Rena Robinett currently has ten short stories published in various magazines, ezines, and anthologies with international and national publications; and has self-published one Science Fiction novelette, BREED. Rena has a BA in English Composition and has attended, by invitation, the Iowa Writer’s Workshop summer session and the Napa Valley Writers Workshop. Rena is currently working on a memoir in two parts and a short story collection. Invitations: Napa Valley Writers Conference, June 2014 Chesapeake Writers Conference, 2013 University of Iowa Summer Writer's Workshop, 2010 THE HEALING |
Jim Woessner works as a visual artist and writer living on the water in Sausalito, California. He has an MFA from Bennington College and has had poetry and prose published in numerous online and print magazines. Additionally, he has had several plays published and performed. Publishing credits include Scarlet Leaf Review, The Sea Letter, Blue Collar Review; California Quarterly; Fewer Than 500; Close to the Bone; Unbroken Journal; Potato Soup Journal; The Ekphrastic Review; Adelaide Magazine; Peeking Cat, Critical Read, Literary Yard, and Ariel Chart. |
In the Absence of Time
There isn’t an adequate way to explain this. When I’ve tried, people have scoffed, changed the subject, or walked away. Ironically, the only ones who have ever been willing to listen are those I’ve had no interest in telling. The idea of reincarnation is too foreign for most people, and perhaps a bit frightening. It’s never been an accepted part of our culture, at least not in upstate New York where I grew up. And that’s understandable, since there’s no way to prove it, at least not scientifically. No irrefutable evidence or repeatable experiments. And if something can’t be proven, then how can it be believed? All I have is my experience, which is more than you might think. I actually “remember” parts of a past life. I know it sounds strange, so strange that I learned early on to keep my so-called “memories” to myself. But I never forgot. You don’t forget such things.
You see, I came into this life clinging to a previous one. Although it didn’t dawn on me until I was about four years old. That’s when I had a large enough vocabulary to ask my parents about the “accident.” They had no idea what I was talking about, and I didn’t know myself except for some sketchy details. I assumed it had been an auto accident, but it might have been something else. I asked how my sister Julia was doing. Was she alright? Did she survive? Was she still in the hospital? I was genuinely worried. But these questions were even more puzzling to my parents, because… well… I was an only child. They became more than a little upset with me. My father dismissed my questions as ridiculous nonsense. “Rubbish” was his word. My mother tried to put a positive spin on my “woo-woo ideas,” as she called them. She told her friends that I “suffered from” an overactive imagination, as if it was a syndrome of some kind. That’s also what the doctor said, the psychiatrist they sent me to before I was five. Here’s the memory. You can judge for yourself.
I’m in a hospital room. I don’t know how I know it’s a hospital room, because up until then I hadn’t been in one since the day I was born, and I wouldn’t remember that. But I’m quite certain it’s a hospital room, and everything is white. Really white, like blinding white. Except for the blood. And there’s a lot of it. Plus there are a lot of people in the room, most of them standing around in hospital gowns looking at a girl who’s lying on a long, narrow table. That’s the Julia I referred to earlier. She’s my older sister. She’s eight and I’m five. And she’s badly hurt. I don’t know how badly, but because of all the people I assume it’s serious. I don’t understand what’s happening, but I can see everything because I’m looking down on her, like a bird that’s been let loose in the room. I warned you this was strange. Julia is lying there cut open like a fish. People are shouting, hooking up machinery, and doing strange things to her body. And not a single one of them is paying any attention to me.
One other thing. I don’t know how or why I remember this, but “New York” fits into the story. I don’t know if it’s the city or the state, but the words “New York” are significant. Maybe it’s because I was raised in New York in this life. I can’t be sure. But that’s part of the story.
The thing that fascinates me most is that the “memory” never faded as I grew older. It remained vivid in my mind. The problem was that I couldn’t talk about it without others thinking I was crazy or delusional. And this inability to communicate became a kind of psychic hole that couldn’t be filled. I tried to forget, put it out of my mind, but I couldn’t. The few times I found people with a sympathetic ear, they were the palm reader, tarot card, or new age types. Once in high school I even dated a girl named Julia. Perhaps it was a feeble attempt to get closer to my “remembered” sister. But going out with this other Julia was too weird, a bit like incest even though we never did it. Mostly I kept everything buried inside. And it stayed that way until I was old enough to not care what other people thought. This change in my thinking was coincident with me reading a book by a paranormal psychiatrist who had spent his career interviewing children who “remembered” their past lives. After that I decided to go deeper into my own story. In a way I don’t think I had much of a choice. I simply had to find Julia. But where to start?
At the time, I had completed two years of junior college. My plan was to finish my degree in journalism, but I put those plans on hold and moved to The City to start my search. I stayed with a friend from high school who had a small apartment in Spanish Harlem. And before the end of the first week, I had a wait job at Kinx, an upscale restaurant on the Upper West Side. It was sixty hours a week but mindless. Mornings I sat in a café on West 73rd. Midafternoons I showed up at the restaurant. And by midnight I was back in the apartment sleeping on a pullout sofa bed. They were busy hours, but I still had time to think and to try to come up with a plan.
For several weeks, I worked the “braille method,” which is pretty simple. When it feels right, you keep doing it; when it feels wrong, you do something else. It consisted mostly of asking strangers if they knew of anyone named Julia. But the method didn’t produce results. I needed something more concrete.
Next came hypnotherapy, which my roommate had suggested. The hypno person I found was understanding. She was good and really tried. We did maybe a dozen sessions. Trouble was, I didn’t learn any more than I already knew. The hospital, the bright lights, Julia on the table, me bouncing off the ceiling like a helium balloon. If anything, the sessions caused more confusion. They made my memory more vivid, but could I trust these embellished visions? I couldn’t help but think about my mother and the psychiatrist. Maybe it was all just due to an overactive imagination and nothing more. That’s when I starting doubting everything. I no longer knew what was real or what I believed. It got so I couldn’t trust myself. So I quit the hypnotherapy. Besides I couldn’t afford to continue.
The next step was to look through newspaper archives. I’d been in journalism; so I hoped I would be able to find something. But it was harder than I imagined. When you get down to it, I really didn’t know what I was looking for. All I “knew” was that I’d been in an accident. But what kind of accident? When and where did it take place? Who was involved? I realized pretty quickly that I didn’t have any concrete details, just a few assumptions. At least one person—me—had died in the accident. The book I’d read, the one about the children who “remembered,” suggested that most of them had been dead three to five years before they came back as someone else in a new life. That gave me a date range. I assumed that I “died” between 21 and 26 years ago. Then there was the thing about New York, so that was my “where.” I also believed that an eight-year-old girl named Julia had survived. It wasn’t much. I looked at the available archives on the internet, but they were limited, so I scanned thousands of microfiche in the public library. But it came to nothing. The only thing that grew were my doubts. On top of this, my parents had barely spoken to me after I’d dropped out of school, and now they believed I’d gone totally bonkers. I learned through the grapevine that my mother talked to her friends about me. “The boy is obsessed,” she told them. “We’ve lost him.”
Then someone I met in the café on West 73rd, suggested I try using social media. He told me about the six degrees of separation, the Kevin Bacon thing, the idea that we’re all connected to everyone else in the world through six or fewer relationships. He said that I could use social media in a similar way. The idea was intriguing, but first I had to decide who I was looking for. Otherwise, there wasn’t any real chance of finding her. There were too many twisted possibilities. Did Julia survive the accident? Was she dead or alive? Did she live in the U.S.? What if her career or marriage had taken her to Boise, Idaho, or Johannesburg, South Africa? What did I actually know about her other than her first name? The short answer is “nothing.” Maybe she was between the ages of 30 and 40. Maybe she lived in New York. Maybe she survived. Maybe her five-year-old brother had died. And maybe I was that long lost brother. It was a long shot, but it was all I had.
Inside of a week, I had the names of fourteen “Julia’s” in Manhattan, another dozen in the rest of the state, and more than I cared to count in the rest of the country. One respondent knew of a “Julie” in England that fit the description. Another wrote that her name was Jules and she’d lost a brother when he was six, but she lived in Germany. The oddest one was a woman named Ju Li Ling originally from Shanghai. She claimed to match my description except that she was in her eighties and currently living in Mexico. Go figure.
The “Julia’s” in Manhattan seemed the most promising. I picked three who came closest to matching my criteria and wrote to their email addresses. I got two responses, both of whom agreed to meet me at the café. The interviews were a bit strained, and neither one felt right. The first had issues with age and timing. The second one was an African American woman who had been raised in Georgia. Race hadn’t been one of my considerations, and since I was white, I’d stupidly assumed that I had been white in my most recent past life. But with this “Julia” it was more of a geography issue. At this point, I was back to the braille method. I wrote to three more on the Manhattan list. Only one of these agreed to a meeting, and it turned out that she’d lost a younger sister rather than a brother. After that I started going through a dozen names who lived in the rest of the state. Out of that number, there was only one, a woman in Albany that caught my attention. I didn’t have a car or the time to get off work, but I did reach her by phone. Again it didn’t feel right. At the time of her “accident,” she had been thirteen years older than her brother and eight years older than a sister who also died in the accident. I confided in my roommate that I’d come up with nothing, zero, nada. It was a dead end. He told me to quit, and for a time I tried.
I focused on work at the restaurant, not that there was much to focus on. But it kept me busy. Plus the money was decent. And I was managing to put some away in case I ever made it back to school. As far as having a personal life, there wasn’t time. I met some interesting women, had a few opportunities, but didn’t like going out on dates. Neither my head nor heart were into it. At my morning coffee, the journalist in me usually got lost in the bad news of the newspapers. On my days off I visited one of the city’s many art museums. I became quite the expert on abstract expressionism. It seemed to act as some sort of escape valve. Then late in July, I got an email.
It was from the third Manhattan “Julia,” the one who hadn’t responded to my first round of emails. She wrote saying that she might be the one I was looking for. Naturally I was skeptical, but I’d come this far. So I invited her to meet me at the café. Three days later, I was sitting in the back corner watching the door when she walked in. I don’t know how I knew, but I knew it was her. She looked around the café but didn’t see me, so I stood up. Our eyes met, and I waved. Cautiously, she made her way through the crowd. She was an attractive woman, thin, her hair tied back. She had a soft, heart-shaped face that was complemented by the pastel colors of her blouse and her creased khaki slacks.
“Julia?” I asked when she reached the table. She nodded. “Can I get you a coffee?” I asked. “I don’t have much time,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m already late for work... in SoHo.” “Right,” I said. So we both sat down.
I apologized for making her come all the way uptown, and she started by asking me what this was really all about. She seemed agitated, on edge. “I guess this is a bit awkward,” I said. “Yes,” she said, evenly. “Well,” I began, “it’s like what I wrote in the search.”
I filled in some of the sketchy details, the problems that I’d had living with these feelings all my life, and my desire to get to some sort of resolution. She took a sip of water from the glass that was on the table and looked at me as if she was trying to find a recognizable feature. I finished my Cliff Notes version and waited for a response. When none came, I said, “You probably think I’m crazy. And I completely understand.” “Are you?” she asked. She paused and took a long breath. “Look, what do you want from me? I’m not sure why I came here.” “Only what I already said,” I answered. But then I added that I’d dropped out of college and took a job in Manhattan on a hunch that she might be living here. I told her about my newspaper searches, and the suggestion that I try searching using social media. “That’s how I found you,” I said.
Julia looked down and started talking quietly. Yes, she said, she had been in a car accident, a head-on collision, a drunken driver. Both of her parents and her brother had been killed. He was five, she said, and she had been eight, the same ages that I had written in the search. She added that she had undergone several operations. I asked if her brother had been brought into the same hospital room as she had. “It’s possible,” she said. She added that she didn’t remember anything from that day. Then without warning, our meeting was over. She abruptly stood up. She looked nervous, unwell. Before I could say a word, she announced that she was late and turned to leave. I watched her navigate through the crowded café and out onto the street. I didn’t think I’d ever hear from her again, and it didn’t seem right to try to contact her. So, I did nothing. In truth, I felt horrible. Never had I considered the impact that this might have on her if I found her. I’m not sure what I would have done differently, but in that moment I wanted nothing more than to drop the search and go back to college.
It was a little more than week later when I got another email and two days after that when we had our second meeting. I arrived at the café and claimed a table. Julia arrived ten minutes later, bought a coffee at the counter, and sat down across from me. I smiled and said “Hello.” She put a large book on the table. “It’s a photo album,” she said. And for the first time on this journey, I felt nervous, so much so that my hands started shaking. I kept them on my lap under the table and out of sight. Julia opened the book to a group photo. I didn’t know if I was looking at a church social, a family gathering, or something else, but I had an immediate and strange feeling. It was a feeling of recognition. Freakishly I pointed to one of the several small boys gathered in front of the standing adults and said, “That’s me, isn’t it?” Julia didn’t say anything. She just looked at me. In fact, she looked rather pale. I didn’t say anything more. After a long moment, she looked away as if to find comfort in the poster art on the walls. Then she turned back to the photo and said, simply, “yes.”
That morning I learned that Julia was 33. That she worked for a magazine. That she had been married briefly but was now divorced. That she used her maiden name Morgan. That she lived alone and had never had children. She turned a page in the album and pointed to a photograph of two adults standing behind two small children. “Their names were Harriet and Jack,” she said. She paused. “And his name,” she said, putting a finger on the boy, “was Hank.” “Hank Morgan,” I said. There was something big and dry residing in my throat. I could hardly get the words out. “We grew up in Binghamton,” she continued. “After the accident, I went to live with an aunt in Syracuse. Her name was also Morgan. Aunt Mildred. She died shortly after I graduated from high school. After that I went to college, moved to The City, got a job, got married, divorced, and,” she paused again, “and here we are.” “Here we are,” I agreed. I was learning that Julia was a person with limits, and we had just reached another. She stood up and said that she had to go. I asked if we could meet again, but all she could say was, “I don’t know.”
That was the last that I heard from Julia for nearly three weeks. Again I went back to focusing on everything except Julia, but of course it was nearly impossible to think about anything else. I confided in my roommate who listened to everything as though it was a PBS documentary on the paranormal. Again, I stayed busy. And I’d almost given up on hearing from her when I got my third email. We met the following morning.
She came to the café but this time looked remarkably different. There was a smile on her face. She came to the table with a coffee and two pastries. “I hope you like ginger scones,” she said, handing me one. “I’m afraid I’m addicted,” she added. I thanked her, took one, and broke off a piece. Julia started the conversation by saying that she had originally thought I was either crazy, a criminal, or both, and that she would never have come to the café the first time had a friend not insisted. She told me that she’d had no interest in reliving the accident and its aftermath, and she was sure she didn’t believe in reincarnation. The only thing she felt certain about was that talking to me could somehow hurt her. I asked her why her friend had insisted. She talked about having had feelings of emptiness that sometimes threatened to eat her alive. She said she was convinced that her marriage had failed because of such feelings. Her friend said that she was never going to resolve her issues unless she explored every opportunity. “That’s why I came,” she said. “That and curiosity, I suppose.” “And now?” I asked. “How are you feeling now?” She said that she felt lighter. Even if there was no truth in what I was saying, she said she felt better having talked about it. “Even with a total stranger?” I asked. “Well,” she said, “if what you claim is true, then perhaps you’re not a total stranger.”
