As Blake began to segue into a commercial break, a screen featuring the scowling face of Bloomberg’s Britt Herndon started its slow descent from the top of the set between Prescott’s seat and Blake’s. Prescott’s smooth smile belied his irritation at the site of the unexpected guest, who happened to be one of his most outspoken critics. The questions were about to get significantly more pointed.
Sara Ewing couldn’t contain her smile as she fought the urge to stare. This was the first time she’d seen him. His frazzled dark wet hair fell boyishly down almost into his fawn-like brown eyes. A few faint freckles dotted his nose, and ran down his cheeks toward a hesitant smile that was conspicuously missing two teeth, one on top and one on the bottom. (Sara briefly wondered if the tooth fairy visited places like this.) His faded blue T-shirt was a couple sizes too large, which accentuated his childish appearance and almost fully concealed his shorts. On the surface he was everyboy, but Sara knew the extraordinary potential that lay behind those bright eyes.
She was a bona fide child-whisperer by profession, but all of her training was currently locked far away in her superego; in this moment she simply couldn’t contain her joy. She finally had a child.
Despite every means known to 21st century medicine she would never be able to experience the magic of being handed a newborn baby in the delivery room, but it couldn’t have exceeded what she was currently feeling.
Her husband Thomas, less expressive, couldn’t quite hold back a single tear which he hastily erased with his knuckle. Then he firmed up his expression and gave Ryan a confident man-to-man nod, which Ryan seemed to appreciate.
“I’m Ryan,” he said, feeling the need to say something to break the silence, yet knowing full well that they already knew his name.
Giggling and sniffling and smiling, Sara attempted to compose herself. “How would you like to get out of here?” she said, stooping to his height, taking no shame in the joyful tears that remained on her cheeks.
“Where?” Ryan asked guardedly, not sharing her enthusiasm.
“C’mon. We’ll show you,” she said, offering him her hand.
Ryan looked up at the headmistress, on her way back from the lobby, who smiled and nodded as if to tell him it was okay. Then he looked down at his bed and his trunk before taking a long last look around the barracks.
Hesitantly, he extended his hand to hers and followed the two complete strangers out of the orphanage, unsure if he’d ever return.
He didn’t know what to feel at the sight of his departing bus, as he continued to follow his new caretakers through the pick-up area and on toward their shiny silver Lexus SUV, with the entirety of his former life packed neatly into his backpack. This was really happening.
Ryan leaned his forehead against the rear passenger-side window and stared out at the houses going by, which seemed to grow progressively larger as they traveled. After about twenty minutes, the car came to a stop on a short stretch of red brick road.
Thomas and Sara gave a familiar wave to a uniformed guard, who nodded respectfully and triggered the slow opening of a heavy wrought iron gate. Ryan lifted his head off the window for the first time, craning his neck toward the middle of the car to get a better view as they passed through. He didn’t know places like this existed. And he couldn’t help but be impressed.
A spotless white bike path snaked through the lush emerald-green grass, so perfect he had to squint as they drove by to convince himself it was real. Islands of deep black mulch, outlined by brilliant red, white and purple pansies surrounded Bradford pear, Japanese maple, and flowering weeping cherry trees in each yard. Even the sky seemed bluer inside these gates. And set in the back of each lot at the end of a long driveway was a colossal custom house, each more impressive than the next.
But halfway down the second cul de sac, Ryan was rocked by another unsettling wave of déjà vus as he caught sight of the brick house he’d seen on TV. He wasn’t actually surprised this time, but he wasn’t prepared for it either. He leaned back with a pit in his stomach, slumping into his top-of-the-line booster seat. One of the four garage doors opened as they pulled into the drive.
Sara and Thomas led Ryan on an abbreviated tour of the 8000 square-foot mansion, focusing on the playroom, basement and office, which featured a miniaturized mahogany replica of Thomas’s desk for Ryan. They finished the tour on the second floor.
“And this is your room,” Sara said, nudging the door open with the back of her forearm.
Ryan’s eyes widened, and his expression brightened as he scanned the room. But he quickly checked himself, hit with a twinge of guilt for allowing himself a moment of happiness in his parents’ absence. He owed it to them not be content with this house; this room; these people.
“Go ahead,” Sara said, sensing his hesitation. “It’s yours.”
He loosened his grip on his backpack, allowing it to fall gently to the ground beside him, as he walked timidly toward a bed in the shape of a pirate ship in the corner. He stopped at the bow to peek up a ladder that led up to a crow’s nest which featured a round table in the middle with miniature built-in seating all around. At the stern was a knotty treasure chest loaded with unopened toys. In the opposite corner stood an L-shaped desk with a computer, a tablet and a smartphone.
A large closet stocked with more clothes and shoes than he’d ever seen in one place abutted an adjoining bathroom — his own private bathroom. No more fighting for space or hot water in the shower.
“Sorry about all the clothes,” Thomas said, slipping his arm around Sara’s waist. “Our families got a little excited when they heard you were coming.”
“There’s one other thing I want to show you,” Sara said, walking over to the ship and pressing a button at the base of a digital frame next to his bed. “I’m hoping we can add a lot more memories to these in the years to come.”
Ryan ambled over, keeping his gaze fixed on the frame, as a slideshow of pictures of him with his birth parents began to play. He stood there entranced as each new picture appeared. When the fiftieth and final picture faded back into the first and the cycle started over, Ryan climbed into the ship and lay quietly on his side facing the frame, continuing to watch as his new parents slipped inconspicuously out the door.
Prescott discreetly glanced down at the phone peeking out of his right pants pocket to check a text he’d gotten from his VP Aaron Bradford before the cameras went back live:just landed in newark — researching JQJ issue. Perfect.
“And we’re back,” Blake beamed, oblivious to the tension in the air. “Joining us now is Britt Herndon, chief financial correspondent for Bloomberg News. Always great to see you Britt.”
Herndon nodded sternly.
Prescott’s smile grew noticeably brighter as he nodded back, knowing that the cheerier he appeared, the more exasperated Herndon would become. Public opinion often had less to do with one’s position on an issue than with the appeal of the person espousing it. If he could paint Herndon as an angry old man bent on stonewalling progress, this could be a good thing.
Blake got things rolling. “Mr. Prescott, some of your critics would say that you are planning on hand-picking only the most talented and most intelligent children for your market. How do you respond?” he asked, tilting his head slightly, cradling his coffee mug in both palms.
“Well, we do preferentially choose children who are most likely to provide return for our investors, Blake. Look, I wish that we could help every child who needed it. I sincerely do. But at the same time, even if we were able to help, let’s say, even one out of every thousand orphans in this country, wouldn’t that be better than not helping any at all, which is what we as a society have been doing — until yesterday?”