What Happened in Strasbourg

Chapter nineteen: What will happen in Houston?

It felt like there was a bubble around my head. Everything around me was clear to see -- too clear even -- but I was detached from it completely. My dad spent every evening on the phone chatting with his friends about how he'd make it big in Houston, while my mom sat in front of her computer, chewing her lip and on the verge of tears. If I ever met up with Imogen on the river bank or outside one of Acheron's high tech, "employee-free convenience stores" we barely spoke at all. She had a way of disappearing like an outside cat, only to come back a couple days later with no explanation, looking more beat up than before. I didn't know exactly what she was up to when she didn't respond to my worried strings of texts, but I knew it probably wasn't anything good, or new.

One evening my dad sat me down in front of our TV and made me watch a playlist of videos about my soon-to-be-home.

"Houston is the best city in America," Paul Landry said in a large, dark auditorium. "He clicked a remote in his hand that changed the digital background screen behind him to an uncanny CGI model of his new headquarters. "Houston is becoming the new Silicon Valley! If you want to make it big, move here! Acheron's got you covered." The crowded auditorium erupted into cheering and clapping and Paul Landry stood there with a big grin on his face. He still didn't look like a murderer. He couldn't be one. Even if he was, I had no choice but to try and forget.

At the end of the day we had chosen Acheron, above everything else, whether it was shady or not. Giant corporations didn't just grow up out of nowhere like mushrooms in the night. We used to have a choice, a say in the world, -- but somewhere, we had made the choice to throw it away.

I knew that soon I would have to live in close proximity to Landry and his inner circle. In order to not lose my sanity, I'd have to stop spending every second of every day thinking about what his corporation had done.

Don't think about what happened in Strasbourg, Gracie, I said to myself over and over again. Think about what will happen in Houston.

. . .

Summer was already running out, and I knew my time in Grays was too. Every day piles of moving boxes inched out of corners of the house and into my path so I constantly had to dodge them. My mom paced the house making lists and sorting piles of clothes. Once she'd gone through her wardrobe she dug deeper into her closet, bringing out an old box of stuff from her teenage years. I sat on her bed and watched her unpack it all -- blue LED strips, a folded bi pride flag, a soprano ukulele she'd somehow forgotten how to play, and a plush seal -- hyper realistic except for the seams running down its back. She held it up, like I imagined Hamlet holding a skull.

"What's wrong?" I asked, as she sniffed and blinked her watery eye.

"Dust allergies," she said, putting the plushie back. "I've always had them."

I knew it wasn't that. She was crying because soon, our whole lives would be packed into shipping boxes and sent away. And because that seal plushie and her other old belongings had managed to bring her back to another time — a time she'd hated while it was happening, but would probably do anything to go back to now.

Later that day, my mom, still under the influence of nostalgia, wandered into my room and talked to me through my headphones. "Is there anything you want to do here before we have to leave?"
"I don't know."
I thought about the restaurants and toy stores I used to like when I was little. They'd been torn down and replaced with new apartments for Acheron employees. The corporation had severed almost every tie I had to my town, from the stores I used to like, to the friends I used to have. Acheron was like glitter that spilled during a craft project -- fun for the longest time, but if you got it everywhere, you weren't able to get it cleaned up again.

I felt too numb to cry about it now, too tired to even care. "I'll think about something to do," I replied. "Have you heard the date we leave?"

"No, not yet. Sometime in mid September, I think. One thing I know is we won't have a hard time selling the house. Properties around here sell like hotcakes. And not only to Americans -- our realtor told us that most of the buyers are actually Londoners who are scared of staying in their city -- or can't afford it now that it's being overrun by the Russians... Some people, Scott included, think Grays is going to get Russified too if we aren't careful."

"Mom, are you scared of the Russians? And Mir-Tek?"

She smiled and looked into my eyes. "No. No, I'm not. And I'm scared of a lot of things." She brushed out my short, tangled hair with her fingers. "Something most people around here don't seem to understand is that Mir-Tek is just as scared of Acheron, as Acheron is scared of Mir-Tek."

"Why's that?"

"Acheron isn't... all puppies and rainbows and cupcakes like their commercials want to make you think." She tried to laugh. "Maybe they don't have executives murdering each other with poisoned tea in London but... you know... there are always some things we will never know they're up to. Unless we happen to be really unlucky."

She glanced at my computer, lying on my desk, and then back at me. "I'm very proud of you," she whispered. And then she was gone, closing the door behind her.

She left me completely confused. Did she know something I didn't? Or something I did? Had she just condoned me using Trench again? I'd spent my whole life being cautioned by her not to do anything risky, and I never had to ask for a reason. The eyepatch she wore was a clear reminder of what trying to speak up had cost her. Whatever "anti-Acheron activity," my mom wanted me to do was probably reduced to her own mind. Hating Acheron and continuing to rely on it changed almost nothing. But at least, I knew one "insider" who was actually concerned about the company they worked for.