Chapter 23

Piper finds out what’s about to happen three hours before Tuesday’s job talk. Honestly, they’d forgotten that a job talk was happening that day until Isabel called a meeting to discuss it. Yesterday’s discovery of the bugged offices, plus everything that’s been happening with Lu and with Jack’s murder drove it right out of their head. They should feel bad about this, because the job candidate will, if hired, add another historicist faculty member to the department, but they can really only summon up a weary sort of gloom: one more thing to worry about.

“We’ve decided,” Isabel says. Her face is grim. She has that concentrated but jittery energy she gets when she is angry about Pace and his allies and can barely contain her need to do something about it. The sight of her like this usually sends a jolt of sympathetic adrenaline through Piper. It comes sluggishly today, a weak surge of resolve that soon dissipates.

“We have to do something, after yesterday,” Isabel continues. They are gathered a near-empty classroom used for the occasional grad seminar when all the nicer rooms are taken. Katie and Antonio checked the undersides of all the tables and chairs for bugs when they got inside. It’s a routine that Piper can’t help but think makes them seem a little paranoid, but then again they have been electronically surveilled for months without knowing it, so maybe paranoia is an appropriate response.

Sarah and Jordan are there; Fatima is not. It’s the second time the latter has been absent from a strategy meeting recently. Piper wonders if that’s the reason for the extra line between Isabel’s eyes. Uneasily, they wish Fatima had managed to make it today; anything out of place is bound to make Isabel more stressed out than she already is.

“What’s the plan?” Phoebe asks, fidgeting a little. Phoebe is a quiet person, generally, and Piper knows that she gets anxious when confrontation seems imminent. Phoebe writes about “bad objects”: texts and people and subjects we should really all know better than to care about, but that have some affective hold on us, some sort of nostalgic and politically suspect pull, nonetheless. Specifically, her project focuses on bad mothers—queer female writers like the unsurprisingly colonialist Willa Cather and the more startlingly pro-French-fascism Gertrude Stein whose very questionable politics cannot entirely eclipse, for Phoebe and for many, their shaping influence on contemporary queer women. Phoebe confessed to Piper once, when she was a little bit drunk at the reception after a departmental lecture, that she’d had a sex dream in which she was sucking on Willa Cather’s nipple while Kristen Stewart, looking like Bella from the Twilight movies, yelled the preamble to the U.S. constitution at her. “It was the most hilariously Freudian dream I’ve ever had,” Phoebe giggled, “and, oh my god, Piper, it was so hot.” But Phoebe tends to be reserved and cautious with those she doesn’t know very well. And right now, she looks very nervous about whatever potentially conflict-inducing plan Isabel has constructed.

“The job talk,” Isabel says. “James Richards, the medievalist they’re bringing in for the potential target hire, assuming the college approves.”

The historicists have been finagling to get a job line all year. They lost a professor to retirement the previous spring, and though the department is too gridlocked to approve a new search, Pace has managed to get approval from the dean for a possible target hire—someone who doesn’t have to go through the competitive application process because the school is trying to recruit them specifically. James Richards is an old friend of Marco Spina’s from the University of Tucson, a private institution often touted as the Ivy of the Southwest. Admittedly, the historicists are sorely short on professors focused on literature prior to the English Reformation, on either side of the Atlantic, but his addition to the faculty would tip some scales that would be better left untipped, as far as the presentists are concerned.

“The plan was to stay away and hope the turnout was sparse enough to deter him. But in light of recent events—” Isabel looks mildly furious for a moment. Piper, too, feels a twinge of anger. “Well. They’re willing to use whatever means necessary. I’m not particularly inclined to take that sitting down.”

She glances at Sarah and Jordan. “We’ve written up some questions,” she says. “We’d like you to ask them at the Q&A.”

Jordan hands them each a printed-out list.    

• At the University of Tucson, you studied under Dr. Tara Sharpe. She recently wrote the infamous blog post, “Medieval Studies Isn’t Responsible For What Stupid People Think About The Middle Ages,” which suggested that white supremacists’ frequent evocation of the medieval period as an era of white power isn’t something medieval scholars need to actively work against. Do you endorse her position, or have you joined the medieval scholars who have publicly denounced her?

• The popularity of the television show Game of Thrones has sparked many conversations about fantasy tropes that are rooted in colonialist, racist, and misogynistic ideologies, many of which play out in a pseudo-medieval world. How do you address this issue with your students, many of whom are likely fans of such fantasy texts?

• How do you actively combat white supremacy in the field of medieval studies?

Piper reads silently.

