by Jim Benton
“Mom?” he asked with disbelief. “You’re part of the Parents Agency?”
“I am, Billy. I just … I don’t know what to say right now.”
“Is this the headquarters?” he asked meekly.
“It is, son,” she said.
The General looked around the room and purposefully locked eyes intensely with Maggie.
His eyes darted over to Marion’s backpack lying on the ground. He nodded slightly.
The small group walked around the headquarters, and the Supervisor issued orders to them as they passed.
“This location has been compromised, people. Prepare to move to a new secure location. No fingerprints, folks. Clean it up. We’re out of here in a week.”
Big Mother gave her son—the General—a big hug.
“So you’re the head of the Resistance,” she said, her voiced filled with mixed feelings of shame, anger, and pride. “We’ve been after you and your group for quite some time. You’ve really been a thorn in our paw.”
The General pulled away from her angrily.
“Why do you do this? Why do you have this terrible Handbook, these stupid, mean rules? Why do you work so hard to keep us beneath you?”
“Keep you beneath us?” the Supervisor scoffed, and Big Mother put up her hand to quiet him.
“Okay. You want answers,” she said. “I understand that. You all have been at this a very long time. We can give you some answers.”
Jack narrowed his eyes and said, “Yeah. Tell us everything, but do NOT try to use one of the strategies on us. We know how those work.”
“Let me start,” the Supervisor said. “Let me show you the Archives. Maybe you’ll agree with what we’re doing. Maybe you’ll decide not to post that file, Maggie.”
He gave her a friendly, practiced wink and she sneered at him.
“Your tricks won’t work on me, you know,” she said.
He put his hands up as if to surrender.
They all walked into a large set of rooms off the main control center. There were displays behind glass and on pedestals. It resembled a small museum.
The Supervisor led them to a case with an old, thin, tattered scroll inside it.
“The Handbook is old, very old. This is the first version we know of. It dates back centuries,” he said.
The General rapped on the case and smirked.
“Of course, over time, things have been added, and translated,” the Supervisor said, “but the main stuff is unchanged. And, of course, everybody went to great efforts to keep the material hidden from children.”
They looked into another case with various copies of the Handbook. Each had a false cover with a title no kid would ever pick up, like New Ways to Wash Behind Your Ears, The Pilgrims Loved Algebra, and So You Want to Sweep Out the Garage.
As they walked, they saw a display of mannequins depicting a young family. The mom was holding a baby, and the dad was holding a copy of the Secret Parent’s Handbook. Both were smiling down at their child.
“A copy of the Handbook is given to all parents when they have children. It’s to help them …” The Supervisor paused as he searched his mind for a word that wouldn’t offend his listeners. “… to help them raise their children.”
Marion clenched her fists. “More like control them,” she muttered with disgust.
“Well, yes, to a certain degree, to control them,” Big Mother said. “But that’s not all.”
“Kids are complicated. They’re difficult,” the Supervisor said, gesturing slightly in the direction of the General. “They’re always trying to poke their eyes out or break their necks.”
Big Mother bent down to speak directly to the General. “Which reminds me, Billy, no more swinging on ropes through plate-glass windows. You could break your neck.”
Maggie squeezed her mom’s hand tight enough for it to hurt. “You shouldn’t lie to us. Why do you tell kids lies, like that if they make a face, it could freeze that way?” she demanded.
Big Mother looked at the Supervisor and he shrugged his shoulders. They looked around at the other parents for an answer.
They all shrugged.
“I don’t know,” she finally admitted. “That’s what the book says we should tell you. I guess it just bugs us when you make those faces.”
The Supervisor said, “You see, kids, parents have a relatively short amount of time with you as children. Most of your life will be spent as an adult. A very small percentage of it will be as a child. So we have to launch you straight, like little rockets, in the right direction. The book helps us do that.”
“Yeah, but if you don’t know why the book says things—like how you had no idea about making faces—how do you know that us little rockets are going the right way?” Jack asked.
“Yeah,” Maggie added. “And all these little ‘rockets’ are different. Maybe they don’t all want to head in the same direction.”
Jen rubbed her stomach.
“It’s going to be … so hard,” she said. “I mean, my baby isn’t even born yet, but I can tell … I can tell what’s going to happen.”
Big Mother put her arm around Jen’s waist and pulled her close.
“Tell them what’s going to happen,” Big Mother said softly.
“I’m going to love this baby so much that it’s going to own me,” Jen said with a sweet smile.
The Supervisor nodded. “It’s true,” he said. “The book isn’t to hold you kids down. You kids own us the minute you’re born, even before. The book is to help us get up to your level.”
Big Mother said, “You may find it hard to believe, but we love you so much that we’re practically powerless against you. We think about you every minute. We’re crazy about you no matter what you do. When you ask for candy for dinner, we want to give it to you, just to see you smile. When you want to jump off the garage roof to see if you can fly, we want to let you, because deep inside, we believe that maybe you really can.”
“Without that book, we parents would probably put every child on earth in the hospital in a week,” the Supervisor said. “Or worse.”
