Now Sophia and Tony were alone in the coffee shop with Jimbo and Leo.
Jimbo had moved away to give them privacy and was listening to music through a set of headphones. Leo was in his usual place by the wall with his bicycle. Almost on cue, Leo got up and walked out with his bike.
This time, he looked at them and waved but did not speak.
“Strange man,” said Tony. “I’ve only heard him speak once, and that was in public at a Town Hall. Not long before the transition to the sharing system he came into the bookstore and left with a Spanish edition of Siddhartha. I assume he’d be able to read it, or otherwise he wouldn’t have picked the Spanish edition.”
“I find that quite interesting,” said Sophia. “When I sat with him at the park, he didn’t tell me anything, even though he’s my father.”
“What? Your father?”
“Well, my biological father. I didn’t even know he existed until my mother was dying a few months ago and she told me. All she knew was that he lived in this place called Three Egg. He’s one of the reasons I came here, to find out more. I told him that my mom died. He just nodded his head to acknowledge it, but didn’t say anything, and then you showed up and he left.”
“I still can’t believe he’s your father. And I’m sorry about your mother. Are you sure you’re not just making this up? I mean, you could tell me anything you want and I would believe you. How would I know? We just met.”
“You can believe me because you are my boyfriend and you’re platonically jumping into my socks. My mom told me that over fifty years ago they had a one-night stand, Yes, a real one-night stand. My mom was a real prankster. There she was dying, and she’s telling me they were actually standing because they were doing it in a closet. So I guess you could say I take after her, at least in terms of reputation.”
They both sipped their coffee. Tony was making a mental note of the number of closets in his apartment.
“Well,” said Tony. “You certainly don’t take after your father. I will say, though, that without his contribution, Three Egg probably would not even exist. Three Egg might not seem like much, but Three Egg is peaceful and nobody goes without. Except maybe Leo, but he’s made that choice and he seems content. Everybody gets along and everybody has what they need. That was all your father’s idea. I still can’t believe he’s your god damn father.”
“What do you mean his contribution? Tell me about it.”
“Okay. In 2006, Three Egg was in a horrible financial situation. The furniture factory where most people worked shut down, and all of a sudden, about a half of the population was unemployed. People who had houses couldn’t pay their mortgages, and people who rented didn’t have money for that. A lot of people didn’t have money for food. People couldn’t pay their utility bills, so the entire town was starting to take quite a hit.
“I had taken over the bookstore from my father, and it was evident I was quickly going to go bankrupt. Local officials called a town hall, and they wanted everybody to show up at the school. Even though nobody knew who he was and he had only appeared in Three Egg recently, Leo was there with his bicycle. People had already learned you couldn’t mess with him about his bicycle, so everybody just left that alone and he took it inside everywhere. And you know, it occurs to me now I think he’s got the same bicycle that he had twenty years ago.
“Bob had recently taken over the consulting firm from his father, and Jimbo’s dad had just opened this coffee shop. Actually, then it was more of a sandwich shop. Hungry people would come in with no money to beg for something to eat. Jimbo’s dad would give them sandwiches for free. He knew he was going to have to close down pretty soon, so he figured he might as well help people while he could.
“At the meeting nobody had any solutions. All people could do was complain about the problems. It was pretty desperate. Then to everybody’s surprise, Leo stood up. Everybody stopped talking. He said the only words I think people can remember that he ever said. I remember this very clearly. He said:
“’Communism. Three Egg should try communism.’ Then he took his bicycle and left.
“Oh man, you cannot believe the commotion he caused. Good ol’ redneck Christian conservative Three Egg. Communism? Hell no!”
“After a few minutes of everybody babbling chaotically, Bob stood up.
People knew Bob had some kind of prissy Ivy League education. He told everybody that what Three Egg needed now was for everyone to cooperate and for everyone to reach consensus on how to solve the economic problem. He said:
“’I’m not advocating communism. But if you throw out the ideology and throw out the idea of party, a communist economic system would resemble the New Testament, people would share.’ A few people started to yell nasty stuff at Bob. After all, he was just a young whippersnapper. What could he know?
“But some other people told those people just to shut up and let him explain. If you’re not going to be part of the solution, they told the complainers, then sit your ass down and don’t be part of the problem.”
This whole time, Sophia had been listening attentively. Then she said, “I forgot to mention my mother said my father was a communist, and that’s why he had to leave Colombia with his tail between his legs. I have no idea how he showed up here, and that’s what I wanted to ask him. What else did Bob say?”
“Bob said, ’If you think about the problem, we have enough food. It’s just that people don’t have money to buy it. There are places for people to live, there’s electricity and water. But people don’t have money to pay for their utilities. So it’s not a problem of supply, it’s a problem of distribution. But there were a few rich people that had plenty of money for everything. The problem for the rich people was that if the rest of society was falling apart, pretty soon it was going to fall apart for them too.’”
