Episode 19: An Offer He Can't Refuse

The guard let Acey into the holding area. “You should see the courthouse this morning, Mike,” she began. “There must be a hundred reporters camped out on the steps reporting on your trial.”

“How wonderful,” Mike replied with a scowl as he brushed his wet hair. He set his brush down, walked over to the bars, and greeted Acey with a kiss. “Well this really IS wonderful. Coffee and doughnuts?”

Acey passed a coffee cup and a bag of doughnuts through the bars with a smile.

“My favorite kind,” Mike noted, peeking in the bag. “This isn’t just a setup for another joke about how a doughnut and a coffee cup are really the same shape because they’re ‘homomorphic,’ is it?”

Acey choked on her coffee. “HOLOmorphic, Mike,” she smiled, rolling her eyes at Mike’s mathematical ignorance. “Not HOMOmorphic. Sadly, these poor paper coffee cups have no handles,” she pointed out, “so they are not topologically holomorphic to a doughnut. Maybe I should have gotten you one of those jelly-filled ones, instead.”

“Still seems like ‘homomorphic’ would make more sense,” he frowned. “That’s ‘same-shape,’ right?” He took a bite of doughnut.

“No,” Acey explained. “A ‘homomorphism’ transforms one set into another in a way that preserves in the second set the operations between the members of the first set.”

“Oh,” said Mike, his mouth half full of doughnut, “but of course.” He rolled his eyes back at her mathematical sophistry, swallowed,and washed down the remaining doughnut with a sip of coffee. “Tastes great anyway. Goes well with the coffee, even if they’re not ‘holomorphic’ this morning. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” she replied looking intently at him.

“You’re not joining me?” Mike asked at last.

“I ate mine on the way over,” she explained.

“Low time preference,” Mike chided her, shaking his head, his mouth full of doughnut. He swallowed the bite and washed it down with a sip of coffee. “Poor impulse control.”

“I can SEE the wrinkle between your eyebrows,” she chided him back. “Though I suppose that DOES explain what I’m doing here with you, instead of holding out for someone better,” she countered.

“Touché,” Mike laughed, popping the last bite into his mouth. He stood up, turned up his collar, grabbed a tie, and began tying it around his neck.

Acey watched him silently, intently. Finally, she stood and grabbed the bars above her head. “I have something even nicer than a doughnut to share with you this morning.” She leaned against the bars, posing for him.

Mike froze, tie in hand, raising an eyebrow.

The guard looked up from his phone and eyed her, suspiciously.

“You’re so cute when you’re embarrassed,” she laughed, taking a step back from the bars. “You really think I’d do anything here with the guard watching? I’m not THAT without shame. But seriously, I do have something very nice for you.”

“Well?” Mike asked, finishing the knot in his tie. “What is it?”

Acey glanced back at the guard and said softly, so as not to be overheard, “How does ‘Assistant Professor of Biology, Dr. Michael Andrews sound?”

Mike froze again. “Tenure track?” he asked at last, raising an eyebrow again.

“Three-year, tenure-track contract,” Acey confirmed.

She passed the official offer through the bars.

“In writing, no less,” Acey added.

“What’s more, it’s effective immediately. So, you even get to double dip – you get both your high school and your university salary for the summer session.”

Mike continued reading the offer.

He looked up. “Start-up funds… really?”

Acey nodded. “The Trustees will grant another two hundred fifty thousand dollars from the Emerging Scholars Fund for laboratory equipment and start-up expenses.”

“I see.” Mike read on. “Wait… ‘subject to good behavior?’”

“Yes,” Acey acknowledged. “Just stay off social media. Don’t comment publicly on politics, or COVID, or vaccines, or anything else controversial.”

Mike frowned. “A lot of people bought into the disinformation they were spreading about COVID and the vaccines, Acey. I can’t stay silent about it. Not when people I care about might be risking their health.”

“I caught COVID early, Mike,” Acey reminded him. “I wasn’t going to get vaccinated when they’re no better than natural immunity and take the risk with a vaccine they didn’t even test on pregnant women so they could assess the fertility implications. Certainly not over a disease that isn’t all that dangerous to the young and healthy. I didn’t need YOU to tell me that. You don’t HAVE to go sharing your opinion where it hasn’t been asked for. If you simply can’t control yourself, get a Virtual Private Network and do your online ‘shit-posting’ anonymously, so it can’t be tracked back to you or the university. Share spicy memes with your buddies on Gab or Social Galactic or on the Aetherstream on Telegram all you like. Just don’t do it publicly, and don’t draw attention to yourself, and you’ll be fine.”

Acey approached the bars.

“Look Mike,” she grabbed the bars, “the university life is not for me. I saw what it took out of my mother. Teaching and working on campus all day, picking me up out of day care, coming home to microwave a dinner, and then turning me over to one of her students moonlighting as a babysitter, so Mom could go back to work on proposals and grant applications and her research. It was a rare treat when she was home to give me a goodnight kiss instead of the babysitter tucking me in.

“I love teaching,” she continued, I love molding young minds, but I also love a more relaxed lifestyle. I’m not going to put any children of my own through what my mother put me.

“A career as a high school teacher works for me, at least until I can settle down and start a family.

“It’s not for you, though.

“You love teaching, but you love your research, too.

“High school only gives you half of what you need from a job. If you’re going to live a fulfilled life, you NEED that faculty position. You HAVE to have it.

“Keeping your mouth shut is a small price to pay for it.

“Think of it, Mike. You’d be on the first real step of your career.”

Acey stepped back and adopted a demure pose.

“You know, IF you were to propose to me, and IF I accepted… my mother isn’t likely to fire her son-in-law, now is she?”

Acey grabbed the bars again.

“Then, we could get married, and finally begin our life together.”

Mike took a deep breath.

“Keeping my mouth shut,” Mike looked at her, “or pretending to well enough that no one notices me. That’s not all your mother wants from me, now is it?”

“All you have to do is apologize,” Acey disclosed at last. “Just tell Sue you’re sorry for making her feel bad. You don’t even have to admit you were ‘wrong.’ You questioned her gender definition. You acknowledge you hurt her feelings. You’re sorry, and you won’t do it again. That’s all you have to do.”

“I promised the superintendent and Senator Travis I’d see it through,” Mike sighed. “An apology would be a tacit admission of guilt.”

“You don’t owe THEM anything,” Acey pressed him. “You don’t think they wouldn’t throw you under the bus if it served their purposes? You think the superintendent or that arrogant asshole, Travis, would defend you for a moment if he didn’t think it would get him votes and publicity?

“They’re using you, Mike.

“That’s all they are.

“They’re users.

“Now, you can use them right back and get your heart’s desire.

“Everything you always wanted. Your career, your teaching, your research…”

She paused and gave him a modest smile “…and me.”

Mike took a deep breath. He looked up, closed his eyes, and slowly exhaled.

“I don’t know Acey,” Mike shook his head. “I really don’t know.”

Acey frowned. “Well, you better decide quickly. Because Roxy is going to be asking you later today or tomorrow if you regret the pain you caused Sue, and your answer better be, ‘yes.’”

“It’s time, Doc,” the guard announced.

“You think on it, Mike,” Acey insisted, lowering her voice so as not to be overheard. “Don’t make the wrong decision.”

Acey turned away, her long hair arcing through the air. Mike smiled, watching her hips sway as she walked to the door where the guard let her out.