Leaving Ashwood

by Cynthia Kraack

“This is when you wanted to visit.” My breath caught in my chest, but I barreled through before Phoebe could sign off. “Noah arrived last night and John is here to finish his research.”

  Amber, Ashwood’s residential manager, knocked on my door. I held up a hand to hold her off. She walked away.

  “Life doesn’t change at Ashwood, huh?” Phoebe distanced herself from our conversation. “You’re always the one everyone wants.” She reached up and unpinned her hair. “Is Grandpa really that sick? You’re making it sound like I’m the only one out of the loop. I’m at a very critical point in the water clarity project.”

  A wheezy cough escaped before I turned my head to pop a suppressant.

  Phoebe, hypersensitive to the slightest issue in David’s or my health, interrupted her protest.

  “Are you okay, Mom?”

  If we had a more adult relationship, I would have told her I was tired from caring for Paul, worried about how her father will deal with losing his father, frustrated about the parade of multi-corps demanding meetings or calls, nearly fed up with the difficulty of managing Hartford, Ltd., in the crowd of big guys. But Phoebe, an intellectual removed from reality, lived in a world where relationships were about caring for her needs.

  “I’m fine, Phoebe. Just trying to get through a difficult time.” Suppressant now under my tongue, I slowed my words. “About your first question. There aren’t a lot of eighty-seven-year-olds left in the country. His medical advisor says he might have two weeks, maybe six, but not a lot more.”

  Tears appeared. She turned her head back toward the windows and the lake. “No one tells me any of this stuff,” she mumbled as she turned back toward me. “Grandpa sent me a fruit and vegetable pack a few days ago with a note about staying away from store berries because of a new preservative that could give me a rash. You know the rash I get from chemicals. I don’t understand how he could be so sick and remember my rash.”

  It wasn’t the time to tell this brilliant woman that Amber did the weekly food shipment and brought notes to Paul for a signature. I hoped she’d say something to remind me of her former gentle-hearted self. I wasn’t comfortable believing in Phoebe’s willingness to accept all the little deceptions we’d taken to create an illusion where Ashwood remained constant.

  “Are Dad’s labs still secured?”

  “The Department of Energy just certified them. We won’t have any researchers onsite until late August.”

  “I’ll do my best.” Her voice flattened. “I’ll send information about my plans.”

  “Dad and I have never suggested you interrupt your work, but this is important.”

  Sadness dimmed the animation that made her so unique. “It’s been years since I came home. I’m so wound up in work that I didn’t even think about that until right now. I love you, Mom.”

  “I love you, too.” A slight buzzing interfered with our images.

  “Are you okay, Phoebe? You seemed distressed when we first connected.” The buzzing became more constant. “Something’s bothering our holo.”

  “It’s Ahlmet.”

  “I’ll let you go.”

  “No bother, Mom.”

  “He can come with you if that would make you happy.”

  “It’s over.” She glared toward me. “I’m getting rid of his stuff.”

  So Ahlmet was history. The intense young engineer who had introduced Phoebe to the things young people with money did in Chicago was gone. I hoped he had anticipated the ending.

  She wouldn’t tolerate sympathy so I didn’t ask for details. “Take care of yourself, sweetheart. I’ll look for information about your plans. Love you.”

  “Love you, too, Mom.”

  Our flawed holo disappeared. Maybe in the lives of my grandchildren, someone would invent long-distance communication that could include a hug. I sat back in my chair and coughed. Many times.

  Chapter 3

  The square footage of Phoebe’s Chicago apartment equaled the minimum space required to house a family of four by Minnesota statute, one of the most generous housing allowances in the nation. High rises in every concentrated living area were built off the same plans with two small sleeping rooms, a bathroom, and one large space to serve all other needs. Communal dining areas often occupied parts of a few floors and residents could cook in these kitchens or bring their families for the meal of the day.

  The holo with Phoebe made me late for one of my least favorite monthly meetings, the local branch of the Federation for Faith and Peace. Organized religions helped keep many people alive during the Second Great Depression. In return, for almost a decade, the government required weekly faith sessions at residential worker settings like Ashwood. Decades of court decisions were swept aside as the nation turned to God for relief from hunger and disease. I believed in God, even prayed, but hated the artificial marriage of religion and government. Then came the Federation for Faith and Peace.

  Incorporating the world’s twenty largest religions into a huge for-profit structure whose operating budget rose or fell on its success in maintaining peace seemed like a politician’s pipe dream. No holy wars, no forced mergers of shrinking religions. The politicians couldn’t make it happen, but the capitalists did. Suicide bombers and chemical weapons interfered with production and distribution. Now, with world hunger again increasing, the Federation assumed responsibility for local feeding programs.

  Food in all its simple, natural forms had become a middle class staple and lower economic class treat. Children in high-density living centers received two meals a day and two nutritional units appropriate for their age and growth needs. Adults might eat only one meal of real food and rely on processed, pre-packaged units for all other nutritional requirements. Protein sticks, sweet o’s, dried milk, or juice dusts and vitamin-infused daily bullets were distributed in colorful, edible wraps from machines on every block and at work.