“That’s all very nice, but look how it’s worked out,” Marion said, pulling herself up to her full height. “You give us answers like ‘Because I said so’ and you make us learn stuff we’ll never, ever use. You say that you do all this because you love us, but really—what difference does it make if we make our beds or not? We’re going to be sleeping in them again that night.”
Big Mother looked to the Supervisor for the answer to that one. He shrugged.
“No idea,” he said. “It’s kind of a fair question.”
Marion clenched her teeth and shook her fist. “Why are we even going through this? When that book hits the Internet, and every kid on earth knows what it says, you know what will happen?”
“The kids will control the parents.” Mike grinned.
“That’s right. THE KIDS WILL CONTROL THE PARENTS. We’ll do whatever we want, whenever we want. Then you can see how you like being bossed around for a change.”
Big Mother flopped down in a chair.
“We already saw, Marion. We were kids once, too,” she sighed. “And we got all the same rules, and reasons, and punishments you get, and we hated them as much as you do. But eventually, when we became parents ourselves, we changed. Kids are the most complicated, most important, most difficult things in the world, and they don’t come with a manual. Over time, parents began to feel that the stuff in the book is, well, it’s probably better than nothing.”
“It’s not,” Marion said. “It’s not better. And none of that matters now anyway.”
“Easy, Marion,” the General said softly.
“Maggie has the material out there. Tomorrow it posts. Freedom for kids begins tomorrow,” Marion said triumphantly. “We WIN.”
Mike applauded and cheered.
Big Mother cast a defeated look at the Supervisor, and he hung his head.
Maggie looked at the parents. She didn’t see anythin
g like anger. She saw worry—pure, undisguised worry, and Jack saw it, too.
They knew this wasn’t right.
“I guess I could stop that from happening, if there was a good reason to stop it,” Maggie said quietly.
Marion glowered at her.
Jack grinned. He understood where she was going with this.
“I don’t know, Maggie,” Jack said. “I mean, the problem here is that we all love each other. And it’s impossible to turn that into something good.”
Big Mother and the Supervisor smiled. Jack was using a strategy from the book:
* * *
The child loves to prove you are wrong, and takes delight in contradicting you. When you want to make a point, state the opposite, and the child, like a fish, will take the bait and argue.
* * *
“Wait a second,” the General said, getting tangled up in their strategy. “Loving each other is a good thing. You’re wrong, Jack. It’s not a problem.”
“Stop it!” Marion shouted. “They’re tricking you, General. That file is going to post tomorrow and we will finally get our way. All the time. About everything.”
“Look, Marion,” Maggie said angrily. “You don’t get to tell me what to do. I can stop that post anytime I want, if I feel like it.”
The General had seen that terrible anger in Marion’s eyes before, and he lunged for the display of mannequins, snatching the copy of the Secret Parent’s Handbook from the mannequin dad’s plastic hand.
“Not if you’re asleep for a week, you can’t,” Marion said to Maggie, and she pulled out an immobilizer that she had smuggled out of the conference room. She gritted her teeth and fired every charge in it at Maggie.
Maggie cowered, and the General leapt with the book outstretched, the blasts intended for Maggie striking the book with sizzling impacts.
Marion lowered her immobilizer slowly as the General stood up.
“Why? Why did you stop me?” she asked. “You … you betrayed me.”
“I’m just not sure anymore,” he said, shaking his paralyzed hand. “I used to be sure and I’m not sure now. I think this battle is changing, Marion. I mean: Look at these adults; we’re going to be them someday, and then we’ll be on the other side of this.”
Marion looked at the parents, and then looked at Jen. It suddenly occurred to Marion that Jen wasn’t really that much older than she was.
Mike laughed and slapped the General on the back.
“Whoa! Nice leap! I thought you were such a little punk and then you went all James Bond and Han Solo and stuff. Like if Batman and Spider-Man had a baby, and it was really, really supershort, like maybe malnourished and sick, and bad at sports, that would be you!”
“Billy,” Big Mother began. “I mean, General—I’m glad you understand why we must continue to use the Handbook.” She smiled hopefully.
“It’s not up to him,” Maggie said abruptly. “I’m the one with the file. And we are making changes around here, Big Mother. That book of yours, this whole organization, the secrets, the lies, it has to change.”
Big Mother stood and stared at her angrily. “And just why is that, young lady?” she said.
“Because I said so,” Maggie responded.
Jack pointed at Maggie proudly.
“She’s in charge,” he said.
For two whole hours, there was a lot of explaining.
Big Mother told the kids what the parents had been doing, and the General told everybody what they had been attempting as well.
“I can’t believe you called my parents,” Marion said sourly.
Marion’s mom stroked her hair and Marion pulled back, away from her touch.
“Marion,” her mom said, “we never meant for you to feel controlled.”
“But all the rules all the time,” she said. “They’re so stupid.”
Her dad looked at her through his glasses. He was tall and strict, and spoke very little.
He cleared his throat and said, “Marion. Maybe some of the rules are stupid. But we could just never stand the idea of you … you know …”
“What, Dad, growing up?” she said, annoyed.
“Being hurt,” he said, and her angry eyes softened.
