Representatives of Future Money
by Perry Genovesi
Emma made it through two sets of security scanners. She set on her game face before meeting Mr. Barnaby. Then they were strolling through the verdant walkways of Collegiate Gothic towers, clean brick, and lush pine.
“Have you ever experienced a day like this, Chrick Day?” said Mr. Barnaby. “I mean here at ground zero? I know your Pops did.”
“I…honestly try to avoid campus on the big day. Dad and I pretty much shelter in place on Track Day, Homecoming, and Graduation. Especially today,” she said, trying to keep the mood light.
“Many do,” said Mr. Barnaby.
Emma retold her anecdotes about Dad working University Buildings and Security back in the day, making sure to leave out how good these gigs were before they were privatized. Mr. Barnaby was the part-time director; Dad had told her how an exec – who was probably Barnaby – had helped contract out and tear these once family-sustaining jobs down in the ‘90s.
“ I don’t expect any problems today,” Mr. Barnaby said. “One glance at you – you look like a bad girl, honey!”
At least her baggy uniform hid her figure from him. Emma stared at a donor’s name engraved into walkway bricks.
| M. Lowry Lavoratto Class of 1944 Lavoratto Brokerage |
They’d never give a Working Joe like Dad a brick, even though he’d given his life’s best years to Building Management. Emma pushed aside those feelings. At the very least this job meant Emma wouldn’t have to drive for rideshare so much. Freedom Security Contractors had hired her for a day but there was an opportunity to stay on if they liked her. Dad might be relieved. Here, Emma was no longer just your average Jane passing through. “No problems except people trying to do you-know-what to the statue,” Emma said. The application had been vague, mentioning only Physical Security and Guardianship of the Donor’s Path Statue.
The path opened up to a podium and benches. The sweat on her upper lip tasted sour.
The bronze sculpture stood atop the podium. Thomas Marshall Chrick. The metal patriarch, hands folded behind his frock, beheld the holly-flanked Donor’s Path. He sported that coiffed beard, mustache, colonialist hat, and powdered wig. His belt buckle shone in the sun. Mr. Barnaby laid his hand on one bronze knee and Emma looked at his wedding ring and then touched the knee too.
Two rising juniors wearing trademark red shirts already soaked with beer or sweat around the collar dragged a duffel bag. When they saw her aiming her Receptor on her chest, they scrambled behind the benches then off toward Spruce, leaving the bag behind. That’s right, Emma thought. She said to Barnaby, “So we’re not gonna talk about the number one threat to Thom up there today?” He kept his eyes on his watch but sweat beaded his temples.
Emma said, “Don’t…want to be vulgar but…”
Barnaby looked like a millipede about to curl.
“‘Dee’ Chrick?” Emma said, watching his chest rise. “Some vandals might try to wreak havoc on you-know-where? I’ve been preparing.”
“Please guard against any vandalism.” He gestured down. “You may have some – suspected radicals out there today.”
“You know how many we expect to get? Have you checked any of the feeds?”
“I did not.”
“People are feeling some kind of way about the U-R-P’s and might want to express that.” U-R-P’s, United Reception Plazas, were the new housing incentives for Chrick University Workers. “You’ll have some people saying they jack up property tax. Some people just want to be heard, and might think…altering the statue’s the best way?”
The U-R-P deal came with the newest 403b Plan, Emma found out on online orientation. But the incentive didn’t apply to those workers who were contracted. She wondered if Hunter had gotten it.
Barnaby left. By the Mary Chrick Library, clusters of students stumbled around in their red shirts and trucker Chrick Caps.
| Janaya Parvel Class of 1975 Tech Front 1 Security, Founder |
Emma told the student with the paint-spattered shopping bag to halt. He abandoned his bag at his shoes like a good puppy. Sometimes Emma wished she were shorter, more petite and less intimidating, less intense. Maybe ten years ago, when Emma took that summer Design Camp here. Emma remembered Hunter was taking it too. He had his license and so could drive them in from the suburbs. They listened to the White Album on cassette which was the first time Emma realized they had goodass songs beyond Dad’s pronouncements.
She and Hunter still talk to each other on social media. He was Emma’s first kiss, right there on Dad’s stoop after the last day of class. Hunter’s got a wife now according to social media. So grown up.
Emma stalked toward one curly-haired louse, his arm rocking, shaking an aerosol can and darting toward the statue.
Emma pressed her Receptor which beeped and whirred. “Stop, Marcus Simmons,” Emma said, “Class of 2029!” The Receptor dug deeper. “B.A.L 1.5 percent!” A goofy picture of Marcus passing out pamphlets for some Democrat’s political campaign coalesced in her vision.
“I could Recept you for public intoxication right now. Don’t let’s make it your fourth count of attempted vandalism.” Marcus glared at her with his goony friend. Then he told her to go fuck herself.
