girl was pulling open a safe. Inside was a gun, what looked like a stack of money, and a brown box. Lena recognized her. It was one of the Madisons she had seen on the second floor. Madison didn’t look at the money or the brown box, just reached for the gun. She stood still. It looked too big in her hands. She was wearing pajamas with a large whale pattern on them. Her hair was in two braids. She pointed the gun at the lamp. The curtains.
“She’ll probably just put it back.”
Madison walked out of the room with the gun. The camera lost her for a moment. The screen went dark, cut to many images of the house—inside and outside, from side and overhead angles. Then the back of Madison’s head as she walked down the hallway, the gun visible over her shoulder. The screen cut to that view, following the girl. It was clear she knew how to walk around the house without waking up her parents. There was no sound. Madison pushed open a door.
“This might be too far,” Smith said.
Dr. Lisa made a thoughtful noise, wrote something down.
“This is incredible,” said the observer. She propped Lena against the wall. “You’re okay.”
In the room, a woman slept on her side, wearing a sleeping mask. A man, probably the girl’s father, slept on his back, arms folded over his chest. It looked as if the woman was talking in her sleep. Madison kept the gun pointed at the bed. She walked to its edge, pointed it unsteadily at her mother. She squeezed the trigger once but didn’t seem to get enough force behind it. Tried again, shooting her mother in the head. There was a kick. She fell back a little, hitting her arm on the nightstand. Madison’s father sat up. He seemed confused. Reached out as if still in dreams, his mouth wide open as if screaming or yawning. Madison shot him too. A few people in the room gasped. Most were writing, scratching out furious notes.
Lena’s mouth let out a sound. The rest she kept tamped down, though keeping all her emotions in check felt like holding in a sneeze. She would not cry. She would not put her hand over her mouth. She would not vomit, though rage and disgust were building in her throat.