Tom vs the Volcano God

by Marilyn Foxworthy

  I said, “Well yeah. I guess.”

  She smiled and said, “Good. OK, First reason. You’re Robby’s brother and it doesn’t make any sense to make other people happy and not his own brother. By the way, do you know where Mark is?”

  I said, “No. His wife died a few years ago, and he quit his job and he and his son disappeared. We got a letter saying that he was fine but that we wouldn’t hear from him for a while.”

  Peach said, “We’re going to start looking for him. Anyway, that’s one reason. Second, you need to make a change of job to match your change of life-style. You have four wives.”

  I said, “Yeah, Sarah and I talked about that briefly last night.”

  Peach said, “We can relocate you basically anywhere in the world. As long as you don’t need to have an active clubbing nightlife, we can find a way to get you some privacy.”

  I said, “You know, this place is a dream. I don’t mean I want this place, but if I could live in a nice tropical place that’s private like this, with Sarah and the girls, that would be great. But what can I do to make a living? Does Robby have a need for a software developer?”

  Peach said, “We kind of think that if you still want to do software that you would do whatever you think would be innovative and Robby would just fund it. If you want to do something else, that’s fine too. In fact, you could probably sit and watch waves all day. But we would want you to be available for special projects.”

  I said, “What kind of projects?”

  She said, “That’s the thing. We can’t know. Something could come up and Robby might ask you to go do something related to making someone happy. Let me give you an example. A while back, a competing property developer tried to make trouble for us and tried to steal some property from us that was worth about five hundred million. Robby dealt with it by finding the right people and offering them choices that made them happier. One of those people was a young woman who the man was taking advantage of. He was a minor criminal and major slime ball. Part of what happened immediately was that Robby paid off her loans, took care of her mother’s medical bills, and then got her ex-husband released from his alimony payments and replaced her income with a better salary that much more than compensated for what her ex was supposed to be giving her. In the process, we ended up taking over properties from the man that so far are worth about five billion dollars and we aren’t done yet. In another case, he offered three ex-military women struggling with various pressures new jobs flying a corporate jet. In another case, he set up a very generous tuition reimbursement program for students who work at any of our businesses so that they don’t ruin their finances by running up student debt. So, you could take part in projects like that when they come up. It’s hard to describe how absolutely gratifying it is until you feel it for yourself.”

  I said, “It sounds too easy. It sounds like I could sort of just retire and do these special projects and do what I want the rest of the time.”

  She smiled and said, “Exactly. And enjoy your girls and travel and have fun. But we would want you to find some of your own special projects. A waitress who’s a single mom whose life would change with a little help. Not just money. Help. Or a community center that is doing great work but needs a little push in a better direction. Or a village that needs clean water and a source of cheap energy. But we want to handle it on a case by case basis. No big global initiatives. Very intimate, very personal projects that make peoples’ lives better. And sometimes those projects make us money, and sometimes they don’t. We had a case where we met a women’s clothing store owner, and we helped her procure a very exclusive line of lingerie and now she has six stores and will expand to nine over the next three years. Perhaps more. And we make money off of it. Do you see how this can work?”

  I said, “I think I do. It sounds really exciting.”

  Peach said, “Make the call. Quit your job and we’ll set it up. Robby wants you and Mark, when we find him, to be part of this. And about your living arrangements. We can do almost anything if you have an idea of what you want, but if you want to wait before settling down, you and the girls can just live at various properties that we own. I’d start by sending you to Tahiti for a few months. Or we pick a base somewhere and you have the girls fly you all to various places we own, and you see what they all look like and kind of act like a secret VIP and check out how we’re doing. Like an undercover boss situation. And the fact that there are five of you isn’t an issue. You are a VIP and you have an entourage, and no one thinks it’s weird at all. Robby often poses as a fashion mogul and we act as his models and Lily is our photographer. No one looks twice. Well, they always look several times, but there’s never any questions about us all being together.”

  I said, “I’m not wearing pants.”

  Peach smiled and said, “I get it. And Dee’s a virgin. I understand what you mean better than you do. You say you don’t have any pants, but what you mean is, how is his all happening right now? Is any of this real? Am I dreaming?”

  Robby and Buttercup walked up hand in hand now and Honey stood up and hugged them both.

  I got up nervously and Buttercup hugged me, and then said, “Sweetie, you don’t have to stand up when one of us walks in. We know how polite you are. Just relax. I’m glad you’re not dressed. We need you to be comfortable with us.”

  I said, “I don’t have any pants.”

  Robby said, “Oh, sit down. Sarah brought your pants back here last night.”

  I said, “I’ll need them.”

  Robby said, “Oh, whoops. I set them on fire. No, you didn’t breach the contact. We just thought it would be fun. Sarah asked if we could, and as you’ll see soon enough, if one of the elves asks for something, I just say yes before I ever know what’s happening. Except for when they ask me if they can build a nine-foot-tall Poppet. They never give up on that.”

  I said, “Robby, it all sounds great. What Peach was telling me about working for you or whatever. And with the girls. I can’t exactly go back and tell the neighbors we’re all married. I am married to them, right?”

