My Redacted Life: Chapter 23 (Cont._3)

Monday came. I had to change my concentration from my Redhead to my career. Still, I wondered. Was she my girlfriend now? I’d ask my next-door neighbor next time I saw her. No use asking the Redhead herself. She’d just give me that funny little look she used so well and say, “Why do you ask?”

So, I went to work. I had piles of reports to go through from my week in Hope. The others were working on a project that was to get us into the land development business where the money was. The head boss had gotten a local savings and loan to finance the project and all was on “go.”

Jack Castin had designed a nice subdivision. As I have mentioned, the parcel lay between a large city and one of its suburbs. For the sake of maintaining harmless history, we’ll call its planned name “Wellington Village.” The reader will understand the need for anonymity later.

The bosses were pleased with the work I’d done in Hope. They stopped short of giving me another raise, but I could tell they were pleased because they gave me some more work to do, on top of everything else.

It seemed that a city, not one of ours, but a voice from the past of one of the bosses, was becoming fearful of the voting power of black residents. They had asked us to study the block statistics from the 1970 Census and lay out proposed voting districts that would assure a white majority in coming elections.

Hell yes, it bothered me. It was one of those “leave or deceive” moments that I would face occasionally in my career. Of course, I chose to deceive. Lack of a conscience was, back then, simply a benefit, a useful weapon in the arsenal of chicanery. Later. it would become a necessity for the highly successful. Four years of military life had pretty well emptied me of mine.

It would take me almost a week to arrive at boundaries that looked as if they met the mandate but were actually quite harmless. I don’t think anyone ever figured out the trickery, and I never told anyone. At any rate, the mayor stayed in office for years, so I don’t suppose he even needed the extra help that he assumed was there.

Back to the Monday, though. I had promised myself that I would forget the Redhead and concentrate on work. I almost made it, but not quite. Someone caught me staring into space once and asked if I had fallen into a trance.

“Concentrating on a problem,” I said, unconvincingly I’m sure.

Quitting time finally came. I set my work into neat piles and prepared to leave. There was no pressing deadline that required extra hours and no night meeting. Good. I’d hurry home and, if I didn’t catch Brenda, I’d at least talk to my neighbor about her. The “game was afoot,” as Sherlock Holmes would say.

I looked up see Jack Castin and the engineer standing in front of me.

“Yes?”

Jack said, “We’re going across the street for a beer. Wanna come?”

For crying out loud. I had other things on my mind. I had neither the time nor inclination to waste time talking about work or telling “war stories.” I had no intention of wasting valuable time that I could spend working on solidifying what promised to be a marvelous relationship. They would understand. To hell with them if they didn’t.

“Sure,” I said.

Decisions were becoming
the bane of my existence.