Kidneybean stood on the sidewalk at the corner of Queen and Illustration boulevard, waiting for the walk signal. Traffic coasted to a halt, and he crossed the street and trotted up the polished granite steps of the Yeezus building, and up to his office on the 39th floor.
He sat in a chair in his work area, pulled out his phone, and launched the matchmaker app. 50 new requests: a full queue. He tapped the first one. It was a 22 year old woman named Salsa. She had brown eyes and walnut-coloured hair cascading to below her shoulders. Kidneybean swiped to her profile. It was relatively well filled out. He tapped out a gesture note on his thigh with his fingers, encoding her eight vital parameters.
Next, he flipped through his matchables. Kenneth, 49. Gravy, 28. Malbec, 24. Malbec had that D0 D1, which could be good. That meant in Ennui and Spontaneity, Salsa and Malbec both had low 200s, which could work. He glanced at Malbec’s photo. Lanky, good jawline, patchy beard. Kidneybean shrugged to himself and flipped through a few more guys: Pear, Sage, Bruno. All three were D-range in 2, so they were off the table.
Let’s give Malbec a shot, thought Kidneybean. He opened Gesture Note and began composing his opening pitch on Malbec for Salsa to read.
“Hey, Kid, got a moment?” said Brayden, Kidneybean’s manager, appearing in the doorway.
“Sure,” said Kidneybean, standing up and pocketing his phone.
They walked to Brayden’s office, a glass room in the corner of floor 39, with a large antique dinner table serving as a desk. Brayden sat in a sleek aluminum and polymer desk chair behind it. He gestured for Kidneybean to sit.
Brayden was older than Kidneybean, at fifty two. Kidneybean was twenty-six. Brayden rested his elbow on the table and pulled out his phone, flipping to Kidneybean’s file.
“How’ve you been?” asked Brayden.
“Pretty good,” answered Kidneybean.
“Any issues? Anything you’re not happy about?” asked Brayden.
“Nope, all good,” answered Kidneybean.
“Great,” Brayden said, looking down at the phone, scrolling through Kidneybean’s performance data.
“Well, I’m just gonna make this short and sweet,” said Brayden. “Overall you’re doing great. Here at the office you’re productive, you’re a great part of the team. Matchmaking you’re at a 32%, which is stellar. I expect that success rate from a Matchmaker with three, four years more experience than you. So that’s great.”
“Great,” said Kidneybean.
“Yeah, great job,” said Brayden. “Couple things to work on, though. Last month you had a couple cases I just wanted to touch on to get your perspective on what choices you made, that sort of thing.”
Kidneybean fidgeted. “Yeah, I think I know the ones — well, one of the ones — you’re talking about,” he said.
Brayden smiled thinly at him. “Yeah. Let’s take a look at what happened.” He pulled up the match record and they talked through it.
A 21-year old woman named Nectarine was matched with Oatmeal, a 23-year old man. He had just moved from Chicago, and her 3 was in E range, E4 or 5, maybe, so it had seemed like a good idea at the time. Unfortunately, Nectarine was a A2 in the Opinion category, and Oatmeal had turned out to be a very persuasive environmentalist. Nectarine ate it up and now her 4 was all the way up to an F something. It was pretty bad for the firm: the dating process was not supposed to change who you were, especially if that meant becoming a rabid tree hugger.
Brayden rubbed his eyes. “God, it still sounds weird to me, all these food names. I know I’m dating myself.”
Kidneybean shrugged. People started naming their kids after their favourite food items that used to exist, before they started making food the way it is now, with everything made from modified corn. It seemed dumb to miss a food like a kidney bean, or oatmeal, when we still had basically everything, just made from regular corn, instead of some random specific plant or animal. And it was way more efficient to farm just one plant, instead of dozens.
“Yeah, I don’t know,” Kidneybean said. “It’s just how it is, to me.”
“Yeah,” said Brayden, resignedly. He leaned back in his chair and smiled from the corners of his eyes. “You know, if I had a kid today, I’d probably name it ‘Pepper’.
Kidneybean frowned. “I know what pepper is. Like, salt and pepper.”
Brayden shook his head. “Yeah, but that’s nothing like the old pepper. It was like this little dried berry, and it was spicy, and kind of tart, and even a tiny bit sweet.”
“Sounds like ketchup,” said Kidneybean.
Brayden sighed. “Don’t get me started,” he said. His eyes went back to his phone. “You really gotta watch that ‘opinion’ category. It’s just not what the user signed up for, to be challenged like that.”
“We need a ninth parameter, something that covers if people have crazy views,” said Kidneybean. “Let them date each other and keep them away from the rest of us.”
“I know,” said Brayden. “But that’s out of our hands, that’s upstairs. For now, if it’s easier, just leave high fours in the queue, and don’t match them. It won’t reflect on your performance.”
Kidneybean nodded.
“This review is in your file. Great job this quarter.”
“Thanks,” said Kidneybean, rising to leave. Brayden turned back to his phone and began writing a gesture note against the desk.
Kidneybean left the office and started down the hall to his workspace.
Time for lunch, he thought. It’s Tuesday. That means the soup special at the diner down the block is probably chili.
