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.There was bewilderment spreading across his face, and little points of pain in the palm of the hand holding the stapler, and what in hell was she doing !He just kept looking at her.He looked.sad?’Do you have to work at being that cynical?’ he asked.‘I mean, do you have to take special classes or something?’‘It just sort of happens,’ she said in a very small voice.He reached to put an arm around her shoulders; she tensed, reflexively, and he stopped.’You know what the worst part of it is?’ she mumbled.‘The worst part is going on a big glorious rant and then right in the middle of it you realise you hate every word you’re saying.And you don’t believe it, but you do believe it, and you just can’t shut yourself up.’‘Is that really what you believe?’ he asked quietly.Sam muttered, ‘What else is there any more?’Paul sat down on the desk, so that his eyes were level with hers.‘What about believing in us?’She was quiet for a long time.The buzz was giving up, collapsing in on itself, leaving a hollowness in its place.‘Something to say?’ he asked.‘Thanks,’ she said, letting herself curl up with tiredness.‘For talking me down.’He let out a sigh and a grin.‘Glad it worked.You have no idea how long I’ve been working on that speech.’She nearly dropped the stapler.‘Wait.You mean you knew I was going to –’‘Oh, I’ve been wanting to talk to you about this for a week now.I think your speech was better than mine, though.’Sam laughed giddily.‘I dunno,’ she said.‘I mean, what do you say when you realise you’ve just shoved your foot in your mouth up to the kneecap?’He grinned.‘Here, let me help with that,’ he said, and mimed pulling the foot out for her.It was about the time of the First Friday Fire that she realised how things were changing.The first inkling came while she was up on the roof of what would be the Luchenko house, nailing the edges of prefab roof panels into place and carrying on a running discussion with Kafiyeh the mason about the latest album from the Pickled Pupils.She had a squeeze bottle to keep her throat moist, skin cool, headband lightly damp, and to squirt at Paul and Feroz as they passed beneath her.With a final smack she nailed the last comer of the vast roof into place, and couldn’t help but face the fact that, dear God in heaven, she was enjoying this.Now that wasn’t a familiar feeling at all.At INC the only thing you could be close to proud of was clearing your in tray – and since you didn’t have anything else to show for your time, you ended up taking a petty obsessive delight in making sure absolutely everything was in its place.But here every day something in the village looked distinctly different, because of her.Paul poked his head out from under the A frame supports of the roof, scored a bull’s eye on her mouth with a blast from his own water bottle and said, ‘Coming to the bonfire tonight?’She unscrewed her bottle top behind her back and splooshed her remaining water down on to his face as he lay there.‘What bonfire?’ she asked sweetly.‘We have one on the first Friday of every month,’ he said, shaking the water out of his hair.‘It helps keep the villagers and volunteers from killing one another.It’s harder to strangle someone you were getting paralytic with the night before.’’Oh, so that’s what everyone’s been talking about,’ said Sam.‘I’ll be there or set square.’The moon was like a searchlight that night.The bonfire was a great pile of fallen branches and leftover planks.Music played, louder than the flames: a radio – well, a terminal relaying one of the popular music broadcasts – and an improvised band.Leah had done herself proud.There were lots of hot rolls, unleavened bread and tin foiled bundles of cake and scones smoking at the edges of the fire.Great kettles of rice and goat’s meat and lentils and coffee were steaming over smaller fires of their own.A cool box contained juice and booze and fruit salad with crushed ice in it.Someone had thrown whole pots of incense into the fire, giving the night a rich, sweet smell that reminded Sam of Christmas pudding.Hookahs had appeared, and card tables and backgammon and chess sets.A couple of the village kids shouted and played tag and never quite managed to knock everything over.Paul was cranking the spit over the fire, swigging cider and singing something fundamentally keyless under his breath.Sam lay sprawled out by his feet, leaning on his rucksack, soaking up the life.Everything seemed a bit more there than usual.She was pointing out the moths flitting around the fire – or whatever they were: big, fluffy insectoids attracted by the light.Ha’olam didn’t have any life forms larger than a sparrow.At least these mothoids had the sense to stay out of the flames.‘The first time I ever got to touch a butterfly,’ she said, ‘it was really weird.like the skin on your fingertips is too thick to really feel what it feels like.’‘They never stay still for me,’ said Paul.‘They hear me sneaking up.’She sat up.‘You’ve got to see the butterfly room!’ she said, without thinking.‘What’s that, then?’‘Um.’Well, she’d stepped right into that one.Say as much as you can get away with.‘Right.Imagine a room, a huge room with a hillside and meadow in it, and about a billion butterflies.All kinds of species, mostly from Earth but from other planets too.’He looked fascinated.‘Where’s that, then?’‘I saw it a few times,’ said Sam.‘On my travels, you know.’‘You’ve seen a lot of places,’ said Paul.‘And I’ve done a lot of things,’ said Sam.‘But when it comes down to it, I haven’t been all that much yet [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]