Noah's Law by Randa Abdel-Fattah

interesting.’
    â€˜Well, I’m filing documents at court all morning so I’ll catch you after lunch.’
    â€˜Yeah, okay. See you.’
    I was still putting the documents in order when Casey walked in half an hour later.
    â€˜Bernie’s coming in for a settlement conference with the other side this afternoon. I’ll need you to prepare five copies of my position paper, stapled not paperclipped, and ensure that all the documents I refer to in the paper are included as annexures and marked accordingly. The conference is at two. I want the papers ready before lunch.’
    â€˜Okay, I’ll just have to check with John how urgent this—’
    â€˜Don’t bore me with unnecessary information, Noah.’ She walked out.
    Oh boy. Usually people like her didn’t intimidate me. My maths teacher, the one in a permanent bad mood, often made students cry; I was never fazed. But there was something about Casey. I couldn’t stand her thinking that I was incapable. I refused to give her the satisfaction.
    I rushed to John’s office in a panic. He looked up from his desk and gave me a cheery smile.
    â€˜Dude! How’s it going? Everything okay?’
    â€˜No. Casey needs me to do something for a conference she’s having at two and she needs it finished by lunch and I tried to explain that I’m doing your stuff but—’
    â€˜Calm down,’ he said in a reassuring tone. ‘It’s fine. My task isn’t urgent. Can you get it done by tomorrow? Perhaps work on it after lunch?’
    â€˜Yeah, sure.’
    â€˜Okay then. Problem solved. Sorry, that was my fault. I should have given you a timeframe. Don’t stress.’
    Wow, what a nice guy. I would even overlook the ‘dude’ usage.
    Of course, Casey hadn’t bothered to explain where she’d left the position paper or annexures so I went into her office and tried to make the subtle point that as intelligent and sharp as I was, I was not a mind-reader, so would she please tell me where I could find the stuff she needed me to photocopy? (I didn’t literally put it to her like that but she got my point.) Without bothering to turn her eyes from the computer screen she pointed to a heap of documents on the floor next to her door.
    I went into the dungeon and got started. It felt a little lonely without Jacinta but I got over it when I realised how much copying needed to be done. As the machine churned through the documents I scanned Casey’s position paper, curious about Bernie’s case.
    CLAIMANT’S POSITION PAPER
    Background Facts
    Â 
    1. The claimant is the spouse of the late Maureen White (’the deceased’). The deceased wasemployed by Jenkins Storage World as a sales assistant in their Chatsbury store.
    2. On 2 July the deceased, thirty-nine years old, was instructed by her employer, Mr Rodney Marks, to transport the day’s takings of $8430 to the company’s other store in Surry Hills. While walking to her car, she was murdered. The murderer has not been apprehended and no witnesses to the crime have come forward. The deceased’s purse was found beside her body. The bag of money containing the day’s takings was stolen.
    3. Had the deceased survived the attack, she would have had a right to an action in negligence against her employer, Jenkins Storage World, on the grounds that her employer failed to employ suitably trained security people to transport money between premises, failed to have the deceased accompanied by another staff member, failed to provide her with a distress alarm, failed to implement Work-Cover cash-in-transit guidelines, and permitted the details of the amount of money that the deceased was carrying to be known.
    4. Jenkins Storage World have admitted that they failed to implement a safe system of work (see annexure 1: statement of Rodney Marks). It is clear that a case in negligence against Jenkins Storage World would have