Tony paused to make sure this was sinking in with Sophia.
“Go ahead. I’m listening.”
Tony continued. “Bob said that if we imagined Three Egg to be one big family with a thousand people, and there was only one person at the top who had all the money, everybody could just divide the money equally, and things would be fine. He also said, ’It’s not really about the money. Money is just a symbol that shows the accrual of goods. In a perfect world, people wouldn’t use money. They would just share and watch out for their fellow man. Maybe this sounds theoretical, and I don’t have any detailed solutions. But if for the short term everybody would agree to share, then we could gradually work out the practical solutions to the problem.’”
Now, even the loudmouths who had been bashing Bob for being an immature whippersnapper were paying attention. Of course, some of them were hungry and didn’t have money for rent.
Then Mrs. Guidry — Miranda’s mother — stood up and said, “I agree with Mr. Poindexter. Everybody knows I’m the richest person in town. We only have about a thousand people. If we took all my money, divided it into two, and then divided one half into a thousand shares, people wouldn’t have much, but everybody would have the same, and they’d have enough to eat and a place to live.”
Now everybody was thinking about this like it was a serious idea.
Especially the hungry people.
Mrs. Guidry continued. “The way we’re trained to think about society is that I have all this money and that’s my right. I earned all this money, and if other people don’t have their money, then that’s just too damn bad. Isn’t that how we think about it? Well, the truth is, I never suffered to earn any of this money. When I was young, I knew my husband was rich and owned a bunch of property, and I just seduced him.
He married me for the sex. When he died, I had all his money. I guess that means I was better at sex than he was at money.”
People were tittering. Imagine this middle-aged lady, a pillar of the community, banging some horny rich guy just so she could get his money.
Mrs. Guidry continued. “Here’s what I think. Like Mr. Poindexter said, I don’t know how the details would work. I’m getting older — not ancient yet — but I’m heading that direction. I’m not young enough to figure out the details. When I do go, I certainly can’t take my money with me. I was planning to leave it to my daughter Miranda, but that wouldn’t solve the problems for everybody here. So I’ll say in front of everybody, we can work out the details later, but I am willing to give my estate to the community of Three Egg to be split equally among the population. I suppose to satisfy convention, I should give Miranda a little bit more so she won’t spit on my grave.”
She was looking at Miranda as she said that and started to say something else when Miranda interrupted.
“No, Mom. I’m with you. Split it all equally with the population. I don’t need more than anybody else.”
It was obvious that Mrs. Guidry had a flash of pride for her daughter.
Then she continued.
“I have one more thing to say. I’m not the only rich person in this town. There are a few more families, and I’m not naming names, but everyone knows who they are. Of course, nobody could or should force them to do this, but if those people think about it, they’ll know it’s the right thing to do. So I encourage all of them to follow my example and leave their estates to the community of Three Egg. Remember, you can’t take it with you. Why don’t you just divide it up like it’s fish or loaves of bread?”
Everybody stood and clapped for about five minutes. Finally, the clapping started to subside, and Mrs. Guidry sat down. Then Mr. Adams stood up. He was one of the other rich people. He was old, and came from old money. He said:
“It appears that old man Leo ain’t no goddamn fool. Seems like he knows what’s best for all of us even though he ain’t from here. We ain’t done nothing for him except not chase him out of Three Egg for being homeless. And I would like to thank Mrs. Guidry for pointing out the obvious. You can’t take it with you. And what good is your money if your community is hungry and people don’t have places to stay? I also agree I will give my estate to the community of Three Egg.
And one more thing. We need to make that man Leo an honorary citizen. Maybe build a statue of him or something. That’s all I have to say.”
Tony continued, “Now people were clapping again. By the time we finished the town hall, the heads of the other two rich families had agreed to give up their estates. We didn’t have any specific details about how things would work, but we had the basic idea of how to go forward. Mr. Adams said we should have a committee moderated by Bob Poindexter to work out the finances. Mr. Adams volunteered to be on the committee, and also Jimbo’s dad, since he was already sharing his wealth by giving people free sandwiches. It didn’t take them long to come up with a plan because once you decide to share everything, the numbers fall into place pretty easily. The plan the committee came up with is pretty interesting. I would be happy to explain it to you, but I’m pretty damn hungry, and I’m wondering if we could go to the Vietnamese restaurant. I hear they have a Sophia Viagra special, and today I feel like eating Sophia Viagra.”
Sophia said, “You dirty pig, Tony. You pontificate a few pages of socialist ideology just so you can eat me.” She gave him a meek, coquettish slap with her palm as she feigned an embarrassed blush. Then they thanked Jimbo for the coffee and started to walk down the street towards Pho You. They were holding hands. Passersby no longer gawked but just looked at them with admiration and wished them both a good day.
End of Chapter Ten