Little Deadly Things (18 page)

“Listen to me,” she continued. Her voice was even, almost hypnotic. “You cannot be one kind of person with your dogs and another kind of person with people. You’ve created a rigid internal boundary and it is costing you dearly to maintain that barrier. Your patience is on the dog side and your anger is on the people side. But the boundary is artificial. Where is Marta on that map? You’re going to have a baby. What happens when your child pushes you to your limits? Trust me, that will happen. Repeatedly. And what happens when your anger with people migrates to dogs?

Jim’s eyes pooled and his shoulders sagged. “What am I going to do? Do you think I like feeling the way I do?”

“Shhh. Just sit for a few minutes. Close your eyes again and breathe. In through your nose and exhale out your mouth.”

Jim took several deep breaths, exhaling each one more slowly that the last. He leaned back in his chair. He could feel the tension drain from his face.

Dr. Luminaria’s firm voice began again. “When you work with a dog, you reward the behavior that you want to increase and ignore what you want to diminish. It’s just as easy with people because the principles are universal. In some ways, it’s easier. Most dogs need a bit of food or a toy or petting. People usually only need a smile or a word of approval.”

“But how do I react to anger? Threats?” Jim asked.

“Why not ignore it all, and let it die out?” Dr. Luminaria asked, “Just as you would ignore undesirable behavior from a dog.”

“How can I?” asked Jim.

“Jim, the easiest way to change an unwanted behavior is to starve it. Reacting feeds the behavior. Children often misbehave in order to get the attention that comes with the punishment. So, ignore the behavior you don’t like. But this will demand that you learn self-control.”

“It’s not the same for me.”

“Oh? You’re the universe’s lone exception?”

“I never lose my temper with dogs. But people? Forget it.” He slumped again.

Marta reached out to rub his shoulders but Dr. Luminaria had stopped her. “Please, Marta, don’t reinforce him when he’s in his ‘poor me’ mode. When he starts to work through a challenge, then you can rub his shoulder to reinforce that behavior. A quick pat as a small reward for a small achievement or a nice shoulder rub as a higher-value reward. And I’ll bet you can think of a nice reward for a bigger achievement,” she said with a smile and a wink to Marta.

Jim saw Marta grin and felt his face burn. Despite himself, he smiled.

Dr. Luminaria turned back to Jim. “Answer me. If a dog has a barking problem, what’s the best training response?”

“Remove the stimulus in the environment that causes the barking. Or cue a different behavior before the dog starts to bark,” Jim said.

“And what else? What do most people do wrong?” she prompted.

“They try to punish the barking.”

“Why is that wrong?” Her questions were rapid-fire, her cadence brisk.

“The punishment just reinforces it.”

“So you ignore the barking and then it goes away?”

“No,” he said, “First there’s an increase in the barking just before it subsides. An extinction burst. Most people give up there. But if they wait, they can reward the dog after the extinction burst, when the dog is finally quiet.”

“Well, people are the same. So, when someone really gets on your nerves, why not assume that you’re seeing an extinction burst and just wait?”

Jim nodded.

“Perhaps you get into trouble because you confuse the extinction burst with a threat. Wait it out. Most people call that patience and goodwill. If it helps you to use the language of behaviorism, then call it an extinction burst.”

“But if I don’t react, there could be trouble,” he argued.

“No!” She rapped on her desk to anchor her response. “The trouble starts when you react. Your father was prone to violence. Do you think most people are like him? Or are people generally peaceable?”

Jim lifted one shoulder in a ‘whatever’ gesture.

Luminaria pressed the point. “Don’t just shrug. You’re avoiding the question. If people were naturally violent, then there’d be a lot more blood on the streets, yes?”

She raised her eyebrows to punctuate her question.

“I guess so,” he said aloud.

She continued, “But if baseline human behavior isn’t violent, then the problem is inside of you.”

“I guess so,” he said again.

“Look, Jim,” she said softly, rewarding him with a soothing voice. “You’re the keenest observer of canine behavior that I’ve seen in a long time. But when you consider people, you confuse
your
feelings with
their
intent. You remember the way your father acted and you see red. I want you to follow the old saying ‘Count to ten’ so you have a chance to wait out your own extinction bursts.”

“But what if someone takes a swing at me?” he asked.

“Duck,” she said.

Marta smiled in approval. Clearly, she liked Dr. Luminaria.

___________________________________________

DISCONTENT, RENEWAL, AND DISQUIET

CAMBRIDGE. MASSACHUSETTS
SPRING. 2030

A
week before the end of the semester, Marta was in a feverish review of cellular biology, organic chemistry, and statistical analysis. Her coffee pot had given birth to a litter of cups. A pile of snack food wrappers grew in an apparent case of spontaneous generation. Marta was a bundle of caffeine-fueled, sugar-enhanced, stress-jangled nerves. Jim tried to help, but to little avail. The vocabulary of her studies was unpronounceable for him, let alone understandable.

Eva joined them, relaxed, as if she hadn’t a care in the world.

“Well, look who’s gracing us with her presence,” Marta groused, part accusation, part cry for mercy. “You’ve decided you need to study like the rest of us mortals?”

“Nope. All set.” This drew a groan from Marta. Eva said, “Stop complaining. It’s just science.”

“I don’t understand how you do it,” said Marta.

“Simple. I learn it the first time, in class. Then I don’t forget it. Try it sometime.”

