The Kaleidoscope (36 page)

Harold described the embedded codes he’d followed. Hidden well, the viral twists and turns had taken him several weeks to follow. Then he’d built the case of how they were skimming portfolios. Dumping small amounts from customer accounts into an anonymous account behind a firewall impenetrable to even the most talented coder. Except Harold.

“Gordon and I,” Harold hadn’t intended to say his name aloud, but no one around them looked familiar. “Supposedly we make the same amount of money, but his lifestyle was more similar to a trust fund kid than a mid-level manager.” Harold sipped. He’d already said more than he was supposed to.

“Why did you really want to meet with me, Harold?” Walter asked. “I sense there’s more on your mind than just talking shop. Father Tucker told me you’d stopped by.”

“Yes, I did, and I guess that’s what I-I wanted to talk to you about.” The wooden stick left a splinter in his lip. “That room you stayed in.” His tongue flicked over the sliver. “He showed me where you lived. All those years.”

Walter watched him over the rim of his cup. “What about it?”

“How did you manage to build the Kaleidoscope, do all your AI research, and work as a janitor? That must have been hard.” He curled his lip, sinking his front teeth, trying to dislodge the splinter.

“I did what I had to do, Harold. When I realized I’d been framed for your mother’s death, I knew I had to do something, and the first thing I thought of was protecting you and finishing the work. They’d done a pretty good job making it appear as if I was to blame, and the longer I hid out, the harder it was to find any way to prove my innocence. When I went underground, I lost touch with some of the people who could protect me. And you.”

“Why didn’t you…I mean, did you ever try to contact me?”

Walter slid the cardboard sleeve up and down his cup. “I always knew where you were. I might have done things differently had I known it would take this long. I wish we hadn’t lost all those years. Maybe I can make them up to you.”

The more answers he got, the more questions Harold had. He ran fingers through his hair, now growing in around his healing wound. “When did you start following me?”

“From the beginning. I assure you what I said was the truth. I was never far away, son. When you went to elementary school, I was close by. When you started taking the bus to your charter school, I relocated. I kept my belongings to what I could fit into a knapsack. Early on, I took a ride on the Silk Road, changed my name, got new IDs and a fake social security card. Those things aren’t hard when you’re on the street. It’s really easier than you’d think to live off the grid, right under everyone’s noses.”

Harold had been traveling the dark paths of the hidden Internet underworld himself recently, following the stinky trail of his suspected internal embezzler. “Why didn’t you ever say anything to me?”

“In case they were still watching you, son. And as it turns out, they were.”

The longer Harold thought about how long Morrie had kept up the fake friendship, the angrier he became. He had wormed his way into Harold’s trust soon after he and Georgia moved to LA from San Francisco. How many others had there been? Was it possible Georgia was one of them? “Dad, is there a way to know for sure who was involved?”

“Like who?”

“Georgia?”

“I don’t think she was, son. I might have found a way to stop you from marrying her if I suspected she was.”

That was either a relief or a problem. He’d have to decide on that one later.

“Why didn’t I ever notice you? If you were always around me, why didn’t I ever recognize you?”

“Were you looking for me? Do we really notice people when they are not something we want to see, Harold? Or do we just wait for them to pass out of our line of vision?”

Again with the questions, and that struck really close to home. The street people encampment had been a bother to him. An inconvenience. And the entire time, his dad had been one of them.

“Why did you give me the Kaleidoscope to keep? With the magnitude of the research behind it and the potential, why didn’t you contact someone who would know what to do with it? Why me?”

Walter tipped his chin at Harold as if he didn’t quite understand the question. “Because, son, I did all the research for you. It was a gift. For you. Whatever you wanted to do with it, I wanted you to have it. There’s no one else I trusted more to handle it with care, to discover and use its abilities.”

Harold thought about that for several long minutes. Then asked, “Why that moment in time? Why not when you’d cleared your name?”

“Because you were ready for it. And it was ready for you. That’s all that mattered. It wasn’t about me any longer.”

“Did you intend the ’scope to teach me something? Is that why you built it?”

“Why? Did it teach you, Harold? Have you changed?”

Mere weeks ago, he didn’t know Pepper, or Keith and Frank, Stan, or even Glenda. And his dad, who now sat in front of him, watching him with the love only a father has for his child, was back. His father who wasn’t the man Harold thought he was. Or even who he imagined a father could be. He was better. So much better.

“Dad.” Here came the biggie. The question he’d wondered all his life. The question that made all questions cower and run. “Grandma Destiny always told me you were…not normal.” He phrased it like that for lack of a better way to say it.
Nutcase.
Fruity. Loony tunes
. He’d heard them tossed about as if they were popcorn seasoning on a movie night snack.