“Yes,” says Antonio admiringly. “Shit, these are intense.”

“But fair,” Katie adds. “I mean, they’re all something he should be able to answer to.”

Piper bites their lip. Katie isn’t wrong. Not at all. But something prickles in Piper’s stomach, some strange feeling of discomfort.

“Right,” says Isabel. “It’s very important that our questions are asked coherently and that they’re all actually fair questions. Any academic who worked with Tara Sharpe should be able to address that situation.”

Sarah nods. “And of course we need to know the answers before we hire them.”

Phoebe coughs a little, and says hesitantly, “What is the answer? I mean…you do already know, don’t you?”

“No public statement on Sharpe at all,” says Jordan. “Clearly he’s diplomatically avoided the issue, probably because she was on his dissertation committee. Which is just—it’s not good enough. That doesn’t signal to students and scholars of color that you support them and their work. That signals that you care more about placating your white mentor than their place in the academy.”

There’s another pause as they all look over the questions again. Antonio and Katie are nodding. Piper twitches uncomfortably. That’s right. It is. So why do they feel so uncomfortable?

“I—” Phoebe’s voice is quiet and a little shaky. “I don’t—I mean, yes. Yes, of course, it—I don’t think that putting your security in the status quo above the needs of students and—and people of color is—that’s bad, obviously. Of course. I just—” She takes a deep breath. “These questions seem maybe a little…unfair? Not the questions themselves, I mean, but it’s a little like—you don’t think we’re…using a really important issue to, uh. You know. Ambush someone? For our own gain?”

Ambush, thinks Piper, oh. Yes. That’s the word.

Isabel looks hard at Phoebe. Katie and Antonio are both staring at their knees, as if they don’t want to make eye contact with her. Katie’s shoulders are hunched in what looks like secondhand embarrassment.

“I just—” Phoebe flounders. Her eyes flicker hopefully to Piper’s. Alarmed, wanting to avoid attention, Piper looks hastily away.

“I hear what you’re saying, Phoebe,” Isabel says slowly. Her gaze is still fixed intensely on the graduate student. “But it sounds a little like you’re saying we ought to act more civil, play some sort of respectability politics—not rock the boat. Be polite.”

Phoebe bites her lip unhappily.

“You get why that’s not helpful, right? They’re not engaging us in good faith, but they expect that we’ll keep engaging them in good faith. They expect us to be polite, to play the game by the old rules. Frankly, fuck their rules.” Isabel’s gaze softens a little as Phoebe looks down, blinking rapidly. “Conflict is hard. I know. We’re socialized to avoid it, right? Women in particular.”

Phoebe nods a little.

Isabel reaches out and takes Phoebe’s hand. It’s the sort of gesture a coach might make to an anxious athlete. Phoebe looks at Isabel through half-lowered lids, hesitant, cheeks still a little pink.

“You can do it,” says Isabel. “Show your teeth, Phoebe.”

She squeezes Phoebe’s hand. After a second, Phoebe squeezes back.

A tiny flicker of envy flares up in Piper’s stomach.

James Richards discusses the intersection between medieval cooking and manuscript culture. The talk is thorough and precise. He shares images from his extensive archival research, manuscript text and marginalia he has photographed and digitally enlarged in crystal-clear resolution. He makes an argument about the materiality of the ephemeral text and the materiality of ephemeral food, about medieval experiences of consumption and impermanence. Piper cannot help but admit that Richards’ talk is for the most part easy to follow despite its high level of technicality and historical specificity. But their body is tensed throughout, each red flag causing their teeth to grind: the fetishization of the archive, the use of digitally magnified images as authoritative proof, the obsession with historical context, the tendency toward a teleological narrative of steady evolution from medieval conceptions of cooking to our own. Piper is sitting between Katie and Antonio and they can feel the frustration radiating from them at the same shared moments. Behind them, Isabel is sitting quite still, stone-faced, jotting the occasional note in her notebook.

Richards takes questions after his talk. Marco Spina, his old graduate school buddy, starts to get up to moderate, but Richards waves him away and calls on the first hand he sees. He lands on Karen Gavras and they have an eager exchange about, for some reason, the filing system at the British Library. He doesn’t know, Piper thinks, that he ought to be wary of who he calls on next. But Spina and Pace certainly are—they’re sitting in the front row, heads together and brows drawn as they glance around at all the presentists’ raised hands.

Richards next fields a question from Dr. Arla Catlin, the young historicist professor who works on transatlantic black literature of the long eighteenth century. She asks, Piper has to admit, quite a thoughtful question about the impact of global trade and travel on medieval cooking. When Richard finishes speaking—Piper is too distracted to really assess the quality of his answer—his eyes land on Phoebe, whose hand has just shot up with determination.

