Hope of Earth (76 page)

But there was no avoiding the fact that the community of Dreams did not like the community of Bones, just as Faience had said. The weekly trips into town to see the movie were the only contact between any members of the two, and that was quiet, perhaps unknown to any but the mothers of the two girls. And to Jack, Lin, and Bry, who were not talking about it. There just might be hell to pay if the news got out.

Saturday came. Jack and Lin did not go; they had other things to do, being well wrapped up in community activities. So it was just Bry and Faience—and Tourette.

This time Tourette wore a skirt and blouse. She was indeed a nice figure of a woman. She had done something with her hair, and looked lovely. This time she wore no visible weapon.

Faience jumped down. “I’ll ride in front, this time,” she said, and climbed into the front seat. That left Bry and Tourette together alone in back. There was a screen separating the front seats from the rear of the van, so they had reasonable privacy.

They closed the door and settled down, leaning against opposite sides, their knees up. Tourette’s skirt fell away below, so that her thighs showed. Bry tried not to look, but failed. Actually the van was dark enough inside so that it was mostly shadow down there, but his imagination ran rampant.

Her very presence made his pulse accelerate. He was suddenly shy. “You’re beautiful.”

“Thank you.”

“I think—I think we have to talk,” Bry said.

“Before we do, would you kiss me?”

“If I do that, we may never talk.”

“That’s okay with me.”

Bry came to a pained realization. “You think I’m going to—to break it off?”

“I would, in your place.”

“You think—the syndrome? That’s not—”

“Please. Before we get into it. Then I will listen, and there will be no trouble. I promise.” She looked at him, beseechingly.

He moved across, kneeled, and kissed her. The van lurched at that moment, and he caught only half her mouth before he fell over. But she joined him on the floor, laughing. Lying there, they kissed again, hard and long.

Then, embraced, they remained there. Her body against his was wonderful. He felt the motion of her breast when she breathed. “Faience says it’s love,” he murmured.

“She may be right.”

They kissed again. Then she spoke. “I’m not apt at this. I have no experience in romance. But the way I feel—maybe it’s better to be clumsy than silent.” She took his hand and set it on her thigh where the skirt rode up. “Anything you want, Bry. Please.”

“Oh, Tourette, I want everything. I think you’re the greatest girl. But—”

“I know. Two different worlds.”

“We’re—we’re joining the pacifists. Do your folk really go armed all the time?”

“Yes. And we are trained to use our weapons.”

“But you aren’t—”

“Yes I am. Here.” She guided his hand up under her left arm. There, next to her breast, was a flat holster. “Knife. In this outfit, a gun’s too hard to conceal.”

“Why did you dress this way, then?”

“For you. Because I wanted to look nice for you. And to make it possible for you to do anything you might want to do with me. But I still had to be armed.”

“For self-defense,” he said. “Because it’s not safe for a girl alone.”

“You understand?”

“My eldest sister got raped. And my brother’s wife, too. And—well, Lin needs protection. My sister Jes is always armed, even now with her baby.”

“But you can’t be that way, in Dreams.”

“But I don’t mind if
you
are. I mean, each person makes his own decision, doesn’t he?”

“No. At Bones, you train in martial art. You go armed. Always. Even when sleeping.”

“So if I visited, I’d have to have a gun, or something?”

“Yes.” She moved his hand across her blouse, so that it touched her warm breast. “Anything you want, Bry. But I am what I am.”

“You mean you think I’ll dump you, but you’ll give me everything anyway?”

“Yes. Now, while I can. I think I love you.”

“I think I love you, too. But I know these things take time. Sometimes it doesn’t work out. My brother’s first wife was beautiful, but—it just takes time. Maybe I should meet your father, or something.”

“No. He would see to it that I never saw you again.”

“Oh, Tourette, I couldn’t bear that!”

“He may find out anyway. He has ways of knowing. I love him, but he’s a hard man. I don’t mean he’s bad; he’s tough but fair. Mom can stand up to him, but I can’t. So this may be our only chance. I hope not, but I don’t want to gamble.”

“You want—to have sex—because you may never see me again?”

“Please. I might twitch a bit, but that will pass. As I said, I dressed to make it possible.”

