She was used to tough love. She'd had her fair share of family interventions over the years. But no one had ever spoken to her with this type of brutal, sadistic honesty.
She hugged herself and began to rock back and forth in the seat. Her husband looked wild-eyed from his wife to Todd.
His pulse rate was jacking up. He looked like he was about to explode. Todd was expecting the man to jump up and punch him right in the jaw at any second. The guy was just as skinny as he was but Todd was skinny because he ran every day, rode a bicycle to work, and didn't eat meat or dairy products. This guy was skinny because he hardly ate at all and was constantly jacked up on amphetamines. If he was on PCP he might have been able to pull Todd's arms off like the wings of a fly if he got mad enough.
'But,' Nicolene looked over at her husband who was staring back at her blankly, his face betraying his shock and confusion, the rage still boiling there just under the surface, 'we don't believe in abortion.'
Todd rolled his eyes and shook his head in exasperation.
'Obviously you don't believe in birth control either. Look at yourselves. Do you really think you'd be any good to a kid? Do you want your kid's life to be even more fucked up than yours?'
Michael sprang from his chair and jabbed his finger into Todd's face. Todd winced and prepared for a blow.
'You son-of-a-bitch! We don't have to listen to this shit! Who the fuck do you think you are?'
'No. You absolutely do not. You can walk right out that door if you'd like. I'll just stamp rejected on your welfare application and you can go back to turning tricks for drug money.'
Michael sighed and slumped down in his chair.
'You know damn well we can't do that shit. We're sick, man! We need some cash.'
'Well, even if I approve you now, the most you could get today would be food stamps. You wouldn't see a check for another month.'
'A month!'
'Six to eight weeks actually.'
'Shit! This is a waste of fucking time!' Michael began to pace the floor, looking lost and desperate.
'That's okay, baby. We can always sell the food stamps until the check comes.'
'That's if I approve you and why should I? Like I said, I already know how this story is going to end for you and your baby.'
'But-but we need it. We really need this money!'
'What if we did like you said? I mean, what if we got rid of the baby? If Nicolene had an abortion?'
'No. No. I can't. I won't!'
'Do you really still want to be out there two or three months from now, trying to turn tricks when you're seven or eight months pregnant? Come on, you know we ain't never gonna kick. You've probably already fucked that kid up with all the horse you've been shootin' in your arm.'
'She'd have to get her tubes tied as well.'
'Yeah, what if we did all of that?'
'If you had an abortion and a tubaligation then I'd sign all the papers to make sure you got your monthly check. I'll even put a rush on it, put you down as an emergency hardship case so you can get your check sooner and I might even make a clerical error and put the son you gave up for adoption down as a dependent to get you some more money.'
'But, I don't want to have an abortion.'
Michael took Nicolene's track-marked arm in his hands and tried his best approximation of a sympathetic look.
'Nicky, we have to do this. You know we wouldn't be good parents anyway. Look at us. We can't bring a child into the world like this. This guy is right. This is the best thing for us to do.'
'I'll go get the papers.'
Todd watched as they filled out the paperwork. He reached into his safe and pulled out a book of $100 in food stamps.
'You'll get the rest in the mail, after you come in here and show me that it's been taken care of. Here's the number of a clinic that will do it all for free.'
Michael and Nicolene De Marco walked out of Todd's cubicle holding hands.
For the second time that day, Todd felt as if he had truly made a difference, not just in the life of the unborn baby or that fucked up couple or that fat woman and her kids, but in the world.
Todd left that day feeling like he should skip down the sidewalk. He walked out of the building and into the parking lot with a smile chiseled into his face.
Chapter Three
Todd pedaled his ten-speed the six miles to his apartment, stopping at the mailbox on his way into the gated courtyard.
He tucked the stack of bills under his arm and then tossed the supermarket fliers, dry cleaning coupons, and fast food menus into the trashcan. His two favorite magazines had arrived. Vegan Times and Imperiled Planet. Todd thumbed through the magazines as he walked to his apartment. There was an article on the detoxification and weight loss benefits of raw foods, an article about famous celebrities who ate macrobiotically, and a recipe for vegan pasta made from shredded zucchini. Todd closed the magazine and opened the other one as he fished in his front pocket for his keys.
All of the positive feelings Todd had about what he had accomplished at work that day dissipated in a flash as he scanned through an article titled Zero Population. It was written by Heimlich Anattoli the head of the environmental activist group that Todd belonged to and it was all about the group and his book of the same name. Todd had read the book last year after it had hit the bestseller's list. The statistics that Heimlich quoted on overpopulation were terrifying and humbling. The kind that makes you feel helpless and doomed, that make all of your efforts feel insignificant. The population was increasing by 76 million people a year, 2,500 every twenty minutes. At that rate of growth, even accounting for a continual decrease in the death rate, the world population would hit ten billion within 50 years. That many people would completely overwhelm the earth, drain it dry of all of its natural resources and leave it a dead husk. Something had to be done.
Earlier that year he'd watched a documentary on Charles Manson in which Manson had stated that he needed to kill about 2 million people in order to save the planet. Two million people would be a barely a drop in the bucket in terms of overpopulation and the 2 unwanted children whose births he had prevented would not make a difference at all. He needed to do more. He had to find a way to convince more people.
Todd finally pulled his keys out and opened his front door. He dropped his magazines onto the coffee table and walked into his bedroom. Todd plopped down onto his bed and opened up his laptop. He went to the Zero Population message board. There was a new message from Heimlich. It was almost as if the man had read his mind.
'I know that many of you are concerned that the task is too big. You think that your efforts are too small to be significant. That there's not much one individual can do to impact an entire planet. Well, let me tell you a story.
A boy and his grandfather are walking along the beach. There are starfish all along the beach that were stranded there when the tide rolled out. The boy reaches down and picks up a starfish as they pass it and tosses it back into the ocean.
He does this over and over again as they pass each starfish.
His grandfather asks him, 'Why do you keep picking up those starfish?'
The boy looks up at his grandfather and answers, 'Because they will die if I don't put them back in the water.'
The boy's grandfather looks down the beach and then back at his grandson.
'There's dozens of miles of beach. What you're doing won't make much of a difference.' The boy looks down at the starfish in his hand and then tosses it into the water.
