Octavia E. Butler - Earthseed, Book 1 -… [708]

Room and board. The offered salaries were so low that if Dad and Cory both worked, they wouldn’t earn as much as Dad is earning now with the college. And out of it they’d have to pay rent as well as the usual expenses. In fact, when you add everything up, it’s clear that with the six of us, they couldn’t earn enough to meet expenses. — , Octavia E. Butler - Earthseed, Book 1 -…, 708

Note

The whole seduction of Olivar dismantled by arithmetic done in the family’s own terms — two Ph.D.s against one income. Butler lets the math be the argument; the concluding sentence’s plain “it’s clear” is the sound of hope being audited.