She had actually planned for this! Yet he balked. How much of this was love, and how much was desperation, if she thought she would never again be with a man? Any man? “I can’t do that. I must see you again.”

“You don’t know. Dad’s away now, but when he returns in a few days, he’ll know. Then I won’t go to town any more.”

“But don’t you have any choice?”

“Not in such a case. We—we aren’t a democracy, Bry. My father is the headman. What he says, goes. I will have the chance to embarrass him only once.”

“If you don’t come out,” Bry said with sudden resolve, “I will go in to find you.”

“Oh, Bry, don’t do that! You have no idea! Please, just love me and let me go, if that’s how it has to be.”

“I can love you. I can’t let you go. Not while I know you love me.”

“I do, Bry.” Then she kissed him with such passion that there was no point in further dialogue.

But before they had gotten beyond hand on breast and thigh, and mouth on mouth, the van slowed. “We’re coming into town,” Faience called back.

“Damn!” Tourette muttered.

But Bry was half-relieved. He desired her, but caution told him that sex at this time could bè disastrous. There had to be a way to make their association legitimate.

They got themselves back in order and got out when the van stopped. Faience joined them, and they went to the movie. In the dark theater, Bry put his arm around Tourette’s shoulders, and she rested her head against him and touched his knee with hers. It was sheer bliss.

When they returned to the van, the front seat was full of supplies, so Faience had to rejoin them in the back. “Sorry,” she said.

“It’s okay,” Bry said. “You introduced us.”

“I can face away and stop up my ears.”

They both laughed. “You’re curious what happened on the trip down,” Tourette said.

“Yeah,” the girl admitted, abashed.

“Well, first we kissed like this.” Tourette kneeled, hugged Bry’s upper torso and pulled him in for a very solid kiss. Actually it had been the other way around, but it hardly mattered. He loved kissing her regardless. “Then he put his hand on my blouse, like this.” She guided his open hand and mashed it into her breast.

“No, first I touched your thigh,” Bry said, with mixed emotions: amazement, desire, and laughter. The more he discovered about Tourette, the better he liked her. Once her genie had been uncorked, she had poured out a whole lot of personality.

“Oh, that’s right.” She moved his hand down, and up under her skirt. “Or did I put my hand into your pants? I forget.”

“Damn, I wish I had a boyfriend!” Faience exclaimed.

“We’re teasing you,” Bry said. “That’s as far as it went.”

“Oh. Still. It must be nice.”

“It
is
nice,” Tourette said. “I love him, just as you surmised, and I think he’s halfway hot for me.”

“Three-quarters of the way,” Bry said, kissing her again. “Going on four-fifths.” Then she sat on his lap and they embraced and kissed some more, just to make Faience jealous, they said.

But after a bit they disengaged, because both were aware that if they didn’t ease off, they would soon get into full sex in Faience’s presence, and that was beyond what they could handle.

The rest of the ride back was routine. For Bry, for now, that was enough. But he worried about the future.

“I love you,” Tourette repeated, kissing him one last time before she disappeared into the forest.

“I never saw her so hot and happy, before,” Faience said. “And desperate. It’s as if she thinks the end of the world is coming.”

“She does.” He hesitated. “Faience, if she doesn’t come next week, will you show me exactly where the Bones layout is?”

“Are you thinking of doing something romantic and stupid?”

“If I have to. Her dad may not let her come.”

“It’s just down the road, that way. They’ve got a bunker and guardhouse. You have to go in the front way, because the rest is surrounded by mines and barbed wire.”

“Mines?”

“That’s what Tourette said, once. They’ve got a siege mentality. Automatic guns that track you, that sort of thing. They’re not nice people, Bry.”

“Except for Tourette.”

“Except for Tourette,” she agreed. “Did she show you her knife?”

“Right by her breast.”

“Yeah.” She looked momentarily thoughtful. “I wonder if I should wear a knife there? When I’m off-campus, I mean.”

“First get a boyfriend to show it to, or to let him feel for.”

She laughed. “Yeah.”

During the week, between projects, he talked with Jes. “I have a problem, maybe. Something you should maybe talk me out of.”

She was nursing her baby. Her breasts had grown enormously with pregnancy and childbirth. She caught him looking. “Yes, I hope they stay this way, after. I’m tired of being mistaken for a man.”