Phoebe takes a breath. She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear and asks, too softly at first but quickly getting louder, an almost word-for-word version of the first question on Isabel’s list—she must have memorized it before the talk. “At the University of Tucson, you studied with Dr. Tara Sharpe, who recently wrote the blog post, “Medieval Studies Isn’t Responsible For What Stupid People Think About The Middle Ages,” which suggested that white supremacists’ frequent, um, depiction of the medieval period as an era of white power isn’t something medieval scholars need to actively work against.” Then, unexpectedly, she adds to the script: “An open letter denouncing Sharpe’s position and committing to antiracist medievalist scholarship has been circulating, and it has been signed by many major scholars in the field. You have not signed this petition. Do you plan to, and if so, can you explain why not?”

A horrible silence stretches on after her question. Phoebe looks quite green, but she keeps her gaze on Richards. Pace is sitting extremely still in the front row; Spina is looking murderously towards the presentists. Isabel, meanwhile, looks pleased and a little impressed.

“I…” Richards begins, eyes flickering to Spina and throat bobbing nervously. “Well. The…it’s a complicated…” He takes a breath, clearly trying to marshal his thoughts in the face of this unexpected and unwelcome subject. “Of course I’m against white supremacy. I believe the academy should be open to all. I…But I do think that this, this current culture of simply condemning those whose views we disagree with, without engaging in discussion first—it’s not in the spirit of academic discourse. That makes the university a very unwelcoming institution, if we have no room for dialogue—”

“Unwelcome to white supremacists and those who support them,” Antonio interrupts, not bothering to raise his hand. His expression is stormy. “Don’t we want the academy to be unwelcome to white supremacists?”

“Tara—Dr. Sharpe—is not a white supremacist. She’s a highly respected scholar who is making some arguments about the relationship between medieval studies and popular culture depictions of so-called “medieval” culture—”

“I’m sorry, but—excuse me?” Heads turn. There are a few honest-to-goodness gasps. Arla Catlin has spoken up, and she sounds angry. “In dismissing the racism rampant in popular depictions of the medieval period as having nothing to do with medievalist scholarship, Dr. Sharpe is denying the persistent refusal of the field to engage with race and to support scholars of color. She has cited scholars who claim that medieval Europe was ‘almost entirely white’ and liked Tweets denouncing scholars who supposedly engage in ‘faddish politics’ at the expense of solid historical scholarship. These ideas she supports are not arguments, Dr. Richards, they are, respectively, a falsehood and a racist dismissal of the work of scholars of color. Are you really saying that we need to engage in respectful dialogue with these kinds of statements?”

Everyone is staring at her. Everyone, Piper notices, except Pace, whose eyes are averted, fixed on the floor. Piper’s heart is pumping wildly. They can feel the excitement radiating from Isabel and the other presentists, and a vindictive slash of satisfaction passes through them at the sight of the consternation on the faces of Kevin and Karen and the other historicist grad students.

“I…” says Richards. His face has turned red. He glances at Spina, rather accusingly, and then blusters out a, “Well—I—” His brow darkens. “Excuse me, but this is—this is incredibly—if you have questions about my work, I’m happy to answer them. But I won’t be grilled on my—my personal relationships to my colleagues, or—”

Weakly, he falls silent. The atmosphere in the room is excruciating. All of them know, even Spina knows, that to simply redirect the conversation would be an inexcusable brushing under the rug of the mess Richards has gotten himself into.

Francis Pace stands up. Piper could swear there are shadows under his eyes that weren’t there before the talk. He runs a hand distractedly through his red hair, then steps to the front of the room.

“I think we’d better end there,” he says. There’s a note of defeat in his voice, though the gaze that travels briefly to Isabel has a steely glint to it. “Thank you for your time, Dr. Richards.”

There’s no applause. For a moment, no one seems to know what to do. Then Richards grabs his notes and stalks out of the room.

Whispers explode into noise. Holy shit, Piper can hear people saying, though it’s not clear who is saying it. Spina is gesturing angrily and talking in a low voice to Pace, who is rubbing his face with his hand. Catlin is sitting very still in her seat. Isabel, Sarah, and Jordan have their heads together and grim smiles on their faces. Piper accidentally catches Kevin’s eye and both of them look away quickly.

“Oh, shit,” Katie breathes. Spina is approaching the three presentist professors.

“Isabel,” he says icily.

She looks up.

