Chapter 85: Movies, Mentoring, and More

Saturday, February 19, 1983

We slept late and puttered around the house a bit in the morning. It was unusual for us to have almost no homework, no tournament coming right up, no paper to put in some time on, no ... nothing, really.

I read a bit, and did some programming on my computer. I’d slowly shifted from reading primarily science fiction to reading a mix of things. Some fiction, but I’d gotten pickier. Some of the basis was knowing that certain books just didn’t hold up, of course.

In their place, I’d added some more ‘classic’ management and people-skills books. ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’, for instance. I was doing fine at that on my own, but it didn’t hurt, not at all. ‘The Mythical Man-Month’, which had applications far beyond software engineering.

I pulled some of Dad’s books on sales off the shelves and read those, too. I had no interest in going into sales itself, which Dad recognized and didn’t mind. After all, no matter how good sales had been for him (and it had been very, very good) it was his second choice. The thing is, ‘sales’ is a broad field. Before long, everyone would be told that they needed to be able to ‘market themselves,’ to perfect their personal ‘elevator pitch,’ and so forth.

Much of what I did was ‘sales.’ Trying to convince a judge to vote for our team and not the other team was, in the end, salesmanship. Oh, the criteria were often the strength of arguments and so forth, but that’s also salesmanship, unless your judge is someone who’s an expert in your field.

Most judges don’t know Noam Chomsky from Noel Coward, not unless you explain why Chomsky matters when you’re talking about international arms sales. Or (if you’re the one being beaten up with Chomsky quotes) why Chomsky doesn’t matter at all.

Anything that involves convincing other people to do something can be related to sales, in one way or another. Salesmen often get a poor reputation because of the perception that they’re trying to convince you to do something against your own interests, but Dad was never that way. A good, solid, reputable product for a fair price was always his way, and it was a product the buyer already knew they needed.

I still had no interest in following in Dad’s footsteps, not directly. But he was very good at what he did. Learning from him, and from the books he’d learned from, seemed like a good use of some of my limited spare time.

Around one-thirty Ang and I left to ‘go to the mall.’ Technically — very technically — we sort of did. We passed very close to Northwest Mall on our way to Jane’s, after all.

I’m certain Mom knew we weren’t always going to the mall when we said we were, and that she was fine with that. ‘Going to the mall’ was pretty much a universal teenage code for ‘doing teenager things parents need not concern themselves with,’ at least around our little privileged piece of suburbia. I again flashed forward to the 2000s, and particularly the 2010s, when the notion of their child being out of touch for more than a few minutes would’ve sent many parents into a panic. I’d seen parents screaming at kids and grounding them for the high crime of letting their phone battery run out of power.

Most likely, Mom and Dad wouldn’t have been that sort of parent. I wasn’t, and I had no plans to do that in the future. Cell phones are useful, and I’d want older kids to have them, but I didn’t want to be checking on their location constantly and comparing it to some approved list of options, not unless they’d already proven that they needed the oversight. Or ... call it a leash. Even so, a child with limited choices is still freer than a grounded child.

We could (and had) told Jane about that part of the future, but I don’t know that anyone from the 1980s could fully understand how ubiquitous cell phones had become and what they’d done to the world, both good and bad. I still wanted to Google things often, and regretted the loss of that option. Information, which had become so pervasive that it was noteworthy when something couldn’t be found with a bit of searching, was again scarce and contained in books, within libraries, which might require travel or a long wait for an inter-library loan.

In any case, we were where we were, for better and for worse. In the words of a movie coming out next year, a movie I very much wanted to be able to quote freely from again, ‘No matter where you go, there you are.’” Ang and I, for all that we had a perspective on the 1980s that no one else had (or, at least, we didn’t know anyone with our perspective) were still once and future kids of the 1980s, and right now the 1980s was ‘home.’ To try to be any other way would’ve driven us crazy.

When we got to Jane’s office, hers was the only car in the parking lot. We found her in her office, waiting. After hugging, we all sat.

“Always good to see you both,” she said. “I think we should start with Sharon’s note. And ... I want to make the point, again, that we all believe these notes are from Sharon, but there’s no proof of that. Someone clever could be posing as her.”

Angie nodded. “But we can’t get in trouble for playing along. I mean, if we sent money or something, we might lose it, or we could give away information, in theory. But it’s not illegal for me to contact her.”

Jane nodded. “At worst, Helen or Sam could discipline you, I suppose, but that’s just parenting, not the law.”

“So, we assume it’s ... her. We know we can’t trust her, so we’re fine there,” Angie said.

“Agreed,” Jane said.

“Agreed,” I said.

Everyone nodded.

“So ... what do we do?”

Angie smiled a little. “Write back. I want some time to think about what to say, but I’m pretty much committed to replying. If I wasn’t going to write back now, I wouldn’t have replied to the card. Nothing in the new letter was ... bad. Or a lot was, but it was past bad stuff. I mean, I get that she feels lost. I felt lost for a year, maybe even two, and...”

She stopped. We both waited, and then Jane said, “And?”

“I was about to compare fuck-ups. Like... ‘I felt lost, and mine wasn’t nearly as bad as hers.’ But fuck-ups don’t work that way. I was more lost for a while than some of the others I knew, while others had gone a whole lot further towards rock bottom than I had. It’s all relative, and ... I don’t really know her. Both... this me doesn’t know her, and my first-life me also didn’t really know her, and also the me that was there before this me didn’t either, rummaging through her ... or my ... memories. There are plenty of memories, but most of them are from immature, rather spoiled girls who were in shock and couldn’t evaluate anyone in any sort of reasonable manner.”