Julia revealed that life after the accident had been difficult. She had nearly died from internal bleeding and organ failure. She’d lost her entire family. She had moved to a new city to live with an aunt she barely knew. The physical issues had been difficult enough, but the mental issues had been worse. After her aunt died, she went off to college to study journalism. She said it was the first time she had been able to explore who she was without the baggage of her past. I laughed at the mention of journalism, and told her about my studies. The connection between us seemed to deepen.
“What now?” she asked when the conversation had reached a stopping point. “I honestly don’t know,” I said. “I haven’t thought that far ahead. But now that my search is over, I guess I’ll try to get into the fall semester. I’ve been wanting to get back to doing something other than looking for you. And now that I’ve found you...” “Yes,” she interrupted. “And now that you’ve found me, what do you plan to do?” “Nothing,” I said. And that was how our meeting ended. Except that this time we hugged each other before she walked out into the light of the street.
A month later I was back in school and thoroughly enjoying my classes. I became a stringer for the college newspaper, which involved far more work than I had anticipated. But in a way, it was exactly what I needed. Without the weight of my search, I was free to be fully myself. I don’t know any other way of putting it. I didn’t contact Julia. I assumed that she needed time to absorb everything that I’d dumped on her. And if she decided not to contact me, I was satisfied just to know that she existed. Then in early November I got a call. It was Julia wanting to know if I could come to The City for Thanksgiving. She said she wanted to spend the holiday with family. I said “yes.”
The End
The Last Shot
Some of the family did not even know that a distant cousin owned a small fishing cabin and a few acres of land near the nature spot that many New Orleans locals liked to go to for the outdoor activities of fishing and birdwatching. New Orleans was below sea-level and areas such as Grand Isle served as the last barrier island for the city. This weekend Cameron, Alma, and Gerard had come to celebrate his elderly uncle Samuel’s birthday with him.
Rather than the big party Cameron had heard his aunt planning, it was just the four of them for the dinner. Cameron’s aunt Alma had prepared Samuel’s favorite jambalaya and surprised him with it at dinner. Cameron had enjoyed the homemade food and had helped himself to another small piece of cake after dinner. But he was careful to check his blood sugar level afterwards, just in case he needed to adjust the setting on his new insulin pump.
Due to coastal erosion and ineffective policies, the barrier was disappearing at a staggering rate, but on the days when 10-year-old piano prodigy Cameron would go there to visit his uncle Samuel with his guardian Gerard, he could not tell. The area was beautiful to him. It was a town on a narrow barrier island with clean beaches, a nature preserve of butterflies and plants local to the area, and many unusual birds. He only thought about how much fun it was to go outside with his camera and take photographs. Gerard was more interested in the fishing. It was one of his favorite past times on vacations.
Gerard usually invited Cameron along and he would spend the day in the boat wondering what the purpose of this activity was. Cameron had awakened early that Saturday morning and dressed in casual clothes that he hoped would be comfortable and warm for a day on the water. The cabin was surrounded by green shrubs and trees. A few hundred yards away the path opened widened and then you could access the beach or pier.
“Cameron, you know, you don’t have to go if you don’t want to.” Gerard Wright said with his clear British accent. Gerard Wright was the music director for the New Orleans Symphony and had been close friends with Cameron’s mother. When she’d gone, Gerard had taken Cameron in. The music had been a surprise. It was only by chance that Gerard had discovered that Cameron was a pianist of astonishing talent who had not even had proper training until three years ago.
At first Cameron was not sure if he should go fishing anyway. He did not want to seem like he didn’t like it. “But I want to go with you.” He was surprised when Gerard closed his tackle box and began to laugh.
“Cameron, you are being very polite. But let’s be honest. You hate going fishing with me.”
“I don’t hate it, Gerry.” Cameron was wearing blue jeans and a red t-shirt. He had vibrant green eyes and dark curly hair. Gerard had just reminded him to put on a long sleeve sweater. The area was beautiful but there were all types of insects including mosquitoes that always seemed attracted to Cameron. The easiest way to avoid being bitten was to wear protective clothing.
“Name something you like about it.” He smiled.
Cameron could not think of anything he liked. Gerard never let him bait his own hook, not that he wanted to touch the live bait anyway. He would have liked being on the water sailing, but for fishing they were anchored and still. Probably the worst thing for Cameron was that you could not talk. He always felt like talking when the three of them would go out to fish, but the idea was quickly put down when Sam said that the noise would drive the fish away. So, you sat there in silence and waited for an unsuspecting fish to come along. No, there wasn’t anything he liked about it. “I’m sorry Gerry.”
“You don’t have to be sorry. If you go back to my room and look in my suitcase, you’ll find the digital camera I gave you for Christmas. Why don’t you go outside and take some pictures?”
“You really don’t mind?” He could not keep the smile off his face.
Gerard shook his head and Cameron rushed back down the hallway of the house. He spotted Gerard’s dark brown leather overnight bag in the corner chair and immediately unzipped the top. The shiny black camera lay on top. Cameron took it out and admired the expensive device for a moment. He had already learned how to adjust the settings and use all the features. While it was true that his smartphone would take quality photos and video, he liked the versatility of the new camera. He might be able to catch a butterfly in flight.
“Stay where we can see you from the boat. We never go out too far. Maybe take your phone with you too. I am going to take mine.” Gerard reached into the pocket of his black jeans and took out the thin phone. Cameron wondered how he managed to never get a scratch on it when he did not put it in a case.
“And why are you taking a phone?” Samuel Leblanc came into the kitchen from his bedroom on the other side of the room. “You know I don’t like talking on my boat when I’m fishing. Scares the fish away.” The older man said with an earnest expression before beginning to laugh. He was tall and slender with curly gray hair.
“Because Cameron isn’t coming with us this morning. He is going to do a photo story about what he sees today and show it to us this evening.” Gerard said in a questioning tone.
“That sounds like a great idea Gerry!” Cameron said and hurried toward the door.
“Wait just a minute.” Gerard called behind him. “Did you check your blood sugar?”
Cameron looked at the kitchen table where his testing kit sat squarely in the middle. Most of the time the family kept it in plain sight so that Cameron would not forget and if necessary, like this morning, someone could remind him. “I’ll check it now.” Cameron went to the sink and washed his hands before starting the finger stick process. He had learned to do it himself even though he hated needles. Using the side of his finger instead of the ball was less painful and didn’t get in the way of playing the piano.
Gerard and Samuel talked about the fishing trip and listened to the weather report on the internet while Cameron inserted the strip into the meter. He was careful to not show any sign in his face. “Normal range.” He lied. He was not going to miss the first chance he had to go take photos during one the trips here. It was like a sign that he was growing up. And getting better.
Cameron did not let himself think much about how things used to be now. There was no point. He was safe here and didn’t have to be afraid anymore. His father was dead. There was no one who was going to hurt him anymore. Gerry and his aunt Alma had assured him of that. Alma lived with them and took care of him when Gerry was working with the orchestra. Everything was better now, and that was what he tried to focus on.
The fear only crossed his mind in a flash sometimes. He felt like he was being watched. When he looked around though, no one was watching. His great-uncle was arranging his tan tackle box and Gerard was typing into his phone. Cameron got his camera and headed towards the door.
“Enjoy yourself. Remember what I said.” Gerard nodded as he passed him.
“I’ll be careful.” Cameron said and left the house. As he pulled the front door shut, he felt a cool breeze blow across his face. He looked towards the beach and saw a woman jogging towards him from the beach. He waved.
“And where are you off to? I thought you were going fishing with Gerard.” Alma took her white earbuds out of ears.
“Gerry said I didn’t have to go. I can go out on my own.” He held out the digital camera.
His aunt smiled. “Get some good pictures,” she said with her hand on the doorknob. “Don’t go too far.”
“I won’t.” Cameron said and began walking towards the beach. The air was scented with the faint smell of the wildflowers at the edge of the woods and the water from the beautiful blue Gulf of Mexico.
It was not long before he had settled on the format his photo story would take. He would record the morning in order and make a kind of diary of what he saw there. It might actually be fun to show the photos to Gerry and Alma that night. He started with the flowers near the cabin and then headed towards the wooded area, taking two more photos on the way. He set the lens to zoom in close once he saw a small scissor-tailed bird perched on a low tree branch and then smiled when he checked the beautiful high-resolution photo.
He looked out towards the water when an engine started. He saw Gerard and his Uncle Samuel in the boat moving out from the shore. He and Gerard waved to each other before he went a little further into the woods. The area was quiet this early in the morning and it was easy for him to hear when the motor stopped. Just as he had expected, the boat was well within sight. He could imagine the quiet of the boat and for a moment wished that he had gone with them.
He didn’t know what the sound was at first. He didn’t want to go any further into the woods than the first sparse row of trees, but the rhythmic sound seemed to be deeper inside. Cameron took one more picture of a bird before walking towards the sound. There should not be anyone there but the family, Cameron thought.
He was surprised to see a man with a shovel digging deep in the woods. It looked like a large hole. Cameron held his camera up to his eye and took a photo of the man. He was very tall from what Cameron could tell and had on a black jacket. He kept his head down so Cameron’s photo did not capture his face, but he had blonde hair. He looked at the display and his heart skipped a beat. He could hardly breathe when he noticed that there was something on the ground near the man who was digging. Cameron could not see what was covered up in black plastic, but he could clearly see that there was a hand sticking out.
He felt sick and was trembling when he lowered the camera. He looked back at the man while being careful to conceal himself behind a tree. It suddenly felt like he was miles away from safety instead of only a few yards from shore where he could call to Gerry. He took a step towards the beach and a twig snapped under his shoe. He quickly aligned himself with the tree again and did not move. He could not be sure whether the man had heard the sound. All he knew was that the sound of shovel against earth had stopped.
Cameron waited for a few moments, unsure whether to run and scream or stay hidden. He felt lightheaded with fear, but then the digging sound commenced again. He seized the opportunity to run and dropped his camera after only a few feet. He grabbed it and continued down the path towards the house without bothering to look behind him.
-----
Cameron burst in the front door of the house with such speed that his aunt jumped up from the kitchen table. “Cameron, what’s wrong?”
“Outside…by the woods…” He gasped. His aunt’s face filled with concern as she came over to him and put her hands on his shoulders.
“Cameron, calm down. Take a deep breath. Did something chase you?”
“No, I saw a man. He was burying something…”
“Sweetheart it was probably the groundskeeper. You know Uncle Samuel can’t take care of this place by himself and…” Her voice was calm.
“But I saw what he was burying. I saw a hand.”
“Oh, Cameron. Really?” She shook her head.
“Yes, I did see it.” Cameron said and took his phone from his pocket. He called Gerard and asked him to come back. He was not surprised when his guardian came back immediately and met him on the beach. His uncle waited in the boat. Cameron knew that Gerard might not believe everything he said. After all, Cameron had been in therapy for years and still saw a psychiatrist every week. But Gerard always listened.
As soon as Gerard tied the boat to the dock he asked where he had been when he saw the man. Alma did not dispute his claim anymore and simply walked with them in silence the few yards to the tree where Cameron had been standing. The area was alive with the sound of birds chirping and the water rustling, but there was no digging sound. No man was there either. In the few minutes since he had run back to the house, it looked like no one had been there at all. To his amazement, the ground where Cameron saw the man digging didn’t look raised. Cameron felt a tight knot in his stomach and avoided Gerard’s eyes.
“There’s something here. Is this where you saw him?” Alma asked from the other side of the makeshift path. She was a few yards away from where Cameron thought he had seen the man. The patch of freshly turned earth was small, too small to be the place where a body was buried.
“Yeah…I guess so…” Cameron frowned as he looked up at her.
“You guess, or you know?” Gerard asked.
“I…I’m not sure.” Cameron blinked.
“Okay, not sure is an honest answer.” Gerard said. “I know you think you saw something. Let me see the photo.”
Cameron obliged and held out the digital camera to his guardian. “I dropped it.” He said softly when Gerard paused to look at the scratch on the camera. Gerard advanced the camera to the last photo Cameron took. He moved closer to Cameron so they could view the screen together.
“Let me zoom in on this part.” Gerard squinted at the picture of a man with a shovel digging in the sand. “I see the black plastic on the ground.” He said. “I’m sorry but I don’t anything else.” He handed the camera back to the child.
“Maybe you are still a little sleepy. You were up really late last night, in the kitchen.” Alma came over and put an arm around Cameron’s shoulder.
“I did see a man…and he was burying someone. I saw a hand!” He pulled away from her, angry that his secret excursion to get more dessert had been revealed.
“Cameron…” Gerard raised an eyebrow.
“I’m sorry.” Cameron apologized to them.
“Let’s not get all upset. Look, I know you think you saw something happen here. But there is no sign of it now.” Gerard looked out at the water. “Maybe it was something else.”
“Maybe.” Cameron had begun to doubt it too. There was certainly no grave in the spot where he had seen the man.
“Is there something I can help you with?” A voice called out to them from further down the path. A tall man with dark blonde hair strode towards them quickly.
Cameron’s stomach tightened when he saw the man he had captured on camera. He backed up until he was standing behind Gerard.
“Good morning, we are Mr. Leblanc’s guests. I’m Alma and this is Gerard,” She gestured towards where Cameron was standing. “And that’s Cameron.” Alma smiled and the man nodded.
“I’m Pete.” He said.
“Have you been working up here this morning?”
“I’m always working Ma’am. Is something wrong?”
“Just…” Alma glanced at Cameron. “on our walk we noticed this spot here. Looks like someone was digging…” she said casually.
“Oh, well I can’t do anything about it Ma’am. It’s tragic that people break the law like that.”
“What do you mean?” Gerard asked.
“This whole area is restricted for hunting. But still sometimes people will come out and shoot, especially if they think no one is around. I found a couple of dead birds this morning. I buried them.” His eyes drifted away from Gerard’s face and settled on Cameron. “I suppose I should let the park ranger know.” He stared at the camera that Cameron held.
“Yes, I guess you should.” Gerard said and regained Pete’s attention. “We won’t keep you from your work then.” He nodded and after a moment’s pause, Pete walked away. They walked along in silence until a few minutes later they heard the sound of a truck engine start and then the sound dissipate as Pete drove away.
Cameron was stunned. “Is that all you are going to ask him? It was a big hole and…” he began before he started to feel dizzy. He dropped the camera. The next thing he noticed was how blue the sky was as he tried to open his eyes wider. He could hear a woman’s voice from a distance.
“He’s still awake. See, he’s all right.” Alma smoothed Cameron’s hair. He was supported in her arms where they both sat on the ground. Gerard ran towards them from the cabin.
