Fatherless: A Novel

by Dobson, James

GIVE THOSE BURDENED THE FREEDOM TO THRIVE.

  A commercial break and tap of the mute icon shoved Matthew into the deep water of his fourth and final point.

  “The material I received said a lot of college students receive funding through the generosity of transitioning loved ones.” He said no more, instead waiting for any clue of reaction one way or the other. A gasp or a sob suggesting he had cut her heart with a knife. Or perhaps prolonged silence as she contemplated an idea she might have already considered, no matter how remotely.

  They sat together quietly staring at the screen. Matthew felt a sense of relief, glad to have completed his mission. He had not suggested that his mother transition. He had merely mentioned what others had done in similar circumstances. The choice, as the law required, must be entirely her own.

  “Hi, Matt!” The sound of Sarah’s upbeat voice yanked him back to the present moment and reminded him of his duty to several dozen abandoned mugs and napkins. “Boy! We sure could have used you earlier this morning. Pandemonium city!”

  “Sorry. Late night.” It felt good to hear Sarah acknowledge his missed usefulness. “I’ll grab these tables over here.”

  He noticed the only remaining customer, a well-built athlete admiring the same red blouse and tight-fitting jeans that captivated Matthew every time they cycled into Sarah’s wardrobe rotation. It bothered him to see another man looking at her the way he had on countless occasions. It bothered him even more to overhear the younger, stronger, scholarship-receiving hunk smooth-talking her into dinner and a movie and, Matthew presumed, the rest. The moment reminded Matthew of his place at the bottom of the masculine hierarchy, where he would likely remain in light of his mother’s reaction to the transition option.

  She’d wept as he had never seen her weep before. It took him hours to calm her down, promising he did not mean she should transition, agreeing that suicide was a mortal sin, convincing her to take something that would help her sleep.

  How can she forget to take her medicine but remember the definition of a mortal sin? he wondered, freshly stoking the anger he had fueled much of the night.

  The door opened as a second customer walked into the café. Matthew noticed Sarah run the back of her hand along the hunk’s broad shoulders as she moved toward the counter where two other employees were trying to restore pre-rush sanity to the place.

  “Hello, Mr. Adams.” It was the voice of Dr. Thomas Vincent. “Doing well today?”

  Matthew smiled at the good fortune of seeing the professor again on a day he very much needed a confidant. “Hello, Dr. Vincent. Doing fine. You?”

  “Can’t complain. And even if I did no one would pay attention!” He chuckled at his own comment.

  “Are you in a hurry this morning or do you have a minute?” Matthew asked.

  Thomas Vincent glanced at the clock. “I have twenty-two minutes until my next lecture. I’ll split it with you. Let me order my drink and I’ll be right with you.”

  Matthew looked toward Sarah, who was already nodding approval for the delayed start, a favor both knew she owed him after reducing his last three shifts.

  He wasted the first few minutes on useless chatter about weather and the weekend game UC had barely lost, trying to appear at ease with the professor. Thomas quickly detected the con.

  “What’s troubling you, Matthew?”

  “Is it that obvious?”

  “Afraid so.”

  He decided against mentioning his mother to avoid contaminating a question better left in the sterile world of the abstract.

  “I know you no longer subscribe to the teachings of the church,” he began, “but I was wondering, what are your thoughts about mortal sin?”

  Thomas’s eyes fixed on Matthew over the top of his disposable cup. He gently blew the steaming surface before taking a trial sip.

  “Which mortal sin?”

  “I don’t know. Let’s say suicide.” Fearing the implication, Matthew quickly added another. “Or sexual promiscuity.”

  “Twenty years ago I would have said I’m against both, but I’ve become a bit partial to the second.” He laughed silently. “Besides, I’m pretty sure promiscuity falls under venial sins, not mortal sins. A mortal sin…” He paused and closed his eyes as if reaching for a distant memory. “Let me get this right, ‘A mortal sin breaks the link between the individual and God’s saving grace.’ Suicide definitely qualifies.”

