The cat disappeared and I heard rapping on my door. King Surmium had a cane with a brass rabbit’s head that he was rapping against the door.
“As a warning to you so you don’t make the mistakes they are making, when you bring food into Fairy and consume it, the odds are good that anyone worthy of the Fairy king title will know it. Since I suspect you will be venturing into other realms soon, let me advise you. Just plan to be detected. If you aren’t, then good for you. Also it’s smart to assume that if you are plotting with more than a handful, it’s almost a sure thing that someone else is paying attention. May I come in?”
I gestured with my hand. “Please come in and be my guest.”
He walked in and sat on the bed. “I found a nice place for you. I owe a favor to a certain Fairy queen and the gateway to her realm is on the property. She would rather it not go to just anyone and she is amused with the thought of us getting an inside agent among the wizards. Don’t bother the domestic Fairies who keep the place in order and you’ll be fine. Don’t worry about giving me any food. Harvey is likely to notice if you do. We’ll arrange something when I figure out a good distraction for him. For now though, I have a test and a distraction for you.”
I winced.
He nodded. “In the coffee house down the street a Goblin and a wizard are about to meet. They are both female and they are both, I think, rather attractive. This all falls through if you can’t face a female wizard and Goblins are an unknown. I don’t really want to call on a Devil to test you with and I am still trying to arrange for you to meet a Daemon. It’s fine if you can’t face a mortal woman. Honestly it makes this whole thing a better challenge. But we will have to come up with a plan ‘d’ since a, b and c will all fall through if you can’t keep it together in front of a wizardess.
“Just remember, the Goblin looks seventeen or eighteen but she watched Shakespeare perform in his own plays. The wizardess is a Fairy queen as well and not a nice one. She’s mortal but a lot older than she looks. It’s okay to be scared of them both. Don’t fall apart though. Some girls can sense that like a shark smells blood. My bet is that both of these girls are that type. The Goblin will be the one with the points of her ears hidden.”
Before you go, let me gift you with something intrinsic. Not something you have to do anything to activate. We should see how that works for you since a lot of stuff is intrinsic and that may be a work around for your issues with spells.”
#
I noticed the ladies through the glass before I went in. The girl behind the counter asked me, “Chi Tea?”
I nodded, she was already aware that I wouldn’t look her in the eye but I tipped well if I was mostly left alone.
After paying I went to a table with an electric outlet beside it. The table was near the wizardess and the Goblin. They both looked like normal but way too attractive girls. I usually sat where I had privacy but I suspected the Fairy king was watching or had spies.
The wizardess dressed boldly. The Goblin girl was dressed casually in comfortable and well worn clothing. I was already close to panic and I hadn’t gotten near them. I opened my bag and focused on the contents.
With my still new laptop I brought up a browser and started checking the forums I frequented. I was getting advice on and discussing keeping a laptop secure so I could work on confidential software and be able to lock it all up and have it safe when I was in public or worse an authority decided to inspect it. I wanted to be sure that my encryption would keep the data safe if the computer got stolen. I was up on security but I wasn’t sure if what was secure a year ago was still secure today.
I was arguing online with a person that was more worried about keeping data over time than keeping people from reading what you had created. He thought my encrypting entire hard drives was crazy.
I understood his priorities, but I suspected he didn’t write code for a paranoid company and he didn’t have a much older brother that wanted him dead.
I barely noticed as my chi tea was delivered. The argument had turned into one of those prove your cred sort of things. I would have abandoned the thread but I had some respect invested in a few relations on this forum so I was furiously trying to not look like an idiot while the guy was trying to prove his points.
I looked up when the Goblin girl laughed. They were both looking at me. Yes, they were crazy pretty. I looked back at the laptop and realized they were laughing at me. I closed the laptop.
As I reached down to pull the surge protector from the wall socket, the wizardess said, “Oh, I think we hurt his feelings.”
The Goblin girl said, “Careful, he could tap you to death with those fingers. What do you think five hundred words per minute?”
The wizardess said, “At least. He probably kills three keyboards a day.”
I didn’t tell them the keys on the laptop were good for a hundred million activations.
There was no point defending my decisions on security with someone online who had entirely different priorities and there was no point in defending my being able to type fast to a mean girl. Like being able to type made someone less of a person.
I got up and for a moment met the look of the Goblin girl. Sad to have seen so much, be so pretty and still remain so shallow.
