“I think that’s wonderful.” He took another bite, swallowed, and carefully blotted his mouth with his napkin. “Would you rather I find somewhere else to be on Wednesdays?”
“We’re not kicking you out yet. When we get to the spooky menopause rituals, I’ll let you know.”
“You mean I’ll be left out of the bonfires and naked dancing under the moon? I suppose it’s understandable, but I can’t say I’m not disappointed.” He finished off the last of his tacos and reached for her empty plate. “Have I mentioned lately that I wish we had someone with your sense of humor in the department? It’s nothing but humorless complaints from everyone right now.”
“That doesn’t sound like your clan.” Usually the math department was a friendly bunch even if they were completely uninterested in anything else going on at the university. If Baxter was wishing for someone with her admittedly anemic sense of humor, things truly must be dire. “People still unhappy about the renovations?”
He shrugged dramatically. “I can’t help that the building hasn’t been renovated since 1932 and the school wants to update it. It’s hardly a surprise. Margaret and I gave everyone two years of warning, but they’re acting like we dropped a bomb on them at the beginning of the semester.”
“What’s the main complaint?”
“That they’re going to have to move offices, of course. We’re splitting up the family for two whole semesters. You know they don’t like change.”
Katherine was fairly sure that disliking change was a prerequisite to any college-faculty admission. “Where are they going?”
“Most of them will be going to Meyer Hall.”
Katherine nearly laughed out loud. “Oh no. Not the social science building.”
The horror. The utter and complete horror. Katherine already felt sorry for the sociologists and psychologists who would be subjected to the insular mathematicians in Baxter’s department.
“I tried to convince them that it would be a learning opportunity, but I don’t think they’re buying it. A few of them have openly stated that they won’t be able to continue their research if they can’t collaborate in adjoining offices.” He set the dishes in the sink and grabbed the half-empty bottle of wine on the counter to refill their glasses. “How was your day?”
“Much less dramatic than yours.” She tried to mentally sort through her day. “Office hours. Uh, had a meeting with Keisha, my new grad student. She’s a delight.”
“Where’s she coming from?”
“Arizona State.”
“Ah.” Baxter’s eyebrows went up. “Interesting.”
“Had an enjoyable discussion in my Applied Physics class. That was fun. Really bright group this semester.”
“No troublemakers at all? How very boring. What’s Fred doing?”
“Not being boring, that’s for sure. He figured out how to destroy the lamp in his aquarium again. Apparently Job’s puzzle ball wasn’t challenging enough. He staged a protest.”
Baxter topped off her wineglass. “I wonder if they’d build us an aquarium in the new lobby of the math building.”
“I really don’t recommend it.” Katherine sipped her wine. “Unless you’re getting actual fish and not cephalopods.”
“Cuttlefish?”
“They might be less rebellious than Fred.”
Baxter turned on a speaker and hit a button on his phone, filling their galley kitchen with jazz. “Colorful too. Cuttlefish, I mean.”
“I’ve heard that.”
Baxter held out a hand and Katherine took it. He pulled her to standing in his arms, swaying with the music as the sun went down though the large glass panes of their front windows.
She put her arms around his waist. She had to remember to feed him more. He’d always been wiry, but he was getting downright thin as they got older. She laid her head on his shoulder and listened to him hum in her ear.
I did something really unethical and I might get in serious trouble. She nearly blurted it out. I’m having visions of things that happen minutes after I see them even though premonition makes no scientific sense.
Was it unethical though? She wasn’t trying to manipulate data. She wasn’t trying to take advantage of the students in the study. She was trying to figure out why two of those students had experienced seemingly out-of-character violent outbursts within a few months of each other.
What if she hadn’t been in the gym that day? What if Justin had killed people—possibly his worst nightmare—and had no idea why? What if some disassociation was a side effect of Ansel’s study? Wasn’t it more ethical to continue trying to find answers at this point, to protect study participants and the innocent people around them?
“You’re thinking quite loudly, darling.”
She propped her chin on his shoulder. “My lovely and wise Professor Pang.”
“Yes, Professor Bassi?”
“I have a conundrum.”
“I would be happy to help in any way I can.”
What to say?
“I have a suspicion that a study Ansel Shaver did last year might have had something to do with the shooting attempt at the gym.”
Baxter pulled away and looked at her, a frown creasing his forehead. “Why do you think that?”
“I was made aware that another student had a similar strange, violent outburst. When I spoke to her, she mentioned being part of the study and also mentioned that Justin McCabe was a part of it as well.”
Baxter’s face was blank. “Did you ask—?”
“She offered the information. I know it’s still a grey area ethically, but she clearly wanted to talk, and I was there.”
Baxter’s hand tightened on her waist. “If the university finds out that you even spoke to her—”
“I know. I know.” She took a deep breath. “But what am I supposed to do, Bax? If these… incidents have anything to do with Ansel’s study, more people could be affected. I didn’t intend to violate anything, but this is too important to—”
“You have to report him to the IRB.”
The Institutional Review Board at the university was set up to monitor any research conducted using human subjects, and the buck stopped with them. If a study was flagged by the IRB, it would go nowhere.
“I only have suspicions right now,” Katherine said. “I don’t have anything to report.
