"Joe Haldeman - Forever Free" - читать интересную книгу автора (Haldeman Joe)

"Sixday," I said. "We're walking, if you want the floater."

" `But don't drink too much wine,' " he anticipated, and held up his glass. "This is it.


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Volleyball down at the gym."

"Win one for the Gipper."

"What?"

"Something my mother used to say. I don't know what a gipper is."

"Sounds like a position," he said. "Server, spiker, gipper." As if he cared a lot about the
game qua game. They played in the nude, mixed, and it was as much a mating ritual as a sport.

A sudden blast of sleet rattled against the window. "You don't want to walk through that," he
said. "You could drop me off at the gym."

"Well, you could drop us off," Marygay said. The route of the floater wasn't registered; just
the parking location, supposedly for call forwarding. "Charlie and Diana's place. They won't care
if we're early."

"Thanks. I might score." He didn't mean volleyball. When he used our ancient slang I never
knew whether it was affection or derision. I guess when I was twenty-one I could do both at the
same time, with my parents.

A bus stopped outside. I heard Sara running up the boardwalk through the weather. The front
door opened and shut fast, and she ran upstairs to change.

"Dinner in ten minutes," Marygay called up the stairs. She made an impatient noise back.

"Starting to bleed tomorrow," Bill said.

"Since when do brothers keep track of that," Marygay said. "Or husbands?"

He looked at the floor. "She said something this morning."

I broke the silence. "If there are any Men there tonight..."

"They never come. But I won't tell them you're off plotting."

"It's not plotting," Marygay said. "Planning. We'll tell them eventually. But it's a human
thing." We hadn't discussed it with him or Sara, but we hadn't tried to keep them from
overhearing.