“Yeah,” Reven wrinkled her nose at him, “I might’ve made a little bit of that up. You know, on account of Eddie not being a very good friend to me in the past, while you’ve been awesome. Over the summer I decided I wanted to get to know you better.”
***
Karen looked over at Ronnie as he deftly spun his float chair up and in the door of their pickup. It was an old beater of a truck that she’d traded their wheelchair van for. Sliding half sideways and half backwards, he brought his chair down on the passenger seat. Grabbing the truck’s shoulder harness, he slipped it across and buckled himself into place like he’d been doing it all his life. She still felt astonished that, since it didn’t have wheels, the float chair fit into the seat of the truck and he could buckle himself in without any adaptations. Ronnie could actually ride in almost any car now, though it helped that the truck was big and didn’t require tight maneuvering like some of the smaller cars they’d tried out.
The pickup was a godsend for this move too. Packing all their crap into the van would have been possible, but the open space in the back of the truck held a lot more boxes and meant fewer trips. The float chair let Ronnie help a lot more too. The knees of the chair would fold out straight when he lowered it so the seat was on the floor. This let him lower himself down beside a box; pick it up and put it in his lap; then lift back up into the air and zip out to the truck. Once out at the truck, he could bring the chair up to the level of the bed and push the box off. She still did a lot of the rearranging of the boxes in the truck in order to best conserve space, but he was way more helpful than he would’ve been in his old wheelchair.
The most amazing though was the fact that he’d saved her hiring some men to move the heavy stuff. She simply tied rope around big objects and he hooked the rope over the arms of his wheelchair. The damned thing could lift a surprising amount, so he could sail through the air with objects weighing a couple hundred pounds suspended beneath the chair. He’d lift them up over the pickup where she’d line them up over the bed and he’d slowly lower them into place. The biggest problems had been when he and the object he was moving wouldn’t fit one above the other through the door. Like with the couch. But he’d been able to maneuver up to the door inside the house while she guided one end of the couch through the doorway. Then he’d zipped out the back door and around to the end of the couch that was already outside, looping the rope to lift and tug the couch outward while Karen lifted the back end the rest of the way through the door.
Karen figured one or possibly two more trips and they’d have all their worldly possessions moved into their crappy little apartment. She’d gotten a job, but it didn’t pay well enough to keep up the mortgage on their old house. The apartment was so small they could barely fit their meager possessions into it, but the low rent should leave them some money to do a few other things.
And, if John managed to find a job so he could pay his alimony and any of her other job applications came through maybe they could move into a better place.
They pulled up in front of their old house and Karen backed into the driveway. To her surprise she saw someone standing on the porch. She could tell Ronnie was looking that way as well. Since so few people came to visit, she once again worried that it was a salesperson or a proselytizer. She couldn’t help but think about the day Reven Davis had delivered Ronnie’s float chair, but had to be realistic that a visitor was likely bad news. I hope the real estate people didn’t forget and send somebody by to look at the house today. She’d told them that it was going to look a disaster because of the move and said she needed a couple days to clean it up before anyone should come by for a viewing.
The truck hadn’t even completely stopped when Ronnie popped his shoulder harness, banged open the door, and flew his float chair out. He shot over the hedge and up onto the porch, leaving Karen with cuss words dying on her lips. What the hell’s gotten him so excited? She glanced at the woman on the porch, wondering if it could be Reven Davis come back. Ronnie was excitedly talking to the woman while floating high enough to be speaking eye to eye like he did almost everyone nowadays. The woman didn’t have shiny black hair like Reven though, more of a dark wheat color.
With a feeling of trepidation, Karen slowly got out her side of the pickup and walked around. Climbing up onto the porch, she said, “Hello?” to the pretty young woman.
“Hi Ms. Williams, I’m Tiona Gettnor…” the woman began.
Ronnie interrupted excitedly, “Mom, she’s Dr. Gettnor’s daughter and the Chief Technical Officer of GSI!”
Karen could tell that her son was doing his best to make sure she didn’t stick her foot in her mouth by not recognizing Ms. Gettnor. She wanted to think that she wasn’t as obtuse as Ronnie thought, but self-awareness made her admit to herself that she hadn’t recognized Gettnor by her appearance even though the young woman was all over the news. “Um, hello Ms. Gettnor. We’d very much like to thank you for Ronnie’s float chair.” Her voice broke a little, “It’s… it’s so improved his life… We’re really grateful.”
