in that part of the world?' They looked at each other, startled. 'We really don't know!' said Mr. Kroginold. 'Many of our People were unaccounted for when we arrived on Earth, but we just assumed that all of them were dead except for the group around here-' 'I wonder if it ever occurred to Jemmy,' said Mrs. Kroginold thoughtfully. After they left, disappearing into the shadows of the hillside toward MEL, I sat for a while longer, turning the moon-pebble in my hands. What an odd episode! In a month or so it would probably seem like a distant dream; melting into my teaching years along with all the other things past. But it still didn't seem quite finished to me' Meeting people like the Kroginolds and the others, makes an indelible impression on a person. Look what it did for that stranger- What about that stranger? How was he explaining? Were they giving him a hard time? Then I gulped. I had just remembered. My name and address were on a tape on the corner of that blanket of mine he had been wrapped in. If he had discovered it-! And if things got too thick for him- Oh, gollee! What if some day there comes a knock on my door and there J-LINE TO NOWHERE It was there. It was there all around me. To smell and to touch. To hear and to feel. Our way out-our answer-our escape. And now it's lost. I found it and let it get lost again. But we'll find it! Chis says he'll find it if it takes even until he is twelve years old! We're working on it already, but it's difficult when you daren't ask a direct question. When you daren't tell anyone for fear-well, for fear. Chis is really brighted about looking for it. And nothing ever brights Chis any more-except maybe hopping the forbidden hi-speed freight glides. And I, Twixt Garath, sister to Chis, daughter to Mother and Dad, I'd be brighted, too, if I weren't busy roaring myself endlessly for letting our miracle come and go again-unlocated, on the J-line. I remember when it all started-even if I can't tell you why it all happened. One day in our unit not so long ago, Mother turned to me suddenly and clutched my arm with both her hands. Her nails made dents in my skin, she held so tightly. For a second I was startled. Mother hadn't touched me for so long –so long- 'I can't see out!' she protested and I could feel her hands shaking. 'I can't see any way out!' 'Out of what?' I asked, feeling sick inside and scared because she seemed to be crumpling. She even looked smaller. 'Out of what?' I repeated. Whoever heard of seeing out of a unit? 'Out of anything!' she said. 'Is there still a sky? Do ants still make bare paths through the grass? When will the shell empty? Our bones used to be inside!' 'Mother,' my voice wobbled. 'Mother, you're hurting .' And she was. Red was oozing up around her nails. She let go, sucking her breath in surprise. I dabbled my arm with a tissue. 'Shall I call Clinic? Are you hurting somewhere?' 'I'm hurting everywhere and all the time,' Mother said, She turned away and leaned her forehead against the wall. She rolled her head back and forth a little as she talked. 'I'm not quite so crazed across as I sound.' Her voice was muffled. 'I used to think those ant trails through the grass were the loveliest, most secret things in the whole world. I was charmed to think of a whole civilization that could function without a single idea that we even existed. And that's what I'm feeling now-a whole civilization functioning without even knowing I exist. And it's my civilization! And I'm not charmed about it any more! 'Remember that undersea vacation we had two years ago? We saw those shells that were so lovely. And they told us that the shells were the external skeletons of the tiny, soft creatures inside. No one cared about the tiny, soft creatures inside-only the bright shell. They forgot that the soft creatures made the bright shell-not the bright shell the creatures. As though the bright shell were the only excuse for the creature!' She turned slowly, her head rolling as she turned, until she finally leaned her back against the wall, her hands behind her. 'Most people think we exist for our lovely exterior skeletons. They think we're only the unimportant soft little creatures inside all these shells-these buildings and walls and towers and glides. That we couldn't exist without them. But I have my own bones! Inside me! I don't need all these skeletons!' And she stood there with tears running down her cheek, her bottom lip caught in her teeth. What do you do when your mother just stands there with tears rolling down her face? I didn't know either, so I got a tissue and gave it to her. She wiped her face and hugged me tight. I could feel the wetness of her tears above my ear as she hugged. How odd! How odd to feel the warmth of another person, so close! How odd, but how wonderful! 'Twixt,' she said, letting go of me to look at me. 'Have you ever run barefoot through the grass? Or squished mud up between your toes?' 'We don't ever touch the greeneries.' I sounded like a tired First Level tape. 'They are the breath of the complex. Maybe one touch wouldn't matter, but who are you that you should touch and others not be allowed to? And there's no soil as such in the megapolis,' I chanted. 'The greeneries are all hydroponics.' 'Remember when you were taking mythology,' said Mother. My head swam as I tried to keep up with her quick switches. 'Remember that man who was strong as long as he touched the earth and lost his strength when he was lifted off it?' I nodded. 'Hercules killed him after he held him off the ground so long he got weak.' 'We are all like him,' said Mother. 'And we've been held off the earth too long. We'll die if we don't touch down soon.' Maybe that explained the funny feeling that had been growing inside me for so long-and twisting me so much of late. Maybe I was dying slowly because I couldn't touch down. But since I don't remember ever having touched down, how could I be suffering because I couldn't-I snatched back to Now. What I was feeling most was uncomfortable, wondering what to say next. I was spared, though. Mother glanced quickly at the timeline rippling along near the ceiling, snatched her bag from the table and a kiss from the air in the vicinity of my cheek, and slid the door to the corridor in a wild flurry of haste. I could have looked at the log to find out what she was late for, but I felt too quenched even to flip her info switch to see. I went to the slot wall and flipped the latch of mine. I kicked off my pneumonosoles and lay down on the bed, clicking the panel shut. The lulltone came on in my pillow, and the conditioning currents began to circulate to adjust to night settings. I was crying now-tears running down into my ears on both sides. 'I hate! I hate! The whole unit-the whole complex-the whole everything!' I sobbed to myself. 'I hate it, but I'm used to it! What can we do else, but be used to it!' I thumped my pillow. 'Gonky slot!' I sniffed. 'Too stupid to know it isn't night!' Then my tears stopped as I suddenly thought, 'Am I any smarter? How do I know it's day? I've been doing day-things just because the timeline says it's day, but how do I know it's day?' Tears flowed again. 'But I did see the sun once! I did! It's big and up and so bright you can't see it!' So that's when the whole thing started, or at least that's when I started knowing there was a thing. It had been an odd, mixed-up day all day. This was only another uncomfortable piece to be fitted in. I had been hoping, in some tiny corner of me, that Mother would be willing to communicate and that by having someone to tell, I could get the day pushed down to its true proportions-or at least be able to blunt a few uncomfortable sharp things that jabbed. That morning, with my usual sense of reaching a refuge, I had slipped into my study carrel at school. When I was in and facing the viewer, I could shut the whole world out. I could get so absorbed that when break-time came I'd have to blink myself back to Now and wander in a fog down the physical area. I sometimes envied the kids who were so loose that they could get together before break-time, volunteer one of them as a puncher to cover six or eight carrels besides his own, and then stand gabfesting in a tight little wad in the corridor while the puncher wore himself out punching enough responses to prevent Supervisory from investigating, or calling for a check response from everyone simultaneously. Our level isn't required to do movement beyond our daily compulsory half hour first thing in the morning, so we. usually sit around the area and, well, you know-music and eating and drinking and talking-and boys. At least for some. I had no gash as yet. Time enough. No one can even put in for marriage evaluation until 21-and lucky to get certified before 25. Mother and Dad were married-younger than that-just before Evaluation and Certification came in. I asked them once how they could tell, then, that their marriage could be functional. Dad laughed-he still could laugh then-and looked at Mother. She pinked and he said, 'Some knowledge isn't programmable. You'll find out.'
