Chapter 8: The Complaint File
The showroom had closed an hour ago, and the complaint file lay open on Marcus's desk like something that had been waiting to be believed.
"Fourteen," Marcus said. "Three months. I counted again this morning because I wanted to be wrong."
"You were not wrong the first time," Lily said.
"No. I was not."
She turned the first page toward the light. "Read them to me. Not the summaries. The words people actually used."
Marcus adjusted his glasses. "Number one. A retired nurse, came in about the Meridian. Quote: the salesman looked at my coat, looked at my shoes, and told me the finance office was probably more my speed."
"Did she name him?"
"Derek Sloane."
"Of course she did. Next."
"Number two. A young man on his first salary. Quote: he laughed when I told him my budget and asked if I was lost." Marcus glanced up. "Derek again."
Lily made a small note in the margin, precisely and without anger.
"Three and four are shorter," Marcus said. "A couple waited while three other parties were served first. A delivery driver in work clothes was directed to the service entrance when he asked about buying."
"Directed," Lily repeated. "How courteous we have become."
"Five is the one I cannot put down." Marcus lifted a handwritten letter, its pages soft at the edges from handling. "Margaret Ellison. Teaches fourth grade. She came in on a Saturday with her sister."
"Read it. All of it."
Marcus cleared his throat. "I have taught other people's children for twenty two years, and I hope I have taught them that manners are what you do when nobody important is watching. I saved six years to buy a good car outright, and I did not dress for the occasion. I wore my school cardigan, the one with chalk on the sleeve, and I suppose that was my mistake. When I stepped closer to look at the silver car, a salesman took hold of my wrist and pulled me back. Not hard enough to bruise. Just hard enough to remind me I did not belong there. He said, some things are not for touching, sweetheart. I left before anyone could see me cry, which I did in my sister's car, like a girl. I am not writing for an apology. I am writing so the next woman in a cardigan gets treated like a customer."
The office went quiet. The Aurelion One sat behind its rope, patient as a held breath.
"She stepped close to the One," Lily said.
"She did. Same rope. Same man."
"And HR?"
Marcus set the letter down. "HR logged it as a misunderstanding about the display boundary. Their note says, and I quote, no injury, no witness, top earner, recommend a conversation."
"A conversation," Lily said. "Fourteen complaints, and the remedy was a conversation nobody can prove happened."
"I pushed, Lily. Twice. I was told numbers buy patience."
"Numbers buy nothing in my building except cars." She closed the folder, then opened it again, because closing it felt too much like what everyone else had done. "So we stop asking paperwork to do a person's job. We do this my way."
"Tell me your way."
"Three visits," she said. "Unannounced. Spread out. I come in plain clothes, coat, jeans, no makeup, no driver, no name. I am a woman looking at cars, nothing more."
"And I do what, exactly? Nothing sits right about nothing."
"You watch from the mezzanine. You do not greet me, you do not signal anyone, and you do not come down unless I ask. If a salesman puts a hand on me, Marcus, you still do not come down. I need to see what he does when he thinks nobody watching matters."
"You are describing the schoolteacher's Saturday, except you are volunteering for it."
"I am. Because Margaret Ellison should not have had to be the test."
"And after each visit?"
"Notes. Yours and mine, written separately the same day, before we compare. Dates, times, exact words where we can manage them. No impressions, no generous translations. If Grace Lin is on the floor, I want her watched too."
"You think she will pass it."
"I think everyone deserves the chance to be seen clearly." Lily stood and looked out at the empty floor, at the car her father's name rode inside. "My father had a rule in the shop. A machine tells the truth. People have to choose to. For three months this file has been telling the truth. Now we find out who chooses to."
Marcus stacked the letters into their folder, square and careful. "When do we start?"
Lily picked up her plain coat.
"Saturday," she said. "We start with visit one on Saturday, and we do not stop until we have the truth."