The wizardess said, “Don’t go away mad, just go away.”
I looked back at her and I couldn’t imagine what a Fairyland would be like with someone like her in charge of it.
I stuffed a tip in the tip jar on the counter before I left.
#
I was fuming. I wanted to get back on the forum so I didn’t look like I had backed off from an argument, but I knew I was not in the best mental state to handle a rational discussion. It was such a tiny thing. I had a disagreement over simple differences in priorities and a pair of girls I didn’t know laughed at me for typing fast. It set me off and now I felt like I was back in high school being laughed at for answering the teacher’s questions.
I didn’t go strait back to my hotel room. I went to a grocery and did some shopping. I waited in a longer line to check out cause the girl at the other register liked to talk to you.
Walking back to my hotel I felt something watching me from the shadows. I avoided looking into the shadows and considered going to Fairy but with Harvey in Fairy, I might not have anyone who I could summon and get back to Real. If something was following me I didn’t want to lead it back to my hotel room. I had been gifted with spells that might be able to handle this, but so far I didn’t have any way to throw the spells so I was useless.
I sat down on a bench in front of a shop that was closed for the night and looked up at the moon. Whatever was waiting in shadow was patient.
The Goblin girl said, “Your milk is going to get warm.”
She was sitting on the bench beside me. The presence in shadow was gone. I took the gallon jug of milk out the bag and put it on the seat between us. “It’s all yours.”
I got up and started walking. I felt the presence in shadow again. I looked back and the girl was gone. So was the jug of milk. I didn’t know anything about Goblins but there was something about shadows and Goblins hiding under beds. The last thing I wanted was some mean pretty girl hiding under my bed or in my closet. Monsters I could live with. This was scarier. I went back to the bench and took out my laptop. I didn’t have the password for any of the network connections that showed up. I didn’t want to use tethering on my cell phone to limp alone with a slow connection to the internet so I closed my laptop and went back to the coffee shop. Without going in I could tell the girls were gone but I suspected the presence in shadow that was following me was the Goblin girl.
King Surmium summoned me before I got to the door. “I expected you back by now, are you okay?”
I said, “I can’t make up my mind about going home or going back to the coffee shop. Funny how that is. Odd how things can get.”
King Surmium laughed. “Tell Agnes to come out of shadows.”
I asked, “Agnes?”
I felt someone behind me. I turned and the mean Goblin girl was looking up at me. I hadn’t noticed that she was so much shorter than I was. She was holding the jug of milk. She noticed I was looking at the jug and kicked me hard in the shin before disappearing.
King Surmium said, “I had Agnes test to see if anger made you resistant. Early on the Fairies made you pretty mad so I figured that might be the trick.”
I said, “She kicked me in the knee. Hard.”
Surmium laughed again. “How did you make her angry?”
I rubbed my leg where she kicked me. “I have no clue. None at all. She’s just mean I guess.”
I felt something in shadow and started to turn when I was kicked in the behind and fell, almost hitting my head against the concrete. I looked back but didn’t see anyone.
“She kicked me again. I may not survive the trip back. Is there a way to prevent such things from following you?”
I felt movement in shadow but again before I could turn, my hair was jerked. I cried out in pain.
King Surmium used the summons and brought me to my hotel room. “Looks like you got her mad. We may have to set a few wards. I was planning for you to work together but some things don’t work out. As he talked I felt movement in shadow.
She stood in the doorway to the bathroom, “No chance I’m going to work with a condescending son of a bitch like him.”
Surmium said, “You don’t have to. I know, he is horrible that way.”
I looked at King Surmium and tried to figure out his game.
Surmium gestured to Agnes. “See that puzzled look? He doesn’t even realize he is so condescending. He’s really the worst. Entirely unaware how much hurt he causes by being mad at pretty girls who mock him.”
Agnes said, “Thou didst tell me to mock him.”
King Surmium said, “Well yes, so what is done is done. Pity about that. I made the mistake of thinking you two might be able to work together. Now there is no point really.”
She gave us both hard looks and disappeared.
Surmium gestured for me to stay silent. He held the gesture for a while. “Alright, she is gone. Now let me lay out the facts for you. You were suspended from high school for helping a girl cheat when you had no idea you were doing all her work. I suspect that more went on before that and you have a tapestry of being used and abused by girls who figured out they could use and abuse you. It seems you manage okay after you get mad. I’m not sure if you have to stay mad but this test proved the point. You got along with the Fairies after a while so maybe you don’t have to stay mad. Who knows?
