 
### Set It Off

by

#### Myanne Shelley

SMASHWORDS EDITION

PUBLISHED BY:

Myanne Shelley at Smashwords

Set It Off

Copyright © 2013 by Anne Shelley

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

Thank you for downloading this free ebook. You are welcome to share it with your friends. This ebook may be reproduced, copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes, provided the book remains in its complete original form. If you enjoyed this book, please return to http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/myanne to discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.

## Chapter 1 Amateur Images

# San Francisco, 2012

The 70 second video clip went viral within minutes. The handheld image swoops briefly upward, as the protester hauled himself onto a table. Then it pans the Occupy Oakland crowd streaming into the bank. (They've arrived together, taken BART across, to supplement the SF movement.) You hear shouts, grunts, a loud clatter as one of the ornate chairs crashes to the floor, and again as the glass door shatters. Faces, contorted in anger, chanting "we are." One man moves into focus. He swirls, exhorting those following him, and swings back around, his whole arm like a battering ram, knocking down a smaller, older man. Someone from the bank, who had stepped forward toward the protesters. From above, you see man on the floor, a shocked expression on his face, and then the guy who knocked him down is screaming, "He's one of them! He doesn't deserve our pity!" Several other young men lash out toward the banker, kicking him, while others pull back; the chants lessen and there are confused sounding exclamations. A vicious blow lands to the man's head and his eyes role backwards. A woman screams from behind the counter. The image abruptly cuts out.

Most people who were there didn't actually see any of this. The bank's lobby was small, the crowd intent on shutting down business as usual. That they had clearly done. A younger, determined bunch, already schooled in earlier demonstrations, sat in front of the entrance and linked arms. Others milled about on the sidewalk and into the street.

An ambulance arrived about the same time as the young cameraman posted his video feed. Even as people outside, one then another saw it, showed the link, asked themselves what had happened, the leaders inside were standing their ground. This was not filmed, this was what people said later, during the police investigation. TV news, complacent and inured to the regular protests by this time, had missed it all and had to rely on the amateur images.

JJ Carlisle, the guy who had – seemingly by accident – knocked over the bank branch manager and yelled with such fury to the crowd, was not the one whose kick had delivered the dangerous blow. Rather he had seemed intent on unleashing his personal fury at each bank employee individually, his contorted, screaming, angry face as close to their faces as he could manage. One or two held their ground, but most had retreated to back rooms in genuine terror.

A group of at least a dozen had wreaked more actual violence. In addition to kicking the one banker and throwing punches toward anyone official who came near, they had overturned furniture and knocked aside the bank's video monitors and paper displays. Then blended back into the crowd, the crowd that impeded the police from making their way into the bank.

After the earlier incidents of brutality, the force had been served notice to move with caution. Of course, after the officers realized the extent of bank exec Robert White's injuries, that tide could easily turn again.

Jackie Carlisle and Karen Emerson met in the hallway at 850 Bryant three days later. Sister and stepsister of JJ Carlisle, each summoned with a barrage of texts and messages, his way of ensuring that someone who looked responsible to the police would arrive to pick him up.

Jackie had a clean t-shirt and a hoodie, pilfered from the back of her husband Tony's closet. Karen brought a burrito, triple wrapped in foil and still warm. The women compared notes at the counter, as they stood waiting. Their appearance as upstanding citizens, middle aged nicely dressed women, did not spur the police staff to move with any haste.

"It's the siege at Kresge's all over again," Jackie muttered. She referenced an incident from over 30 years ago, when they were high school friends and JJ a runty 7 year old, bullied into shoplifting and caught red handed.

Karen flashed a grin. "He wanted us to bring him food back then too, didn't he?" Together they had sweet talked the store manager and paid for the small trinkets, downplayed the whole thing to a misunderstanding to Jackie and JJ's parents.

Even so, JJ had achieved a brief bit of notoriety in their small home town of Blossom Valley. He had, in the second grade, developed a hitch in his walk, the small swagger that remained to this day. Some of the other kids looked to him for direction at recess, even though he was average in stature and neither brainy nor exceptionally wild.

Until then, JJ had not been exceptional at all, just the much loved youngest child, the only boy, conceived in a last ditch and unsuccessful attempt to save a failing marriage. Back in small town Pennsylvania, JJ's image had easily faded back to obscurity. It took more reckless behavior in later years to cement his bad boy reputation, though even that had hardly crossed the small community's borders.

Now, he had been identified in the clip that had been viewed by millions and counting, commented on by thousands, discussed in Occupy meet ups, college campuses, and everyday offices by tens of thousands more. Both Jackie and Karen had seen the video, but neither yet realized how widely it had circulated, nor had really considered what it might mean for JJ and his family.

Karen had a 19 year old daughter who had always looked up to JJ, the fun uncle, closer to her in age and still capable of boyish enthusiasm well into his 30s. She was glad Bethany was unaware of this little journey downtown, though. JJ had sounded so angry in his voice messages. Furious at the arrest, though surely it hadn't been unexpected. Self righteous, unwilling, or perhaps unable to see the harm he had instigated, sure he'd be bailed out of this, as ever. And indeed, one of the astoundingly young Occupy Oakland legal guys had posted bail, with a simple, wearied click of his iphone app.

Eventually a tired looking police officer appeared, JJ at his side. The policeman's pace was measured, while JJ strained, yanking his arm away, tossing his head around, pulling himself as far ahead as he could get. The officer dropped his arm as if he'd been carrying dog do the moment they passed the security gate.

JJ's angry expression morphed quickly to a carefree grin, and he launched himself between the two women, awkwardly hugging them both.

"Jeez, JJ, you really need a shower," Jackie said, teasing although not inaccurate.

Karen dangled the burrito bag. "I feel like I should ask you to explain yourself first. That's what your mom would have done." She smiled, but her eyes remained serious.

JJ plucked the plastic bag from her fingers and tore through the foil. "Good old mom. Glad she missed this." He took a bite. "Mm, I'm so hungry." He looked up, eyes darting between them, focused on the food but at least a tiny bit aware of the social niceties of the situation. "Thanks for coming down here. I didn't mean it like that about Mom."

Jackie nodded. Their mother had succumbed to a fast moving cancer just a couple years back. "Dad and Amelia are, um, concerned. They saw your picture on the news before anyone even told them about the arrest."

Karen noticed the way that everyone within earshot was listening, daggers shooting from several sets of eyes. It occurred to her that someone might consider this a news event. Bailing out her ne'er do well stepbrother could well revolve into some further televised embarrassment. "Let's go, you guys," she said, picking up the grimy bag that had been dropped at JJ's feet and expecting him to follow.

"Can't get out of here fast enough," JJ sneered, with a quick hostile glance toward all the uniforms behind the counter.

They all three walked quickly, Jackie's heels echoing on the marble floors. Past courtroom doors, out the lobby, past the bored looking security guards and random confused people shuffling in for afternoon jury duty.

Karen was aware of people watching them, murmuring, at least one snapping a quick picture. She lowered her head, trying to obscure her face without giving the appearance of shame. Jackie had her phone out – she was preoccupied, texting her husband, trying to remember how much time was left on the meter. But JJ walked as though he expected people to pause and take note of his progress. He paused for a moment at the top of the steps, eyes blinking in the bright sunlight, then spread his arms slightly. As if offering benediction. As if everything was right with the world.

## Chapter 2 Just Another Phase

# Blossom Valley, 1975

A few months after she turned 12, Karen Emerson began a brief but passionate phase of writing down absolute truths on the covers of her three ring notebooks, then inking over them so thoroughly that the ballpoint pen raised hash marks like Braille on the inside. In this way she could be reminded of what she had written, what she knew, but not risk anyone else like her brothers or parents reading it.

Everything was a phase, according to her mom, who was recently into pop psychology. It was as if anything anyone in the family thought to do could be easily dismissed as some unoriginal reaction to the outside world. Predictable and soon passed. Her mom ("please, call me Amelia" to her friends, so embarrassing!) could even joke about her own journey, as she called it, into feminism. It was a little behind the time the new women's movement had hit the big cities, and quite a lot more subdued. But she was on the journey!

She had taken a part time job a couple years back when Karen was in 5th and her younger brother in 3rd grade. More recently she'd cut her hair into a modern shag. She had a group of friends who had a monthly night out, women only, and brought home books that were, she said, brimming with new ideas.

Karen, frankly, had gotten busy enough with her own life not to pay all that much attention to her mother's doings anymore. Seventh grade meant the Junior High across town, rising super early to catch the bus, seeing the transformation of kids she had known since kindergarten. Some were already growing tall, developing, pretty popular girls and athletic boys, while others pushed their way into one or another newly formed lesser tiers.

Karen, who had always coasted pretty easily in the middle ground, found herself scrambling a bit in the new scheme of things. She got along pretty well with boys and girls both, and with older and younger kids. She had two brothers after all, one older and one younger. But lately she was understanding what her older brother Peter had tried to tell her, one rainy afternoon the summer before. "It's just different, it's just different," he had repeated several times, finally shushing her so they could both watch the repeat of Star Trek on TV.

Peter had reached high school, so they took different buses and didn't talk much now day to day. He had grown suddenly taller (his "growing phase" according to Mom) as well as become irritable and sometimes spookily quiet. He could be in a room with the rest of the family but also somehow not there. As if he was actually hovering somewhere above, or in a science lab somewhere, observing the rest of them through a microscope.

She could see now how hard junior high might have been for him, a quiet and skinny boy who was smart but in a way that probably branded him a teacher's pet. Karen was usually referred to as nice or sweet or fun, where Peter was the smart one, their younger brother Clay the funny and clever one. She wasn't dumb. Just not as smart. But smart enough to see that being real smart wasn't a good thing anymore, nor popping your hand up in class every time you knew the answers.

Karen instead worked to establish herself as friendly and nice. The sort of girl who would say hello to anyone she saw, who wasn't mean to the unpopular kids or scared of the rough country kids, the ones who got into fights during lunch period. She had her eye, already, on the high school twirling team, which was two rungs below cheerleaders, one below pom poms, but better than marching band. Or the kids who did nothing at all.

Lucky for her, she had a little group of friends who had hung around sometimes in elementary school. These were girls who quickly sat together where they could, and found a table toward the front of the cafeteria that first noisy frightening day at lunch period A. One of the girls had left the group, morphed into the tanned, shiny haired, perfectly made up group that sat together with the popular boys at the dead center at lunch. But Karen had met and brought in a new girl, Jackie, who easily took her place.

Jackie's family had moved from Boston, which she breezily called "the city." She was a tall, broad shouldered girl with perfectly feathered ashy blond hair, a wide smile despite her braces, and a fast, bossy way of talking that Karen admired. On their first day in class, Jackie had interrupted the Home Ec. teacher to clarify the appearance of boiling water. Somehow the way she did it, smiling and confident, hadn't bothered the teacher, who was like a hundred years old and probably just glad anyone was even listening.

All of their little group lived in the same part of town. The nice part, their mom called it. The boring part, Peter said – although it's not like there was really an interesting section of Blossom Valley. There were a couple streets up at the top of the hill with bigger houses, lush lawns, wide porches with views of the whole area (the fancy part). Karen didn't think anyone with kids lived up there though, it seemed like mostly old people. And there were two trailer parks, but it was dull there too. Mostly grown ups there worked in the factory a couple towns over – people who tried not to draw much attention to themselves. Kids who lived there usually tried to hide the fact, although after awhile everyone knew.

The rest of the town stretched over the rolling hills, modest suburban tract homes all built around the same time, back when people started settling here, extending a pattern of escaping Philadelphia and then the busy suburban towns around it. To the east were a series of larger and more populous towns, to the west it was more rural farms dotted with small villages until you got to solidly into Amish country. In the very center of Blossom Valley there were some older structures, brick or stone, and just one block with some stores and a gas station. For most everything else you needed, someone had to drive 10 miles or so over a highway too dangerous for bikes, which was totally frustrating for everybody under age 16.

Fortunately Jackie lived in easy biking distance from Karen. And happily her mom didn't care where she rode her bike as long as she stayed off the highway. Jackie's parents were actually kind of strict about where she went. Jackie just laughed this off as the burden of being the oldest. She just had to prove herself responsible, she assured them all, and they would loosen up. They were still getting used to living out in the country. That's what all the Carlisles called their new home, despite its being on an ordinary street with regularly spaced houses.

Jackie had to share a bedroom with her younger sister, which rankled her. Karen didn't see that it was really a problem though – Jackie pretty much bossed Joy around, and Joy was willing to do what she was told just for the privilege of staying in the room, listening to the 12 year olds talk. "We're practically teenagers," Jackie often stated. "People should just get used to treating us like teenagers now."

They had the cutest baby brother. Both sisters complained about having to care for him, babysitting when their mother went places, changing his disgusting diapers, listening to him squalling in the morning. But Karen could tell they got a huge kick out of him, just as she did. Their love for him ran a lot deeper than their exaggerated complaints about his gross eating habits or the way he ran shouting through the house wearing only a droopy diaper.

The baby was named Jerry, but everybody called him JJ. He was a junior, named after his father Jerry. Her dad really wanted a boy, Jackie told Karen, to explain why her mom had had another baby despite being so old. Until she mentioned it, that hadn't struck Karen as out of the ordinary. Her own father was pretty old, more than a decade older than her mother, something they made stupid jokes about sometimes. But Jackie's father didn't seem that excited about having a son that she could tell.

She had only met him once, and that was when she had been over on a Saturday. He had been mowing the lawn – he'd muttered pleased to meetcha, before grabbing a beer and returning to the yard. Jackie said he didn't like rural life as much as he thought he would. She said her parents had been fighting more in the city. Moving to a quiet place and having another baby were supposed to make them happy. It did stop them from fighting; now they didn't talk much to each other. He had a long commute and often missed coming home in time for dinner. While her mom, according to Jackie, kept finding excuses to drive from town to town, shopping or getting ideas for the garden. Or possibly just driving aimlessly, smoking, returning empty handed, or thanking the girls for babysitting by handing them each a candy bar they could have easily gotten in town.

Jackie said she liked hanging out at Karen's house better than at her own. Karen had her own room, for starters. She preferred the food they had on hand for snacks, and got a kick out of seeing her dad in the kitchen (one of Mom's things after she got her part time job, that Dad should part time cook). Her mom would talk to them as if they were normal people, not tiny children. Mom liked to get a "young person's perspective," and while Karen, Peter and Clay would just roll their eyes at that, Jackie loved to answer all these crazy questions. And if Peter had a friend over, Jackie would find every possible excuse to parade herself by the pair of them, head tilted down, eyes darting up, smiling, laughing, gauging their reactions.

Karen, at least until this point, had never looked at either brothers' friends as anything beyond annoying extensions of themselves. As for her parents, they'd always seemed pretty normal with each other, aside from Mom's embarrassing need to speak everything on her mind. But seeing the way Jackie's could be in the same house but never really meet each other's eyes was kind of odd. Still, she felt more like a grown up over there. Jackie's parents let them alone, and they could fix their own snacks. Joy treated them like rock stars, and they got to take care of little JJ, dressing him up, hauling him around, even pushing him outside in his stroller.

Autumn afternoons, Karen liked lolling around Jackie's bedroom pretending to do homework but really whispering about TV shows and movie stars and older kids at school. Or taking JJ "out for air," pushing the stroller together as it crunched through the fallen leaves, the fresh scent of cut grass and raked leaves mixing with hints of neighbors' dinners.

Drifting away in her head to fantasies of being grown up, with her own baby, a house and a handsome husband in it awaiting her return. And in her imagination, she and this faceless but suave guy would have teasing, bantering conversations. They would talk fast, the way Jackie did, cleverly playing off each other's sentences, laughing together, toasting each other and their friends with sweet delicious drinks. They would never slouch around in bathrobes every weekend morning or fall asleep in front of the TV, as her parents did. Nor glide past each other with looks on their faces that said almost out loud what a disappointment it was to be sharing even a moment together. Like Jackie's.

And riding home, her bike flying down the hills, hair streaming behind her, Karen tried but usually failed to maintain her fantasy world. Something about being on the bike just felt so childish, fun but goofy and unsophisticated. By the time she had bounced over the lawn and stowed her bike in the garage, she was back to being 12. Unsure of much of anything past what was for dinner that night.

Still, she found herself spending less time playing and more time just sitting, pondering, trying to figure things out. One hand looping through her plain brown hair, wishing it was longer and fuller. The other straying softly across the covers of her notebooks, fingertips brushing the darkened places. Remembering what she had written.

Teachers lie. Being smart is better than being pretty. It's much worse being alone in a crowd than being home alone. Nobody's happy all the time. I'm more afraid of not trying than of trying and failing.

That last one wasn't entirely true for Karen, at least not yet. But it was something she had heard on TV that stuck with her. Something to aim for, the sort of person she wanted to be.

## Chapter 3 Some Small Adjustments

# Blossom Valley, 1977

For the first time in her entire life, Jackie Carlisle was actually glad when Christmas break was over and she had to go back to school. Even getting up on cold dark mornings, climbing onto the stinking wheezy bus with damp half frozen hair, was better than the long days at home.

Ninth grade was at least predictable, at least had a chance of some laughs. Where day to day at home, who knew what weird thing would happen next? And since her parents had announced they were getting divorced, it was like no laughing allowed on the premises.

Jackie, anyway, had not been much surprised by the announcement. Not like her sister, who burst into pretty pink cheeked tears, or her brother, who being only 3, had no idea what forever even meant. At least, she told her friends later, they didn't tell me they were going to move somewhere new and have another baby. She had a new, hoarse sounding laugh, a slightly deeper voice that she had been cultivating. Cynical, world weary – and why not, with the way her family was driving her crazy.

She and her friends were the top dogs at school, and she tried to take advantage of that status when she could. Next year, tenth grade, they'd be back at the bottom at the high school. Honestly, being the leader, being the oldest, tallest, smartest and so on came naturally to Jackie. She was the oldest in her family, and the oldest of her cousins too. She had been tall since she could remember, always one of a few girls relegated to the back row in class pictures (no cute ribbon haired cross legged poses for her).

As for being smart, she was pretty confident there too. She had always gotten good grades. When she was little, the teachers would write stuff like "it's a pleasure to have Jackie in my class" or "she's always prepared and very helpful around the classroom" in those notes they sent home to her parents. And not to be super competitive, but Joy's notes never seemed as good.

This year, though, Jackie wondered what the teachers would write, if they still wrote notes instead of just assigning grades. She always did her work, including little flourishes where she could, or extra credit assignments if available. None of the classes were all that hard really. But she had noticed in History, that the teacher kind of favored some of the kids who were, like, secretly smart. Who didn't raise their hands, but knew the answers if called on, and who liked to argue the so called right answers.

She could remember this one guy, already obviously a stoner even in ninth grade, talking about Kennedy and Vietnam, and the teacher nodding, smiling, even though what the kid was saying was nowhere to be found in their textbook. Or a paper she had written that came back with only a B, and a comment about not "just regurgitating what was in the book." She'd had to look up the word, and then been mad – wasn't all of school just a matter of digesting then barfing back up the same facts?

She told herself it didn't matter. That teacher, anyway, was kind of pathetic. You could tell he was young and inexperienced, never mind the beard he had that he liked to stroke. He tried to use teenage slang, only it came off stupid. Things like exclaiming, "dynamite!" when who said that anymore. They probably made fun of him in the teacher's lounge.

What bothered Jackie more – what she tried not to think about, or steered her mind away when it wandered there – was that possibly in the bigger world she was not destined to be the smartest or the one in charge. There were two feeder schools to the high school, so twice as many kids. And already things like Bs in History. Proofs in Geometry she could struggle through but that truthfully didn't make much sense when they were finished. She wondered if she was not quite getting it the way the dweebier kids did.

Ironic, she thought (vocab word, memorized, of course), if it turned out she wasn't as smart as everyone had always assumed. Her superior abilities were the one thing that both her parents agreed on.

Jackie had to catch the bus straight home three days a week now. And while she did not necessarily have a better place to go, it sucked just the same. If it wasn't too cold, her friends could stay after, hang around and then take a long, slow walk home, or catch the late bus. They could go bike riding or all get together at somebody's house, watch TV in the basement or something.

Jackie, on her babysitting days, was only allowed to have one friend over at a time. Any more was considered a distraction, as if two people over would keep her from noticing if JJ had wandered outside to play in traffic. On their stupid little street that had no cars, and as if he would bother going outside without a whole entourage to push his stroller and carry his snacks.

But those were the rules. And Joy would be sure to tattle if Jackie broke them. Or if they tried to coordinate and both have more than one friend over, both agree not to tell, little JJ would be sure to rattle off everybody's name to Mom later on. Sneaky little blabbermouth. Young as he was, he had a pretty good sense of when anyone was trying to fool him. Like a sixth sense, he'd perk right up and pay special attention the moment she or Joy started telling him something that might bend a rules the tiniest bit.

Jackie just did her best to adjust. Same as she had always done. "You're the oldest, you set the example," and so on. She had not wanted to move, back when they had left the city, but now Blossom Valley really felt like home. To be honest, that had been her first thought when Mom was explaining the divorce and how Dad would now be living in the place where he sometimes stayed over, closer to his work.

Joy had sat there, cuter than pie, choking back her tears, while JJ's head swung between her and Mom like a hyper yo yo. Dad had sat stiffly, with a serious but friendly expression, his basic salesman face on, saying nothing, as if they had agreed that Mom would talk and his job was just to nod. And Jackie had been sitting there wondering if they would have to move, how she could stand being the new kid in the middle of the school year. How long to wait, looking somber, before she could get that part clarified.

"We'll stay here," Mom had said.

"Here in the house?" Jackie asked, making sure. Both parents nodded, exchanging one of those looks that made it seem like they had been married, would be married, forever. She had glanced at Joy, wishing the pair of them could communicate with just a raised eyebrow, back each other up the way sisters in trouble did in books.

But Joy was just staring at Mom, bug eyed in relief, as if the idea of a move was only just occurring to her.

Jackie shook her head now, freshly annoyed at the memory. It was another dull afternoon. Joy was down in the basement, listening to her three favorite 45s on the scratchy old hi-fi over and over again. One of them was a Bee Gees song that had started to get badly on her nerves. But since she had announced that she would only listen to albums anymore, Joy played her little records all the more.

And JJ, for whom Jackie was forced to be here for all afternoon while Mom worked her new job, was basically content to play on his own. He was playing one of his favorite games, which involved dragging all his toy train tracks and bright orange race car tracks into the living room and running them across the furniture in a growing and ever changing course. He wasn't big on actually running the trains and cars – and a good thing, since the tracks tended to loop and dip in gravity defying ways – but had a fine time just making weird configurations.

He looked up as Jackie leaned toward the front window to see out. The weather was Pennsylvania at its dullest, not snowing or even raining, not windy enough to be a storm but not sunny either. Just gray and cold. "Watch," JJ said in his childish monotone. "Watch this."

"Good, JJ," Jackie said back brightly. "Wow." She couldn't even tell what he had done differently. Not that that mattered; he just wanted somebody to pay attention. Yeah, that was her job, she thought. Sit and praise JJ. Because she knew that contented as he was playing with her there, if she went left the room, he would find some reason to whine or he would pretend to hurt himself, or in some way need to assure he had attention before he could go back to playing by himself.

He had his own bedroom – the three and a half year old! – just because he was the only boy, while she and Joy had to share. Not that he appreciated it at all, oh no, he had to drag all of his toys into wherever she was sitting.

JJ hummed to himself, but it was like he had eyes in the back of his head as far as whether she was watching. Jackie went over to the phone. "I'm calling Karen," she told him, knowing he would pester her with questions otherwise. In addition to being one of her best friends, Karen didn't mind helping baby sit. She thought JJ was adorable.

"Karn, Karn," JJ repeated back. He picked up one of his wooden train cars and ran it back and forth, still mumbling. Was he naming his train after her or just telling it? He seemed fond of Karen too, although it was a little hard to tell with him – he would be pretty friendly with anyone who walked in and said boo to him.

Jackie just needed a brief conversation to convince Karen to come over. She was home and bored too, they both had homework, and Karen didn't have to stay inside.

She hung up and went to get a book out, maybe read an assignment during the time it took Karen to bike over. JJ had dropped his train and went back to rearranging the tracks.

Karen, she thought, was pretty smart, but also tended to be one of those kids who wouldn't raise a hand even if they knew the answer. She didn't seem to care about her grades, although they were good. She didn't want people to think of her as a smart kid, in fact she made kind of a point of trying to fit in with the average kids. She worried that smart girls were never popular or pretty, she had said as much.

Karen wasn't all that pretty, Jackie thought, smart or not. Nothing really stood out about her – her hair was mousy brown, her eyes somewhere between brown and hazel, her face kind of narrow, lips thin. But she had a nice smile, a cheerful way of making you feel like she cared about you. Even JJ must have picked up on that. What had Mom said – Karen was trustworthy.

Well, that was the kind of friend Jackie needed, she thought. Teenage years were supposedly the worst. The world was going to crap, her own little world all the more so. Dad moving out, Mom and Dad with their hissing hostile arguments as he chose what to take with him, fake smiles from both as they discussed the visits to Dad's apartment and summer vacation possibilities. More than ever, she needed people she could count on.

## Chapter 4 A Chance to Catch Up

# San Francisco, 2012

JJ Carlisle leaned back into the expensive leather rear seat of his sister's husband's car. Tony drove, fake casual, an arm draped over his seat towards Jackie but fingers tapping nervously, giving himself away. Jackie sat upright, her head zooming back and forth, part watching the road, teeth clenched, probably pushing an imaginary brake as Tony wove through traffic. And part earnestly talking at JJ, trying as ever to "engage him," to "bring him out." All those psychobabble techniques she had been using for years.

He snorted back a laugh, suddenly reminded of being driven places by his dad. As a teenager, after his sisters had moved away – being stoned and almost cracking up at everything he saw, while his dad drove the car, and whoever was the current girlfriend tried to chat him up, all fake friendly.

He watched his sister's expression change to one of annoyance. The frown line she'd had since she was like 15 was now permanent, and it deepened. "It's not funny," she said.

"What?"

"That they're worried about you. JJ, getting taken to jail is serious, even if you got right back out."

JJ pffted his lips, trying to replay the last bit of their conversation in his head. He hadn't been paying much attention, just nodding while Jackie droned on about whatever. Their dad and Amelia, that was it. "I'll be cool," he said. "I'll reassure them. They won't stay mad."

"They're not mad so much as concerned. They've probably seen that video on the news by now. It's not a pretty picture. Whatever your lawyer is telling people, you're the one who knocked that guy down."

"He ran into me," JJ answered. Exactly what the lawyers said to say to anyone who asked, not to mention the truth. As far as he could remember the guy was on the floor before he'd even seen him coming. Anyway, the point was corporate greed.

"You were there, right in the front of what I'm sure they would see as an angry mob. You could have just held a sign or something, couldn't you? You were screaming at the guy." She sighed audibly. They had been over this. "Plus you know they're going to ask about if you have any job leads." Jackie's eyes darted downward. It was obvious she wanted to know too – this was just her little way of asking without being rude.

He turned toward the window. They were on the Bay Bridge now, shooting by trucks and slower moving sedans. He could barely make out the water down below. In Oakland, those huge shipping container devices at the port stood like lumbering dinosaurs, unused.

That's the sort of job he should have had, JJ thought. Something real, a genuine union job with good pay and benefits, and a built in brotherhood of solid guys to work with, sharing the load. Ha, remember those old days. Those kinds of jobs were gone now, sucked away by multinational corporations, and thus his own involvement in the Occupy movement.

He had started in San Francisco, being that's where he lived. But they got kind of wussy, too willing to compromise or make nice with the cops. Occupy Oakland felt more real. That's where he would be today, if not for getting dragged off by Jackie, and that had been his main movement before the thing at the bank went down. JJ felt a streak of anger shoot through him, again, just remembering the indignity. How the cops had treated him, the stuff press people yelled, their stupid questions.

"He's not going to answer," Tony said to Jackie, in that high mincing corporate voice of his, loud enough for JJ to hear.

He turned his focus back to the car. His so called job prospects. Ignoring Tony, JJ addressed his sister. "You can tell Dad and everybody at the country club that I plan to have some contract stuff lined up shortly. Friend of a friend, actually, who saw me on TV and also remembered the programming I did at MoDoCo."

"Well that's good, JJ. In your field, right? Is it a start up?"

"Dude, enough with the questions. I don't know, we just texted."

That much was true. Point of fact, the guy was mostly just saying damn, I can't believe I know someone on TV, as if he was bragging to a bunch of nerds at a bar (or gathered in a basement more likely). That JJ had the muscle to knock a guy down, when the rest of them had chickened out of every fist fight since the second grade. But he had texted, they had gone back and forth about JJ's programming work and that he'd now consider doing more of it. And that fell under the definition of having stuff lined up, right – anyway, enough of a so called lead for the family to chew on and be satisfied.

"I can't believe Dad's turning 80. It's crazy." Jackie reverted to the topic she had been discussing at length and in detail to anyone who would listen for weeks now. Months. "He really looks good for 80, doesn't he? I mean, he seems younger now than he did 15 years ago."

