The Nanny Plan. Sarah M. Anderson
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to the Speaker Symposium at San Francisco State University. I am your host, Jennifer McElwain...”
Trish tuned the woman out as Jennifer went on about SFSU’s “long and proud” history of social programming, other “distinguished guests,” blah-blah. Instead of listening, Trish scanned the crowd. Over half of the mostly female crowd looked like they were hoping for a wild ride in a limo to happen within an hour.
The sight of so many young, beautiful women made Trish feel uneasy. This was not her world, this college full of young, beautiful people who could casually hook up and hang out without worrying about an unexpected pregnancy, much less how to feed that baby. Trish’s world was one of abject poverty, of never-ending babies that no one planned for and, therefore, no one cared for. No one except her.
Not for the first time, she felt like an interloper. Even though she was in her final year of getting a master’s degree in social work—even though she’d been on this campus for five years—she still knew this wasn’t her world.
Suck it up, she thought to herself as she counted the number of television cameras rolling. Five. The event was getting great press.
She was a woman with a large check and a secondhand Wonder Woman T-shirt waiting to ambush one of the richest men on the planet. That was her, Trish Hunter, in a nutshell.
“...And so,” Jennifer went on, “we are thrilled to have the creator of SnAppShot, Mr. Nate Longmire, here with us tonight to discuss social responsibility and the Giving Pledge!”
The crowd erupted into something that wasn’t quite a cheer but came damn close to a catcall as the Boy Billionaire himself walked on stage.
The audience surged to their feet and Trish surged with them. Longmire walked right past her. She had an excellent view of him.
Oh. Oh, wow. It’s not like she didn’t know what Nate Longmire looked like. She’d read up on his public persona—including that ridiculous article naming him one of the Top Ten Bachelors of Silicon Valley, complete with a photo spread.
But none of the pictures—not a single one of them—did the man justice. Attraction spiked through her as she studied him. In person, the tall frame and the broad shoulders weren’t just eye-catching, they moved with a rippled grace that left her feeling flushed. He had on hipster jeans and Fluevog boots, but he’d paired them with a white tailored shirt with French cuffs and a purple sweater. A striped purple tie was expertly tied around his neck. He wore a scruffy beard and thick horn-rimmed glasses. They were the nerdiest things about him.
Longmire turned his face to the crowd and Trish swore she saw him blush as the thunderous noise continued. He did not preen. If anything, he looked almost uncomfortable. Like he didn’t quite fit in up there.
“Thank you,” he said when the noise did not let up. “Please,” he asked, a note of desperation in his voice, motioning for everyone to sit down. That, at least, worked. “There we go. Good evening, San Francisco State University!”
More applause. Trish swore he winced. He sat on a stool in the middle of the stage, gestured and the lights went down. A single spotlight fell on him. Behind him, a screen lowered to the ground and a slideshow began.
“Technology,” he started as the screen flashed images of attractive people on tablets and smartphones, “has an enormous transformative power. Instant communication has the power to topple governments and reshape societies at a rate of speed that our forefathers—Steve Jobs and Bill Gates—only dreamed of.” The audience laughed at this joke. Longmire gave them a tight smile.
Trish studied him as he spoke. He’d obviously memorized his remarks—not surprising, given that the press had reported his IQ at 145—just above the threshold for a true genius. But when the audience responded in any way, he seemed to draw back, as if he didn’t know what to do when he went off script. Excellent. That was exactly the sort of speaker who wouldn’t know how to tap-dance out of a blatant donation request.
“And you are on the cusp of this technological revolution. You have that power at your fingertips, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.” Longmire paused to take a drink from a water bottle and clear his throat. Trish had the distinct impression that he was forcing himself through this. Interesting, she thought.
“The problem then becomes one of inequality,” Longmire went on. “How can you communicate with the rest of humanity if they don’t have those things?” Images of tribal Africans, destitute southern Asians, aboriginals from Australia and—holy crap, had he actually found a picture of...Trish studied the photo hard before it clicked past. No, that hadn’t been her reservation out in South Dakota, but it might have been the Rosebud lands.
Well. Yay for him acknowledging the state of the Native American reservations in a five-second picture, even if the montage did irritate her. All the people of color had been relegated to the poor section of the talk.
“We have a responsibility to use that power—that wealth,” he went on, “for the betterment of our fellow humans on this planet...”
Longmire talked for another forty-five minutes, calling for the audience members to look beyond their own screens and be conscious consumers of technology. “Be engaged,” he told them. “A rising tide lifts all boats. Solar-powered laptops can lift children out of poverty. Make sure the next Big Thing won’t be lost to poverty and disease. It all starts with you.” This time, when he smiled at the crowd, it was far more confident—and far more practiced. “Don’t let me down.”
The screen behind him shifted to the official Longmire Foundation photo with the Twitter handle and website. The crowd erupted into applause, giving him a six-minute standing ovation while Longmire half sat on his stool, drinking his water and looking like he’d rather be anywhere but here.
The emcee came back out on stage and thanked Longmire for his “absolutely brilliant” talk before she motioned to where the microphones had been set up in the aisles. “Mr. Longmire has agreed to take questions,” Jennifer gushed.
Timing was everything. Trish didn’t want to go first, but she didn’t want to wait until the reporters started to pack up. She needed a lull that was just long enough for her to haul out her check and get to the microphone before anyone could stop her.
About ten students lined up in either aisle. Some questions were about how Longmire had started his company in his dorm room and how a regular student could come up with a billion-dollar idea.
“What’s something that people need?” Longmire replied. “I wanted a way to take my digital photos with me. Adapting a simple idea that would make it easier to share photos with my parents—and make it easy for my parents to share those photos with other people—led me to adapting the SnAppShot app to every device, every platform available. It was ten years of hard work. Don’t believe what the press says. There are no overnight successes in this business. See a need and fill it.”
When he was replying, Trish noted, he had a different style. Maybe it was because he was really only talking to one person? But his words flowed more easily and he spoke with more conviction. The power in his words filled the auditorium. She could listen to that voice all night—he was mesmerizing.
This was a problem. Trish rubbed her hands on her jeans, trying to steady her nerves. Okay, so he spoke quite well off the cuff—which he demonstrated when a few people asked antagonistic questions.
Instead of acting trapped, Longmire’s face would break into a sly smile—one completely different from the cautious movement of lips he’d used during his prepared remarks. Then he would dissect the question at an astonishing rate and completely undercut the argument, all without getting off the stool.
Ah, yes. This was his other reputation, the businessman who, much like his technological forefathers, would occasionally sue people for fun and profit. Nate Longmire had amassed the reputation of a man who never gave up and never surrendered in the courtroom. He’d completely bankrupted his former college friend, the one he’d started SnAppShot with.
Trish