Quiet in the Ludlow house?
“Who woulda thunk it?” eleven-year-old Velma Trent said as she listened from her porch.
“Ain't it the truth,” eight-year-old Gracie Trent said.
“I mean, they have taken this co-grounding thing George and I had to a whole 'nother level,” nine-year-old Milton Trent said.
“And see, this is the stuff Pop-Pop is always reminding me of,” nine-year-old Vertran Stepforth, first cousin to the Trent children, said as he sat down with them on the porch. “The real news, and the real life big things, just don't happen on the Internet. This is amazing, but you can't video silence well.”
“Yep,” Velma said. “That's the only group of people I've ever met who can enlarge their numbers and get quieter.”
“But I mean, that's kind of a choice,” Milton said. “I mean, George and I are plenty loud, but we found out that voluntarily co-grounding and reading more keeps us out of a whole lot of trouble.”
“Well, at some point, we all gotta stop just getting old and actually get wise,” Gracie said.
“It's good to see it catching on in the world,” Vertran said, “because when Tom gets back today, boy is he going to have a story about what happens when it doesn't catch on.”
“Is he OK?” Velma said.
“Oh, he didn't blow up the kitchen this time trying to fry a whole frozen fried chicken or anything,” Vertran said, “but just look up.”
The sky was covered in huge thunder clouds to the east.
“It wasn't forecast to rain today, but Hurricane Justicia broke up last night over the Atlantic, and the Gulf Stream is pushing those rain bands up here,” Vertran said.
“Oh … that neighborhood that sinkhole is eating is about to get ate up,” Milton said.
“Yep,” Vertran said. “Here, these rain bands are going to get shoved up against the Blue Ridge and drop their load. Although it won't be 8-10 inches of rain, it will be enough. Tom is stationed at a good lookout point for it all up on the ridge.”
“But isn't that going to be a little dangerous in the storm?” Velma said.
“Oh, he's not staying up there,” Vertran said. “He's just getting cameras set up out of the wind and all with the Free Voice team, and then they are heading back to headquarters. Probably not going to be a good live feed with that much rain anyhow … more like a before and after.”
“Thirty years of bad decisions,” Velma said, “about to get wiped out in three hours.”
“But where are all these people going to live after this?” Gracie said.
“Pop-Pop has been talking with Col. Lee's other grandparents, his grandma Mrs. Selene Slocum-Lofton and the grandpa who just stepped up, Mr. John Worley,” Vertran said. “Turns out they've been buying up and fixing up a lot of homes in Lofton County, and they are working on a plan.”
“Mrs. Slocum-Lofton is kinda cool,” Velma said. “You can tell she was the evil version of our grandmas for a long time, but then got saved and has been coming to the light and is doing much better. Super-smart and powerful and doing right is always cool.”
“Yeah, but I just listen to her on these Zoom calls and it's kinda scary,” Milton said, “because she is that one billionaire who you just know even Pop-Pop really wouldn't want to have to tangle with, and there's not that many people out there he respects like that.”
“She's real old money,” Vertran said. “She's a Madison and a Lee, and Aaron Slocum-Lofton her husband was already a high millionaire when there weren't really billionaires like that. He left her so much that she just went on and turned it into a billion last year, working alone. She and Pop-Pop talk about stuff like buying and selling local banks and stuff, and she's a tough competitor, but a good partner.”
“I like Mr. Worley a lot – not a billionaire, just a high hundred-millionaire, but he reminds me of Lil' Robert next door: he has a real tall and caring soul, so, he's really just as rich,” Velma said.
“To get married again at that age,” Milton said, “you kinda gotta hafta have that kind of soul. But at least both of them know they weren't married for their money – there's no point, especially at their ages.”
“I notice Pop-Pop kinda hangs out with billionaires and high millionaires who don't get caught up on that stuff,” Vertran said. “It's kind of like not getting caught up on the Internet: there's a lot that happens to human beings that has nothing to do with the money they have.”
“Ain't it the truth,” Gracie said, “because ain't nobody buying an umbrella big enough to stop what is about to happen today from happening.”
“Nope,” Velma, Milton, and Vertran said.
Meanwhile, Mr. Thomas Stepforth had quietly brought the computer out so that his colleagues could hear, and just as quietly tiptoed back to the room in which he was virtually meeting with Selene Slocum-Lofton and John Worley.
“I couldn't live with your grandchildren!” Mr. Worley said when at last he came off mute. “I'd laugh myself to death!”
“I consider myself living in danger for family necessities,” Mr. Stepforth said, and Mr. Worley had to go back on mute.
“And this is why I have to sit in a different room – the perils of remarriage to an easily tickled man,” Mrs. Slocum-Lofton said, and smiled as her much beloved second husband's laughter got loud enough to be audible where she was. “We needed that break, though, because what is about to happen today is no laughing matter.”
“Nobody expected that hurricane breaking up like that,” Mr. Stepforth said, “but it would be Justicia.”
“The irony is poignant,” Mrs. Slocum-Lofton said. “I have an old portfolio here I was offered for potential investment in all that, and I pulled it out because it will be wanted at trial when this is all done.”
“Who do you have for the law firms involved in this?” Mr. Stepforth said.
“That's not the question I'm so much concerned with. John and I can't make the county numbers work for the size of the civil suit it will have to pay out. We can't even make a decent settlement work out.”
“Oh,” Mr. Stepforth said. “The county is going bankrupt, today.”
“Yes, and there is nothing anyone can do about it. Your little grands are hilarious, but also, just right.”