“Thank you very much for your most excellent advice,” said Marta. She was too tired to add the usual edge of asperity to her voice. “So how have you been filling your time? Surely not reading a novel?”

Eva looked askance. “Why would I do that? No, I’ve got a project. Here, look this over and approve it,” she directed. Marta’s dataslate pinged receipt of a document.

“What is it?” asked Marta.

“An application. Sign it.”

“Mind telling me what it is?”

“Read it,” Eva ordered.

“I’m in the middle of organic chemistry. Or is it statistics? Whatever—can’t it wait till after finals?”

“Nope. Need your approval. Project application is due tomorrow.”

“What project?” Marta asked, bewildered.

“Open it,” ordered Eva.

Marta groaned again and subvocalized to open a heads-up display. “It’s a work-study grant application,” she said, surprised. “Bingo.”

“I don’t get it. What work-study?”

“Listen,” Eva began. “We’re going to pool what we know and get credit for it. Take some time out of the classroom and do something real, make something. The project will show the feasibility of nanoassembly of medicines. It’s right up our alley. You know more about folk remedies than anybody in the world. We take the best stuff from your rainforests and synthesize it with a nanoassembler. Maybe even turn it into a business.”

“Where are we going to get an assembler?” asked Marta.

“Oh, ye of little faith. I have a plan,” said Eva.

“I get that you want to use what I’ve found in El Yunque. But I don’t like it,” said Marta. “I’ve spent years cataloging what I found in El Yunque and around the world because the rainforests are dying, not to be some kind of tycoon.”

Eva set down her dataslate with exaggerated care and stared at Marta. She made a hunched shoulders, palms-up, ‘what gives?’ gesture and said, “That’s exactly why my plan is perfect. The rainforests are dying. The people who know what’s in them are dead or moving to the cities. What’s going to happen then? Do you want to let it all get lost?”

“No, but I don’t like this idea of yours,” Marta repeated.

“What’s not to like?”

“Well, for one thing, I don’t like you doing this behind my back.”

“Oh, relax. I just did the part that I’m best at—organizing and creating a business plan. You ever done anything like that before?”

“No,” Marta admitted, “but—”

“You’ve written grant applications before? Even one?”

“No. I’m a researcher, not a wanna-be tycoon.”

“Wanna-be? Riiight.” She drew out this last word. “What about you, Jim? You have any desire to manage the business part?”

He shrugged. “I’ll help.”

Eva said, “Marta. This is not, ‘Eva’s going behind our back’ but ‘Eva’s taking on the crappy part of the job so her friend can study.’”

“I’ll think about it,” said Marta.

“Think about it?” Eva shot back, as close to shouting as she might ever come. “Think about what? What are you going to do, spend the rest of your life cataloging plants that are going extinct? Here you have a chance to do something real. Catalog, my ass. Let’s build something. Take that brain of yours”—she reached up and tapped Marta’s forehead with two stubby fingers—“and use it on something practical.”

Marta winced at the touch. “I don’t know,” she said. “There’s an awful lot to find and preserve. That could take me the rest of my life.”

Jim broke in. He positioned himself slightly between Marta and Eva. Marta relaxed. He said to her, “Didn’t you tell me that Abuela said the same thing? That you could teach the doctors? Maybe this is your destiny. Here’s a chance to find out.”

“Maybe after finals,” Marta allowed.

“Meantime, Marta? Approve the damned application. Deadline is tomorrow.”

“I’ll look it over. No promises. I guess I’m a bit miffed. You bring this to us as a
fait accompli
and that sort of takes me by surprise.”

Eva mimicked,
“Fait accompli.
That’s a good one. Just sign it, Marta.” Then, “Please?”

Marta reviewed the grant application. “Okay, I’ll do it. I have to admit that it’s well-organized. Your writing is easy to read and it has enough detail to demonstrate the project’s feasibility. You did a good job. And I can use something from El Yunque, from Abuela. I might even help the world understand the Taíno culture.”

But before Marta and Eva could tackle nanoassembly they had to tackle final exams. Weather conditions conspired to make life miserable late in April, a time that is filled with flowers and robins and budding trees everywhere except in Boston, which might as well have been in a weather quarantine. Lowering gray skies unleashed daggers of sleet that etched their faces. Acres of half-melted snow conspired to trap the exhausted collegians’ feet. Around them, unsuspecting pedestrians stepped into curbside potholes, ankle-deep with dirty slush. They cursed the weather, cursed their drenched feet and, for good measure, cursed each other.

And yet... winter must stand aside for spring’s arrival, even in Boston. Final exams and meteorological ordeals were over. The morning of June 7 was a smile after winter’s glower. Snow was a melted memory. Sunshine swept aside the gloom and Marta’s misgivings. She had linked to Eva to congratulate her on a successful proposal and its funding and to tell her how much she looked forward to independent work.

“When my grandmother told me I’d be teaching doctors about our healing plants, I thought she was being, well, unrealistic, shall we say. Eva—thank you.”

Now Eva waited for Marta on a bench outside the Northwest Science building. The massive steel and glass-fronted building was a research center for neurosciences, bioengineering, systems biology, and computational analysis. It stood near Harvard’s museums and Harvard Yard—’Hahvahd Yahd’ in the local dialect—and was surrounded by a manicured expanse of grass and trees, green with new life.

Jim waited with her. He was excited too, and brought coffee and bagels. The baby was due any day, and Jim used every break in his schedule to be with his wife.