Chapter 4

Constance pulled her coat tightly around her body as she braved the veritable squall battering her as she walked. The towering buildings of downtown New York City served to create a wind tunnel, directing its full force on people on the street. People like Constance. If one was conspiracy-minded, one could pretend that the gale was meant to attack her specifically. She realized (and she would know) that with this particular conspiracy, it could not be man directing the body blows, but God himself, who must surely hate her to direct the gusts just so.

Not that she believed Man was off the hook. Far from it. It was her job to know better. She had made sure, over the years, that she studiously kept abreast of the scientific consensus on climate change. As a straight news reporter for the New York Times, she had a duty to know more about the topic than the average person, and she embraced that duty as if it was the flag itself. Then, whether it was hot or cold, wet or dry, calm or chaotic, she ensured that the science supporting man-made global warming poured out of her columns with the same force and magnitude as the wind currently hammering her as she walked; the towering walls of her paper and a thousand responsible media outlets with it helped funnel the power of the truth into a regular deluge right on top of the heads of their readers and watchers.

How, exactly, this particular wind was the result of selfish humanity, she did not know. However, she knew that someone out there knew, and that was enough for her. Still, it did seem that God had it out for her a little extra today.

She finally arrived at work, but there was still the matter of getting in. First, she had to make her way through the maze of Jersey barriers past a handful of camouflaged soldiers, and then, once entering the lobby, wait in line to show her credentials to the soldiers there, as well. It was an infuriating experience for her, as she was so well known and famous that it followed that no one would need to check her I.D.. This morning, though, she was distracted by this annoyance by her reflections on the soldiers standing guard in the street. The wind carried ice picks this morning, but they seemed to just bounce off the soldiers. They seemed to be almost unconcerned that sleet was pelting them. They practically paid her no mind as they laughed together, but one did wave her by saying, “We consider this to be balmy in North Dakota.”

Inside, the soldiers were a little more sullen. Did they prefer to be outside in the elements?

“Identification, please,” the soldier asked.

“Don’t you know who I am?” Constance snapped, stomping her feet.

Now, she really just stomped her feet to get some of the water and slush off of her Stuart Weitzman boots, but it must not have come off that way, as the soldier’s head snapped up and he glared at her wordlessly. She softened her demeanor by sheer willpower under his wilting look, and handed over her papers.

“Mrs. Lyre?” the soldier asked.

“Ms. Lyre.”

One of the other soldiers standing nearby rolled his eyes.

“Very well, you may go through,” the soldier said, handing back her documents.

Her tough attitude returned once she was out of earshot and eyeshot. “Almost a whole year of having these yokels check my I.D. and they still don’t know who I am. I guess you get what you pay for,” she said; not that anyone here was paying for them, of course, unless one was referring to the fact that they were being paid for by her taxes and the taxes of millions of others. But Constance was thinking no such thing. In her mind, the soldiers were there for ‘free.’

She stabbed the button on the elevator. A few people got off as she got on, and she stabbed the button again. When she finally exited onto her floor, she had cooled down and was back to her normal self.

The news room did have some bustle to it, but it was still nothing compared to the era of the previous presidential administration. Working from home had become more fashionable here as was the case elsewhere. Constance could do most of her work from home, as well, but one of the reasons she became a journalist at all was for the bustle. She relished the seeing of other people—and especially the being seen by other people.

She dropped her coat and bag off in her office and went straight for the espresso bar. All she found were packets of dehydrated decaffeinated coffee. She grabbed one of the packets and shook it furiously in the air, turning to the rest of the newsroom as she did so. “What the hell is this?”

“No coffee,” a certain Stuart (tech reporter) replied.

“How the hell can we have no coffee?” she cried out. Stuart (tech reporter) shrugged.