“As many years as I’ve been studying AI, I’ve never heard or arrived on a really suitable definition of what intelligence is, son. And I’ve never really heard a satisfactory definition of normal, either. Have you?” He winked at Harold, who knew immediately that whatever went on inside the man’s head, he needn’t fear being just like him ever again. He wanted to be exactly like him. “But I can say without reservation, that I love you very much. You can decide whether you think that’s normal or not.”

He shook his head, partially to agree, but mainly to clear it of all the poison that had built up inside him against this man sitting in front of him. “Thanks for protecting me, and finding me again.”

“You’re welcome, son.”

Their cups were empty, and they stood up to leave, walking to the door together.

“Keep in touch, Harry.” Walter shook Harold’s hand.

“I will. Dad.”

“What do you say when our lives calm down a bit we take that hiking trip to Yosemite I promised you so many years ago?”

“That sounds great.”

“Your birthday in October should be a nice time to hike the trail for a few miles. Set up camp before the snow flies.”

“I’d like that.”

Walter hadn’t let go of his son’s hand yet, and pulled him in for a long hug and a fair amount of good-natured back slapping.

The embrace wore down his last bit of resistance and resentment, and, in broad daylight in the middle of the busy Los Angeles sidewalk, Harold melted into his father’s arms, and wept like a child.

“And thank you for accepting me back into your life, son.”

“Thank you for loving and protecting me, Dad. You sacrificed your life for me.”

****

Harold floated home, the bulge in his pocket flopping against his leg with every step. Every nerve ending was on alert, every ounce of him buzzed with determined conviction. He was on a mission, and he had one person on his mind.

“Hey, Harry, I was just going to put in a pizza,” Pepper said when he breezed inside. “Hey! What?” She had to stop talking when he spun her, placed his lips over hers, and planted a long one on her. “What’s all this about?”

“Get Glenda’s leash, we have an errand to run, and it won’t keep.”

In a few minutes, but not before she tried to tease it out of him, Harold, Pepper and Glenda were heading for the park. “Where are we going in such a hurry?”

“Be quiet, woman, and follow me.” Harold checked to see how his directive was received.

“Hey, I’m not sure if I like Sergeant Harold.” Her giggle belied her argument as she went along with him.

They waited at the light, Harold punched the crossing button as if it would respond as she had, but they still had to wait. Finally, the traffic stopped and Harold almost pulled them in front of a truck that failed to yield. “Hey, we’re walking here!” He gestured at the driver, but Pepper pulled him along when the truck had cleared the lane.

“What has gotten into you?”

Across the street and up onto the familiar sidewalk, Harold led Pepper by the hand. He paced while Glenda did her business, then Harold bee-lined for the oak tree. “I have something I want to show you,” he said when they got to “the” spot.

“What? I don’t see anything unusual. You didn’t have to bring me here just to kiss me, Harry, we could have done that at ho—”

Before she could finish her protest, what appeared to be the homeless encampment, with its blankets and lumpy forms, began to move in front of her eyes. “What the…?”

Harold turned her so she could see behind him, and knelt onto one knee. “Pepper Suzanne Eugenia Fairbanks, would you do me the honor of marrying me?” He’d forgotten to take out the box, so he had to straighten his leg, pulled out the Kaleidoscope and handed it to her so he could take out the velvet box. Whispering from behind him, and a “sshhh” erupted while he worked open the lid.

Pepper bent over and peered at the delicate ring. Its metal was of the same gold as the Kaleidoscope, it had a small diamond in the center surrounded by cobalt blue, green, and amber gems, the same colors that made up the shades inside the ’scope.

“It’s beautiful!” she squealed, and pulled Harold up to hug him, but at that moment the street people village behind them exploded, all the blankets were thrown off and everyone they knew—Walter, Stan, Keith, Frank, Rhashan, Leesa, Luke, and a few others they didn’t know, burst into an off-pitch version of “Moondance.”

“Yes! Yes, Harold Donaldson, I will marry you!” Pepper swung from the maladroit choir to her man, now beaming in her glow, an expression of impish expectancy behind his grin.

“I still owe you a shooting star, but I hope this is enough for the moment.” Harold pulled out a sparkler, lit it, and kissed her underneath its spitting, sparkling brilliance. Right there, in front of God and everybody.

A word about the author…

Bev’s a graduate of Texas A&M University and is multi-published in both fiction and nonfiction. She’s the co-author of the best-selling and award-winning
Lessons from the Mountain, What I Learned from Erin Walton
with the actress Mary McDonough.

A former business writer, she’s dabbled in many things from working as a theatre set dresser and props mistress to riding horses at pre-Olympic levels, judging for the Miss America/California pageants, and escorting her kids to work in Hollywood as professional extras.

Married to her high school sweetheart, they’ve lived in two countries and six states, but promise they’re not running from the law. A member of the RWA and ACFW, she also blogs, tweets, and Pinterests when she’s not dreaming up new stories or planning a round-the-continent RV trip when said husband retires.

http://www.beverlynault.com

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this publication of The Wild Rose Press, Inc.