“Whatever. I feel for you, Madison. That form takes hours,” Imani said.
“And Nancy wants it back right away. I don’t have all those details at my fingertips. Can I get an extension somehow?”
“She wants it in one day?”
“Yes.”
“That’s nuts. What do you think, Sean? What should she do?”
He frowned. “On the one hand, completing that form overnight is not realistic. On the other, Nancy is a stickler for deadlines. She’ll have a cow. And believe me, she can make your life unpleasant.”
“What if Madison hands the form in with the answers she knows, and anything she doesn’t know, she leaves blank and says she’s working on it?”
“Good idea,” Sean said, nodding.
“The FBI won’t mind?” Madison asked.
“Oh, the FBI has nothing to do with this. It’s just for Nancy’s benefit.”
“I don’t understand.”
“They’re not actually going to run an official background check on you. It’s too resource intensive for a job that doesn’t handle classified information.”
“Are you sure? I would hate to submit something incomplete to the FBI.”
“Positive. Nancy made me and Imani fill out the same form. We were never checked by the FBI, and we’re salaried government employees. She just likes to have the information on file for her own peace of mind.”
“Is that normal, for a case manager to ask so many personal questions?”
“It is kind of odd now that you mention it,” Imani said, crooking an eyebrow. “Nancy pretends it’s some official process, when it’s not. It’s just her.”
“Yeah, because she’s the one who handles hiring paperwork,” Sean said. “Naturally, being Nancy, she uses the most ridiculous, burdensome form in the world. You’d expect nothing less. But there’s nothing weird about it.”
“I guess.”
“Anyway, Madison, you have no choice. Suck it up and fill out the form, just like we did. If you’re pressed for time, do what Imani said. Hand it in with some blanks. Stick a Post-it on it saying you’re waiting for more information. But don’t delay. If there’s anything that sets her off, it’s missing a deadline. Speaking of, we should get back,” he said, checking his watch.
They bussed their table.
Madison took the law clerks’ advice, handing the form to Kelsey right after lunch with a yellow Post-it on the front that said “Incomplete, awaiting information.” She even left it unsigned for extra CYA. The plan was: drag her feet for long enough to speak to the judge after class next week and explain that stupid omission about Danny. Then she’d circle back and complete the form. At least in the meantime, there would be no perjury, nothing to blow up her life or destroy her future.
She hoped.
7
Madison spent that afternoon settling into her internship duties under Imani’s watchful eye. It was borderline disturbing how eager the law clerks were to have her avoid the mistakes of the mysterious Olivia. She did her best to put Olivia out of her mind, and Danny, too. There was so much to learn, like Judge Conroy’s preferred format for legal memoranda, how to access the online research databases, how to prepare a binder of cases for the judge to consult on the bench. Hours passed in a blur of excitement and a constant buzz of stress. Imani set her up with a login ID and gave her a lecture about computer security. She wasn’t to use her work computer for personal purposes, which obviously meant she couldn’t research Danny’s case. Not that she would have, though it was kind of a shame, given that she now had full online access to all of Judge Conroy’s case files. All she’d have to do was type in Danny’s name. She resisted the temptation. After all, she’d just dodged a bullet with the employment form. How stupid would it be to turn around and get fired for unauthorized accessing of files? No, just no.
Madison put her head down and made quick progress on the first research assignment. The judge was old-fashioned. She still liked her information on paper. Madison printed the most important case precedents off Westlaw, highlighted the holdings in yellow, three-hole-punched them and put them in a binder for the judge, just like Imani showed her. Then she got to work on a memo summarizing the key points. Shortly after five, Sean returned from court. He and Imani were both mired in work, behind on draft opinions. All three of them sat at their desks in silence for the next couple of hours, the only sounds the clacking of keyboards and occasional sighs.