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cut through another way to go on an errand for Mother. All alone in the school
Open, I looked up and up the sheer wall that towered without an opening on
this side from Crib Level all the way up to Doctor's Degree. And it scared me.
What if it should fall on me! I was so little and I could die! The building
looked as though it didn't know I was alive. It looked solid enough to go on
forever and ever after I died. I suddenly hammered my fists against the
vitricrete and cried, "I'm supposed to be immortal, not you! You you unlive
you! I've got a soul. Whoever heard of a vitricrete soul!"
But I was the one that bruised, and the vitricrete didn't even plop when I hit
it.
And then home to Mother's breaking. And my tears in the slot. And a weary
going on with the usual routine.
Dad came home that evening more silent than ever, if that's possible. My tears
were long dried and I was sitting on the floor in front of the telaworld
watching the evening news. I gave Dad a hi and cut my picture to half a screen
to clear for his sports program. I removed the ear so I could hear what Dad
had to say.
"Chis?" Dad asked as he flipped a finger to inflate the chair to his weight
before he dropped wearily into its curving angles.
"Not in yet," said Mother guiltily, her face pinking.
"He knows," said Dad. "Guidance warned us-and him. If he glide-hops once more
or enters male-subteen-restricted areas, he'll go to therapy."
"And so will we," I thought sickly. "The whole family will have to go to
therapy if Chis does. Illness isn't isolated."
"I-I-" Mother looked miserable. "Darin, can't we do something for Chis? Can't
we get him brighted on anything?"
"Like what?" Dad filled his half of the telaworld with his underwater program
and fumbled for the ear. "Even Guidance is stumped."
"But at ten?" Mother protested. "At ten to be so quenched on everything?"
"Guidance says they're working on it." Dad sharpened the focus on his
half-screen. A shark seemed to swim right off the screen at us. "He's on page
14 in volume 2-of the ten-year-olds. I wonder which, page they'd have me on?"
He turned from the telaworld. "I don't imagine the list would be very long of
malcontent males who stop in midmorning to remember the feel of sand
dissolving from under his bare feet in a numbing-cold, running stream."
"I wish," said Mother passionately, "that we could-just go!"
"Where?" asked Dad. "How? We'd have to put in for locale amends, specifying a
destination and motivation. Besides, is there any place-"
"Just any place," said Mother rigidly.
"Would it be different?" I asked, feeling hope surge up inside me. Mother
looked at me silently for a moment; then she sighed and her wrists went limp.
"No," she almost whispered. "It would be no different."
I didn't know when Chis came in. I guess he slid the secondary exit. But there
he was, sitting in his corner, twirls and twirling a green stem between his
fingers-a green stem with four leaves on it. I felt my heart sag. He had
picket leaf! From greenery!
Mother saw him about the same time I did. "Chis," she said softly, and Dad
turned to look. "Is that a real leaf?"
"Yes," he said, "a real one."
"Then you'd better put it in water before it dies," said Mother, not even a
tone in her voice to hint of all the laws; he had broken.
"In water?" Chis' eyes opened wide and so did mine.
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"Yes," said Mother. "It will last longer." She got a plastiglass from the
dispenser and filled it. She held it out to Chis. "Put the stem down in the
water," she said. And he did. And stood there with the glass tipping almost to
spilling and looked at Dad. Then he leaned over and put the plastiglass on the
table by Dad's chair. Dad looked at the leaf and then at Chis
"Will it grow?" asked Chis.
"No," said Dad. "It has no roots. But it will stay green for a while."
Chis reached his hand out and touched Dad gently on the shoulder. Dad showed
no withdrawal. "I won't ever take another," offered Chis.
"It's better not," said Dad.
"But someday," cried Chis, "I'm going away! I'm going to find a place where I
can run on a million, million leaves and no one will even notice!"
I hunched there in front of the telaworld and felt myself splintering slowly
in all directions into blunt slivers that could never fit together again. This
must be what they meant by crazing across. I was immortal, but I must die. And
soon, if I couldn't touch the soil I had never touched. I didn't want to touch
anywhere, and yet I could still feel a hand enveloping mine and another
pressed firmly against my waist. I hated where I was, but sickened to think of
change. But change has to come because. it had been noticeable that Dad hadn't
withdrawn when his own son touched him. Nothing would be smooth or fitted
together again-
I creaked tiredly to my feet. Mother quirked an eyebrow at me. "Only to the
perimeter," I said. "I want to walk before dimming."
Outside our unit I paused and looked up the endless height of the
building-blind, eyeless, but, because it is an older unit, I could still see
scars where windows used to be-when windows were desirable. I walked slowly
toward the perimeter, automatically reminding myself not to overstep. With
Chis already on warning, it wouldn't do for me to be Out of Area after hours.
Someday-some long away day-I'd be twenty-one and be able to flip my Ident
casually at the Eye and open any area, any hour of the day-well, not the
Restricted, of course. Or the Classified. Or the Industrial. Or the-well, I
have the list at home.
Around me, as up as I could see, were buildings. Around me as far as I could
see, were buildings. The Open of our area, ringed about by the breathing
greeneries, must have had people coming and going, surely a few, but I didn't
see them. I seldom do any more. Of course, you never deliberately look at
anyone. That's rude. Nor ever speak in public places except when you
absolutely have to. You do murmur to friends you meet. And because you don't
look and don't speak, people sort of get lost against the bigness and
solidbuiltness of the complexes. So I walked alone in the outer dimming, my
pneumonosoles not even whispering against the resilicrete floor of the Open.
I found myself counting steps and wondered why. Then I smiled, remembering. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]