  Robby nodded and I continued, “It’s too good to be true. Could I have some pants?”

  Honey said, “OK, everybody get dressed. Something around our hips at least. Tom is right. This isn’t play time. We’re making big decisions and some clothing is a good idea. Sarah, take Tom in the house and give him some pants and we’ll all meet back here in a few minutes”

  We all stood up, and Honey, Peach, Buttercup, and Robby headed into the house. Sarah and I followed, and Alice appeared and led us to a bedroom where pants and a shirt for me were laid out on the bed waiting. Alice and Sarah went to the closet and took out dresses and slipped them on. When we were dressed, we went back to the veranda. A minute or two later, the others joined us again and Alice left and went inside to do something else.

  Honey said, “Tom, thank you. Getting dressed right now was just the right thing. For all of us.”

  The women were all wearing attractive summer dresses, not just something around their hips, as I was afraid that they might be. We looked dressed for a very casual business meeting on the patio of a nice restaurant.

  Peach smiled and said, “So, now that we’re comfortable, I’d like to settle as much of this as we can. But only because I want you to be comfortable. I figure the more you know, the more comfortable you will be, and the easier decisions will become. If you want to leave it up in the air, we can.”

  I said, “Um, No. If we can make any decisions at this point, that would be great.”

  Peach said, “Good. Let’s start at the beginning. What do you need to know in order to make the decision that you are going to come work with us?”

  I said, “Um, nothing, I guess. I assume that the salary and benefits and stuff will be fine. As long as I can make a living and provide for my family, it’ll be fine. I have no idea what I’ll be doing, but it sounds like you want me to do something that I’ll be good at, so I’m OK there too.”


  Robby said, “Tommy, salary and benefits are not even the right terms for this. You are family. I had to wait until now, but this offer was going to happen eventually, as long as you didn’t become a real jerk at some point. The benefits are that all of your medical type expenses, dentists and everything, is paid for a hundred percent. Forever. You get a retirement income, at the level you make at your job now, but before any taxes, forever, adjusted for inflation over time. Peach make that happen now, no matter what. But if you work with me, I assume Peach described some of our special projects, you can travel, live at any of our properties, or have a beach house in any of several locations on one of our personal estates, etc. I would suggest that if you want a beach house that we have it on one of the existing estates. It will be easier to see each other and share housekeeping and gardening staff.”

  I said, “What do you do about that? Given what goes on here?”

  Robby said, “I told you that. So did Lily. Elves. I told you about that.”

  I said, “Oh yeah. It’s a lot to keep in my head.”

  Robby said, “So, if you have a house here, private but on the property, we only need one tribe of elves and don’t risk them going back and forth between locations. But if you really want your own place, we can talk about that. I like the idea that we’re family and we share everything in some ways.”

  I said, “OK. That sounds OK. So, full retirement and all medical paid.”

  Peach said, “And all insurance, housing, and travel, both business and leisure.”

  Robby said, “As long as he doesn’t go crazy. If he does, he gets the same deal Lily offered the girls.”

  I looked puzzled and said, “You bury me in ants?”

  Robby said, “We leave you alone. You keep the pension and benefits, but you find your own housing and you never hear from me again. And if the girls want it, you never hear from them again either. But that isn’t going to happen. I hate doing this what if planning, but you need to have choices, even there. If you think that you will be happier drinking yourself to death at the dog track, that’s up to you. But that isn’t going to happen. I just want you to know that it’s a perfectly viable option. There’s a whole lot of things that we could talk about doing or not doing, but let’s focus on what are reasonable scenarios. You are a good man, a brilliant problem solver, and have maturity and wisdom. You will fit in well with us. You aced our tests with Sarah and the girls in ways that we couldn’t have hoped for. Do you want to pick a place to live, for now at least?”

  I said, “In the near term, if it was possible, I’d just stay with you. Wherever you are going to be. I don’t know if that’s OK, but that would be my first choice.”

  Robby said, “We can do that. Except at the residence in Oregon. Then, well, we have the guest house. Alice, is there something that we can do about access for Tom’s family?”

  Alice wasn’t in sight, and I wondered what Robby was doing, but Sarah pointed to her ear and whispered, “Ear-fish.” That’s right, they had a way of communicating and Alice could listen in all the time.

  Robby said, “Well, we won’t worry about the residence there. We’ll work something out. Alice says that we can give you service personnel access to the labs, at least. But we aren’t headed to Oregon soon. The plan is to stay here for several more weeks at least. So, Tom and his family will travel with us and stay with us for a while.”

  Peach said, “We can take care of selling your house and everything in it for you if you don’t want to go back.”

  I said, “Well, I might want to save a few things.”

  Peach looked concerned for me and said, “Oh, of course. I forgot. Spend as long as you like with us and then go back, and we’ll arrange a crew to work with you to clear it out. Anything you don’t want, we would send to worthy charities, unless you want to do something else. But that’s a ways out, so we don’t have to make any of those decisions right now. But I will get started on retirement accounts and insurance and health care.”

