Barbara Arnoff can’t be counted. If she were where she was supposed to be, I’d count her. One. If she were dead, I’d enter a zero, then I’d check the box marked “deceased.” That's my job. Barbara Arnoff celebrated her eighteenth birthday two weeks ago in University Heights, OH, a suburb of Cleveland. Barbara still lives at home with her mother. Earlier tonight she called down the basement stairs to her mother to say that she was heading out. She won't be coming home.
“Hello is Mrs. Arnoff there?”
The whole reason we have to go field counting is because people have not responded to their census forms. This suggests one of two general things: they didn’t return the survey through some fault of their own, or they just weren’t there. When no forms come in to our office, out go the counters. This leads us to places where people’s lives can interfere with their ability to reliably mail forms and it leads us to places where people are more likely to go missing. These are often the same neighborhoods.
“Hello Mrs. Arnoff, my name is Theodore Burnkey.”
Field counting is the only reason that I got out from behind my desk. It’s the only reason that I started talking to people again. Every ten years we need to count you suckers. Even desk zombies like me have to go out and one-two-three your asses. I’ve learned to love it. Of all the people in the world, I love strangers most. And the rest not at all. Strangers can still surprise me, even if just for a moment.
“No, you don’t know me, I work for the Census Bureau.”
When I’m not talking to strangers, though, my desk job suits a guy like me. I get all the numerical data of all of America at my finger tips. I don't decide what it means, it just is. If you have three children, you have three children, that’s a fact. No one can debate one of your children away or even pull that “2.8 children” hilarity. I look at the data and I see more. I see truth. I see the numbers wiggle and jump. I see them like I once saw some liquor bottles on some yellow stairs. When I was four and needed to answer to the patterns. The numbers fly across the screen and my eyes stop seeing, but start feeling. It was in the middle of this that I started noticing some strange things.
“Is your daughter named Barbara?”
The missing. These are the people that never get counted. These are the holes where data should be. These are the missing pieces in the middle of Mickey Mouse’s face, in the puzzle you thought you’d finish tonight after work. And that mouse is just staring at you with that stupid smile. The missing people hurt because they are the lack of data. I know what it's like to lose people. I took their database on as my own project.
“The Census Bureau, Mrs. Arnoff, in Boston, Massachusetts. I’m afraid it’s important.”
I was working at my desk when the cleaning crew came through the office. That’s normal. They are consistent, I hate that. It happens at the end of the night. I will be at the office for only four more hours. A man named Jesus wished me a happy birthday. And that was surprising. That was nice. I looked back to my data, and then to Jesus and he glowed like his very Namesake. Birthday. What about census data changes every year? Ages. The images in my head shifted based on the new information. I felt the answer. It was the missing part of the pattern. Mickey Mouse with a full stupid smile. I slapped Jesus on the arm. “Gracias! Gracias!”
“Your daughter isn’t home right now is she? Her birthday was exactly seventeen days ago. Am I right?”
The ratio of female to male runaways is approximately two-point-five to one. Of those who call runaway hotlines, most stop calling after the first week they've been gone. Some never call at all. The pattern I found applies to this unfortunate second set. The unexplained. Those who never get a chance to call. Once I saw it, I just needed to see where it would move next. Patterns move onward. Always. To mathematical infinity. Or they wouldn't be patterns. Where would this one lead? Maybe not to anyone. Birthdays, after all, are random (except for seasonal mating patterns, of course). I scrolled through the dates. April 28th. Seventeen days ago. University Heights, OH. Arnoff, Barbara.
The pattern that wove through the census data, and that was now clarified by the perspective of dates, led right to Barbara. Seventeen days ago it was her birthday. The pattern hated that about her.
“Mrs. Arnoff, don’t call the police, they won't believe you, but your daughter won’t be coming home tonight. I’ll be there by midnight to try to help you. Yes, Saturday.”
A physicist named Schrodinger had a famous pet cat. He placed this cat in a box with a radioactive particle. I know. Weird. Stick with me. The particle had a 50% chance of killing the cat and a 50% chance of doing nothing but make the cat perform his normal routine of licking his rear end. Schrodinger closed the cat in the box. He enjoyed asking people if the cat was alive or dead. Some people would answer "alive!" or would say "surely he's dead." Schrodinger would just laugh. The answer? Barbara, please hold on for a little while longer. The answer is that the cat is neither alive nor dead. This would continue to be true until someone finally looked in the box. Looking kills or saves the cat. Schrodinger, as far as I know didn’t really have a pet cat, but Barbara is very real.
I'd helped a Florida office with some counting a few months back, but that was business and I flew down. This was different. For the first time in three years, I packed my own car and left Boston.
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