“Cameron, Cameron here take this.” Gerard said and gently placed a small tube of instant glucose gel in his hand and then helped him place it at his lips. “Go ahead.”
Cameron swallowed the cherry flavored gel.
“You’ll feel better in a minute.” Alma said.
You are going to be just fine.” Gerard reassured him. “Let’s get you back inside.”
The three of them walked back towards the cabin. Samuel called to them from the pier where he was securing the boat and waited for him to come over to them.
“I feel better now Gerry. You can go fishing.”
“No, I don’t really want…” Gerard leaned down, so they were at eye level.
“Please Gerry,” Cameron whispered as his uncle approached. “I don’t want to spoil your day.”
“You’re not spoiling anything.” He shook his head.
“But you said we would stop letting it get in the way and try to have more fun.” Cameron repeated the words Gerard had used when they had talked with his endocrinologist about his diabetes a few weeks before.
Gerard laughed. “I was actually talking about you having fun, but okay. You’re right. I did say that.” Gerard patted his head gently. “Do you want to go out with us this time?”
Cameron hesitated before he smiled. Alma cleared her throat. “Why don’t we all go?”
“Are you all right child?” Samuel asked as soon as he was within range.
“I’m okay.” He smiled. “We were all going to go out on the boat with you.”
“If you don’t mind a little talking while I am sketching.” Alma laughed. “Cameron is going to be my model today.” She opened the cabin door. “While you pack the food, I will get my art supplies.” She said to Gerard.
“Okay.” He said. “Cameron, I will let you help me choose some balanced nutritious snacks.” He grinned knowing the child’s fondness for sweets.
-----
Before dinner that evening when they had returned from a day on the water, Gerard went in search of Cameron’s digital camera. While they were on the boat, Cameron had used his phone to record video and photos. He thought he must have dropped the camera somewhere along the wooded path. Gerard looked all around the area where they had walked but did not find it. The area was silent as the sun began to set. He gave up and started walking back towards the cabin when he heard the sound of a truck engine start and then grow fainter as the vehicle moved further away.
THE END
Rosalind Kaliden has published a chapbook Arriving Sideways and a book of ekphrastic poetry, Trysting with the Divine. She has completed a second, unpublished book of ekphrastic poems and is nearing completion of her fourth book of poetry. She is also working on a memoir. She has published her poems and essays in many journals or anthologies both here and abroad. She has taught English, speech, journalism, and reading in secondary schools and has instructed as a Reading Specialist at the University of Pittsburgh. |
Midday, October 28, 2020
the Ohio River from my deck, pre-election, November 4
The electorate elicits the future.
The media promotes half-truths;
COVID natter grates on residual nerves.
And the nation’s aspect turns gray and watchful.
While on my deck,
Seven pots of sturdy begonias persistently birth
a riot of neon yellows and brilliant oranges,
and the emerald ferns still stretch for the obscured heavens.
And I can see a darkened barge, miles away, drive hard upriver.
And it is only midday.
JUST DUCKY, 1952
from Untitled, 1960, Donald Judd
her heavy pinking shears in the air, adding the finishing touches
to her masterpiece. She trimmed the length of the long ribbon tails
hanging down my back and in one smooth motion, gently, she
touched my shoulder, turned me around and lifted my chin to hers.
Looking me straight in the eyes, she twinkled, “You look just ducky!”
I lifted my shoulders and exhaled. Once again, I was ready
for Easter Sunday, so pleased in the semi-sheer yellow lawn dress
with dropped waist and pleated skirt that ballooned when I twirled.
She hand-stitched two embroidered white ducklings to the corners
of the square neckline in front. And in the back, the long brown ribbons
trailed from a flat velvet bow tacked above the zipper. When I tilted
my head backward and shook my long brown wavy hair,
I could feel the curls barely glancing off the neckline. Perfect.
Tomorrow, dyeing eggs, outsized natural wicker baskets with puffy
pink and yellow bows; Sunday, solid chocolate bunnies, jelly beans,
and marshmallow peeps, banks of fragrant white lilies in front
of the altar, lively hymns, our chests vibrating with the loud
organ chords, my natural straw hat with a thin ribbon and brown-eyed
Susans on the flat crown, the clear plastic, shoulder-strap purse
that shut with a snap, black patent Mary Janes, and most cherished
of all, white stretchy-lace gloves. Step aside, Funny Face!
Our Future From Above
from Shorter Than the Day, Sarah Sze, Installation sculpture
at La Guardia Airport, New York, May 2020
Our future will always be there.
The lofty daytime colors—blue, red, orange, yellow, black, and gray.
Rectangles flutter and flash from above in a vast empire. The palette
suggests that all people represent these brilliant options.
Mankind can always advance their fragile individual dreams.
Many people; countless directions.
All connections in one spiky, gorgeous, black graphic.
Suspensions off countless frail-strong rods.
Airy, light, free—offering much room for growth.
My chest expands with freedom’s invitation, with cleansed flight,
as light as birds’ hollow bones.
My breaths, complicated as birds’ nests, with welcomed glances
of similitude. Touch is not necessary, but the danger of civil
institutions, that falling out of sync, will pull and push us down,
violent and fast, land us on the floor, crumpled like so many empty
beer cans. A 2020 Beirut explosion of their own making—lies
in confused memory. Or a Nashville 6:00 a.m. blasted Christmas surprise.
Your journey may be shorter than one day,
but together we should, or could, last longer, grow stronger,
shine brighter each day’s revolution. Become wiser
each century. More brilliant, more hopeful. More kind.
Above, the colorful aluminum plates continue to swirl,
their elbows never banging. Their paths are plotted, arced or straight.
The winds of passengers, travelers rushing through, carry them
from a north to west orientation, no COVID-19 molecules to befuddle
their trajectory. No science in this reality. It is spellbinding
to observe. The movement catches our imagination, stops us for a time,
while no white bunny rattles us; no nervous chatter hurries us.
I’m late, I’m late—for a very important date!—does not resonate.
Even the delicate/gigantic—puzzling shadows, like errant kites
and the perplexing—density/immensity
cannot hold us—long enough—to make us—miss our flights.
White Valentine, 2016
Crunching footsteps in granulated snow.
Rising sun casting lacy shadows.
The Bough Bounces
that the bough bounces
when that little bird alights
on that very fragile branch
amidst the falling snow
and causes a clumpy shower
that rolls into a soft ball
that rolls into a larger ball
that starts an avalanche.
I wonder if he knows.
Young and Green
“This heat index is too much for any vehicle’s radiator to withstand. Even Sally and all her American made muscle had an issue,” said Ted.
“So much for ‘American made muscle’ and whatever other tropes you and the rest of the Young Ignoramuses preach. Also, you just personified a hunk of metal,” Jane said motioning a thumb towards the shadow gray metallic Chevrolet Silverado chain linked behind the tow truck.
“Young Republicans. We are The Young Republicans,” corrected Ted. “In your alternative universe you’d still be galloping through campus straddling a donkey while the rest of the tree hugger brigade gawk in awe over their clueless leader.”
Greta Thunberg’s expression of exasperated passion atop a wrinkled beige knit roared beneath weathered denim overalls. “Call the Green Thumbs club what you may. We actually strive for environmental sustainability while all The Young Trust Fund Babies do is ensure they have a Vineyard Vines polo for everyday of the week,” Jane said arrhythmically tapping her sun bleached Allbirds. Edging toward the driver’s seat scanning the barren landscape for any sign of escape while she clutched a six pack of an obscure brewery.
“Normal people actually wear clean clothes. That shirt looks like it's made from leftover hay horses from the equestrian club didn’t want,” rebutted Ted as perspiration trickled toward his brow aided by generously applied styling moose.
“It’s called recycled wool, genius.”
Opposite ends of the world resided just a three-foot slide down the dusty bench for each of these university club presidents. Juxtapose to Jane was Ted. Glistening jet-black hair neatly combed to the left, navy and white striped Vineyard Vines polo donning an American Flag pin neatly tucked into creased khaki dockers.
Ted’s reach across the bench for an attempted friendly shoulder pat was swiftly thwarted by a tenacious forearm. “The next hand that touches me will be as lifeless as fifty percent of our planet’s coral reefs,” yelled Jane.
“If I’m not mistaken, YOU asked me for a ride.”
“Desperate times call for desperate measures.”
“Well a deal is a deal.”
“Theres a higher probability you see me purchasing a surplus of plastic water bottles.”
“Listen, you agreed The Green Thumbs would attend our NRA seminar if I’d let you tag alone.”
“And look where we are now, two hours away in a damn tow truck riding through the desert. Should have used vegetable oil.”
“Four-hour drive to deliver some hippy dippy beer. Whatever happened to a Budweiser?”
Suddenly the trading of bantering jabs halted. With one comment, Jane’s debating spirit evaporated. As wide eyes narrowed, taut shoulders slumped. Vivacious green eyes grew murky as her nose flattened against the sizzling window seeking companionship from the fleeting cactuses. Miles of silence accompanied by only a marriage of rubber meeting asphalt and rattling of a rusted chain connecting Ted’s Silverado to the tow truck.
Blinding yellow beams softened to orange as the now western sun began its descent below distant canyons. As did Ted’s guard.
“Hey Jane, I’m sorry if I said something that upset you. Is everything alright?” asked Ted.
“That beer means much more than just a drink to my best friend and I,” replied Jane with her nose still planted against the window.
“Is that who you are visiting? I’d like to hear more about it if you feel comfortable.”
“His mom is losing her battle with cancer. This brewery was a place of comfort. We spent many nights both coping and attempting to escape reality before he moved back home to assist her,” said Jane easing off the window to wipe her nose. “My home life left much to be desired growing up. His mom always included me on their family road trip to nature parks.” Jane fidgeted with the 16oz cans, admiring the vibrant design. “Autumn leaves fluttering as if in slow motion replaced hurling glass bottles. Singing mockingbirds drowned out prior night's arguments. The natural serenity of those parks became my comfort zone.”
“Wow, I had no idea. I guess I should have anticipated a dire circumstance when the Green Thumbs President asked the Young Republicans President for a ride.”
Jane cracked a smile. “I apologize for criticizing Sally. I have a vinyl player named Rosey, she stalls every once and a while too.”
“You’ll make it there before nights end. One way or another. I promise”
Appearing in the headlights danced a roadside repair shop’s neon welcome sign as dusk settled. Instead of being thwarted, Ted’s hand landed on Jane’s shoulder with an approving smile.
“I really appreciate that, and I’ll help you fix Sally’s American muscle.”
Aadil Farook (Pakistan) is a Thinker, Poet, Writer, Translator, Researcher & Musical Artist. He is the Winner & Nominee of 3 International Awards in the US & the UK. His intellectual, literary & musical contributions can be viewed on his website: www.aadilfarook.com |
The Rhythm of 2022
From devils to angels is its range
Can religion alone transform us?
Without spirituality in the nucleus
Does mere belief bring moral elevation?
If not accompanied by a firm conviction
It’s the cup of love that purifies humans
Eradicating the taint of inner demons
When you let love take control
There is a unity of body and soul
Love grants a fresh new start
Ends mind’s war with heart
Love has a higher reasoning
Way beyond logical thinking
When the grasp of rationality ceases
Our intuitive intelligence increases
Love has a lens that is so clean
Conceals that which makes us mean
Love has wings with a perpetual flight
Because it galvanizes our inner sight
Love is a domain with no boundaries
Its seeds always turn into trees
Love sees no pagans in people
Its reach is above good or evil
Love is the precondition of peace
Solves the puzzle piece by piece
Love is the oxygen of life
For existence without strife
Love is the symbol of beauty
It’s the essence of humility
Love is the ultimate sign of God
An armor against any sword
Love conquers any philosophy
As its knot ties to divinity
Love is true like any Science
As it breeds no human bias
Love is the immortality of mortals
Bringing home the highest laurels
Love is the cornerstone of greatness
The secret behind immaculate success
Love unlocks the code of fate
Knowing best how to translate
Without love, Rumi was just a scholar
Before love, Ghazali was only a thinker
Love was the spark of Ibn-al-Arabi’s genius
Without it, philosophy was Iqbal’s venus
When they tasted the depth of love
Wisdom opened its doors from above
Love isn’t merely a four-letter word
In it lies a symphony to be heard
It is the emancipation of human-self
It is a library, not a shelf
Speeches, sermons theorize liberty
Love turns it into actuality
Let the world embrace this message
Towards cure, this is the passage
Let humanity dig much deeper
to discover our differences are meeker
May this be the rhythm of 2022
One day, let this poet’s dream come true!
Taking Credit
They say that 52 percent of Americans believe in fate. I suppose it’s easy to latch onto the notion that your life is predetermined or that you have a destiny, but I choose to work hard instead. I’ve never managed to find the easy path to anything, but that’s alright. I believe you have to earn success and purpose. I’m just not sure that I know how to do it.
I started building my model in my third year of grad school at Duke. My original plan was to work on climate modeling, but I attended five climate change conferences my first two years and realized that that field was fully saturated. I knew it was ridiculous to compete with hundreds of climatologists from around the world. It took me four more months to settle on soil devastation as my focus. I looked at soil conservation strategies, but pretty soon it was clear to me that conserving soil was a lost cause. Between soil loss, erosion, and pollution, there is just too much wrong for us to overcome the devastation. We’ll never do it. Pretty soon, we’ll face mass starvation because of a lack of arable land. We’ll also see flooding reminiscent of the Biblical story. All of that was clear to me after about a month of reading the literature, but what I did not know was how to translate what I could see so clearly into a dissertation.
I went to my advisor— a young academic named Byron Renday with a thick central Canadian accent and the wildest red hair you’ll ever see—with an idea of writing about the threats of soil devastation in the Yucatan. At the time, I was Byron’s only advisee. No one else wanted to work with him, because he had been #MeToo’d several years before. That was even before it was called #MeToo. I heard rumors that he had impregnated an undergraduate, a senior from Atlanta, I think. I don’t believe the rumors, though, because Byron had a picture of his smiling wife on his desk. In any case, I asked him to be my advisor because he seemed to have the time to give me special attention, and during my first semester he told me his doubts about the Origin of Species. I liked that. I mean, Darwin was smart, but he left a lot of holes.
Originally, I wanted to research soil devastation on the Yucatan, because I could use my Spanish and because I had read in a magazine article that some farmers in that part of Mexico are still using millennia-old techniques. But my plan did not satisfy Byron. He said I needed to think bigger.
I responded to him, “I thought the trick was to specialize. All of my classmates chose to study regions. Hortense is writing her dissertation about the environmental impact on salamanders from a single factory near the Mississippi.”
Byron, in that fashion that is peculiar to him, rubbed both hands violently through his hair. I learned quickly in grad school that he did this whenever he was thinking about what to say. I was convinced—I’m still convinced—that Byron is one of the most brilliant men I have known, but he is inarticulate. To his credit, he knows this, and he tries to compensate. I assume that he messes with his own hair as a means to pause himself before responding so that he can think of the right words. As I said, it’s peculiar to him, but many colleagues have picked up techniques over the years to help them behave in-line with societal norms. Byron’s particular tic stood out because his hair was naturally unruly and such bright red. If he cut it shorter, no one would notice when he did this.
