Layout was distracted that day, his head full of Marketing, not that most of us knew about it at the time. Arts had seen them, but Arts was sworn to a secrecy he’d only break for Copy, and the rest of us were vague on the situation until the day those two announced their engagement. Anyway, we were all worried about the stupid anarchists — even Marketing, who was trying to figure out how aligning ourselves with the protesters or being hated by them would sit with the people who buy our ads — but Layout doesn’t really stress over content per se. We could tell him to print an invitation to a Nazi rally or the second coming of Christ, and he’d do that. He’d gussy it up until that Nazi thing looked like a hip art student’s wedding planner, same as the rest of our paper.

All of News’s rants have a lot going on, and Copy wanted to walk him through the proof. “There,” she said. “We just went ahead and rewrote that whole sentence. It’s on the Post-it here. Can you read it?”

“No,” Layout shook his head, so she typed the new sentence into the InDesign file for him, then she guided him through the rest of the page. When she was finished, she asked him what happened to his glasses.

“My allergies,” he said. “I sneezed so hard they fell off in the middle of the crosswalk, then some woman ran her wheelchair over them.”

“It’s crazy, isn’t it?” Copy said. “My allergies are going nuts too. I walk in some mornings and I can’t breathe. I have to pull out my inhaler.” Copy paused. “I wonder if it’s that gas the cops used the other night.”

“Could be,” Layout said. “Lingering. Jeez, must be awful for the campers.”

Layout’s taken on Copy’s job since she’s been gone, the way they do it at major publications like The Standard. Still, it’s clear to us that this merging of positions is a mistake, and that a person can’t be a genius at all things.