“How did you figure it out?” I asked him.
“I think I knew all along. Ever since the story appeared. I just didn’t want to know it.” I looked up at him because that wasn’t an answer. “We thought it was an analyst inside Tara. We were monitoring all of them for months. Finally, the cybersecurity guys got a hold of the actual leaked document. They all have e-signatures, Jack. It was the one I sent you.”
“Should I ask how the cyber guys got a hold of that document?”
Fred hesitated. “No. And that’s why this all has to go away.”
Even though he’d made this tacit admission that he had one foot in the shadows, I still found myself apologizing. “I’m sorry, Fred.”
“Are you?” His tone was genuinely curious. He palmed his beard, rubbing it furiously like it was stage makeup he was trying to tear off. “When you started going down to those silly little spirit rallies at the gas station, I didn’t say anything. When you quit the fund, I didn’t say anything. When you went to work for Morris, a woman we used to mock—”
“You used to mock.”
“I didn’t say anything. I never discouraged you or said a nasty word about any of it because I’ve always trusted you. We have investment strategies in place for a reason. We are a forward-looking fund built on socially responsible models that—”
“Socially responsible,” I said plainly. “Fred, you were long on a company that’s institutionalized human trafficking as its core business model. That moves dispossessed people into slavery.”
He shook his head. “That’s bullshit, Jackie. You’ve been reading all the propaganda, so now you have that stupid, ignorant frame on it.”
“Then what do you call it?”
“Nosiki helps people find work and a home! If you didn’t notice the world is swarming with people who don’t have either.”
“And prison companies to house the ones who either won’t or can’t indenture themselves. And security companies to guard them. And walls to keep them out—yeah, in the future, they’ll really be singing songs around the campfire about Tara Fund’s noble work, I’m sure.”
“Jesus Christ, you’ve really drank the Kool-Aid and joined the cult, huh? We work with incredibly complex algorithms that are managing this. That’s how this works. They decide where the investments go to keep energy cheap, markets functioning, and the economy flowing, but instead of dealing with that reality, it’s like our whole society wants to stop vaccinating its children all at once.”
“You wanted to know why I did it, so I told you, Fred. Because I’m ashamed. I’m ashamed of the way we got what we have.”
He laughed. “That’s rich. This is a conversation with the woman who ran up a bill of $167,000 at Brunello Cucinelli last year.”
“Yeah, but you have to admit that Balmain coat really did look good on me.”
This joke did not land and got carried off into the sound of East Side traffic and one particularly noisy truck coughing diesel fumes. Dusk was settling over the city, a crimson flame cutting through the towers, reflecting off the mountains of steel and glass encasing southern Manhattan. The world’s tallest Ferris wheel loomed over the water, its lights popping on. Now I could hear the chants drifting down from the Financial District, and when we passed Old Slip, I could see a middling crowd pumping its fists in the air, surrounded by NYPD. “No Justice, No Peace! No Vengeance, No Sleep!”
Fred did not even appear to notice. We walked in silence for a while as the chant faded and the Brooklyn Bridge came into view, all that cable webbing so spider-perfect it almost looked a part of nature. Like the earth had grown this dark and lovely arch over its own water.
“Jackie, we did nothing illegal. And I wouldn’t have gone along with anything if I thought for a second it was. We had a team of lawyers looking at every move we ever made. The general counsel and head of compliance aren’t just for show.”
“Legal doesn’t mean it’s right, Fred. I thought that would be obvious.”
“You think I don’t wonder if I’m an awful person?” He said it so suddenly, a defiant admission. “Of course I do. Everyone should wonder. How could I not, when I have a son who…” He exhaled slowly. “Who did what he did to that kid.” He was quiet. The bridge glowed with the gold of the disappearing sun while the skyscrapers glittered to life. A kebab scent wafted off a halal cart. The big-eared vendor could see we were in an argument, but his expression remained vacant as we passed. When we were a safe distance away, we stopped. I slipped my hands into the pockets of Fred’s coat. Felt his cold, soft palms. Then I put my cheek in his beard.
“I don’t expect you to forgive me,” I whispered.
“I’m not worried about forgiving you.” He drew one hot breath right by my ear. “If you would do something this cruel to me, you clearly think I’m someone else. Someone different from the person you’ve been with all these years. I’m more worried about you forgiving me. I love our life together so much. When I met you, Jackie, I was miserable; I had nothing but a failed marriage.” He choked a bit on what he said next. “And a son who did something I could never bring myself to forgive him for.”
I put my forehead against his. He put his palms on my cheeks. “Fred.”
“You put me back together. You made me glad to be alive again. And if you’d just said something. If you had told me what you were thinking, I swear to God, Jack, I would’ve burned Tara to the ground for you.”
I pulled his body against mine then, as sirens started up from the north, as a black NYPD helicopter thundered overhead. Falling sunlight poured through the canyons of Manhattan, absolutely blinding, lighting the streets on fire, and casting the city as a bold and haunting ruin.
We got back to our place as the last light fled the Midtown sky. The stout cleaning robot was zooming around, mopping and dusting and vacuuming and straightening in whatever algorithm dream it inhabited. Fred withdrew his phone from his breast pocket, and I could see there was something on it worth knowing.
“What?”
“Turn on the TV.”
“What happened?”
“Turn on the TV. They voted on a new president.”
The next day, like any other, I took the ferry across the harbor. I drank my coffee and watched the TV playing the news. But there was hardly anyone inside because most of the passengers had gone to the starboard side of the ship. They were all, very sincerely, very cornily, gazing at the Statue of Liberty as we passed. Nearly every passenger. People had genuine tears in their eyes. A man held his glasses out from his face to get a better angle with the camera as the morning sun lit up the statue. A girl, a true Staten Island beauty with crimson nails, white platform shoes, and a squall of an accent, told her boyfriend how they displayed just the statue’s head elsewhere until they built the whole thing. A small boy rested on his father’s shoulder, tuckered out, while a little girl asked irreverent questions, wondering if the lady could walk off her pedestal or perhaps even fly. It wasn’t my imagination. I could feel us all catching each other’s glances, because for some reason, watching this icon bathed by the winter sun, we were no longer afraid. And looking at each other, we could see that we were not afraid.
Kate had texted the organizing committee and said we were going to have an emergency meeting: Time to figure out what to do about this monkey-fucked pony-show situation. The offices were frenzied that morning. Everyone had an opinion, an argument, an idea. Jenice and Tavia brought doughnuts, and the heat wasn’t working, so Carmen was on the phone trying to get a repairman to come take a look. Liza was swamped by Seventh Day hubs asking what this meant for the looming February actions, while Garrett kept screaming that we had media outlets from New York City to Tokyo who wanted Kate’s take on this development. Where would the Seventh Day protests go from here? Facing the headwinds of an impossibly chaotic news cycle, we were still growing. What she said next would matter.