Emma threw her arms up. God she hated being cursed at. God she hated them. Hard to believe these were future presidents, celebrities, representatives of future money.
Emma wondered what Hunter’s donor brick would look like.
| Hunter Berryman Just took a summer design class here but taught Emma Marshall how to kiss, with tongue |
—
Q: How did Emma first see her?
A: Marching up from Walnut, an upside-down U.S. flag modeled into a tube top. She had a better cat’s eye than Emma’s, though her green hair dye was patchy with gray showing through. She raced near the statue to the trio of spray paint cans another rising junior had surrendered. Emma aimed her Receptor and clicked it on.
“You’re protecting that?” she said. Not university-associated. Dropped out of Temple her sophomore year. A Vesna Haven resident and active member in the People Up organization.
Emma told her that’s what she was doing.
“It’s ridiculous. How much profit his foundation rakes in,” Aamina said. “How much real estate they owe to the Black and Brown people of this city. How much they owe in reparations.”
“I…have no comment on that today.” Emma couldn’t help feeling woozy, this being the most anyone had talked about the political character of the job with her today.
“Chrick reaped the fruits of the slave trade. Brought over—”
“Memphis, Wooster, and Chester.” The foundation had etched their names on the memorial too, after months of protest, which Emma had participated in years ago. His ‘little kids’ Chrick had called them.
“So you know. And yet…”
“I needed a job!” Emma wished she had something better to say. Her stomach was filling up with Receptions of Aamina’s relationships. Emma blinked onto a vision of Aamina’s father. Judging by her Receptions, Aamina’s Dad appeared to be in better health. “I’m listening,” Emma said.
“What about the land Chrick sits on? Lenapehoking? The land they took?” said Aamina. “The poor and working families displaced. Because of this racist’s manifest destiny. His dream. His nightmare. For this school?”
“I bet it’s awful.” Emma didn’t want to get too attached in her own sympathetic gestures. “I’m sure it disproportionately impacts low-wage households. So what do we do about his legacy then?”
“What are you saying?” Aamina bent and grabbed a spraypaint can. Emma’s throat closed up.
“Let me dick Chrick,” said Aamina.
“Why?”
“I’ll tell you what not acting would do. Tell Slavemaster Chrick U that everything’s cool – no problems with their fascist.” Aamina stepped toward the statue.
“If you did that, the U would just see it as an extension of today’s frattiness. Might as well wrap a beer bong around his neck. They wouldn’t see your desire for change which, I’m gonna repeat,” Emma showed her palms, “I hear you. I do.” This statue was such a sacred cow. Though to different people it meant different things.
“So you’re out here telling me what is and isn’t protest? Just feeding the university’s line to me?”
“No, I’m,” Emma smiled, “I have nothing to do with the university. I’m a contract worker.”
“You can be a better comrade than you’re being now.”
“Look, my Dad lives with me in South Philadelphia. He worked Chrick Buildings and Security until they started privatizing. They laid him off, he got sick. Couldn’t work.” Emma’s throat dried; she tasted dead leaves. “We can talk about dicking Chrick all we want. But is that gonna heal our Dads?”
“Did you Recept me?”
“You—”
“I didn’t consent to that.”
“You agree as soon as you enter campus property,” Emma said.
“This university pushes property values off the cliff wherever it crams in new campuses. Those U-R-P’s. They displace hundreds of Black and Brown elders in West. My Aunt Beth.” Aamina stepped close to read Emma’s ID. “Emma Mitchell. You need to educate yourself,” she said.
Emma winced. “I know all about it. My Dad got displaced by a U-R-P, ok? And I know how the U-R-P’s brought in professors and their stupidass kids.”
“Why should I care about your Dad?” she said.
Emma Recepted Aamina again, deeper. It might’ve been a health risk but Emma had to know. Click. Aamina’s Dad had been slapped with a DUI right outside the M. Lowry Lavoratto Stadium. University Property. That led to the loss of his license, then his job, then his house, which was why he lived with Aamina and her boyfriend now at 5501 Vesna. “We’re on the same team, ok?” said Emma. “Maybe you just…haven’t had to struggle with employment like I have. Like our dads have.” Emma could see her job statistics, relationship status – everything.
“I’ve struggled, bitch. You don’t know.”
Emma closed her eyes and inhaled. “Just move on.”
“Emma. Emma!” she shouted.
“Move along, please, Ms. You can’t be rude to me like that. Or…” Emma made a show of pressing her Receptor until Thomas Marshall Crick’s stenciled face glowed in it. Aamina backed away.
—
Emma sat on the one of two benches that wasn’t occupied by passed-out Chrick junior, good old’ Marcus Simmons, of the Hammerbett College House, Room 615. Courtyard holly smelled like vomit. Here, sober as babytears, was Emma Mitchell.
| Emma Mitchell State College – Class of 2013 Underemployed until finding a random Unico Ad for Freedom Security Contractors |
Emma dragged her fingers down her cheeks. If Aamina Reynolds were sleeping like Marcus, the University would arrest her for vagrancy. Dicks.