"He's got a good attitude these days," Tony said. Also about the three hundredth time he had repeated those words. Usually followed by some observation about how marrying Amelia and moving to California had done him a world of good.

"Totally," JJ exclaimed, knowing Jackie would pester him until he gave some sort of chipper positive response.

Now they were off the bridge. Jackie and Tony muttered about which lane they needed to be in. Tony, ever patient, let her tell him how to drive, never mind he had driven this route a million times before. He should just let her drive his car, JJ thought. If they hadn't picked him up, for sure the two of them would be in her two seater. He had offered to take BART over, call the house from the station. But she would have none of that, it was no problem, they would love to pick him up, what a great chance to catch up.

Jackie didn't trust that he would actually show up if she didn't personally escort him. JJ grinned to himself. She had a point. He would make it over eventually, probably, but no way this early. No way with his own present, where she had instructed him to add his name to the card attached to a giant wrapped box perched next to him in the back seat. An amazing birdhouse, one of a kind, just the type he wants, she had whispered proudly, from all three of us.

Typical Jackie. As usual, JJ felt a contradictory set of reactions – appreciation that now his ass was covered and annoyance that of course she decided on the gift and purchased it, took total charge of the thing while assuming he and Joy wouldn't get it together themselves without her doing it all. The party, she probably would have done the whole thing herself except for Amelia's intervention.

Amelia, according to Jackie, had insisted on no surprises, and on having it at their house out in Orinda, even though the city would have been more central for lots of the guests. JJ had listened to her whole rant about the thing back on the way home from Christmas dinner. God, you'd think it was a meeting to bring peace to the Middle East, from the importance she gave every nuance.

Amelia had severely culled the guest list too, insisting on only close friends and family. Jackie, JJ was sure, saw this as some sort of defeat in the grand competition of life of who has the most friends and admirers. Jackie, who still posted near daily status updates on facebook and boasted several hundred "friends."

JJ would rather the thing was in the city just for convenience sake, but he could see how Dad would much prefer people coming to him. He was actually a little surprised that Amelia had stood up to Jackie like this. She always made such a point of being nice to all of them, supportive, even pushing Dad's ties to his original family. But Amelia was like a rat terrier, he'd heard her daughter Karen say, when it came to protecting those she loved. And anyway, Amelia liked gatherings that were mostly family.

"When's Joy getting there," JJ asked. Joy was the only one of them who hadn't migrated west. Not quite the prodigal daughter, but she didn't come to visit as often as Jackie or Amelia thought she should. Dad, JJ thought, probably didn't notice. He was probably relieved that she wasn't living her lesbian life style where he would have to better acknowledge it.

"She's been there," Jackie exclaimed. "I know you've been busy getting fighting your charges and all, but haven't you been paying attention? She flew in two days ago. Supposedly she's helping set up."

Jackie and Tony exchanged a glance. JJ had long learned to ignore that sort of comment. He had neither awareness nor interest in whatever might be brewing between his sisters. Or maybe that was just some sort of anti-lesbian comment, like too bad it wasn't JJ who was gay, then they'd have a good decorator in the family. JJ hid his smirk, head aimed back toward the window.

"Karen's going to get there early to help, though Bill might be late," Jackie continued. "And Bethany will help, I think, though I guess she's coming separately from Cal. Can you believe she's in college already? But neither of the boys can make it. Apparently they're planning to Skype with them."

JJ felt her eyes on him, possibly looking for some props that she knew how to Skype. He nodded, making a note to himself to avoid that boring exchange between the 40 something "boys" and the step-dad they'd barely met.

Tony, signaling carefully, pulled into the left lane entering the Caldecott tunnel. JJ closed his eyes, a moment's peace from the chattering. All the cars' noises echoed in his ears, and lights from the sides of the tunnel flashed on his closed lids. It was strangely comforting. Where most people said they went out into nature to relax, or sought out silent monasteries where they could meditate, JJ found himself most at rest in the midst of noise and lights and fast movement. Another thing to like about Occupy Oakland, he thought. He was pretty sure he could tell people that and they would understand, or at least shrug their shoulders. Where the crunchy ideologues in SF would recoil in delicate horror at him for feeling that way. Or at least for admitting it out loud.

JJ was roused from his thoughts by their arrival. Good thing Tony was driving; even if he'd borrowed a car, no way he could remember the last few winding streets that led to Dad's little house.

Orinda sucked. It was this cute little town, one of a precious string of them called LaMorinda, in a valley in the eastern East Bay. Nauseatingly cute stores in a little downtown, streets weaving up into the hills, McMansions and overpaid yuppies who hired gardeners and didn't pay them fairly.

To be fair, Dad and Amelia's house was normal sized, small even, just room for the two of them and a couple tiny guest rooms for visitors. They had bought over a decade ago, before the tech boom peaked, when real estate hadn't gone crazy yet at least that far from Silicon Valley. Dad had moved out just a couple years after he himself had, persuaded by Amelia that their roots were mostly gone from the east anymore.

JJ thought back to it, himself in his 20s, weirded out at the idea that not only his sister and stepsister but now his father would be living nearby. As it turned out though, he really didn't see the parents very much, it wasn't different from when they were back east. Amelia was the difference really – her coming into the picture meant old Dad suddenly remembering he had kids and when their birthdays were and Sunday phone calls just to say hi.

As it turned out, he thought, he was an idiot not to have bought a house of his own out here. He could have – he could have! Straight out of college (he hadn't even finished to get his degree, not that that mattered to anyone then), JJ had been hired by Oracle. Then moved to Cisco, and then on to his first start up, in each case taking stock shares with him, selling them back as they zoomed upward in value.

Stock options instead of salary, the norm of seeing profits explode, and people his age driving brand new cars and buying condos in the city, bidding them up before they had even been fully built. JJ had not wanted the hassle. Yes he got a new car, but the whole home ownership thing, not into it at 25. Where now at, God, he choked on the number, 38, too damn bad he hadn't invested in some little place like this. Bought and then sold at the peak, made another cool million and this time frigging kept it.

JJ shook his head. Not the time to start bumming out about his lost millions. Rather, he plastered a goofy smile on his face and followed his sister into the house.

Dad offered bear hugs to everybody just inside, a smile goofy but wide and genuine on his leathery face.

"Hey Dad, how old are you again?" The living room was festooned with streamers and balloons, a huge Happy 80th sign drooping off the wall over the sofa.

"Well, look at the TV star," Dad roared back. "I always dreamed of a son who'd break a baseball record. Guess this will have to do."

Jackie and Tony chuckled appreciatively. You could tell Dad had been repeating this line to everyone he saw.

Amelia scurried up, talking in a flurry about where to put coats and presents and the cake being late and would they like a drink or should they wait until it officially started. She was dressed in some kind of fancy gown, way beyond her normal older lady sweater and slacks. Even her hair was piled on her head. JJ nodded along as Jackie complimented her, unsure himself of what to say. Glancing back, he realized Dad was in a suit.

He cast a quick look down, having spaced out what he had put on this morning. Nice khakis, a striped sweater that had been a gift. Jackie had specified when she called to say when they'd pick him, he remembered, no holes, no logos, no jeans.

Their sister Joy bounded in from the kitchen. "You're here, finally, hi you guys." In a rush she grabbed each of them with one handed hugs, the other clamped somewhat desperately to her beer bottle.

Jackie issued a quick series of directions about the present, and Joy started in about the food in the kitchen. JJ exchanged a look and a shrug with Tony and followed her back. "You stay there and greet people, Dad," Joy admonished. "Just pretend you don't know what's going on in here." She wiped her hand on her pants – also khakis; had Jackie told her what to wear too?

Every surface in the kitchen was laden with food or glassware or some weird decorative item. Amelia, lucky for everybody, didn't care about her kitchen being taken over like this, not the way their mom probably would have. Back a zillion years ago before she kicked him out.

JJ waited, feeling over large and in the way, until Jackie assigned him a task of slicing some vegetables. He wanted a beer, but thought he had better wait a little while. Joy got some slack cut, probably since she'd been dealing with all this for two days.

Shortly there was another high pitched roar from the front, and then their stepsister Karen squeezed into the room, arms wrapped protectively around a giant bakery box. Her kid Bethany followed, softly saying hi to everybody. She had a funny mix of emotions on her face – partly laughing with her mom, caught up in the excitement of the party and whatever disaster almost averted the cake, partly slouching, cool, bummed to be the youngest person around by almost 20 years.

The women's voices rose all around him. Amelia had come back too, all of them cooing over the food and cake and decorations. Karen saying about the traffic in Berkeley, madness in the bakery parking lot – destined to be another saga in the family lore, something to be repeated later at every gathering to entertain the new people never mind bore everyone else to death.

Joy slipped her bottle into the recycle bin, wiping her hands further on her pants, that were now both damp and stained. At Jackie's look, she exclaimed, "I have a skirt, don't worry. I'll go change."

JJ looked at the refrigerator, mind again on a beer. Or something – something about all those familiar voices just made him want to get buzzed as quick as he could.

"They're in the ice chest," Joy said to him, tilting her head to the back porch.

"If you don't think it's too early to start," Jackie added, as usual eyes in the back of her head to pay attention to every conversation around her.

JJ shrugged. When the sisters started bugging him, he lost interest in behaving appropriately. "I don't, actually." He saw Bethany watching. "Want one too? Are you old enough yet?"

Bethany shook her head, taking half a step backwards away from both him and Karen. He expected her to say something about the YouTube thing. Karen couldn't have kept her from seeing it, could she, for Christ's sake, Bethany was in college. He popped open his beer and took a couple long, comforting swigs.

As Jackie took over the final food prep, the others drifted away. Except for Tony, who stood at her side obeying her every command like one of their well trained dogs.

JJ stepped into the living room. A couple of their neighbors had arrived, more old people. So the party was official. JJ watched Bethany edging along the far side of the room, politely addressing one of the old ladies. It was possible she was avoiding him.

Across the room, Amelia had Dad posed under the sign, giving a thumbs up, while somebody took a picture. Dad did look happy, JJ thought. Amelia did too, standing there leaning toward him, arm looped comfortably through his. She always did, though, she was a naturally cheerful sort of person.

Dad, though – to see him here now, retired with plenty of time on his hands, interested in golfing and gardening, perfectly content to accompany Amelia to the Farmers' Market or have a leisurely dinner with his kids – you'd hardly recognize the man JJ remembered from being a kid. JJ recalled those weekend visits he would have, especially once the girls were away. He would be fed and entertained, asked the usual questions about school or sports, but mostly he just felt like he was in the way. Dad would suggest he watch TV and then busy himself with work he had brought home, or long phone conversations. Or if he had a girlfriend, they would eat together and then the woman would make a point of leaving, when you could tell it was normal for her to stay over, that both of them wished he wasn't there in the way.

Well, those were old times, dead and gone. People might look now at JJ, people who had known Dad for awhile. Remember him as the black sheep, the one who didn't care enough to study and get good grades, who dropped out of school, who had no interest in anything to do with Dad's type of work. (What even was it, insurance oversight, hospital administration, something about risks in hospitals? Not that Dad had much been around to talk about it.) Or they may recall JJ the young computer whiz. He could specifically remember dad using that phrase to introduce him back then, so dorky and funny.

But the point was, all of them had shed their old skin a few times over the years. Dad, JJ himself. How once everybody, himself included, thought he was like a genius boy from all the easy money he used to make, the quick product turn arounds at start ups (always someone else's ideas though, weren't they). Joy going from maybe bi to radical lesbian to let's just stick with marriage rights and monogamy and a decent job in the city. Amelia, who had already had a long happy marriage, three kids of her own – Karen's father had been a lot older and had died, something sudden and unexpected twenty years back – now attached to Dad like it was meant to be.

Jackie was suddenly standing in front of him, cheeks bright and grinning, maybe tipsy herself. "Mingle," she whispered. "Don't just stand there like it's all your oyster."

Before he could argue, she popped a freshly baked cookie into his hand. Like a little reward to make her criticism less harsh. "Okay," he said, taking a bite. "Thanks." Jackie, of everyone he knew, had probably changed the least.

JJ moved farther into the room, obedient, resigned to his fate. Even as he "mingled" though, he wondered how his friends were doing today at Occupy. The Saturday demos and take overs had shrunk in size, but recently been rebounding. "F- the Police" was what a lot of people were calling them – the local cops had alienated everybody so much that part of the deal was just to mess with them too. A fair amount of the original people were gone, but different people joined. Some came and went. Every news hit seemed to swing equal numbers one way or the other, one bunch saying it had all gotten too violent, they should just hold their signs and be quiet, another newly radicalized, frothing at the mouth to do more.

The hours passed, quick enough. JJ was surprised the thing didn't drag more, actually, but Amelia and Jackie kept the food and activities coming. Food, cake, funny speeches. Gifts, posing for photos, more food.

Sometime around nine the last guest was ushered out, and just family remained. Dad slumped in his favorite chair, looking beat.

"Oh, my," Amelia said, lowering herself to the couch next to JJ. Her hair had come undone at some point, and she had a large sweater wrapped around her dress; she looked more like her normal self again. "We're not used to being on our feet for so long. We're usually thinking about bed at this hour, but I don't think I'll be able to sleep. Tony," she called toward the kitchen, "I can take care of those tomorrow!"

"Let him," Jackie said. "He's likes having something to do."

Tony was loading the dishwasher and rinsing wine glasses, conveniently away from the rest of the family's quick to commence blow by blow of the just finished party. JJ wished he had a car now, or the excuse of a last BART train to catch. Instead he sprawled on the other side of the couch, hand dangling toward a nearly empty bowl of chips.

Jackie was already quizzing Dad about who was this person, why hadn't this other one shown up, what on earth was that other lady wearing. Like she had a schematic of the whole invite list in her head. And memorized what each had on, what present they brought, how early or late they arrived. Joy butted in now and then with her take; good luck anyone else getting a word in when the two of them got into it.

"Well, JJ, I've been meaning to ask," Amelia said, her voice low and quiet. She sat toward him, patting his knee as if he was a child. "Now I know there are many perspectives to this whole Occupy movement. No traditional leadership, different goals. But I was worried about you in particular. Why the..." she faded out for a moment. "You seemed more angry than the situation warranted, I guess I'm trying to say."

So apparently everybody, even the elderly, had seen that clip. JJ glanced over at Dad, who looked mostly asleep despite Jackie and Joy's lively analysis. And back to Amelia, whose expression was more serene than judging. Something about her mellowness made him hold back from how strongly he would normally present his case here. "I think anger is the point," he answered. "It's easy for all the people in those companies to be like, I didn't take your house, I didn't give you the bogus loan, I just work here. But, really, they are part of it."

Amelia gave a slow nod. "So if they're not part of the solution, they're part of the problem? That's what we used to say in the 70s."

"Yeah, I guess. I mean everybody's so freaking complacent, you know?"

Amelia sat there, like she was actually thinking about what he had said. Unlike anyone else around here. "So it's kind of a frustration that most people don't feel the sense of urgency that you do? Or that people who are not being immediately and directly impacted – even though, say their pensions may be taking a hit or they can't afford to sent their kid to college – they're acting like the financial crisis is not their problem?"

JJ sat up straighter, surprised. "Yes, exactly. All these people are just struggling along in their little jobs, or begging to get any kind of stupid job, and not getting that the whole system is screwed. There's systematic exploitation by a very few towards the 99 percent."

"I do understand that, that idea that it's large and systematic," she said, eyes meeting his and an anxious sort of smile on her face. "But I can't help but worry that some of the tactics are just going to alienate the very sort of people you're talking about. People who might understand the issues at an economic level see people in masks throwing things at the police and they don't think that's their kind of movement."

"The police are bringing that on themselves," JJ said, keeping his voice a near whisper, not wanting Jackie to start haranguing him again. "They're coming at us in riot gear and purposely entrapping people. They tore down our camp with, like, no warning. They want protesters to start something so they can bust heads, I'm serious."

"I wonder if that's all the officers or just a few. Same with the protesters. It does seem to me that things are escalating very quickly based on just a few bad apples. If there was just some way to isolate the worst of both sides, the police who are looking for an excuse to rough people up, and the protesters who are using the cover of the crowds to rile people. In a rather cowardly way, I might add."

JJ turned away for a moment. She had a point, for sure there were some cops who looked like they pretty much hated their jobs and wished they could be home watching TV or something instead of lined up in battle gear. And certainly some 99 percenters who felt that way. "But let me ask you," he said. "Do you think the media would cover any of our issues if everybody just stood there holding signs? If there was no conflict?"

Amelia smiled, her eyes crinkling up both happy and wise. "That's a valid point. But I have to ask you back: when the media does cover any of this movement, do they understand what these issues are? Can anyone really articulate them? Because it mostly seems like a bunch of young men yelling."

Before he could get an answer together – that there were men and women both, young and middle aged, that the website had information, or would soon, that you can't judge anything based on TV news – Jackie interrupted to insist they move the furniture back. Which, as usual, meant he and Joy and Tony hauling things around, Jackie directing, Amelia assuring them it was fine, she and Dad could take care of it all later. Dad half dozing in his chair, barely aware the family was even in the room.

JJ figured he would have his flat to himself for awhile, getting home relatively early on a Saturday night. But no such luck. Two of his three roommates were there, plus Oscar had a friend over. They were zoned out in front of the TV, some weird horror movie on, the kind that's part scary, part funny.

JJ stood for a moment, watching, and barely realized when he sank into his chair. Oscar and his friend were sprawled across the battered old couch, looking pretty stoned. Their new roommate sat straight backed on the floor, in some kind of yoga pose. She twisted her head back to tell him the names of the main characters. JJ glanced over at Oscar to see if he had a joint to offer, but apparently not.

Oscar stared at the screen, grinning. It was his TV, a big flat screen that he'd gotten a year or so ago. Most of the furniture and stuff in the flat was his, actually, the couch and a pair of raggedy chairs, the kitchen table and mismatched stools, the microwave and dishwasher. Oscar had lived here for some crazy amount of time, like 25 years. Rocking on SF rent control. He didn't say how much the total rent was, but JJ was pretty sure that he wasn't paying any of it, he just collected rent from the others and then wrote the check as master tenant.

But JJ couldn't really complain, since the rent was damn low compared to what he would pay on his own. What he had been paying before he landed here, three years back. It had been that long, longer actually, since he a regular type of job. Full time, benefits, all those perks people used to take for granted. Shit, that he had hardly used, JJ thought. Recalling buzzing by the free food in the cafeterias, preferring the local Indian place. Never even visiting the gym they had available during his time at MoDoCo.

Now, JJ laughed to himself, didn't he wish he had access to a shower that someone else kept clean. Or imagine having facilities like that available for the Occupiers. That actually wasn't a bad idea. He looked over at Oscar – Oscar was basically a full time activist, although he said he was too old for camping out. His back had spasms and stuff, and of course he needed the medical weed, didn't want to toke up in front of the SFPD. But he was still involved in SF Occupy.

JJ wondered if any of them had connections still with possibly sympathetic tech firms. The drag there was that nobody had those kind of facilities anymore, he was pretty sure. People were back to starting their firms in a garage, or more likely a Starbucks with wifi using just their iphones. Anyway, this wasn't the time to mention it. Oscar pretty much looked like he wouldn't remember anything they talked about tonight.

Daytime, not stoned, the guy could be sharp. He was a good idea person, he had been urging Occupy to keep up momentum after the main camp shut down at Justin Herman Plaza. Weekly marches to keep people from drifting away, and moving the targets, not just hitting the same old bank headquarters all the time. Branch offices (that too had been partly Oscar's idea, not so great on implementation as it turned out). And finding people who had actually lost houses to foreclosure. Putting a face on the statistics.

Over in Oakland, after a lot of back and forth, they had backed off the port shut downs for awhile. Too much bad PR. Anyway, it was pretty damn easy to find foreclosed houses, though a lot of the people in neighborhoods wanted nothing to do with them. There was a racial component, JJ would admit. The movement didn't technically have leaders, but the perception was that it did and that they were a bunch of white guys from elsewhere. Kind of what Amelia had mentioned.

JJ could see how an outsider would get that impression. For sure, the way the media played it, they would show the loudest, angriest protesters, and guess what, those were probably young white guys. He had been annoyed by the outsider slant of the coverage, by the way they kept harping on there being no message. Like if it didn't fit on the wrapper of a Big Mac, it wasn't a real message, he thought, recalling the weeks it took to hammer out their 15 point goal statement. Which the media would never reference, never mention the Occupy website, just lame stuff on posted up on their own.

It pissed him off more now that the mainstream media acted like the whole thing was over. You would think some idiot Republicans voting in the deep south were the only thing happening in the nation these days. Even though his quote, legal team said this was a good thing, that less coverage meant people moving on from that stupid guy at the bank, JJ felt increasingly impatient. He was ready to freaking move on.

He had been instructed to "lay low," as if taking part in an 80s cop show. Until his case had wound through the system, he should not go anywhere near a news camera, and stay off even friends' videos and postings. Stay strictly back of the pack in any demonstrations. That was annoying to JJ; he didn't like to be part of the half assed crowd that might slip off for a latte when things got rough.

Truth was, he pretty much got off on the mike check form of communication, especially when he was being mike checked. Every phrase he uttered screamed out by the crowd, the most simple and elegant form of communication that no one could take away from the movement. Any phrase or idea sounded awesome like that.

A roar from the TV pulled his attention back. Zombies on fire. Good thing he didn't have weed, this would give him nightmares, JJ thought. He watched the very fake fire shoot up, all flame and no smoke, nothing like an actual fire. There had been several cases of arson recently. JJ had been by the burnt out hull of one abandoned building, reeking of smoky chemicals. He had wondered at the time, and wondered again – was this a new tactic? Was he missing a new radical step forward?

## Chapter 5 Filling the Void

# Blossom Valley, 1980

In the fall of 1980, Karen Emerson felt like she was trapped in some weird twisting time space warp, the type of thing that so fascinated her older brother in his love of Star Trek. Because days like the typical school day stretched out endlessly before her. Hours dragged, minutes were endless. The last ten minutes at the end of class, the hands on the big clock on the wall might have been glued in place, so slowly did they spin.

But at the same time, she could look back and realize weeks and months were passing at lightening speed. Her senior year, finally the last year of high school, was already whizzing past. Of her closest friends, Karen thought she might be the only one who was at all appreciative of this time in their lives, who remembered to stop and smell the roses, as her mom would say.

It could be fun, being a senior. You didn't have to try so hard anymore, either in class or out. Kids had pretty much established who they were, where they fit in amongst the broader circles at Blossom Valley High. And the teachers knew that last year's grades had been more important, along with activities, test scores. Senior grades hardly counted. Although most of Karen's friends were already stressed about college applications, the SATs, essays.

Karen had three colleges already in mind. Her mom and dad had included her in the conversation they had with her brother Peter a couple years back, about setting sights high but being realistic. There was a college fund for the three of them, but it wouldn't be enough for expensive private places. They could get a perfectly good education by applying themselves to their fullest abilities at any reasonable state school, or a modest place that came with scholarships.

Karen had long been interested in graphic arts, first as a hobby, and more recently with the thought – broadly and excitedly pushed by her mom – that it could lead to a career. Rochester Institute of Technology had a great program. Karen had gone, junior year, to a college fair and met with this woman who gave her all kinds of information plus told her they were eager to recruit women to the program. There were many more guys than girls at the school, which wasn't exactly the best reason to choose a place, but sure wouldn't hurt once she got there.

Her scores and grades and the way the lady urged her to apply early admission made her feel okay about the whole college thing. Like everybody, she had a couple back ups in mind. One party last summer a whole group of them sat around laughing about how they would all end up still hanging out together if nobody made it into their first choices.

Karen had been right in the middle, laughing too. Although it seemed to her that it didn't matter so much what particular college they ended up attending. The point was to leave Blossom Valley behind, go somewhere, anywhere bigger than here.

Lately, just doing her thing day to day, she kept thinking how small it was here. How very small – the town, and her life within the town. Stuff that had once seemed so important now had become trivial. Miniaturized, like the weird little doll furniture collection the old lady neighbor had down the street. Was she pretty enough, popular enough? Blossom Valley High was just so little – Karen realized that now. Most or least pretty or popular were only a few dozen people apart.

What did her friends think of her, had she done well enough on her homework, would she get a good date for homecoming or the prom. Well, now she could see all her friends wondering the same thing, obsessing on their own problems, barely noticing if anyone else was acting weird. The teachers would give the same grades they always did; a student who came in with good grades would automatically get treated well. The teachers here, some of them had been teaching so long they could barely tell one kid from another. And those school dances, fodder for so many slumber party fantasies and nail biting nerves years back? The cooler kids didn't even go anymore.

Karen had had one, then another boyfriend junior year. When everybody seemed to be pairing off, of course she had jumped at the chance too. Been flattered when the first boy asked for her number, even though he hardly talked when he called. And they had gone out for pizza, later parked, like everybody. She had giggled with her friends about it, about the awkwardness, trying to enjoy it at the same time as making sure nothing really happened. How stupid the guys acted when they were, quote, aroused. (She wished she had paid more attention to health class. That got another round of giggles, but nobody wanted to discuss that sort of thing further.) She liked him, but wondered if this feeling was at all related to the stuff people wrote songs about, or cried over.

Boy 1 took her to Homecoming. Boy 2, who happened to be friends with Boy 1 and was probably why he had ever was interested in her in the first place, lasted through Junior Prom, a great relief to both of them. Karen wasn't surprised when he suggested they take a break for the summer, while he would be away as a camp counselor. And probably had a summer girlfriend, she later realized. Nobody was surprised when their summer break became permanent.

This year, she felt okay not paired up. She was just coasting, as far as all that, waiting until there were better choices than the immature guys she had known since the second grade. When her mom asked – not that she would ask outright, but when she hinted around, broached related subjects then watch her questioningly – Karen just said she was happy socializing with a group. Parents were supposed to like that answer, envisioning a clean, Coke drinking basement party, lights on, no pot or beer, no backseats of cars or teenage pregnancy.

Mom would just gaze at her, eyes narrowed. Unable to argue with this plain response, but in her eyes a lingering suspicion that it wasn't really that simple. And it wasn't, of course not. Of their group, one girl had gotten pregnant in spite of her secretly purchased contraceptive cream. The other girls had helped out with money, collecting enough for her "birthday present" and covering for her to her parents while keeping quiet to all the guys. One guy had gotten into coke, and not the soda kind, making clandestine trips into Philly, saying he was going to track meets long after he had quit the team.

Karen's escapades were far tamer. Enough pot to get pretty high, but only on weekends, with her pals, not buying any herself. Occasional make out sessions with some guy or another that she was not going out with, laughing these off later to her friends. They didn't care about the making out, but that she hadn't extracted any sort of commitment from the guys. Not explaining – she didn't think they would understand, or that she could even articulate it – that for the most part, these guys were just stand ins for an older college guy she had met briefly last summer. In her mind, far away from the squirming bodies in a darkened corner of a basement party, it was him instead. And rather than kidding around with her, treating her like a little kid – the way he had actually behaved – he was wild with passion for her.

Passion. That was another thing pretty much lacking in Blossom Valley in general and in Karen in particular. It was like an insult to read the so called classic literature in English, and know these characters fell madly in love back hundreds of years ago. Or read in History about the Spanish Civil War, or here, the civil rights movement. Know that people were willing to sacrifice everything for a cause. At school, the big issue kids might talk about was whether the ice cream bars had shrunk in size while costing just as much as last year. It was pathetic.

In that lull after Thanksgiving but before the Christmas season was really underway, Karen found excuses to stay late at school or go over to friends' houses. Anything to fill the void that seemed to envelope her when she was home staring at the four walls of her bedroom, wondering when her life would really begin.

Until recently, her friend Jackie's house felt like a noisy refuge from the numbness of her own head and heart. Jackie's sister had gotten into sports and often half her volleyball team would be over, and her little brother was louder and wilder than ever. Jackie herself was one of the most hyper of all of them about college applications, constantly talking and worrying about them. But even that – just the strength of her feelings about getting into the "right" college – lifted Karen's spirits in a weird way.

Then Jackie had suddenly started seeing this guy she had met from a couple towns over. He went to a private school, which made him like doubly exotic to the rest of them. It seemed like she wanted to keep him to herself, which was funny for a girl who kind of liked to brag about her accomplishments. Finally she had brought him to a party just before Thanksgiving. The guy, William, seemed nice enough. Maybe a little full of himself, kind of dominating the conversation with the other guys, talking about how competitive his school was. He didn't say it, but you could pretty much guess he meant as compared to the puny public school the rest of them attended.

But he made a point of seeking out Jackie, winding an arm around her waist, leaning in close to her, whispering. Both of them were tall, both had big smiles that night. Before they left – early, with other things in mind, Jackie made clear – she whispered to her friends that William had invited her to meet his family and his grandparents. The whole family would be coming for the holiday and she would visit for lunch the next day. William (he never allowed anyone to use a nickname, she added with odd pride) apparently didn't bring a lot of girls to meet the family.

At the time, Karen wondered idly where William planned to go to college, if that would alter Jackie's plans. Later she wondered if William just used family lunches as a way to push things along, relationship-wise, since Jackie almost immediately started going to his house afternoons, just the two of them, no proud parents or doting grandmas around.

