"Rusch-WithoutEnd" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rusch Kristine Kathryn)

Each event has its own ripple, independent of another ripple -- "

"Unless they collide," Dylan said with a leer.

"Unless they collide," she repeated, ignoring his meaning. "But who is to say
that once a pebble gets dropped, you can't go back to the same spot and watch it
get dropped over and over again. You can in video tape, why not in life?"

"Because life doesn't have rewind and fast forward," he said.

"Who says? Time is just perception, Dylan."

He rolled to his side, kissed her bare shoulder, and draped an arm across her
back. From his perspective, the blade of grass between her fingers looked ragged
and damp. "So you're saying you might perceive that you're marrying me for
eternity, and I might perceive that I'm marrying you for Wednesday. So I could
turn around and marry someone else for Thursday -- "

"Only if you get a divorce first." She threw away the blade of grass.
"Legalities, remember? Other people's perceptions."

"-- and you would still think you're married to me forever, right?"

"I think I heard about a court case like that," she said, leaning her head into
him. Her hair smelled of the sun. He kissed her crown.

She turned, so that she was pressed flush against him, warm skin against his.
"But when you say you'll love me for eternity, you mean it, right?"

He leaned in, his face almost touching hers. He couldn't imagine life without
her. "When I say I'll love you forever," he said, "I mean it with all my heart."

The dean's office was on the second floor of Erskine Hall, where the senior
professors resided. Dylan used to aspire to walking that staircase every day.
Then he would have had tenure, been able to stay in Oregon until he retired. He
used to imagine that he and Geneva would buy a beach house. They would work in
the city, then drive the hour to the beach each weekend. They would sit outside,
on a piece of driftwood, staring at the point where the sky met the ocean.
Geneva would contemplate the universe, and Dylan would contemplate her.

Dreams. Even dreams were ghost limbs. Moments, frozen in time and space.

He walked down the narrow corridors, past the rows of crammed offices, filled
with too many books and stacks of student papers. The dean's office was a little
larger, and it had a reception area, usually staffed by upperclassmen. This
time, though, the receptionist was gone.

He knocked on the gray metal door. "Nick?"

"Come on in, Dylan, and close the door."