  Robby said, “You really don’t need any money. We will have credit cards for you in a day or so. Until then, we will give you a prepaid debit card that you can use anywhere.”

  Peach said, “We have a few with partial balances on them left over from other projects. I can probably find ten thousand dollars between them.”

  Robby said, “Great. They need to buy some clothes and sit in restaurants and go on some sightseeing tours. Tom, you are on a quadruple honeymoon, so act like this is a wedding present. Live it up a little. Sarah, can you drive the cars?”

  Sarah said, “I never did but Alice said that I can if I practice. Should I go practice right now? That would be fun. I never did that before. But I’ll miss Tom, but he should go see the airplane girls. The Fire Maidens, ha ha. Tom, I could stay here and drive cars and you can go sit in restaurants with them and have fun and I’ll see you again when you come back. And now Alice can teach me more because we love each other.”

  I said, “OK. I do need to go talk to them. How can I get there?”

  Honey said, “Peach will go get you some money and Alice will take you to the resort. You can play there for the day. Everything you need is in easy walking distance.”

  Chapter 17 - New Stuff

  Within a half hour or so, I was standing in the driveway with Alice. I had a pocket full of debit cards that didn’t require my name to be on them, and an unusual off-road sedan was parked in front of us.

  Alice said, “Hop in,” and she opened a pair of doors on the curb side of the vehicle.

  The car was like a nice sport sedan, but with a few modifications. For one thing, it had an unusual amount of ground clearance and oversized tires and wheels. It was wider than most passenger cars. The only doors were two on the one side that opened opposite each other. And inside, there was a sofa-like bench seat across the back and three nice seats that swiveled to face either the front or the rear of the vehicle. There was no steering wheel or driver’s seat. Alice explained that it was self-driving, or more precisely, remotely driven by her. She told me that she could hear through microphones in the car and that I could simply ask to be taken anywhere I wanted.

  Alice ushered me into the vehicle and told me to have a nice time. She stayed outside as she closed the doors, and as soon as I sat down, the car started to move. I hadn’t really chosen a seat, but just sat down in the closest spot, and that turned out to be the sofa. As the vehicle made its way through the jungle on the dirt path, I got more comfortable and sat next to the left window. The ride was surprisingly smooth. I decided to try out the idea that Alice was listening, and I asked her about the ride. She explained that the vehicle used a very advanced active independent suspension system that kept the passenger compartment as still as possible, regardless of road conditions.

  I watched the trees and plants go by outside the window. I didn’t spend much time thinking about what was happening. I stayed in the moment, not focusing on my past or future right now. Unhappiness most often comes when we think about what has happened, or what might happen, rather than what is happening. Planning for the future was fine, and good plans and hopes could be very energizing, but worrying about what might happen, or what this person was probably going to say and how would we respond, and how would we react if this awful thing happened, never made you happy. I was in a smooth-riding car in a beautiful tropical place, being driven to a resort where I would see three wonderful girls that I wanted to get to know better. I had money in my pocket and nothing that needed me to worry about it for now.

  The trip to the resort took about thirty minutes. It was just a few miles south of the airport. The place was amazing. We drove up to the front, and Alice told me that she would park he car and to just call her on my phone when I was ready to go somewhere.

  The hotel had no doors. I got out under a covered area with a bellman’s station and a nice guest receiving area. I was pointed to an escalator that took me perhaps five stories down what was once a hill into the resort itself. At the bottom
was a large garden and koi ponds surrounded by shops, meeting rooms, and the guest check-in lobby. The lobby didn’t have a door either, just a big open entryway.

  I went to the desk and asked if there was a key waiting for me. A very pleasant girl smiled and handed me a card key and a map and pointed out where the room was. She offered to have someone take me to the room, but I thanked her and told her that I could find it myself. She explained that my card key would allow me to make any purchases at the resort and have them charged to the room. She pointed out the location of several bars, restaurants, gift shops, boutiques, jewelry stores, and the spa. She explained that the pool had cabanas that could be reserved and that the beach shop rented boats and snorkeling equipment. I thanked her again and headed in the direction that she had indicated.

  I pulled out my phone as I walked and called Alice. I asked her what I should do about wedding rings for the girls, and after a quick exchange with Honey, she told me to buy them before I returned to the house. She told me not to give them to the girls yet though and suggested a specific jeweler that wasn’t at the resort. She would take me there when I was ready.

  I walked down an open-air hallway and onto a huge veranda overlooking a huge swimming pool with an island in the middle. I found out later that it was the largest fresh water swimming pool in the United States. Beyond the pool was a beach about a half a mile long in a quiet bay. A cruise ship was docked about two miles away.

  I went down another walkway and stopped at a pair of elevators. When the door opened, I got in and pushed the button for the nineteenth floor. The nineteenth floor was actually on the fifth level because they had a strange numbering system. The twenty third floor was in a different wing of the hotel that was ten levels high. So, the floor number told you not the height of your room, but what floor of which wing you were in. It was a weird system, but you got used to it. Whatever.