“Now we get to Agnes. Poor thing has had her ups and downs. Never learned to read. Terribly jealous of those that can. She came from a time when class mattered. She came from a broken family and her Goblin family wasn’t much better. I told her you used to tutor girls in high school. I didn’t mention how badly that worked out for you, but that’s all water under the bridge.
“So here’s the thing. She holds grudges but she’s honest. If you leave sweets out, you know, expensive quality dark chocolate and the like and you leave a note saying, ‘For Agnes,’ she will likely take the bribe and leave you alone. Keep up the offerings and she might even forgive you.”
I said, “She kicked me twice, hard. I didn’t do anything.”
The Fairy King smiled and rubbed his chin. “Often hurt people feel injury when none was given. Imagine, if you will, being a young girl without the benefit of a birth certificate, drivers license or education for over four hundred years. You were almost killed. She has struggled to find a meal more times than you have had breakfast.”
#
Harvey asked, “Who’s Agnes?”
I shrugged. “Someone who likes chocolate.”
Harvey gave me a mean look. “I can’t touch it cause it might kill me as a cat, but I love chocolate.”
I said. “Don’t touch it then. It’s for Agnes.”
#
I read through all the arrangements of our corporation and the notes on it and looked up contracts on the web. The tax issues were the worst of it all. Accounting was the exact opposite of statistics. Statistics was all about making complex issues simple and easy to figure out. Accounting was all about making simple issues too complex for anyone to follow. Adding in tax laws was like trying to lie about it when half the folk in the room know it’s a lie and the rest got lost at the beginning of the conversation so there was no point in lying in the first place.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
I tried to get angry at Jenny, our tax lawyer so I could face her but apart from her immersion in tax law she was perfect, sweet, kind and gentle to a fault. She scared me so bad I wanted to call the whole thing off.
I had made notes on the issues I had and my new lawyer partners insisted I ask Jenny to explain.
“Joshua, the first thing you have to do is forget that it’s money. Forget that money can save lives, pay for education, care for the sick, make the nation strong, repair roads, and make people secure. Forget that wars are fought over it and it ruins the lives of people and corrupts the innocent. Just look at it as monopoly money. The people who wrote the laws, and paid people to write the laws just want enough stability to keep on playing the game of monopoly they have played since the dawn of time. The people who make the rules have no wants or needs but they will do anything to keep from paying their fair share.
“We can try to get laws to change things, but while the laws are what they are, it is just a game and you have to play to win. Otherwise, you just hand it over for other people to steal it and they win. After you have survived taxes, then what you do with the money can be decent and nice. But when you play the tax game it’s all for keeps and you won’t help anyone by losing.”
I nodded. I wanted to bolt and run. Jenny managed to get scarier every time I saw her. When I made the mistake of looking at her I felt like a deer caught in headlights. There wasn’t and inch of her that wasn’t frightening. Just the sound of her clicking her nails against the table put fear into me.
#
Since I got out of the coma, I started checking my bank account several times a day. I had no idea what my brother might try and since he had all my mother’s records and he had looted my apartment, he probably had all the data he needed to commit identity theft and bankrupt me. I had already changed banks, but I was still nervous. I had half of my money in the new corporations account but I needed to be careful about withdrawal so the fiction of corporate independence from my personal money was maintained.
I checked my accounts and none of it make any sense. I called Jason and asked him to look it over. While I was waiting for him to call me back I got an email from a real estate agent that my purchase had gone through. I was about to report it as spam when I was summoned.
A lady’s voice said, “Joshua, this is Queen Cypsela. I am delighted to have thee as my new neighbor. I do so look forward to being thy guest this next full moon.”
Since the property in the email was called the, “Cypsela Estate,” I figured it was probably the same thing.
#
My brother had taken everything from my apartment and I had chosen to avoid seeing him or getting anything back since he had tried to kill me. Without much in the way of possessions, it was easy enough to pack. They had upgraded my company car to a large gas guzzling SUV monster with two tanks. It was great for moving but If I still had it, I could have moved in my old hatchback since my brother took everything I wasn’t wearing when I went to the hospital. I think the whole point of the car, was to make it more of a pain for me to sever relations with the company. The last thing I wanted to keep was a vehicle that guzzled gas like this, so they made an assumption about me that was dead wrong.
