Duffy took a deep breath and shook his neck to loosen up a bit. “Can I say something, Harold? I want to say this: I’ve been here for ten years and this is the first time that anything like this has come up. It almost never happens. If I have to come in at two, there’s nothing I can clean. The gym and the upper gym are in use, the locker rooms are in use—there’s nothing I can do.”

“I’m sure you’ll think of something.” Tap, tap, tap.

“Plus—after the game, like tonight. Tonight there’s football. The team won’t be out of the locker rooms until a quarter to eleven—everything will be muddy, a total mess, and I’m supposed to have gone home fifteen minutes previous—”

“On game nights come in at four. How’s that?”

“Look…Harold. The reason I took that gym job was so I could baby-sit until my wife gets home from the auto plant. She gets home at four-thirty. If you change my hours, I’m going to have to hire a baby-sitter—”

Hammermeister rocked back in his chair, steepling his fingers. “I am familiar with your union contract, and I can change your hours to suit the needs of the school. Is that clear?”

“All right, we can play it that way. I tried nice, but we can take this motherfucker to the union, and we can sit in hearing rooms…by the hour! I know you got lots of homework. It’s going to be fun. You can really make progress on that thesis of yours. Or maybe you can read a little Joseph Conrad. It would do you good, Harold. Give you a little insight, Harold, into the ways of the world. I’m filing.”

“You pay union dues, and I encourage you to use the union,” Hammermeister said evenly. He swiveled his chair away in a little half-twist and busied himself with a file folder, dismissing the custodian with a wave of the hand. He wasn’t going to let the man scream or give him the satisfaction of making eye contact. Anger—for a lot of people, it was a hobby. They liked it. Why play their silly-ass game?

Duffy slammed the door so hard a draft of air lifted Hammermeister’s thin, fluffy, light brown hair, which was combed forward to cover a receding hairline. He zipped open his drawer, popped two Excedrin, two Advil, swallowed a double glug of Pepto-Bismol, and then hunched over his desk and restyled his hair using a comb and hand mirror.