“Next time, at least have the guts to ask the question yourself, instead of having your student puppet parrot it for you.” He glances cuttingly at Phoebe, who flushes deep red.

“My students have minds of their own,” Isabel replies. “I’m not sure Dr. Richards does, based on his response to my student’s extremely important question.”

Spina takes a step towards her, suddenly threatening, hands balling into fists. “You’d better watch out, Isabel.”

She looks at him calmly. “Or?”

“Marco,” Pace calls out sharply from across the room. Like a bulldog being restrained by its handler, Spina strains towards Isabel for a moment, teeth bared, before turning abruptly and returning to Pace’s side.

“Time to go,” Sarah mutters.

They file out. Piper’s pulse is still racing. They glance at Antonio and Katie, who grin triumphantly once they’ve left the room. Piper swallows. Suddenly, it is all too much. They break off from the group and hurry towards the floor’s one gender-neutral bathroom.

Once inside, Piper lets out a shaky exhale. They turn on the tap and stare into the mirror. Fuck. That was…they feel like they’ve just witnessed a car crash, or maybe been in one. Anger at Richards’ response makes up part of the sour churning in their stomach, but it’s also the effect of the electrified air of the conference room, the throat-tightening fear, the taste of betrayal and distrust as alliances split along widening cracks. Arla Catlin, going against her own allies. They splash water on their face. When they turn off the tap, they realize someone is in one of the stalls. Heavy breathing fills the bathroom, and then, all at once, the sound of retching and the splatter as vomit hits the toilet bowl.

Piper freezes. Who…?

There’s a whimper from the stall, quickly muffled. But Piper recognizes the voice.

“Phoebe?”

A sniffle; a silence.

“Phoebe, it’s Piper. Can I…?”

After a moment, the stall door opens. Phoebe emerges, face drawn and a little yellow.

“I just…” she says unsteadily.

“Yeah,” says Piper, “yeah,” and pulls her in for a hug.

She tenses, and then slumps into them, pressing her face into their shoulder for a long moment.

“I hated it,” she whispers.

“I know.” Piper rubs her back helplessly.

She peels away from them and wipes her mouth, then drinks a little water from the sink. “Sorry,” she says.

“No, no, it’s—”

“It’s what Isabel says. Conflict. It’s hard. I’m working on it.”

“Phoebe…”

She gives them a wan smile. “I’m okay now. Thanks, Piper.”

She leaves. Piper stares after her. They glance back to the mirror. Their face stares back at them, worry lines etched into their skin, their dark eyes shadowed and lost. The raw undercurrent of pain in Dr. Catlin’s voice when she spoke to Richards, threading through the more obvious tones of outrage and disgust, hooked onto something in Piper and is still tugging at them now. Richards was supposed to be Catlin’s ally, and Piper’s enemy. Yet they can’t feel as satisfied as they ought to either by Catlin’s brief defection or Richards’ defeat. Piper understands Phoebe’s nausea more than anything, can relate to it viscerally more than any other possible response. They swallow hard and take a few deep breaths.                   They push open the bathroom door. The halls are quiet now, though Piper can hear voices behind the closed doors of offices, and someone is whispering around a corner.

They want to leave. They head for the stairs. The whispering gets closer.

“Fuck this,” someone is saying, a man, and a woman replies, “I know. I know,” and Piper recognizes their voices. Kevin and Karen.

“It was a shitshow, though,” says Kevin. “He crashed and burned.”

“He was blindsided—”

“I know.” A pause. “He was also wrong.”

“That’s not—I mean, yeah. But they weren’t asking that question because they actually care about his racial politics. They were asking it because they don’t want us to get another professor.”

“I know.”

Piper’s stomach turns over.

“Jesus,” says Karen’s voice. “What a disaster—we should never have—”

“Shh,” comes back Kevin’s urgent reply. “I know. But not here.”

“Yeah.”

Footsteps receding. No more whispers. Piper stands against the wall, breathing deeply.

After a moment, they head for the stairs. But more voices distract them, coming from close by.

Piper glances towards the nearest hallway as they pass it. At the end of the wood-paneled corridor, Isabel is speaking with Phoebe. She’s got hold of both of Phoebe’s wrists, grasping them as if in support of Phoebe’s upturned palms. Phoebe is nodding. Isabel is smiling as she speaks.

“God, I’m proud of you.”

Phoebe’s face is gaining color again. Her eyes are locked on Isabel’s. “Really?” she asks softly.

“So proud,” Isabel says, and Piper passes out of view and then out of earshot, a hot tangled pulse of wanting and warning beating deep in their belly.