Nancy Kress: Nothing Human

“Uncle Keith, you said that two people died on your energy case.”

“Yes, they did.” He was curious to see where this was going.

“Was it worth it? Two people dead, and everybody else gets lots of energy?”

“We don’t look at it like that,” Keith said, startled by the starkness of her viewpoint. “Although unfortunately new technologies always seem to cost lives at first. Railroads, air travel, heart transplants. Probably even the discovery of fire. Still, it’s more a question of whether the energy company could have anticipated that the accidents might happen.” Did she know the word “anticipate”? He had no idea what vocabulary a ten-year-old might have.

“I see,” she said primly. And then, “I think two deaths is worth it.”

He was strangely shocked. Was that normal for a little girl? Weren’t children supposed to be sentimental? Peering at Lillie’s face through the gloom, he saw her expression: sad and thoughtful. Her gold-flecked gray eyes gave back a reflection of his own face.

“But,” she added, “the energy company should give the families of the dead people a lot of money. And medals, too. Hero’s medals. Uncle Keith, you’re going to have that man you were talking to on the phone, that Jamal, investigate Bill, aren’t you?”

“Why, Lillie ―”

“That’s why you really wanted Bill’s name and address.”

“I―”

“It’s a good idea,” Lillie said. “Mom doesn’t know him very well. But, Uncle Keith, you shouldn’t worry too hard. Because I look out for Mom, you know.”

It was that moment, a decade after her birth, that Keith fell in love with his niece. Her serious, half-seen little face, intermittently lit by fireworks, gazed at him with everything Barbara had never had: judgment, reason, sense. She was an amazing little girl. More, she moved at that moment from being an abstract—“my niece”—to being a real, living, individual person. Herself.

But all he said was, “How did you know I was going to have Bill Brown investigated?”

“Because that’s what they do in the movies,” she said, grinning with ten-year-old glee, and his capture was complete.

“Hey!” Barbara called, ducking under the maple, “come out and watch the fireworks, you two! You’re missing everything good!”

The Pittsburgh physician’s name was Samuel Silverstein. Keith flew to Pittsburgh International and took a cab for the long ride to Silverstein’s office. The office was neither shabby nor luxurious, a solid, reassuring setting located in a new medical building. The door greeted him respectfully by name when he pushed it open, even though he was half an hour early.

“I’m told this is not a medical appointment, Mr. Anderson,” Silverstein said. His schedule ran right on time. Silverstein was short, overweight, with intelligent brown eyes.

“No, doctor. I read the article you posted on CaseNet and—”

“You are not a physician.”

“No. It was shown to me by my niece’s physician, Dr. Shoba Asrani at New York-Presbyterian. My niece Lillie has exactly the same condition as your patient, and exactly the same PLI and DNA charts.” He passed Lillie’s printouts to Silverstein.

The doctor studied them intently, paging through the stack of papers with methodical attention. When he looked up, Keith said, “Lillie was also the result of in vitro fertilization. Like your patient. I would like to know if her fertilization was done at a place called the ChildGive IVF Institute. I don’t know where the Institute was located, and no records are available.” Barbara had lost all the paperwork. All she had remembered about the location was “some town north of the city.”

Silverstein looked at Keith a long time. Then he said quietly, “Give it up, Mr. Anderson. It isn’t possible.”

“So I’m told,” Keith said grimly.

“You’re a lawyer, aren’t you?”

“Yes. How did you know?”

Silverstein ignored that question, answering instead one that Keith hadn’t asked yet. “It is against patient confidentiality for me to identify the clinic. Or the patient.”

“Can you at least tell me if there are any others? Besides Lillie and this boy?”

Silverstein hesitated. Finally he said, “Yes, there are others. Two more.”

“So far. Doctor, I will sign anything you like attesting to the fact that I will not sue the clinic. That’s not my aim. I just have to know what happened. Lillie is my niece, my legal ward since her mother died. Anything I can learn, from anyone, might help her physician to understand her condition better, and that of the other three children, too. I’m in a much better position than you to run a discreet investigation, believe me. And I’m prepared to supply you with all sorts of references so you can check me out first.”

Silverstein was shaking his head. “Not necessary. I cannot tell you the names, and I wish you could believe that it wouldn’t help your niece if I could. I’m sorry.”

Keith tried another approach, and then another. Nothing worked, and Silverstein was becoming annoyed. Finally Keith left his card.

So it would have to be an investigation without help. More expensive, longer. But certainly possible. He flew back to New York.

During the year after the July Fourth picnic, Keith saw Lillie often. Barbara married Bill Brown, who turned out to be an ordinary, noncriminal, reasonably solvent guy whom Keith didn’t like very much. He was handsome in a thuggish sort of way, with deep-set blue eyes and a heavy beard. Barbara seemed crazy about him. She and Lillie moved into Bill’s West Side apartment and Lillie began exploring the city by subway.

“She’s too young,” Barbara said, running her hand through her short hair and making it stand up in spikes. Barbara had lost even more weight since moving back to New York. “She’s only eleven years old!”

“Kids that age go all over by subway,” Keith said, “and Lillie’s a sensible girl. I’ll teach her the ropes.”

He did. They went to the Museum of National History, to the ballet at Lincoln Center, for walks in the Park, to overpriced little restaurants in SoHo. Lillie was fun, enough of a child to be impressed by everything and enough of an adult to provide actual companionship. One Saturday just before Halloween they met at an Irish pub for a plowman’s lunch. Lately Lillie had insisted on meeting him at their excursion destinations, rather than his picking her up at home. “I like to study the people on the subway,” she said. “I’m going to be a film-maker when I grow up, you know.”

“Last week it was a diplomat.”

She remained unperturbed. “I have lots of time to decide. Uncle Keith, do you believe in angels?”

“No.”

“How about ghosts?”

“No.”

“Space aliens?”

“Could be. But there’s no evidence either way.”

“Demons?”

“No. Lillie, what’s this all about?”

“Oh,” she said, turning her head away, “Mom’s on a new kick.”

He looked at her harder. “What sort of new kick?”

“She thinks the apartment is haunted.”

Keith groaned inwardly. That was all Barbara needed — a “haunting.” He said to Lillie, “What does Bill say?”

Lillie’s face tightened. “He’s not there much anymore.”

After barely a year. Keith ran over his schedule: He could maybe go see Barbara Monday night. It was too late today, he had a date tonight. And all day tomorrow he had to work. He took his niece’s hand across the wooden table. “Lillie, are you all right? With their… their marriage problems?”

“I have to be,” she said pragmatically, and with no trace of self-pity. But clearly she didn’t want to talk about it. “Uncle Keith, tell me again about SkyPower.”