Report 7: “Stand Tall” Protest Rally, Interview 2: Faith

            I turned around at the tap on my shoulder to find myself facing a teenage girl of probably no more than seventeen with a wild mane of curly brown hair and dressed in a flannel jacket.  I nearly did a double take when making eye contact, as her irises were piercingly silver, bordering on a ghostly hue.  I might’ve assumed she was blind if she hadn’t met my gaze perfectly.

TC: Yes?  Can I help you?

Faith: Maybe.  Did I hear you right?  Earlier?

TC: Well, I’m not sure.  What did you hear?

Faith: You’re from Techilogic?

TC: Yes, you heard right.

            There was a pause here as she furrowed her brow, studying me intently, and with some understandable suspicion given the venue we found ourselves in.  She crossed her arms.

Faith: Why are you here?

TC: At the rally, you mean?

Faith: Yes.

TC: I was interviewing Jennifer Sheller.

Faith: What for?

            Knowing the girl’s aggressive questions were probably coming from paranoia at the sight of a perceived foe within the bounds of a safe space for free speech, and given my currently tenuous position at Techilogic, I saw no reason to withhold information.

TC: I’m conducting a study on the Shrink Act, and speaking to people who have been involved in the matter in some capacity.

Faith: Okay.

            Her tone suggested she didn’t fully believe me.

TC: It was a very informative discussion.

Faith: Informative how?

TC: I just hadn’t had the chance to speak with someone so involved in an activist group before, and since Stand Tall is currently the largest one in the nation, it was a good chance to hear the opinion of someone in the thick of it.

Faith: Oh.  That’s good.

TC: The research has been helpful to me, and I hope it can be to others at some point.

Faith: So that’s what your study is?  You talk to people about what they think about the Shrink Act?
TC: Well, many of my interviews were with people currently serving shrunken house arrests, or their caretakers, so the line of questioning was a little varied based on that, but yes.

Faith: Doesn’t that limit you a little?

TC: I suppose so, yes.  I can’t coerce truth or even answers out of everyone.  It’s a fly-on-the wall perspective at best.  But it wasn’t something that was being looked at in any real capacity that I could see, so I thought it might as well be me who started doing it.

Faith: No, not like that.  I mean doesn’t it limit you just talking to people who are under the Shrink Act, when there are others who could probably give you more?

TC: What do you mean?  Who?

Faith: You’re only talking to the people that your company is okay with letting you talk to.  If you really wanted some “informative” talks, you’d find the others.  The ones who have to stay hidden.  If Techilogic let you talk to the people they don’t want you talking to, the Shrink Act would be burned to the ground in a couple weeks.

            I was thrown off for a moment here.  I was beginning to suspect more and more that this girl had a specific alternate agenda, but then again, who am I to fault someone for a fact like that, when much of this study was conducted on such a thing?

TC: I wouldn’t know where to go to get into those conversations.  I know people are out there who have claims, but-

Faith: But you don’t know where they are or what happened to them.

TC: Well, most don’t.

Faith: Don’t you think that’s a little strange?

TC: Of course it is.

Faith: So what do you do about it?

TC: Go looking.  I’ve been in the process of it after a very revealing second interview I had with one of my subjects, actually, but there’s only so much available.  I don’t have the answers.

            The girl gave me a slight condescending smirk, but there was pain behind her eyes I had trouble fully discerning.

Faith: You want answers?  You want truth?

TC: Of course.

Faith: Then just start looking into the empty spaces: the lost people, the cracks in time where there’s so much nothing that it doesn’t even make sense.  Where somebody obviously had to do some erasing to make things look pretty on the other side.

TC: Like what?  I don’t understand.  Look, miss, you obviously have something specific on your mind that you want me to know about.  Please, just give me something to work with.  A place, a name, something.

Faith: Julia Mack.

            I had to pause for a moment.  She said the name as if I should recognize it, but I didn’t.

TC: I haven’t heard of her.

Faith: Exactly.

TC: Who is she?
Faith: Well, according to your company, she’s nobody.  Nobody at all.  Wouldn’t that have been enough for you at some point?

TC: It would’ve, yes.  A long time ago.  But not anymore.  I haven’t been able to take anything Techilogic’s said at face value for a number of years now.

Faith: So?

TC: So, I’m not your enemy.  I’m not anyone’s enemy.  I just want to understand.

            She smirked again.

Faith: Then why don’t you do yourself a favor and find out who Julia is?  And maybe ask your company, too.  I’m sure that would be the more interesting answer.

TC: So you’re trying to tell me she’s someone who disappeared?

Faith: I’m not trying to tell you anything except to try opening your eyes a little wider to just how much is going on here.

            The longer this conversation went on, I felt like I was becoming lost in a surreal drunken fever dream.  I’d never heard someone speak like this with such simultaneously unflinching sharpness and calculated vagueness, and it was all coming from a nameless teenage girl who approached me under a tent while chaos unfurled around us.

TC: What’s your name?

Faith: Faith.

TC: Do you have a last name?

Faith: Yes.

TC: Okay.

            I paused for a moment, but she was clearly done divulging.

TC: What do you want from me?

Faith: Just look up Julia Mack.

TC: Where are you suggesting I look?  I can’t start the search if you won’t tell me what you know.

Faith: You must be a smart guy to be working there, right?  You can probably find a way to see things, even if they don’t really want you to.  Try and see if you can unbury her.  And maybe then you’ll get a better idea of exactly the kind of place that gives you money at the end of the week.

            Faith had stepped back and disappeared back into the crowd before I had a chance to pose another question.  I peered around for her for a few minutes, but her shorter stature and the growing crowd made rediscovering her a severe impracticality, so I resolved to leave this particular “interview” as a loose end for now.

            The bizarre conversation with the girl left me with a pit in my stomach and fresh determination.  She didn’t put anything in explicit terms, but given all I’ve seen during this study, and the kind of risk I’m currently in of being among the nation’s unemployed once again, I’ve resolved to go out on a limb and look into what paltry information she provided to me, even if it means putting myself at risk for arrest for the second time in the course of this study.

            There’s a lot of work to be done.  The first and most pressing of tasks now is the repossession of certain materials from my office and the Techilogic Corporation before my termination from this job, which was shaky before, but will undoubtedly be history after it’s discovered that I’ve attended this rally for interviews.  I estimate that I’ll have around two days after my return to the office before I’m asked to leave.  Luckily, I am efficient.  And though I can’t be certain, I’ve been around long enough to know where in the building Techilogic might try to hide some of its dirty laundry to keep the stench from leaking out.

            The second task and quite possibly just as troubling will be getting an answer that’s now been bothering me since my discussion with Faith for reasons I cannot hope to explain: who is Julia Mack?