Efficiency

She sits in her rocker, looking out at her rose bushes, the buds just beginning to form, wondering when they will bloom. A week, maybe two? 

“C’mon, Grandma. Time to go.”

 She startles, looks up. “Go? Where are we going?”

“To our new home.”

She shakes her head, confused. “This is our home.” 

“Not anymore, Grandma. Remember?”

She looks around the empty room and furrows her brow. “Where is my bed . . . my nightstand? My medicine was on the nightstand.”

“It’s all packed. Everything we can bring.” The rest has been sold, but he does not say this. 

“Why?” 

“Because we’re moving.”

“What?” She sits up, drawing her shawl over her shoulders. Her cat, Lancelot, is nestled next to her. He shifts position and kneads his paws on the seat cushion. “Why in the world would we move?” She has lived in the house since she was a newlywed. 

“Because Flex Corp took the house. Remember, I . . .”

“Took the house?” she nearly laughs. “How could they? It’s been paid off for years.” Her attention drifts back to the yard and the robins pecking in the grass. The grubs must be here. They’ll need to spray for them.

“I know, but they’re taking it anyway. They need the land.”

“For what?” 

“A data center.”

She tilts her head, trying to decipher this foreign language. “A data center? What’s that?”

“A building full of computers that run everything. I explained it to you.”

“Computers? They’re putting computers in the house?”

He sighs. “No, Grandma, they’re tearing down the house, the neighborhood, to build a data center for the computers.” 

She looks alarmed, pushes herself up from the rocking chair, teetering unsteadily.

“Tear down the house? But my Henry built this house.”

“I know, Grandma. But it’s close to company headquarters and they want to build their data center here.”

She narrows her rheumy eyes. “They said that company would be good for this town. Said it would bring prosperity.”

“It has brought prosperity . . . to the owners of Flex Corps,” he adds, looking over his shoulder.

“They can’t just take our house! This is America.” She is worked up now, shaking her finger. “I’ll write to our congressman. Henry knows him.” 

She starts across the room but stops short. Her desk is not there.

“There’s no mail, anymore. Remember?”

“No mail? Don’t be silly.” She waves a bony hand. 

“C’mon, Grandma. There’s no time.”

“We’ll call then.” 

“There are no congressmen anymore. The president got rid of them. Remember?”

“What?” she says, aghast. “Then we’ll call the governor?” 

He shakes his head. 

“The mayor?” 

“They do what the president says.”

“We’ll call the president, then.”

“He does whatever Flex Corps says.”

“What about our constitutional rights?”

“There’s no Constitution anymore. They got rid of that, too.”

“What?” Alarm creeps across her cratered face. “So, they can just take our house?” Her voice cracks.

“It’s a matter of national security, they say. Not that they need a reason,” he says under his breath. “They can do whatever they want. C’mon, the soldiers are waiting.”

Her eyes go wide with fear. “Soldiers?”

“Flex Corps security.”

“Where are they taking us?”

“To the housing complex. They’re giving us an apartment in exchange for the house. Apartments are more efficient, they say. Everyone in the neighborhood is going.”

A voice outside yells, “Final call. Five minutes.”

She crosses the empty room and looks out the front window. Soldiers in black stand on either side of the street, FLEX CORPS in all caps across their backs, guns across their chests. Neighbors wait in line to board a bus that also says FLEX CORPS. She doesn’t recognize the faces, but the people seem familiar. Everyone’s heads are hanging, some cry. Tears well in her eyes.

A church steeple rises behind the bus. She can’t recall going, but the sight of it is comforting.

“The church?” She asks. “Will it be torn down, too?”

He drops his eyes, nods. “There’ll be a church at the Flex Corps complex. Attendance earns you credits for the dining hall.”

“The dining hall?”

“The apartments don’t have full kitchens. It’s more efficient for everyone to eat in the dining hall.” 

Panic floods her. She clutches at her shawl with gnarled hands, and shuffles across the empty room, searching for something, anything familiar. She ends up at the rocker—the only thing left, and catches sight of her garden. 

“What about my rose bushes?” she wails.

“No plants allowed. There’s no place for them at the complex.” 

She staggers and reaches for her dresser to steady herself, but it isn’t there. She grabs hold of the rocker, where Lancelot lounges, and bends to gather the cat, a gift from Henry when he got sick. “To keep you company when I’m gone,” he’d said.

“No pets, either.” 

“What?” she gasps, clutching Lancelot to her chest. “No. no!” she shakes her head, backing away.

“Sorry, Grandma,” he says softly and pries the old tom cat from her arms, sets him on the windowsill, gives him a pat. Lancelot leaps into the yard, climbs the maple tree and settles on his favorite branch. A shard of memory flashes in her mind--she and Henry on their knees, planting the maple sapling their first Easter in the house. She’d told him, kneeling there in the dirt, that she was pregnant with their oldest. She begins to weep.

Her grandson takes her hand and guides her from her room of fifty years. Void of its contents, it holds no memories for her—the bed where she nursed her three children and argued and made up with her husband, the dresser that held the sweaters she knit and souvenirs from her travels, the armchair where she read countless books, the desk where she wrote countless reviews and letters, many to her congressmen—all gone.

She leans heavily on her grandson as they make their way down the hall, past the blank spaces where family photos used to hang, past the kitchen where she cooked thousands of family meals.

“Remind me,” she says, “why did we give up our rights?”

“For efficiency,” he says.