Hidden Empire (Empire 2)

"All these years I've known you," said Cecily, "and I had no idea you were suffering from chronic clinical depression."

"Mom, I'm happy being who and what I am. I imagine all kinds of lives I might lead, and the only ones that look good to me are the quiet, safe, boring ones. Finding a wife and never looking at another woman. Raising my kids and being happy as long as they don't actually become drug addicts or criminals. Going to a job every workday and taking two weeks of vacation every year. All the things that everybody says are boring, that's what would make me happy. I never ever wanted to be like Dad. I never wanted to do his job."

"He certainly never knew that."

"Why would I tell him?" asked Mark. "Besides, I couldn't have put it into words then. When he was still alive. I just knew."

A thought occurred to Cecily. "Are you trying to tell me something?"

Mark thought for a moment, then laughed. "I'm trying to tell you what I told you," he said. "And no, I'm not gay. It's girls I have disturbing dreams about."

"Disturbing?"

"Wow, you're in a creepy mood," said Mark. "I'm not doing anything weird in my dreams. It's just disturbing to be committing the sin of fornication every night. Father Thaddeus tries to convince me that it's perfectly normal and he won't even assign me penance for it beyond the prayers I already say, but I can't help but think that I'm awfully eager to commit mortal sins with any bimbo who happens to show up in a dream."

Cecily couldn't help laughing. "You say you're not brave, but do you know how many boys would die of embarrassment before saying anything like this to their mother?"

"Yes, but they don't have you as a mom, so it would take courage to say it to them. Give it up, Mom, this is the kind of argument I can't lose."

"I didn't know it was an argument."

"Oh, come on," said Mark. "You try to convince me I'm a perfect son, and that gets me to tell you all the bad things about myself, and then you reassure me I'm not bad, so I tell you worse things. I swear, you ought to be training priests how to take confessions. Or interrogating captured terrorists. You're like a waterboard without all the gasping and gagging and crying."

Cecily hugged him and laughed so hard she cried. "I'll tell you something, Mark. God does have a mission for you, and that's to make me happy while you're growing up in my home."

"Well, then, things are working out nicely for both of us," he said. "But then I think of Chinma and I remember that it can all be taken away. Men show up with guns, or a disease strikes and kills half the family, and … " Then he shrugged.

"And that wouldn't take away anything from the happiness we already had," said Cecily. "When your father died, it hurt me worse than childbirth, worse than a broken bone. But a broken bone doesn't erase all the running you did before, and Reuben dying didn't take away a single happy moment of our lives, and childbirth—wow, that left me with prizes."

Chinma was standing in the doorway to the back yard. "There are many, many cars," he said.

"Cars?" asked Cecily.

"On all the roads. Going every way. How do they know where to go?"

Cecily was confused by the question. Chinma had ridden in cars and trucks—he knew that they didn't steer themselves. So the question wasn't about cars, it was about people. "They're all busy, doing their jobs, taking care of their lives. So one car is headed to the store to buy food, another one is taking someone to his job, and all those people get up in the morning and decide what they need to do and then they do it."

"In cars," said Chinma.

"Not if our president can help it," said Cecily. "Cars are burning up all the oil in the world. We need to get rid of as many cars as we can, and change the rest to electricity."

Chinma nodded wisely. "Then you can walk and be strong," he said.

"Yes," said Cecily, laughing. "That would be good."

"Are you afraid?" asked Chinma.

"Of what? I'm afraid of a lot of things."

Chinma nodded wisely. "Your boy Mark, he's afraid."

Mark's jaw dropped. Cecily certainly understood why. It was such a rude thing to say right in front of him. But then, wasn't that better than saying it behind his back?

Before Mark could recover himself enough to reply as angrily as he would obviously want to, Cecily chuckled and spoke. "Afraid to climb trees? I would hope so! What you do is very dangerous," she said.

Chinma flashed a brief smile. "Trees never hurt me."

"Well of course not," said Cecily. "It's the ground that hurts you, when you fall out of the tree."