  “Do you consider it suicide if someone volunteers to transition?” Matthew asked. “I mean, would the church call that a mortal sin?”

  “Probably would,” Thomas confirmed. “Another reason I could no longer affirm Catholic teachings.”

  “So you consider transitions a good thing?”

  Dr. Vincent appeared to experience a sudden awakening. “We aren’t having a hypothetical conversation, are we, Matthew?”

  Matthew hesitated. “No, sir. I had two conversations over the weekend that have put me in a difficult position.”

  “With whom?”

  “My mother.” He looked toward the window to hide false eyes. “I’m…I mean she’s considering a possible transition. Wants me to use her assets to pay for college.”

  “Really? She wants to fund your dream?”

  “And hers. She always wanted me to become a professor.”

  “But?” Thomas poked.

  “But I’m wrestling with the idea. She was always pretty religious. Still prays the rosary on her good days.”

  “And you wonder whether volunteering to transition is the same as committing suicide?”

  “Her former priest, Father Tomberlin, says the human body is sacred. I disagree, of course, but worry the church will reject her if she decides to go through with it. Renege on her baptism or something like that.”

  Thomas noticed the time. “Listen, Matthew, I need to head to class and I don’t want to rush this conversation. Let’s make an appointment for when we have more time. I fly out of town this afternoon for a lecture series in Chicago but I have office hours available next week.”

  Matthew nodded absentmindedly while trying to evade self-doubt.

  If he convinced his mother to transition, would she be committing the mortal sin of suicide?

  If he convinced her on a day when dementia impeded a sound mind, would he be committing the mortal sin of murder?

  Dr. Vincent stood and moved toward the door while throwing a slight wink in the direction of Sarah’s red blouse. Desperate for guidance, Matthew spoke up to avoid losing the professor’s attention.

  “Just answer me this. Would you help your own mother transition, you know, if she asked you to?”

  Thomas stopped and turned back toward Matthew. He said nothing for a moment, slowing zipping his leather jacket as if inching an answer upward from the center of his being.

  “My mother transitioned back in ’39 shortly after my dad died. That was before they recommended input from loved ones, so she never discussed it with my brother or with me.”

  He said it in such a manner that Matthew assumed it was not something Dr. Vincent liked to discuss. But he needed to know, so he gingerly asked one last question.

  “Would you have helped her if she had?”

  Thomas began rubbing his chin the way Matthew had noticed him doing in class. Fifteen seconds later, the answer came.

  “Yes. Remember what we discussed before, Matthew. We all decay. Why would I prevent my mother from sidestepping such an unpleasant process? Yes, I believe I would have helped her.”

  He turned to leave. The door had barely closed behind him when it opened again. Dr. Vincent threw his would-be protégé one final thought.

  “Remember, Mr. Adams. There’s no such thing as a mortal sin. Just hard choices.”

  Matthew resumed cleaning tables. Dr. Vincent’s advice was just what he’d needed to hear. So why, he wondered, did he feel worse instead of better?

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  A chilly breeze blew off the Potomac, quickening Julia’s pace and mak
ing what she had intended to be a thirty-minute power walk into a vigorous sprint between wind-shielding monuments. She had planned to wake early and begin shaping notes and interview recordings into the beginnings of a feature story. But another exhausting dream and a two-hour time zone difference had conspired against her best intentions. Several fruitless attempts to compose an opening paragraph had digressed into a halfhearted effort to craft an outline. After nearly an hour, Julia threw in the towel. She decided to catch a transport from her hotel to the National Mall, where she hoped to sort through the clutter in her mind.

  She began her walk at the Jefferson Memorial with an eye toward the massive granite bust of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The fifteen-minute route fell to six as Julia rushed for protection from the cold offered by the form of the slain civil rights leader. His eyes seemed to look across the Tidal Basin toward founding father Thomas Jefferson. She considered the irony of slaves working Jefferson’s plantation while he penned the famous words of the Declaration of Independence that later seeded Dr. King’s dream.