A couple times she even agreed to baby sit for little JJ while Jackie went to William's house. She and another girl watched TV and did their homework while JJ tore around screaming. And Jackie did whatever she was doing, racing back to join them before her mom got home from work, no idea that Jackie had just arrived 10 minutes before her.

Jackie would go from blissed out happy to eye rolling pissed off in a matter of seconds, because JJ inevitably had broken something in the house or left something out in the rain or was bruised himself from having crashed into a wall in between the girls yelling at him to stop running around. Young and seemingly scatterbrained as he was, JJ had some intuition for recognizing bad behavior in other people. He would notice in a second if any of them tried to sneak a drink out of the liquor cabinet, for instance. And he had with Jackie a funny, sophisticated arrangement of bargaining to cover for each other. He not mentioning to her mom that Jackie went to William's house or had him over in her bedroom with the door shut, she helping him repair or hide stuff he broke or flat out bribing him with candy or even money (JJ didn't really understand money, Karen thought, he just knew it had value and he liked shiny stuff).

It made Karen just as glad her brothers were closer in age – they basically left each other alone, especially now that Peter was in college. Of course none of the three of them got in much trouble, or at least didn't get caught. Karen wondered if her whole family lacked some essential spark of innate passion that made them all destined to be as boring as their parents were their whole lives through.

Early in December she had her answer: no, she did not lack deep feelings, in fact she would later wish felt less. It started late on a Monday night. Homework done, TV abysmal and anyway not wanting to be in the living room with the parents, Karen had the rock station on in her room.

They interrupted it with the announcement, cut right in the middle of a song. Someone had shot John Lennon. No joke, the DJ sounded hoarse, barely able to speak. The hospital wouldn't confirm anything but people there said he was dying. Yoko had been with him, they had been at their apartment, and now he was dead. She didn't want their son to hear about it on the news – the DJ whispered this, as if afraid the boy might be tuning in, or one of his listeners would call him.

Karen was alone in her room. And alone in her life, in a way she had never felt before. Imagining Yoko's grief. Not able to believe one of the Beatles could be gone – they were from the 60s, he just had an album come out! It was too late to call anyone, anyway, who would she call. What could she and her friends say, high school students who had never done anything, never seen him play. The radio played "Imagine," and Karen stood in front of her mirror watching tears course down her cheeks.

At school the next day, everybody talked about it. He had been shot, he had died. Most people were somber though a few guys made rude comments. Even the kids that laughed weren't really laughing, Karen thought. She went through her day feeling numb. Like a robot. Going to class, twisting the combination of her locker, brushing her hair, watching teachers talking without hearing their words. Watching the clock.

At 2:20, she walked straight away from her locker. Called a quick goodbye to the friends that were gathered nearby, talking loudly about who knows what, homework, going out later, whatever. Karen just walked. She didn't want to be on the bus, or around people.

There was a single road that led from the high school, and she followed it, head down, arms crossed to ward off the cold air. Even feeling that air, the chill it brought, seemed like an improvement – she could feel something. She started passing houses, the ones they blew by on the bus every day. On foot, she could see little differences in each, the colors of the houses and doors and yards. One with a pile of kid's toys out front, another pristinely swept with sharply trimmed hedges, another messy and overgrown. No people around. Everybody at work or at school or busy with some stupid tasks to keep them from thinking about the real meaning of life, Karen thought disgustedly.

A breeze swept over the last of the leaves still clinging to trees. Some fell, or blew lazily along the sidewalk. Karen's shoes were thin and scuffed. She wished she had on her sneakers. Nobody cared what she looked like, she should have just worn comfortable shoes. She paused, a little out of breath, and turned on the street that ran into the center of town.

A car cruised past then abruptly stopped and came backwards. Karen stood, annoyed. This was the kind of thing Jackie's mom was always going on about, girls getting kidnapped in stranger's cars. But a lazy voice called her name. It was William, Jackie's boyfriend. He was driving this big new looking car. "Hey, Karen, right? Need a ride?"

Karen shrugged. Her feet were cold and kind of tired. Her nose was probably red and running, but who cared. She walked around to the passenger side. "Thanks. Where are you going?"

William shrugged. "Nowhere really. Just driving. Where do you want to go?"

"I don't know. I just got out of school, and I just didn't want to, you know, be around people acting like everything's fine. Because of the shooting," she added.

William was already nodding. "I can't believe it. I just sat there playing my old albums last night." His voice was soft, emotional.

Karen wished she had the whole album collection too. And wondered if maybe William was deeper than she had first thought. "I just kept the radio on, but it was so sad. Listening to those lyrics."

They just drove in silence for a few slow blocks. When they got near Jackie's street, Karen told him he could drop her off, that her house was close by.

William shook his head. "That's not where I'm headed. Me and Jackie, we're not like a boyfriend girlfriend kind of couple, you know? We're both seniors, we're both going to college out of state. So we're not really..." he drifted off. Paused, turned south, toward the little creek that ran through town.

Karen didn't say anything. Had no interest in going home. Though she was a little surprised what he said about Jackie – she was pretty sure Jackie had said my boyfriend about William.

William pulled into an empty lot in the park by the children's playground. This time of year it looked desolate, the swings crooked and creaky in the wind, the monkey bars like rusted prison cells. The grass seemed beaten down, and the trees bare and exposed. There were a couple little kids down near the water, bundled in heavy jackets, throwing rocks into the creek, but the rest of the place was empty.

They talked about John Lennon. Karen felt her eyes water, felt stupid and shallow and terribly emotionally fragile all at the same time.

"Hey, hey," William said, leaning close.

She closed her eyes and felt his gentle finger wipe away her tear. Eyes back open, she stared at his face, so close, so warm and so alive. Foxy, actually like a fox, she thought stupidly as they started to kiss.

I don't even know this guy's last name, she thought. And, what about Jackie. But in a moment the thoughts were gone, and she was entirely encompassed in the now. Her mom had used a phrase like that recently and it hadn't made sense, but now it totally did. There was nothing more than the two of them here. Moving, circling, breathing as one.

In a few easy adjustments he pushed the long flat seat of the car back, and Karen slipped off her coat. They paused, eyes locked, laughing and then diving in further, tongues slipping around, hands moving, probing. Time either stopped or moved like lightening, because the next time Karen looked outside it was getting dark.

They were sprawled onto her side of the car, she half over him and his head awkwardly against the car door. Grinning, he sat them both up. "Well, now I feel bad for feeling so good," William said, that slight canine smile on his face.

Karen nodded. She felt suddenly shaky, not sure if it was from feeling good or sad or just how far they had gone so fast. "I need to get home," she whispered.

"Yeah, my parents are going to start to wonder. But, listen, I'm really glad I ran into you," he said, then paused, looking, what, embarrassed?

"We don't have to talk about it," Karen said. It was as if this afternoon had been set apart, somehow, from the rest of either of their lives.

He nodded, and started up the car. Still, she noticed as he drove, he was smiling. She was too. She asked him to drop her off at her corner, not even in front of her house, because her father had been coming home early from work lately, complaining about one ache or another, nothing better to do than stare out the window and ask questions about her friends. Which was ironic now that her mom was finally developing interests of her own and had stopped asking so many of those sort of questions.

Although Karen told herself it had been a one time thing, guess what, it happened again. A bunch of kids were over at Jackie's house, and William offered to drop several people off. It being winter, and him having his dad's big car. And he just acted like he didn't quite know his directions when he did this weird loop that arranged for Karen to be the last one let off.

This time, they reached for each other quickly, hotly. Knowing he should get back to Jackie's house, that any of the neighbors could walk by and see in the steamy car windows. "Let me call you," he had whispered, and she had given her number.

Then they could meet, secretly, late afternoons after school, sometimes driving around, mostly just finding a private spot for awhile. There was something about him, and about the danger of it all, that they were out in a car or someone might see them, might wonder about him going out with Jackie too. That, combined with sense of reckless Karen felt anyway, the sense of letting go of all her past life, made her take risks with him. Do new things, go farther than she had even with her actual boyfriends.

Just after New Year's, still on Christmas break, Jackie invited some kids over to her house. Just girls, she said, so nobody has to bother wearing their good jeans or blow drying their hair. Karen jumped at the chance to get out. Her dad wasn't feeling well again, and both parents and brothers were home moping around.

At Jackie's they hung around, eating chips and leftover Christmas cookies, comparing notes on presents, complaining about how soon they would have to go back to school. Nobody talked about guys, Karen noticed. The girls without boyfriends tired of the whole topic, the ones who had boyfriends just as soon keeping their activities to themselves.

Karen thought about the last time she had seen William. They had hardly said two words, it had all been physical, animalistic even. She watched Jackie, who sat cross legged on the couch, and wondered what if she and William were doing the same things, or more. It made her feel weird – she had tried not to think about it, but sitting in the room with her, it was hard not to.

Karen stood and went into the kitchen, water glass in hand. JJ appeared at her side as if he had been waiting for her, and demanded that she give him a Coke. She glanced into the other room. There was a can half poured, and she knew they let him have pretty much what he wanted, so she shrugged and poured the rest of it into a cup.

"Ice," he demanded.

Karen rolled her eyes and dumped in a couple ice cubes and handed him the cup.

JJ motioned her closer and whispered, "Karen and William sittin' in a car, k-i-s-s-i-n-g!"

"JJ, that doesn't even rhyme, silly," Karen said, giving him a friendly poke and trying not to blush. It was like the kid could read her mind.

"No, I saw you. Mmmwah," he smacked his lips, chortling.

"No, you saw Jackie," she said.

"No, you, I saw you. At the creek." He stood up tall, raising his head toward hers. "I saw you and I might tell. You'd be in trouble." He said the word in two long syllables, looking pointedly toward the living room, where Jackie was still talking.

Karen turned away, frowning, remembering – that first day by the park, kids throwing stones into the water. "Wait a minute, JJ," she said. "If you were down at the park by yourself, you're in trouble. You're not supposed to leave your street." She felt bad like stooping to his level, but what choice did she have.

He glared at her for a moment, his serious expression a funny contrast to his small size and scruffed, little boy clothes. Then his pout turned into a mirthless laugh and he demanded a candy bar.

Jackie appeared and grabbed him by the shoulders. "Shut up, JJ," she exclaimed. "Go have a cookie and stop bothering us."

JJ averted his eyes from both of them and ducked into the living room. Karen observed him acting overly childish with the other girls, almost flirting with them. She didn't exactly trust him, either to keep the implicit bargain they had just made, or to tell the truth to Jackie regardless – who knows what kind of stories he might tell just to be the center of attention.

She phoned Jackie later, and casually worked a question about William into the conversation. Casual, but Jackie leapt on it, clearly happy to talk about her wonderful boyfriend and how glad she was that they were going together. Every word she said contradicted the way William had talked about her.

By the end of the conversation, Karen felt sick to her stomach, realizing that William had flat out lied, at least to her, and probably to both of them. He had told her that "their thing" was so unique and special and he'd never talk about it to anyone. But who knows, maybe he had other "special girls" other days. Maybe all the guys at his school knew her name, knew she was a slut.

She sat by herself in her room. She could not be part of this, she thought, spine tingling fun as those spicy afternoons in his father's fancy car had been. Anyway, it's not like she loved him, she just loved that time out of time that they had. William was out of town with his family, not getting back for another week. But next time he called, she would tell him no. She didn't think she would need much more explanation than that she was friends with Jackie, that the two girls had talked about him.

And as for Jackie, Karen promised herself she would be strictly hands off any boyfriends, even sort of boyfriends, of friends from here on out. There was no reason to tell her what had already happened, hopefully no reason Jackie would think to ask. Lucky for her, Jackie tended to discount a lot of what JJ said no matter what the topic – that plus JJ's not wanting to get caught, she would probably be okay. Stopping the thing with William was the right thing to do, never mind she should never have gotten started with him in the first place. Karen swallowed hard, her stomach and nerves still churning, guilt wracked despite her decision.

1981 pretty much sucked so far.

## Chapter 6 A Leg Up

# Blossom Valley, 1981

Was there anything more disgusting than a bunch of boys hanging around the entrance to their stinky locker room yelling and burping and making rude remarks about any girl that walked by? Jackie Carlisle thought not, even if the best they could do was observe that she was too tall. Which if maybe true also meant she could literally look down on most of them, especially now, senior year.

But there was something worse, and it happened at lunch on a February day, in the back of the cafeteria where everyone could witness it: Brad Denton pulled his early acceptance letter to Princeton out of his oversized History textbook and held it up for his whole lunch table to see. It earned him a quick round of cussing and thrown food wrappers from the other guys at the table. His group was nerdy, but smart nerds, guys who did well in school aside from being socially inept. Involved in student government, the debate team, things like that; a couple of them ran track or subbed on the basketball team.

Jackie, two tables over, pretended she had not witnessed any of this. Really, she was too far to see the school's logo, there was so much yelling in the cafeteria that who could hear anything at all. But she knew inside, exactly what it was, what it meant. He had gotten in early to his first choice, an Ivy, while she would be lucky to get into her number one, Villanova, at all.

"Look at Brad over there, bragging," one of the other girls said.

Jackie was forced to acknowledge the thing, the boy and his letter. "He's a legacy, you know," she told the table. "His dad went there."

But everyone also knew that Brad was obnoxiously smart. They had been new kids the same year, back in seventh grade. The principal's secretary had walked them together down to their homeroom that first day – their names being close in the alphabet assuring the always had that class together. That plus they were both college track, so Brad's know it all face had been nearby in lots of classes. Both worked to push beyond the gets-good-grades loser stereotype at school. And there was just something annoying about him – they were natural rivals.

Now this. The group at her table were already talking about something else, something from TV last night. Picking at their food. It was the early lunch period and nobody felt much like eating, plus the whole cafeteria had that sour bleach on top of overcooked casseroles smell. Jackie stole another look over at Brad's table. They too were talking loudly, grinning at each other over the general din. He looked entirely too happy for a Wednesday at lunch in a school cafeteria. In his face it was like he had already started his life as a college student.

Jackie was glad for once when lunch was over. Gladder still at the end of school, when she could escape the rest of the seniors – God, other kids could be getting those letters every day now.

Home, she went straight into her room and shut the door. Joy, thank God, had practice or something, probably wouldn't be home until dinner. She tuned out the noise she could hear in the distance – the hum of a buzz saw their neighbors had going on in their yard, repairs after a recent storm. And whatever JJ was doing, a rhythmic banging, punctuated by his exclamations, hard to tell whether he was excited or mad. Now and then a yell from Mom, who came home from work by three now. Supposedly both the parents had agreed to this, that JJ needed more supervision, though Mom half the time was holed up in her room.

Jackie didn't care though, about any of them. Any more than they cared or understood her. Maybe Joy did a little, she at least got it about needing to get into a decent college. But it was years away for her, still an abstract. This, Jackie thought, swallowing a large gulp, was real. Daily now, she would be fingering through the stack of mail that Mom left out casually on the kitchen table. Waiting, wondering. Possibly she had screwed up her entire future if anyone found out what she had done.

It's not that big a deal, she told herself, stop being over dramatic. Worst case, just a worse school, right? She had only faked the recommendation letter to Villanova. As for her fall term English paper – if they had found that out, she would surely know by now.

Not a big deal, Jackie told herself again. Hardly thinking about it, she spread out the paperwork from the colleges. She had separated it all into ranked piles, and from them pulled out the better brochures. It was weirdly comforting, seeing all those photos of students strolling around their campuses, or earnestly raising their hands in class. We all belong here, they seemed to say, and you will too.

Lots of kids got a little help in writing their papers, she told herself. Another girl in class had a dad who was a professor, bet he gave her some suggestions. Jackie rolled her eyes briefly, imagining her own father attempting this. They were lucky if he even remembered what grade they were in. And he was all busy trying to look with it, hair grown out and constantly wearing new clothes; thank God the leisure suit days were almost over. He would be more likely to talk about upcoming dates and new trends in music than express the slightest interest in their school work. Not that he ever seemed very happy with the dates or the music.

Jackie shuddered just thinking about those awkward conversations. The point, though, was that all she had done was gone to the library – carefully driven to one two towns over, where her boyfriend lived – and used a book there to get ideas for her analysis of the themes of _The Invisible Man_. She had made a point not to copy it word for word, and had even put in a slightly awkward compound sentence, the sort that the teacher often criticized.

The paper got an A. The A raised her grade point average. The grades were important since her SAT scores weren't the greatest, thank you very much public school with no special preparation for the test. (William's private school had its own tutor available to help anyone who asked prepare for the SAT or PSAT!) Anyway, she could have come up with all those ideas if she'd time – there was a lot going on in the fall.

There were many justifications. About the paper. The forged letter, that would not be easily explained. Of course any kid in her class would understand it, at least anyone who wanted to get into a decent school. Probably half the senior year teachers just weren't who you'd want to write those letters. A couple of them, including the English teacher, where just mean, mean and sarcastic. Another was sweet but seriously old, as in probably couldn't even use a typewriter anymore, and another was practically senile.

And guess what, they were the ones that taught the classes where Jackie had the better grades. The math teacher was cool, but she sucked at math. She did okay in Bio, but she didn't think that teacher would say anything good about a girl. Anyway, she had given it a lot of thought, laid it out like an Algebra equation to solve, and the best option was to write one of the letters herself. Access to the school's stationary was easy, since she worked on the school paper and was regularly in and out of the front office. She even had the teacher's signature, from a sample business letter used by the Future Secretaries.

Jackie had written it, typed it, scribbled the signature with a flourish, and mailed it, even thinking to use the mailbox in front of the school. As far as anyone would know, it was a perfectly legitimate, strong recommendation.

JJ's voice pierced her concentration. He was yelling Mom, Mom, like the house was on fire, except that he did this all the time. Jackie rose from her bed, scattering the glossy brochures, and whipped open the door. "Shut up! God, JJ, what's your problem."

Her little brother's head appeared at the foot of the steps, red faced. Jackie glanced across the hall – Mom wasn't in her room.

"I'm hungry," JJ shouted up. "I want a snack!"

"Look in the driveway, is the car there? Did Mom tell you she was going somewhere?"

"Oh yeah," he answered in a normal voice. "She had to pick up milk and eggs." He stared back up. "Are you staying upstairs, Jackie?"

Jackie rolled her eyes. She knew exactly what he had in mind. "Yes, but Mom can tell if you sneak food, she knows how many cookies there are all the time. Just wait a little while."

He didn't answer, just stood there with his little boy arms crossed comically. Jackie went back to her room. She lacked energy to manage him, plus she didn't really care if he wrecked his appetite for dinner. Anyway, he was harder and harder to control as he got bigger. He was Mom's problem; she would be gone soon enough.

Still, she always had to be a little wary, careful with the kid. JJ had stumbled on her secret, for instance. Back when she was writing that recommendation letter. She had needed several drafts on the family's typewriter, getting the words just right and fixing typos. The kid had been underfoot as usual and had pulled discards out of the wastebasket. (This sort of thing drove her crazy – no privacy even for her trash.)

He barely could read, but there he was asking questions anyway, why was there a picture of the high school on the paper, why was she writing a letter about herself. And Jackie – knowing JJ's honing ability to sniff out people hiding things – had blithely assured him that this was completely normal, that students often wrote drafts of letters for their teachers in high school as part of practicing typing skills.

Jackie returned to her doorway. JJ was no longer visible. It was utterly silent, which, she thought with a laugh, was almost a sure sign that he was doing something he wasn't supposed to. She imagined the sound of chairs crashing, cookie boxes falling, if Mom's car was to suddenly pull up. Then what, another trip to the emergency room? No good. She pointedly clomped down the stairs. Giving him time to retreat with his plunder, keeping Mom out of it for both of them if she could.

She didn't talk to William that night, or the next. They had vague plans to go out Saturday. Or maybe it was just to watch the first part of Saturday Night Live. Anyway, usually she liked it if they could at least talk a little, but she realized, thinking about how many days it had been, that she was afraid he would get his early acceptance letter too. Letters, maybe, he had applied to several schools. One was in Chicago, another in Washington, others in Boston. He claimed not to have a favorite but that he would have to take into account the "whole package."

Jackie smiled to herself, thinking that sometimes William sounded like a 30 year old lawyer without even trying. She checked around to see that the rest of them were still downstairs, and then bounded quickly up before anyone noticed. The upstairs phone was placed awkwardly on a small table in the middle of the hallway, but it was possible to drag it then stretch the cord into the entrance of her room for some privacy. If she spoke quietly and they had the TV on, it was almost like having a private conversation.

William was home, studying, he said, though she could hear the TV when she answered. William had his own TV in his room – which he still complained about, because it was the family's old black and white. Some people just don't appreciate what they've got, she thought, sounding like her mom on one of her annoying tirades.

He didn't say anything about college letters. Or weekend plans. Instead he told a long story about some guys on his school's basketball team, or some other guys, something they did during a game. Jackie was only half listening. It occurred to her that either he didn't know that she didn't care about sports, or knew and didn't care. Not sure which was worse.

It struck her, not for the first time, that they would have to break up pretty soon. The best part of going out with William was doing things together, in person. He was busy a lot with school stuff anyway, it seemed like he had something he had to do after school almost every day. And they definitely weren't going to the same college next year, and probably wouldn't even be in the same city. She could hardly imagine having this conversation and having to pay long distance for it.

"This guy in school got his early acceptance a couple days ago," Jackie interjected in a break in William's monologue. "Princeton, la-di-da. He even brought the letter to school."

William snorted. "People would laugh if you did that at my school. Although, Princeton, that's pretty tough to get into."

"So have you heard anything?" Jackie asked, after an uncomfortable pause. She'd been waiting for him to make some crack about public schools.

"Nah, not yet. I don't think most of them send until March anyway. I'm not worried."

"Yeah, me either, at least not yet." He didn't ask whether she had heard, Jackie thought. Or just assumed she hadn't, probably.

After they hung up, she realized they never had clarified what they were going to do on Saturday. If anything. Pretty much at this point her main reason for wanting to go out and do anything was to occupy her mind from endless worrying about the college letters. About being found out.

She dragged the phone back to its table. Joy ran up the stairs, and Jackie gave her a brief look, a half smile to show her appreciation that Joy tried not to just butt into their room when she was on the phone. Ever since she'd started ninth grade, and started hanging out with the girls on the volleyball team, she had gotten nicer, Jackie thought. Too bad, now that she was going away next fall. Probably.

"He's driving her crazy," Joy said. No need to explain she meant JJ and Mom. "You should go down there."

"Yeah, that's a great reason," she answered, her sarcasm sliding out before she could think about it. She knew what Joy meant – often having another person in the room kind of spread out JJ's energy, dissipating it at least a bit.

Joy just shrugged. "So listen to them yelling later."

"I'm done with my homework, I can go." Jackie turned to the stairs. Not that she'd actually done her reading. She could skim it later.

"Can't you girls get along?" Mom demanded the minute Jackie sat down on her end of the sofa, nudging JJ over into the lumpy middle part. "It's possible to share a room."

Where Jackie might have once been smart aleck or defensive, pointing out that Mom failed to notice that she and Joy got along better now, that neither of them were 12 anymore, she just shrugged it off. "I finished my homework," she said. "I just wanted to see what was on."

The TV was on, but the sound was off. Some cop show, it looked like, probably a rerun. Still, JJ wriggled around, his fists curled into imaginary guns, shooting wildly.

"Nothing's on at all until this one gets to bed. It's almost nine, JJ!"

"I already brushed my teeth!" he yelled back.

Jackie hid the laughter that bubbled up. The contrast between her mom, leaning back in her chair looking too tired to even make a move towards JJ, and the kid, who was wired and looked like he could stay up babbling and making excuses for hours, was funny. Or would be, if it wasn't happening every stupid night.

She leaned toward her brother, play wrestling. "She's just going to turn off the TV until you get out of here. Or do you want us to give you big sloppy bedtime kisses?"

At that he roared in disgust and bolted off the sofa. Mom sank further into her chair. Both knew JJ would be in and out a few more times.

"I'm going to miss you next year," Mom said softly. "And not just because you're so good with him."

Jackie shrugged again, looking away. Lately her mom was getting misty eyed over every little thing, it was embarrassing.

"My first baby, old enough for college," Mom continued.

"Mom, jeez." Jackie glanced over – at least Mom was smiling now. She talked as though next year was just days away sometimes. As if the whole thing was already settled, that there was no question about Jackie getting accepted somewhere, packing her bags, knowing what to take, how to fit in. Jackie used to take for granted the confidence her mom had always had in her. Now, though, the pressure of waiting – of waiting and knowing what she had done, how she could still possibly be caught – made her nerves jangle so badly it was hard to just sit quietly in the room with her.

Both turned toward the sound of JJ dropping something in the hallway and yelping in surprise. Mom rose stiffly out of her chair.

Jackie stayed put. She would chase him up next time. She looked toward the TV, but left the volume down – hearing it would just get JJ back in here quicker. She tried to imagine sitting around in a college dorm instead. Dorms had common rooms, right? Only instead of an exhausted mom and misbehaving brother, she would have sophisticated friends. All of the poring over their books together, writing long essays, or dashing off to the library to do research.

Mom returned, part of a cookie still secreted in her hand. That was one of JJ's tried and true stalls: cookies or candy to quiet down, but then another round in the bathroom, complaining he'd already brushed his teeth, and on and on until you just wanted to swat him or chain him to his bed. "You were always the sensible one," Mom told her.

This time, Jackie couldn't even meet her eye, and busied herself, instead, poking through the newspaper for Dear Abby. Something to remind her that other people had worse problems than she had.

Even as she read it, though, something nagged at her. In the back of her head, murmuring, distracting her, the thought that all that confidence might just be false. That just as easily as JJ made everybody think he was sorry, he'd be good now, when let's face it, the kid seemed pretty much lacked a moral compass – what if she was the same way? Fooling Mom, and Dad (talk about easy to fool), and everybody to think she was smart and capable when it turns out she needed a leg up to for the simplest thing. If she had to cheat to get into college, what would she have to do in order to succeed there?

Days passed, every one the same. School, hanging out, choking down dinner, listening to Mom and JJ bicker. Weekends no different from the last one or the next. Saturday dinner at Dad's house – better food if they went out, worse if he just heated stuff up. The same conversations. Jackie, parroting a pale imitation of her old assured self just to keep anyone from noticing anything was wrong. Eating less at dinner, stomach churning when she felt other people's eyes on her, but then mindlessly gulping down whole bags of chips or crummy cookies. Hand moving to mouth, eyes glued to the TV, trying to distract herself.

All the way into March, just when it seemed her life was a broken record and she would be spinning endlessly, secretive and guilty, the first envelope arrived. Just like they sad: it was big and thick. Towsend, her fall back, said yes. Jackie, acting cool since Mom was right there crowding in as she read the letter, casually flipped through the material. Her brain wasn't taking it in though – her brain was still repeating you did it you did it. She had at least someplace to go.

Only two days later, the packet from Villanova arrived. This time, Jackie allowed herself a victory dance, waltzing JJ around the room as Mom laughed and applauded.

"What do I do now, what do I send them?" Jackie exclaimed, too happily frantic to even sit down yet.

Mom waved her off. "Take the whole thing to your father's Saturday," she said. "He'll help you fill out the financial part, that's what we agreed. Now what about dinner, shall we make something special?"

Jackie shrugged. After all this time, all this wait, she couldn't even think about something as stupid as dinner. This was her whole life stretching out, newly and wonderfully guilt free. "You decide," she said, a wide smile cracking through. She carried all the material from Villanova up to her room and set about organizing it, and then gleefully threw out all the rest of the brochures.

## Chapter 7 Tactical Differences

# San Francisco 2012

Another endless BART trip. JJ Carlisle sank back in his seat, scuffed sneakers resting on the seat across from him and eyes tracking the fast blinking lights that shot by from the tunnel under the bay. This time of day the car was half empty, no uptight suits giving his shoes on the seat the evil eye, fewer ridiculously young guys frantically zooming through their messages and making him feel lazy and under employed.

He had worked like three ten hour days last week, so enough already. (Fortunately the guys paying him barely had a clue of the work required, so he had stretched the time out quite a bit, but still.) Hard to see how these people could stand it, worrying and fussing over their boss's expectations and their programming problems day after day.

As for JJ, cash the check, pay the rent, buy some food, and see ya later. No need to struggle toward some status condo in a status neighborhood. He preferred the Mission anyway, and as for having roommates, he'd gotten used it. Better than putting on a tie or working all the time, especially with little damn work to be had.

He was headed toward another meet up in Oakland, one of a competing series held by Occupy and the 99 Percenters splinter group. Somebody's Twitterfeed had promised that both groups would be in the same area at the same time, and people could meet together afterwards. Assuming anyone was up for hours more discussions on top of what they'd just done. JJ shook his head. Matter of fact, a lot of those guys would love nothing more. Some of them could talk in circles for days if you let them.

He felt most motivated to go to represent the obvious alternative to all the blah blah talking – more action. Not the black bloc anarchist stuff – even the more hard core occupiers questioned some of those motives – but thoughtful and targeted. It was frustrating because he was still on order from everybody involved to sit quietly in the backseat and not call attention to himself. But that ran both counter to who he was and to what was so obviously needed in the movement now. Lack of action threatened to grind the whole thing to a halt.

