Greg Bear - Darwin's Radio

“Exactly,” Abby said. “He was being defensive. But he knows me. He knows I don’t mince words, either. With all this original sin popping out all over, I think we’re in for a world of change. A lot of ways men and women do things will change. Don’t you think?”

“I’m sure of it,” Kaye said.

“I want you to work as hard as you can, please, dear, my new daughter, please, to make a place where there will be love and a gentle and caring center for Mitch. He looks tough and sturdy but men are really very fragile. Don’t let all this split you up, or damage him. I want to keep as much of the Mitch I know and love as I can, as long as I can. I still see my boy in him. My boy is strong there still.” There were tears in Abby’s eyes, and Kaye realized, holding the woman’s hand, that she had missed her own mother so much, for so many years, and had tried unsuccessfully to bury those emotions.

“It was hard, when Mitch was born,” Abby said. “I was in labor for four days. My first child, I thought the delivery would be tough, but not that tough. I regret we did not have more…but only in some ways. Now, I’d be scared to death. I am scared to death, even though there’s nothing to worry about between Sam and me.”

“I’ll take care of Mitch,” Kaye said.

“These are horrible times,” Abby said. “Somebody’s going to write a book, a big, thick, book. I hope there’s a bright and happy ending.”

That evening, over dinner, men and women together, the conversation was pleasant, light, of little consequence. The air seemed clear, the issues all rained out. Kaye slept with Mitch in his old bedroom, a sign of acceptance from Abby or assertion from Mitch or both.

This was the first real family she had known in years. Thinking about that, lying cramped up beside Mitch in the too-small bed, she had her own moment of happy tears.

She had bought a pregnancy test kit in Eugene when they had stopped for gas not far from a big drug store. Then, to make herself feel she was really making a normal decision despite a world so remarkably out of kilter, she had gone to a small bookstore in the same strip mall and bought a Dr. Spock paperback. She had shown the paperback to Mitch, and he had grinned, but she had not shown him the test kit.

“This is so normal,” she murmured as Mitch snored lightly. “What we’re doing is so natural and normal, please, God.”

Kaye drove through Portland while Mitch slept. They crossed the bridge into Washington state, passed through a small rainstorm and then back into bright sun. Kaye chose a turnoff and they ate lunch at a small Mexican restaurant near no town that had a name that they would know. The roads were quiet; it was Sunday.

They paused to nap for a few minutes in the parking lot and Kaye nestled her head on Mitch’s shoulder. The air was slow and the sun warmed her face and hair. A few birds sang. The clouds moved in orderly ranks from the south and soon covered the sky, but the air stayed warm.

After their nap, Kaye drove on through Tacoma, and then Mitch drove again, and they continued in to Seattle. Once through the downtown, passing under the highway-straddling convention center, Mitch felt anxious about taking her straight to his apartment.

“Maybe you’d like to see some of the sights before we settle in,” he said.

Kaye smiled. “What, your apartment is a mess?”

“It’s clean,” Mitch said. “It just might not be…” He shook his head.

“Don’t worry. I’m in no mood to be critical. But I’d love to look around.”

“There’s a place I used to visit a lot when I wasn’t digging…”

Gasworks Park sprawled below a low grassy promontory overlooking Lake Union. The remains of an old gas plant and other factory buildings had been cleaned out and painted bright colors and turned into a public park. The vertical gasworks tanks and decaying walkways and piping had not been painted, but had been fenced in and left to rust.

Mitch took her by the hand and led her from the parking lot. Kaye thought the park was a little ugly, the grass a little patchy, but for Mitch’s sake, said nothing.

They sat on the lawn beside the chain-link fence and watched passenger seaplanes landing on Lake Union. A few lone men and women, or women with children, walked to the playground beside the factory buildings. Mitch said the attendance was a little low for a sunny Sunday.

“People don’t want to congregate,” Kaye said, but even as she spoke, chartered buses were arriving in the parking lot, pulling into spaces marked off by ropes.

“Something’s up,” Mitch said, craning his neck.

“Nothing you planned for me?” she asked lightly.

“Nope,” Mitch said, smiling. “But maybe I don’t remember, after last night.”

“You say that every night,” Kaye said. She yawned, holding her hand over her mouth, and tracked a sailboat crossing the lake, and then a wind surfer in a wetsuit.

“Eight buses,” Mitch said. “Curious.”

Kaye’s period was three days late, and she had been regular since going off the pill, after Saul’s death. This caused a steely kind of concern. When she thought about what they might have started, her teeth ground together. So quickly. Old-fashioned romance. Rolling downhill, gathering speed.

She had not told Mitch yet, in case it was a false alarm.

Kaye felt separated from her body when she thought too hard. If she pulled back from the steely concern and just explored her sensations, the natural state of tissues and cells and emotions, she felt fine; it was the context, the implications, the knowing that interfered with simply feeling good and in love.

Knowing too much and never knowing enough was the problem.

Normal.

“Ten buses, whoops, eleven,” Mitch said. “Big damn crowd.” He stroked the side of her neck. “I’m not sure I like this.”

“It’s your park. I don’t want to move for a while,” Kaye said. “It’s nice.” The sun threw bright patches over the park. The rusty tanks glowed dull orange.

Dozens of men and women in earth-colored clothes walked in small groups from the buses toward the hill. They seemed in no hurry. Four women carried a wooden ring about a yard wide, and several men helped roll a long pole on a dolly.

Kaye frowned, then chuckled. “They’re doing something with a yoni and a lingam,” she said.

Mitch squinted at the procession. “Maybe it’s a giant hoop game,” he said. “Horseshoes or something.”

“Do you think?” Kaye asked with that familiar and uncritical tone he instantly recognized as no-holds-barred disagreement.

“No,” he said, smacking his temple with his palm. “How could I have not seen it right away? It’s a yoni and a lingam.”

“And you an anthropolologist,” she said, lightly doubling the syllables. Kaye got up on her knees and shaded her eyes. “Let’s go see.”

“What if we’re not invited?”

“I doubt it’s a closed party,” she said.

Dicken went though the security check — pat-down, metal detection wand, chemical sniff — and entered the White House through the so-called diplomatic entrance. A young Marine escort immediately took him downstairs to a large meeting room in the basement. The air conditioning was running full blast and the room felt cold as a refrigerator compared to the eighty-five-degree heat and humidity outside.

Dicken was the first to arrive. Other than the Marine and a steward arranging place settings — bottles of Evian and legal pads and pens — on the long oval conference table, he was alone in the room. He sat hi a chair reserved for junior aides at the back. The steward asked him if he’d like something to drink — a Coke or glass of juice. “We’ll have coffee down here in a few minutes.”