  As she blew warming breath into her cupped hands Julia admired how far her nation had come in the nearly thirty years since the King memorial had been built and dedicated to the memory of a man who embodied consummation of the founder’s vision.

  All men are created equal. Despite the annoyance of a masculine pronoun she admired the progress the idea empowered.

  And they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights. She wondered why Jefferson had rooted his big idea in a creator’s intent. Wouldn’t personal autonomy have been equally self-evident? Didn’t one’s unalienable rights include controlling one’s own body, choosing one’s own offspring, and ending one’s own existence?

  Julia found it odd that the man credited with separating church and state had included a religious argument in his most important founding document and that the memorial celebrating civil rights used the form of a former pastor. Everyone knew that innovative solutions such as the Youth Initiative would have been impossible in either Jefferson’s or Dr. King’s generation. Hers, by contrast, enjoyed the benefits of activist courts and pragmatic politicians who had managed to untether national policy from religious ideals.

  The wind died down a bit, offering Julia motivation to continue her run. Assuming she could make the Lincoln Memorial in about seven minutes, she slid her numbing hands inside the thin protection of her jogging suit pockets. She began running at a slow pace to give her mind room to think through the conversations of the previous day.

  Nicole Florea had characterized Kevin Tolbert as a radical who wanted to undermine the Youth Initiative by proposing crazy, unworkable ideas.

  Despite sounding reasonable and articulate, Kevin had indeed appeared eager to advance ideas that Julia considered naïve. Even if it was true that the primary resource shortage was young people and even if one could entice women to have more kids, it would be decades before those children would make any serious contribution to the economy. The Youth Initiative had generated immediate fiscal savings by going with the grain of public sentiment. Breeder values, by contrast, ran opposite to common assumptions and against the new American dream.

  And then there was Trisha Sayers. Julia had enjoyed the tour of the Her Look Inc. corporate office complex. The entry and every hallway displayed life-size photographs of glamorous models strutting the world’s most trendy runways, a stroll down memory lane of the gradual shift in women’s power fashions over the prior decade. After giving Julia the grand tour the superstar-turned-fashion-mogul invited her to dinner at one of the finest restaurants overlooking the Potomac. It was there that Julia recorded Trisha’s criticism of the bright spots perspective.

  “I couldn’t believe when Anderson approved further exploration after Tolbert’s pitch,” she explained while sipping wine with an elegant grace Julia found striking. “I mean, does he really think we can sell such an outrageous idea?”

  “How outrageous?” Julia had asked.

  “He wants to bring women like us back to the Middle Ages. He didn’t even seem embarrassed when he said we should penalize those who choose childlessness. As if the government has any business forcing us to lose our figures to wipe snotty noses!”

  Julia remembered the nonstop action of her evening with Tommy, Joy, and Leah and the relief she had felt driving away from the Tolbert home Sunday afternoon knowing she would spend that night in a quiet hotel room. She also remembered the look on Angie’s face when Joy leaped into her mommy’s arms during their Sunday-morning reunion. Angie had clearly enjoyed the break, but also missed the source of her exhaustion.

  “By the way, your figure’s adorable! Ever model?”

  “Thank you. No, I never modeled.” Julia blushed slightly before pressing on. “Did Kevin Tolbert actually say we should penalize childless individuals?”

  “Almost. He said we should make it easier for those who choose parenthood.”

  “Because?”

  “He claims we should consider the time and money they put into raising kids an investment in our long-term economic stability. He actually wants us to subsidize parenthood!”

  Julia remembered thinking Trisha’s derisive laugh tarnished her lovely face.

  “That’s why I called Paul.”

  Trisha called Paul? I thought it was the other way around.

  “I knew RAP would spin the story well. But I never imagined he would assign a powerhouse like the famous Julia Davidson! I’m a big fan of your column.”

  Julia savored the memory of the compliment while ascending the steps toward a massive Abraham Lincoln sitting in stoic contemplation. She was not breathing as heavily as she’d expected, which reminded her of the one-mile altitude drop from Denver to DC. She approached the sixteenth president’s feet, jogging in place to keep her heartbeat steady. Turning to the left she noticed the text of his most famous speech inscribed on the south wall. She moved closer to read the familiar 271 words.

