They sat quietly in the lawyer's office waiting patiently. The air was cold, the lighting was cold, and the shelves of humorless law books made it seem even colder. Wendy shivered. Her father just crossed his arms and remained silent.
Wendy gripped Tom's hand tighter, holding onto him for dear life. A door opened suddenly and startled her. She took a deep breath as an older man in a slick suit made his way behind the oversized desk, and gave them all a disingenuous smile.
"Hello, Mr. Ward," he said to her father.
"Please, George is fine."
"Very well, George. Miss Ward," he said with a nod toward Wendy. "And..." he checked some paperwork, "And one Mr. Thomas Cisero...did I say that right? No matter. Let's get this squared away, shall we?"
"Thank you for seeing us on such short notice, Mr. Cohen," her dad said graciously. She wasn't happy about any of this, but she didn't have much of a choice in the matter.
"Ah, yes, well I owed Harvey a favor, so I'm glad I could fit you in." Harvey was her dad's regular attorney. This Mr. Cohen was supposedly a specialist in owned persons cases...like theirs. "Okay, before we get started, Tom, I'm going to have to ask you to wait outside in the reception area, if you please."
"No, I want to stay for this," he protested. Wendy could feel him tensing up.
"I'm sorry, but that's just not how we do things. Besides, you have no role in this--"
"No role?" Tom interrupted a little too loudly. "It's my fucking life that's being traded around like I'm some kind of used car or something."
Mr. Cohen held up his hands and waited for Tom to calm down before speaking. "Which is exactly why you shouldn't be here. Emotions can run high, as you so aptly demonstrated, and to be a witness to this process won't do you, or your loved ones, any good. I'm afraid I'm going to have to insist that you wait outside." He pressed a button on his desk phone.
"I will not," Tom declared. "I'm not a piece of property, I'm a human being, for God's sake."
"Legally, you are an owned person. You are biologically a human being, yes, but as far as the law is concerned you are something else entirely."
"This is bullshit." Tom tried to stand, but Wendy held him down.
"Wendy," her father said in a low voice, "Ask him to wait outside. It will only be a few minutes."
"Mr. Ward," the lawyer spoke up before Wendy could respond. "Technically you are still his current owner. If you give the order, he must comply or be in violation of 27.1 through 27.5 of his indentured agreement contract and be subject to potential repossession by the company."
"Well, we don't want that." Her father said, then cleared his throat. "Tom, please, for Wendy's sake, just go wait in the other room. We'll take care of this thing, and then we can all go home...together"
Tom let go of Wendy's hand. "It's not fair that I can't--"
"Tom!" Wendy knew that tone of voice - she'd only heard it twice in her life: once when she'd snuck out her window one night to go to a party, and once when he caught her smoking. It was his don't-fuck-with-me voice. "Wait outside. Now!"
For a moment it seemed like Tom was going to refuse. She'd never seen anyone stand up to her father when he was in this kind of mood. Her stomach churned and she feared she would be sick. Tom was silent for several long seconds, then nodded. She could see the fight go out of him. He was surrendering, not just to her father's demands, but to his whole situation.
"I guess I don't have much of a choice, now do I...master?" He tried to make that sting like he often did when he fought with her, but her dad was made of sterner stuff than she.
"I guess not, boy. Now move your skinny ass out of here before I have to do it for you."
He didn't have to humiliate him like that, Wendy thought. She was embarrassed for him.
"Fine, I'm leaving," he said as if it was his decision, and walked out briskly.
"I've seen worse," Mr. Cohen commented and added an unctious smile that was meant to be consoling but just came across as creepy. "First, Miss Ward, I need to apprise you of your rights and responsibilities as a holder of an owned person."
The process took longer than a few minutes. Wendy had a pounding headache by the end of it. Her hand was cramped after all the signing she had to do. She felt demeaned by the act of taking legal ownership of the man she loved, and she could only imagine how belittling it had to be for Tom. She felt just awful, but it was better than knowing he was dying a slow death somewhere in a Russian prison factory just to satisfy a debt to a soulless crypto company.
All she wanted to do was go home and take a very long, very hot shower.
~ ~ ~
Tom opened the door for Wendy, which was a nice gesture, she thought. If nothing else, this experience seemed to have taught him some manners. She walked into the house and sighed. No one had talked on the ride home, which was just as well. She couldn't have handled the fight that would have provoked.
"Okay, so that's over with." She turned and hugged Tom. "Now things can get back to normal."
"How is that even possible...mistress?" Tom said sardonically.
"Oh, please don't call me that." She held him tight. "Nothing has to be any different between us. We can simply go back to the way things were and just pretend like this never happened."
He let her hug him for a bit, then held her at arm's length. "We both know we can't do that. You own me, for God's sake. How am I supposed to just pretend like that isn't real?"
Wendy shrugged, it was obviously affecting him more than she thought it would. "We're going to be married soon enough...and then we'll own each other. It's not a big deal."