Already, mainstream news media had turned away. And screw the eager puppy eyed attorneys who were so called advising him, and saying the lack of attention was a good thing for his case. No TV cameras, no reporters, meant they were practically in a vacuum. Trees falling in a forest, 50 people demonstrating, and nobody heard it. Even though the noise was there.

Like this train. JJ became aware of its steady ear splitting buzz as they churned out of the tunnel and rose rapidly above ground. He had ignored it but the racket was there, audible even over his ear buds. Patches of blue sky came into view, in contrast to the fog hanging over the city. It would be good to get outside at least, even for a lot of talk instead of action.

Piling out of the station at City Center, pushing past the slow moving people in his way, JJ felt only a moment's irritation at the exorbitant cost of BART. He'd heard rumors about a way to hack into the Clipper system; he would feel a lot better about the cost if he could get a piece of that action. But the gathering crowd at Occupy Plaza came into view and he hastened toward it, annoyance forgotten.

Lots of familiar faces, and at least a few people he knew pretty well. Greetings, fist bumps, laughing when one of the guys pretended to knock him down (he assumed another tired joking reference to that bank guy). His phone buzzed, and he checked it: a text from Jenna, the attorney girl, reminding him to "avoid cameras and unwarranted attention."

JJ raised his head for a moment, searching the crowd. Not to be too paranoid, but was she like stalking him? More likely she'd just seen the same tweets, knew he would be here. All around him, guys were quietly texting. One or two already held phones aloft, filming the small gathering as it grew and spread across the terraced plaza. A bunch of people had brought their signs, never mind that this was supposedly a strategy session, everything from pro-Palestine to stop Keystone pipeline to fuck the rich.

JJ watched more people coming up the escalator from BART, a train from Berkeley, he guessed. Pretty clear which people were headed here and who were local people, quickly steering clear. Seemed like everybody African American took them in with a glance and walked away as fast as possible. This is your problem too, JJ thought, but restrained himself from approaching anyone. That hadn't been much of a viable strategy even before he was supposed to lay low.

He eased closer to the center of the group, jostling a group of gray haired ladies, total Berkeleyites, who were lugging some giant picnic basket between them. No loudspeakers were allowed, but somebody had a megaphone, and he called in a piercing, scratchy voice, for everyone to gather.

No mike check anymore, JJ noticed. Too time constraining with this many people, sure, although it made the whole thing less democratic. The guys with the megaphone would be controlling the dialogue, that was clear.

"Occupy the plaza," someone yelled from the back, but others quickly shushed him.

"Here are the topics!" the megaphone boomed. "One, next target areas. Two, reporting from committees on sustainable vision. Three, progress on banks and foreclosures and specifically the houses we are protecting here in Oakland. Four, information technology and social media updates—"

At this, a round of booing and jeers overtook the guy for a moment. JJ watched the dude swallow hard and continue down his list. He had to feel for him a little. Pretty clear he was reading off a list that had taken hours for a dozen or more people to agree to, and he was stuck presenting crap he didn't agree with either. JJ had been part of numerous arguments about use and abuse of social media, how to draw in the young crowd, generating a non-threatening presence on facebook, preventing twittterfeeds associated with Occupy from advocating violence toward individuals, etc.

Like obviously a lot of people gathered here, he scoffed at the idea of this movement of small d democracy dictating what anyone should post online. Anyway, the older leadership (screw it, he might as well admit there were leaders despite all public claims to the contrary) didn't get it. They talked about facebook and tweets as if these were something a person did outside of their regular lives, like making a special trip to the library. JJ, aside from actually being closer in age to the leadership, understood it from a younger perspective: using your cell wasn't something you ever thought about, it was just living. You texted, you checked gps and the time, Yelp, messages, who wanted to hang out, what that movie was you loved in second grade – it was like walking and talking, things you did without thought or analysis. Or some wonk telling you what not to say.

The megaphone traded hands and another dude started reading his dry report. JJ's attention wandered, soon caught by some kids below him, just at the entrance of the station, tagging with one of those huge markers. Young guys, small, high school or maybe younger – white but dressed like black kids, and drawing those exaggerated letters like street kids.

But JJ would bet they weren't from here; something about how hard they were trying to look nonchalant. The local kids would mark the wall and be silently gone. These guys paid too much attention to their baggy pants and tried to flash hand signals awkwardly. One even pulled the newest iphone from his pocket and snapped a photo of his handywork, and JJ snorted out loud.

At that point, several middle aged hippie types started scolding the kids, who responded with expletive laden jeers. A voice raised above them, urging everyone to pay attention to the meet up and if the weren't taking part to at least do it quietly. The central cadre of people, who were grouped around and now avidly shouting their preferences for target areas, ignored the whole thing. But others drifted over. JJ, who hadn't moved, now stood in the denser part of the crowd.

"Hey, man, fuck you. Fuck private property," one of the kids yelled. His friends clustered around him, but looked nervous as the group of onlookers grew.

His stance might have been more defensible, JJ thought, if he'd been tagging something political rather than a large graphic of his own initials. A pair of old women stepped forward, walking right up to the kids. JJ could just hear a bit of what they said, something about respect for other people's community and how this was public space, that BART was public transit, not a private corporation.

The post-hippies looked annoyed, like they would rather fight their good fight loudly than actually make the kids put down their markers. But that's what was going down – whatever the senior citizens had to say, it got to the kids. They hustled off toward the back escalator, as fast as their awkward, baggy pants walk would allow.

One of the old people looked up, surveying the crowd. She looked like Amelia, JJ thought. He peered under his sunglasses – that was her, for sure. But seeing her in this context gave him a start, it was just too weird, and he backed away into the crowd. It was like an automatic reaction from childhood to seeing a parental figure: sneak away before you got caught misbehaving. Even though Amelia wasn't like a real parent, never mind being married to Dad. Or like he was doing anything wrong by being here. In fact, he should be paying more attention.

JJ coolly shoved his way closer to the speakers, where the discussion of potential Occupy targets was still loudly underway. They had a small card table set up in the middle of things, with several people furiously tapping away on tablets or laptops. A solid half of them having wifi issues, from the looks of it, which was causing everyone to repeat their comments multiple times.

"We need a summary, can someone summarize?!" one guy kept yelling.

JJ had arrived right on time, he thought – much rather hear the digested version than all the lame ideas it was generated from. It was pretty clear that so far, they weren't even ready to winnow down the list, or start analyzing the practicalities, like access and whether there would be immediate arrests. No, the focus was still on the principles involved. Minutia regarding the highest tiers of politically correct concern, which would roughly translate into whether to first focus on the corporate pigs, the largest or nearest or most egregious, or rich individuals who were big private right wing donors.

Or probably a lot of these guys would rather just talk the whole thing out some more. Jesus Christ. Blow off the whole idea of action in favor of another hundred point list to be posted on a website that nobody read.

Finally, one of the note takers stood up and read off the list – the same targets, nothing new. Several people immediately called out specific names of companies, banks, buildings, and that at least got people fired up. But in a flash, the self-appointed leaders, one of whom kept a constant eye on the time, declared they had to cover more topics.

Another guy – JJ recognized him from dozens of meetings and actions – stood and declared that his visioning committee on would cede its time to hear about the foreclosure progress. Something real, he called it, to loud cheers.

"And then let's actually go there and do something about it!" JJ yelled out, before he could even think about it. Several others chimed in, calling for less talk and more action. JJ, finally, felt some motivation about being here.

More than one person recognized him from the video, JJ realized. One guy nodding too eagerly, a pair of woman glaring, looking ready to tell him off. But the bulk of the crowd was with the talking heads, and most everybody cooled off to listen to some woman talk about legislation on bank foreclosures. Others veered away. JJ noticed a couple guys he knew from other actions slamming back through the crowd toward the federal buildings by the plaza. Easy, if tired old targets. The sign that labeled this Frank Ogawa Plaza had been defaced so many times you could hardly read it. He ambled casually in that direction, telling himself it was just to check it out. In his head he was already explaining to the pro bono lawyers, how he had no intention of getting involved.

It was probably lucky for him that a line of cops was already there. All that would go down was more yelling, that was clear. Or head banging, if someone got too far in their faces. JJ stepped up as far as the first police line and held his ground, but kept quiet. The cops' faces were hidden behind their head gear. He doubted they could see his face clearly to recognize him, but even so, he had no interest in getting clubbed before anyone even made it to the buildings.

When shouts erupted down the line, JJ, feeling suddenly old and mature, decided just to blend back into the crowd. This wasn't real action. It looked like someone had maybe thrown an empty coffee cup. There was no coverage, no good target, no real reason other than frustration to try these same buildings again. These were just late comers to the movement, JJ thought. They didn't care for symbolism at all, they just wanted to break stuff. At least in the F- the Police actions, you got the satisfaction of baiting those trigger happy cops. Instead, he wandered back, where the main part of the group was gathered, still talking over each other.

Some of the guys here, he thought, honestly didn't see much difference between what was happening here and the Arab Spring. Like their action papers and quiet demos could just bring the system down, make it right. Their demands would lead to closing down the banks and to universal healthcare. While others had no understanding that the actual one percent are pretty much unaware of anything going on without something really extreme to get their attention. What we need is a trigger, JJ thought, to seriously set off the movement.

Farther along, he noticed a funny line of other people holding signs, calling themselves "Stand for Oakland." They were older, not Berkeley hippies but just normal people, kind of weather beaten. Their signs were crookedly hand drawn, and they were jostling each other, laughing sometimes. A cameraman zipped by, filming them, ignoring the Occupiers. A tall, heavyset woman proclaimed that local citizens were organizing to protect their local small businesses from the protesters.

JJ made himself hold back. He couldn't tell if it was TV or just some local filmmaker. But figures that 10 people opposing Occupy would draw the attention.

A sudden movement at his side broke his focus. He looked over, surprised to see Amelia heading toward him in as hurried a pace as such an old lady could muster. "Well, JJ, I thought I might find you here," she exclaimed, as pleasantly as if they had met in Jackie's parlor for tea.

"Hi," he said, as usual at a loss for words around his stepmother. "Um, what are you doing here?"

She had come, she explained, with some of her Sierra Club friends. She indicated the little cluster of senior citizens she had broken away from. They had driven over (carpooling, of course) from Orinda to represent the tri-valley at the 99 percent meet up.

JJ nodded, smiling a little at these phrases coming from anyone associated with the family.

"But I must say, I was interested to see this group, this 'Stand for Oakland,'" she added, nodding toward the rag tag group he had been watching. Some of them were now attempting to march in a circle, while others milled around, getting in the way. One lady had brought a folding chair and sat heavily in it, fanning herself as though the exertion of holding her sign had worn her out. The lady in the chair was dressed up, like she was in church, JJ thought.

"I wonder if they got organized by a local church? They're not with us," JJ explained.

Amelia gave that little high pitched laugh she had. "I gathered that, young man," she said, "seeing as how they're protesting Occupy Oakland." Voice lowered, she added, "I don't think I'd be spilling any secrets if I let you know that most of my colleagues are more sympathetic to their message than to yours. At least as evidenced by the activities in the plaza."

"Most of us are just talking," JJ snapped back in defense, never mind that he wished for more action and less talk. "Look at them."

At this point, you could hardly tell a movement was taking place at all. One group, mostly young guys, the same ones who tended to get on TV, shouted down the cops and darted back and forth in frenzied and unsuccessful forays toward the federal building. The ongoing discussion had splintered into several competing sets of people talking loudly, gesticulating. Plus a whole other crowd just roamed, snapping photos or texting. There were more people watching the activists and cops as though it was a reality show than actual activists, and the only cops that even looked interested were the ones who had taken paint balls off a guy and were now happily hustling him towards a squad car.

Amelia shook her head. "Indeed, it's chaotic and seemingly without goals or direction. Where these folks are pretty clear in wishing to support their local businesses."

JJ didn't even know where to begin. "This is like ten people. I mean, there's nobody here to read their signs—"

"Except for all of us!"

"There's no media," JJ continued. "Do they have any message besides a couple signs? Any way to communicate? A twitterfeed, even a facebook page?"

Amelia shook her head, looking sober for the first time since he had spotted her. "I'm afraid you're right, those certainly are considerations these days. But," she waved her hand back toward her tri-valley compatriots, "we've been discussing the critical need for something that takes a step back from all this, the chaos and violence. A principled non-violent movement to bring attention to inequities. A way to address the most blatant of the problems by legal and political means. And believe me, older folks like us have some serious concerns."

JJ doubted someone married to his dad could have, like, any inequity problems. Aside from the obvious point that things had been getting worse economically for years. But nobody was capable of doing anything about it through the tired old channels of peaceful protest and bullshit bipartisan law making. JJ tried to phrase this in a politer way, but basically he reiterated that only a massive show of strength and force could bring down Wall Street oligarchs.

Amelia's friends surrounded them, and JJ suddenly felt freakishly tall. And uncomfortable, the way a bunch of grown ups had always made him feel. But she patted his arm kindly, and said they had to head back. She urged him to find the post meet up gathering, saying perhaps their debate could continue in the context of the two groups hashing out these important differences in tactics.

JJ nodded, saying, "Sure," as she and the group fluttered off down 12th Street like a flock of bright colored birds. He took a few steps back toward the plaza, glancing back, almost worried that someone would turn back and watch to make sure he returned.

It wasn't clear which group was which at this point, except for the guys running up against the police, obviously the so called radical element of Occupy. JJ couldn't really see any point in a bunch more discussions, anyway. He would read what came out of it later. And make his point again and again about action. High minded or sensible or whatever as Amelia was, he seriously doubted the system would ever change due to passive discussions and calm presentations of the problems. Especially considering the gross unfairness already of which entities held all the power.

For now, he was hungry. He cruised around the bulk of the crowd toward the back, where there were often free food stations set up. A simple, meaningful, direct way to get food to the hungry, bypassing external chains and distributing what was here now; Amelia and her gang should check that out.

But the back area was pretty much empty. A few office workers taking smoke breaks, some teenagers hanging around. Recent posters renaming the plaza and been torn down, graffiti cleaned up, the original tent encampment long cleared away. No leftovers from Food Not Bombs, not even a damn hot dog stand. It must be later than he thought.

JJ debated going straight back to the apartment where the food was free between all the stuff Oscar bought in bulk and the others brought back from restaurants. But he wanted something now. Annoyed at the hassle, he walked back out to the street. Away from the plaza and the station, where a lot of the vendors got all chicken shit and left when there was any sort of a demonstration.

The air was warm, the sun beat down, buildings casting sharp shadows and the only noise coming from traffic. Oakland felt different from foggy and people clogged SF, and a block from Occupy felt even more different from being in Oaktown during any demonstration. Down here, people on the street moved languidly. No one in a hurry to be somewhere. Older ladies waited patiently for the bus, as if they hardly expected it, hardly cared if it showed up. Guys half slunk, half swaggered, raising their heads just slightly to assess people nearby.

JJ gave a cool nod to a group of guys clustered by the entrance to a building. Yeah, he was white, but not a cop or a narc. We're all oppressed here, man, he said in his head. He spotted a sandwich truck farther down the street and headed toward it

The Asian dude running it took his order and his money with no words, not even eye contact. He equally ignored a trio of kids, wannabe gang bangers, who mumbled angrily toward JJ and the truck. One of them, half a head shorter, jerked a shoulder toward JJ, in a veiled, threatening way. JJ didn't react, didn't move, just waited for his food. He wished there was some way to get kids like these to understand that they were on the same side, facing the same economic injustices. The same corporate pigs were screwing with all our lives, these kids should be lining up to be part of Occupy, the F- the Police rallies were on their behalf.

JJ watched the kids, darting out to cut across the street at a wide angle, and an old guy sweeping dirt from the front of his shop, pausing when a woman pushed a stroller by. In the distance, a siren rang out – hard to tell if it was reinforcements for the demonstration or just the same old shit of someone getting busted on the street. Nobody else even looked up.

## Chapter 8 Small Graces

# San Francisco, 1989

Karen had been living in California for almost two years when her father died. She had only been back to Pennsylvania once, that past Christmas. The length of time it took to fly across the country had not even been a factor in her decision about whether to take her new job and make the move. That wasn't something you thought about in your twenties, was it? Even if your dad had always been one of the older ones at any school function, even if he had taken an early retirement.

But she had the whole length of the country to contemplate the distance that long day after. Her mom had called, just past dinner time, a totally normal time to call. It hadn't even occurred to Karen to worry about answering the phone; it had taken several tries for her mother to speak coherently. Even then, Karen couldn't quite take it in.

Dad not feeling well for several days, Dad going into the hospital, that part was clear, unsurprising. But then suddenly dead from what was probably his third heart attack? At age 64? Mom working with the minister to put together a service, did Karen have any favorite poems or readings to suggest?

Her older brother Peter, fortunately, was already on hand, living close by in Philly. They'd had a hard time even tracking down Clay at his teaching job down south. He would be driving all the way up, as usual the last one to arrive. Karen had quite literally hopped on the first plane she could, but Mom would have been widowed for almost a day by the time she made it back.

On the flight, she managed to snag a window seat, despite the last minute reservation. She did not even fake her usual politeness to the guy in the aisle or the flight attendants, just refused their offers and stared out the window. Land receded and puffs of clouds drifted below, their curved shadows dancing across the treeless western hills and then the flat plains.

All day, ever since the call came, really, she had a sense of standing outside herself. Going through the motions: calling the airline, letting Peter know her flight time, letting her roommates know when she would return. Writing early checks for bills, watering her plants. Telling her boss she would need the time off – he was only a few years older but completely understanding of the situation. Gay guys here, young guys, had seen so many of their friends die from AIDS that they got it, he had explained – she should take the time she needed, be there for her family.

And yet, flying toward home, it struck her that her father was the family member she had known the least well. Not that they had been in conflict. Just that he had been a person of his time and thus barely involved in bringing up the kids. He worked and paid for things, mowed the lawn, took the snapshots on vacations, with only the occasional shadow of a finger in the image to prove that he had been there at all.

What made her sad was thinking about her mom. Mom was what, 51? She hadn't even finished college, quitting to marry, as she often referred to him, "your dad, the dashing older man." Yes, she had always managed the family's budget and she had even worked the last 15 years. But always small, meaningless jobs, things to do for extra spending money. Despite her sociology books and women's support groups, she had no real career, she had never really lived independently.

Still, Mom had never held Karen back. Not pushed her away from her own budding career in graphic arts or urged her to marry young and have kids, as she herself had done. Or at least she laughingly bemoaned the lack of grandchildren equally to Karen and both her brothers. Always lightly, Karen thought, always with a cheerful acceptance of whatever they chose, whatever life threw at them. Clay choosing to teach the poorest of the poor in the rural south – why not. Karen's exciting opportunity to help launch her company's new west coast branch in San Francisco, what great news!

But this. How could anyone accept this? Karen thought of the last time she had seen her dad, dropping her off at the airport early in the morning in the dark of winter. He had insisted on driving her, though he hadn't been feeling too well. (That was normal, a basic tenet of home life, Dad not feeling too well – it just meant a headache or his needing to lie down for a bit. Not die.) She tried to picture his face, puffy in the glare of streetlights, and stern as he waved off the traffic control guys who scolded him for parking the car in the drop off section.

Instead she heard her mom's voice in her head again, apologizing over and over, saying, "No, honey, he's already gone, I'm sorry, it already happened." Her voice a strange monotone. As numb and outsider herself as Karen felt, she couldn't imagine how her mom was coping with all this.

Voices from the seats behind her caught her attention. A deep voiced man telling his seatmates about the earthquake. Over three weeks ago, but still so fresh. Karen realized that she had not thought about any of it since last night. Which seemed miraculous considering how immediate and blatant the aftermath still was, daily in the news and in simple decisions about getting around. Still so many aftershocks, which Karen felt exceptionally sensitive to – being in the air was a relief, she realized, because all the jerking and noise here were normal, to be expected.

"Our office opened back up after just a day," the guy's voice droned on, "but just one street over there were red-tagged buildings. One of my co-workers lived in the Marina, and their whole block was cordoned off."

He started explaining the intricacies of the color coded tagging system. Karen, despite herself, flashed back on that afternoon, October 17th. She had been at work, joking around with a couple co-workers since it was late in the workday. One of them had squealed at the first noticeable jolt, and then they had all laughed uncomfortably. Karen had not really had experience with quakes – there had been one in the summer that had startled her, but it had been over before she figured out what it was.

This one had just begun. The project director, always a somber looking guy, had hurried past, his face a grim mask. Heading for their doorway, she realized, something she had read about doing. Instead, she crawled under her desk, wedging herself in and pressing against it as the floor jolted back and forth. There were unidentifiable noises coming from several directions. Her eyes were squeezed closed, but she opened them enough to watch books across the hall slide smoothly off their shelves.

They said it lasted 15 seconds. Karen was sure it went much longer. Things kept swaying up on the 5th floor of her building. Afterwards, she was so shaky herself that she could barely stand. They gathered back together, giggling again with sheer nerves. The director was curt and told everyone to grab their things and go, to take the stairs. And indeed, the whole building's population was tromping down fast, stirring up a strange dust cloud from fallen plaster throughout the stairwell.

Stumbling onto the sidewalk outside, they saw a bike messenger in the middle of the street, hollering at everyone to stay inside, screaming that they were in danger from things falling. He looked completely unhinged, and they all walked quickly away. In retrospect, she thought, the guy had been right. Some buildings had lost bricks, whole walls had fallen. They could have been killed.

Karen felt a shiver run up her spine. Oddly, she had been calm that day, even in the aftermath when the power was out and smoke was visible from the big fire. She only lived a couple miles from the office and she and another co-worker had set off on foot in the same direction. Walking crowded streets full of office workers doing the same, everybody strangely cheerful, high on nerves. The streets were clogged with cars, but it was the most polite traffic jam she had ever seen. Some intersections even had volunteer traffic directors waving cars past one at a time, since no traffic lights were working.

It wasn't until the next day, then the days beyond, that Karen really embraced the reality. She read and obsessively reread the stories of near misses and survival. And of the terrible deaths, the people crushed in their cars or trapped under rubble in their buildings. Over that first week she felt both claustrophobia from being inside, and panic with every footstep outside, sure she was stumbling from another aftershock.

In the worst moments, she had even thought about flying home. Or flying anywhere, trying to calm herself with the logistics of escaping a peninsula with wrecked roads and train tracks. What an unpleasant foreshadowing, she thought now. For a long time she closed her eyes and tried to tune out the overwhelming noise of the engines and the soft buzz of voices from behind. She longed, in a way she hadn't since being a little kid a week after Christmas, for the ability to turn back time. To go back a month, to be back before the death and before the earthquake, and appreciate that life before.

The next days passed in a blur of sleeplessness and almost frantic revelry. People called and many just dropped by – Karen had forgotten that small town social norm. Neighbors piled the counters high with food that no one felt much like eating. Mom flitted room to room, a half dozen task lists started and set aside. For the most part her energy was high, although she barely had a bite to eat. But then she would just sag into herself. Karen or Peter or their Aunt Bette would urge her into the guest room to lie down. She couldn't even close her eyes in their bedroom, she told them.

There were so many details. Bette put herself in charge of pulling together the service. Mom just kept throwing up her hands, saying we were going to talk about these things, we just hadn't yet, over the smallest questions. And Peter's new girlfriend came and proved herself invaluable in making the sorts of phone calls that no one else could face – alerting various offices, canceling appointments, that sort of thing.

Peter helped Mom go through papers. Clay drove back and forth to the airport to pick up other relatives. And Karen found herself back in her regular role of checking in with everyone, trying to sooth nerves and comfort people, politely accepting the lengthy stories and gestures of comfort that various people offered.

After awhile she was forgetting who she had talked to, who was who amongst Dad's former co-workers and old friends. But it didn't matter. No one noticed or cared if one of them spaced out. It was like being a child again; you just had to show up and everyone cooed over you. And yet, not like that at all. Karen and her brothers spoke in hushed voices, one of the afternoons when Mom was resting, about whether Mom should sell the house. About where the legal papers were, and what she was likely to get from Dad's pension and social security. Karen had never felt so much an adult.

The service was nice enough, though it seemed over in a blink. Not that Karen had much basis for comparison. She tried to focus, but her mind kept wandering. Seated up front, she couldn't see the people, but could hear murmurs behind her, appreciative chuckles as the minister mentioned endearing traits. Next to her, Clay sniffled. On the other side, Peter sat stiff and grim, and Mom slumped, sometimes nodding along, sometimes dabbing her eyes with her handkerchief.

Karen felt herself compartmentalizing the whole thing. That was the phrase her supervisor had used, off handedly mentioning the painful death, at age 32, of a close friend. She would be able to take it out, examine it, relive the thing and experience the proper emotions, sometime later. Soon, she told herself. Just not yet.

People gathered in the chapel after, a ragged receiving line forming around the immediate family. Karen was surprised, though she shouldn't have been, at how many people were there. Dad had been a respected member of the community, Mom always had lots of friends, and clearly there were many people ready to support her. That made her feel better in a small way. I'll take it, she thought, feeling newly mature at the knowledge she should appreciate those small graces wherever she found them.

Karen noticed that her friend Jackie Carlisle's parents were both there. They had apparently grown more tolerant of each other in the years since their divorce, and came over to say hello together, son JJ between them. Now, that made her feel old. The former baby boy had morphed into a gangly, stringy haired teenager, taller than any of them. Jackie's mom and dad each clasped her hands and spoke their kinds words, her mom specifically mentioning how much Jackie admired all the Emersons and that she sent her sympathy from her new home in New York.

JJ just stood there, spooky silent. Not so much uncomfortable with the circumstances as seeming far outside of it all, so far that they might all be a book he was reading, or a video game he had stumbled across. Karen remembered that thing he did, kind of making unspoken bargains with Jackie. And with her that time too. She felt a moment's distaste at the recollection of that smarmy guy, her awful behavior, and swallowed hard. Unlikely JJ had the slightest recollection. As for Jackie, they hadn't been in touch for awhile, though their old friendship still emerged when they saw each other. Karen usually made a point of seeking her out when she was in town, maybe a bit of guilt still tying her to her old friend.

The Carlisles moved on, both adults embracing her mom. Another older couple took their place, then another. Toward the end of that afternoon, Karen felt like her face would crack from sheer politeness. All those phrases repeated, our deepest sympathy, such a fine man, your poor mother. It was a simple pleasure to return to the house, to shoo Mom out of the kitchen and attempt to organize all the food.

The front door slammed, and she jumped. Then shook her head, reminding herself that she was all the way across the country from the aftershocks. No one had even talked about it, she realized. Of course she had talked to the folks right after she got her phone service back, the evening of the quake, and they had let everybody know she was fine. But it was weird, as if people here had already forgotten, or assumed everything was back to normal. One old lady, the widow of a former co-worker, had asked Karen whether she now intended to move home. I can't, she had told the lady, I'm committed to my job, and things will be rebuilt. Only now, she realized, the woman may have been asking whether she would move back to stay with her mother, not whether she feared living in earthquake country.

Karen stacked together a set of serving dishes and utensils that were labeled with masking tape as belonging to a long time neighbor. (A fan of Hints from Heloise, Karen thought idly, a thoughtful lady with time to cook, a friend who had known the family for decades.) She could drop them off, she could use a little walk for exercise and just to get out of the house. Her brothers were zoned out in front of the TV, and Karen pulled on a coat and told them she would be back shortly.

Dusk already, the air cold and crisp in a near forgotten way. Karen gazed up at the dark silhouettes of the nearly bare trees against the sky. It was familiar and yet foreign too. The chilled air, bare trees, wide car-less streets, just the general lack of color anywhere. Had she already become a "California Girl," as her former colleagues had teased her when she left? It wasn't even winter yet.

Freezing, nonetheless. Karen walked with her head down, wishing she had thought to put on gloves. The neighbor wasn't home – she could tell because the lights were out and no car in the driveway – but Karen knew the stuff would be safe inside the screen door. Such a nice thing, trusted neighbors, everyone with their own parking space. Their own cars, affordable houses.

In San Francisco, Karen was lucky to afford her shared place, and when she ever got a car, she would join the frustrated neighbors chasing down a parking spot. She had no idea who lived a block down the street. Not to mention the possibility of earthquakes!

Still, she couldn't shake the feeling that life back here was all in black and white. Not just the dull tones of a November dusk, but the lack of any sort of vibrancy here. Nothing in Pennsylvania, or Rochester, or Syracuse, where she had found her first post-college job, compared to her new home. Her actual home, she repeated in her head.

Back at the house, some semblance of normalcy had taken hold at last. Peter sat at Dad's work desk with a bunch of papers and a calculator. Mom and Clay still had the TV on, and both were snacking on what appeared to be slices of whoopie pie. It could have been Christmas break, or high school. It was hard to imagine that Dad wasn't just upstairs, about to reappear, yawning but smiling, telling everyone he felt refreshed.

"This is nice," Mom told the room at large, as Karen sat on her old spot on the couch, rubbing her hands to warm them. "Everyone here together. Despite it all."