  FOUR SCORE AND SEVEN YEARS AGO OUR FATHERS BROUGHT FORTH ON THIS CONTINENT A NEW NATION, CONCEIVED IN LIBERTY, AND DEDICATED TO THE PROPOSITION THAT ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUAL…

  Before she reached Lincoln’s references to the bloody Gettysburg battleground a familiar ping interrupted Julia’s reading. She tapped the headset in her ear. A voice message from Paul Daugherty.

  “Hi, Jewel. We’ve got trouble. But don’t worry. I have an idea. Listen to the attached, then call me right away.”

  Julia opened the pocket zipper to remove a tiny control center device and tapped the PLAY ATTACHEMENT option. She didn’t recognize the voice, probably that of a no-name research assistant or one of countless freelance academics paid on retainer by the RAP Syndicate.

  “Hi, Paul. I looked into the breeder question you floated and found something you might find useful. It appears that somebody on the Hill named Simmons requested numbers in anticipation of an upcoming task force presentation.”

  Troy Simmons? Julia wondered.

  “This Simmons guy asked the research team to either substantiate or repudiate something labeled…let me see…here it is…something he called ‘bright spots trend lines.’ Unfortunately, I only managed to access one side of the conversation. I don’t have the questions, just the answers. Get this. The summary shows economic growth pockets that run polar opposite to general trends. From what I can piece together the data seem to correlate high fertility and low transitions with economic strength. It looks solid at first glance, but I can’t imagine. There must be a flaw in the analysis somewhere. I’ll keep you posted as we dive deeper but I wanted to get you what I had. You know where to send questions.”

  The message ended, prompting Julia to tap Paul’s image to return his call.

  “Hi, Jewel. You got my message?”

  “I did. Did I hear correctly? The Bright Spots proposal has merit?”

  “Whoa…slow down, Nelly!” Paul said. “Let’s not jump to conclusions. All we know at the moment is that some analyst somewhere gave data to an a
nonymous congressional aide that supports a proposal we haven’t seen.”

  “Troy Simmons.”

  “Who?”

  “It’s not an anonymous congressional aide. I’ve met him. His name is Troy Simmons, Kevin Tolbert’s chief of staff. He and I spent an hour together yesterday afternoon.”

  “Wow. You really did get inside!” Paul sounded genuinely impressed. “What did you learn?”

  “Not much. Sharp guy. Seems genuine.”

  “A breeder?” Paul asked.

  “No. Well, not the way you mean it, anyway. But I think it’s safe to assume he falls in the anti–Youth Initiative camp.”

  “What about Tolbert?”

  Julia hesitated. Could she trust Paul with details of an off-the-record conversation?

  “Nothing official yet.”

  “Anything unofficial?”

  “Not really. Like I said in my text, he invited me to attend the austerity coalition meeting this afternoon. I hope to learn something useful then.”

  “Look, Jewel. The editorial board is breathing down my neck here. They expect a proactive piece ready for review soon. I’ve told them I’ve got my best people on the story and that we’ll deliver with our usual excellence.”

  “Best people? Who else?” Julia heard herself ask.

  “Best person, then. But I have to tell you I’m getting sweaty palms here. I stuck my neck out to get you this gig, Julia. Please tell me you’ll deliver.”

  Julia could not recall a time when Paul had seemed so anxious for a story. “Of course I’ll deliver, Paul! But why the panic? Is there something I need to know?”

  “No!” he snapped. “There’s something I need to know. Can you deliver a feature story that links this Bright Spots proposal to the source?”

  “Source?”

  “You know, guilt by association.”

  “I’m not sure I follow you,” she confessed.

  Paul assumed the vocal posture of a mentor tutoring his young apprentice, causing Julia to chafe while listening. “People care a whole lot more about being with it than they do about being right. All you need to do, Jewel darling, is craft a story that will make it easy to frame details about economic growth pockets and demographic trends with the more important reality of the situation.”