#
As we drove Harvey alternately slept and stretched up so he could put his paws below the window and look out.
“Tell me about the estate,”
“I got a good deal on it. A really good deal. I haven’t seen it. There are several springs and some forest. It has a large lake. It was a sudden deal and too good an offer to pass on.”
Harvey said, “I know you have been wheeling and dealing with lawyers but I never imagined you were into real estate.”
I shrugged. This was an arrangement the King of our Fairyland had set up with a queen of Fairy that I had only recently spoken to, and all of those arrangements were secret from the group of Fairies that were secretly plotting to escape the king’s Fairyland, so I didn’t want to say anything.
#
The estate was easy enough to spot. It had a stone arch over the drive with the carved letters “CYPSELA,” in an old stylish font. The road curved a couple of times and then there were overgrown urns on either side of the road and tall thin evergreens. There were a few branches in the road that lead off into the woods, but I stayed on the main one. It opened up to a circular drive in front of what was at one time a grand mansion. Now it was an overgrown ruins with a few large trees growing out of it.
Harvey pawed at the window. “I gotta pee. Let me out.”
I put down the window and he jumped out. I got out and walked up the stairs and stood on the large stone expanse in front of what was at one time an imposing entrance. It was imposing still, but the doors were gone, the hinges rusted and just past them the wooden floors had long ago collapsed and you could see a pool down where there was once a basement.
Harvey sat beside me. “How much did you pay for this?”
I shook my head. “Not much. Maybe we can build a cabin.”
From behind us a voice in the distance shouted, “Do you ride?”
By the SUV was a white horse. “If you are moving in, the first question is, ‘Do you ride?’ There’s a lot of grounds to cover and we don’t want tire tracks ruining things.”
Harvey whispered to me. “Yea, let’s not let anything go to ruin here. We can’t have ruins.”
I shouted to the horse, “I have ridden ponies but someone else held the bridle.”
The horse said, “You’ll have to learn to ride without a bridle. None of us will tolerate them.”
I walked down the stairs and the horse got low and lay down. “Kitty, kitty, kitty. Here kitty. What’s you cats name?”
Harvey said, “Harvey. What’s your name.”
The horse said, “Eloise. Kitty want a ride?”
Harvey looked up at me. “I think she likes cats.”
Eloise said, “I adore cats. Come here kitty.”
Harvey said, “I realize I am a talking cat and you were recently in a coma and in a Fairyland, but does anything seem a bit strange to you?”
I shrugged and wondered if I was still in a coma. That was seeming like the best and easiest explanation for all of this.
#
Eloise shook her mane. “The stables and the barn are in good shape. Do you do ham radio?”
I said, “I was always tempted to. Never spent the money though or took the time.”
Eloise eyed the SUV. “You’ll want to drive to the cottage. Catch up with me, but don’t drive too fast.”
Eloise started trotting down the road. I picked up Harvey and we got into the gas guzzling behemoth and went the rest of the way around the circle and followed Eloise. She turned off at the first road into the woods and we drove a short way and came to a clearing with a barn, stable and a two story stone cottage on another circle with a smaller road to the lake behind the cottage.
There was an antenna tower by the cottage that I expected was for the ham radio.
The door opened as we approached.
Eloise swung her head and lifted it to signal that we should go in. I walked in carrying the cat and the door slammed shut behind us.
Two small ladies in modest serving outfits were at the door.
One said, “Dust thou thinkest the cat can see us?”
The other replied, “Probably, but look at the horror on the guys face. When he goes for the door, hold it closed for a bit and then let him run away. I doubt he’ll return to vex us.”
Harvey said, “Hold it together, Josh, they aren’t alive.”
I nodded. “I’m okay. For a moment I thought they were living.”
Harvey jumped down. “Well they have power here. After looking at the main house I figured it might be candles and outhouses.”
I looked at the ladies and shook my head before I looked for a light switch. I used it and the light stayed off. “We may not have power after all. This is my first time owning a place. I didn’t think to check on water and power.”
I looked back and the two small ladies were gone. I opened the door and looked out. Eloise was looking through the window of the SUV.
