"Jeff VanderMeer - Flight Is For Those Who Have Not Yet Crossed Over (2)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vandermeer Jeff)

The silence, then, and the space, which allows Gabriel to pretend that
nothing surrounds him, that the road passes through an infinite bubble
encompassing the sky, and within that bubble he is the only person alive;
that once he passes through the silence and space, washed clean by it,
when he is home, he enters his second life.
Glancing at the stars, Gabriel gets a crumpled feeling in his chest. Once,
he had dreamed of flying as a career: a commercial pilot or a member of
the airforce, like his grandfather. His grandfather - Ricardo Jesus de
Anda - whose hands were so soft and supple it was difficult to remember
that he was a hard man who had spent many nights in his MiG defending the
country's borders from attack. Before the coup, his grandfather shot down
three F-15s in four hours over Honduras and they gave him a medal. The
next day, he was at Gabriel's house, laughing, holding a beer, and looking
at the ground in embarrassment while Gabriel's mother detailed his
exploits. And Gabriel had thought, What could it possibly be like to fly
at such a speed, no longer bound by the earth, curving the air with the
violence of your passage?
Gabriel's leg begins to throb and he remembers D'Souza saying, "When I am
dead..."
He stops thinking and stares ahead, at the road. Soon he pulls into the
gravel driveway of his four room house. It forms part of a state-sponsored
housing project, not much different from the relocation sites made
available to Indian tribes uprooted from the mountains. His house is
constructed of unpainted concrete, single-story, with the gracelessness of
a building block. As the VW comes to a stop, Gabriel blinks his headlights
three times before turning them off, so that if Sessina is awake she will
not mistake him for the police.
Gabriel knocks on the front door and then unlocks it himself, certain she
is in the kitchen, preparing his meal. Inside, Gabriel can smell rice,
beans, and eggs. Sessina has turned off the lights to conserve electricity
and he has to orient himself by the glow of the kitchen and the television
in the living room. The bedroom is off to the left. They share an outdoor
bathroom with the couple in the house next door. The living room wall is
half-wallpapered, half rude concrete.
"Sessina?" he says. "Are you in the kitchen?"
"Yes," comes the muffled reply. "You are late."
Gabriel unbuttons his shirt, places his guard's cap on the baroque iron
hat rack. Another present from Pedro.
"A little trouble with a prisoner," Gabriel says. "Nothing to worry
about."
"What?" she says as he walks into the living room. A replay of the
football game is still on and the national team is up three to two, with
thirty minutes to play. The green sofa calls to him, but he disciplines
himself and walks into the kitchen, shielding his eyes from the angry
white light of the naked bulb that hangs there.
"I said I had a little trouble with a prisoner."
Sessina stands before the stove, spatula in hand. The light illuminates
her face in such a way that her beauty is almost painful to him. Her hair
is black and shines a faint metallic blue, her eyes large and