Tiger Read Free Page B

oh,” Lewis said when he turned to face her. “How bad is it?”
    â€œPretty bad,” she said, anxiously flicking the corner of the musty old case file she was working on.
    Lewis sighed, and turned to retrieve his hat and coat from the rack.
    â€œCome along. Everything goes down better with dumplings.”
    There was a Mandarin place with pretty good dim sum on Second Avenue that Lewis loved. The place was loud and steamy and already crowded when they arrived, but the staff treated Lewis with deference—he and Wally were given a table immediately, and a quick nod to his favorite waitress was all it took to order two lunch specials.
    â€œTell me,” Lewis said as soon as their order was placed.
    â€œWe had a walk-in this morning,” she began, already dreading his reaction. “Carmen wasn’t in yet, and the guy was in rough shape. More than anything, I think he needed someone to talk to.”
    â€œWallis,” Lewis gave her an exasperated look, “please tell me you didn’t do the interview.”
    â€œNo!” she exclaimed. “Not intentionally. But we were sitting there waiting, and he just started talking.”
    Lewis sighed. “And what happened?”
    Wally described the entire session with Kyle. She kept checking Lewis for his reaction, but his expression revealed nothing. Lewis had heard a million tragic stories in his years with the Society. It took a lot to impress him.
    â€œI see,” he said evenly, when she was done.
    His calm demeanor only made Wally more anxious about what he was thinking. She caught herself holding her breath in anticipation and let it out.
    â€œAnd how would you grade your performance?” he finally said.
    â€œWell, the session ended with him running out on me. I never had him fill out a bio sheet, so I don’t know his full name or any other specifics that would help us follow up,” Wally said, feeling even more ashamed as she heard herself listing her failures. “He was upset when we started, but worse when he left. He might actually be in danger, and now there’s nothing I can do to change that.”
    â€œRough morning,” Lewis said. “And a little bizarre, don’t you think?”
    â€œI guess,” Wally said, though she hadn’t seen it that way, before. “Yeah, he was a little ‘out there.’ Whatever’s going on has got him incredibly stressed. But that was no reason for me to fumble it so badly. I think I’d give myself an F.”
    â€œI think that’s about right,” said Lewis. “On the bright side, you now have a better appreciation for how fragile the process can be.”
    â€œLucky me.”
    Their food arrived, and they began eating in silence. Wally, however, soon lost her appetite. After slowly consuming half his plate of dumplings, Lewis dabbed his mouth with his napkin and studied her for a moment.
    â€œSo,” he said, “your failures are obvious. Tell me what you did right.”
    â€œUh . . . ” Wally tried to think, but she was still too upset to dissect the situation objectively.
    â€œVery well,” Lewis said. “Allow me. First, you showed confidence in your ability to do this job. That’s something to build on, even if that confidence was premature. Second, from what you’ve said about Kyle, you made a correct assessment of his state of mind. The turmoil in his life would make him a bad candidate for our process at this point, and you were right to be direct with him about that.”
    â€œOkay,” Wally said, grateful that Lewis was being generous with her.
    â€œWhat you’re doing right now is a bigger mistake than all the rest,” Lewis added.
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œYou’re beating yourself up. You think you broke this young man, but in fact he was already a train wreck when he walked through the door. Do you understand?”
    â€œMaybe. But I still