I shouted to Eloise, “Till we get power and water, I’m going back to the town to get a hotel room. At least the place looks clean. I can’t go shopping till I know if the refrigerator works. Are there any horse treats you want me to bring back?”
Eloise was kneeling and making beckoning gestures with her head at Harvey. “Apples always. We haven’t had any sweet feed in ages. Not since the previous owner. The chickens are free range but they would love to get some proper feed.”
I went to the SUV and took out some tape and paper.
Eloise got up. “What are you writing?”
“I left a note for Agnes giving her directions if she wanted to travel all this way for some chocolate. I’m going to leave a note on the door in case she comes by. In the morning I’ll see if I can send someone out to check on power.”
The house lights turned on.
Harvey gave me a hard look. “Did you buy a haunted house on purpose?”
I walked towards the house and the lights turned off.
I said, “Eloise, The last thing I need in my profession is a house with faulty wiring. I’ll bring you some sweet feed before I put this place back on the market.”
A man shouted, “Thou dust have to warn us before thou dust switch the power back on.”
One of the small Ladies came out. “Sorry, Dustin. We want to turn the power back on.”
The man said, “It may take a bit. The zero space generators are forty years out of date and take a while to calibrate.”
The man turned towards me. “Beg pardon m’lord. The cottages powers only been on to test every full moon since the previous master passed away. We were using the kilns down in the caves and the extra power drain threw the breakers. I should join the boys down there. If the lenses cool off too fast it’ll cause aberrations and the lenses could end up worthless.”
The man disappeared around the corner of the house and the small lady curtsied to me and went back inside.
I looked at Eloise.
The horse shook her head. “The lenses have been cooling for half a year. I doubt I can help but I should check.”
Eloise took off trotting to the stables. Harvey looked at me and ran after her. I looked at the house, shrugged and ran after Harvey.
Eloise took a rope in her mouth and pulled a wall back. There was a tunnel going down with a track on one side.
Another horse asked, “What now?”
Eloise said, “Randal, this is the new owner. The House Fairies turned on the power to the cottage and the extra load threw the breakers. Now they are worried the lenses might cool to fast.”
Randal said, “That shouldn’t have been too much load.”
Eloise said, “Since folk were moving in I suspect they turned on the refrigeration units. Since the ice caves haven’t been kept cold all this time, the refrigeration units would all turn on at once. It takes a lot of power to cool down five acres of cold storage.”
Harvey asked, “This has ice caves?”
Randal said, “You go Eloise, I’ll explain.”
Eloise trotted off down the tunnel.
Randal watched her go and then flicked his tail and turned his head to look at us. “No, it’s just a few large underground coolers. We call it the ice cave though. Truth is, a third of it is kept above freezing.”
Harvey asked, “What is all of this for?”
Randal asked, “Have you ever wondered how magic worked?”
I nodded. “Constantly.”
Randal said, “All the real work was done thousands of years ago in another dimension by Elves. The Dread Lord has done a lot to improve the basic understanding of things, but apart from some alchemists and insane dabblers, no original research in the field of magic has been done in ages. Certainly no one competent has done any notable research. We figure it’s high time someone started to ask questions again.”
Harvey asked me, “How did you get involved in all of this?”
I shrugged.
The horse looked at the cat and then at me. “Well we need a front man to keep the estate legal in the real world. It may not seem an important part of the cause, but it matters and without a good front man it all falls through, doesn’t it? We can’t just bring anyone from Real into this and we only want Fairies involved that can keep a secret.
“Sadly we have to keep most of our work rather quiet since we don’t want to start a magical arms race in Real or Fairy. We would love to hire a team of researchers but how can we trust a mortal, especially when he could die and blab everything when he ends up in some Fairyland. It would be wonderful, for example if we could hire a good programmer that knew his way around data bases, but how could we possibly find one we could trust to keep his mouth shut in the here and hereafter?”
Harvey looked at me and narrowed his eyes. I gave him an innocent smile.
#
In town, I went to the feed store first. I asked them how much sweet feed and chicken feed I could manage in the SUV and they loaded me up. As soon as they decided I was horse people the stranger in town distance disappeared. At the bakery a pair of old men were drinking coffee and playing dominoes. The women behind the counter were a lot older but they seemed friendly enough.
Not for the first time I wondered if being cruel and manipulative was a generational thing. I was probably being unfair. I suspected that the worst detected my weakness and went for blood. The problem was I got stupid in front of all of them and had no way to judge.
