"Replica15 - Transformation - Kaye, Marilyn" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kaye Marilyn)

"But what if Dr. Noble started giving pop tongue checks?" Amy wondered.

When they arrived at their condominium community, they were both still laughing at the image of Dr. Noble storming unexpectedly into a classroom and ordering all the students to stick out their tongues. Then Amy noticed that a taxi had pulled into the driveway next to her own.

While the driver took suitcases out of the trunk, a woman with masses of frizzy red hair and trailing a long multicolored scarf swept toward the town house door. "Look, Monica's back," Amy announced.

The woman spotted her and Eric and waved.

"Where's she been?" Eric asked.

"She went to school for a month, somewhere up north around Big Sur. She's training to be an alternative therapeutic healer."

"A what?" he asked, but she was already running toward her neighbor.

"Monica, hi! How was your school?"

The woman gazed at her through kohl-rimmed eyes that sparkled. "It was . . . I can't describe it. No words can capture the experiences I've just had. It was mystical, it was spiritual, it was . . . it was Ч "

"Sounds great," Amy said hastily, knowing that Monica would go on and on if she had the chance. "I like your new look." The last time she'd seen Monica Jackson, her neighbor had been into a gothic look, with spiky black hair, black lipstick, and a tattoo of a skull and crossbones on her arm. A temporary tattoo, of course, since Monica changed her look almost as often as most people changed their underwear.

"I think it suits my new profession," Monica told Amy solemnly. "It's less threatening, more open and nonconfrontational. Don't you think so?"

Basically, in the gauze dress and beads, Monica looked like a cross between a hippie from the 1960s and a New Age astrologer, so Amy had to agree it was a friendlier look than the last one, which had been almost scary.

Amy's mother must have witnessed Monica's arrival from a window. She came out onto the front steps and waved.

"Welcome home," Nancy Candler called out. "How was the school? Are you an official alternative therapeutic healer now?

"Yes, I am!" Monica said happily. "Oh, Nancy, it was . . . it was . . . indescribable, like something out of this world, like an experience in a dream, like Ч "

Nancy was also familiar with Monica's tendency to talk incessantly. "You can tell us all about it later," she said hastily. "We're having a picnic this afternoon, around three, and I've got to make potato salad. See you there!"

"You're coming to the picnic, aren't you?" Amy asked Eric.

"Sure," he said. "Hey, Amy Ч "

"Hmm?"

"What's an alternative therapeutic therapist?"

Amy looked at him reprovingly. "Oh, Eric, come on. Are you serious? Where have you been?"

"C'mon, help me out," Eric said urgently. "I don't want to look stupid at the picnic when everyone's talking about it. Tell me, what's an alternative therapeutic healer?"

Amy grinned. "Eric, I don't have the slightest idea."