"James Tiptree Jr. - Beam Us Home" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tiptree James Jr)

"You're alienated," she told him. "Rinse your mouth out with that. You don't relate to people."

"I think you're people," he said, rinsing. He'd heard his before. "I relate to you," he said. He leaned out to
spit. Then he twisted his head to look up at the sky and stayed that way awhile, like an animal's head
sticking out of a crate. Dog could feel him trembling the car.

"Are you going to barf again?" she asked.

"No."

But then suddenly he did, roaringly. She clutched at his shoulders while he heaved. After a while he
sagged down, his head lolling limply out at one arm.

"It's such a mess," she heard him whispering. "It's such a sтАФтАФting miserable mess mess mess MESS
MESSтАФ"

He was pounding his hand on the car side.

"I'll hose it," said Dog, but then she saw he didn't mean the car.

"Why does it have to go on and on?" he croaked. "Why don't they just stop it? I can't bear it much
longer, please, please, I can'tтАФ"

Dog was scared now.

"Honey, it's not that bad. Hobie, honey, it's not that bad," she told him, patting at him, pressing her soft
front against his back.

Suddenly he came back into the car on top of her, spent.

"It's unbearable," he muttered.

"What's unbearable?" she snapped, mad at him for scaring her. "What's unbearable for you and not for
me? I mean, I know it's a mess, but why is it so bad for you? I have to live here too."

"It's your world," he told her absently, lost in some private desolation.

Dog yawned.

"I better drive you home now," she said.

He had nothing more to say and sat quietly. When Dog glanced at his profile, she decided he looked
calm. Almost stupid, in fact; his mouth hung open a little. She didn't recognize the expression, because
she had never seen people looking out of cattle cars.

Hobie's class graduated that June. His grades were well up, and everybody understood that he was
acting a little unrelated because of the traumatic business with the maid. He got a lot of sympathy.

It was after the graduation exercises that Hobie surprised his parents for the first and last time. They had