“You mean the pacifism is getting to you? You want to be soft like a woman?”

“When I want to be. But I’m no pacifist. I think that part of Dreams philosophy is unrealistic. Come the crash, how will they stop the crazies from overrunning them for their food and supplies?”

“I don’t know. How’s Ittai feel about it?”

“He loves it here, but he doubts, too. I think our family is split about evenly between believers and doubters. That may be a problem.”

“Well, maybe my problem relates. I have to tell you something private.”

She nodded. “Tell.”

“I’ve been seeing a Bones girl.”

Her eyebrows elevated in mock shock. “Consorting with the enemy?”

“I think I love her.”

“Think?”

“Actually, I’m pretty sure I love her. And she loves me. And her dad maybe won’t let her out any more. Which mean’s I’ll maybe have to do something stupid.”

“Like going over there and demanding to see her?”

“Yeah.”

“And you could use a backstop.”

“Yeah.”

“Why do you think I’d be more help than, say, Sam?”

“They all go armed, all the time. Even the women and children. You might relate better.”

She laughed. “I might indeed. Very well, little brother; I’ll go with you. I’m starting to go stir crazy here anyway.”

“Thanks,” he said, relieved. “Maybe it won’t be necessary.”

But Saturday morning, Tourette was not there. “Uh-oh,” Faience said. “She was right. ‘Cause I know she’d come here if she could.”

“I guess I’ll have to beg off the movies, this time,” he said. “You go on in alone. I’ve got business here.”

“And miss the show? I’ll go with you.”

“Thee will not,” her mother said sternly. “I can’t stop the visitors from being suicidal, but thee is mine.”

“It’s no democracy here, either,” Faience grumbled. But she joined Fay in the van. “But if thee gets thyself stupidly killed, Bry, I’ll never speak to thee again.”

He had to laugh, and not just because of her humor. Her mother had used the plain talk, and that had triggered Faience’s switch to it. But he was distinctly nervous. He knew he was going to make what could be a bad scene.

He went back to Jes, who, evidently anticipating this, had just finished nursing her baby and had turned her over to Snow. She was wearing a jacket and skirt, and carried a bow and arrows. “If they want to see Diana the Huntress, so they shall,” she said.

They drove their own van to the Bones entry. It was indeed closed, with a guard who came alert as they parked and came forward. He carried a rifle at port arms. “What’s your business?” he demanded.

“I’m Bry, and this is my sister Jes,” Bry said. “We’re from the Dreams community, trial new members.”

“They don’t carry weapons.”

“Maybe I’ll flunk my trial,” Jes said.

“We don’t have anything to do with them.”

“Well, I do,” Bry said. “I have come to see the chief’s daughter.”

“Petition denied. Go back where you came from.”

“I call her Tourette.”

The man jumped, his rifle swinging around. But Jes was faster. Her knife was in her hand, the tip of the blade pointing at his face. “At ease, soldier,” she said.

He hesitated, so she did her trick with the knife, flipping it and catching it an inch from his nose.

The guard shrugged, then looked at Bry. “Describe her.”

“Age sixteen. Shoulder-length brown hair. Brown eyes. About yea tall.” He held his hand at the level of the top of her head. “Very nice figure. Very nice person.”

“What’s your business with her?”

“I love her.”

The guard whistled. “You’re in trouble.”

“Just take me to her.”

The guard lifted a walkie-talkie. “Two from Dreams being admitted on temporary passes to see the chief’s daughter.”

The gate cranked open. Another guard appeared ‘This way,” he said curtly.

He brought them to a Jeep, and drove them along a winding drive to a massive building that had the aspect of a fortress. A device on its roof moved to track them, just as Faience had said.

They parked near an armored door. ‘I must search you before you enter,” the guard said.

“Like hell,” Jes snapped.

“Electronic.”

She shrugged. “Okay. But where I go, I go armed.”

“Understood. This way.”

They passed through a frame similar to that of an airline inspection station. There was no buzzer, but Bry saw the guard look at a computer screen. Then he spoke into a mike. “Man, unarmed. Woman, with bow, ten arrows, three knives, and a club.”

“Do they come in truce?” a woman’s voice asked from a speaker.

“Yes,” Bry said. Jes hesitated, then nodded. Evidently that was good enough, because the metal door slid open.