The Emoticon Generation Read Online Free PDF

slammed the door behind her, and left Glynis in darkness.
    But Glynis didn’t let the subject drop. She pestered her mother every day. And, five days before the birthday, Olivia finally relented: “Okay. Okay.”
    Glynis crouched in front of her mother, her eyes glittering in excitement. “Okay?”
    “I’ll tell you his name,” Olivia said, then added in determination: “But not as a birthday gift.”
    Glynis wanted to argue the point, but held her tongue. “His name is Jonathan. Jonathan Hatch.”
    “You took his name ?” Glynis whispered in awe, even as she silently repeated the name in her mind.
    Her mother flashed an involuntarily smile, and said, “Yes, I have his name.” Then they’d been married ! “He was very handsome when he was young, just a bit taller than me, and had the most beautiful blue eyes you ever saw.” She held her daughter’s chin and looked into her face. “You have his eyes.”
    “ You have blue eyes.”
    “True. But you have his blue eyes. Now that’s all you’re ever going to hear about him. Is that understood?” Glynis understood. But she understood even more. When her mother talked about this Jonathan-Hatch-Jonathan-Hatch-Jonathan-Hatch, she talked about him with love in her voice. There was no hint of hate, resentment, or pain. It didn’t end badly, whatever it was. He was a nice, loving man!
    “Oh, thanks , Mom,” she engulfed her mother in a massive hug and inhaled a whiff of that wonderful smell her mom always had. “Thank you! Thank you!”
    “Now,” Olivia said, hugging her back, “I have to think of a good gift to get you for your birthday.”
    Glynis tore herself away and looked up at the forty-three-year-old face. “You don’t have to. Really!”
    Olivia ignored her. “I’ll think of something nice.”
    That night, Glynis could hardly sleep. She tossed and turned, rolling the name in her head, trying to attach an image to it. A man called Jonathan Hatch must have black hair and not brown hair. Or he must have big brows. But what took up most of her time was trying to figure why her mother, on the one hand, always tensed up when the subject of Glynis’ father, Olivia’s husband, Jonathan , was broached, and how, on the other hand, she talked about him earlier that day with love and affection. It didn’t make sense.
    There was something there. Something big. But no longer something scary.
    At last, she had a clue; she could begin to investigate.
    The next day when Glynis woke up, her mother, as usual, had already gone to work. Glynis fixed herself a sandwich, brought it with her, and sat in front of the computer in her room. Finally there was an advantage to her physical affliction. She had a rare and congenital calcium deficiency that made her bones brittle and easily broken – enough so that her mother never risked taking Glynis out of the house not even to school. Ron and the computer taught her everything. Over the years, the grownups had learned that she gets her lessons done even when left alone. Well, it was time to play hooky.
    She accessed the Net, and as she did so, she involuntarily mimicked her mother’s smile. For some reason, Olivia was amused each and every time she saw Glynis surfing the Net. That, in turn, always seemed absurd to Glynis. For god’s sakes, it was 2019; who didn’t surf the Net?
    Glynis began with a rudimentary search for the name Jonathan Hatch. She turned up three people – a twenty-year-old student in Oxford, a newborn whose pictures and name were put there by the proud parents, and a forty-year-old man in Los Angeles looking for a male companion. Of course it wouldn’t be that easy.
    She had to widen the search. Maybe he wasn’t an American like his wife and daughter. Maybe he wasn’t even in the States. So she couldn’t search for his name in a certain city or a specific country. But if her father was not a natural citizen or did not die here – then he must have either arrived or left, and all visas and