Eastern Standard Tribe by Cory Doctorow (best reads .txt) 📕

/> "So, Arthur, tell me, what are you doing with your life?" the Father said. He
had grown exquisitely aged, almost translucent, since Art had seen him last. In
his dog collar and old-fashioned aviator's shades, he looked like a waxworks
figure.

Art had forgotten all about the Father's visit until Gran stepped out of her
superheated kitchen to remind him. He'd hastily showered and changed into fresh
slacks and a mostly clean tee shirt, and had agreed to entertain the priest
while his Gran finished cooking supper. Now, he wished he'd signed up to do the
cooking.

"I'm working in London," he said. "The same work as ever, but for an English
firm."

"That's what your grandmother tells me. But is it making you happy? Is it what
you plan to do with the rest of your life?"

"I guess so," Art said. "Sure."

"You don't sound so sure," Father Ferlenghetti said.

"Well, the *work* part's excellent. The politics are pretty ugly, though, to
tell the truth."

"Ah. Well, we can't avoid politics, can we?"

"No, I guess we can't."

"Art, I've always known that you were a very smart young man, but being smart
isn't the same as being happy. If you're very lucky, you'll get to be my age and
you'll look back on your life and be glad you lived it."

Gran called him in for dinner before he could think of a reply. He settled down
at the table and Gran handed him a pen.

"What's this for?" he asked.

"Sign the tablecloth," she said. "Write a little something and sign it and date
it, nice and clear, please."

"Sign the tablecloth?"

"Yes. I've just started a fresh one. I have everyone sign my tablecloth and then
I embroider the signatures in, so I have a record of everyone who's been here
for supper. They'll make a nice heirloom for your children -- I'll show you the
old ones after we eat."

"What should I write?"

"It's up to you."

While Gran and the Father looked on, Art uncapped the felt-tip pen and thought
and thought, his mind blank. Finally, he wrote, "For my Gran. No matter where I
am, I know you're thinking of me." He signed it with a flourish.

"Lovely. Let's eat now."

Art meant to log in and see if Colonelonic had dredged up any intel on Linda's
ex, but he found himself trapped on the sunporch with Gran and the Father and a
small stack of linen tablecloths hairy with embroidered wishes. He traced their
braille with his fingertips, recognizing the names of his childhood. Gran and
the Father talked late into the night, and the next thing Art knew, Gran was
shaking him awake. He was draped in a tablecloth that he'd pulled over himself
like a blanket, and she folded it and put it away while he ungummed his eyes and
staggered off to bed.

Audie called him early the next morning, waking him up.

"Hey, Art! It's your cousin!"

"Audie?"

"You don't have any other female cousins, so yes, that's a good guess. Your Gran
told me you were in Canada for a change."

"Yup, I am. Just for a little holiday."

"Well, it's been long enough. What do you do in London again?"

"I'm a consultant for Virgin/Deutsche Telekom." He has this part of the
conversation every time he speaks with Audie. Somehow, the particulars of his
job just couldn't seem to stick in her mind.

"What kind of consultant?"

"User experience. I help design their interactive stuff. How's Ottawa?"

"They pay you for that, huh? Well, nice work if you can get it."

Art believed that Audie was being sincere in her amazement at his niche in the
working world, and not sneering at all. Still, he had to keep himself from
saying something snide about the lack of tangible good resulting from keeping
MPs up to date on the poleconomy of semiconductor production in PacRim
sweatshops.

"They sure do. How's Ottawa?"

"Amazing. And why London? Can't you find work at home?"

"Yeah, I suppose I could. This just seemed like a good job at the time. How's
Ottawa?

"Seemed, huh? You going to be moving back, then? Quitting?"

"Not anytime soon. How's Ottawa?"

"Ottawa? It's beautiful this time of year. Alphie and Enoch and I were going to
go to the trailer for the weekend, in Calabogie. You could drive up and meet us.
Swim, hike. We've built a sweatlodge near the dock; you and Alphie could bake up
together."

"Wow," Art said, wishing he had Audie's gift for changing the subject. "Sounds
great. But. Well, you know. Gotta catch up with friends here in Toronto. It's
been a while, you know. Well." The image of sharing a smoke-filled dome with
Alphie's naked, cross-legged, sweat-slimed paunch had seared itself across his
waking mind.

"No? Geez. Too bad. I'd really hoped that we could reconnect, you and me and
Alphie. We really should spend some more time together, keep connected, you
know?"

"Well," Art said. "Sure. Yes." Relations or no, Audie and Alphie were basically
strangers to him, and it was beyond him why Audie thought they should be
spending time together, but there it was. *Reconnect, keep connected.* Hippies.
"We should. Next time I'm in Canada, for sure, we'll get together, I'll come to
Ottawa. Maybe Christmas. Skating on the canal, OK?"

"Very good," Audie said. "I'll pencil you in for Christmas week. Here, I'll send
you the wish lists for Alphie and Enoch and me, so you'll know what to get."

