was demoted from his residency in the medical center. Though he had an M.D., with special training in pediatric oncology, he could find work only as a lowly-paid medical attendant in the center, where there had to be maintained a bias against him, that he might never be allowed to “practice” medicine again. Yet, Dad never (publicly) complained—he was lucky, he often (publicly) said, not to be imprisoned, and to be alive.
From time to time MIs were obliged to restate the terms of their crimes and punishments, and to (publicly) express gratitude for their exoneration and current employment. On such occasions Dad took a deep breath and, as he said, bartered his soul another time.
Poor Dad! He was so good-natured in our household, I don’t think I realized how terrible he must have felt. How broken.
Within the family it was understood that we didn’t discuss Dad’s status per se, but we seemed to be allowed—that is, we were not expressly forbidden—to allude to his MI status in the way you might allude to a chronic condition in a family member like multiple sclerosis, or Tourette’s, or a predilection for freak accidents. Being MI was something shameful, embarrassing, potentially dangerous—but since MI was a (relatively) minor criminal category compared with more serious criminal categories, it wasn’t a treasonable offense to acknowledge it. But Dad took risks, even so.
For one of the memories that comes to me, strangely clear and self-contained, like a disturbing dream suddenly recalled in daylight, was how one day when no one was home except us Dad took me upstairs to an attic room that had been shut up for as long as I could remember, with a padlock; and in that room Dad retrieved from beneath a loose floorboard, beneath a worn carpet, a packet of photographs of a man who looked teasingly familiar to me, but whom I could not recall—“This is your uncle Tobias, who was Deleted when you were two years old.”
At this time I was ten years old. My two-year-old self was lost and irretrievable. In a quavering voice Dad explained that his “beloved, reckless” younger brother Tobias had lived with us while going to medical school and that he’d drawn the attention of the F.B.E./F.B.I. (Federal Bureau of Examiners, Federal Bureau of Inquisitors) after helping organize a May Day free-speech demonstration. At the age of twenty-three “your uncle Toby” had been arrested in this very house, taken away, allegedly tried—and Deleted.
That is, “vaporized.”
What is that, Daddy?—“vaporized.” Though I knew the answer would be sad I had to ask.
“Just—gone, sweetie. Like a flame when it’s been blown out.”
I was too young to register the depth of loss in my father’s eyes.
For Dad had often that look of loss in his face. Exhausted from his hospital job, and his skin ashy, and a limp in his right leg from some accident after which a bone had not mended correctly. Yet, Dad had a way of smiling that made everything seem all right.
Just us, kids! We’re hanging in here.
Except right now Dad wasn’t smiling. Turned a little from me so (maybe) I wouldn’t notice him wiping tears from his eyes.
“We aren’t supposed to ‘recall’ Tobias. Certainly not provide information to a child. Or look at pictures! I could be arrested if—anyone heard.”
By anyone Dad meant the Government. Though you would not say that word—“Government.” You would not say the words “State”—“Federal Leaders.” It was forbidden to say such words and so, as Dad did, you spoke in a vague way, with a furtive look—if anyone heard.
Or, you might say They.
You could think of anyone, or they, as a glowering sky. A low-ceiling sky of those large dirigible clouds rumored to be surveillance devices, sculpted shapes like great ships, often bruised colored and iridescent from pollution, moving unpredictably but always there.
Downstairs, in the vicinity of our electronic devices, Dad would never speak so openly. Of course you would never trust your computer no matter how friendly and throaty-seductive its voice, or your cell phone or dicta-stylus, but also thermostats, dishwashers, microwaves, car keys and (self-driving) cars.
“But I miss Toby. All the time. Seeing medical students his age … I miss how he’d be a wonderful uncle to you, and to Rod.”
It was confusing to me. I’d forgotten what Dad had said—Vaporized? Deleted?
But I knew not to ask Dad more questions right now, and make him sadder.
Exciting to see photographs of my lost “Uncle Toby” who looked like a younger version of my father. Uncle Toby had had a frowning-squinting kind of smile, like Dad. And his nose was long and thin like Dad’s with a tiny bump in the bone. And his eyes!—dark brown with a glisten, like my own.
“Uncle Toby looks like he’d be fun.”
Was this a stupid thing to say? Right away I regretted it but Dad only just smiled sadly.
“Yes. Toby was fun.”
He’d tried to warn his brother about being involved in any sort of free speech or May Day demonstrations, Dad said. Even during what had appeared to be a season of (relative) relaxation on the part of the Homeland Security Public Dissemination Bureau; during such seasons, the Government eased up on public-security enforcement, yet, as Dad believed, continued to monitor and file away information about dissenters and potential SIs (Subversive Individuals), for future use. Nothing is ever forgotten—Dad warned.
At such times rumors would be circulated of a “thaw”—a “new era”—for always, as Dad said, people are eager to believe good news, and to forget bad news; people wish to be “optimists” and not “pessimists”; but “thaws” are factored into cycles and soon come to an end leaving incautious persons, especially the young and naïve, vulnerable to exposure and arrest and—what comes after arrest.
After Uncle Toby’s disappearance (as it was called) law enforcement officers had raided the house and appropriated his medical textbooks, lab notebooks, personal computer and electronic devices, etc., and all pictures of him either digital or hard copy that they could find; but Dad had managed to hide away a few items, at great risk to his own safety.
Saying, “I’m not proud of myself, honey. But I knew it would be wisest to ‘repudiate’ my brother—formally. By that time he’d been Deleted, so there was no point in defending him, or protecting him. I guess I was pretty convincing—and your mother, too—swearing how we didn’t realize we were harboring an SI—a ‘traitor’—so they let us off with just a fine.”
Dad drew his sleeve across his face. Wiping his face.
“A devastating fine, actually. But we had to be grateful the house wasn’t razed, which sometimes happens when there’s treason involved.”
“Does Mom know?”
“‘Know’—what?”
“About Uncle Toby’s things here.”
“No.”
Dad explained: “Mom ‘knows’ that my brother was Deleted. She never speaks of him of course. She might have ‘known’ that I’d kept back a few personal items of
