Identity

"What the matter, Paul? Did you try to hit on Patience and she told you what she really thinks of you", I chided.

He smiled and relaxed a little, but shook his head and said, "No that's not it."

I stopped, starting to get a little concerned and asked, "Well, what is it? Is there something I can do to help?"

"Well, you can help by not getting mad at me." He replied.

I hate it when people ask me in advance not to get mad. It deprives me of the right to experience an involuntary emotional reaction. It makes me the bad guy for reacting in a natural way to a given situation. It would have been reasonable to ask me not act upon my anger by punching him, but that was ludicrous from the start. The only time I have ever struck another person was that day at the mall year ago, and even then I didn't actually punch him. Asking me not to get mad was just a chicken shit way to avoid responsibility for the situation whatever it was. And the thought of it was making me angry.

I took a breath. Why was I reacting this way? It was so unlike me and so inappropriate. I just didn't seem to be myself these days. I gathered my composure and continued.

"Alright. What is it?"

"Margaret Xhtsosee (he pronounced it so-see) addressed one of my classes last week on the responsibilities between individuals and the social units that they are a part of. She was asking the class if they made any specific voluntary efforts to fulfill their obligations to society. When she looked at me, I had nothing to say. I had never even thought of it before. I felt silly in front of the class so I told her that you and I and Haggerty belonged to the Association for Social Responsibility."

"You what?" I asked unable to believe that he would offer us up like that.

"Yeah," he said, "And after class she said she wanted to know more about this Association. I told her that we meet once a month at the Brewer's Pub. I thought the idea of meeting in a bar would put her off completely. But it didn't."

"Go on," I said feeling increasingly more uncomfortable, knowing full well where this was going.

"Well," he said, "She said she wanted to come to our next meeting, which is this Thursday."

"And you said?"

"I said Great! I told her we'd love to have her join us."

I stared at him in disbelief, and then just walked on.

I was on my way to challenge our most popular professor for illegally tampering with our web site. Then I would be exposed as an irresponsible rake to the moral compass of our department. If the ocean were public opinion, I was the Titanic.

When I got to Frank's office I found Angel sitting at the desk by the door organizing software boxes and color coding files of some kind.

"Hey, there, Angel. How's it going?" I asked trying to keep my inner turmoil on the inside where it belongs.

"Everything's fine with me," she said " but it doesn't look like everything's fine with you."

"I've just got a lot on my mind," I said, not wanting to get into it. "Is Frank in?"

"Yeah. He's right over there at his desk."

I walked in and saw Frank at his desk grading quizzes.

"Hey, Frank. How's it going?"

"Fine, Tad, What brings you here"

"I see you grade your own quizzes." I observed wanting badly to avoid my reason for coming. "Why don't you have Angel grade them?"

"Well, I like to grade the quizzes myself so I can know how each student is doing. When I see their individual answers, it is easier for me to tell if somebody is having trouble."

God! I thought. This is going to be even harder than I thought.

"Frank, I need to talk to you in private." I said looking over at Angel and hoping she would take the hint.

"Looks like we're going to be talking about you, Angel." He joked as she got up and went out.

Knock it off, Frank. I thought. You're not making this any easier.

"O.K. Tad. What's on your mind." Frank asked as he closed the door.

"Frank, remember those web pages that have been missing since last spring?"

"Yeah, it was some of the faculty pages if I remember correctly." He said holding his hands up to his forehead as though it improved his memory.

"Well, I've been checking into it and something very funny is going on."

"Like what Tad?"

I explained the trail we had uncovered including the deleted directories from the server and Patience's machine, the missing pages of Frank's, and the things we uncovered about the backups.

"There may be some other explanation, Frank. But you're looking pretty guilty. The thing I can understand is why?"

Frank pondered it for a moment and began, " things are not always what they seem to be, Tad."

"That platitude doesn't tell me much, Frank. What's going on?"

"Let's assume everything you say is true, Tad," he began warmly. "What's the big deal? What if I don't want my pages online."

"Well, if you had a good enough reason, that wouldn't be a problem. But you overstepped your authority as sys admin when you deleted the pages. Then you went into my office under false pretenses and violated security on Patience's machine. You violated my trust and you violated Patience's trust. Then to top it off, you tried to blame the missing pages on Angel when you said she messed up the backups. If you ask me, this is pretty irresponsible behavior. I thought I knew you Frank, but I guess I don't."

He looked hurt and then angry. His eyes focused sternly on me and he said, "Tad, I really like you and it hurts me to hear you say that. I'd like to level with you right now, but I can't. Give me a few days to sort things out and I'll let you know what's going on. Can you give your old drinking buddy that much leeway?"

Since he put it that way, I didn't have a choice. I gave him a week to sort it out and let me know what was going on. I told him that if he didn't have it cleared up by then, I would have to turn it over to campus security. I wasn't sure if I would really turn him over, but as it turns out the point was moot.