Xmas wishlists in July. Organized hippies! What planet did his cousins grow up
on, anyway?

"Thanks, Audie. I'll put together a wishlist and pass it along to you soon, OK?"
His bladder nagged at him. "I gotta run now, all right?"

"Great. Listen, Art, it's been, well, great to talk to you again. It really
makes me feel whole to connect with you. Don't be a stranger, all right?"

"Yeah, OK! Nice to talk to you, too. Bye!"

"Safe travels and wishes fulfilled," Audie said.

"You too!"

25.

Now I've got a comm, I hardly know what to do with it. Call Gran? Call Audie?
Call Fede? Login to an EST chat and see who's up to what?

How about the Jersey clients?

There's an idea. Give them everything, all the notes I built for Fede and his
damned patent application, sign over the exclusive rights to the patent for one
dollar and services rendered (i.e., getting me a decent lawyer and springing me
from this damned hole).

My last lawyer was a dickhead. He met me at the courtroom fifteen minutes before
the hearing, in a private room whose fixtures had the sticky filthiness of a
bus-station toilet. "Art, yes, hello, I'm Allan Mendelson, your attorney. How
are you?

He was well over 6'6", but weighed no more than 120 lbs and hunched over his
skinny ribs while he talked, dry-washing his hands. His suit looked like the
kind of thing you'd see on a Piccadilly Station homeless person, clean enough
and well-enough fitting, but with an indefinable air of cheapness and falsehood.

"Well, not so good," I said. "They upped my meds this morning, so I'm pretty
logy. Can't concentrate. They said it was to keep me calm while I was
transported. Dirty trick, huh?"

"What?" he'd been browsing through his comm, tapping through what I assumed was
my file. "No, no. It's perfectly standard. This isn't a trial, it's a hearing.
We're all on the same side, here." He tapped some more. "Your side."

"Good," Art said. "My grandmother came down, and she wants to testify on my
behalf."

"Oooh," the fixer said, shaking his head. "No, not a great idea. She's not a
mental health professional, is she?"

"No," I said. "But she's known me all my life. She knows I'm not a danger to
myself or others."

"Sorry, that's not appropriate. We all love our families, but the court wants to
hear from people who have qualified opinions on this subject. Your doctors will
speak, of course."

"Do I get to speak?"

"If you *really* want to. That's not a very good idea, either, though, I'm
afraid. If the judge wants to hear from you, she'll address you. Otherwise, your
best bet is to sit still, no fidgeting, look as sane and calm as you can."

I felt like I had bricks dangling from my limbs and one stuck in my brain. The
new meds painted the world with translucent whitewash, stuffed cotton in my ears
and made my tongue thick. Slowly, my brain absorbed all of this.

"You mean that my Gran can't talk, I can't talk, and all the court hears is the
doctors?"

"Don't be difficult, Art. This is a hearing to determine your competency. A
group of talented mental health professionals have observed you for the past
week and they've come to some conclusions based on those observations. If
everyone who came before the court for a competency hearing brought out a bunch
of irrelevant witnesses and made long speeches, the court calendar would be
backlogged for decades. Then other people who were in for observation wouldn't
be able to get their hearings. It wouldn't work for anyone. You see that,
right?"

"Not really. I really think it would be better if I got to testify on my behalf.
I have that right, don't I?"

He sighed and looked very put-upon. "If you insist, I'll call you to speak. But
as your lawyer, it's my professional opinion that you should *not* do this."

"I really would prefer to."

He snapped his comm shut. "I'll meet you in the courtroom, then. The bailiff
will take you in."

"Can you tell my Gran where I am? She's waiting in the court, I think."

"Sorry. I have other cases to cope with -- I can't really play messenger, I'm
afraid."

When he left the little office, I felt as though I'd been switched off. The
drugs weighted my eyelids and soothed my panic and outrage. Later, I'd be livid,
but right then I could barely keep from folding my arms on the grimy table and
resting my head on them.

The hearing went so fast I barely even noticed it. I sat with my lawyer and the
doctors stood up and entered their reports into evidence -- I don't think they
read them aloud, even, just squirted them at the court reporter. My Gran sat
behind me, on a chair that was separated from the court proper by a banister.
She had her hand on my shoulder the whole time, and it felt like an anvil there
to my dopey muscles.

"All right, Art," my jackass lawyer said, giving me a prod. "Here's your turn.
Stand up and keep it brief."

I struggled to my feet. The judge was an Asian woman about my age, a small round
head set atop a shapeless robe and perched on a high seat behind a high bench.

"Your Honor," I said. I didn't know what to say next. All my wonderful rhetoric
had fled me. The judge looked at me briefly, then went back to tapping her comm.
Maybe she was playing solitaire or looking at porn. "I asked to have a moment to
address the Court. My lawyer suggested that I not do this, but I insisted.

"Here's the thing. There's no way for me to win here. There's a long story about
how I got here. Basically, I had a disagreement with some