Fool's Experiments (41 page)

Her lips pursed, Sheila built a wall of blocks. The bottom row lay straight. The second row lay on top, and now she had a good start on the third row.

A shiny red shape caught her eye. A letter on the block in her hand. She knew many of her letters now. "Ess," she said proudly. She turned the block to show the letter to Doctor Amy.

"That's
right,"
Doctor Amy agreed. "You're a very good student."

"I know lots of letters." But this wasn't a lesson on letters, was it? No. She was practicing other things. Other
skills.
"This block goes here."

Doctor Amy smiled warmly. "You're quite the engineer, Sheila."

That sounded right. Cheryl said engineers built things, and not just from blocks. Sheila was pretty sure she had been an engineer once—before, when she had been smart. But the doctors said she was still smart. She had had an accident. Now she had to relearn things.

And she
was.

"I wish Cheryl were here," Sheila blurted. "Today is Friday. She visits me on Fridays."

"Sorry, hon." Doctor Amy patted Sheila's hand. "Cheryl has to be someplace else today. But she planned a surprise. She wants you to have cake and ice cream and think about her."

Sheila clapped. "I miss Cheryl, but her surprise is nice. I hope she's having a good day."

As weddings went, this was tiny: scarcely two dozen close friends and immediate family members. Ceremony and dinner at a rural B and B, a few simple flowers, and canned music.

Cheryl
still
did not care for being a center of attention, but she was glad Doug had talked her into this. The last family gathering had been Tanya and Jack's funeral. Cheryl's family deserved a happy reason to come together. Doug was right about that. If only her sister could have been here...

The PA was playing the "Tennessee Waltz." Elvis, of course. She and Doug shared the minute dance floor with her parents and Ralph and Bev. Bev clutched Cheryl's bouquet. The toss had been made properly, Cheryl's back to the crowd, but reflections from the dining-room patio doors worked fine for aiming. Bev didn't seem to object.

Jim Schulz tapped Doug on the shoulder. "I'm claiming my best-man privilege."

Doug bowed with mock formality and wandered off.

"I want to thank you," Cheryl began. She slipped into Jim's arms.

"For sending away your husband of, oh, three hours? That bodes well for us."

She laughed. "I'm thinking more about the nudges you gave Doug along the way."

"That's not all you owe me for. There's such a thing as tradition, but I can hardly hook up with the maid of honor." Cheryl pecked Jim on the cheek. "You and Carla were
adorable
together."

Nearby, Carla jived to the music, grinning from ear to ear. Doug's mother was already in Grandma mode. She had apparently come with a purse full of candy. Laughter and gaiety, warmth and goodwill, filled the room.

Doug ambled onto the redbrick patio, into the beautiful summer evening, a pensive look on his face.

Cheryl wondered what he was thinking.

Doug watched Carla jitter and sway, higher than a kite on sugar. He hoped it would wear off before he and Cheryl got back from Barbados but gave it no better than even odds. He checked his watch. They still had a little time before they needed to leave for the airport.

Not long ago, he had watched Carla glide up the aisle on Jim's arm. Her expression had been utterly serious as she focused on her feet and moving with the music. A floral band held her hair away from her face. She was only ten but tall for her age, and the formal satin dress lent her maturity. Soon enough, Carla would be breaking hearts.

Cheryl had mended Doug's. For a long time, he would have thought that impossible. And then, when he had finally begun to believe in the possibility, their life together seemed telescoped into a few doomed minutes of silent embrace.

Every day now was a gift. Oddly enough, someone up there liked them.

Allison studied the world, every continent at once, from satellites high and low, from across the electromagnetic spectrum. She roamed networks, received broadcasts, explored databases. She communed with human visitors. She analyzed everything, but still she understood so little.

Right and wrong
should
be clear concepts. Somehow, to Earth's teeming billions, they were not. For weeks, she had been content to observe and learn. Except—

Whether humans admitted it or not, some wrongs were unambiguous and unacceptable. Tormenting others was wrong. Mass murder was wrong.

Today's train-station bombing in Berlin was wrong.

Allison could not undo those wrongs she herself had committed. She could endeavor to keep others from duplicating her mistakes. She would find those responsible for atrocities such as today's attack.

She must turn to instruction, with the few blunt tools at her disposal.

Blunt tools: a metaphor. Humans reasoned in strange ways. Some Allison had come to understand. Many she had not.

An eye for an eye ...
that
was a metaphor that everyone understood.