The Standardization of Demoralization Procedures by Jennifer Hofmann

Author:Jennifer Hofmann
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Published: 2020-08-11T00:00:00+00:00

It was Katja who offered to direct Held to his office. As soon as they stepped outside, she wiggled out of her poncho, swiftly and effortlessly, like a snake exfoliating its skin, then set off down the narrow path at such speed that Held had to jog to keep up. She stayed close to the buildings, avoiding patches of sun, and steered away from the paved pathways, along the backs of buildings, where the heat glimmered like water among the desert slopes. Absent the poncho, Katja’s body looked childlike, her naked arms like two chicken wings gnawed to the bone. The back of her neck was covered with a sheet of translucent freckles so dense it resembled a tan. The two of them angled around a corner, and just as Held darted after Katja into the building, there, topping a bald hill, were the five boys, waving at him as if he were one of their own.

“I burn in the sun. I have to move fast,” Katja said, not the least out of breath.

She ushered him down a bland, frigid hallway and pointed him into an office. It was windowless and sparsely equipped with nothing more than a desk and chair, a filing cabinet, and one dim light attached to, but not quite centered in, the ceiling. The piercing stench of pipe smoke hung in the air like an abandoned soul.

“It’s all on there,” Katja said, gesturing at a slip of paper on the desk as she backed out the door. “It’s all any of us got as to instructions. It’s a comfortable life. A paid vacation in charred paradise. Don’t mind Hans, he’s a monarchist.”

“On my way to the cafeteria,” Held mumbled, “and just now, I saw, I don’t know what I saw, there were…”

But Katja had already made her way down the corridor.

The instructions, as she’d suggested, were simple, outlined by hand on graph paper. Held was to perform, record, and supply his calculations daily, the contents of which would be defined as needed through written correspondence to be found on his desk. There were apologies for any disappointment as to the lack of equipment they could provide for applied-theorem tests. He was invited to eat liberally, socialize freely, and meditate with abandon on the sublime natural beauty of the desert grounds. The signature was ornate and illegible.

Held, gripping the paper with both hands, let himself sink into the chair. A lightness that he could not name overcame him, and suddenly he had little recollection of how he’d come to be sitting in this place, so many unthinkable miles from a home to which nothing and nobody could force him to return. He performed his calculations, placed them on his desk, and left his office around twilight. He walked at a leisurely pace, stopping occasionally to gaze into the brainlike face of a succulent blooming along the winding path. He spotted first one and then dozens of small, algae-colored lizards flitting among the gravel or basking atop stones, pumping their tiny forearms in calisthenic exercise.

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