Jane nodded. “I think that’s a good way to look at it. I’m not saying you can’t judge, just ... be careful.”

Angie smiled. “I will be. The thing is, if I write back anything that sounds like that ... well, it’d be bad. I mean, if she’s serious. If she’s really trying to make amends and build a new life, pissing on that is the worst thing I could do, even though I’d bet serious money that she expects me to, and thinks she’s ready for it if I do. I mean, fucking hell, I’m supposed to be sixteen for real. How many sixteen-year-olds wouldn’t lash out as hard as they could?”

“A fair number,” Jane said, “but in most of those cases it’s because they’re too damaged and afraid of their own shadow to do what they probably should do. You? I can only conjecture, but I imagine a legitimately sixteen-year-old Angie would be out for blood and would probably get it.”

“This Angie probably would, if not for Steve. Well, and you, really.”

“I appreciate the compliment,” Jane said.

“Me, too,” I said.

“I’ll write something, but then I want you two both to pick at it. Steve first, obviously, but both of you. I won’t make it too long, but I have things to say, or I think I do. Like I said, I still think most of the real healing has to wait until I’m eighteen and can talk to her in person. But, see, that’s something I can write, and something I should write. If she has to wait for a year and a half, but it’s time spent thinking that there’s light at the end of the tunnel, that’s one thing. If I act like I’m just toying with her for no reason, that would just hurt.”

I reached over and squeezed Angie’s hand. “That’s the difference, I think. Angie a couple of years ago would’ve wanted it to hurt.”

She nodded. “I’ve gotten over the worst of it. Some of it is ... taking the long view, maybe. Or the Candide view. The ‘ends justify the means’ view, or whatever. If she hadn’t been such a total fuck-up, the other me would probably be with her or her parents or someone else instead of here, which means she wouldn’t be at Memorial or have Steve or Mom and Dad or ... anything. Most likely that means the other me would be a druggie and maybe on her way to being a whore, or already there. Also, this me probably wouldn’t be here at all. I’d — I mean, this me — would be somewhere else where she was who she is, ‘cuz I still think the other me had to die for me to get here. It’s kinda like a personal, fucked-up version of the Anthropic Principle, or maybe Ultimate Time-Traveler Solipsism, no Impostor Syndrome needed in this case.”

She realized we were both staring at her and stopped. “What? I read things, too!”

Jane chuckled, and I followed. Jane said, “I have never in my life had a patient mention the Anthropic Principle, and I probably would’ve bet money that one never would.”

“Pay up,” Angie said, then giggled.

After we’d settled down, Jane continued, “I do get it. You’re here only because Sharon was a total fuck-up. If she’d been any better, you’d be somewhere else. That doesn’t justify her being a fuck-up, it just means that it’s impossible that you’d have a better Sharon in your life.”

“Exactly. She has to be who she is, or worse, in order for me to know her. The universe is, in its way, manipulating me to hate her, and I reject that. I mean, I really don’t think it’s malicious or planned, it’s just that there’s no way around it.”

“Eh,” I said. “You — the old you, I mean — could’ve died in a traffic accident or had a brick fall on your head or a million other things. Sharon didn’t have to be the cause, or even involved.”

“Fine! Rain on my parade!” Angie said. “Seriously, I do get that, but ... nah. That would also just be different. I suppose I would be here, but not here here. Ugh. Yeah, that’s hard to phrase. I might be in this universe, but not with either of you, which — for all practical purposes — would make this a different universe.”

“Dangerous levels of solipsism detected,” I said.

“If you’ve got it, flaunt it,” Angie said, grinning.

“Honestly, sometimes you both make my head hurt,” Jane said, grinning, too. “I wouldn’t have it any other way, though.”

“So,” I said, “Angie writes a note, we both read and edit, she rewrites, we edit, and so on, until it’s ready to send.”

“Agreed,” Jane and Angie said together.

“Good,” I said. “I mean, like I’ve said all along, it has to be Angie’s decision. That said, I like it.”

“Me, too,” said Jane.

“I don’t see how I could do anything different, really,” Angie said. “You’re both right. If I don’t forgive, it might or might not hurt her, but it definitely hurts me. Carrying that anger and hate isn’t helping me. I don’t need it to drive me or anything.”

“Yes,” Jane said. “Another thing that’s hard to get people to see. Some of them do need it, too. Candice needs some — just a little, but some — for instance. But no one needs as much of it as most people who’ve been seriously wronged are carrying with them.”

We both nodded.

“So ... I know this took over what you wanted to talk about. Want to cover that a bit?” Jane said.

Angie looked at me. “It’s his idea — I like it, but it’s Steve’s. Let him go.”

I did, explaining the basic idea of investing in medical technology and improved medical records. It wouldn’t be the only thing we’d do — far from it — but it was one good direction. Good for us, and good for society. Free — I thought — from major ethical issues.

Jane nodded along, asking the occasional question. When I’d finished, she hesitated a minute, then spoke.

“If you’re right, and there’s no big personal innovation you’re stepping on, it sounds ethical enough to me. The idea isn’t new. I barely know anything about computers, honestly. They seem complicated and, well... difficult... to me. The picture you’re painting isn’t like that, and I’m sure that’s because you’ve seen it be different. I mean, when personal computers came out, I remember thinking ‘Why would anyone want a computer in their home?’ I still only barely get it, and most of that is listening to you two. But I’d love to just push a few buttons and get medical records — with consent and safeguards and all that, but, still. It’s not easy at all, right now. And all of the other things — I can barely imagine all of that ... technology ... around medicine.”