Gettnor gave Karen a brilliant smile that warmed her soul. “I’d say that we’re really glad we could help, except it was really just my dad’s idea.” She glanced over at Ronnie, “And Ronnie was the inspiration, having been the one my dad saw struggling with a wheelchair and a curb cut.” Her eyes turned back to Karen, “I’m actually here wondering if you could help us?”
The bottom dropped out of Karen stomach. I knew it was too good to be true! They want to be paid for that chair! Then her logical side caught up, telling her that no company would send their CTO out to collect money. Glad that her voice didn’t sound shaky, she said, “Sure, what can I do?”
“Well, we’re setting up a charity to give away float chairs to people who need them but can’t afford them. I’m thinking someone like you might have just the perspective we need to run it.”
Karen’s eyes widened. Back before Ronnie got hurt, when she and John were together and their finances were solvent, she’d volunteered with a couple of small charity organizations and found it really fulfilling. “I’d… I’d so much like to say yes. But right now we’re having our own financial trouble. I’m looking for a second job and spending all my time filling out applications. Much as I’d like to help, I just can’t spare the time. Maybe… maybe someday in the future, if I can get a better job, maybe I could help then?”
Gettnor looked a tiny bit startled, then her eyes crinkled a little at the corner. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t very clear was I? We’d like to hire you to run our charity. With your degree in social work I think you’d be perfect. I have a guy in mind with a degree in accounting who’d be running the books.”
Then Gettnor named a salary figure that nearly doubled the best job Karen had ever had.
Karen found herself lying on the bare porch with Gettnor holding her hand. Ronnie’s chair shot out from inside and he handed Gettnor a wet rag to put on Karen’s forehead. Gettnor frowned with concern, “Are you okay?”
“Yes. Oh yes! I’ll take the job. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.” She glanced at Ronnie.
He had a huge smile on his face.
The End
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Author’s Afterword
This is a comment on the “science” in this science fiction novel. I’ve always been partial to science fiction that posed a “what if” question. Not everything in the story has to be scientifically plausible, but you suspend your disbelief regarding one or two things that aren’t thought to be possible. Then you ask, what if something (such as faster than light travel) were possible, how might that change our world?
This story poses several “what ifs?” First, as in “Tiona” it continues to wonder “what if” we had a reactionless drive in which thrust is generated by accelerating dark matter to produce thrust. What effects would such technology have on our lives? It certainly would find more uses than just
spaceflight. Helping the handicapped is an example to be found in this book.
The second “what if” hearkens back to “Vaz.” What would it be like if the preeminent genius of our times was a socially impaired person on the autism spectrum? There are socially impaired geniuses out there somewhat like this, though none with the capabilities of a Vaz. How might such a person deal with the stress of an alien invasion? Could their brilliance help the world or would their social impairments prevent them from being able to do so?
In the past I’ve found it hard to accept the common SF theme that aliens might travel between the stars to make war on us. The cost of transportation would make it unreasonable to believe that they’d come here to steal valuable resources from us. Making slaves out of us? Why? Surely robotics would be easier. Because they’re afraid of us might be plausible because we’re so warlike, but surely if they can travel between the stars they can’t fear us now—perhaps they might fear what we might become though even that seems doubtful. But then, considering the way our own population keeps growing, I realized it might be plausible that they just can’t stop reproducing and need the room. However, that’d only be credible if they had an easy way to move huge numbers of their people between the stars.
Another concept I find interesting is the possibility that aliens, even star traveling ones, might be way ahead of us in some sciences, yet behind us in others. Here the aliens have better materials technology, but no thrusters; they have wormhole tech, but less capable computers. I’m not the first author to consider this—I loved Harry Turtledove’s short story The Road Not Taken and also liked several books by Christopher Anvil that examine this theme.
Finally, some of you may recognize that I stole an idea about social hierarchy from orangutans who, by unclear methods and reasons, hormonally elevate one of their males to a massively powerful, highly-dominant state called a “flanged male” who lords it over the others and is almost the exclusive mate of the local females. With these aliens it’s a female who becomes the dominant one and she’s the only one allowed to use a name instead of a title.
Acknowledgements
I would like to acknowledge the editing and advice of Nora Dahners, Gail Gilman, Mike Alsobrook, Allen Dietz, Mike Giroux, Jack Hudler, and Eddie Still, each of whom significantly improved this story.
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