Once he had sufficiently mussed his hair and pondered his words, Byron responded to me, “that’s Hortense. You’re going to do something bigger, and I’ll help you. You have something here, Kenny, and it can be bigger than you’re thinking. It could be more than a dissertation. Based on your initial assessment of the existing literature, when would you estimate this terminal date might be? When do you think we might see the point of no return for arable land?”
“Terminal date?” At that point, I had not yet thought of it in such fatalistic terms. I had only thought about the devastation of soil suitable for farming. “This is just an estimate off of the top of my head,” I told him. “But we might see the start of the downfall between 70 and 250 years from now.”
Byron tussled his hair again, but this time he moved his hands more softly, indicating that he had less to consider. He also made an anguished look on his face, like he was trying to convince himself of something that maybe he knew was wrong. After a moment he said to me, “the final number will have to be lower than the range you gave me, but I’m sure we can figure it out. The real number won’t come for several years. Listen, Kenny, email me some of the research that informed your thoughts on this idea and then come by my office again next Tuesday and we’ll start planning this. I’m tentatively excited. Maybe we have something here.”
I returned to Byron’s office on Tuesday as he told me to. Usually, he made me stand while we met, even if it was for an hour, but this time he offered me a seat. He began speaking immediately without pausing to consider his words as he usually did, and he did not bother moving his hands through his fiery hair. I thought at the time that he seemed enthusiastic, even compared to his usual excited state. While he was speaking, I distinctly considered that he had previously rehearsed the speech.
For almost 20 minutes, Byron went over his thoughts based on the research I had provided him and further research he did over the weekend. He had become convinced that soil devastation, “must be,” the focus of my research, and he decided that he would be involved in my work from the start. “This will be big, Kenny. Are you prepared? I know how this works. Do what I say, and we’ll make this into something great.”
That was four and a half years ago. Since then, I have built five successively more complicated and more detailed models of soil devastation. As I continued tinkering, each model led to a more devastating forecast than the version before it. I received my Ph.D. based on the project, though Byron made sure I did not have to write a full and proper dissertation. I wrote an article that I submitted to the magazine Natural Planet, and that was the basis for almost the entire dissertation. Byron and one masters student were co-authors. Before I even completed the Ph.D., I received tenure-track job offers from the environmental policy programs at two respectable research universities. My fellow grad students were undisguisably jealous, because I had done the near-impossible. It was almost unheard of to land a tenure-track job without a few years of tedious post-doc and fellowship positions. Everyone in my program stopped speaking to me, except for Aron. He told me our classmates could not understand why only I had good job offers. However, most of them have called me or emailed in the years that followed. They generally want to see if I can help their careers.
To everyone’s surprise, including my own at the time, I left academia and took a position at a fairly new think tank called Future World Initiative in Chevy Chase, just outside of the capital. There were four reasons for this decision, and I won’t tell anyone which reason was most important. One reason was that FWI offered me resources I could never get as an assistant professor at a university. Almost from the start, FWI assigned to me two full-time assistants, one with an archival research background and one with an education in data science. FWI also promised to purchase or lease all of the computing power I would need to run my model, and they committed to paying for consultants to assist with programming, if necessary. Another reason I went to FWI was the money: twice as much in salary as either school offered, plus benefits and a generous stipend for conference travel. A third reason I went to FWI is that Byron said it was a better spot to complete and publicize my research. Byron was impressed with FWI’s publicity and development staff, but I must admit that at the time that I was choosing a job I could not comprehend why a scientist would need publicity. I took his word for it, and now I’m starting to understand. The fourth reason I chose FWI was Jason, my partner. He had a job offer at a hospital in York, PA, and we figured we could live half-way between the two. We wanted to get married, so the FWI job just made sense. Jason is an orthopedist.
That’s how I came to work at FWI for the last two and a half years. Jason and I did get married, and we have a well-maintained and comfortable three-bedroom colonial in the middle of a quiet one-way street in a little town. Barney is our mut. He’s a schnauzer-poodle mix, and he barely knows us. Other than a late-night walk, we only spend time with him on the weekends. We pay a funny looking guy with six piercings on his face to walk the dog in the morning and during the day. Jason is talking about children, but I’m not ready.
At the office, I spend most of my time in a converted conference room where Nicki (we call her “Research Girl 1”), Jeannine (“Research Girl 2”), Derek (“Numbers Guy”), and Patrice (“Team Mommy”) do what I tell them. I know the nicknames might be considered offensive, but we spend a lot of time together, and they just formed naturally. As the head of the team, they just call me Kenny. At least, I don’t think they have a nickname for me. We have files, papers, and a few handy books spread across the conference table in an organized mess. A white board covers much of the east wall of the room, and a computer in the middle of the conference table connects to two 60-inch monitors mounted on the south wall. This computer is the system from which we run my model. This system, alone, runs on a secure, designated connection to the IT department, and it is protected by a physical padlock, a traditional passcode, and a biometric test. Only I can access my model on my own. Any combination of two of Research Girl 1, Research Girl 2, Numbers Guy, and Team Mommy can gain access together.
FWI has grown since I arrived. It now employs somewhere between 40 and 50 people, I think. They spoke about the growth plans at the staff meeting last month, but my mind was focused that morning on a small glitch Numbers Guy had just found with Model v5.2. Technically, my title is Senior Scholar, but I have a lot of autonomy. I’d like to think I’m as important as the Fellows and Senior Fellows. Of course, I know I fall below the Executive Director, Christine Shaldor, on the prestige scale, but my work is pretty important for the think tank. Every few months, they put me on a video conference or take me to a meeting with a wealthy donor to talk about my model. I review the work I’ve done so far, the work we are doing, and the implications of it all. I follow a script that is quite clear and that has been refined by the publicity and development staff at FWI over my time here. (See, I mentioned that I am starting to understand why a scientist would need publicity. It’s about the money).
Besides those meetings with donors, FWI keeps most of my work under wraps. They know I published that article in Natural Planet, but they insisted I embargo my dissertation so no one can look it up. They say they want to roll out my model at the appropriate time, but I’m not sure about the paranoia. That early work I did in grad school was Fred Flintstone’s brontosaurus compared to my current Ferrari of a model. However, because of their anxieties, all of my model work must be done in the designated conference room. Although, I do have my own office with a desk, phone, bookshelves, and all of that. On one bookcase in my office, I keep a picture of Jason with Barney and a small library of books on soil—soil formation, soil erosion, and soil loss. On another bookcase I keep a photo of a beach we went to in Delaware last year, a Baltimore Orioles hat, and a dozen books written by FWI colleagues which they gave me for free. I don’t like baseball, but the publicity and development staff want me to make the office look personal in case they ever bring a donor by. Those same women told me to keep a suit and tie in the office in case I ever needed them, so I have clothes hanging in a suit bag on the hook on my office door, and I keep a pair of loafers under my desk. I have not yet worn them, and sometimes I wonder if the suit pants still fit me since I’ve gained a few pounds with all of the takeout lunches and dinners I eat in the office.
Last night I fixed the inputs for CL166 and AR65, and now I have 37.977835 or a timeline of “less than 38 years” until the terminal date. I have a meeting this morning with Mrs. Shaldor to tell her about the latest development. There will be others from FWI there, probably some Fellows and Senior Fellows. These people spend their days writing books and opinion pieces in newspapers. They also give speeches, appear on unimportant panels, provide interviews to the press to describe the actions of other people, and just hobnob with government bureaucrats and other think tankers in DC. Few of these Fellows or Senior Fellows are real scientists. Most of them are former government “hacks.” Some were journalists. One owned a paint-your-own pottery shop in suburbia before she signed a book deal to write about artisans in northwest India, and now she’s a Senior Fellow and an “expert” on “Global Workers Rights.” These are the types of people who will be asking me questions about my model and prodding my work. They don’t really know anything about it, and they wouldn’t understand it no matter how long I tried explaining it to them. Mrs. Shaldor is no scientist herself. She majored in French at Wellesley almost half a century ago, and she doesn’t even have a master’s degree. However, her husband was an eight-term congressman and an Assistant Secretary of State. I think she knows everyone at every club in DC—and I don’t mean the Dupont Circle-type of clubs that Jason tried to drag me to on Friday nights when we first moved to the area. Mrs. Shaldor’s talents are not in the sciences.
So, here I am now, waiting in the sitting room outside of Mrs. Shaldor’s office. The blue plush rug is quite comfortable on my feet. It is so forgiving that I feel like my Adidas are resting on a pillow. Her assistant, Daniel, tells me to wait, and I get the feeling I may be here a while. Daniel doesn’t seem to mind, though. He’s older, maybe 45 or 50, but he always tries to flirt with me. It’s kind of pathetic, since I’m not yet 30 and much more attractive than him, but I try to play along to be nice. In a way, Daniel’s banter helps pass the time as I’m waiting.
Daniel gets a phone call while he’s in the middle of telling me about a trip he took to St. Lucia. Something about the way he tells the story and describes himself snorkeling makes me think that the trip happened a couple of decades earlier, and I find that really sad. Did he not have a more recent story to impress me? I don’t listen to him talk on the phone, because I think nosiness is the epitome of evil. When he hangs up, though, I look at him, and he is already motioning me to follow him into Mrs. Shaldor’s office to wait for her some more. There, he sits me in a stiff and creaky wooden chair across from her desk. The office has the same blue plush rug, though. I really like it.
One thing that always gets me when I visit Mrs. Shaldor’s office or the offices of Senior Fellows is how nice they are compared to mine. She has built-in bookshelves and a wide, wooden desk. I don’t know what type of wood; I never remember what different trees look like once they’re harvested and milled. It is all much nicer than my furniture, though, which is particle board with a veneer, essentially one step up from Ikea. Also, Mrs. Shaldor’s window looks out over the garden and a pond with a fountain. My office looks out over an alley and a brick wall 15 feet away. Yet, I can’t complain too much, because the conference room we work in also has a view of the lawn, but it’s only a partial view of the lawn. Mostly, we have a view of the road.
I don’t know how long I am waiting for her, because I forgot to check my watch when I came in. Daniel actually said something funny as he motioned for me to sit in the uncomfortable chair—he made fun of a receptionist’s messy lipstick application—and I was too distracted to see what time it was. Usually, I like to check the time whenever I go somewhere, change positions or move around a little. It helps me know how long I’ve been in one spot. It’s good to keep track of that data, but I’m not crazy about it. I don’t record it or anything.
Mrs. Shaldor walks in while I’m thinking about the weed killers used to maintain the pristine lawn outside of her window. She’s overly friendly as always. I must give her credit for being a perfect hostess, and she always knows what to say and how to make each person feel special. I rise to shake her hand, which she takes, but she quickly suggests I sit again. She even offers me a drink—"Coffee, water, orange juice, a coke?”—but I tell her Daniel already offered, and I’m not thirsty. Finally, she sits behind her desk and looks at me with a kindly smile. That’s when I realize we are alone. I was sure she would have invited at least a few Fellows and Senior Fellows to hear about my work, but instead it’s just us.
That’s why I ask her, “Is anyone else coming? I brought printouts to pass around.” It took me many months, but I came to realize that I should never attend a meeting at FWI without a PowerPoint or handouts. PowerPoints are necessary for a conference room or the auditorium; handouts are for meetings in personal offices.
“No, Kenny, we’ll save that for another time,” she says, so pleasantly and with such a kind smile that I’m not disappointed I printed the handouts for no reason. “I have a little surprise for you, actually, and it’s excellent timing now that you think you have finished this draft of the model—"
“My model is done.” I feel wrong as soon as I interrupt, but she has to know that the model is complete. Only new data can change the outcome, but my model itself is fully constructed.
“Okay, great.” That smile, her clear annunciation, and her calm demeanor are perfect. “Aren’t you interested in the surprise?”
I just nod. Sure, I’m interested, but I have never really liked surprises. I always found my birthday presents in advance so that I could feign the appropriate emotions when my parents handed them to me after cake. It was not hard, since my mother hid them in the same basement closet every year.
“Oh, look here,” Mrs. Shaldor says, so I look to her. However, she is not looking at me. She is looking beyond me, above me.
I turn around to see what she is looking at, and there stands Byron Renday, my advisor. His hair is cut much shorter than I have ever seen it before. Also, he is wearing a sportscoat and a tie, which I rarely saw him do during my grad school years. In his hand is a leather briefcase instead of the raggedy dark green computer bag he used to throw over his shoulder. He looks different, but it is Byron, always a welcome face. He taught me everything I know. Isn’t that what they say? It’s not entirely true in our case, but it sounds nice. It’s the kind of thing I could imagine saying at his retirement party or funeral someday.
Mrs. Shaldor is right, though. This is excellent timing for Byron to visit, because I’ll be able to show him the finished model. He stopped into the FWI office once soon after I started here, but now I have a staff of four and my own workspace. He’ll be impressed, and then I’ll tell him I owe it all to him. That is not entirely true, either, but Jason keeps saying I need to make people feel appreciated. I rise to shake Byron’s hand, and he sits down before me in the seat to my right. I notice that he does not wait for Mrs. Shaldor or me to tell him to sit down, even though he is the visitor. I look to Mrs. Shaldor to start talking, since she is the hostess of this meeting, but Byron starts instead.
“It’s nice to see you, Kenny,” he says, facing me. “Are you surprised to see me?”
“Actually, I am, but, as Mrs. Shaldor just said, you are visiting at a great time. I just finished my model last night, and I’d love to show it to you. Can you stay for an hour or two?”
Byron and Mrs. Shaldor both laugh, and I become uneasy. I don’t believe they’re laughing at me, because they’re both too old for such cruelty, and Mrs. Shaldor is too proper. There must be a joke I don’t understand. Still, it irks me that they seem amused about something I said or did.
“What’s going on?” I ask.
Byron opens his mouth to say something, but Mrs. Shaldor cuts him off. I never saw her interrupt or preempt anyone before. “Dr. Renday is here to stay,” she says. “He is joining our team at FWI permanently. I thought you should be the first to know, Kenny, because you always speak so highly of him. I was hoping you two could reignite some of that magic you had at the university.”
It’s true. I have always spoken highly of Byron. I believe loyalty is important. However, I don’t understand what he’s going to do at FWI. Until I came along, his research was focused on the historical and prospective deforestation of the southeastern portion of North America, but that is not an in-demand topic these days. He co-authored that one Natural Planet article with me on soil devastation, and I know he has spoken about soil devastation at a few conferences, because I helped him with his notes for those. However, he has no particular expertise that a “forward-thinking think tank” like FWI would value. (“Forward-thinking think tank” is used all the time by everyone at the Future World Initiative, and the publicity and development staff have carefully inserted it into my lexicon).
“Welcome, Byron,” I say. It is all I can think to say.