  Trapped at my desk while FFP representatives reviewed numbers and reports and recommendations about food resource centers locations drove me crazy. This month, like every month, the appeal to sponsor new centers came without time for analysis.

  Unlike other months, silence followed the FFP nutritional chair’s request. She cleared her throat and leaned toward her camera. “We have dire needs in the north metro and southeastern traffic corridors. Is there data that anyone would like repeated?”

  Committee members from Deshomm, ELH and other multinationals checked the time. Smaller food producers assigned to the group, already taxed generously to supplement feeding programs, wore neutral faces. Whatever was said in this meeting about this topic would be on the news boards immediately. Hartford, Ltd., already managed a dozen nutritional sites, employed people to teach food preparation in those locations and stocked their shelves and refrigerators.

  Finally a multinational volunteered to supplement a number of sites serving children if allowed to test new nutritional products. I bit my tongue as the FFP chair accepted. God knows what will be fed to unsuspecting families with FFP absorbing full cost of providing market testing. Instead of speaking what would be an unpopular opinion, I signed myself out, claiming a conflict in my schedule.

  “Anne, do you have a minute?”

  “For you, Amber.” Her name choked into another cough. Discretely I felt around my top desk drawer for the case of suppressants. “I’ve got to get us off the board of the local FFP or at least its emergency feeding advisors. Between the graft and corporate games some mess will be exposed and implicate everyone.”

  “That’s an awful wheeze. Are you okay?”

  “I thought my office had a musty smell when I got here this morning. Or it could be allergies.”

  “When I helped Paul settle in the back screen porch, he wanted me to remind you about calling Phoebe and Andrew. Clarissa said you spoke with Phoebe, and I wanted to save you from calling Andrew b
ecause I just heard from him. He’ll be here tomorrow.” Her beautiful black hair fell in loose curls down her back and made it hard to think her thirtieth birthday would be in this summer. She was the first person I met when I arrived at Ashwood. Then she was a tiny five-year-old worker adjusting to being away from home.

  “Wonderful. Phoebe said she’d try to get away.”

  “We’ll get rooms ready for everyone. How amazing it will be to have the whole family together.”

  “Don’t say anything to Faith right now.” Our youngest daughter, born seven years after the youngest of her siblings, loved being with any combination of her brothers and missed Phoebe. Amber, adopted by us in her early teens, had been Faith’s closest companion for many years.

  “By the way, Sadig says they’ve completed a work-around to bedevil the multinationals’ jamming of our communications. We’re still in security status limiting visitors and vendors.”

  I sensed weariness with the corporate situation and tried to make a light joke.

  “Does that mean a certain medical technician won’t be wandering up the drive to look at the lilacs?” David called Amber the kind of woman whose beauty stopped conversations and wondered how the poor tech would find enough courage to talk with her.

  “You’re behind on estate gossip, Anne. That’s been over for weeks.” Her shoulders rose and lowered. “You might have at least one spinster daughter.”

  In the urban areas people still met and married in traditional ways. On the estates, work left little opportunity for causal socialization. Amber never shared why she returned to Ashwood after a few years in California and France. We thought she’d find someone, and never expected her to come back and ask to work at Ashwood.

  “Ahlmet is history also.” Amber would find her way. Phoebe might not. Ahlmet seemed most likely to bring regular life to our daughter’s world.

  “No surprise. Nothing outside the Intellectual Corps really holds that woman’s attention,” Amber said before she left my office.

  Hartford sucked ninety minutes out of each hour I gave it. Facing the takeover threat shoved every business meeting off my calendar. Dozens of small incidents throughout Hartford revealed that Deshomm was gaining toeholds in our corporation that might not be reclaimed. My communication tools vibrated in a pattern that indicated trouble in our systems.

  “Sadig.” Using a very old-fashioned pager unit I told him I wanted to talk face-to-face. As I waited for him to walk from the business building I found a note from Phoebe with details about plans to arrive late that afternoon. She’d received clearance to work in David’s former DOE labs for some undefined period of time.

  Instead of approving copy from the consultants working on the Deshomm crisis, I turned my chair to look out the window at Ashwood. I could only wonder how Phoebe would fit into this world. Like the fickle waters of Lake Michigan, Phoebe may look calm while a constant undertow threatened her hold on reality. She might be bright sunlight during the darkness of Paul’s decline or add more stress.

  Bringing a member of the Intellectual Corps to Ashwood required adherence to a higher level of government protocol. Our daughter was a national treasure protected by people and technology every minute of her day. As Sadig entered I finished sending a note to David and Amber about Phoebe’s plans and asked one of them to assume responsibility for fulfilling the Intellectual Corps’ requirements for the place she called home.

  “We’ve cleared the communications issue, Miss Anne.” Sadig began speaking as he walked in the door. He continued with details as he shut it. Pure Somali ancestry showed in his tall, lean body and sharply chiseled face. He was the grandchild of immigrants whose motivations I did not always understand. His mother, a woman soured by many disappointments in her life, had worked in our kitchens until her unreliability forced Amber to change assignments.

