FICTION

Being Nobody At All

Janet, Va.

It was damp that night. The forms on the dam project would be wet and slippery, but I do my best thinking on the project after the crews have gone home. My mind needed time. to regroup after another hectic day. I had not had time to think since I was called in on the job.

The rough jog of the battered mud path we call our work road brought my full attention back to driving. A bright full moon was jockeying for position with ominous cigar shaped clouds. Erie moonlight flooded the road to near twilight brightness, making the headlights almost useless, and the road nearly indistinguishable from its drainage ditch.

The dirt smoothed for a moment, and my mind drifted back to the problems of the job. It was dropped in my lap one week ago, nearly one week to the minute. The previous job foreman had somehow gone over three months behind schedule. For some unstated reason the boss had been thoughtful enough to transfer the lagging foreman to a safe small job in Japan three days before I got there to ask him what might have gone wrong. The resident engineer doubled for him before I arrived. He assured me he didn't have the slightest idea why the project had gotten behind, unless it was the original cost estimate. No dice here. I had already checked this excuse to see if I could use it. That put the completion of the lagging job squarely on my shoulders. I had to pick up the loose ends my predecessor had left unmarked. I had to figure out what he had done, what he had not done, and what I could do to get everything done on or before our deadline. It was just as well the foreman wasn't there. I'd probably have dropped him for getting me into this

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