"It's kind of weird though. Like Dad should be here too," Clay said, his eyes darting Karen a nervous glance, as if wondering if it was okay yet to speak of him.

"I was just thinking that. Like Christmas break or something," Karen assured him.

"We knew," Mom began, than stopped for a moment. Karen and Peter exchanged a look.

"We knew going into it that I would most likely outlive him," Mom went on, with the smallest of smiles darting across her face. "Even after you fall in love, you get your senses back eventually. It was something we discussed way back. When we got serious, I guess. Before he went to have a chat with my father, the way one did in those days." Another tiny smile crossed her lips, as if she could even now picture that awkward meeting between these important men of her life. "But we decided that we would just accept it. Knowing I would live on after him wouldn't change the time we had together. It didn't. We would have wished for longer..." she faded out.

"Thirty years," Karen said. "That's pretty long to be married at least."

Mom nodded. "I'm glad we celebrated our thirtieth. Even if your father didn't want to make a fuss. It was a sweet little party. Our last, as it turns out, before all this."

Karen watched her mom closely, worried she would finally break down. But she didn't. She looked somehow more sure of herself than she had all week.

"Now, what about you two," she said suddenly. "All this time together and we've barely had a chance to catch up. Karen? Clay? Anyone new I should know about?"

They all teased Clay for a few minutes – apparently a girl had answered the phone at his house and had extensive knowledge of his schedule, though he assured them she was just a friendly roommate.

Karen rolled her eyes at the question too. She had a not serious/no commitments guy she had been seeing. She hesitated to even call him a boyfriend, although that's how she had previously described him to Mom. But it was just for fun, for convenience, two people both new to the area, exploring new places, sometimes tumbling into bed after. More convenient for him, Karen thought. He worked like half the hours she did, so he had plenty more time to meet other women and not be tied down.

While Karen's work was really a priority, as she established herself at the firm, and they got a foothold in the Bay Area. Things in her life revolved around her office, she thought. Often as not, she was there at dinner time, and the food they ordered was better than the stuff she could afford or had time to make at home.

"I'm not really involved with that guy anymore," she said, when Mom pressed about the faux boyfriend. "That was just this temporary, this flaky thing... And I've been so busy. We're like a start up, that's what they call the new high tech firms. You're expected to work long hours."

Mom wore her worried expression. Those tilted down lips and raised brows – Karen had seen them all week of course, with all the things on Mom's mind. She hated to be one more worry. "There is this guy that I met at work," she added, the words slipping out before she could stop herself. "He just got brought on to work on a project. But I mean, we need to work together. I don't think he sees me as anything but potential competition really, or as just this girl who's inexperienced and laughs a lot."

"Oh my," Mom said softly.

"What?" Karen stared at her mother. The guys had already stopped paying attention.

"Nothing. Just something in your expression just then. It reminded me of your father. Of us, way back." She shook her head. "I'm projecting, just ignore me." She paused. "But promise me you'll let me know later. If anything does develop."

Karen shrugged and nodded. She pictured Bill Roscoe for a moment, recalling the precise moment when they had met, how his expression had turned from surprise to pleasure to a mask of all business. Their eyes had lingered on each other too long, she knew that, and had been relieved when other people came into the conference room.

Obviously there was some attraction there. Bill, unlike a lot of people she knew, seemed serious. Or not embarrassed about being serious – he had a sly subtle sense of humor, she realized, but no need to flaunt it. And no need to march out there proclaiming himself one of the straight guys (somewhat few and far between at the west coast office). He was comfortable with who he was, and comfortable with everyone else too.

Karen turned back to her mom, wondering how much of her thoughts could be read on her face. She felt ashamed for a moment. Both of the inappropriateness – daydreaming about a virtual stranger the night of her dad's service. And that this is what it took to shake her up, to make her think about him, about Bill. A death, an earthquake, giant reminders to grab onto what was important and leave the rest behind.

## Chapter 9 Great Opportunity

# Blossom Valley, 1994

Jackie had a wedding coming up in less than a week. Yeah, too bad it wasn't her own, wasn't it, she asked herself, not for the first time. Jackie herself was 31 years old and very single, having recently broken up with her boyfriend of three years. The man she had certainly once pictured herself marrying. Though now, he was just the final reason she had left New York. For how long, who knows. At least for this past spring, a time she had dedicated to reconnecting with the folks, recharging herself, and refilling her depleted bank account. (Despite earning more than she once would have thought possible in the city, she had also managed to spend it all and then some. Thank God for the ease of subletting her apartment.)

These past months had been a funny, busy time, more so of both than she could have imagined in the worst of her emotional gyrations back in February. She'd had a decent stream of editing jobs that she could take care of from afar, and the season was soon to culminate in a matched set of momentous events: her mother's move from the family home to an adult only condo, and her father's wedding.

The former, nearly everything was organized, sorted, donated away or packed. Mom was looking forward to the change, and as much doing Jackie and the rest of the family a favor by keeping the house available for them for another couple weeks. During the wedding weekend, when everybody would be gathered.

As for the wedding, time would soon tell. It was to be a small and quiet event, at the request of both her dad and Amelia Emerson. Jackie shook her head. It had taken awhile at first to wrap her mind around this pairing. Dad, after his long string of too young, too loud, too demanding girlfriends, none lasting more than a year at most, acting more like a school boy with the widow of her high school friend. Karen's mother Amelia, whom she had always liked, who had always treated her with both affection and respect, but whom she never thought of as a potential stepmother.

Amelia was so different from her own mom, not a person she could have imagined with Dad. And yet, as she spent time around them, she saw that it kind of worked. Even Mom basically approved (although she would be hightailing it out of town before they got back from their honeymoon). Turns out that Dad, despite his sometimes frenzied attempts to modernize himself through clothes and music, in his heart longed for the sort of stability he had last known sometime in the late 1950s. Quiet homemade dinners, a friendly partner who challenged him intellectually but supported him emotionally. As for Amelia – she was genuinely nice. She loved Dad, and enjoyed spending time with the rest of the family. It was easy to recognize the real thing, Jackie thought, after having been merely put up with on numerous occasions with other ladies in Dad's life.

Despite everybody's best efforts, though, the event was mushrooming. Hard to help, of course, and Jackie took no blame. Just the two extended families added up to two dozen people right there. Even winnowing down to their closest friends meant a bunch more. Everybody loved Amelia! Dad, never mind being semi-retired, had his own set of colleagues not to be slighted, and neighborhood guys and golfing pals.

The original setting, the diminutive yard at Dad's place, proved too small. Jackie had overruled their objections and contracted with the country club. It's not like it was a big or exclusive place, after all. They had the facilities and a caterer on site, and Dad certainly could afford it. (Even if JJ stayed in college for a sixth or seventh year, which seemed likely the way he kept dropping classes, she thought, but didn't say out loud.)

Dad and Amelia went along with it – what could they do, they were so glad to have the whole thing organized. And Jackie had let them nix a lot of other ideas. There would only be flowers picked from a friend's garden, no flower girl, no open bar, a DJ playing old standards but no band.

Neither bride, groom, nor attendants would even wear traditional wedding clothes, just regular formal wear. Jackie thought she herself might be the only one who had bothered to shop for a new outfit. She had done so in the city before she left, charging a near maxed out card with the excited sense of one last foray toward the edge of the financial precipice before her responsible self took over and she retreated to live rent free with Mom and replenish her funds.

For sure, the siblings would be ill attired. Joy made it clear she was compromising her lesbian feminist principles to even show up at all, much less in a skirt or heels. And JJ would probably put on whatever got laid out for him in the morning, much as he had as a child. But he was a 20 year old college kid; they'd be lucky to see him in a pair of pants without gaping holes or bong water stains.

Amelia's adult children would be okay at least. Unlike Jackie's stoned and aimless baby bro, Karen and her brothers were responsible adults. They guys were an accountant and a teacher, she thought, and Karen had proceeded in a refreshingly normal path into the graphic design career she'd been mulling over since the tenth grade. Her old friend was married too, and had a baby girl. It was only the utter exhaustion that had been clear in Karen's voice each time they had spoken recently, hammering out logistics, that kept Jackie from being insanely jealous.

A part of her couldn't help herself even so. Jackie had always been competitive, and it was hard to help comparing herself to a girl she'd known since the week she moved to Blossom Valley and not coming up short. Karen, she knew, had been actively recruited to her college, and then had a choice of jobs after she graduated. She had been promoted and picked to help open up a new branch in California. Whereas Jackie had done okay in college – she had. But that didn't change the fact that she barely made it there in the first place. It had taken months, years even, before she could be sure that no one found out what she had done to get in, would call her out as a fraud, as not quite good enough to make it on her own.

None of that mattered now, she told herself. No one knew, no one had to know. She might not have had the clean career path, but she did okay. Thanks to one particular editing job – and yes, for a friend of her ex's, but networking is how it's done – she had landed a whole series of tech related writing and editing jobs. Maybe not the dream she had always had (and frankly, being an Oscar winning actress slash Olympic figure skater really weren't in the books for many women, were they).

But she had found a thing she could do well, and she got paid for it. Paid pretty well, when compared to the kind of genius work it took to actually create the software, she thought. And it was nicely transportable – those companies up on 128 didn't care if she was producing the jobs from New York City or podunk PA, as long as she met her deadlines.

Which was not to say she could stay here. No way no how. It had worked as a temporary thing only. Her subletter would be out at the end of the month, and she had a mental list half a page long just of restaurants she had in mind for meals. There were friends to catch up with, exhibits that had opened, and she missed just the freedom of walking down the crowded streets anonymously.

In the back of her mind, though, in a darker space, Jackie thought resentfully that no one was really missing her that much. Certainly not her ex, who would be easy to avoid once she was back. She'd had good long phone calls with a couple friends. Though she felt a bit that she was losing them too – one close friend had recently had her first baby, and another moved in with her boyfriend out in the burbs. Anyone who thought her single life was like the TV show Friends would be sadly let down by the reality.

Jackie stood, resolute, shaking the demons out of her head and ready to busy herself. Working on the wedding bought her good will from Dad plus served as a huge distraction from the disorder of the rest of her life. She could hear clattering from the kitchen. Amelia, who had basically moved in (although nobody in their generation would admit such a thing), had dinner started although it was not even six. Dad liked an early dinner these days, and Amelia liked to please him.

Could it really all be so simple, Jackie thought, going into the kitchen to see if there was anything else left to do for the wedding before she drove back to Mom's. No relationship of hers had such easy give and take. Of course, until recently she and her boyfriend had full time jobs and active social lives – nobody with all afternoon to prepare a nice meal.

JJ was slumped on a chair in the corner, long legs extending practically across the room. Amelia wove gracefully around them, setting out food from the fridge and looking utterly at home here, more so than Dad ever did in his kitchen. Seeing Jackie, she stopped and wiped her hands on a pretty dishtowel. "Well, I think we're about set, don't you?" she asked. "Karen and Bill are flying in tomorrow with the baby. I can't wait for all of you to see her, she's cute as a button!"

"Yeah, it'll be great," Jackie said, trying to sound more genuine than she felt.

"You two are welcome to stay for dinner," Amelia said. "It's just pasta, but I'm making plenty."

JJ looked momentarily alarmed. He had been waking up around noon since he got home to Mom's place – he probably had no idea it was anywhere close to anyone's dinner time.

"Thanks, but our mom is expecting us. I think she's trying to use up all the food in the house."

Amelia laughed sympathetically, and murmured about the challenges of moving households. But JJ continued to slump, looking more put upon at the memory of the weird, slapdash meals they had been having. His face was almost a pout, a comic expression, Jackie thought, on her now tall and lanky brother. She doubted he really understood that Mom's move and Dad's marriage meant that now this would be the place he spent the rest of his college breaks, however many more years that lasted.

Amelia talked some more about her granddaughter, Karen's baby. Jackie took one more look at her master checklist for the wedding before she felt ready to leave. Dad wandered in and out of the room a couple times, self important with his own set of tasks, readying the house for the guests, trying to baby proof the place. JJ stayed put, plunked down in the middle of the kitchen, still looking somewhat annoyed.

He helped Dad move around some furniture earlier, his nominal reason for being on hand. Since then, no one had paid him any attention, Jackie realized. She had been deep in her lists and preparations, Dad and Amelia busy with their own planning, talking mostly about her children rather than him. The boy just wasn't used to not being the center of attention. Jackie promised herself she would pay more attention to him.

"Let's go, JJ," she said to him. "I want to shower and change before dinner."

She purposely took the longer, more scenic route, back out to Blossom Valley. Careful not to sound demanding or motherish, she queried about his classes. She knew to give him long pauses, let him work out just how much he wanted to share with her. Sometimes that was just grunts, next to nothing, other time he would really open up.

At the end of last semester, he had been quite taken with his philosophy professor, freely quoting from him as well as from various texts. Unfortunately a different teacher had turned him off, apparently, to the whole subject matter.

"Lectures are so boring," he complained after she pressed him about it. "They give us all this reading then just stand there and talk about it."

"Well, that's what they do," she said, remembering not a few dull lectures she had gone through to get her degree. "I mean, it's not all fun in college, right?"

JJ had never been a good student – not because he couldn't do the work but because he couldn't sit still. These days, they would probably have him on medication, she thought. Glancing away from the rolling road, she could see half his face. His expression now looked hurt, though it wasn't clear whether from recalling his classes or from Jackie's lack of sympathy about it.

"You've always been too smart for normal classes," Jackie continued. "Which was fine when it was a small group and there was a teacher who could, you know, cater to your needs. But at a big school, you may have to be more proactive."

JJ muttered something incoherent, his head turned away toward the rural landscape. A few small houses dotted the view as they came toward town.

"I've met some pretty bright guys through my work," Jackie continued. "They're not what you'd call super social, and they're definitely not businessman types. But they're designing these new computer programs, and it's pretty lucrative. You could think about some sort of computer classes, something like that."

After a moment's silence, during which she wondered if he'd heard her at all, JJ said, "The whole thing seems like kind of a waste of time. And I'd have to take all this other shit to get my major requirements. I could be there for, like, years."

"You've got to stay in school, JJ," she exclaimed. "At least to get your degree – it doesn't even matter what it's in, but it's important."

He shrugged. Jackie was glad, she realized, that he didn't ask her why. She'd be hard pressed to articulate the reasons at this point, she thought, feeling cynical and old.

They rode in companionable silence the rest of the way. These past weeks, she had gotten so used to driving these roads she barely had to think about it. Such a change from the city though, always having to drive, using this precise set of streets to get home. The town so small, even JJ commented about that every time he returned from school, and he hardly noticed his surroundings.

Jackie stayed busy right up until the wedding itself. Details begetting more details, and she was the only one really on top of things. Joy made it back late the night before, scuffing around with her chic short hair and giant man-boots, and telling her to relax. Easy for her to say, Jackie scoffed inwardly. Between JJ, who wouldn't notice even a critical problem (rings lost, for instance, or the vows misspoken), and Joy, who pretty much didn't care, Jackie felt herself, as usual, taking on the pressure for all of them.

Still, once she finally found a moment to scramble into her dress – which fit perfectly, and was unmatched by anything else in the assembled group – and made her way to the door of the club, she was inordinately pleased. By her own doing, no one would forget this day. The place had a simple elegance, an easy color scheme, the delicate ribbons and flowers lending just enough of a festive touch to bring smiles as the guests slowly sat.

Jackie caught a glimpse of her father in the doorway of the office that had been designated his dressing room. His suit made him dignified, but his grin really made him look good. He kept darting out to greet people, though he wasn't supposed to make an appearance until the music started. A moment later, Amelia ducked down the hall toward him, and they stood together for a moment, chuckling quietly about something. She straightened his tie and he whispered something that made her blush prettily like a shy bride.

They weren't supposed to see each other yet either. His first vision of her in her gown (or in her case, pale yellow dress) should be as her sons escorted her down the aisle. Oh well, there was a limit to Jackie's powers. Anyway, it was a sweet moment, she thought, wishing she could have caught it on camera.

The music began, and Jackie nodded to the ushers to finish herding people in. She found her sister and brother, and walked them up to the front with dignity. Just a glance back at the people seating themselves, whispering happily back and forth, told her it would be a success. Dad had asked his younger brother to stand up with him, and the two men took their places up front, grinning and nudging each other like school boys.

Two of Amelia's closest friends marched up, arm in arm, and then everyone took a collective sigh as Amelia followed, each hand resting lightly on the arms of her beaming sons. Her expression was somewhere between joyful and serene. And that was what you noticed, Jackie thought. Hair, dress, makeup – all understated – didn't really matter. Across the aisle, she saw a similar smile on Karen's face. She looked like Amelia more than ever now, Jackie thought. Karen caught her eye and flashed a small thumbs up. Next to her, her husband bounced their cute little girl on his lap. It was the kind of wedding where a baby gurgling in the front row just added to the charm.

Dad and Amelia said their vows quickly and quietly, smiling and nodding with the officiator, who was an old friend. Dad's hand shook just the tiniest bit when he slipped on the ring, and Amelia reached out to steady him. They kissed shyly, just once, before turning with big matching smiles to the crowd, who stood and applauded as they walked back past, arms linked.

Jackie exchanged a quick high five with Joy and JJ, and then with Uncle Cal. The reception was all ready and just steps away in the club's dining room. From here on out, she knew it would be fine. Her part had come off without a hitch.

She gracefully accepted the thanks and compliments that came her way, and made a point to acknowledge everybody who helped out. It seemed like everybody in the room talked to her – she was as bad as the happy couple, barely able to manage a few bites of the buffet meal between conversations.

But finally she eased onto a chair next to Joy, and wriggled out of her pumps. "It's fun," Joy said, reaching over to fill a wine glass for her. "I'll admit that much."

"And I'm really glad you're here. He is too," she added, nodding toward Dad. Dad and Amelia, and their friends, were ruling the dance floor, grooving to old swing style music, while the younger people stayed on the edges, still nibbling, drinking, chatting.

Karen Emerson pulled up a chair next to them. "Oh my God," she exclaimed. "My new sisters!"

They all three toasted. "We should get photos with all of us," Jackie said. "The guys too, where did JJ sneak off to? He's always liked you, since we were kids," she added to Karen. That much was true, although he always seemed to smirk a little, when talking about Karen. Who knows what went on in her brother's head.

"Not yet. Sit for a few minutes," Karen said.

Just the idea of resting her feet appealed too much to argue, and Jackie took an appreciative sip of the wine instead. They watched Dad and Amelia, now swooping gleefully around the edges of the dance floor, urging other couples to join in. Jackie sighed inwardly. She had promised she wouldn't give in to self pity, but it sucked being here single.

Karen glanced behind her, mouthing something to her husband. "He's in charge for awhile," she said lightly.

"She's so cute, Karen, I'm so jealous."

Karen smiled, that happy/calm smile just like her mother's. "We're lucky she's still comfortable with strangers. Supposedly she's going to start freaking out from new people soon, but for now you can just pass her around like a football and she's perfectly fine with it." She was joking around, but a small part of her never lost sight of who had the baby. Close up, she looked both happy and exhausted.

They chatted about family and baby stuff, and Joy soon found an excuse to move on. "Hey, I meant to tell you," Karen said when it was just the two of them, leaning in. "I know this isn't really the place, but Mom says you might be taking on new editing jobs?"

Jackie nodded.

"I know this guy – someone I used to work with, who's helping launch a new company – and he's going to be hiring for just the sort of projects you've been doing." She went on to explain that the guy was based in Philly, but getting funding out in Silicon Valley, probably going to do the public launch out there. But they needed the tech writing and editing done here and now, wanted someone who could work fast and also coordinate with designers and printers. It was something technical, Karen didn't know much beyond that. She said everyone she knew out there in California was getting involved in high tech work.

"Tony's a really nice guy, too," she added. "We got to be friends through work, and I was sorry he left, although this sounded like a great opportunity."

Jackie nodded. She would take the guy's number, see about the job. The "opportunity." It seemed like she heard that word a lot lately. Opportunity, investment, next big thing. All the computer guys she worked with were like anxious greyhounds at the starting gate, ready to race forward and sure their products were winners.

She looked around the room again. The reception in full swing, guys stripping off ties and jackets, ladies their shoes. Half empty plates and wine glasses shoved aside, loud calls for faster music, and funny configurations of semi-disheveled relatives mixing it up.

Another couple hours and it would be done. Her role officially over. Mom would be moving, Jackie's credit cards were paid off and her bank account even had a little left over. Not much though. She would have to start working longer hours, especially once she was back in her own place. All those guys talking about the programs they would develop, the money they would make. Maybe it was time to get on board.

## Chapter 10 How it's Supposed to Be

# San Francisco. 2012

JJ, despite himself, kept reading other people's posts and tweets, and clicking through to see what they were checking out. He would admit it, he looked for references about himself, his legal case – to hear his lawyers talk about it, it was a big deal. However, the guy, Robert White (that's right, Bob White, who would name someone that?), didn't remember enough of the incident to make much of a case against him personally anyway. And online, nada. So it rankled that he was still on public lockdown. Still getting lectured by them and still expected to go to their stupid office and their stupid meetings.

Plus it annoyed the crap out of him, that even fairly cool aware people – like his roommate Oscar, for instance – could not shut up about the presidential race. Our President, who might as well be another rich white guy for the utter lack of any progressive agenda he had managed to get done. Versus the other guy, the laughably robotic gazillionaire who had out right winged the right wing. But who everybody knew would flip flop his way back to the so called center come the fall. Yeah, the quote center, which was somewhere rightward of the worst of the Reagan administration of his childhood, once considered far right.

Meantime, the movement languished. The one thing he could note with any sort of pride was how the whole percent thing was taking hold in the lexicon. Everybody talked about the 1 percent – candidates, news sites, comedians. That was cool, JJ thought. At least it was something.

And at least, as his main attorney girl Jenna Chin kept calling to remind him, everybody's attention on the candidates – plus the baseball season and the farmers' market and family vacations and whatever else – kept the heat off his case. She actually used that phrase. She had been a lawyer for something like two months when her firm put her in charge of the pro bono case.

It was kind of funny. Although when he laughed, and he did sometimes, he couldn't help it, he noticed that she honestly didn't get it. She took herself that seriously. She was that young. She would get a nervous little half smile, like she knew she should relate to him somehow, before moving along to the next topic. Usually something about how most of these cases were settled but he still needed to be prepared.

JJ, on this too quiet Tuesday afternoon, clicked languidly through one site after another. Rolling his eyes when stuff was slow to load, thinking he would need a new phone soon. Wondering if he could convince Dad to make it an early Christmas present, or if he should borrow Oscar's iPad. Except that Oscar was on it all the time. And he used enough of Oscar's stuff already.

Jenna had sent him three different reminders of their meeting this afternoon – a text, an email, and a smiley faced post on facebook. He texted back, reminded of this sort of thing with his sister. Both of them sure to keep poking at him until he responded.

Back on facebook, he saw a message from Jackie. Sighing, wondering if possibly she was reminding him about the meeting too, he clicked. But he was surprised to see that it was about a re-post from some kid from high school, Her note was that she had come across this and thought he might be interested. Unbelievable. Some tiny group of losers back there from his tiny high school were putting together a 20 year reunion.

It had its own website (somebody else had too much time on their hands), and a pretty damn comprehensive list of classmate emails. His own included, thanks no doubt to Jackie. Of course she would hear about this, never mind she was like 11 years older. She always knew somebody with a half sister or kid she babysat that was in his class. Like her own little spy network.

Don't get so paranoid, bro, he told himself. It had been years since she had actually ratted him out in any way. Years since she even tried to. Ever since she and Tony got their dogs, probably. Yeah, her most laser-like attention had shifted from him to a set of fussy mincing freak breed dog, something-apoos. That was what they had done instead of have children, he recalled. God help the kid they would have raised, monitoring his every freaking step.

It wasn't funny, JJ told himself, even has he laughed inwardly. Fact, they wanted to have kids but got started too late, or Jackie had some women's problem. More likely Tony's boys just couldn't make the swim anymore, for sure he had done some decent weed back in the day. But they seemed fine with the dogs, anyway.

He pushed himself up from the couch, tired from zoning out. It was probably time to leave if he wanted to get all the way downtown for his so called meeting. He kept forgetting how long it took on Muni. The time actually on the streetcar wasn't that long. He just tended to space out waiting for it, and getting there, and the extra blocks to the law firm once he was down in the financial district. To him, it was all a big blur of corporate buildings, but Jenna regularly pointed out that they were almost in North Beach, not in the financial district at all.

JJ caught the first streetcar he could, easing on the back and waving a clenched hand toward the clipper thing, as if tagging it. That's all he'd need, to get ticketed for fare evasion – Jenna would crap her pants. A furtive glance around revealed only bored fellow passengers, teens and old people mostly, no Muni cops. He checked messages, and texted a couple friends to see if they were going to Occupy on Saturday.

All the while, the car swayed and jostled him back and forth, breaks screeching and his seat jerking at every stop. He tuned out the sounds and voices, kids yelling some inane conversation behind him. No go for Saturday – would anyone show up? Sometimes he was tempted to swing over to the black bloc faction, just to be assured of some company. Those guys were too intense though. Seriously, thumbs up for anarchy, but JJ didn't especially want to be part of a group that was itself about as militant as the Oakland cops.

He started watching these girls who got on at Van Ness and almost missed his stop. Forget it, he told himself, not even worth an attempt. They were hot and knew it, probably 22 years old. Saw him as some old dude, jeez.

Instead, he hustled down Montgomery, past the corporate types and massive downtown buildings. He had been down here so many times he was getting damn used to seeing this part of town. Where before, he had only been down here for actions. He had been part of the crowd and the suits were the ones hurrying away.

The law firm was in one of those faux distressed buildings – visible wooden beams, wide windows that opened out, a small lobby made to look more like a living room than an office. JJ had spent enough time out there on a comfy chair, waiting for the attorneys to finish up or hand him stuff to review, that was for sure. But they also had a nice kitchen, often leftovers from other meetings available for anyone to share. Jenna always made sure to order him a sandwich if they were meeting anytime near lunch, although she had figured out pretty quick that he was more likely to show up later in the day.

JJ slowed his walk as he approached, not wanting to seem either over eager or out of breath. Glancing down towards Columbus, wishing he were headed to a bar or something rather than a law firm, he sighed and pushed open the heavy ground floor door. Jenna shared her office with the other newbies just beyond the lobby. She caught his eye and waved, pointing to the phone in her other hand and mouthing something.

He waved too, and poked his head into the kitchen. Snagged a couple cookies from an open box and settled in to wait. In a few minutes, Jenna greeted him with her usual serious handshake, and invited him into the conference room.

"We're this close," she exclaimed, holding up her little girl fingers to a tiny pinch. "We heard that the bank worked it out with their workers' comp, and they're kicking in with some special fund to make sure all Mr. White's medical expenses are covered. At least they have good coverage at the bank, right?"

JJ rolled his eyes, as he did whenever she chirped some positive sounding comment about her corporate overseers.

"So there's much less motivation to drag things out. Bottom line is there's a chance it would cost them from lack of proof. I mean obviously everyone knows he was hurt. But your being held, and even the video, none of it is conclusive evidence of your specific intent to cause him harm. Bottom line, they don't want to risk losing money just to make a point."

Bottom line, another of her catch phrases. Like all the world was her checkbook. JJ realized she had stopped and was watching him. He nodded earnestly.

She continued on, more about how this or this other thing might or might not happen. He'd noticed it about all the lawyers – they charged by the hour, and loved nothing more than discussing in detail a hundred things that probably would never even occur. Good thing they weren't charging him here, just wasting more of his time.

The upshot, after she had gone on for awhile, was that he had a lengthy document to review and sign. All it did was summarize exactly what they had previously discussed but he should read it carefully anyway. And then they would review it with the big lawyer, Jenna's boss, who would be helping her present the case to whoever.

Bottom line, she didn't quite say out loud but certainly implied, was that since Occupy was pretty much over and done with, the guys at the bank no longer needed a scapegoat to take down.

Bullshit, bullshit, JJ thought but did not say, as he headed back to what he thought of as his chair in the front. He knew for a fact that there would be a huge action at the one year anniversary in October. Things were far from over, everyone would see. They were just getting started.

Still, why not get this bogus stuff out of the way now, right? JJ sat and skimmed the pages. God it was long. He was reminded of college, major déjà vu. How often had he sat in some common room, or sprawled across a library chair, trying to get through some dried up repetitive reading requirement. The words swimming before him, barely making sense at the start and devolving to true randomness as long minutes passed. Suddenly noting how many "ing" endings there were, or funny patterns the spaces between words made trailing down the page. The sentences themselves just repeating, riffing off some central point that was stupid to begin with.

Jenna had explained it already anyway. She was like a cast member from school too, he thought. One of the kids who sat up front and shot their hands in the air in anticipation of the next question. Or the hyper TAs, a couple years out of college and eager to do everything right. The partner lawyer – he was like the professor. He would be grading everyone at some point, but you could barely catch a glimpse of him during the semester.