  “You told Amber it was corrected an hour ago. And there’s this whole episode of the two kids making out in the orchard after lockdown last night. If we need outside expertise during the next few weeks we’ll roll the expenses into our defense costs.” My coughing started again. Again my fingers searched for suppressants.

  “I was distracted from giving approval to the patch. We have a log of calls or messages that you may have missed. The supervisor has been disciplined about incomplete procedures. It was not really a big deal.” He lowered himself into a chair. “Are you okay?”

  “Doctor Frances says smog from the cities is giving many of us with environmental asthma some troubles.” The suppressant didn’t ease my spasms. “Timing is bad.”

  He tapped on his pad. “Dr. Frances knows you are in distress?”

  I shook my head. “You are the one who might be in distress. Phoebe will be here late this afternoon. That means a lot of security activity. Maybe the Intellectual Corps already contacted you?

  “Just now. Is this why you wanted to see me?” He didn’t wait for answer. “Don’t worry. Hartford security meets Corps protocol. I have heard a lot about her and look forward to personally meeting one of our nation’s elite. You must be proud to have parented her.”

  The careful turn of words displayed Sadig’s multi-corps experience. No sloppy “proud to be her mother” or awkward “proud to have your stepdaughter so recognized.” I waved him to my conference table, hoped to catch my breath while moving from my desk. The morning was almost half gone.

  Chapter 4

  The best security professionals say little that is unnecessary. A suggestion to sit and talk suggested a call to danger.

  “You have my full attention, Sadig.”

  “You should have that cough checked at the Mayo, Ms. Anne. It might be something in your environment that Doctor Frances cannot detect.” He sat, back perfectly straight, long hands resting on the chair’s arms as if testing it for size. “I have reason to believe the air quality of this office has been compromised to cause you discomfort. We will be installing a new micro-scrubber later this morning. I don’t know who has caused this tampering, but I will. Soon.”

  John’s address displayed on my communicator. I tapped once to let my son know I would be with him soon. “That’s one of the creepier invasions we’ve experienced. Just my space?”

  “You’re the one with the power to make decisions.”

  “We have family concerns that make the Deshomm challenge particularly difficult.”

  “Hartford, Ltd., is most vulnerable if something happens to you.”

  Giant Pines, one of our livestock and traditional grain operations, had been hotly pursued for at least eighteen months. Our private-labeled organic foods had a few suitors. More than one multi-corps had made offers for our educational services branch. Deshomm executives from around the world had flown to Minnesota specifically to convince me that all of Hartford, Ltd., should become a satellite company within their business web. Large money and stock were the lure. Subtle threats, security breaches, communication jams suggested what our existence might be like if offers were ignored.

  “Ms. Anne, there is no issue more important to Hartford, Ltd., than your safety.” He spoke slowly as if delivering news to an uncomprehending child. “Not one.”

  The man across my table had been a toddler during the Second Great Depression, too young to experience that everything could be taken away—family, land, money, hope—if unprotected. In a quarter century our world had transformed from protective governments to dominant multi-corps. Money ruled. Governments served those with the power, not those in need.

  “That it is why you report to me. And why I bring up the undetected kids in the orchard. Outside my office window.” David and John walked past my inside office window. David sent a small smile in my direction. He had a stately air, with his salt-and-pepper hair, broad shoulders, and the padding of a man his age across his chest.

  “That man,” I pointed to David, “doesn’t feel comfort
able with security around me. He would have choice words to say if he knew of this breach.”

  Sadig gave the impression of being fully engaged in our conversation and fully distanced, as he monitored an ear communication piece, a data pad, and whatever other security monitors he carried. Either he didn’t hear my displeasure with his performance, or ignored the message. Not for the first time I wondered if he didn’t listen as carefully because of my gender.

  “In the past it made sense to have security and engineering management together. In light of the intensity of the multi-corps, maybe it’s time to reconsider that structure.” This caught his attention and I continued without hurrying a word. “Perhaps directing security for a corporation with installations in multiple states is a big enough job?”

  A work crew, all young people who arrived at Ashwood unprepared for the agricultural life, rode past my outward facing windows, heading toward the ginseng growing buildings. Some proclaimed their metro roots with bald heads, one wore braided locks and facial hair. All were trim, muscular, healthy after a few months of regular meals and exercise. Once I knew the workers’ names and stories and would be able to call those teens something other than boy and girl.

  “What are you saying, Ms. Anne?”

  “Deshomm’s timing is critical because my father-in-law’s passing will lead to changes in shareholders. Changes in who might control key votes like changing our articles of incorporation.” It was time for him to show he had control of our physical safety. I threw a fairly basic fact into the conversation to test his knowledge of Hartford’s structure.

  One eyebrow raised above Sadig’s coffee black eyes. “This is confidential?”

  He had not wondered about the possibility of upheaval when Paul passed. Sadness slowed me, the memory of discussing this plan with my father-in-law. “There could be challenges. The South Dakota Regan family ranch is not as prosperous as Hartford, Ltd., and we think one of David’s brothers might ask for consideration. And there is a slim chance one or more of the surrogate offspring could be demanding.”