“Thanks, Kenny. I can’t wait to learn more about your progress. I heard you and the others have been working hard on this project. It will be great to get in there and roll up my sleeves.”
What does he mean? I’m confused, and apparently Mrs. Shaldor sees that, because she steps in. “Let’s clarify some things here, because I think there may be some confusion.” Mrs. Shaldor stands up from her desk chair and walks toward her office door. “Dr. Renday is going to be our new James and Clarissa Burke Senior Fellow for Soil Management and the Future of Agriculture. I want him to guide the completion of the model and the rollout of the model into the public sphere. I know you two will work well together since you worked so well together before.”
Before I can grasp what this means, Mrs. Shaldor is signaling for me to leave the office. As Daniel leads me through the sitting area, Byron says, “Christine, when will we return from lunch this afternoon? I’d like to let Kenny know when to expect me.”
“We should be back by 2:30,” she tells him.
Byron calls out to me, “Kenny, come by my office at 2:45, will you? It’s two doors down from here. The nameplate’s already up. We can discuss the progress on the model then.”
I nod my head but don’t say anything before I leave. I notice that he called her Christine. I’m not so sure he should be so informal with her. Also, I wonder why they hired him. What’s he going to do here? I can’t imagine it will be too long before Mrs. Shaldor and the board realize that Byron has little to offer them. Meanwhile, maybe he’ll be able to help me a little with a final review of my model. This afternoon I’ll show him my work, and he’ll understand how much I’ve already accomplished on my own with only the help of my team. But what really puzzles me is: why does he have an endowed Senior Fellow position?
I go to Byron’s office precisely at 2:45. The door is locked, and a receptionist comes by to see if she can help me. I’ve never seen her before, and she obviously does not know who I am. She looks me over, not hiding her disapproval of my jeans, sweater, and sneakers, and she offers me a seat in the main waiting area by the front desk. I laugh and return to the conference room where Research Girl 1, Research Girl 2, Numbers Guy, and Team Mommy are playing on their phones and computers. They don’t have anything to do now that my model is complete. Now we’re just waiting for FWI leadership to tell me what to do with it.
At 4:00, I return to Byron’s office. I thought about returning at 3:00, and at 3:15, and at 3:30, and at 3:45, but I realized that he could find me if he wanted. When I get there at 4:00 precisely, the door is open, and he seems to be rearranging the furniture. He sees me and starts talking immediately without mentioning anything about his absence at 2:45. Byron fails to offer me a seat, just like in grad school. Instead, I stand in the doorway while he continues tinkering with the office furniture. First, he asks about Jason—they met once or twice—and tells me that he and his wife are subletting a two-bedroom apartment in Cleveland Park while they look for a house in the area. I’ve never met Byron’s wife. Why not? Eventually, I just tune Byron out as he talks about the real estate agent that “Christine” sent to his wife and about how generous FWI has been in covering added relocation costs. Instead of listening to him, I notice that his furniture is authentic wood as well, and his view is better than mine from the conference room. He also has a minifridge in his office and an attached bathroom which is apparently private. I don’t have any of that.
Finally, Byron is ready to talk about work. Still, he does not offer me a seat. I think of sitting down without an invitation, because I am now just as credentialed as he, but I choose to stand instead. “Let’s look at what you’ve got so far with the model—tomorrow morning,” he says, apparently forgetting that I was going to show him my model this afternoon. “I’ve got meetings and phone calls until 11:00, but I’ve already blocked off 11:00 to 11:30 for you and your coworkers to show me what you’ve been doing since you last updated me.”
“Byron, I was trying to tell you before. I finished my model. The final output is 37.977835 years, or 37 years and 356.9 days. And I’d appreciate if you don’t call the members of my team my coworkers. They work under me. I’m their boss.”
When he hears my reply, he sits in his desk chair. I suppose my tone may sound harsh, but I want to be clear and adamant. Byron looks at me without speaking and slowly rubs his left hand—just his left hand—through his now short red hair. I would not say it is closely cropped, but it is short enough that it has lost its wild nature. “I understand, Kenny. I did not mean to offend you. Let’s start going over things tomorrow at 11:00.” Byron stops talking for a second, but I know he has more to say, because he is still rubbing that hand through his hair. He starts again. “You know, if you want, we could meet earlier.”
“Earlier?” I ask. I generally arrive at 8:00, but there are usually only a couple of other people at the office that early. The only person I ever speak to at that hour is Aleksander, the morning janitor who is an immigrant—I think from Russia, but I wouldn’t want to presume. Aleksander likes to practice speaking English with me.
“Yes, do you think you could be here at 6:30? Then I could give you my full attention before my breakfast meeting,” Byron says.
I confirm 6:30 is what he said, because I don’t want to be stood up again like I was earlier this afternoon. I tell him I will see him then. In the end, I knew he would have the time to spend with my model and me. And he does. He is making the time, even waking early on his second day on the job to learn about my work.
I think I’m going to tell the team to go home early today as soon as we finish the afternoon backup. We’ve been working a lot of late nights—well, more me than them, but they’ve been working hard too. Besides, we can’t do anything until FWI leadership tells me what to do with my model now that it’s complete.
Getting home early for the first time in months is nice. Barney meets me at the door, but I think he’s confused. He probably thinks I’m the dog walker or something. Poor dogs. There is so much they don’t understand, and we never really know what they’re thinking.
I check Jason’s schedule and see that he’s supposed to be done at work at 6:00. I expect him home before 7:00. Maybe I’ll read a book for a little while and then make dinner for him. I’ll have it waiting for him when he gets home. He complains often that I work too much and don’t do enough spontaneous things for him. That’s why I will make dinner tonight.
Dinner is exceptional, if I may say so myself. I made roasted chicken and I serve it with a Vietnamese scallion sauce that I once saw on a PBS cooking show. On the side, I serve lightly steamed broccoli the way Jason likes it and roasted red potatoes sliced in half with a healthy serving of paprika on the open faces. In both of our glasses, I pour craft beer that Jason bought last weekend at a farmer’s market while I was in the office. While we eat, I tell Jason about my day, because he often tells me I need to share more about my life outside of home. I tell him about the meeting in Mrs. Shaldor’s office, Byron’s surprise appearance, and why I let the team go home early. I try to relay the conversations word for word and share each detail, even that Byron stood me up at 2:45, which is a little embarrassing.
When I finish, Jason puts his hand on mine. That’s something he only does when he’s trying to explain something serious or something that maybe I should have understood on my own. “Ken,” he says in that gentle tone he uses when he’s trying to spare my feelings. “Please be careful. I know you like these people. I see that, but they may not have your best interests at heart. You have spent almost five years of your life building this model, and it seems to me they may be trying to take credit for it. I know, I know, he’s your mentor, and Mrs. Shaldor’s been good to you, but this doesn’t seem right.”
I tell Jason I need him to elucidate, because I’m not positive about what he’s trying to say.
“Why is Byron here?” Jason asks. “Why did they hire Byron just as you finish the model? And, as you say, what use do they have for Byron? You’re the scientist who built the model. And why does he get an endowed Senior Fellow title while your title is just Senior Scholar? How much money and recognition did they have to offer Byron to get him to leave the cushy tenured professor job right at the prime of his career? And Mrs. Shaldor—I know you like her, but her interest is FWI. That’s her priority. Please don’t take this the wrong way, Ken, but you know that you are not the best at presentations and conversations, even after all of those sessions with the publicity team--"
“The publicity and development staff,” I interrupt.
“Yes, even after the hours and hours you have spent with them, what if—and don’t take this personally—FWI decided you are not the right face for rolling out your model? I know you can do it, and I have faith in you, but they don’t know you like I do. Maybe—and I pray I’m wrong—they plan to use Byron as the face of your work.”
Jason’s words have only elucidated a suspicion that was already growing in the back of my mind, but it’s not a thought I want to have. I have to acknowledge that Jason’s hypothesis would explain all the actions and statements that confused me during the day. Still, I hope he’s wrong. If he’s right—no, I can’t even think of what that would mean if he is right.
In the morning, I arrive at the office at 6:15 so I can straighten up the loose papers on the conference table. At 6:28 I go to my office, sit behind my desk and try to look busy, because maybe Byron will come to find me. He does not come, though. At 6:35, I check the conference room. He’s not there. I check the front door in case he doesn’t have a fob yet, but he’s not there either. I walk by his office, and he’s sitting at his desk writing on his laptop. He does not even look up at me until I speak, and he’s not ready to come into the conference room. I have to wait three and a half minutes for him to finally follow me. I don’t think Jason is right, but maybe he’s not entirely wrong.
The first thing I do is show Byron the complicated identification system one must go through to access the computer system. Byron cannot see the code when I type it in, but he is impressed. I can tell. I pull up my model on the two sixty-inch monitors and take him through the work. I start with Region 00001 and cover the variables, assumptions, and algorithms. I show him the Assumptions Sources Sheet which has reached 1,653 lines long. When I finished grad school, the Assumptions Sources Sheet was only 786 lines long. I show him the Conclusions Sheet, with the 37.977835 in bold, 18-point font at the top. The whole time I’m speaking, he takes notes in a brown leather notebook.
He doesn’t ask any questions until I finish talking, and then he says, “Look at that. It’s almost 7:15. I have to meet Christine in a few minutes, but I have a couple of questions, Kenny.”
“Sure.” I expected questions. In fact, I hope he will ask several so I can show off more of my work. I had no idea he needed to go at 7:15. I thought he would stay at least until 9:00 when the team usually arrives.
“Kenny, are you constantly updating your data as new information comes in from scientists in the field? And, if so, how?”
“Of course, Byron. Remember, that was one of the issues I faced in grad school. With the resources here, we are much more advanced, and we’re always improving. We handle it three different ways. First, we have a growing number of farmers, field scientists, and amateurs globally who report back to us directly with soil data on a bi-monthly basis. That data is inputted directly to a spreadsheet which we download and then share with my model. If we can’t do that in a given spot, we keep in contact with scientists in particular locations who are willing to share data with us when available. For the spots where even that is unavailable, we keep a comprehensive listing of sources to check regularly for updated data. That’s handled by Research Girls 1 and 2, and Numbers Guy makes sure it is all converted into data we can use.”
“Who?” he asks while finishing his notes.
“Sorry,” I apologize, ashamed for using insider nicknames in front of an outsider. “That’s Nicki, Jeannine, and Derek. I was using their nicknames. Sorry.”
“Okay, Kenny, how many regions do you cover in your model? And will the number of distinct regions change?”
“We broke the planet into 4,965 regions. Of course, the regions could change, and we could be more specific by shrinking the size of regions, but we’re proud of what we have. We don’t measure soil in Antarctica for obvious reasons, so right now the average region is about the size of Massachusetts.”
“Massachusetts, you say? How big is that?” He’s staring at his notebook, not looking at me.
“Massachusetts is about 10,500 square miles, give or take a few.”
“Thanks,” he says as he stops writing and puts the notebook down on the table.
“And that 37.978 number? How much wiggle room do we have with that if we change some variables?” At this point, Byron has both hands moving rapidly and recklessly through his hair. “I mean, if we have reason to show that the date is further out or maybe even nearer, are there some assumptions that maybe could be altered? I don’t mean we’d fudge the data but maybe are there some assumptions that maybe we might decide should be different in consultation with knowledgeable parties?”
“Sure,” I say, but I don’t know why I agree. And that’s the end of our meeting.
Byron doesn’t come around for the rest of the day, and I barely see him for another week and a half. I don’t know what my team is supposed to be doing, because Mrs. Shaldor has not actually given me instructions for what to do next with my model. To keep everyone busy, I suggest we all work on updating data from observers in as many regions as possible, then we check over my model again and again. Team Mommy cleans the conference room so many times that we don’t know where to find any of our papers. Eventually, I stop by Mrs. Shaldor’s office after lunch to talk to Daniel about her plans for my model. I correctly assume she will not be there, because she always has important lunch meetings. Daniel promises he’ll talk to her about it, so I return to the conference room.
Two weeks after Byron arrived at FWI, at 7:48 in the evening, I get an email from Tanya, who is part of the publicity and development staff. She works with Bridget mostly. Tanya’s email invites me to an interview with the Wall Street Journal the next afternoon at 1:30 in the office library. The email says Mrs. Shaldor and Byron will be there, as will Tanya herself. Of course, I’ll be there. Finally, I can talk to the outside world about my work. I’ve been waiting for this. I didn’t know they booked an interview with the Wall Street Journal, but I suppose these things are scheduled at the last minute, because in the movies reporters are always saying they’re, “on a deadline.”
A funny thing about Tanya is that she’s actually related to Jason. Over the last two and half years, I have spent hours training with Tanya and Bridget, learning how to present to potential donors, answer media questions, sit straight and look into someone’s eyes or into the camera. In short, I have learned how to present myself according to the FWI standard. During this time, we naturally got to talking, and I learned that Tanya is from Bangor, Maine. Immediately when I arrived home that night after I learned this, I told Jason that I work with a young woman from Bangor and he must know her. He laughed and told me that Bangor has more than 30,000 residents, as if that’s a lot. I responded that I was sure he knew her. That’s when he rolled his eyes and asked, “is this woman Black? You know, not all Black people know each other, even in Bangor.” But it turned out they do know each other. They kind of grew up together, although Tanya is younger. Jason’s mother and Tanya’s mother are first cousins.
So, when I tell Jason that Tanya just emailed about an interview with the Wall Street Journal, he says, “that’s nice.” About an hour later, he walks into the bedroom where I’m reading. He’s carrying a worried expression. I ask him what’s wrong. He sits down and once again does that thing where he holds my hand.
“I just got off the phone with Tanya,” he says, clearly cautious about something. “Don’t get mad, but I asked about the Journal interview tomorrow. She says it’s not for you. It’s for Byron, and Mrs. Shaldor will also be interviewed.”
“That’s odd that they would invite me then. I wonder what the interview is about. Maybe they just want me to see how a press interview goes since I’m sure I’ll be having some once we roll out my model.”
“No,” Jason says, and he squeezes my hand tighter. “They are talking about your model tomorrow at this interview. This is the start of the rollout. Did they not tell you about this?”
I’m stunned, but, really, I should not be. Jason warned me. I should have listened to him, because he does care only about my best interest. I know that.
I’m not sure of my feelings right now with regard to Byron and Mrs. Shaldor. I’m not sure what I’ll do. All night I toss and turn. Usually, I sleep straight through the night until my alarm wakes me, but tonight I just can’t keep my eyes shut without horrible thoughts racing through my head.
By 7:31 in the morning, I’m in the conference room. I had an idea while getting dressed. I call Ben, the IT guy, on his cell phone and catch him while he’s eating his breakfast. I think he’s slurping cereal, which sounds kind of disgusting over the phone. Ben doesn’t try to hide how annoyed he is that I am bothering him at home so early, but I need his help. I make him promise to come to the conference room as soon as he arrives.
Meanwhile, I have nothing to do but twiddle my thumbs until Ben finally arrives at 8:56. As soon as he walks into the room, I tell him that I am concerned about security, and I need to ensure no individual can access my model except for me.