Whereas JJ, even then, knew his place to be in the back of the lecture hall. Appearing there often enough to get recorded in attendance, but just part of the blur of faces when it came time to call on people. One of the guys on that high school reunion post had gone to the same college, been in a couple of his classes. His name was in his head, JJ realized, because he had just seen it this morning on facebook. Kind of crazy to think old Arnie was still back in Pennsylvania, just a couple towns over from Blossom Valley.

The reunion notice had announced the region was now considered an exurb, that the people who had moved away would be pleasantly surprised by the quality and diversity of local dining options now available. Yeah, right. Probably they meant there was a Taco Bell. JJ wished there was someone here to share this opinion with. He glanced at his phone. Probably not Jackie, she had always been weirdly defensive about the place. He flashed on those days back in the lecture hall. Arnie had also been a back-of-the-class dude, and they had sat together and muttered sarcastic quips to each other in more than one large lecture hall.

God, to think about that now. In 1995, about the time when the internet went from a short cut for sending memos amongst university professors to gearing up to change the world, JJ had still been in school. That fall, in what turned out to be his final semester, he had really started to see how much there was for him out in the world, versus there in the classroom.

There were several guys he knew who had also gotten excellent paid internships that summer. It had been a bummer coming back to school afterwards, taking classes he didn't really care about after spending fast summer days programming and getting paid for it. He could recall it like it was yesterday, the group of them sitting around the cheap bar near his dorm, almost smell the mix of stale beer and the musty sawdust on the floor, hear the sound of darts and foosball, random shouts from other students.

None of them exactly bragging, but just reveling the knowledge that they had at last gotten ahead. Feeling a bit sorry for the pre-meds and the athletes and all the kids who had taken shitty restaurant jobs or unpaid internships or lived at home. And looking with more pity at the do gooders, who were still struggling to find some sort of free love peace corps ideal in the new economy.

Because he had felt without a doubt back then that he was smart, his computer skills valuable, and that his future held more, a lot more, of everything he had just started tasting that summer. Work that felt more like kicking back with other cool guys and perfecting video games. Workplaces filled with free food, free scooters, not to mention the easy money.

Shit, he had not even known to count stock options amongst the perks that were short to follow. The bumps in pay, the holiday bonuses, handed out at crazy lavish parties. All he had known then – and it gave him a weird little lift, even now, to recall – was that he and the whole world with him had finally figured out that he was that smart guy that people used to say he was. People like his mom and his sister, or teachers sometimes, the younger cooler ones who would try to draw him out, give him interesting word problems after he refused to do the dumb stuff in the text books.

He could go places, get ahead, get rich, be a part of the tech revolution or whatever they were calling it back then. He had always felt somewhat special – more clever than he necessarily let on, keeping an eye on people, learning their secrets. Learning how to let someone know what he knew just by hinting a little, enough to get what he wanted back from then. Back then Jackie, for instance, had recently gotten engaged to Tony, a dude who was friends with her old buddy and their new stepsister Karen.

Was it some weird retribution for Karen stealing a guy from her? JJ didn't know, but he had stored the info in case of future need. Of course at that point, he had few needs. He could score a hot job without their help at all. Despite Karen living in San Francisco, he could use his own connections from the internship, or like, just from knowing the basic basics. Yeah, maybe Tony had called a friend to help the thing back at the start of the summer, but JJ had taken it from there.

And it had not taken very long for JJ and those guys to realize school was pointless when everything else was taking off so fast. Some of them left mid-semester, he remembered with envy. Those days, a couple months could put you ahead of the pack. JJ had stayed out the semester – had to with both his parents and the new step-mom on his case about it. Dad had already paid the tuition and blah blah.

But he had high tailed it, what, New Year's day. Driven his old beater of a car, handed off from Jackie a few years before, all the way across the country. What a transition – hours and hours of bleak, cold, flat mid-western interstate, into the mountains and barely accessible roads, and finally over the top, an interminable slog out of the winter and into the wide central valley of California. Interstate 80 blasting him all the way into the heart of San Francisco. It couldn't have been that great, it was winter, after all, but in JJ's memory the first weeks of his time here had been bathed in golden sunlight every day.

Crashing with a couple guys he had met that summer, who had moved west and already gotten awesome jobs, a decent apartment. Choosing his first job at Oracle from among the offers, then quickly realizing he'd be happier at the next place. Because you could just glide like that back then, and they'd be happy to have you. The next place already coming up with new perks to lure you away. Everybody needed workers, everybody was growing and expanding.

They used to have these workshops, he recalled. He had been to several different ones, put on or at least sponsored by various companies for the employees. The theme though, no matter what consultant or venue, was that success was inevitable. Failure not an option, not even mentioned as a possibility. It was all about bringing the most to the table, succeeding even more awesomely than everyone else. As though combining the collective talent in those big hotel ballrooms with sheer will would guarantee that even the craziest notion would get its VC funding, its IPO, that stock values that would spiral ever upwards. And hell, even if you hated the group exercises and the manic presenters, you couldn't argue with the streams of cash flowing into your account those days.

God damn it, he thought, coming suddenly back face to face with the present, in the person of the big boss at the firm standing in front of him. This dude always had the fake smile on his face. He liked to "reach out" to people, the smallest things were "perfect, perfect."

"Just a few more minutes of both of our time," he boomed, ushering JJ into the conference room where Jenna was already perched like an anxious puppy dog. "A few more signatures and we'll be good to go. I'm betting the hearing won't last more than an hour," he added.

Jenna nodded eagerly. JJ sat and accepted another sheaf of papers. He'd bet Jenna wished the hearing could go all day. So she could go be a lawyer with a judge instead of sitting around kissing this guy's ass.

The big lawyer kept talking. JJ could hardly focus on the words – once he had heard that the case against him would probably be dropped, what more was there to know?

This loud voiced guy, though. Man, he was secure about his job. Back when the dot com bubble burst, sure, everybody scaled back. JJ sold the new car he had recently bought, and got used to working for less pay. Not hopping around between start ups but settling in a little more as things ramped back up. But now it had been, what, four years since things went so sour with the fiscal meltdown in 2008. All the politicians kept going on about jobs jobs jobs, but nothing to show for it.

How many damn protests would it take, JJ wondered, until the 99 percent started getting their good jobs back? What would it take to get everybody off their asses to demand change? Despite his beliefs about the inequities, he figured he himself, with his tech skills, would be okay. But how damn long would he have to wait – he was sick of it just now and wished things could hurry up and get back to how they were supposed to be.

## Chapter 11 Sense of Self

# San Francisco, 1996

Karen Emerson felt as lost these days as she ever had. She was still young: 33 was young. But not so much, because her primary role was being a mom now. Bethany had recently turned three; she was the young one. As for Karen, years of vigilant nights had left her muddled, always behind on sleep, alert to any odd noises, regularly waking up suddenly and unsure of when and where she was.

And fully awake, where was she, who was she then? Just someone's mom? She was still in San Francisco, but no longer in the vibrant areas where she had begun. She and Bill had decided, sensibly and it turned out luckily, to buy a house during the downturn a few years back. Coincidentally when they got married, 1991, why not go all in? So they had made that investment and moved from the Haight out to the avenues. Then when Bethany was born, Karen had quit her job. And the title and salary and all the little things that helped define her disappeared as well.

Even her name was regularly in question. She had kept her name, which seemed the normal, professionally reasonable thing to do, she and Bill had both agreed. But Bethany had his name, which caused ridiculous confusion to all kinds of people you'd think would be prepared for this sort of thing. A fair portion of both their families just ignored the choice and addressed Karen as Mrs. Roscoe. Still that gave her a start, since Mrs. Roscoe was and always would be Bill's wonderful mother.

Maybe the worst thing, Karen now thought, was the degree to which she lazily accepted her everyday lack of direction, place, and focus. This morning, nothing but another ordinary day. Bethie awake at dawn, quietly cooing while Karen tended to her and allowed Bill the extra sleep. Then the three of them trying to manage a quick breakfast like a normal family, except Bethany disliked sitting still and Bill started thinking about work, jotting himself notes or dashing off to put something into his case.

He had cut his hours back in the early days too, willing and serious about making sure he had a role in raising their daughter. Without it being a big deal, he just naturally came to the table – there was more work, of course they would both do more around the house, of course she shouldn't be the only one in charge of Bethany. (Karen had been so proud, back when she was pregnant, explaining this to her mom. Who had certainly not gotten that sort of amiable cooperation from Dad.)

Now though, Bethany was morphing quickly from toddler to firm minded little girl. Developing her own opinions more than ever, settling into an easier sleep and eating schedule, able to occupy herself for increasingly longer periods. Bill's extra effort was less needed, and certainly into the future Karen would be able to regain a better sense of herself. Wouldn't she? As her own person, not just mom of this energetic and precious little girl.

Bethany would be ready for pre-school soon, maybe more ready than Karen, she sometimes thought. The idea of long hours with neither her baby or her job seemed unimaginable. How did her mom do it for those years and not go nuts, she wondered. She recalled, wincing, how she and her brothers had laughed at Mom going out and getting a job. At the very idea of her having something else to do beyond tend to the family.

Mom had done it anyway – kept a smile on her face and put herself out there. Took one then another secretarial job, and appeared pleased with each of them, although surely she would have been capable of more intellectual work. This was the 1970s, that was all a middle aged woman might expect, of course. Karen had mocked the pop phrases of the era too, the idea of Mom having an inner child, "finding herself."

But now, didn't Karen comprehend all this and more? The words may have changed, but, oh, the concepts were right here right now. And Mom, to her eternal credit, never uttered a peep that sounded like I told you so. She must have had down days, she must have felt isolated or like her mind was going to rot – but she brought none of that to the dinner table.

She had gotten herself out, stayed current through the newspaper and the library, forged lasting friendships with her women's group and other back to work moms she befriended along the way. In all kinds of ways giving outward, Karen realized, Mom had also forged a better role for herself. She thought of how Mom would quiz her and her brothers' friends, or go welcome new neighbors, really drawing them out with her genuine interest. And what a network she had built. Even after Dad died, after she retired, she had people to see and places to go. She did community work, volunteered with the church, just had lots going on. She did not, Karen was pretty sure, ever mope around alone, asking herself who she was or where she should be going or why she should bother.

I should call her, Karen thought, glancing into the kitchen to check the time. Somehow it was almost noon already. Better wait until after lunch, after Bethie's nap. Use to be, the girl would be lulled to sleep by the sound of Karen's voice on the phone. Now she was more likely to come barreling out of her room demanding to be put on the phone to say hello to anybody on the other end of the line.

Plus, Karen felt a little awkward sometimes, now that Mom was remarried. She was happy to hear from her, of course, but Karen got it that Mom had other things going on. Jerry, her stepfather (who Karen still thought of as Mr. Carlisle in her head, despite herself), liked to go out and do things much more than Dad ever had, and Mom was eager to join him. The pair of them now liked to take trips together – Mom finally, in her late 50s, getting a chance to explore the sorts of places she had only read about.

They had visited out here a couple times, and Mom and Jerry both had seemed to relish the Bay Area in a way that surprised Karen. Mom, who once seemed most satisfied just sitting at her own kitchen table, had newly developed opinions about politics and technology and the environment, to name a few. And she had a great time exploring San Francisco with Jerry. Of course each had kids living here, that was part of it.

Jackie Carlisle had married a friend of Karen's and now was living in the midst of things as if she had always been a California girl. Well, she was always the urbane one, even back in Blossom Valley. Karen remembered how exotic she seemed back when they met, so tall and sophisticated. Funny she would end up here, rather than New York, where she had gone after college. But good thing they had been friends already, since their parents now locked them together.

They didn't see each other very often, considering they lived just across town. And yet, it was more than just distance. Jackie had a full time job, and she and Tony presumably had a more active social life than did Karen and Bill, the parents of a small child. They had a gorgeous condo in Nob Hill, where parking was horrible (and again, kid equals need the car to cart along all her stuff these days).

When they were all out here, the last time Mom and Jerry visited, Karen had been stressed with Bethany's tantrums, apologetic about the state of the house. It was fine day to day, just a little run down. Just meeting their regular expenses was the most they could do – no renovations of the 1960s style kitchen or fixing the regularly leaking windows on the west side of the house.

Everyone had shrugged it off, pitched in to get a big meal on the table for the whole blended family. Aside, Jackie had whispered to her how much she adored Bethany, hinting she hoped to have one or two of her own any day now. (Between leaning close, adoringly, to Tony, the two of them still very much the newlyweds after almost a year of marriage.) Thus far, however, nothing more on that score, and Jackie was looking more sleek and stylish every time they saw each other.

The only other child who had made an appearance, oddly enough, was Jackie's brother JJ. Or maybe it wasn't so odd that he would come trailing after his generous and worldly big sister. JJ had dropped out of college, to the distress of the rest of the Carlisles. Karen could hardly feign surprise at this – the kid had gotten into one or another sort of trouble his whole life. He was bright enough, but such a brat on a regular basis – maybe the surprise was that he had gotten through as many semesters as he did.

But now, here he was, a young man living on his own, thriving even. Though he was tall and had filled out, Karen still saw the little boy in him. But anyone meeting JJ now would probably have a hard time imagining him little and innocent. He still dressed the part, favoring the distressed jeans and ironically hip t-shirts of the new tribe of tech workers who descended daily into the area. But he acted like he owned the place, like the city was his own playground, like everything old was just going to fall, to be replaced by new stuff that catered to the high tech world.

Maybe in some ways he was still the JJ of old, seeming a step or two removed from any conversation, warily watching the people around him, scheming in his head. Mostly, though, Karen now saw him as one of this ever growing horde of super entitled young people. The tech firms all were hiring. Everybody was leaping on board, every existing place needed a website, and a thousand new entities were springing up, all of them ending in dot.com, to chow down at the gravy train of financing being thrown their way.

So naturally, there were positions to fill. Somebody like JJ, a bright, geeky boy who liked to take things apart, would have his pick of jobs. And coming right out of college, he didn't really have a perspective that landing a well paid job even with no experience wasn't what anyone else considered normal. But that didn't change the fact that the high paying jobs were there, and dot com workers were streaming here to take them.

Monthly, their numbers increased. Rents were skyrocketing, especially in the once working class and now hipster neighborhoods where poorer residents were getting elbowed out. Really, it was ridiculous – the last time Karen and Bill had gone out, just the two of them for a nice dinner, the trendy new restaurant had been over crowded and over priced. They had parked blocks away, waited a good half hour despite their reservation, and paid more for the two of them than Karen's normal grocery bill.

And it wasn't just the money, Karen thought. It was the attitude. All those people, driving giant SUVs, laying down wads of cash to get the fanciest booze in the place. Ignoring basic tenets of a civilized society – running red lights, parking right on the sidewalk, because they had so much money that tickets didn't matter. The jokes about tear downs, where someone would buy a perfectly good house just for the lot and tear it down and rebuild a mansion to their own particular specifications.

At least on her turf, JJ had toned it down. She had observed him interacting with Bethany, who quickly honed in on him the way she did with bigger kids or friendly dogs. Better hope that all the girl saw in him was a fun uncle. Not the mindless consumerism and shallow values that were driving regular people like teachers and non-techie designers out of town. Although she should talk. In enough ways she had already driven herself out, made a little cocoon out here for herself and her daughter.

Karen rose and made her languid way into the kitchen. Auto pilot pulling together a light lunch for the pair of them. Sure as clock work, Bethany tumbled into the room at the sounds.

"Soup, Mommy? Soup? Soup?"

"Yes," Karen murmured. "Chicken noodle."

"Crackers? Crackers?" Bethany's cheerful voice lilted upward, little fingers dancing at her legs.

And so on – she would parse out the whole meal, leaving no element unstated. Karen barely paid attention, focused on the food. But for a moment she did pause and take it all in.

Her daughter had a round cherub's face, framed with delicate wisps of golden hair. She favored bright colors and liked to spin around or race with her arms extended like wings. At three years old, she was fascinated by birds. She had learned on her own how to drag out her high chair, which she did at meal times, face stern with the effort. Now she lifted her arms so that Karen could help her into her chair, and then sat patiently waiting. Babbling something about birds in the yard.

Karen turned back to her stove to remove the pan. The room smelled savory, nice, the way a kitchen should smell. Her daughter's voice and the birdsong from the yard for background music, she set down the plates and bowls. Maybe the window leaked, but it was a bright warm room on a nice day. The walls were a pale yellow that set off the light wood of the table and block counter. The fixtures old but utilitarian, metallic. She and Bill had done what design they could around them, and it came off well. At least until she started comparing to brand new mini-mansion kitchen, Karen thought.

She shut that inner voice right off, and tuned back in to her daughter's precious chirping words. Aware, again, of how fleeting these days together actually were. Knowing she should cherish them. That's what Mom did, Karen thought. That's what gave her that inner light and it must have been what carried her across the hardest times, raising three kids so much by herself.

She let Bethany help clean up, then sent her to her room to at least lie down. She claimed not to fall asleep, and Karen – schooled at picking her battles – never mentioned that she did almost every day. For less and less time though.

Once she was up and stirring, Karen did call her mom. She let Bethany say a few words before taking the phone back, drinking in the joyful sound of Mom's laughter as they compared notes about the girl.

"Is everything all right, Karen?" Mom finally asked. "You sound a bit tired."

"I'm okay, nothing's wrong. Just wanted to say hi. Have an adult conversation, you know."

"Oh yes, I remember." She paused. "Still, there's something so delightful about a child's perspective. To this day, I enjoy it. And she'll only get brighter and more interesting for years to come."

"I know. Until she shuts up all together."

Mom laughed. Karen too. It was a joy and a triumph that they together could speak so lightly about her teen years. Mom talked about projects she and Jerry were undertaking for their house, and Karen about things she hoped she and Bill could take on eventually.

Mom described work in her garden, and a local political race she was canvassing for. "Door to door at my age! At least people aren't rude, for the most part. They probably open their doors worried lest I collapse on the front walk."

"Jeez, Mom, you're still middle aged, you're hardly old." She was in great shape, in fact, Karen had noticed the last couple times they had seen each other up close.

"Now what about you? I've been doing all the talking."

"What about me? I know who my local supervisor is, if that's what you're asking."

"No, honey." Mom's voice dipped the tiniest bit, the don't-pretend-to-be-dense bit. "What's really new? What are you interested in these days?"

Karen said nothing, and the silence spun out, suddenly longer than the distance between them. Mom usually asked something like this, it wasn't a trick question. But she was hard pressed even to make something up. "I don't know," she whispered finally. She checked to make sure Bethany wasn't right there listening. "I feel kind of, um, directionless. It's hard to explain."

"Try me."

Karen sighed. "I try. I read the paper but then I get interrupted and it's like I just don't care. Or I listen to Bill talk about his work and I remember how much I liked being in the center of things, taking on new clients and working with them on the designs. But now I can't even imagine it. It makes me so tired, even thinking about my old job, going to all those meetings, all that stuff to keep up."

"Well that's fine, but there are things other than work. What about your friends? What about all these new world wide web places I keep hearing about?"

"The only friends I hang out with now are the ones from the baby group. We mostly talk about the kids, or take them someplace for an outing," Karen said. Wishing it weren't true, but at a loss how to change the fact. "Or guys from Bill's work, if they have a party or something. I mean, none of this is really my thing. I don't think I have a thing, you know, not the way you always do."

"Well, I haven't always. But, Karen, now that I am older, now that Jerry and I do have so many things lined up, I could kick myself for the time I wasted. How I took for granted my good health, my free time..."

"It's not really free time, Mom, not with a three year old."

"Oh, of course, I didn't mean you now. I meant myself over time. Looking back over decades, not months."

Karen nodded, never mind Mom was on the other side of the country. "I know I won't always feel like this. And I suppose I will get another job. When Bethie's in school if not before then. It's just – the work I used to do doesn't mean much right now."

"Well, JJ tells us that jobs are pretty to easy to come by in your neck of the woods. They must be if people keep making him such lucrative offers." She lowered her voice. "No offense to any of them, but I don't know that I'd hire the boy for anything terribly important."

Karen laughed, agreeing. "He's right, though. High tech places are taking everybody they can get, and young guys who know something about computers can pretty much name their own price."

"Well, there you have it. You know quite a lot about computers, don't you? You've been using them for years."

"I have, but not like that. Not like programming them or setting up networks. Everybody is sharing information over the internet now. Pretty soon we won't be mailing letters at all."

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't that be a boon to a graphic designer? Wouldn't that sort of thing make it easier for you to pass ideas back and forth without having to go trundling off to all those meetings?"

"I guess, yeah." Karen's attention, which had been wandering, snapped back. "Actually, there are some new programs that are kind of bringing design elements to the masses. Bill complains about it, actually, that bigger firms are afraid of getting pushed out."

"Well, I'm not encouraging you to go out and steal your husband's clients," Mom laughed. "But I do wish you'd get off your duff if the alternative is feeling aimless and tired. You don't have to be completely enthralled to develop some new skills, right? But I honestly think it's better for one's children if the mom has some outside interests. Plus, a second salary wouldn't hurt, would it."

"Yeah, no kidding. And if I was mostly at home, no child care costs." Karen caught her breath, aware of a surge of excitement she had not felt for awhile. Something maybe she had missed.

They wrapped up the conversation, but Karen's head kept it moving. Mom was right – again. All those papers and journals she read, and that finger still was on the pulse, she had to admit. Desktop publishing programs were getting user friendly. Anyone with a decent computer could prepare their own stuff for publication – newsletters, journals, not to mention those ubiquitous websites. But not everyone had an eye for what worked on a page or how to pull together a theme across disjointed material an organization might produce.

Karen did know that stuff. Her eye was good, making things match and fit and look smooth doing it was second nature to her. One of her friends – the only one from the mom group that she also had known before, from work – was in the same boat. She had a little boy at home but needed to make money, They had been bemoaning rising costs at the last get together, how much more it took for the kids, how all those costs would keep spiraling up.

Imagine the two of them going into business together. It wouldn't take much investment, a couple good computers and printers, software, a reliable home line for the internet. Between them they knew any number of potential clients. And frankly Bill should have some leads, those very people who were no longer willing to pay the big firm prices.

Karen stepped firmly into the nook of the living room and booted up the bulky old computer. At the very least she could draft a simple plan. Take some small first steps. She had no illusions about quote having it all as a working mom; she had seen enough of her friends frustrated by all the demands of that life. But something would have to give pretty soon, she knew that already. Maybe some sort of balance was possible.

## Chapter 12 Special Life

# San Francisco, 1999

It was the afternoon of New Year's Eve, the very last day of the 1900s. Crazy auspicious, right? Teetering on the edge of a new century? And Jackie Carlisle was – drum roll – still at work. No, not still at work accepting thanks from her grateful colleagues before heading out for a dazzling night on the town, but still at work working her rear off.

She had wrapped up a half dozen projects this morning and had another bunch to go. All these places with their calendar year deadlines. Some long term clients, sure, but also not a few obnoxious last minute jobs. Companies with enough funding that no one dared tell them what they could do with their ridiculous requests. Her small company's bottom line, once all these places finally got around to paying up, would be looking pretty damn good in the year 2000.

Earlier, though, Jackie had been barely short of chucking herself out the window at noon, when the downtown execs dumped out their page-a-day calendars. The office manager had pulled her into the conference room for a few minutes, and pushed a paper cup of champagne into her hands. They all toasted their most successful year yet, and whooped and high fived. Laughed at the spectacle of the lawyers across the alley flinging things out and random papers cascading past the wide window.

Then most everyone had left. Jackie, in charge of the larger accounts and responsible, really, for the whole operation, stayed on to finish up. Someone obviously had to be on hand until five o'clock in any case; Jackie would do well to get out before six. Maybe she wasn't the owner, her name wasn't on the door, but everybody knew who was really in charge of this place.

Jackie emailed out, double checking the time and date stamp, one, then another completed job. Just making sure deadlines were met. There had been all this Y2K talk, weeks, months of it. Most of the tech people Jackie knew pooh poohed it. The actuality of anything serious happening that is. In fact, it had been quite a boon for programmers, all the systems and software that needed a revision or a patch to make sure the internal dates didn't revert to year 0 or crash everything down. And Jackie was okay to go along with the ride – they all needed to be written up so that the everyday user could operate them, of course.

By midday in California, it was pretty clear nothing major would occur. Planes didn't crash down over Europe, the internet kept functioning as normal as the clock wound ahead and the dates shifted forward. All that effort, and for what? So all the little digital clocks could have four digits instead of just two. The year 2000.

Jackie slowed down enough to heat up her lunch in the microwave. She brought it back to her desk, sighing afresh at the sight of the piles still accumulated there. All she would do today was the urgent stuff. Y2K or not, there were dozens more jobs on the way – everyone with new software, requiring new descriptions, new updates. Everybody behind, they had all just gotten used to that by now. The programmers were behind, the product managers making excuses, begging for more time, the writers and designers backed up, printers going crazy from the false starts and last minute edits.

Things had been spinning out of control for awhile now, Jackie thought. It had become acceptable – the stacks of files, the backed up work, missed deadlines. Even somewhat shoddy work. Because there was just so much of it, so many more jobs lining up like planes on a busy runway. You just had to get them launched.

She took another bite, opened another file. It took a quiet day like this to notice. When it was just her chaos, not all her co-workers too, it seemed kind of nuts. Really, how long could this all go on before everybody burnt out? She knew of people who had gotten out. People, younger than Jackie even (who was hardly old at 36), who managed to cash out when their companies went public. AOL millionaires. Lucky secretaries who had been in the first dozen employees at some little place that got bought by Microsoft.

Her own brother JJ could be on the way to that lifestyle, she thought. Wasn't that something. It was kind of ironic that the guy who lived in t-shirts and jeans could afford a designer wardrobe. Who could probably afford a nice place down in Palo Alto or even Atherton, but would prefer a loud neighborhood in the heart of the city. Jackie tried to tamp down the bit of resentment that flared, even thinking about it.

It's just that she and Tony had really struggled to come up with a down payment on their house after already ruling out the tonier towns they would have chosen if money were no object. They were doing well, certainly, and anywhere else they would be able to afford several bedrooms on a good sized lot. Not in the current rush in the Bay Area, though. Jackie at least felt glad they had bought when they did, almost a year ago now.

Tony loved the place. It was quiet and out of the way, and they had a little yard. No one right on the other side of the wall, like the place on Nob Hill. Jackie still considered it an investment property though. Something they could sell at a big gain in a few more years when things were settling down. When they presumably had a growing family.

Jackie sighed. Made herself slow down and eat a couple more bites of lunch. This level of stress certainly wasn't helping in that department. She didn't like to think how long they had been trying. More than a year, closer to two really. And in all that time she had had one miscarriage, very early on, just days after the initial test. Nothing more. For all the time she had insisted on waiting, wanting their financial situation to be secure, waiting for Tony's new position to gel – they might as well have been trying the whole time. God, everything she read about it referred to women over 35 as if they were ancient and barely functional.

Jackie dug back into her work. She wasn't worried about it. Not yet. Tony, like the supportive guy he always was, backed her up regardless. Happy to discuss baby stuff, plenty happy to give it a go whenever she said the time was right. And supportive when her period showed up again, like clockwork, on the 27th day. She flipped on the overhead light as the sun sank down beyond the back windows.

She should be thankful for Tony, Jackie thought an hour or so later, taking up her spinning thought track at her next little break. And yet – she had to admit to herself another stab of annoyance. Irritation because of everything he was willing to simply sit back and accept. Like tonight. They had both been so busy, they hadn't made reservations and it seemed like not the best night to just wander downtown without plans. Just in case something happened. But surely they could have managed an invite to a classy party? Or joined up with one of their client firms at some swanky place, gotten dressed up and enjoyed some superior food and wines?

The fact was, Tony was just as glad to stay home and have a quiet night. When here they were, living close to San Francisco, center of the biggest tech boom in history. Here they were smack in the middle of their lives, biggest night of the decade, and here she was alone in her office, working. Not even doing important work, just finishing up and shoving out other people's projects.

The only marginal scheme she had come up with, having JJ and a few friends over, had fallen away. People hemmed, made excuses. JJ had better plans. Her brother, who generally couldn't be counted on to remember to go to work in the morning, had a ticket to an exclusive gathering of some sort, hosted by his new hotshot best friend's workplace. He hadn't said it out loud, but Jackie understood that he wouldn't want her to come too. That he'd be, what, embarrassed? Or just that they both knew she wasn't really part of that world. It was one of those firms with the strange names, dots or caps in the middle of a made up word, but a place with money oozing from anything associated with it.

Like JJ these days. He was considering working there. He had said it like that, last time they had talked (her phoning him, leaving several messages before he could even be bothered to return the call). Mulling it over, as if there were so many competing demands for his services that the salary and options, the free gym and gourmet meals and God knows what other perks hardly registered.

No, what impressed JJ was that one of the guys there had co-founded Burning Man. This weird art festival that took place in the Nevada desert, a week long event that JJ assured her was already passe by the time she had even heard of it. And somebody else had a patent on some piece of technology that swear to God sounded like a mechanical pencil and paper, but that JJ's friends thought was short to revolutionize the world.

