“Are you mad at me?”

“I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at myself. I should’ve ended this weeks ago.”

“That’s easy to say now. Things were different weeks ago.”

“Sure they were,” Ben said sarcastically.

Lisa walked back to her desk. “So what are you going to do?”

“I don’t know yet,” Ben said. “Let me think.”

At a quarter to eight that evening, Ben left the Court and made his way to Union Station. He took the escalator down into the dimly lit, underheated, advertisement-decorated hall and was surrounded by fellow overachieving, business-clad Washingtonians. Ben started counting blue pin-striped suits, brown leather briefcases, and black wing tips in his immediate vicinity. The majority of those with all three were losing their hair, and only one had actually loosened his tie since leaving work. Ben suddenly felt claustrophobic and walked to the far end of the platform. What the hell am I doing to myself? he wondered, staring at his peers. When the silver train hissed into the platform, Ben got on board and found an empty seat. Two minutes into the ride, the train came to an abrupt halt.

“We regret the inconvenience, but we have another train in the station ahead of us,” a grainy voice announced through the public address system. “We’ll be moving again in a few minutes.”

The crowd let out a simultaneous groan, and Ben settled back in his seat.

“Every day,” sighed the passenger sitting next to Ben. “I mean, can’t they ever time it right? It’s not like there’s never been a rush hour before.”

“Yeah,” Ben muttered, glancing an acknowledgment at the young man. He couldn’t have been more than sixteen, even though he was wearing a suit and tie.

“Why is it the same story every night?” the boy asked. “Why can’t they fix it?”

“I have no idea,” Ben said. “And I’m too tired to think about it.”

“Don’t talk to me about tired,” the boy said in a slight Massachusetts accent. “Run from the Senate buildings to the House buildings twenty times a day and then talk to me.”

“So you’re an intern?”

The boy proudly pulled open his coat and showed off the laminated Senate I.D. card that hung around his neck. “I prefer to be called a page. And just so you’re aware, if you need to know the coffee preferences of any senator, I know them all by heart.”

“The pee-ons of the People, huh?”

“That’s what they say. But I won’t be for long.”

“And why’s that?” Ben smiled.

“Because I’m good at what I do. I solve problems.” The boy motioned to the front end of the train. “That’s what’s wrong with the people who set the train schedules. None of them are problem solvers. They’re boring, staid, reactive. That’s why we’re sitting here right now. No one goes after the problem proactively.”

“So what’s your solution?”

“It’s not so much a solution as it is an approach. In my mind, if you really want to deal with a problem, you have to go straight to the heart of it. But no one in this city ever does that. They just dance around everything defensively.”

“And that’s your grand plan?”

“I never said it would change rail travel as we know it,” the boy snapped. “I’m just telling you my approach.”

“You planning to go to law school?” Ben asked.

“How’d you know?”

“I can smell lawyers a mile away. They have a distinctive scent.”

“Don’t mock what you don’t understand. Being a lawyer is the only way to be taken seriously these days. Without a law degree, no one will listen to a single thing I say, but if I’m a lawyer, they’ll give me real responsibility.”

“You think so?”

“I know so,” the boy insisted as the train started moving. “Good ideas can only get you so far. You need credibility to get real work. If you’re suffocating at your job, you should think about it. Law school’s for everyone. It’ll open up your future.”

“I appreciate the advice,” Ben said, as the train arrived at its next stop. “I’ll give it some thought.”

“I hope you do,” the boy said. “It may change your life.” The boy got up and walked to the door. “Well, here’s where I get off. Enjoy the rest of your night.”

“You, too,” Ben said as the boy stepped out. Seconds later, the subway doors slid shut and the train pulled away.

When Ben arrived at home, Eric and Ober were washing dishes in the kitchen. “Finally,” Ober said the moment he saw Ben.

“Don’t tell him,” Eric said, running a dish towel across the outside of their large ceramic pasta bowl. “He’ll hate it.”

“No, he won’t,” Ober said, his hands foamy with soap. “He’ll love it.” As Ben put away his coat, Ober called across the room, “We thought of a whole new way to organize the judicial system.”

“That’s great,” Ben said dryly, as he approached the kitchen.

“What happened to you?” Eric asked when he caught sight of Ben. “You look terrible.”

“Thanks,” Ben said.

“Everything okay at work?” Eric asked.

“It’s the best,” Ben said, pulling some leftover Chinese shredded beef out of the refrigerator. “Every day’s a pleasure.”

“You didn’t hear from Rick, did you?”

“Not yet.” Ben grabbed a fork from the utensil drawer.

“Screw Rick. He’s gone,” Ober said, rinsing a plastic mug. “Now listen to this idea. Here’s what we propose: To make the judicial system more efficient, wouldn’t it be great if everything-every case, every motion, every hearing-was decided by arm wrestling?”

“Just think about it for a second,” Eric said. “Don’t dismiss it too quickly.”

“Consider the possibilities,” Ober said. “Law firms would be populated with huge wrestlers; they’d recruit at all the best gyms.”

“It’d be a return to Darwinism,” Eric interrupted. “Survival of the fittest! Instant justice!”

“Your Honor, I object. One, two, three-case dismissed,” Ober said, pretending to be beaten by an imagined arm-wrestling opponent.

“So?” Eric asked as Ben sat down at the kitchen table. “What do you think? Pretty good idea, eh?”

Ben stared down into the carton of shredded beef. “Do you think I should turn myself in?” he asked.

“What?” Eric asked.

“You heard me. Do you think I should turn myself in?”

“Why would you do that?” Eric asked.

“So I could get out of this mess.”

“You wouldn’t get out of this mess,” Eric countered. “All you’d do is get in deeper. The moment you told anyone, you’d be fired.”

“So what? Is my job worth all this headache?”

Eric threw his dishrag on the counter and approached Ben. “Are you feeling okay?” he asked. “You have the best legal job on the planet. Why would you want to jeopardize it?”

“What do you think?” Ben asked Ober.

“If you’re actually serious, I agree with Eric. Why risk it all now? Rick’s beaten. He’s gone. What’s to worry about?”

“What if he comes back?” Ben asked. “What do I do then?”

“I have no idea,” Ober said. “But if you’re going to wreck your life, I’d at least wait until Rick showed his face again. Otherwise you’re throwing it all away for no good reason.”

“Maybe,” Ben said as he stabbed at his shredded beef. “Although I’m not sure that’s true.”

Lying in bed that evening, Ben tried to fall asleep. His feet were clammy from sweat, and he searched endlessly for a comfortable sleeping position. Lying on his back, he thought about open green meadows. Shifting to his side, he pictured the tumbling of sapphire ocean waves. Turning on his stomach, he fantasized about sex with a long-legged redhead. But in the end, the meadow always became the Supreme Court, the waves always crashed too loudly, and the redhead always became Rick. His eyes long since adjusted to the darkness of his room, Ben eventually got out of bed and sat down at his desk. On one of his bookshelves, he spotted the cheesy metal scales of justice his mother had bought for him when he first got his clerkship. He grabbed the scales from the shelf and smiled.