“We don’t always know what to do, Marion,” he said, his deep voice cracking. “We just—we love you, little girl. More than anything in the world. You are everything to us.”
Her mom spoke softly. “You never knew your aunt Marion, sweetheart. You were named after her, you know. She was your dad’s little sister. I never knew her either. She passed away when she was just a child, and your dad has missed her every day of his life. He always felt that she hadn’t been protected very well. He can’t help protecting you so, Marion. I can’t either.”
Her dad spoke carefully, trying to control his cracking voice.
“But I can do better, Marion,” he promised.
“I’ve said that exact thing,” Marion said quietly. “I’ve said that exact thing so many times.”
He put out his arms toward her.
“Maybe … I’ll let you try to prove it,” she said softly.
She had been angry for so long that she could hardly remember the last time she felt like a little girl, but she allowed herself to slowly lean into her dad and be swallowed up by his giant hug.
The General could not believe it was really Marion.
“Ewww,” said Mike, witnessing the hug.
Jack said, “Look, we get the rules, at least some of them.” And he talked about what they had learned over the past couple of weeks, and that he had come to believe that maybe parents weren’t always the enemy. You actually can get sick of eating candy all the time.
Mike shook his head in disagreement.
“Speak for yourself,” he said, patting his ample gut. “You just don’t know how to commit yourself to it. You really should have tried the gummy bear soup I invented.”
Jack ignored him and went on to say that they had realized they would probably grow up into lazy, stinky dummies, adding that Mike had stopped washing his hands after he went to the bathroom long ago.
The adults thrust bottles of hand sanitizer at Mike.
“Okay,” Maggie said, “I admit we need rules. But why do you need so many? Why does there have to be a whole book full of them? Parents can come up with their own rules, and be flexible enough to change them sometimes.”
Big Mother smiled.
“I would have never believed that kids would arrive at the conclusion that they really needed certain rules. I wonder if maybe we’ve been … underestimating you. I’m delighted to see that you understand why we can’t just eliminate the Parents Agency, or get rid of the Secret Parent’s Handbook.”
“I don’t understand,” Mike said, and the whole group fell quiet. “I’m not going along with this. You do have to eliminate it.”
“Mike, think it through,” Big Mother said sternly.
“That, Big Mother, is exactly how I DON’T like to think things: through.”
A few of the agents began to reach slowly for their immobilizers.
“Let me tell you how I see things,” Mike began.
The Supervisor put a hand on Maggie’s dad’s shoulder. He leaned in and spoke in a whisper.
“While Mike there is speaking his mind, let’s talk in private, just for a moment. Bring your wife and Maggie. This will just take a second.”
Jack looked back over his shoulder and watched as Maggie and her parents walked into the conference room and closed the door behind them.
“Look,” the Supervisor said to them, “I was afraid that this whole negotiation was going to go bad. Have a peek at this.” He pulled a check made out to Maggie from his pocket and handed it to her dad.
The Supervisor spoke quietly and quickly. “How about if we just buy the file from you, Maggie? We’ll still—you know—improve on this whole handbook business. But there’s not enough time to make this happen right now. Everybody feels too rushed. The deal is falling apart
out there. Any moment, we might get impatient, or the Resistance will get impatient, and somebody is going to do something hasty. When the smoke clears, who knows who will be in Antarctica?”
Maggie glowered at him.
“Wha—, wha—,” her dad huffed in disbelief, his eyes wide, as he examined the amount of the check. “That’s a lot of money. A LOT of money.”
Maggie’s mom said, “And if we take this deal you’re proposing, none of the kids will be punished? Nobody gets in trouble?”
The Supervisor smiled and nodded. “It’s a better solution, isn’t it? You guys can buy a new house, heck, a few new houses. You can retire. The kids go to college, get new cars. All that stuff. And dolls. Think of all the dolls! You like dolls, right, Maggie?”
Maggie smiled and plucked the check from her dad’s hand. “Oh, I just love ’em,” she said. “Can I have a minute to talk about this with my parents?”
“Of course,” the Supervisor said with a big warm smile, and left them alone in the conference room.
The Supervisor nodded confidently at Big Mother.
Mike was just wrapping up his speech.
“And that’s why, no matter what your parents think, you should be able to eat a chili dog while you go to the bathroom,” he concluded.
“Where’s Maggie?” Jack asked the Supervisor.
“She’ll be along shortly, I’m sure,” he said, thumping Jack playfully in the shoulder.
“I want to talk to her,” Jack said, and the Supervisor smugly leaned against a wall and winked at him, then flashed a thumbs-up to Big Mother.
“Thank you for your valuable input on chili dogs, Mike,” she said. “I think we’re done here,” and she nodded at the security staff.
“Yes,” the Supervisor said. “Let’s all just go have a little rest.”
The security agents took ahold of Jack and Mike and their parents as well. They unholstered freshly charged immobilizers.
Mike’s sister, Jen, was also being hustled along by the agents, when Maggie’s dad emerged from the conference room.
“So,” he said, “I think it’s probably a great idea if we all run as fast as we can out of this building.”