Maybe she really didn't understand tech applications much better than the hapless readers they wrote their texts for, Jackie thought. I just need everything user friendly. I can't see the potential in things anymore. Or I see what's not there instead of what is there. Decent job, but little recognition for my hard work. Married four years and all I focus on is not having a baby. Living in an exciting place at an exciting time, but too boring to spend New Year's Eve with my genius baby brother.

Maybe that was the root of the problem, Jackie realized. Hearing JJ talk made her understand all the more just how average she and Tony were. Growing up, Jackie always liked being in charge. She felt like a leader, someone cutting edge, important. But she was just a regular person, no more, no less. If anyone in the family was destined for something special, it was JJ. The most graceful thing she could do was back him up, she supposed. Be supportive, be the big sister she had always aimed to be.

It was dark by the time Jackie closed up. She pulled the firm's door shut and tested the lock. Everybody else in the building was gone, it appeared. Alone in the elevator, then through the small empty lobby to a weirdly deserted street. Jackie turned toward the BART station. Just a few people were on the street, far fewer than a normal workday, everyone walking head down, hurrying away.

Several store fronts had plywood covering their glass windows, and the guy from the corner store was pulling in his displays, locking up already. One homeless person sat forlornly on the curb, not even panhandling. There was hardly even any traffic. Jackie pulled her coat close around her. It wasn't cold exactly. Not the temperature. But there was something strange and eerie down here. The usual night of celebration transformed into deserted streets.

Jackie thought about the people she'd read about, who had hoarded food and weapons in preparation for Y2K. Anyone on the street even now was probably suspect, could be a paranoid nut job. Apparently everybody else was opting for private parties or quiet nights home, away from the crazies. Great. Middle of my life, middle of the city, what should be the biggest night of the year – and my brother is the most important person I know and he won't even be seen with me.

She walked, faster now, back towards her not so special life.

## Chapter 13 Hella Occupy

# San Francisco, 2012

JJ Carlisle could think of about a hundred places he would rather be going, but he reached for his jacket and checked the pockets for a BART ticket with more than a buck on it. His light jacket, the one he wore when there was basically no likelihood that he would need to scale a fence or duck a cop's baton. In other words, the thing he had been wearing all summer. Off to a strategy meet up – no action, no demo, just planning for the one year anniversary of the night Occupy Oakland was forcibly torn down.

Halfway down the street, he remembered he was supposed to mail back the final letter to his lawyers, some signed document they needed that proved they had worked on his behalf. Jenna had left him a couple messages about it, making it clear that her bosses were hounding her to get it done. God, that life, kowtowing to those guys, that poor girl.

He was running late though, and would miss the train for sure if he stopped now. At least, with the charges gone, he should be able to do more when the actions started. JJ upped his pace, cutting crosswise across the street, glaring at a driver who honked. Asshole in a Lexus. In this neighborhood, maybe he should watch it himself. JJ was tempted to turn, try to key the car or intimidate the guy, but that wouldn't get him over to Oakland any faster.

Instead, he dodged past the usual bums and shuffling overweight ladies, past a couple guys selling CDs and another with a cart of churros for sale. Down the wide stained stairwell and through the turnstile, running when he heard a train. A couple guys in front of him shoved into the nearest car and pressed against the door for a moment until he slid in. "Thanks, man," he murmured, moving to an empty seat to spread out.

He held out his phone, squinting against the dark reflection. It was slow to load on BART, hard to read. Both his sisters had been complaining about needing reading glasses at Dad's party. Complaining about getting old, which seemed fairly rude considering that Dad was turning 80, but whatever. Dad just liked it when people showed up. Jackie had warned him, laughing in that it's-not-really-funny way of hers, about turning 40. Well, fuck that, he wasn't there yet.

Facebook opened with a bunch of posts about an anniversary, and JJ was surprised. Not that many people who still posted here were that into Occupy. Quickly he realized they meant September 11, that anniversary, which was tomorrow. All the candidates and politicians would have flowery words to say. People online tried to come up with pithy, sentimental phrases, or images like empty shoes or the hole in the skyline.

JJ tilted his head back, feeling the vibrations of the moving car through the dirty blue cushion. There were supposedly people who, even now, were afraid to be in crowds or on public transit like this, who feared another attack on a big city landmark or transit hub. He glanced around at his fellow riders, every one looking bored, zoned out or squinting at their devices. He wondered for a moment, if something were to happen here, say an explosion at the other end of the car – who would be the hero amongst these people? Who would freak out, who would think to punch out the fire extinguisher, pry open the doors?

Back after the actual 9/11, he used to have thoughts like those a lot. It had been a weird freaking couple weeks, that was for sure. The day of – he hadn't known a thing at first. It went down back east, early morning in California. A guy he worked with had called, woken him up, told him nobody was going to the office and to turn on the TV. JJ could still recall bumbling over, half asleep, trying to understand the images they kept showing over and over. By that time, the Twin Towers had collapsed, people in New York were streaming over their bridges on foot, covered in crazy gray soot. TV news people were barely coherent; the news didn't make sense and it was on every channel.

But once he pieced it together, understood how easily those guys had gotten onto the planes, how they had forced their way into the cockpits, he found his anger. He had become as enraged as anyone. Even now, eleven years later, thinking about it brought back a taste of that searing fury. All those planes were headed for California – it was as if he had been personally attacked.

And in the towers, maybe a bunch of capitalists had fallen, but so had regular people from all over the world. Waiters, janitors, working class firemen. JJ could remember comparing notes about all this with his co-workers the next day. Nobody working, not even hiding the fact that they were basically grouped around the little TV in the break room talking, pointing out slight variations of the same things as the stations replayed those sickening images again and again.

For awhile there, he had felt an intense sort of patriotism that was completely new. Sure he had grown up reciting the pledge, hearing the anthem at games and whatever, but it never had meaning. Until these dudes were like, we'll kill you because of who you are. And suddenly he had understood the connection to people across all across America. How veterans must feel at their parades, the pride and cohesion, the sense of unity.

It was weird, he almost missed those feelings. The closest thing since was the sense of solidarity from the beginning of Occupy. Maybe that was part of what motivated him even now, the memory of that unity despite all the recent splintering and internal bullshit. Because it was like they all belonged to something big, they were all working together to make sure everybody got a piece of the pie. Too bad that now, not only were there 99 percenter spin offs and little groups haggling about protect Oakland, even the Occupy core had gotten uncomfortably segmented.

To start with, some people were acting like leaders of their supposedly leaderless movement. Calling for their three point plans, for long term goals and strategies and all this crap about reaching out and compromise. Yeah, reach out to the cops and watch how they had torn down their tents. Try to compromise and you end up with some mushy middle ground that loses the point entirely. They needed to take a stand and keep it. That's what made the thing so effective from the beginning, from Zuccotti Park, from the very start of occupying Wall Street until the corrupt system fell by the wayside.

Now some people were like, let's just re-elect the president since he talked about the 98% who make under $250 thousand in his speech. Let's not do anything at night because it might scare people or make their commute five minutes longer. Stop waving the Fuck the Police signs because some suburbanites might be offended. Don't try to take over the port again because some old guy in the paper complained about it. When it was pretty damn clear to JJ that that sort of action was the only way to go. They needed stronger tactics, not weak watered down stuff.

If he really had his shit together, he would have come up with some better ideas, JJ thought. Last night, for instance, instead of getting hooked on some series Oscar had on the TV, partaking in the medicinal meds. Well, that was partly being a good roommate – he couldn't pitch in on the bills, he could at least be decent company if Oscar wanted to hang out. He'd be screwed but good if Oscar decided to kick him out, that was for sure.

JJ scuffed his shoe along the seat opposite, edgy at the very thought. It sucked that it was Oscar's good luck that made him master tenant, that put him in that position of power, even if he was pretty cool about it. It sucked that he himself could get booted when he had lived here for so long, had paid the high rent during the boom years.

He imagined himself committing to live in a tent full time. Backed by a revitalized Occupy. They could find a way to decently heat the place, hook up fast wireless, and he could spend his time scheming up serious actions. He could lead some anti-corporate forays again, only this time they'd listen to him as a respected spokesperson instead of trying to haul him to jail.

JJ was still spinning out his fantasy as BART pulled into Oakland. So much for arriving with a plan of action. No big deal, though, he thought best on his feet anyway.

The meet up was, no surprise, a combination of hyper organized and chaotic. JJ didn't even try to follow the agenda. Let those losers complain, he had stuff to say. As did a lot of other people, most of them on the same side for once. With the so called moderate bloc pretty much out shouted, the rest of them agreed on the need for a diversity of tactics.

In other words, relax, folks, nobody was preventing the basic march. The core group with the papers and agendas, they could write up their press release. Tell everybody that no one intends to break windows. They'd better hope the police would allow the peaceful march.

But clearly, the occasion called for more. One year ago October 25, the cops tore down Occupy, and gassed everybody, even people who were trying to leave. A freaking Iraq war vet had been nailed in the head by the cops, landed in the hospital. The sort of corruption that allowed cops to indiscriminately beat people like that and the politicians who allowed it, they demanded more than a quiet march. How else could anyone understand the depth of the corruption?

JJ found himself tuning out. Too many people all talking at once just turned into a blur in his head. He'd made his point, and he had chimed in on a couple others, guys he didn't even recognize. In fact, a lot of the faces were new. Also, few people seemed to recognize him, which was probably a good thing, although a little insulting. His case gets dropped, and he's a nobody all of a sudden? He noticed that the little cadre of faux leaders were purposely ignoring him, doing their best to shut him and his ideas out. Well, they'd all see, come the anniversary.

By the time the stupid meeting was over, JJ felt pretty low. There was obviously a lot left unsettled, or maybe just assumed by the guys who had anointed themselves in charge. But hey, their agenda said the time was up, they had their jobs or music or whatever to get back to. He noticed a couple of guys he thought he recognized as black bloc leaving together, and he ambled in their direction. But he was pretty sure that they took his presence in at a glance, and quickly moved away.

They were young guys, barely in their twenties, with enough energy and Red Bull in them to leap over the shoulder high concrete barrier and off down to the street below. JJ shrugged it off. Where were they going anyway, back to someone's mom's basement to take pictures of themselves in their Guy Fawkes masks probably.

He went back home, outlining a nice long rant in his head. By the time he got back, though, he was too disgusted with the whole thing to even bother. Way to many words for Twitter, and who would even look at Facebook but people like his sisters, who really shouldn't be kept apprised of any of this stuff anyway.

Days passed slowly, dragging the way they do when you're anticipating something but don't have much of a schedule, day to day. JJ kept up with the Occupy site, scanned the local news for stories; of course it was barely mentioned in the mainstream. He even got mildly interested in the end of the baseball season. Not that he had followed it much since being a kid, yelling for the Phillies, but the Giants made it to the pennant and squeaked through the playoffs, and then ended up winning the World Series.

Oscar had invited a bunch of people over for what turned out to be the winning game. So they were all kicking back after, toasting each other with beers, ribbing the one guy with Detroit roots who had come by, teasing a couple of the girls who said they were more interested in the hot players than the rules. There were firecrackers going off, lots of yelling, some sirens, but from their place bordering the Mission and Noe Valley, it didn't sound much different from a regular rowdy Saturday night.

Turns out there had been some big damn riots, though. Happens it was trash night, and guys had lit bond fires in the middle of intersections. Some dude was dumb enough to post pictures of himself cracking the windshield of a Muni bus. JJ, when he finally caught up to the news, was pretty damn incredulous, both the he had missed the whole thing, and that so many people had spontaneously gathered and taken over the streets. Gotten so many random people involved, gotten all that publicity. Over baseball. Is that what it took to set them off?

He wondered just what was needed to get things moving across the bay. The original Occupy had felt spontaneous, and had been for some people. But it took coordination, thought, planning. The night before the demo, he found himself thinking of the 9/11 terrorists. Teams of those guys had planned the thing out over months and months, placing the dudes in apartments, making practice runs in airports. Shit, paying the cost of flying these guys around just to see if they could easily get on the planes.

Imagine having the patience to pull that off, to wait that long. To figure out all the steps, to manage to take over a plane using box cutters. Some of the guys he knew, the more hard core ones, had talked about arming themselves. Not like terrorists, but for defense. Shields against the cops' batons, and maybe some sign posts that could function as batons too. Maybe even carrying heat, in case of an unauthorized police raid, for instance. Even Oscar had told him he had a rifle locked away in his bedroom closet. No big deal, he'd said, just something from his dad, something he could bring down and use to scare off an intruder, from back when the neighborhood was more dicey.

Just thinking about it all made it hard for JJ to fall asleep. It would be stupid to take anything even close to a gun to the demo, but imagine the reaction if someone did. The extra attention it might bring. If it came down to that, he would be sure to get near some cameras, make their points where the TV news could take them down. He shifted in his bed and told himself to chill.

Morning of the day, barely awake, a call came and he answered it, not even looking, expecting updates about actions. A surprise, then, to hear his dad offering a hearty and cheerful hello.

"Dad," he said. "Isn't it kind of early?" Dad usually called on the weekend, and JJ wondered if he had forgotten a birthday or something. Of course Jackie usually called about that – unless it was Jackie's birthday?

JJ tuned back to his father's voice; Dad was rumbling on about just checking in, and how Amelia wanted to have a word with him.

JJ pulled a fresh t-shirt over his head and moved into the kitchen to look for something to eat. It was later than he thought, but he had time enough not to rush.

"Now, I know where you're going today, JJ, let's just cut to the chase," came his stepmother's voice in his ear.

"Hey, Amelia, how's it going?"

She gave an impatient tsk. Unlike his own family, Amelia never seemed to be put off track by him changing the subject or interjecting a dumb question. She went on, her voice kindly but firm. Saying how her friends from that group had tried to interject the need for a long term perspective, how some of the behavior of his colleagues, as she called them, was not helpful to the goals, would appear so silly and immature. That violence begets violence, where fairness all around was in order, being the central goal of the thing from the start.

"They were violent, you know," JJ interjected. "It was a police bean bag that sent our guy to the hospital."

"I'm certainly not condoning that," Amelia exclaimed. "But think how it worked back during Vietnam, are you old enough to remember any of that? Nobody paid much attention to the protests when it was seen as screaming hippies. But when middle class kids got involved, suburbanites, that's when the leaders in Washington sat up and took notice."

She said some more, but JJ started tuning out approximately where she said Vietnam. Which, like, no, how would he remember that, he was born in 1974. His early memories of politics were of a smiling man named Ronald Reagan. People making fun of Jimmy Carter's sweater, people celebrating after those hostages were released.

Vietnam was history, and history, even Amelia would have to admit, got rewritten by those in power. Who knows what had actually happened back then. More to the point, who cares? It was irrelevant now. As far as JJ knew, aside from somehow organizing without the internet or even cell phone technology, all those people had been a lot better off financially than people were now. College was practically free, rents were tiny, students could study and smoke awesome weed and still have time to protest because they didn't need two and three jobs. And women hardly had to work at all – even his mom had stayed home as a housewife back when his sisters were first born.

JJ finally cut in and told his stepmother that she was really giving him some things to think about. That he would love to hear more about all of it, but for now he had to go.

"I know you feel you have to be part of it all, JJ, I understand that," she said. "I do believe your heart is in the right place. But will you promise me, promise me and your father, to at least stop and think before you do anything you might later regret?"

"Yeah, sure. Don't worry about me." JJ ended the call, all polite and sincere. Although the only thing he actually promised himself he would do was check the incoming number before answering it again.

By the time he finally made it over to Oakland, he felt better. A bunch of them took BART over together. He felt that sense of camaraderie again, as more people got on the train downtown, took each other in at a glance, all clearly headed to the same place. He could feel the veiled glances of other riders, intimidated, admiring? Nobody meeting their eyes anyway. They left the train in a fast moving mass, and grouped together at the plaza, gathering but careful not to challenge any of the police just yet.

The cops were already out in force, that was for sure. And JJ could see news vans parked out on the street, bored cameramen smoking, waiting for the TV people to show up, or for something to happen. A fair number of other people milled around, hard to tell if they were here for the demo or just wanted to film it on their phones or make a movie for a school project or something. Around him, some of them joked around as they hung out – good thing the damn economy was still so bad that everyone had spare time to be here before the end of the work day.

JJ laughed too, but it also pissed him off. Because it had been so long, years now, that he and people like him were getting the short end of things. Government bailing out banks too big to fail, companies making obscene profits, fat CEOs giving themselves fat bonuses while regular people couldn't find work. And for someone like himself, someone who was considered talented and special, well, it riled him all the harder. He deserved a hell of a lot more than he had gotten over the last months and years and even decades.

Somebody swatted JJ's arm, told him to cheer up, wasn't this his thing? He shook himself out of his head and smacked the guy's arm back, and they compared signs. Some people had gotten pretty creative, they agreed. Across the plaza, several guys were putting on masks, bandanas, painting their faces. He watched an apple cheeked young photographer setting up a picture of a guy angrily staring out behind his "Hella Occupy" sign, and wondered if she was even reading the signs or just taking arty photos, mindlessly doing her job.

The place was filling, but slowly. More observers than participants, as per usual these days. Some people were using chalk to outline the fallen tents and bodies from the encampment, and JJ grabbed a thick piece to join in. "Yeah, we're pissed off," he hollered toward some people who were silently watching. "Come on, you remember what they did here?"

One or two offered a tepid reply, others moved off. There were speeches, and at least a respectable number of people grouped around, hoisting signs and answering the exhortations of the speakers. As night fell, the march began. Almost immediately, JJ could feel the conflict between all the so called moderates, who just wanted to hike around the streets and wave their signs, and those who would take back the plaza and challenge the cops.

A cadre of masked black blockers held their shields in the air, daring anyone to come after them. The bulk of the protesters headed off together, voices rising and falling in disjointed chants, aiming their loudest yells for the TV cameras. But even within the march, different segments challenged each other seemingly as much as the system itself.

It was beyond frustrating, JJ thought. Supposed activists yelling at other activists to stop yelling at the police. Marchers surrounded by cops and cameras trying to look like a force taking over the street, when the streets had been blocked off before they arrived. A hundred people taking pictures of each other, like they'd forgotten any purpose beyond facebook status updates.

People started peeling off long before anything real happened. The group just wasn't big enough to have a serious impact tonight, JJ could see that even though he would deny it publicly. There had been more cops than protesters the whole time. He fell in with a group of guys who were headed back towards the plaza. But it looked like pretty much a choice of go home and be quiet, or take a quick trip to jail in one of the buses lined up, empty and waiting.

JJ stuck by the edges, avoiding the central plaza where the most cops waited and biding his time, but forcing himself to put his ambitions on hold again. Frustrated again that it wasn't working, the revolution would not be starting on this particular night. Stronger tactics were needed, maybe even something independent of the half sold out movement spinning its wheels before him. A few sirens sounded, and the acrid smell of tear gas rose from canisters dropped in the back of the plaza. Crumpled signs lay underfoot, and the chalk drawings and splattered paint were unreadable. People were edging down into the BART station or off into the street in pairs or small quiet groups.

Standing in the deep shadows, watching the cops and activists grimly lined up across from each other as the TV news people drove away, JJ couldn't help but feel a weird sympathy toward the 9/11 terrorists. They must have gotten to the point where they had no choice but to go all in. They must have realized that sacrificing some innocents was the only way to make their point and get it noticed – otherwise they would keep getting completely ignored.

## Chapter 14 What's Important

# San Francisco, 2007

Karen's birthday came just nine days before Bill's, and since their first year together, they had combined their celebrations. If it was up to Bill, this would have probably been nothing more than a hearty toast of wine over dinner with the two of them and no meetings right afterwards.

Karen, though, had grown up with a mom who made the day special. And she had been happy to continue that tradition, and share it with Bill, and of course make a big deal out of Bethany's mid-summer birthdays. All these years later, Bill had come around to enjoy a bit of a fuss, Karen thought. And because they celebrated together, they generally bought themselves a joint present – something nice for the house, or a weekend getaway, or in earlier years just a babysitter and a good dinner out.

Since her mom and Jerry had moved to the Bay Area, almost ten years ago now, they also got the family together for a meal or picnic or something. Every year it seemed more challenging to find a date and place that worked for everyone. With the combined families, Jackie's and JJ's schedules included, with the extra hours now normal for Bill and of course side tracking around her own clients and 14 year old Bethany's growing activity load, they were lucky to even keep it close to the middle of March.

But every year Karen was glad in the end to have done it. It was truly a joy that Bethany was growing up in frequent touch with her grandma, and that her mom got the pleasure of this role. And it just felt right for her, for her and Bill, to be in the midst of all these people she loved.

Back around Valentine's Day, Bill had quietly suggested that they could maybe also go out to dinner, just the two of them, sometime later. He probably had the toughest schedule these days, and the family gatherings tended to stretch hours past what seemed reasonable to him for dinner and a birthday cake. Now that she thought of it, he'd made the same suggestion a year ago. They had tried a couple times but never actually managed to go. And here a whole year had elapsed.

It didn't seem that long, Karen thought. Seemed like just a few months ago she had been leaning toward Bill, squeezing his hand as they blew out the candles together on Mom's home made fudge cake. She pictured Bethany from last year – she had just gotten her braces on and had been practicing smiling without opening her mouth.

That's how one tells time with a kid, she told herself. Look at her now and see the changes, talk to her and hear a teenager instead of a child. Bethany was even now conspiring with her grandmother on something birthday related. She and JJ between them had persuaded Mom and Jerry to buy a decent home computer and gotten them wired up. Bethany, whether through powers of persuasion or just by being a modern child who could hardly communicate except via messages and texts, had gotten Mom savvy enough to have online chats with the girl that Karen was no longer a party to.

Bethany was a bit tech obsessed these days, in Karen's opinion. It was hard to tell how much was just normal for a kid growing up here and now, versus the degree to which she should be concerned that the girl spent so many hours in an online trance.

This morning, for instance, the morning of the birthday bash – wouldn't one expect a teenager to be trying on outfits, maybe asking for a trip to the mall to buy new jeans or something? Nope, Bethie had slumped down to the latest possible breakfast Karen allowed on weekends, then returned to the little alcove in the living room with the family computer and hadn't budged since. She was counting the days until she could have her own computer, the way kids used to look forward to getting drivers' licenses. Once she gets one set up in her bedroom, we'll never see her, Karen thought.

She knew how to check the browser history, and had done so, whispering her guilt later to Bill. Bill shrugged it off; he thought they should be glad she stayed in the house, that they could keep an eye on her. He had co-workers with kids who stole prescription meds or came home drunk.

But honestly, Karen didn't really know what her daughter was doing for so long online, who she messaged with, what sorts of inappropriate things she was seeing. Probably JJ was the only adult she knew who would be able to delve deeper into the computer records, find that stuff out. JJ, though, Bethany's favored uncle, would most likely not be in favor of such spying.

Hard to imagine approaching him about it anyway. Last time the family had gathered, over Christmas with both her brothers in town, JJ had barely shown up, arriving late for the one joint big meal and then hustling off early with another event to get to. Making it pretty clear that hanging out with the family fell low on his social totem pole. She didn't care herself, but it worried her that Bethany would be hurt. She always enjoyed her high tech chats with JJ, gloating over the knowledge of Apple products and insider websites they shared that the rest of the family hardly knew or cared about.

Karen decided to leave well enough alone for now, abandoning her daughter to her keyboard and mouse, and busying herself with errands and things around the house. Bill was home, but working, shut in the office with his work laptop. He would drag himself away in time for the party, but she knew better than to expect much more before then. He had less control over his hours than she did. Karen certainly appreciated the relative freedom of being her own boss, setting her own hours. Of course she purposely freed up her weekends and evenings, and was careful not to promise jobs turned around super fast. In fact, she had turned down potential clients who came in with those sort of 24/7 schedule demands

Bill, she thought, could have been a bit more proactive that way. Instead these recent go go go years had pushed him to take on a greater workload, longer hours. It almost seemed like he avoided the sort of unscheduled time that she made a point of arranging for herself. It's not like either of them need fear running out of clients, she felt sure. Both of them drew from the valley – his the big companies, hers small orgs or individuals, but everybody pretty flush with cash these days. She swallowed back the concern that surfaced sometimes, of just why he kept himself so busy.

Just after five, she poked her head into the office where he'd been ensconced for most of the afternoon. "We should leave in half an hour," she said lightly.

He glanced up, nodding. "I'm just about done here."

Nothing in his posture to offer cause for concern – his standard eye contact and smile, no sudden moves to clear his screen or anything (as Bethie sometimes did if approached from behind). Just too bad it took two birthdays to get him up and out for a nice social evening. Lately it seemed to Karen that she was more likely to turn to near strangers to have the sorts of engaging and rambling conversations she used to have with Bill. New clients over lunch, little networking gatherings or catching up with friends she hadn't seen for awhile – all seemed to offer more fun than tiptoeing around Bill's headache once he had finally shut off his laptop.

Karen stretched open the closet doors and pulled out a couple things to test out. She didn't need to be super dressy, but she wanted to look nice. At 44. Was that middle aged yet? Certainly Bethany would think so. She pulled on the name brand jeans that Bethany had rolled her eyes at, apparently of the opinion that adults shouldn't wear anything so low slung and tight. Unfortunately, they were tight; not ideal for a big sit down meal.

Who was she kidding, she thought, turning to her favorite slimming basic black pants and a soft ruby colored sweater. The dinner was at Jackie and Tony's place in the city, centrally located between Belmont and Mom and Jerry's house out in Orinda. When Karen had worried that it would be an imposition, Mom assured her that she was taking care of catering the thing, Jackie was just providing the place. And that she would like the excuse to show it off, frankly, having just updated their living room furniture. Again.

"You look nice," Bill's voice came behind her.

"Thanks." Definitely she was going with this outfit then. Karen took in a side look in the mirror. She had kept her weight down pretty well, and her hair, when it was styled, didn't look too bad. But somehow everything had pulled downward, condensed toward her middle, she thought, standing taller, arching. Up close, little lines crisscrossed below her eyes and radiated outwards. Laugh lines, but still.

Bill, typically, snagged a shirt and pants and dressed quickly, without so much as a glance toward his reflection. His age showed too, but his deepening jowls and salt and pepper hair just made him look distinguished. He was getting a bit soft in the middle, and no wonder since he spent so much time sitting at one or anther desks. He went into the bathroom to shave, leaving the door open. "Let's not stay too late, okay?" he said, voice muffled as he twisted his mouth around.

"Um hmm. Mom and Jerry won't want to be on the road real late anyway." Karen wasn't ready for promises – they so rarely went out, why not make a night of it? It's not like Bethany was a little girl with an early bedtime anymore.

She knew Bill had a whole list of things he needed to do over the weekend, some work related, others for the house. He had at least one college basketball game to watch, which he would do while reading a week's worth of business sections from the paper. And he would need to check his voicemail and email a dozen or more times, never mind it was the weekend. Bethany was the same way – she could barely function without near continual input from her friends either on the computer or on the phone.

The pace of their lives, of pretty much everybody's lives, Karen thought, had accelerated too much in recent years. It really wasn't healthy. She could see it in Bill's minor health problems, and in the pressure Bethany and her friends put on themselves to succeed in school. With lots of her clients too. And when she went into the city, especially at rush hour, it was sad and a little scary to see the stress level apparent on pretty much everybody riding BART. She couldn't help but look at strangers tapping furiously away at their laptops and think that their relationships must be suffering as well.

Karen moved purposely away from the mirror, and from her negative thoughts. She turned her mind instead to Mom, dinner, the bright lights of the city, and went with a smile to prod Bethany to get ready.

They arrived in good time, only minimal traffic on the way into the city. Too early for the Saturday night rush, Karen thought. Bill parked in the overpriced lot a couple blocks away; that helped too, instead of circling endlessly for something free to open up.

It was just getting dark, but the sidewalks were well lit and swarming with people. Voices and traffic noises and finely restored architecture competed for attention. Just being here felt festive, Karen thought, pulling closer to Bill as they skirted around a rollicking group of young men. She watched Bethany's eyes darting toward them – hopefully the girl was admiring their brand new cell phones and not the young men themselves. She felt an involuntary shiver just from this quick glimpse of what the next few years would no doubt bring.

Jackie's condo was up a hill, then up broad front stairs. Karen paused for a moment at the top, catching her breath and admiring the grand rows of houses below. The bell chimed inside, followed by excited barking and quick footsteps as Tony welcomed them and ushered them in, one hand held behind him toward the dogs.

Greetings all around – it was always great to see Tony, whom she had known forever. Tony took coats and released the well behaved dogs to wriggle up, noses raised and tails slapping. Jackie emerged from a fragrant smelling dining room looking lovely and regal. "Happy birthdays!" she exclaimed, hugging everyone in turn. "Hope you're hungry – your mom ordered enough for a small army."

"Or JJ if he brings a couple friends," Tony added.

He and Jackie exchanged one of those not now dear looks. JJ, Karen recalled hearing, had recently shown up at a small dinner party with three uninvited guests. One of whom he had only met the day before.

"He just doesn't always think ahead," Jackie said. "He is planning to be here tonight, running a bit late as usual," she assured them. "Just him though. I was hoping one of those gals was more than a friend, but it seems not."