“Emma?”
When Emma looked back, she almost wanted to Recept him to make sure it was really him.
“Are you…working here?” Hunter said.
“Shut up!” Emma wanted to tell him how she just needed any job. Emma stood, knocked him on the shoulder, and they hugged, like how Emma remembered. He smelled like vanilla. His tan collared shirt made him look like a scout – maybe a People Up radical instead of a first love. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m on the Design and Architecture Board now,” he said. “I just accepted it last week.”
Emma stood straighter. “Good…but you know I don’t care about that stuff.”
“So you’re hanging here on the day we all avoid, huh? Doesn’t look like too many have been trying to dick Chrick,” he gestured with a jerking hand.
“Had one suspected rad.” Emma smiled. “But I put her in check.” Emma mashed fist into her palm. “How’s Theresa?”
“We split,” he said. “She decided she liked girls.” He scratched his hair and looked at his shoes.
“I haven’t posted about it. Did you know that because you—” he pointed to her Receptor.
“No!”
“It’s just weird to see you here like this,” he said.
Emma bent her head toward the sun and then away from it. “I mean we’re both here, working for slavemaster Chrick,” Emma said.
He squinted. “But I’m on the Board. I’m walking to my company car – a Prito in the Master Lot. They gave me my own parking space – charging station and everything. An expense account. The most money I’ve ever made. I’m not bragging.”
“I know.”
“I bought the house…I live in, a U-R-P. We have a community garden, co-op coffee, yoga commissary—”
Emma laughed.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
He brushed hair from his eyes. The paint smell crawled up her throat.
“With the Chricksurance I have, you wouldn’t have had to…do so much crowdsourcing when your Dad’s cancer…”
“Duh,” Emma said. What the hell was he asking? But then a paint can rattling made her turn.
“Hey!” Emma pivoted. After Emma dealt with Cheryl Rockefeller with the yeast infection, BAC 2.0%, she had to scare away another little shit who abandoned a can near his white Nikes and fled. Emma tried to maintain some sexy panache on her walk back to Hunter, but there was nothing fashionable about her today. He grabbed the can Cheryl had left. “It’s funny – I’ve been thinking about you,” Hunter said.
Emma’s neck was slick and her collar felt gritty – the thought of how haggard she must’ve looked in front of him hurt. Some sour mush felt like it had lodged in her throat. “You know it was the fucking U-R-P’s which pushed him out. That’s why he had to move in with me. Because of his former employer,” she said.
“Shit.”
“Yeah it’s no good.”
“It’s funny. It’s like if anyone deserved to do this today, it’s you.”
Emma pulled her bandanna from her pocket and wiped her face.
“I mean I’m down with Chrick,” said Hunter. “I’ve got a Chrickulous shirt. You know what serendipity is? I mean it’s like we did the summer design at Coates House – what, ten years ago? And now I’m on the payroll, and you’re…here? And your Dad? Fate’s not supposed to let that happen.”
Emma scratched her neck. He spritzed the bottom of the bench, testing the paint, motes wisping by his fingers and blowing toward her in the wind. The rotten egg smell assailed. He rose toward Chrick’s figure.
“Try it,” Emma said.
Emma turned on her Receptor and inched toward him. In one swooping motion Hunter sprayed a footlong down the statue’s right knee, and then drew three drops and filled them in. Emma grabbed his wrist. He pushed against her, but Emma forced him up. “Ow! You’re hurting me! Jesus.” His mouth was on hers. Maybe he was trying to give it all to her. Horrendous. Things got fuzzy after that. His hot breath, and then his sticky tongue seeking out her gums and teeth.
Emma took out her phone and glared at her reflection on the black screen. When she looked up he was shaking his head. “Fuck,” he said. “What was that, Em? I thought you were different now.”
“Now?”
He tried leaving the way he came but Emma double-tapped the Receptor, holding it until Thom’s face was sizzling red. Hunter lumbered back, fixing his eyes on hers. He reversed and lurched down Donor’s Path to the Master Cave.
Emma used her Receptor to radio Mr. Barnaby and told him she had one coming his way.
“Your Pops would be proud,” he’d say, after her shift ended and he’d invited her to stay on permanent part-time.
Perry Genovesi lives in West Philadelphia, works as a public librarian, and is a proud member of AFSCME Local 2187. His first book, Skintet and Other Tales of the Brassican American Experience in Philadelphia, is forthcoming from Main Street Rag. His work has won the O:JA&L Weitz Prize, been featured on Top 50 Micro Writings of 2025 (Scaffold) and been nominated for the Best of the Net Anthology and Best Microfiction. You can read him in The Santa Monica Review, Bridge Eight, BOOTH, and collected on tiny.cc/PerryGenovesi. Death to valorizing being busy! IG and Bluesky: @beerdistributor