“You’re secure,” he says. “You have the designated connection to the cloud. And locally you have a three-pronged security system. First, you have the physical padlock on the door to the local servers. Then you have the biometrics. Then there’s the passcode. Only your biometrics allow for you to use the passcode. Other than that, only your assistants can do it, but they need two of them. And I can’t change this system. Only one person can have unilateral access to the system, and that’s you. Don’t worry.”
“So, no one else can access my model? Is that what you’re saying?” I’m still concerned.
“Not exactly,” Ben tells me. “The model is also on your backup, right?”
“Of course, that’s what a backup is.”
“The backup is done through a cable to a designated hard drive in the IT office,” he explains, but I already know all of this. “I reconnect the hard drive to your system every morning and disconnect it every afternoon. In the evening, I leave it in the safe in the IT office. That’s why I tell you to backup only between 9:30 and 4:30 every day. But it also means I have access to the hard drive backup. I can access it if I want to, but I don’t honestly understand what you’ve been doing back here. And I don’t care. I wouldn’t steal your backups.”
“So, you haven’t accessed that backup, have you?” I ask.
“Well, actually, I thought it was ok. Maybe it wasn’t—”
“Just tell me.” I’m an instant away from losing my temper. I need to know what happened.
“Do you know that new Fellow, Dr. Renday?” Ben asks.
I nod and motion with my hand for Ben to get on with his story.
Ben follows my prompt and tells me what happened. “A day after he started here, Dr. Renday came in and asked for me to make a copy of the backup for him. He said it was important to store it in multiple spots, and since Christine herself introduced him to me the day before I just figured he had the authority.”
“You’re saying he has a copy of the backup?” I am irate. “That is not good. That was not supposed to happen, and it is a major breach of security.”
Ben must be able to tell how angry I am, because he sounds miserable as he tells me the rest. “That was the first copy I gave him. He’s asked for copies two more times since then. He said something about securing changes you have made. Look, Kenny, if I was wrong to share with him, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. Tell me what I can do to help fix this.”
I am fuming, not at Ben but at Byron. Yet, I do not have time to be angry. I have to act. It feels like a movie, and I always knew I was meant for moments like this. As I have always said, “Byron is one of the most brilliant men I have known,” but I do believe I can outwit him. I pace back and forth across the length of the conference room while Ben waits patiently. I assume he feels guilty and doesn’t want to interrupt me while I am pondering the problem.
Then I find it, that eureka moment. I ask Ben, “how does the backup work? Do you send Dr. Renday the file?”
“No,” Ben giggles for a second. “The files are much too large for that. I gave him an extra hard drive. When he wanted a copy of the backup, he’d bring that hard drive to me, and I’d put a copy on the hard drive. Then I’d return it to him.”
“Good,” I say. This will work. “Ben, can you do me a favor the next time he brings you that hard drive?”
“Sure, Kenny, I feel terrible about what happened. I’ll do anything I can to fix it.” I believe him.
“Give me half an hour, Ben, and I’ll backup a decoy file. You just make sure it goes to a blank hard drive instead of the real backup location. The next time Dr. Renday asks you to give him a copy of my model, you will copy the decoy file onto his hard drive instead. At the same time, you will erase all of the old copies of my model from his hard drive. Is that clear?”
“Sure, I can do that, Kenny. But please don’t tell Christine.” Ben is shaking at this point. I don’t want him to feel so guilty, but I know his guilt will help me get what I need. I reassure him I won’t tell anyone as long as we, together, solve the problem. Then I shuffle him off while I fabricate a decoy file. My team begins arriving for the day, but I ignore them. They know better than to bother me while I’m working.
At first, I consider sharing an old model as the decoy file, but even that is too advanced and useful for me to give to Byron. Then I get a better idea. I make a duplicate of the actual model file, which, even with my fast computer takes several minutes. With this new duplicate file, I begin deleting sheets outright. I alter figures and equations, and I erase large sections of the Assumptions Sources Sheet. I spend 17 minutes making my model unusable. It’s humbling when we remember that building something is so difficult while destroying the same thing is so easy. Before I press save on this decoy file, I check the Conclusions Sheet. The new terminal date is set for 1,006,228.455037 years. That will mess with Byron.
After I hand over the decoy file—cooly renamed Soil Model v5.z—I finally relax. I am excited to tell Jason. He won’t believe I did this. I think he’ll be just as impressed with me as I am. From my office, with the door shut, I call him. Luckily, I catch him between patients, and I’m right. He is extremely proud of me. When doubts begin to catch up with me, he reminds me to have faith in my own decisions. Jason tells me what I already know: that it is my model. I am only protecting my hard work.
Most of the remainder of the morning is boring, but at 11:48, Byron storms into the conference room. Well, that’s what Research Girl 2 tells me. Team Mommy and I are actually out getting sandwiches for the team, because we are so bored. Research Girl 2 calls on my cell phone to tell me that Byron—“Dr. Renday,” she says—has come to the conference room, and he is frantic. She says that Numbers Guy and Research Girl 1 are trying to calm him down. I tell Research Girl 2 to put the speaker phone on, and I hear Byron demand to see me. When they tell him that I’m out and they’re not sure when I’ll be back (they’re lying), Byron demands that they open my model for him. They refuse that as well, and they tell him they need to wait for me before sharing it with anyone. He tries to assert his position as a Senior Fellow, but they do not budge. I love my team. They are quite loyal.
An email arrives a few minutes later from Daniel telling me there will be an urgent meeting in Mrs. Shaldor’s office at 12:30 and that I am expected to attend. This makes me nervous, quite nervous. Confrontation has always terrified me. While I know that my scheme with the decoy backup was necessary to preserve my work, I can’t stop imagining what will happen in Mrs. Shaldor’s office. I envision being fired. That would be embarrassing, but Jason makes enough money. If I do get fired, though, I would still need to make sure no one uses my model. This makes me think about my contract. What does my contract say about my model? Is it my property or does it belong to FWI? However, I realize I am being foolish, because they can’t use my model without me. It is far too complicated for even Byron to master, even if my team were to defect and help him.
When I arrive at Daniel’s desk promptly at 12:30, he whispers to me, “what happened?” I don’t want to explain, so I just shrug, and he goes on, “she skipped her lunch meeting today for this. Dr. Renday is seething and panic-stricken, but don’t you worry. She doesn’t seem nearly as upset as he is.”
Daniel knocks on Mrs. Shaldor’s door and opens it before anyone answers. Mrs. Shaldor is seated calmly in her desk chair, but Byron is standing with his arms crossed and leaning forward over one of the uncomfortable wooden chairs. “Take a seat,” says Mrs. Shaldor, and I do as she says in the other wooden chair. When she sees that Byron intends to continue standing, Mrs. Shaldor says to him, “Byron, it’s best if you sit too.”
With both of us sitting, she begins, “Kenny, Byron is upset about the level of cooperation and collaboration in the office here. As you know, at FWI we pride ourselves on working well together. That said, you and your team have enjoyed an enormous amount of autonomy since you arrived. That is a testament to how much we value your work, but as we approach the rollout, it seems that increased cooperation is vital. Don’t you agree?”
“Sure,” I reply. That is the truth. I have no problem with cooperation.
Mrs. Shaldor smiles. “I’m glad we’re on the same page, Kenny. So, I believe now the next thing to do is to find a way for Byron to have greater access to—no, hold on, access is not the word I’m looking for. If we can find a way for Byron to be able to work with the model—and with you—to address more wide scope issues that can be handled only with the expertise you have brought us. So, I want to find a way to incorporate Byron into the Soil Model Project, but to work with you on a more universal scale, because only you can handle the details.”
I know she is speaking nonsense, and this realization makes me more confident. She needs me, she knows she needs me, and I know she knows she needs me. That means I have more power than I thought. Having just convinced myself of this, I turn to Byron and, with a smile, ask, “is something wrong, Byron?” I can’t believe I am so bold.
“You know exactly what’s wrong, Kenny!” Byron is furious, and it is not a good look for him. Between his red hair and his now red face, he looks like a tomato or maybe a carrot. He looks like produce.
Mrs. Shaldor does not like confrontation either, I gather, because she interrupts before the situation can degenerate further. “Kenny, let’s not pretend ignorance. Everyone here knows what happened. Byron has been accessing your backups to familiarize himself with your most updated model. Now, he should have done so with your permission, but that is as much my fault as his. I am afraid I may have left the impression that Ben in IT could grant him access and that it was unnecessary to speak with you first. If I did give him that impression, I apologize to both of you. Now, we also all know that this morning you switched the latest backup with a fake. I understand why you did that, but that could have caused terrible embarrassment to your colleague and to FWI. This type of behavior cannot happen again. All three of us made mistakes, but we have to cooperate with each other. Is that understood?”
Both Byron and I assent, and the meeting ends. I do not understand how Byron and I are going to work together, let alone be friends, ever again. Perhaps we were never friends. He was my mentor, and maybe mentors are accustomed to stealing from their proteges. I don’t know.
A few minutes after the meeting, while I’m finally eating my sandwich in the conference room, I receive an email from Tanya that the Wall Street Journal interview has been canceled. That makes me proud. The whole fiasco today has exhausted me, and I’m actually looking forward to discussing it with Jason so he can give me advice. When we finally sit down to dinner that night—not until 8:16, because Barney is sick—I tell Jason about everything that happened after I called him from the office. He tells me that I am right, and he reminds me to stand firm. This makes me feel better. I just have to remember that I am a bright person, and this is my work I am protecting. No one else has a right to claim my work.
Over the following two weeks I learn how to deal with Byron. He comes to the conference room every morning from 10:30 to 11:30, and we go through my model together. We spend about 45 or 50 minutes just reviewing my model for errors, and we have agreed—with Mrs. Shaldor’s mediation—that he cannot take notes during this period. For the last 10 or 15 minutes, Byron asks questions about my model to better familiarize himself. He is permitted to take notes on this part. My team sits quietly at the conference table during the Q&A, and they only answer his questions if I tell them to. Otherwise, they let me speak. When they do participate, my team knows not to share too much.
I’m pleasantly surprised late on a Monday afternoon—3:51, to be precise—when Mrs. Shaldor comes to visit me in the conference room. My entire team goes quiet when we notice her in the doorway. It’s obvious that Research Girl 1, Research Girl 2, and Team Mommy feel slightly self-conscious around Mrs. Shaldor, because they sit timidly and look down instead of meeting her eyes. Mrs. Shaldor has that effect on people. She’s not young at all, but she has so much class and poise that even at her age she could be described as striking. In any case, she has not come to see my team. She has come to see me. She tells me that she has quite exciting news, and she wants to share it personally. We have an appointment at the White House in one week. We are going to present my model to a Deputy National Security Advisor, the Science Advisor, and at least one representative from the Department of Agriculture. Mrs. Shaldor says it will require planning and preparation. We will meet in my conference room at 4:00 pm each day for the rest of the week to formulate and practice our presentation.
I thank Mrs. Shaldor calmly, but inside I’m dancing with joy. Though I fully expect her to leave after this announcement, she walks right into the room and takes a seat at the table. Seeing my confusion—Mrs. Shaldor always knows when I don’t understand—she says, “Kenny, we’re starting today. Ibrahim from government relations will be coming to help us today. Also, Byron will be here.”
“Are they coming to the White House with us?” I ask.
“Byron is coming with us. I’m not sure yet who else will come, but we’ll figure it out. Unfortunately, I don’t think we can bring the whole team.” Mrs. Shaldor turns to each member of my team, making them feel as if she is focusing on them individually, and she adds, “I know how much you have all done on this project and how much you continue to do. You should know how much we appreciate you at FWI. I’m sorry I don’t get to see you as often as I should.” Then Mrs. Shaldor smiles at me, and I know that we have made her proud.
The daily preparations are boring, although I think everyone is excited that we’ll be going to the White House. I assume Mrs. Shaldor has been there several times before, but, even if she has, this must be exciting for her too. Nevertheless, she spends much of the meeting each day typing on her telephone. After the first meeting, we decide to bring Tanya and Bridget in to hear our ideas for the presentation and to give us tips. Ibrahim comes each day too, because he is friendly with the Assistant Secretary of Agriculture and so the decision is made that he will join us at the White House. However, I doubt he understands what we are talking about, and he brings his laptop to do other work from my conference room each day. Everyone agrees that Byron should lead the bulk of the presentation, and I do not mind. After all, even Jason admits that I am not good at presentations. Plus, Mrs. Shaldor is planning introductions for the meeting, and she says she will introduce me as the “innovator and expert behind the FWI Soil Model.” I am told that my job is to provide a face to my model and also to answer any difficult questions. They instruct me to answer as briefly as possible, because, apparently, I have a tendency to ramble. My guess is they will need me to answer quite a few questions, because Byron, Mrs. Shaldor, and Ibrahim simply are not capable.
The night before the meeting, I have trouble falling asleep. Jason tries to give me a sleeping pill at midnight, but I don’t trust those. Instead, he just tells me not to worry and rolls over so he can go back to sleep. I go to FWI the next morning wearing a dark gray suit and a cobalt tie, because I am too worried that the suit that has hung on my office door for so long no longer fits me. Nerves bother me all day at the office. At one point, at 11:26, I find myself shaking uncontrollably as if I just emerged from a cold lake. Also, I become testy with my team so that they basically stop talking by noon.
At 1:11, Daniel calls the conference room and tells me to meet Mrs. Shaldor by the front reception in five minutes. I assume Daniel really means four minutes, and I get there even before that. It can be strange going to such an important meeting, like a cloudy dream. We get into Mrs. Shaldor’s Audi, all four of us, and then I don’t remember anything until we’re seated in a small conference room. The four of us from FWI are on one side of the table, and a half dozen men and women are on the other side. Yet, I cannot remember meeting them or shaking their hands. I assume I did, but I don’t even remember walking into the building. I decide that when I am invariably asked to answer questions about my model, I will speak to the oldest looking people in the room. The young people who are my age and younger must be the aides, I assume.
Mrs. Shaldor starts with an introduction of our model, and she does point to me and say, “Kenny is the innovator and expert behind the FWI Soil Model.” The people on the other side of the table all look at me impressed for just a moment. Byron begins once Mrs. Shaldor completes her introduction. He stands, which strikes me as unnecessary, because the conference room is so small. Byron goes through PowerPoint slides that we put together over the last week based off of my model and my data. To be honest, he does a nice job. The audience is intrigued and terrified when he reaches the conclusion, and they see the “less than 38 years” on the screen, but Byron says, “this is a tentative number, but it gives you a good idea. Remember, the data changes.” I don’t know why he says that. Of course, the data changes, but the number is not “tentative” given the current data.
Byron answers the first question just fine on his own. He answers the second as well. The third question is about FWI in general, and Ibrahim answers that. The fourth question is actually just an inquiry about how Mrs. Shaldor’s husband is doing since his bypass surgery six months ago. The fifth question is also handled by Byron. I am starting to wonder if I will ever be needed at this meeting, when the sixth question comes in from a young man sitting behind the others. I assume he is an aide. He asks, “How do you model this globally? Do you average soil data across the globe?”
