Richard Strand is musical. Additionally, he has perfect pitch*.
As suits an upper-class New England WASP family, he was taught piano and violin as a child, and, when he thinks to keep up practice, is a decent player.
In his Strand Institute office, he has his old violin, and occasionally plays it to clear his head, in the fashion of Sherlock Holmes. In fact, Ruby’s been with him so long, she can gauge his mood based off of the music coming from the other side of the door:
Romantic-era sonatas ( Brahms, Chopin, Mendelssohn, etc.): Bored and/or near a stopping point, would welcome an interruption.
Classical and Baroque Period sonatas and pieces (Haydn, Mozart, Purcell, etc.): Working on a thorny problem, only helpful interruptions welcome.
Modern and/or Minimalist works (Glass, Pärt, Shostakovich, etc.): Either delighted or ticked off by something. No need to interrupt; he’ll eventually tell Ruby himself.
Atonal works (Bartok, Prokofiev, Schopenhauer, and, incidentally, Scriabin): Nope.
Also, from his teenage years? Embarrassing garage band photos, people. Think of the possibilities.
*Which may or may not be one of many traits used by DaevaCorp to identify Strand family members with the particular “family ability” they are reputed to have.
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The original opening of The Bigger They Come, The Harder They Fall, but I cut it because it felt too long-winded. I was basically just trying to get a handle on Strand’s characterization, so that I could effectively write the next 5,000 words from his point of view. (And boy is Strand, especially in early season 1, a piece of work.) No shippy parts, unfortunately, just good ol’ Strand and Ruby.
He’s typing away at his computer, annoyed with the newest email in his inbox (“Irrefutable proof of ghosts! Forward to 10 people to stop you from being haunted”), a repeat of nearly 200 he’s received in the past two weeks. He’s going to ask Ruby to look into a more sophisticated spam filtering program, because these emails aren’t worth the time they take to move to the Trash folder in his Outlook.
The aforementioned technically skilled assistant knocks on his half-open office door and enters, disrupting the impeccable order of the room with her ripped skinny jeans and black hoodie. If the interloper were anyone else, he’d snap at her that what is the point of knocking if she’s just going to let herself in? He’s not comfortable allowing strangers (even clients) into his office without advance notice. There’s something in the traditionalism of his upbringing that valued a man as king of his castle. It forces a naturally adversarial perspective that he dons every day like he does a freshly pressed button-up.
“Hey boss,” Ruby drawls, a bored expression on her face. “Jenna called. She said that reporter from Seattle is still trying to get an interview, and she thinks you should do it.”
Strand communicates his annoyance with an almost theatrical slam on the delete key to rid his inbox of time-wasting junk mail (the digital equivalent of stay off my lawn, damn idiot kids).
“She’s called eleven times, you know,” his assistant adds, the toe of her Converse sneaker tapping the floor in impatience.
Whoever this reporter is, she’s persistent. He didn’t expect this from one of those scatterbrained NPR types. He’s accustomed to the way those young female reporters flit from subject to subject without direction, the vocal fry of their voices betraying a vapidity he finds particularly vexing. Strand is not an avid public radio listener.
Maybe if he grants the Seattle reporter a few minutes of his time, she’ll stop harassing him and his staff.
He sighs, and the exasperation it carries pleases him. “Do you have her phone number?”
“Yeah, I can email it to you.” Ruby retreats from his office back to her desk, and a minute later an alert pops up on the bottom right of his computer screen: “Alex Reagan contact info.”
“Alex Reagan,” he murmurs. It even sounds like an NPR reporter’s name. He’d ask God to spare him the torture of calling her back, but referring to religion even in casual thought merits an instinctive snort of disbelief.
He dials the number and gets her voicemail. He hates leaving messages.
Note: Curious about vocal fry? Here’s a great This American Life segment about it.
