✅ Unusual Vacancy

Part 4 - The Interview

Yoyos Nursery was an old building. When it was built, it would probably have been large and impressive, but those days were centuries gone. It was still heavily built, though. The front wall was decorated with an endless pattern of columns, protrusions, and ornaments. There was almost no bare stone, and she wondered if the architects had been aiming for baroque and overdone it a little, or if they'd actually wanted it to look like a giant brass knuckle with its complex network of ridges.

There was a little white plaque beside the door.

'Dr P. Fittergillie''Yoyos''New Members by Invitation Only'

That answered some of Amy's questions, anyway. A members' club of sorts, for presumably wealthy parents. The kind of people who didn't want to associate with the uncultured masses. There would be nothing so crass as advertisement, because if you moved in the same social circles as the clientele you would receive an invitation from a friend as a sign that you were one of them. For a while before that, while they assessed you, you would have heard about this and all the other members only institutions that your friends used, and you would know that getting into some of those clubs was your only way to improve your social standing.

And if you didn't move in the right circles, if you weren't already competing for approval with other parents rising out of the middle classes, then it didn't matter if you'd heard of the place or not because you weren't coming in.

Did such places really exist? Amy had only heard of them before in sitcoms on TV, where you found characters who had inherited everything except an intellect. It was a stereotype she could believe in, but this was the closest she'd come to evidence that it was for real. She should probably change her appearance after the revelation, but she didn't know if it would be better for her outfit to be more revealing, or less. If she should be slim, athletic, or curvy.

She did the only thing she could, and walked forward to the door. It was heavy wood, decorated with metal studs as large as her thumb. She couldn't see a bell to ring, but as she raised her hand to knock she thought she had heard a faint click. An icon in the corner of her vision reported that her public profile had been read by a nearby sensor. Of course, they would want to know who was here before you even knocked. And she had an appointment, so the doors might have been expecting her.

She put one palm on the door and pushed. She had to exert some force; it was a very heavy door. But perfectly balanced, so that once it started moving it didn't stop until it came into contact with a shaped felt panel on the wall, which muted the sound completely. As she passed, she noted that the timber was at least ten centimetres thick. And it was actual timber, not reconstituted board or imitation wood. A dark surface, made up of a hundred different shaped strips with the grain in slightly different directions, held together with a dark varnish that had almost managed to hide the joins from her fingertips.

The hallway beyond was long, and brightly lit. There were tapestries hanging on the walls, looking more like a stately home or country club than a nursery. Her earlier impression grew stronger. This building might serve the function of a nursery, and they might have staff who were trained to entertain the whims of the most privileged kids, but this was primarily a place for immensely rich people to be reminded just how rich they were. It wasn't just money that mattered, she guessed now, but old money.

At one side, there was a heavy wooden desk with a secretary behind it. She was smartly dressed, in a navy blue suit that could have marked her as a senior lawyer or a partner in some business. Her expression as she looked at the newcomer was a carefully-rehearsed, welcoming smile. Amy would have been willing to bet that this woman had been coached in precisely what to say, and how pleasant to be for each possible type of visitor.

"Hello," Amy greeted her with a confident smile. But she found herself mumbling, the word caught between her teeth as all the nerves finally caught up. She held out her hand to shake, realised the distance between them would still take a dozen paces to cross, and hurried forward with her arm outstretched.

"Miss Peltier?" the secretary asked, giving the simple name just a hint of French pronunciation that almost made it sound like it belonged in these surroundings. "I am Cass, and I am here to welcome you to Yoyos. I must say that the doctors were quite impressed with you during the first stage screening."

"Uhh..." Amy started, "Thank you?"

"I was asked to obtain all your social media profiles, and to present the semi-executive board a portfolio of photographs, videos, and any newsworthy mentions and reviews from your previous employment. And it seems that you are witty, good natured, intelligent without being over-enamoured of the ivory towers of university life, energetic, and show a deep respect for learning. I hope you will find our little family just as appealing."

They wanted her. The relief flooding Amy's mind almost took her breath away, and she managed to miss the next couple of things the secretary said as she followed her down the corridor, through one heavy wooden door after another. After four or five turns, she found herself leaving the building again. They'd somehow reached an upstairs level, though she hadn't noticed any stairs, and were on a balcony overlooking the courtyard. There were irregular lawns, and paved areas decorated either with painted grids and numbers for various kinds of playground games, or with enthusiastically drawn pictures in brightly coloured chalk. There were children all over, probably twenty of them, though they moved around quickly and chaotically enough to thwart any attempt at counting.

"...also one of our main play spaces," Cass was saying, "Of course, having access to an enclosed outdoor space so close to the city centre was quite an investment. We had to acquire all the adjacent buildings in order to guarantee security. Most of those are used for storage, for the consortium's other business interests. If you accept our offer, then you would of course commit to not noticing any of the people or deliveries using those premises. As, of course, the employees and contractors of other consortium concerns would not remember seeing you if asked."

"Is this legal?" Amy found herself asking, before she had a chance to censor herself. The see-no-evil corporate philosophy seemed to imply otherwise, but then there could be any number of reasons for a legitimate businessman to want their research to remain hidden. But a nursery?

"Entirely. We are employed by a fully registered corporation, itself a holding company of a licensed trust fund reinvestment portfolio, with its shares owned in a diversification pattern by a Cayman corporation created to oversee the divestment of stock dividends into unnamed subsidiaries. I assure you, the appropriate three-letter organisations are fully aware of the state of our finances, and we are fully regulated for every activity that we perform."

"I'm sorry. I just... I've never been told not to notice something before."

"I understand entirely. And don't be concerned, we do not practice memory suppression here. Some organisations looked on technological advancement as every toy they'd ever wanted, but I much prefer working with a group who would technologically adjust our clients and employees only as far as necessary. And to set your mind at rest further, I will say that we maintain privacy only because some of the little ones playing out there may have... acquaintances who would pay quite a large sum for knowledge of where they come to enjoy themselves."

Amy thought about the words for a few minutes, trying to translate back into normal English. The privacy was for the kids. Some of their parents might be major celebs, with crazed stalkers who might seek to harm the kids. Or, from the way Cass had phrased it, Amy wondered if she was looking at the children of mafia bosses or somesuch. So this place kept its clientele strictly secret so that these little angels wouldn't suffer for the sins of their parents. Working out what Cass meant had taken Amy long enough that she didn't react on instinct this time. Asking about what the parents were up to that could put them in danger would certainly lose her the job. Instead, she settled for a noncommittal: "I see."

"There are also several indoor play spaces, as well as sleeping areas, a nurses' office, staff accommodation, and everything else that might be needed to look after so many little ones," she continued, "But I think that might be better addressed during your induction, should you choose to accept our offer."

"I don't need an interview, or some kind of test?"

"I've seen you smiling when you watch them having fun. You are fun loving, open, and honest. That is all the qualification we need."