At this, I snicker, and Mrs. Shaldor shoots me a look that is all the admonishment I need. Byron begins to answer, “No, we measure soil in different regions. We break the world up into regions and model each region.”
This leads to more questions from the young man. “Do you mean like continents? How many regions?”
I think this is getting a bit technical. I should probably help, but before I can say anything, Byron speaks. He answers, “yes, like continents. You know, we have a few regions here and there. More than continents, but, um…”
I don’t understand what’s wrong with Byron. I gave him this data the day after he arrived at FWI. I told him about the regions. I told him. How did he forget?
“Doesn’t that seem a little imprecise if you break it down into continents and so on?” the young man asks, unimpressed by Byron’s answer. “I was born outside of Miami, I grew up in Minnesota, and I went to college in Virginia. The soil is very different in all of those places.”
Byron is so flustered he looks to Mrs. Shaldor for help, and she has that expression of complete disappointment, like Byron and I both wasted her time and money. Byron runs his hands through his hair maniacally and only says, “no, the regions are smaller than continents.”
At this point, Mrs. Shaldor turns to me, and asks, almost pleadingly, “Kenny, anything to add?”
“Sure, I’d be happy to clarify,” I say. I’ll admit, it makes me proud to speak as the person of authority at a White House meeting. “We broke the planet into 4,965 regions. We don’t measure soil in Antarctica, for obvious reasons, so that leaves about 52 million square miles of earth. Some is rock, but we count everything. The average region is about the size of Massachusetts, which is approximately 10,500 square miles, give or take a few. And to receive data from each region, we follow a three-part process. First, we have a growing number of farmers, field scientists, and amateurs globally who report back to us directly with soil data on a bi-monthly basis. Where we do not have direct access to our own testers, we keep in contact with scientists in particular locations who are willing to share data with us when available. For the spots where even that is unavailable, we keep a comprehensive listing of sources to check regularly for updated data. It’s complicated, that’s why only FWI can do it.” Then I stop. I don’t say anything else, but I look at Mrs. Shaldor who is smiling back at me. I know I did it.
The meeting ends shortly after that, and Byron and I are quiet on the car ride back. Mrs. Shaldor and Ibrahim talk about his newborn daughter and other things that don’t interest me. As we enter the FWI office, Mrs. Shaldor pulls me aside and asks me to wait at work until she comes to see me. She wants to speak with me after hours.
At 6:39, Mrs. Shaldor walks into the conference room where I am browsing my Facebook account. I wish I am doing something more responsible when she comes in, but I am not. For a moment, I think of apologizing, because I feel as if she has caught me naked, but she starts speaking before I can say anything. “Kenny, you did a great job there today.” I can tell she means it. “I just got off the phone with the Assistant Secretary of Agriculture, and they and the NSC are very concerned about what we’ve found. I believe this will lead to a big grant and quite a bit of publicity over the next year. Are you ready? This will mean a much bigger staff the Soil Model, more computing power, and maybe even a separate office location so you can spread out more.”
“That sounds great.” I’m not positive that I fully grasp what she’s trying to say, but it does sound exciting.
“And I wanted to tell you first that Dr. Renday has agreed to part ways with FWI. It is a mutual decision. Tomorrow morning I’ll send an email to the rest of the staff, but I wanted to tell you first because of your long history together.”
Mrs. Shaldor waits, as if she is expecting me to speak, but I have nothing to say, so she shrugs her right shoulder slightly and continues, “we’ll bring in some help for you, Kenny, but assuming we achieve the grants and donations that I’m expecting to get, this is going to be a major responsibility and a career boost for you. You’ll have a director to handle your program directly and we’ll get you someone to handle communications, but I have confidence in you.”
I smile, not sure if she wants something else from me. It’s exciting, and I’m ready, but I don’t have anything specific to say, so, again, she speaks. “There is one thing we need to discuss about the model, though. I got a call from Francis.” That is the name of the Assistant Secretary of Agriculture who Ibrahim knows. I remember that from the meeting even though I blanked out during the greetings. Mrs. Shaldor continues when she sees that I recognize the name. “Francis and the rest of them are very impressed with the model, and obviously, from what I have already told you, they want to see more of what we can produce. However, they are concerned about this ‘terminal date’ as you call it. First, the name will have to change. Immediately, the thought is ‘response date,’ but we have time to work on that, and we’ll get the right people on it. The second concern is whether 38 years is a concrete number. They want to know if there is any wiggle room. I know I originally thought 38 years would get their attention—and it did—but they’re thinking if we can push out that date a little more it will help them accomplish more policy goals. Do you understand, Kenny? Does that make sense? Is it possible?”
My first thought is to respond in a way that will make me proud when I tell Jason about this tonight. The worst thing one can do in situations like this is go home with regret. I know from experience. I have to go for what I want, just as Jason always tells me. “Can I have a promotion too?” I ask.
“Sure, Kenny, that makes sense. We’ll make you a Fellow.”
“Thank you, and if the grant comes through and we expand as you plan, it would make sense for me to become a Senior Fellow, don’t you think?”
“Sure, Kenny. We can do that, but can we also find some flexibility on the response date? Maybe there are some data or variables that can be revisited.”
“Mrs. Shaldor, the data come in from the field. I can’t change those. But I have 1,653 lines on the Assumptions Sources Sheet, so there’s plenty we can revisit. Just let me know what they’re looking for.”
Cathy Beaudoin’s fiction stories have been published in literary journals including Pomona Valley Review, Angel City Review, and Freshwater. One of those stories has been nominated for a pushcart prize. Her nonfiction writing has appeared in Triathlon Magazine Canada, the Reader’s Choice award-winning anthology: Firsts: Coming of Age Stories by People with Disabilities, and literary outlets such as Five on the Fifth. She enjoys hiking in the big mountains when she is not writing. |
One Hundred Miles
It was five o’clock AM and a full moon lit the peaks of the San Juan mountains. Minka and Amelia stood in the midst of a group of four hundred runners..
“You ready for this?” Minka asked, her hands resting on Amelia’s shoulders.
“I’m nervous. I’ve never run a hundred miles before.” She tapped the race bib fastened to her shorts. “Who’d have ever thought I’d be here today?”
“Just remember, this is a choice, the choice to go on a journey, the choice to find out who you are. Sometimes it just takes a hundred miles to get there.”
The two friends hugged and wished each other good luck.
“Have fun out there,” Minka yelled as she headed to join the other elite runners. Amelia turned and went in the opposite direction. Once the race started, she didn’t want to get trampled by the faster runners.
*****
Minka settled in at the front, waiting for the race to start. She futzed with her GPS watch, making sure it had a signal. Satisfied, she looked to the sky. Her goal was simple: to stay committed once the trails pulverized her feet, quads and lungs, and win.
“One minute, one minute to go,” the announcer yelled out, no microphone needed.
Tall and boney-kneed, Minka was inked from shoulder to ankle. Wearing a hot pink skort, white technical tee shirt and a fire engine red hydration pack, she adjusted the black and white checked buff wrapped around her neck. The tats told a life story, the bicep with a man’s head topped with green spiked hair, the thigh with a jet-black chopper, the words Running is Life stenciled on her left calf, just above three broken links from a chain. But from the neck up, she was untouched, her long brown hair pinched into a ponytail that dangled out the back of a white baseball cap. Surrounded by a dozen of the world’s best mountain runners, Minka took a couple deep yoga breaths and wished anyone within earshot a hearty good luck.
“Three, two, one,” the announcer bellowed. A horn blew and a couple of top guys, and one woman, charged toward the base of a steep, fifteen-hundred-foot climb. Breathing easy, Minka settled in behind them, content to see how the day unfolded.
*****
At the back of the pack, Amelia heard someone up in front yell, “One minute, one minute to go.”
She tugged at the hem of her extra-large, navy-blue basketball shorts. Her over-sized neon-yellow tee shirt was tight over her belly and stained where she lubed herself silly. When Amelia secured the clips to her hydration pack, the straps pinched her breasts. On top of her head, a black trucker hat hid her blonde, pixie haircut. Worried her bowels were about to let loose for the third time in the past hour, Amelia shifted her weight from one leg to the other and clenched her glutes. She scanned the faces of the other runners and muttered. “What am I doing here?”
“Three, two, one,” the announcer bellowed. A horn blew, but no one in front of Amelia moved. When the runners finally surged forward, she started to jog. Slosh, slosh, slosh. Her hydration pack sounded like a giant rubber band expanding and contracting as she bounded up and down. Within a minute or two, the runners spread out in a long, thin line, gaps already forming. Just make it to the first aid station, she told herself.
*****
Amelia never ran a step before she met Minka. The two women, both thirty-eight-years old, met when Minka’s partner, Teddy, came to the cancer clinic for prostate cancer treatment. Amelia was Teddy’s nurse, tending to him during his chemotherapy treatments. She noticed how Minka doted on Teddy, loosening his shoelaces when his feet swelled with diabetes, wiping his forehead with a cool cloth when he became red-faced, and taking notes when the doctors talked about treatment options. Though Teddy constantly thanked Minka, he seldom looked her in the eye.
For years, Amelia huffed and puffed her way around her patients, a tender hand on the arm here, an inconspicuous needle poke there. Short and stocky, she blamed her growing waistline on the long hours. It didn’t help that her patients often brought her chocolate truffles, homemade banana bread, and oatmeal cookies. One day, when Minka sat at Teddy’s side, Amelia groaned, “I need to get out and move or I’m going to end up being a patient here!”
Minka’s eyes lit up. “You know, I run with a group of ladies on Tuesday nights. We run a little, walk a lot, and gab like Olympians. You should join us.”
Amelia locked her eyes on Minka’s arm sleeve. “You’re a runner?”
“Yes,” Minka answered, her tone uncharacteristically brusque. “I’m a runner.”
“Oh boy,” Teddy snorted. “You’re in trouble now.”
“Hey,” Minka shushed Teddy. She turned to Amelia, her soft face already suggesting forgiveness, “We leave from the running store at six. It’s just down the street. I can pick you up.”
Without thinking, Amelia shook her head. “I don’t know. I don’t even have running shoes.”
Minka looked at Amelia’s feet. She wore a pair of old, unbranded sneakers. “Those are fine. Hell, I’ll go in my old army boots if it’ll make you feel better!”
*****
Though the grade up the mountain quickly morphed into a fifteen percent incline, Minka stayed right behind the race leaders. She shifted gears and power hiked, her gait looking effortless. Amongst the other runners, Minka had a reputation for being able to endure more pain than anyone else on the mountain. Of course she could. She was the daughter of a poorly equipped, single mother, and was effectively emancipated when she was fifteen years old. Minka knew how to manage through tough times.
Behind her, most of the mid-packers walked, hands on knees. Still in last place, Amelia bent at the waist, grimaced, fought gravity, and sucked in big gulps of air. Chest heaving, she looked at the switchbacks looping up the mountain. What in god’s name am I doing here? She looked up again. Half the runners were no longer in sight.
*****
When Minka crested the first climb, she pumped her fist, increased her speed and disappeared down the trail. She wasn’t worried about the woman ahead of her. This was Minka’s eighteenth one-hundred-mile race and, if she won, it’d be her fourteenth victory. She knew the exact splits needed to have a chance to win, and planned for a big effort during the second half of the race. In the meantime, the goal was to conserve energy.
When she wasn’t caring for Teddy, Minka trained in the mountains, spending as much as six hours a day traversing trails at altitudes of up to ten thousand feet. For Minka, the trails were everything she hoped for, a place of peace, a place where she was in control. But if she stopped and thought about it, the mountains were daunting. That’s when she reminded herself, it was a mental game, telling herself the mountains were nothing more than dirt, grass, rocks and bushes. Stripped down to the basics, life really was that simple.
As strong a runner as Minka was, she savored her Tuesday night sessions with the ladies, most of whom ran less than ten miles a week. Not long after Minka invited Amelia to run, the two women entered the running store together.
“Hey all, this is Amelia,” Minka announced. “She’s a virgin.”
A teenage boy at the register blushed and a group of ladies milling around the front entrance giggled.
“Just walk when you need to,” one of the women offered. “We don’t leave anyone behind, ever..”
Minka checked her watch. “It’s time ladies. We can do introductions on the run.”
The group headed out the door, walked two blocks down Main Street and turned off into the town park. The women paired off in groups of two or three and started jogging on a cinder footpath that took them along a rambling creek, past a duck pond, by the outdoor pool and past the tennis courts. The women turned onto a dirt road that cut through miles of dry, high desert pastureland and into the foothills. Whenever those in the front got ahead by more than thirty or forty yards, they slowed, letting the others catch up. Like usual, the women chatted about their babies, spouses, partners, and jobs.
Amelia gasped for air.
“Breathe in your nose and out the mouth,” Minka told her.
“Yeah, right. Easy for you to say.” Amelia grabbed a handful of her mid-section and joked, “My belly’s flapping around. Who ever heard of a belly flapping when they run?”
A woman in front turned. “That’s nothing. You should’ve been here when my kid was breast feeding. My nipples leaked all over the place.” The other women laughed and Minka slowed the group to a pedestrian, twelve-minute mile pace, allowing Amelia to catch her breath.
A couple weeks later, paired up on a Tuesday night run, Amelia asked Minka, “You and Teddy married?”
Minka bit her lip.
“I’m sorry, I should mind my own business.”
“No, it’s okay. We aren’t married.” She hesitated. “We have what you might call ‘an arrangement’.”
Amelia cocked her head and raised an eyebrow.
“We’re not lovers. I take care of Teddy, like a caretaker. When he found out he had cancer, he wanted a live-in companion. You know, so he wouldn’t be alone, at the end.”
“Well,” Amelia said, huffing and puffing, “lots of people need a companion to lean on when they’re facing their mortality.”
“It’s more like a financial arrangement. I have a place to live, food, that kind of stuff. And if I stay with him until the end, I get the proceeds from his life insurance policy.”
Unsure what to say, Amelia stared at the trail twenty yards in front of her.
Minka continued, “Don’t get me wrong, I don’t wish the worst for Teddy. But I never expected him to hang on so long. First it was radiation, now chemotherapy. I guess I didn’t realize men could live with prostate cancer for half their life!”
“Well,” Amelia said, her hand touching Minka’s forearm. “You take such good care of him. He’s lucky to have you no matter what the arrangement.”
*****
In addition to the Tuesday night outings, Amelia and Minka started running together on Sunday mornings. Amelia enjoyed running longer distances, an unexpected self-discovery. When she was outdoors, she felt unburdened by the stress of caring for cancer patients. And while she lost a couple of pounds, it was the change in her mental game that motivated her to keep at it. She was sharper, more alert, and her overall mood was better.
Minka didn’t mind running with Amelia. For her it was an easy recovery run, and the one thing she was never good at was going easy on herself.
