Of all the bullshit myths about graduate school, this one takes the cake — the graduate coordinator is your best friend, your departmental advocate, your unflagging guide through the labyrinthine bureaucracy. What a shitty illusion to foster in the minds of grad students. Especially foreign nationals overwhelmed by the dual burdens of university policy and post-9/11 immigration crap. They desperately want to believe a beneficent paperwork-slaying ninja has got their backs.

In reality, graduate coordinators are a different manifestation of the same problem. Think public defenders — drowning in clients, devalued and underpaid, just trying to move caseload while their existence “proves” the fairness of the system. Graduate coordinators will plea-bargain the bureaucracy, not go to trial for you. Or better yet, they’ll dump some papers in your lap and tell you to go file them yourself.

This isn’t to say that graduate coordinators are useless, like some human appendix of the bureaucracy. They function as an early warning system for sick building syndrome, since they’re tethered to their desks while profs and grads breeze in and out. They can also be a handy source of do’s-and-dont’s where norms of collegiality are concerned. But mostly they know a lot of shit. It’s hard to say what portion of their headspace is dedicated to pointless crap about this form or that policy, but ask the right questions and you can always learn something useful.

That’s why I’m knocking on the door of Tammy-Sue, the graduate coordinator for my department. She’s shoehorned into one of the “small” offices as they’re euphemistically called, really just a broom closet with a sealed window on one end and a nameplated door on the other. There’s barely room for her turn sideways to welcome me. Limpid too-black hair dangles in front of her tortoiseshell glasses, and her merle turtleneck sweater seems like a bad choice given the greenhouse effect in her office. But that’s her deodorant’s problem, not mine.

“Hey Tammy-Sue.” I wedge myself into the visitor’s chair, located right behind the door. Then I drop my customary surprise gift on her desk. “Go ahead. Try to guess what I got you this time.”

She grins at me like an evil den mother, tap-tap-tapping the envelope with dangerously long fingernails. “It wouldn’t be free passes to an all-ages show? Or a lottery ticket? Is that it?”

“Bzzzt. It’s a Domino’s 2-for-1 coupon. But you have to use it by this weekend.”

“Whoo hoo! Christmas is coming early this year.” As we laugh together, I’m reminded that Tammy-Sue is painfully human, drawn to us graduate students — her brood, as she calls us — because she and her husband are still trying to conceive at fortysomething. “What kind of favor do you need, Nick?”

“Just the information kind. I’ve been poking around for additional funding, and I stumbled across this thing called a supplemental research grant. What can you tell me about it?”

“Not much, really. Supplementals are only for faculty. Graduate students don’t qualify for them.” She folds her pale hands. Easy question, easy answer. But something is bothering her. She unfolds her hands again. “That’s not an entirely true statement. Back in the 1980s we managed to award one to a grad student.”

“It went to Cecilia Nepomuceno for her dissertation research, right?”

“You have been poking around, haven’t you?” Tammy-Sue adjusts her glasses to see me better. “That was before my time, so I don’t know the details. But my understanding is that Cecilia got a supplemental to preserve and organize that abandoned archive in Ecuador. Apparently it was like a home renovation project in the rainforest. She had to hire a local work crew, rebuild the roof and floor, salvage the documents, things like that. All with the blessing of the Ecuadorian government, of course.”

“Of course,” I nod, and sweat drips off my chin. What impoverished South American country wouldn’t love a free jobs program to preserve their history? “So how did Cecilia manage to land a supplemental when it’s supposed to be impossible?”

“It was special circumstances, I’m sure. Extraordinary circumstances.”

“It was Hercules.”

“And that.” Tammy-Sue grins evilly again. Both of us know how this department works.

“What did he have to do, go to the dean? He went all the way to the dean, didn’t he? Fucking A.” Despite myself, I’m coming down with a bad case of Hercules admiration.

“I don’t know what it took. And I don’t want to know.”

“How much did Hercules get for Cecelia?”

“I have no idea. I could dig through Michelle’s files and see if I could find an amount.” Michelle was the previous graduate coordinator. Tammy-Sue inherited her files like a future generation inherits a toxic waste site. She glances tiredly at the shelves above her desk, bowed with three-ring binders and a fan spinning uselessly.

I take the hint. “Nah, that’s okay. Don’t waste your time looking. But I’m curious — did anybody else in the department have to sign off?”

“Who knows? It didn’t happen on my watch.”

“But if you had to guess?”

“If I had to guess, then no. Probably not. Assuming the UCLA back then was anything like the UCLA now, the whole thing must’ve happened outside of channels.” The words make Tammy-Sue recoil, as if somebody just told a scatological joke in front of her. Her career depends on doing things inside of channels. Following official procedures. Documenting compliance with mounds of paperwork.

I quickly replay our conversation in my mind. This is my first and probably last chance to broach the topic with her. Any information I need, I have to ask for it now. But no further questions occur to me. “This has been great, Tammy-Sue. Just what I needed to know. Thanks!” I struggle to my feet, plowing through layers of torpid heat.

She’s peering at me, her professional distance eroding into curiosity. An eyebrow rises above the rim of her glasses. “Why are you asking about — ”

“No reason,” I interrupt her, wondering if I’m standing upright yet. Nothing about my posture or locomotion feels right, as if I’m a giant shambling hotdish. I bang out the door and into the relative coolness of the hallway. How many more times will I have to endure Tammy-Sue’s office before I finally get the fuck out of UCLA?

My cellphone drowns in a sweaty palm as I call Nooshin. Or try to call, more like. A soothing female voice informs me “The number you have reached is not in service.” When I check the quickdial, the slick clamshell almost squirts out of my hand. But I called the right number. I wipe my palms on my t-shirt and try calling again. The same soothing female voice, the same canned message. What the hell?