I needed to go into the larger city and do some serious shopping, but I got started late and I was worried that someone might eat the chocolate I left out for Agnes. Not that I had a good way to tell if Agnes got it or someone else did. The chocolate was still there when I woke up so I didn’t know.
At the post office a woman was telling a man, “I give it a week. Two weeks tops. After they look around and things happen, the Cypsela place will be back on the market.
The man said, “Full moon, would be what ran them off. They say Mr. Tinbed went there as a dare back in high school. He won’t talk about it. Davis went there when he worked for the census though and said it seemed normal enough.”
The woman asked me, “New in town?”
I stepped up to the counter. “Yes, I just moved in at the Cypsela Place. I think I would like to get a mail box and have all the mail go to it.”
She smiled at me.
A woman behind me said, “You may want to wait till the full moon before you commit to anything.”
I went to the small grocery and turned around. Only one register was open and the girl at the register was young but she looked dangerous. I needed to go shopping but I wasn’t going to risk anything.
I sat in the car and did an estimate on distances and decided I could make it to the city and back in time since there was a large grocery store on the outskirts nearby.
#
With all the grain in the back, the gas was going down even faster as I drove the huge SUV so I stopped to fill up.
When I got back into the SUV, Agnes was sitting in the passenger seat holding the assortment of chocolates I had left for her.
“If you mean this as a romantic overture, give it up.”
I said, “I figured if you ever came all this way, a few candy bars wasn’t going slide as a gift. Don’t worry. If I start to like you I’ll probably start hiding in fear of you.”
Agnes said, “Good, keep it that way. I probably won’t visit though. From the marks left by other Goblins, the whole town you moved near is considered unsafe and unfriendly. I took a cross country route and didn’t see them, but when I went into town there was an odd vibe so I looked around. You know they are talking about you?”
I nodded.
She changed her voice like she was imitating a young girl. “He was pale and hunched over but he had large nervous eyes. Cute, but he looked around like he was scared he was being watched.”
She made another voice, “Tall, pale and skittish. He may have already visited the estate and it left him a hollow husk of the man he once was.”
She made yet another voice, “I’ll be eighteen in two years. Who knows. If he’s still around, he’s got money and horses. He might be a perfect fixer up special.”
I grimaced in fear and put the SUV in gear to get out on the road since I didn’t have much time. “I’ll keep a box of chocolates in the fridge for you, if you ever decide to come out this way. I’m going to the grocery store. If you want anything to take back with you, just ask. My treat.”
She said, “It’s kind of a pain coming all this way. I live in the opposite direction. I’ll probably have to move soon though so if I’m closer I might visit. You work for King Surmium?”
I drove a bit before answering. “In my profession, I am respected for not revealing secrets. Often I can’t be sure what is a secret and what isn’t so I don’t generally talk much. Someone asked who you were when they saw the note I left with the chocolates. I said, “Someone who likes chocolate.”
She said, “Who asked?”
I kept driving and didn’t answer.
Agnes said, “I’m guessing it’s the talking cat Fairy. By the time you drive to the grocery, It’s going to be twilight. It’ll be a dark night so you should probably pull over and let me out. I don’t want to get stuck way out here.”
I said, “I have spare rooms. The Fairies had a list of things for me to get so they could prepare meals. I can get some more and you can have supper and breakfast before you leave. I’ve never had a guest before and to be honest, I’m a little nervous alone with the Fairies.”
Agnes said, “I thought Fairies didn’t scare you.”
I drove a bit longer before answering. “When they start acting nice, and smiling, it gets a little bit creepy.”
Agnes nodded. “King Surmium said you were damaged that way.”
At the grocery store, just having Agnes beside me was like a magic charm. The pretty girls just walked by. For once I didn’t feel like I was being hunted.
On the way back to keep things from drifting onto subjects I wasn’t comfortable with, I asked her about Shakespeare. After she warmed up and started talking I said,
“No one knows this stuff. You know more history than anyone I have ever heard of. You just shot down a third of what I was taught in college history. You should teach this stuff or put it online.”
Agnes was quiet for a few miles. I realized that if she couldn’t read, computers were unusable. She couldn’t put anything online. In this day and age, illiteracy was a curse like it had never been before. It was probably horrid in the past, now it was crippling.