Both times caught by Marcus' routine checks and both times delayed by supply chain issues on the replacement sensor. His notes on the repair order were thorough. He documented the potential failure window. He'd been right about exactly when it would fail. She pulled his employee file.
Marcus Webb, senior facilities technician. Three-year tenure performance reviews exceeds expectations all categories every cycle. Emergency response record. 14 incidents handled average resolution time 11 minutes below department standard. Commenations from three separate department heads.
One note from HR 2 years ago indicating he'd been offered a facility supervisor position and declined to maintain current schedule flexibility for family commitments. She read that last line twice. The next week, she found herself walking through the service corridor on the 9inth floor. At a time she had no professional reason to be there, and she told herself she was doing a building walkth through, which she did sometimes, which was true enough to be technically defensible. He was replacing an HVAC filter panel when she came around the corner.
He looked up without surprise as though senior executives wandered through the service corridor regularly. Miss Callaway, he said. Something wrong with the climate control on this floor? I do walkthroughs, she said. I know, he said with just enough of a pause to suggest he wasn't entirely sure this counted as one.
The HVAC on 9 has been pulling about 3% low on the east zone. Not enough to be uncomfortable yet, but it'll get there. I'm getting ahead of it. You do a lot of that. Getting ahead of things.
He considered that it's easier than fixing them after they break. He held her gaze. Usually, "Sir, there was a beat of something she didn't know what to do with." "How long have you worked here?" She asked.
"3 years in February. Do you like it?" He smiled just slightly, the same smile from the elevator corridor. "I like knowing that things work because I showed up." "Yeah."
She nodded and continued down the hall and told herself she was conducting a walk through. She saw him with his daughter on a Friday afternoon. It wasn't planned. She was leaving late, taking the parking structure elevator to level two where she kept her car, and the elevator opened onto a scene she wasn't prepared for. Marcus was crouched beside an older model pickup truck, a tire iron on the ground, working a lug nut that wasn't cooperating.
And sitting on the hood of the truck, wrapped in a bright orange winter coat, with her legs swinging freely over the bumper, was a little girl with two braids and enormous dark curious eyes narrating the tire change in real time. That one's being stubborn, the girl observed. It sure is, Marcus agreed, not pausing. Can I try? Maybe when your arms are longer.