Forget to Remember

carbon output will be. The man who had been doing these calculations just left us for a better job.”
    Carol was intrigued. “Show me what kind of calculations you’re talking about.” She knew the odds at backgammon. She knew how to convert from decimal to binary. Maybe her understanding of math went deeper than that. She suspected it did. She had a warm feeling about numbers.
    Ernie took a pad and wrote equations on it that involved both math and chemistry. Carol had no trouble following him. When he set up a problem, she was able to solve it, using a calculator and knowledge that came from somewhere deep within her brain.
    Ernie and Tina were impressed. It gave Carol an idea. “Why don’t I work for you? I could do the calculations and help you prepare proposals. Hopefully, it would save you some time.”
    Ernie was enthusiastic. “It would be a godsend.”
    Tina took care of the financial end of the business. “We can’t pay you. You don’t have a Social Security number.”
    “You’ve already paid me.” Carol made a sweeping gesture with her arm, indicating the surroundings. “You’ve given me a place to stay. You’ve fed me. You’ve bought me clothes. You’ve given me friendship. Without you, I would be naked, starving, friendless, and on the streets. Please let me help you.”
    Ernie laughed. “Well, when you put it that way. Would you like to come to work with us tomorrow? We’re putting together a big proposal now. It’s worth a lot of money if we can land the business.”
    ***
    Carol was gushing to a sleepy Rigo who was drinking coffee and eating breakfast while trying to wake up. “You and I have a great opportunity to help your parents. I worked on a proposal yesterday that involved a lot of calculations. I did them by hand, but there’s a better way. You can write a program to do the calculations. It would make good use of your computer skills, and it would save them a tremendous amount of time. I can show you exactly what the program has to do.”
    She had labored all day and felt good about the results. She knew she had done this sort of thing before. All the time she was working, however, she had the feeling it could be done easier, faster, more efficiently. When she thought about Rigo and the classes on computer science and programming he’d taken at the University of Southern California, she was sure it was a match made in heaven. All she had to do now was convince him.
    Carol had finished the calculations for the big proposal. Ernie told her she had earned her keep. That’s when she decided to stay home on Friday and try to motivate Rigo. Maybe she should have waited until he had a couple of cups of coffee in him. Her enthusiasm hadn’t allowed her to wait, however.
    Rigo was either thinking or falling back to sleep; she wasn’t sure which. Then his face grew more animated. “It sounds like fun.”

“It’s right up your alley. I think you should forget about jumping through all the hoops the state makes you go through to be a counselor, or—heaven forbid—a therapist, and concentrate on computers. You’re good with computers and you enjoy working with them. Plus, you’ll get a much faster financial return than you will by taking years to get some kind of certificate to hang on your wall.”
    Rigo was laughing by this time. “We need someone with your enthusiasm to promote world peace. When do we start?”
    “As soon as you finish breakfast.”

    CHAPTER 20
    Rigo felt he’d earned the right to go to the Friday afternoon football game at the high school. He and Carol had worked for several hours on the computer program and had actually been able to get a prototype running. It needed more work, of course, but at least they knew it could be done.
    His parents would be pleased with him—and Carol. She’d convinced him this program would save them a lot of time and money. If he joined the company as a computer expert rather than some sort of flunky, it would be good for his ego, and—the thought he usually suppressed occurred to him, unbidden—his father would be proud of him.
    He and Carol met Adam at the game. Adam insisted on sitting beside Carol. Rigo insisted on sitting beside Carol, too, which meant she had to sit in the middle. They were crowded together, their legs touching. He hoped she didn’t feel uncomfortable with this arrangement.
    Adam was Rigo’s best friend. He was also a married man with two children and another on the way. He wouldn’t try