Page 34 of Unfaithful

She beams as she takes it from me, reddens a little. “What for?”

“For helping me out with my car, of course. It’s called a ZZ plant, and the florist assures me they’re unkillable. Not that I doubt your nurturing skills, obviously, but you know, in this place, between the Fluro lighting and the unreliable aircon…”

“Thank you! And you’re very welcome, Anna! There was no need for that.”

“There was, and I wanted to. You’ve been so nice to me.” For some reason as I say this, I feel my lips tremble. It’s the stress of everything, it’s the car, the vandalism, Ryan. Obviously I don’t think it was kids anymore, but I don’t tell her that.

She tilts her head at me. “Everything all right?”

“Yes, everything is great. I just need to…” I wave my hand vaguely in the direction of the elevator. “Anyway, I’ll see you later, all right?”

I leave her to find the right spot for her plant and march right out of the building and over to the law faculty, up the stairs and down the corridor to the admin office where I last saw Ryan. I walk in with clenched fists, a thumping heart and a determined chin. The door to the admin office is opened and I see him immediately, his back to me, sitting at his desk in the corner. I’m nervous, even shaking a little, but deep down I am seething with anger.What do you think you’re doing? Did you do that to my car? Are you trying to intimidate me? Why?

“How dare you?” I bark when I reach him, but the man who snaps his head around is not Ryan. He just looks a little bit like him from the back.

He startles. “Excuse me?”

I begin to stutter. “I’m—I’m looking for Ryan.”

“Ryan?”

“He works here.”

“Oh. Sorry. I don’t work here. I mean I don’t work on this floor. I’m only using the scanner.”

“He’s left,” says someone. I turn around. A woman with short brown hair, older, is taking her glasses off and wiping them with a small piece of cloth. “Ryan the IT guy, right?”

“I think so, I mean his name is Ryan and he was working in this office a few weeks ago.”

She nods. “The IT guy. He left a couple weeks ago. He doesn’t work here anymore.”

“Where did he go?”

The woman shrugs. “Search me.”

I nod, try to think of what to do next. “Do you know where I can get an address for him?”

“No idea. Try HR.”

Back at my desk, I pull out the university directory that lives in my bottom drawer and find a number for HR. I put my query forward. I am looking for a contact address for someone called Ryan.

“But you don’t have a last name?”

“Unfortunately, I don’t. He was an IT guy. That’s all I know.” I should have asked, of course. I was over there, in his old office, talking to someone who clearly knew him. But I barely slept last night and I am not thinking straight. “I could get a last name, if I must. But do you have many Ryans in IT who left the university recently?”

“What was his position exactly?”

“I don’t know. IT.”

“I know, but more precisely. Support desk? Network specialist? Hardware acquisitions?”

“He worked in the law building, does that help?”

“No. There are no IT people who work directly in the law building. He must have been there on a specific job. And you’re in the math building, is that right?”

I rub a hand hard across my forehead. “Yes, that’s right.”

There’s a pause. “The thing is, Dr. Sanchez, even if I did track the employee’s home address, I’m not sure I’m at liberty to give it to you without his express permission. We have very strict privacy guidelines here, and I don’t—”