“I liked the photo. I recognized the steps of Building Thirteen.” Carl loaded his plate with lox and whitefish, eggs and sausages.
Orion watched Molly’s mother pause wistfully at the waffle station, and then settle on yogurt, fruit salad, and a bowl of Irish oatmeal. The resemblance between Deborah and Molly was striking: dark eyes, a heart-shaped face, lovely from the front, less so in profile. Molly had her mother’s slight bump in the nose and tiny chin. They were both petite, but Deborah was also zaftig, a short, wide gerontologist who wore tunic-length sweaters and long necklaces—silk cords hung with unusual pendants, a tiny woven bag or a many-hinged locket, a miniature kaleidoscope bouncing like a buoy on her vast bosom.
“Well, this is nice,” said Deborah when they reconvened at the table.
“Tell us about the IPO,” said Carl.
How different Molly’s father seemed from the man Orion had first met, almost eight years before. The Eisenstats had driven up to see their daughter, and she’d brought her new boyfriend to breakfast. On that occasion, he and Molly had shared one side of a booth like brother and sister facing their parents. Orion’s wet blond hair had fallen in his eyes, and Molly’s short curls had been damp. They’d looked a little too clean to be entirely innocent, having just come from Mather House, where they’d shared a shower, but they sat straight with the seam of the upholstered booth running up between them. Molly’s mother had tried to make conversation, but Professor Eisenstat kept his eyes on Orion, who had tried not to bolt his food or gulp his juice, or think about the night before, lest some memory of warmth and nakedness flash across his face.
Still, Carl had gazed at him with a grim, penetrating look. “I have a question for you.” Carl’s voice had been taut and slightly amused, as though he were sharpening cruel ironic skewers and looking forward to running Orion through. “How is it majoring in an auxiliary field?”
“Auxiliary? You mean computer science?” Orion had been so busy guarding against attacks on his character that at first he didn’t recognize Carl’s scientific gambit as such.
“Right. Auxiliary in that computer science is not a true science in itself, but a handmaid to math, physics, chemistry….”
“I like CS,” Orion said stoutly.
“But that’s my question,” Carl pressed. “What exactly do you like about it?”
Orion paused. “Programming.”
“Hmm.” Carl sipped his coffee.
Twenty years old, Orion had gazed across the table at Molly’s father with a mixture of resentment and misery. He was good at math, of course, but he excelled at building little computer systems piece by piece. Orion had always loved to tinker. He was a puzzle solver, no deep-thinking puzzle maker. He had done well in his CS courses: programming, distributed systems, hardware, algorithms, and graphics, for which he’d rendered a faceted crystal vase filled with water and a single red rose so that it cast an accurate shadow on a wood-grain tabletop. Were these exercises at all important? In Carl’s presence he’d felt acutely that computer science lacked a certain—he would never say the word aloud—but, yes, the field lacked a certain majesty.
Now, in the glass and farmhouse restaurant with its baskets and bouquets of chili peppers, Carl seemed thrilled with Orion’s programming habit. He actually whipped out that morning’s Boston Globe and read aloud. “Asked about his heroes, company cofounder Orion Steiner cites computer pioneer Donald Knuth, and maverick free-software activist Richard Stallman.”
What a strange effect money, or even the idea of money, had on people. Orion could not avoid wealth, or Carl either. How could he put off shopping for a ring? In six months, he could afford any ring or bracelet or necklace; he could afford anything. Orion looked at Carl’s smooth, close-shaven cheeks and his hawkish gray eyes and he saw what wealth would mean: not just traveling the world and buying toys, but paying huge complicated taxes and living in a house with Molly forever—not forever in the romantic sense—forever like her parents, with a loud dog and yellowing houseplants. Molly would gain a hundred pounds, and Orion would have to start collecting ugly paintings. They’d have a three-car garage and seven bathrooms, and they would sit around at night and debate whether it was better to time-share or buy planes.
“How many employees are you up to now?” Carl asked.
“I think we’re at …,” Orion hesitated, distracted by the cell phone in his pocket, buzzing against his leg. “Eighty-three?” he ventured, checking the caller ID. “Ninety-three?” It was Jonathan, but Orion ignored the call.
Deborah focused on Orion with a look of quiet pride. Carl leaned forward, keen and curious. Only their daughter paid no attention. Molly had closed her eyes and left him to entertain her parents’ expectations on his own. Exhausted, she was still sitting upright in her chair, but she had fallen fast asleep.
Carl and Deborah were driving home immediately to beat the traffic, and they dropped off Molly and Orion on the way. He helped her up the stairs, and she leaned against the wall as he unlocked the apartment. Then dropping her bag just inside the door, she bolted for the bedroom.
“Wait,” Orion said. “Molly?”
Fully clothed, she lunged for the bed and seized her pillow. Gone again.
“Aren’t you going to take off your shoes?” Orion tugged at one shoe and then the other. Her legs were dead weights in his hands. He reached around her waist, unbuckled her belt, and unzipped her pants. “Ouch,” he murmured. Her belt had cut into her soft stomach and left red marks. He tried to unbutton her blouse, but she clung to the pillow, and he couldn’t get it off. “I give up,” he said.
The dressertop was strewn with bills and mail, bank statements from Fleet. Orion didn’t bother opening them. Despite his huge equity in ISIS, he had, of course, no money to speak of in his account. Molly’s damp towel lay in a heap on the floor. She had good reason to avoid inviting her parents up to the apartment.
Orion scanned his e-mail. Seventy new messages, two from Jonathan. Subject: URGENT. Message: Get your butt over here now. His cell phone rang again. He didn’t have to look. His bike had a flat, and he knew he should get moving if he was walking to Kendall Square. He stuffed his computer into his backpack.
“Okay, Molly, I’m going.” He bent down over her curly head. “Bye.”
She turned, her face tender with sleep. When she reached out and wrapped her arms around him, she was warm, her skin smoother than the silky blouse that she was wrinkling. Her eyes opened. Her lips parted, and he was about to kiss her, when suddenly she spoke. “Get milk,” she said.
“Where the hell have you been?” It was uncanny, as if Jonathan had been standing in front of the elevator the whole time. He played laser tag like that, appearing suddenly, bearing down on you.
“I was having brunch,” Orion said.
“Brunch?” Jonathan echoed, as if he’d never heard the word before. Lou was right, Orion thought. Brunch when you’re old.
They were walking through what had recently been the second-floor wilderness of the company. At one time, Jonathan and Orion had played a form of indoor badminton here, but new cubicles had been installed to pack more programmers together. There were private offices here as well, for Aldwin the CFO, and Jonathan the CTO. Jake was the chief programmer. Only Orion wasn’t chief of anything. That had been his choice. They’d offered him some sort of vice presidency, but at the time, the whole thing had sounded too ridiculous, like aspiring to Communications Minister of the Duchy of Grand Fenwick. Of course, Orion had been wrong about this. ISIS was a cash-rich powerhouse, no fictional Grand Duchy. The CFO and CTO were, in fact, piloting the company, along with Dave, who was much given to navigational language, along with Mission Statements, foam-core credos posted throughout the building like slogans from Orwell’s Ministry of Love. We are a community. We value excellence. We believe in the capacity of each individual to make a difference….