Tap. Tap. Tap. their feet hit the ground together.
“So, what’s your story,” Minka asked Amelia as they ran through the woods outside of town.
“What do you mean? I’m a nurse who for a long time ate too much and didn’t move enough. But this running thing, it makes me feel good about myself.”
Minka brushed away Amelia’s answer with the wave of a hand. “No, not that. I mean boyfriends, girlfriends, anyone special?”
“Oh, that.” Breathing hard, Amelia struggled to get any words out. “Divorced.”
Tap. Tap. Tap. “Married after college.” She grunted. “Ended it four years later. Nothing terrible. The man had no ambition.”
Minka slowed her pace. “What about after that?”
Amelia inhaled through her nose. “I guess I got self-conscious, afraid of being rejected.” Tap. Tap. Tap. “What about you? What’s up with you and Teddy?”
“It’s a job,” Minka said gently.
“Seems like it’s more than a job. It’s an intimate thing, to care for someone with a cancer diagnosis.”
“I do care about the man,” Minka insisted. “But he doesn’t care about himself. He won’t eat healthy food and his diabetes is going to kill him if the cancer doesn’t. The constant junk food, it’s getting on my nerves. He’s going to live forever, and expect me to take care of him.”
Tap. tap. tap.
“I think I need to make a change,” Minka confessed. “I’ve been saving money so I can get my own place.”
Amelia glanced at Minka. “Why? Seems like you have a good deal with Teddy. Caregivers come in all kinds of shapes and forms you know!”
“It is a good deal,” Minka admitted.
“What’d you do before taking care of Teddy?”
Minka picked up her pace. “I worked at the mini mart after I stopped dancing at a nightclub.”
Amelia stumbled and rolled her ankle. “What?”
“I was a stripper.”
*****
Nearly forty miles into the race, and still able to see the lead woman in front of her, Minka felt a pull in her right hamstring. Dang it, she thought, it’s too early for this. She went into troubleshooting mode. She’d been drinking her normal amount of water and electrolytes, but it was warmer than expected. Minka dug around in her skort pocket looking for a salt pill. She panicked. There were no salt pills. The hamstring spasmed. Shit, this is going to hurt. She ignored the pain and legged it out to the next aid station. On arrival, she begged for a handful of boiled potatoes dipped in salt and chewed through them like a beaver. Hoping the food rebooted her system, she resupplied, and assumed the niggle would work itself out. As she hustled to get back on trail, she caught a glimpse of the third-place runner coming up behind her. Minka bolted out of the aid station.
The next climb topped out at an altitude of eleven thousand feet. Though the pinch in her hamstring disappeared, Minka’s legs felt like rubber, and she was low on energy. She drank some calories but couldn’t coax her legs to turn over at a decent speed. The last time she saw the leader was two miles ago, and now the third-place runner was coming up behind her.
“Want to run together for a few miles?” the woman asked.
“I’ll probably slow you down.” Minka stepped to the side, giving her competitor plenty of room to pass. “Go on ahead.”
“Okay.” The woman gave a thumbs up as she trotted by Minka. “Hang in there.”
Normally a bulldog, Minka was shocked at how easy it was to let the woman go. She walked the next hundred yards. Come on. FIND A WAY. Picking up the pace, Minka surged, then slowed, surged, then slowed. She finally eased into a respectable pace. As long as her hamstring held up, Minka was confident she’d catch both women in front of her. The trail took her down to Big Basin, where there was an alpine lake with crystal clear, turquoise water. Dusty and warm from the mid-day miles, she stopped and splash the frigid snowmelt on her face, neck, and arms. Refreshed, she attacked the next climb, then picked up her pace, running through a grove of Ponderosa Pines, White Fir and Aspen trees. This was her place, where she could outrun everyone, everything, her past.
Minka popped out of the trees into a clearing, no one else in sight. Surrounded by a field of vibrant yellow arnica flowers, a cold wind came hard at her. A rain squall advanced from the north and within minutes, Minka was drilled by tiny, hard pellets. Chilled, she slowed and dropped her pack off one shoulder, unzipped the storage compartment and pulled out a black, eight-ounce rain jacket. Within a minute she had the thing on, zipped, and had her pack back in place. Thunder boomed overhead and hail stones followed. Minka looked at the sky.
“Really? You have to do this now?”
The temperature dropped a couple degrees and her hamstring contracted. She ignored the cramp and sprinted as best as she could to the next clump of pine trees. Once under cover, she massaged the back of her leg and looked at her watch. The display suggested her heart rate was over one hundred and seventy beats per minute. This was not in the plan. She took a few deep breaths and stared at her watch. One sixty. One Fifty-five. One Fifty. Keep it under control, she reminded herself. A crack of lightening touched down on a ridge a quarter mile away. The tinny smell of electricity in the air, more thunder followed.
“Dang it.”
Her skort front stained with rain, Minka jogged to the next clump of trees. She ate a protein bar, then took a long drink of water. Once the lightning struck on the trail behind her, she started running again, never looking back. Within minutes, the rain slowed to a drizzle, then stopped. The moisture left the trail tacky, but the rain didn’t last long enough to puddle. With firm footing, Minka ran a very controlled pace to the next aid station.
“What do you need?” a man asked with urgency.
“Water in my bottles. Some fruit, if you have it. And something salty.”
Like a pro, she ripped off her jacket and repacked it. A volunteer held out a plate of juicy watermelon wedges. She sucked them down, letting the liquid dribble down her chin. A second volunteer dumped a packet of cashews in the palm of her hand, then jammed refilled water bottles into the front of her vest, Minka stuffed the nuts in her mouth and licked the salt off her fingers. Done refueling, she wiped her face with her sleeve. “How far back am I.”
“Second place left four minutes ago. The lead woman is seven minutes ahead.,”
“Thanks,” she said as she hustled out of the aid station, toward the next three-thousand-foot climb.
*****
Four hours later, Amelia walked into the mile forty aid station. She missed the storms, passed eight other runners, and beat the cutoff time by more than an hour.
“Woot, woot,” she exclaimed, hands waving overhead. “I can’t believe I made it this far. And I’m not in last-place!”
“You’re doing great,” a volunteer recording her arrival reassured her. Another volunteer located in the food tent asked, “What can I get you?”
Amelia’s eyes fixated on a package of tortillas. “Are you making quesadillas or burritos?”
The volunteer twirled a spatula between his fingers. “Burritos with beans and guacamole, or cheese quesadillas.”
“I’ll take a quesadilla to go.”
Amelia hobbled over to the medical tent and took a seat on a thread bare camp chair.
“Blisters?” a medic asked.
“Nope, at least not yet.. It’s, uh, this.” Amelia lifted her shorts, exposed her inner thigh. and pointed to the red, bubbly rash
“Oh, chafing. I can take care of that.”
“Can you hurry? I don’t want to be pulled from the race because I didn’t get out before the cutoff time.”
The medic pulled a tube of ointment and some sterile pads from a bucket on the ground. “Give me five minutes and you’ll be good as new.”
Amelia sighed. “I think I’d need a magic pill to feel good as new!”
By the time she left the medical tent, the burning on her inner thighs was gone. After grabbing her food and water bottles, Amelia hustled out of the aid station. It wasn’t long before she was at the base of the next climb. After a rocky uphill section, her calves screamed, her ankles swelled, and her feet burned. How does Minka do this, she wondered.
With each painful step forward, Amelia negotiated with herself. If you finish, you can have a sausage pizza, with extra cheese, a whole one, all to yourself! With a beer, a Vienna Lager. Saliva flushed her palate. Then again, she told herself, you already made it farther than you thought was possible. Who cares if you quit now? No. No. No quitting. She knew from training with Minka that the negative self-talk was the effect of the prolonged effort, the resulting rawness,, the exposure. But she also felt something new inside. She was evolving as a person.
Amelia lumbered on, passing a couple more runners. Halfway up the next climb, she came across a guy on the side of the trail, bent at the waist, a pool of vomit at his feet. She stopped and placed her hand on his back.
“Hey, you okay?” she asked. “I’m a nurse. How can I help?”
“I’m okay. Just couldn’t hold my food down.” The man dry heaved. “You keep going.”
Amelia pulled off her pack and dug around in one of the side pockets. “Here. Eat one of these and save the rest for later.” She handed him a couple pieces of crystalized ginger.
“You sure? What if you need them?”
“I’m sure.” She placed the ginger in the palm of his hand. “I have more.”
“Thanks.” Wrapping his fingers around the bite-sized chunks, he nodded in the direction of the trail. “You should get going.”
The two made eye contact. “Okay,” she conceded. “You have enough food, water and electrolytes?”
“Yeah. Get going, I don’t want you to miss the next cutoff because of me.”
“Alright, but I’m going to give them a heads up about you at the next aid station.” She patted him on the back and started down the trail. By the time Amelia got to Big Basin, she passed four more runners. Stunned by her progress, and the views, she stopped dead in her tracks and gaped at the turquoise-colored lake, the big horn sheep on the hillside, and the ridge line framing a pink, alpenglow sky. Tears trickled down her cheek. She wished she had someone to share this moment with. She knew that’s what running long distances did to people, gave them the ability to strip everything away and evaluate what was important. Ignoring the pain in her feet, Amelia picked up her pace, intent on continuing her journey.
*****
At mile seventy-five, Minka was losing ground to the first and second place runners. She was pushing hard when she came across the most technical section of the course, a quarter mile stretch through a scree field alongside a cliff with a five-hundred-foot drop. Fatigued, Minka’s concentration waned. She thought about Teddy. When she first moved in, she thought it’d be a short-term thing, maybe a year. That was four years ago. If she left him now, she’d be leaving him in a lurch. Minka zoned-out at the thought. Focus, she chided herself. With every step she took, the rock under her feet shifted, no foundation to rely on. Minka’s right foot slipped on some loose debris and her legs split wide. Her left femur stressed to a near break, she fell to her knees and rolled against a sturdy rock marking the edge of the trail. You’ve been here before, she told herself, the number of times she’d found her mother with slit wrists, the freezing nights walking the streets to avoid her mother’s drug habit, the ease with which she removed her clothes for money. You are strong. You’re not going over the edge. You didn’t then, and you’re not now.
Blood flowed from Minka’s kneecap. A sharp-edged rock had ripped a gash across the patella tendon.
“Dang it!” Her scream echoed in the valley below. She grabbed at the knee and fingered the open wound. Struggling to her feet, she tore a water bottle from her vest and washed the blood away. Then she pulled the buff from her neck and tied it around the open cut. After wiping her wet palms against the side of her skort, she limped through the rest of the scree field. Back on firm ground, Minka’s gait morphed to a trot, one clearly favoring the damaged leg. She glanced down at what was now a mere trickle of blood. No problem, she thought, ignoring the pain and picking up her speed. When she arrived at the next aid station, Minka waived off the medics.
“I’m fine. How far ahead are the first and second place women?”
“Second left ten-minutes ago,” a woman with a clipboard answered.
“What about first place?”
“Oh, she’s long gone, maybe thirty minutes ahead of you.”
“Oh, no,” Minka grinned. “Don’t count me out yet!” She took a deep breath, refueled, strapped a headlamp to her head, and sprinted out of the aid station.
*****
Exhausted from hiking alone through the night, Amelia was unnerved. She thought the light on top of her head caught the glow of several pairs of eyes staring right at her. Before she started trail running, Amelia was petrified of wildlife. As a kid, the thought of coming across a wolf or bear kept her far from the woods. Now she was sure they were just yards away.
“Control your fear,” she muttered. “Control your fear.” After several minutes of repeating the mantra,. She heard a noise behind her, turned, and screamed, “Oh, shit. It’s a bear. It’s a fucking bear.”
“Hey,” a man yelled out, I’m not a bear. I promise, I’m not a bear.”
Amelia stared hard behind her. “Hah. It’s vomit man!”
He laughed. “It’s the ginger lady!”
Amelia slowed until they were walking side by side. “I can’t believe you caught up to me. I thought you were done back there!”
“Oh that. Just a bad patch. After a half an hour of walking, and the ginger things, I felt better.” He patted his belly. “By the way, My name’s Rob.”
“Amelia.” She drew in a long breath. “My name is Amelia.”
“That sigh,” he said, “I know the feeling.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that. My hips, my knees, my feet, they’re all screaming at me to stop. And I have a gnarly blister on the heal of my foot.”
“Yup, sounds pretty normal. It’s what we signed up for – right?”
Amelia didn’t answer. What had she signed up for? A physical challenge, yes. Being stripped down to the rawest of emotions, that was unexpected. No longer feeling skittish or alone, she treasured these intimate moments on the trail.
The two shuffled along, sharing their post-race plans. The food: pizza, hamburgers, French fries, chocolate shakes. The shower, with foamy scented soap, a palmful of thick, gooey shampoo and a soft towel to wipe off with. The plans for sleep, a cushy queen-sized mattress, a soft comforter pulled up to the chin. When they walked into the next aid station, they made a pack to leave together. Amelia went to the medic, untied one of her laces, pushed a sneaker off her foot and peeled off a grimy sock. The medic sanitized her heel, popped her blister, then wrapped her foot with mole skin and duct tape. She was on her way again.
At the food tent, she slurped hot chicken broth and some fizz-free coke, then crammed a few packages of saltines in her jacket pocket, made sure her bottles were refilled and coaxed her new friend out of his chair and down the trail. They walked, then jogged, then walked again. In the silence, Amelia felt like she was with an old friend.
*****
With less than fifteen miles to go, Minka knew she’d have to red line it to the finish if she had any chance of catching the woman in second place. She high stepped her way across Dead Man’s Creek. Three feet from the other side, she slipped on the wet rocks, rolled an ankle and fell into the knee-high water.
“Dang it,” she yelled out, slapping the water with the palm of her hand. Immediately chilled to the bone, Teddy’s comment you’re in trouble now, ran through her mind. Minka scrambled to her feet, streams of water flowing from her skort. Shivering, she exited the creek. Just do what makes you happy, Teddy told her. She didn’t need to win races to be happy. And she didn’t need to have her own place either. That would come soon enough. She made a commitment to him. All he asked in return was for companionship. It was never about the money. It was always about security. And for the first time ever, Minka felt she had it. She’d be an idiot to leave him.
Minka picked up her speed and sprinted down the trail. Two miles to go. One mile to go. Her legs buckled and she fell. In the dark, she remembered calling out to her mother, get up, get up. Minka didn’t want to be her mother, the one who didn’t answer the call. Raising herself off the ground, she committed to finishing what she started.
Fourteen hours later, less than a mile from the finish line, Amelia and Rob were in the final stages of the dreaded death march. No longer able to run or shuffle, Amelia walked, groaning with every step.
“You can do it,” Rob reassured her. “We’re almost there.”
“This has to be the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” Amelia cried.
“Yeah, but we’re almost done.” A hundred yards from the finish, Rob asked, “Do you want to go ahead of me, you know, so you can cross the finish line by yourself?”
Amelia thought about it for a minute. “No, do you?”
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