Free Civilly Disobedient (Calm Act Genesis Book 1) by Ginger Booth Page B

Dan,” I assured him. “I can sell this unit of crap to my people, in exchange for telecommuting. Without the compensating bribe…” I shrugged rather than complete the thought. Leaving the threat vague kept my options open.
    “Yeah, I could sell that,” Mangal backed me up, leading a chorus from the other two.
    Dan’s hands splayed aggressively on the blotter again. His face began to settle into his more-in-sorrow-than-in-anger act.
    So I preempted him. “Let’s all sleep on it, Dan,” I encouraged. “Tempers are high. None of us wants to say something rash.”
    Trevor, one of the other section heads, piped up to warn us, “Our people will hear about it from the other branches.” Trevor’s section was system administrators, not creatives like my section and Mangal’s.
    “Tell them we’re still discussing it,” Mangal said smoothly. “They’ll like that. Makes them feel better about the situation. Because there’s some wiggle room. Because we’re still talking.” He smiled at Dan.
    That’s what I love about Mangal. Not only did my best friend understand my off-the-wall suggestion, but he caught the ball and helped me sell it, with no advance warning whatsoever.
    -oOo-
    Happy hour at Public, the new corner bar, was far from packed. Mangal and I had been joking for weeks that we should check the place out before they went out of business.
    The secrets to their un-success were legion, starting with the choice to open an after-work bar in downtown Stamford in May. For a brief couple of months, replete with vacation days, we commuters stood a prayer of getting home before twilight. Happy hour is for the dark months. The decor was all-over chrome and beige, with bright fluorescent lighting of a bilious cast, that reflected off the chrome to spotlight everyone’s jowls from below. The average overweight American was not flattered by that lighting. Mangal and I were slender enough, and just looked greenish. But I could readily see myself in the convex mirrored pillars surrounding me, showing me how I would look three times wider. Hard to imagine what the interior designer thought he was doing.
    Mangal and I easily secured a corner booth, three tables away from any other patrons. We loaded small plates with over forty bucks apiece in free happy hour appetizers, and ordered a couple soft drinks. That waiter wouldn’t be back to check on us any time soon, no matter how little else she had to do.
    I took out my phone pouch and reached a hand below table level, to request Mangal’s phone. I stowed both phones away in my purse-borne Faraday cage. If you block all signals, it doesn’t matter what spyware is installed on a phone. No one can locate you, listen to your microphone, run software, or turn on the camera. Of course, we couldn’t receive any calls while the phones were shielded, either.
    Mangal sighed. “We should just fix our phones.”
    “Can’t,” I said. “I put mine in a pouch for a week, and bought another to use. Personnel informed me that I was required to use the UNC phone. Even on weekends. Because managers often receive work emails on weekends.”
    “Too often,” he agreed. “Alright. What did we need to talk about?” He teased a vegetarian nacho out of his heaped plate. Mangal was Jain, not Hindu, but Jains are even more fervently vegetarian.
    “Well, I think the telecommute ploy will work,” I mused. “But I want to go to Philadelphia.”
    “Since when?”
    Mangal knew full well I wouldn’t have gone to the Philadelphia demonstrations until forbidden to go. “Since this afternoon, of course,” I replied. “This quarterly meeting wasn’t due for another two weeks, Mangal. Interesting timing.”
    Mangal shrugged. “C-levels take vacation in summer, too, Dee. Scheduling conflict. Could be coincidence.”
    I shook my head. “I don’t think so. Upper management takes vacation after the fiscal year closes on July first. But this weekend is the big protest march in Philadelphia.