He made a begrudging noise of approval, stood up and followed the postdoc into the lab directly across the hall. The serrated faucets and gas valves were cased in plastic coverings that came in any of the primary colors, though he had never been clear if one indicated something from the others. His teaching assistant, Amy, stood over a green flame. She did not look up.
―See, I was, Ellis continued toward the furthest corner, ―running a polyacrylamide gel analysis overnight, but it doesn’t seem…
Behind them, the sound of glass shattered. A boyish figure in a lab coat was at his knees muttering and breathing through his nose, over a broken petri dish. Liquid spread around him.
―Was the, that the, damn it did you…
Amy’s eyes showed through her glasses, her hand moving instinctively, histrionically over her mouth as she shuffled out of the lab.
―Because I don’t think it’s been properly set up and I’ve been over it but it’s as though someone had tamper…
―Need to but I just…
―What was, what is that boy’s name?
―Oh, Louis? No I’m sure he…
―Passaging cells like a, is that what he thinks he’s…
―So I think if you could just maybe come take a look at, no it’s okay hold on a min…
―Louis.
―Yes, he struggled around on his knees, trying to contain the spill, glasses tipping from the bridge of his nose, he pushed them with a ring finger, strangely, Lattner thought, mouth nearly at the tiles.
―Louis, look at me.
―Hm, the eyes met his for a moment, then receded back to the floor over which he bent, hands trembling, fingers grasping in different directions, face and neck starting to bead with sweat.
―Louis.
―I but I um was…
―What category were those?
―Those were, um but I think those were ours we were…
―Ours, whose?
―But, he trailed off, looked up at the ceiling, then to the door. He touched finger to glasses, so glasses moved closer to face, which had become splotchy.
―What?
―Which fuck, I mean do you know which cells those were, I cannot read the label, knees dropping to the floor then, too, he searched about with his hands, his own glasses still forgotten on the keyboard in his office. He gathered the pieces of broken dish in his palm.
―The um, they were, like, the…
―Lattner, if you could just, because I mean, this is ruined now anyway, I have to be home by two, you know, I told you about this, like, the cable company needing to meet with us today, and it seems like Louis is having one of his little moments, and so I was doing the analysis like I did last week, I had…
―Passaging cells, can you just tell me which cells they were…
―Oh, no! No, I mean they weren’t cells they were the larvae from the flies, for the um, like, the…
―You. What did…
―And I mean since Manilda is coming over today after work with her son, and well you know how she can be, and since…
―No, no don’t be mad because they were the control, like, and I was moving them because they were right next to the experimental group and I kept getting them mixed up and this way I could save time…
―And it’s very important for me to, you know, get to Berlin because that’s the place to be this year, to be, well, seen, and without it I don’t even know how this grant is going to pull through, and with the university considering departmental layoffs I could really use your help now before this, this meeting, see my abstract is still a bit clunky too and…
―Where does it say control, holding individual pieces of glass up to the light, ―I don’t see anything about control here.
―Oh, well but these were… Louis took the glass from him and looked up, grinning. ―See, I marked them like U for unchanging and V for variant, it’s just a way a teacher taught me in high school, I know it’s not, like, really right but it helps me and since you put me in charge of the…
―High school?
―I need the internet, I mean, she already says I don’t think enough about her. About her kid. She doesn’t trust, or, like, understand, everything. Usted no se preocupan por nosotros, she says. Por Manny. Poor Manny? She’s got it all wrong, creo que sí, we have to get this cable fixed, the internet’s all fucked up and when she comes over after cleaning all day everything has to be… ―But wait. Wait this is a V.
―No, no, that’s the um, well it’s the, like, Latin V, it’s…
―But then what…
―No, see look, this V is winged, it’s how I distinguish, see, he rushed to the counter, returned with the second dish.
―But why…
―It’s like Weezer, you know, like, Weezer Dr. Lattner?
―But this thing, this thing on the internet that’s been a problem, where I have to be able to keep in touch with, like, well, I mean, but just when you’re finished come get me I need to use the bathroom I’ll be in the break room I have to…
―No, but, where are the flies we originally took the sample from?
―Oh, well. Well, when you said we didn’t, like, need them anymore, and I asked if I could bring them up to my dorm, just in the sealed environment and all I’ve been doing my best to like draw my own samples up there, but I, I hope that’s okay? I can, like, bring them back.
―Yes, bring them back, Lattner stood against the wall for a moment. ―I’m going to go for a walk. Just, please, could, just bring them back.
―Oh yeah, definitely tonight, like tonight I can do that, he crossed the room, ―Or maybe tomorrow actually if that’s okay, I need actually to get to a, like, practice now, you know?
―I’m sorry, the…
―It’s my club volleyball. I mean, we’re not that great, but…
―Yes the, fine…
―It’s about having fun, though, really, isn’t…
―Okay, please…
―Right, so I’ll be just going now, but I’ll have those flies back and we can restart the control and do our comparisons like two weeks apart, no big deal, I’ll make it happen.
Lattner kept his distance behind the student, moving past the department lounge’s doorway to the sound of, ―Oh Latt, I mean Dr. Lattner, I could really use your help before I have that meeting today you know that I was telling you about…