Further discussion was interrupted by the Mom and Jerry's arrival, setting off another round of frantic barking and happy hugs. Tony lured noisier of the dogs into a back room, and Jackie led the rest of them on a tour of the newly furnished living area. The place was a refurbished Victorian, and they had torn out the drop ceilings and restored the intricate woodwork of the original design. There was period furniture too, though Jackie apologized that it was already starting to look shabby because the dogs loved to sit by the windows and look out.

Karen oohed and aahed as she was expected to, but also thought that the lived in look of the dogs' favored couch was probably the best part of the room. Otherwise it seemed more like a page from a magazine than a place where people enjoyed living. It was nice, it was pretty and everything, but Karen couldn't imagine curling up with a bowl of ice cream, for instance – a single spilled drop could wreck a chair.

They sat, kind of clustered around Mom and Jerry, and accepted wine glasses from Tony. He thoughtfully brought out soda in a fluted glass for Bethany. He would have been a good dad, Karen thought. Too bad it never happened. Jackie had never really confided the particulars, but Mom had confirmed that they had tried but not succeeded in having a baby. Quiet early miscarriages only. No wonder she threw herself into perfecting her house and her dogs, Karen told herself, you should be more sympathetic.

Jackie adored the dogs anyway, that much was clear. Although would she have been quite so good as a parent? She had so often babied JJ too much, almost in the same way as the dogs – excuses were made when he misbehaved, treats were offered. It wasn't her fault back in Pennsylvania, she was just a girl stepping in where their mother tossed up her hands at his exploits. But Karen wondered how much Jackie would have done the same thing with a child of her own. Watching her old friend, she could even now see traces of the girl she had ridden bikes with so far away in time and place both.

As a kid, she had admired Jackie, but also felt a bit competitive with her. Or maybe like the short end of the stick in comparison? But now she felt, without any rancor, that she had the better life. The better balance, maybe. Jackie still exuded a kind of high pitched wire of tension that was almost visible across the room. How she strove for flawlessness in the smallest things, things that didn't really matter. The exact placement of the meticulous and matching place settings at their fancy dining room table, the precise temperature of the food, the pairing of wines.

Even now, Jackie pulled Tony into the kitchen to confer about how long to wait, whether things would dry out too much. Mom rose to go in but thought better of it, and sat back. Jerry patted her arm with a smile. They all knew JJ would be late, just not how late. It didn't matter, Karen thought. He would hardly care if they started without him, nor notice if everything was held up on his account. A day or two later, who would even remember.

So many things that once seemed important just faded over time. Karen gazed over at Bill, who had gotten down on the floor to goof around with one of the dogs while Bethany watched, giggling. Think of back at the beginning, struggling over whether to call up that attractive new man, or what to say, running over possible topics of conversation in her head, nervous for their dates. Passionate love, furious anger, glee and humiliation and sorrow all eventually shriveled and became pale shadows of themselves. Winners and losers in competitions now just blended together.

Even things that were once shocking or shameful could lose their sting over time. An out of wedlock child, an affair, an accidental betrayal. Once, Karen thought, a woman widowed like her mom was would have been expected to remain true to her husband's memory even if she outlived him by decades. But it was surely better to see Mom happy again. In the same way, where she once felt any rivalry with Jackie, now she just wished her to find as much happiness as she could.

The doorbell chimed, the dogs leapt up, and Bill rose slowly, a careful hand on his knee, brushing himself off. We're middle aged, Karen thought, like it or not.

JJ slumped into the room, mumbling a general greeting to the group. Jerry rose for a handshake; the others stayed seated, knowing how JJ tended to lurch back from any sort of demonstrative movements.

"You got any decent beer," he called to Tony. "I'm so thirsty. Not into this fruity wine."

Tony's lips formed a thin line, you could almost see him swallowing back a reply to the insult of his wine, which was dry and delicious. He carefully provided a cold beer and a mug, and when JJ stood there looking half confused, he poured it for him.

He was more than a little stoned, Karen thought, glancing at Bill to see if he noticed. Bill gave a minute head shake and looked away. Neither of them wanted to call attention to it, although frankly she suspected that Bethany was already familiar with stoned behavior. From movies rather than school, she hoped at least.

"How's the new job, JJ?" Mom asked gamely. "He was asked to give a presentation to a whole division just days after he started," she added, turning toward the others.

JJ's eyes drifted over the group. He cleared his throat. His expression suggested it was a burden to be forced to address them, but a necessary evil. "It was lame," he said. "Not a presentation, just a demo of a new product. One I'd just learned. They're, like, too, um, unaware of how to use their systems to have just figured it out."

He was going to say old, Karen thought, stifling a grin. At least he was aware enough to not be that grossly rude.

"Well, we're proud of him anyway," Mom said with a genuine sounding innocence. "It's quite a coup to take on a management role so quickly, I'd say."

"It is, and he can do that sort of thing really well, he's a quick study," Jackie said, answering for him, the way she liked to do. She toweled off her hands and motioned him towards a chair. "Sit already, relax."

JJ drank down some more beer. "Are we going to eat pretty soon?" he asked her. "You were all rushing me and shit."

"It'll be a few minutes," she answered calmly. "The food has to heat. Thanks again, Amelia, it looks delicious."

JJ looked ridiculously put upon as he plopped himself onto the chair. "Come here, mutts," he said to the dogs. He liked to play kind of rough with them, get them riled up.

Karen could see Tony grimacing, practically read the thought bubble above his head: of course JJ would be late, make everyone wait, and then wonder why dinner didn't instantly appear. And then spend the time waiting annoying the dogs, grabbing their toys away, tempting them to bite before shoving them roughly away. He never had cared much for any kind of animals, she thought, remembering how obnoxious he had been with his meat eating when Joy was deep in her vegetarian phase.

Soon they moved into the dining room, laughing at the long pause in conversation as everyone dug into the food. Mom, in that graceful way she had, made sure they all participated in the conversation, even drawing out Bill to talk about some recent jobs. Karen watched happily as he talked, sounding more relaxed than he had all week. And she smiled to see how nicely and patiently Bethany sat listening. She would surely rather be on the phone with her friends, but she got it, that sitting around the table with Mom and Dad was important too.

Jackie rushed out the cake as soon as they were done eating. Assuming, Karen supposed, that JJ would get visibly impatient or stand up to leave otherwise. Well, she was happy to eat Mom's cake whenever and wherever. They lit a few token candles, and she and Bill gently blew them out.

While Jackie backed the cake into the kitchen to slice it onto her lovely little plates, Bethany proudly presented her gift. It was a small rectangle. Karen exchanged a raised brow with Bill. Mom was beaming.

It was a CD case. Karen held it up for the rest of them to see.

"It's your best pictures," Bethany exclaimed. "From all the way back, Grandma loaned me hers and we snuck some of Dad's out of the photo albums. And mine. Not all of them, just the good ones. Look at the image."

Karen unclasped the case. Right on the disk was a favorite picture of the three of them, from when Bethany was about five. They were at a local park; Bethany had scrambled up onto a rock and Karen and Bill flanked her. They were windblown and squinting toward the sun, but in each face you could see such happiness.

"This is wonderful, what a good idea, you two," Karen exclaimed. Feeling her eyes suddenly teary, she let Bill finish the thanks for both of them. Bethany had always had a good eye for composition and image – something she had gotten from both of them no doubt. She grinned across the table at Mom, who was delicately dabbing her own eyes with a napkin.

As the evening continued, Karen finally felt as joyous as she had been aiming for earlier in the day. She didn't bother to take the slightest offense when JJ hurriedly departed, after a few more unkind words toward his bosses and nothing whatsoever about Bill or Karen's birthdays. At least Bethany had a new computer partner in her grandma, Karen thought. One who might be as likely to encourage her to go out and smell the flowers, to turn off all the devices and take pleasure in the natural world too. Maybe Bethany would roll her eyes if Karen said such things, but she'd bet the same ideas coming from Grandma would have an impact.

Not long later, Mom and Jerry made a move to go. "Are you in that little lot?" Bill asked Jerry. "Let me run over and pick up the car, I could use the exercise."

"I'll go too," Karen said. "We'll be right back, you two sit and entertain your granddaughter." She followed Bill down the stairs, pleased with the delicacy with which he handled the older folks. Jerry had a bit of a balance problem, especially on hills, and Mom's night vision was poor. She could only hope Bethany took after him rather than someone like JJ as far as that kind of tact come their later years.

They walked quickly, braced against the firm breeze. At the corner across from the lot, Bill stepped off the curb as the light turned. In a flash, a car careened through the red light, straight at him. Karen heard her own high loud gasp as Bill jumped back out of the way. Her heart pounded almost out of her chest. But he was standing upright, in one piece. A couple people nearby muttered angrily toward the driver, no one else much noticed.

"Are you okay, are you sure?" Karen repeated, as Bill nodded, firming his shoulders and crossing the street.

They got the car, and returned, seeing Mom and Jerry into it, climbing the stairs once again. They were fine, everyone was okay. But Karen felt the pure joy dissipating. Along with her desire to go out on the town. God, think how this night could have ended differently. Bill on a stretcher, or worse, or if it was Jerry or Mom. How casually we all say goodbye to each other when what if it was the very last time? Or think of their eventual reunion. If he had been injured, comatose or in surgery. The sweetness of their homecoming.

There are things I should be saying out loud to him every day, Karen thought. To all of them. On this night of their birthday celebration, she could suddenly think of nothing better than just going home, the three of them, and together looking at the pictures of their lives.

## Chapter 15 Letting Go

# San Francisco, 2010

If Jackie and Tony ever had managed to conceive and successfully give birth, she would have told the child about her burial wishes the moment the kid could read a legal document. Maybe sooner. As it was, she had insisted that she and Tony write up their own wills and had each of their sisters as witnesses. Wouldn't you think her own mother could have managed that sometime before she reached age 75?

Jackie took a deep breath. Then another. She rose from her bed, already angry at the day, when she was supposed to be achieving closure. Closure from Mom's death, from the speed of the cancer, the viciousness of the treatments, the exhaustion from those cross country trips to try, unsuccessfully, to mange it all. Maybe she had come through as well as she could, she and Joy both disrupting their lives but then losing Mom anyway. She had done her best for her mother and Mom had at least thanked her. But then withered and died. At peace at last, but it also felt like a rebuke, somehow, that Mom had just seemed to give up. Hadn't even bothered with her basic paperwork, leaving Jackie to muddle through. Had never even made the second visit out here that she kept putting off.

If she'd had a child, then Mom would have made another trip, a bunch more probably. She would have fought harder, sought treatment earlier, something. Jackie stood in front of the bathroom mirror, trying to keep the harsh frown off her face, attempting yet a again to tamp down the familiar anger that rose like bitter bile.

Both Tony and a couple of Jackie's friends had hinted that perhaps some of her fury was just misplaced grief. Well, whatever, as JJ would say. What she did know is that during the illness she had taken charge as usual, then been resented (Joy) or blown off (JJ) for making decisions as she saw fit.

Mom had not let on about the cancer at all, at first. She had ignored initial symptoms then somehow figured she would start her treatments, start getting better, before she worried anyone out west. That's how she collectively referred to the family, with thinly veiled resentment that Jackie and JJ both lived so close to Dad and Amelia. Mom acted like they had jolly weekly meals together, when in fact she probably spoke on the phone equally frequently to both parents.

Anyway, by the time the word had gotten out, and Joy had driven back for a long weekend and then called Jackie to report, she was in terrible shape. It was lung cancer, stage 4, fast moving and not responding well to radiation. And that streak of a martyr complex of Mom's had not helped the situation. Not apologizing for withholding info about her condition, just mumbling in her new whispery voice about "not wanting to bother you kids, you're all so busy with your lives..."

When if she had bothered Jackie about it earlier, they could have made all the decisions together, gone over the paperwork while Mom was still focussed and thinking clearly. Gotten her input in some delicate way on her wishes for afterwards. The airfare would have been more reasonable, she could have scheduled her time better at work. Let it go, she told herself, for the thousandth time. It's done.

Jackie dressed in the pretty mauve toned outfit she has laid out last night. Mom had always favored shades of red and purple; no somber black for this little family gathering. She glanced out at the day, glad to see the sun shining and little fog. They would be scattering the ashes at a nearby beach, so good the sun was out.

She said as much, joining Tony in the kitchen for coffee. Tony, bless him, had already been out and brought back fresh fruit, yogurt, pastries. Things Jackie considered ideal breakfast foods – at least he got it that this should be a special day.

"Think it's too early to call JJ?" she asked.

Tony didn't bother to answer beyond a quick eye roll. It was way too early. Frannie, the oldest and sweetest of their dogs, pressed against his legs as he reached down to cuddle her head. Frankie tried to squeeze in for his turn.

"I know we didn't set an exact time," Jackie continued, reaching over to give Frankie a pat. "But I want to give him a warning that we're coming. To make sure he's there, that he remembers. So we don't have to sit around at his stinky old flat and everything." She trailed off, aware she was just stating her worries out loud. Or substituting, worrying about JJ being ready when she was actually worried that he was still pissed off. Not to mention still unemployed, more directionless than ever as the stubborn recession dragged into another year.

As Mom had withheld her bad news from Jackie and Joy, they all had kept it from JJ for even longer. Jackie regretted that now, now that she knew how little time Mom had had left. At the time it seemed like sparing him – JJ could take that sort of thing hard. He could be like a kid, uncomprehending, but then lash out later. He got angry about anything he couldn't control.

She had been worried about her brother already, as the financial meltdown that most people had seen coming apparently took him completely by surprise. The company he'd been working for had suddenly gone under, which had happened before, but not like this. JJ had worked at a bunch of places, but over a scant few months all those places were laying people off instead of hiring.

Probably not surprisingly, JJ had been pretty slow to tighten his belt the way most people did as layoffs loomed. They didn't talk specifics, but she figured he'd been wracking up credit card debts, since he kept up his standard lifestyle for months and months after his last real job. Expensive apartment, dinner out every night, lots of partying. Jackie tried not to totally scold him, but she did make a point of explaining how carefully she and Tony had timed selling their old place and buying back in the city. How they budgeted and added to their retirement savings even when the market was going downward.

Finally he'd at least moved into a shared flat, shifted to take out burritos instead of three course meals, but still. Every time they talked, his litany of complaints had gotten longer and more vitriolic. At one point he had gone so far as to express enthusiasm for the Tea Party movement. Like he'd somehow gone from Bay Area genius techie to a downtrodden redneck, an oppressed, left behind white guy. Ridiculous, she had said as much, hoping this new fascination would be short lived.

She believed – she had to believe, to keep her sanity – that the current economy was more a bad blip than a new normal. She didn't want times to revert backwards exactly, but there would hopefully soon be boom times again. Her job would get more lucrative, or she could move up, be the boss again. JJ could emerge from this funk he'd been in since well before Mom's illness.

By the time they had shared the news about Mom, he really didn't get it, didn't get the seriousness. She and Joy had to drag him back – she'd put his ticket on her points, Joy had picked him up and driven him to the house. He hadn't wanted to go because he had some lead on a temp contract job that much as he may have needed some bucks could hardly compare with a last goodbye to your mom.

It hadn't gone well. Mom was either barely conscious or bitterly angry by that time. JJ – whose communication skills with either parent could be wanting in the best of circumstances – had reverted into his full on teenager sullen mode. Apparently, he had barely talked to Mom at all, nor her doctors nor any of the friends and neighbors from her retirement community.

Then back home, when Jackie tried to have a simple conversation with him, coax out how upsetting it was to see Mom like that, he had lashed out in fury at her. Accused her of lying and resenting his success and conniving with Joy to make off with Mom's assets when she died. It had taken every measure of self control to keep the ensuing argument from spiraling into a shouting match. She had to remind herself, she still did, even this morning, that he was a super sensitive person under all that bluff.

He had eventually started to come around, after her careful and humble apologies, after convincing him that she and Joy really hadn't known about it much longer, after showing him the legal documents and explaining that with Mom's years in the retirement place and medical bills there really was no estate to be pillaged. His attitude was not great these days, but at least he would pick up the phone when she called. Jackie figured he would stay kind of mad at Mom, as she couldn't help being herself. Plus he was just mad at the world. The financial meltdown, things like the terrible earthquake in Haiti, that awful tsunami – it was as if JJ thought these things were out to make him personally miserable, no matter how far away.

"You're worrying too much." Tony's voice brought her out of her reverie. "Worst case, we just go ourselves, make it nice. He's had every chance to be part of it. Joy too."

Jackie nodded. Reached for more strawberries and tried to focus on the task at hand. Joy, not surprisingly, refused to fly out to take part in the scattering. She had gotten all the closure she needed from her trips east, she said. And though Jackie thought it might be a nice break from late winter in Chicago, she could understand. JJ, she told herself, would be there if she had to drag him by his arm like when he was a kid.

They took all the dogs for a nice walk in Alta Plaza, where they could romp with their doggie friends. Make up for leaving them behind later – they loved the beach, but having them launching in and out of the water didn't seem like quite the right tone.

Off leash, Frankie and Delta raced to join a tail wagging, butt sniffing group of similar sized pals. "You go to, sweetie," she urged Frannie, who stayed put at her feet, her face raised mournfully. Lately the poor girl hesitated to let them out of her sight, as if already aware of the painful hole she would leave in the household when she left this world.

Tony gently shepherded her towards the other dogs. Frannie's days of dashing after toys were over, but she did at least like to socialize. "She's slowing down," Jackie said to a familiar women kneeling nearby, unclasping her Shih Tzu.

"My old dog got like that," she answered. "A little clingy. It's sweet though."

Jackie nodded, watching her beloved girl. She didn't like it when other people called the dogs substitute children, but there was some truth to it. They had gotten Frannie as a pup, back when they were still trying. After the second miscarriage, the really fast one. Something for Jackie to focus on besides her stupid body.

The dogs, her job, a long period of house hunting and overseeing the sale of the old place, moving, decorating. Lots of distractions. They'd moved back to the city when it was pretty clear they were not having kids. It was kind of a compromise, if you could call it that – the savings from what they might have spent on infertility treatments, which she decided against, went instead towards the new investment. The schools, the quiet streets, the main reasons for staying in the burbs just melted away, both of them agreed.

Now with Mom gone, with Dad so well settled, Tony's father gone and his mother also remarried, why not devote themselves to the dogs? She still missed Maxie, their first, who had been gone for a couple years now. Why not get another, or a pair? Jackie stepped lightly down the hill toward Tony and the dogs, Frankie's favorite toy in hand. However heavy she found the rest of the day, there was joy and lightness here.

She needn't have worried so much, Tony was right. JJ only made them wait a few minutes before hopping obediently into the car, his former anger at her apparently behind him. He was even dressed appropriately, not at all scruffy and with an attractive jacket to keep him warm at the coast.

"Where's, um, Mom?" JJ asked warily, eyes darting around the back seat.

"In the trunk. She arrived in a neat little box." Jackie caught her brother's eye over the seat as she turned back towards him.

His eyes widened. Hearing how her words sounded, she giggled, and in a second they were both cracking up like wild naughty children. Good thing Tony was driving. He grinned, but kept his eye on the road.

Oh, how I had needed to laugh, Jackie thought. She wiped a tear from her eye and resolutely faced forward, JJ's muffled chortles from the back seat threatening to set her off again.

Tony made a sharp turn and drove up a small rutted road that curved along gentle hills beside the ocean. She had researched – they could find a bit of solitude in this little place just south of city limits, plus there would be no legal entities to object to the disbursal of the cremains. They pulled into a little lot with a few scattered cars. One guy sat in his car with the radio on, and a couple were taking off with their dogs. Otherwise, it was theirs alone.

Jackie opened the trunk and handed bunches of flowers to Tony and JJ. She slid her fingers under the twine around the small box and loosened it. "Let's go down there, toward that bluff." Carrying the box, she led the way down a wide path along the grassy hillside. A mild breeze blew in, and closer to the water, they could hear the pounding of waves and cries from gulls circling rock outcroppings.

JJ loped along beside her, flowers held out like an offering. She tried to read his expression, but couldn't. As was so often the case now as he got older, his face appeared simply hard and vacant. Like he had gotten tired of feeling so much and just put on a mask that looked like JJ but didn't emote.

They reached the edge of the low bluff. Waves ebbed and receded below. The whole of the Pacific edged toward the horizon before them and gentle green hills rose behind. It was lovely, just lovely. Mom surely would have liked this place.

"Well, here we are. Come to say a last goodbye to Mom." Jackie had thought of a bunch of stuff to say, but now in the moment, none of it seemed to matter.

Tony pulled her close for a moment, watched to see if she was done talking, then leaned in to help her with the box. JJ muttered something under his breath and clamped his lips shut. They got the box opened, and all three of them grasped it, leaning out awkwardly over the ledge and away from the wind. Traces of ash fell, then large clumps, odd brittle bits that must have been bone.

Jackie reached for the flowers and tossed some of those too. Tony finished shaking out the box, and she and JJ threw the rest of the flowers one by one. The floated on the water's surface, tiny from the distance, and already bobbing away. She stood still for a moment, aware of the poignant picture she made, a delicate tear on her cheek, breeze lifting her airy skirt around her.

A flock of pelicans flew by, low to the water. Down on the nearby beach, someone's dog leapt into the water after a stick. Jackie realized she actually felt the sort of peaceful release that she was meant to experience. That she said this day was all about even though she doubted she would feel that way. But she did. She was alive and well on this lovely day. Mom was gone, but her children remained. Who knows, JJ could still keep the family going into a new generation.

Jackie glanced over at her brother, hoping he shared her unexpected sense of peace. But he turned away, eyes and narrowed lips bitter, and trudged back up the hill with sloping shoulders and the look of someone more hopeless than ever.

## Chapter 16 Firepower

# San Francisco, 2013

It had been awhile, but a guy recognized JJ while he was at the burrito place. Not his usual one, the more hippy dippy one on 24th, near where he had met up with some guys earlier. Oscar liked this place, and JJ had stopped in to buy them both dinner. He had been short on his rent for a couple months now, more than a couple actually, so he tried to do something like this for Oscar to make up for it. Oscar, when stoned, would pretty much equate a burrito in front of him to a fat wad of cash.

He pulled out a chair to sit while they made his order. And he could feel the dude's eyes on him in this particular way. Like part scared, part admiring. He was young, skinny, dressed all in black, a cap pulled low on his head, earbuds dangling. When they called JJ's order, he met the guy's eye as he passed. Gave a slight nod, like, yeah, I'm him, the guy from that video.

It gave him a little rush, that recognition. Didn't exactly make up for having to walk, having no car, no extra cash to make up the missing rent. But it was something. Hell of lot better than the attitude he'd been getting from some of the original Occupiers. JJ had been all but shut out of recent discussions. All the talk was of staying relevant, creating a positive spin in the public's eye, making the movement grow in a quote respectable way.

He munched on a couple chips as he walked down Valencia, rolling his eyes at the more obvious signs of gentrification along this end. That's what most of those guys wished for, he thought. Something once cutting edge and now all prettied up so that the Walnut Creek wannabes wouldn't be scared to walk here. How many of the original players had up and left, he wondered. Gotten all excited that they'd re-elected their president and moved on. Jumped on the gay marriage bandwagon, like that was somehow equivalent to institutionalized poverty, or challenging the government's increasing program of secret drones.

Or maybe they decided gun control, aka gun violence prevention, was the new cause. Yeah, it was a shame about those little kids in Connecticut, sure. But poor kids in cities got gunned down every day. Poor people were in the situation where they had no choice but to commit armed robbery because of the damn corporate inequity. The real powerbrokers were still in power. Obama's win hadn't changed that. Gays winning the right to lead boring middle class lives like straight couples, that did nothing for the truly impoverished and oppressed of the world.

JJ paused at the book bin outside a used book store. They'd never notice if he snagged something. Too bad the selection was lousy. He would rather read stuff online anyway. Hyperlink if he wanted more info, read the snarky comments for fun. Through the dark glass, he could see this young woman really studying the books. Superimposed was his vague reflection – dark hoodie and squinting frown. He wondered, if she looked up or he went in there, would she be scared? See a rough old school Mission resident, or maybe recognize him from Occupy?

Or maybe she would just look right through him like he wasn't there. That happened too often. It sucked worse than any other reaction. JJ turned away, kept walking towards home. But there was a lesson there, he thought. You start looking quiet and old and nobody pays attention. Occupy – or whatever new name or brand or mission emerged – needed to stay fresh and loud to make an impact.

JJ dodged around the neighbor kids out kicking a soccer ball around the sidewalk in front of his house, and tramped up the steps. Oscar had some music blasting, something new and techno sounding. He was at his computer, fiddling with the sound, head bobbing idly in time to the beat.

JJ held up the bag.

"Awesome," Oscar said, hands out, like a he was offering a blessing.

They didn't bother with plates, just ripped the foil off the top. "Who is this?" JJ asked, trying not to spit out food while he talked.

Oscar told him a bunch of stuff about the band. And the sound. And some more stuff, but as he was listening, JJ was trying to think how he could interest Oscar in the ideas he was thinking about. How to get the serious activists back on track. How to really shake things up, what kind of actions would seriously get the kind of attention worldwide that the original movement had. Or that, like, all the mass shootings were doing. It was frustrating – even Oscar, like Mr. Movement, had gotten all distracted by the 49ers going to the Superbowl and shit like that.

JJ at least initiated the conversation. It was hard to articulate exactly, but Oscar has been around, the dude was pretty smart.

"I don't know, man," he said, cutting in when JJ paused, kind of flailing to wrap up what he meant. "I think we need to face it that a lot of the initial energy is gone. You know how everybody gets their news from who their facebook friends are following, right – I mean, that just exacerbates how fast something like Occupy can get old."

JJ pffted his lips. "So, like, the guys who started Arab Spring should have just given up? When their facebook friends got bored with it?"

Oscar grinned, and languidly reached for the last of the chips. "Not the same. You know when we were first going down there?" He waved his hand vaguely in the direction of the Federal Reserve downtown. "There were a lot of people who were like, we'll occupy until they frigging close the banks and jail the corrupt execs. Until college education is free."

"So what, those are bad ideas now?"

"It doesn't really take into consideration the entire scoop of the problem, you know? I mean that the financial crisis was worldwide. Huge. That the actual 1 percent is so totally cloistered that a hundred marches on their banks won't bother them. They don't actually come down here at all."

"But we still have to take it on! It's still bullshit!"

"I'm just saying, if there's a limited amount of resources as in activists and their time and attention, it makes sense to pick your battles. Find out what's going to resonate with a wider audience. What can actually make an impact, like taking over the foreclosed houses." Oscar gave him this look, the weary, I've been around forever look.

JJ gave a grudging nod – he didn't really agree, nobody could convince him that anything less than the explosive confrontations of the original movement were needed now all the more. But he knew Oscar wouldn't be pushed once he'd made this sort of pronouncement. Actually, he sounded kind of like Amelia there, JJ thought, momentarily amused. His stepmother had used prettier language but kind of said something similar last time she had called. Something along the lines of choosing a small set of conceptual targets such as ending for-profit military contracts or legally preventing corporations from being called people.

Amelia had also again asked him to promise not to do something he would regret. Which he roughly translated into something that would embarrass them and Jackie. Well maybe they'd be proud when he did something to get noticed around the globe on the six o'clock news instead of just on YouTube. Amelia might have some respect anyway. Jackie would probably just tut tut in her annoyed big sister way no matter how big an impact he made. Anyway, for now it was easier just to avoid their calls. Like how it was easier to just not be around Oscar when the rent was due.

"Hey, I saw the Jakes earlier, at Muddy's," Oscar said. "And that other guy that hangs out with them, the student? You should talk to those guys. I mean if you really want to get some people behind new direct action."

"Cool, maybe I will." JJ didn't know those guys very well, but they had hung out. These two friends both named Jake were definitely gutsy as far as charging the cops and stuff like that. They were young, early 20s. Looking for leadership, he thought. Oscar was right, those would be the type of guys to back him.

JJ went into his room, kicking off his boots and pulling on a lighter, marginally cleaner shirt. Trolled through the same old websites, annoyed at the lack of serious dedication to the cause, or to the original ideas expressed in the movement. Thinking about the guy at the taqueria, he brought up the video of himself to watch. He hadn't seen it in months, hadn't ever really looked at it that closely. Hard to believe it had been more than a year ago – in some ways it felt like it had just gone down. But then again it seemed like a world away. Because that anger, that was so obvious in everybody's faces and that he could feel in his gut even now, it just wasn't out there anymore.

JJ reversed and replayed the part where you could see all the people around him going nuts, like pounding on anything in the path between them and their righteousness. The faces, the expressions, so alive with feeling. That was it, that's what was lost, and that's what he needed to create again. By any means necessary.

Scrolling, he saw even more comments. A bunch of people had comments and there were twitterfeeds that kind of mocked the thing, but a bunch more were totally positive. Damn, if he was looking for fellow believers, this was the place, right? He just needed to get out in front of them all again.

His sister had always said he was special, JJ thought. Maybe she didn't know just how special. Maybe nobody did. People were always underestimating him. But maybe next time, he wouldn't be stopped so easily. Let the philosophy majors worry about the ethical implications. Let somebody else figure out the vision statement. He just needed followers and firepower. No one would forget when he finally made his stand.

###

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