Little Brother

it.

Chapter
16

    This chapter is dedicated to San Francisco's Booksmith, ensconced in the storied Haight-Ashbury neighborhood, just a few doors down from the Ben and Jerry's at the exact corner of Haight and Ashbury. The Booksmith folks really know how to run an author event — when I lived in San Francisco, I used to go down all the time to hear incredible writers speak (William Gibson was unforgettable). They also produce little baseball-card-style trading cards for each author — I have two from my own appearances there.
    Booksmith: 1644 Haight St. San Francisco CA 94117 USA +1 415 863 8688
    At first Mom looked shocked, then outraged, and finally she gave up altogether and just let her jaw hang open as I took her through the interrogation, pissing myself, the bag over my head, Darryl. I showed her the note.
    "Why —?"
    In that single syllable, every recrimination I'd dealt myself in the night, every moment that I'd lacked the bravery to tell the world what it was really about, why I was really fighting, what had really inspired the Xnet.
    I sucked in a breath.
    "They told me I'd go to jail if I talked about it. Not just for a few days. Forever. I was — I was scared."
    Mom sat with me for a long time, not saying anything. Then, "What about Darryl's father?"
    She might as well have stuck a knitting needle in my chest. Darryl's father. He must have assumed that Darryl was dead, long dead.
    And wasn't he? After the DHS has held you illegally for three months, would they ever let you go?
    But Zeb got out. Maybe Darryl would get out. Maybe me and the Xnet could help get Darryl out.
    "I haven't told him," I said.
    Now Mom was crying. She didn't cry easily. It was a British thing. It made her little hiccoughing sobs much worse to hear.
    "You will tell him," she managed. "You will."
    "I will."
    "But first we have to tell your father."

    Dad no longer had any regular time when he came home. Between his consulting clients — who had lots of work now that the DHS was shopping for data-mining startups on the peninsula — and the long commute to Berkeley, he might get home any time between 6PM and midnight.
    Tonight Mom called him and told him he was coming home right now . He said something and she just repeated it: right now .
    When he got there, we had arranged ourselves in the living room with the note between us on the coffee table.
    It was easier to tell, the second time. The secret was getting lighter. I didn't embellish, I didn't hide anything. I came clean.
    I'd heard of coming clean before but I'd never understood what it meant until I did it. Holding in the secret had dirtied me, soiled my spirit. It had made me afraid and ashamed. It had made me into all the things that Ange said I was.
    Dad sat stiff as a ramrod the whole time, his face carved of stone. When I handed him the note, he read it twice and then set it down carefully.
    He shook his head and stood up and headed for the front door.
    "Where are you going?" Mom asked, alarmed.
    "I need a walk," was all he managed to gasp, his voice breaking.
    We stared awkwardly at each other, Mom and me, and waited for him to come home. I tried to imagine what was going on in his head. He'd been such a different man after the bombings and I knew from Mom that what had changed him were the days of thinking I was dead. He'd come to believe that the terrorists had nearly killed his son and it had made him crazy.
    Crazy enough to do whatever the DHS asked, to line up like a good little sheep and let them control him, drive him.
    Now he knew that it was the DHS that had imprisoned me, the DHS that had taken San Francisco's children hostage in Gitmo-by-the-Bay. It made perfect sense, now that I thought of it. Of course it had been Treasure Island where I'd been kept. Where else was a ten-minute boat-ride from San Francisco?
    When Dad came back, he looked angrier than he ever had in his life.
    "You should have told me!" he roared.
    Mom interposed herself between him and me. "You're blaming the wrong person," she said. "It wasn't Marcus who did the kidnapping and the intimidation."
    He shook his head and stamped. "I'm not blaming Marcus. I know exactly who's to blame. Me. Me and the stupid DHS. Get your shoes on, grab your coats."
    "Where are we going?"
    "To see Darryl's father. Then we're going to Barbara Stratford's place."

    I knew the name Barbara Stratford from somewhere, but I couldn't remember where. I thought that maybe she was an old friend of my parents, but I