"Alex Irvine - Intimations of Immortality" - читать интересную книгу автора (Irvine Alexander C)

Melinda smiled, and her friends laughed out loud. "Is that so?"

"'Fraid it is. And I doubt Terence would be able to speak in your presence. He's a bit shy around people
who aren't as ugly as he is." Well, now, that wasn't very friendly, was it? Norm said to himself. It was
true, though; Terence had said as much himself. But there was a difference between being
self-deprecating and having someone else do it for you.

Norm stepped back from the table. "I'll get them over here anyway."

"She gonna take you out in daddy's suborbital?" Matt said when Norm came back.

"She just might," Norm said with a grin. "And one of her friends might take you. Come on, the ladies
desire company. If your principles permit."
"Shit," Matt said. "It's only the big head has principles." They dragged their table over in front of the fire
door. The four immortals already had another pitcher waiting.

5

"What I mean to say, Dad," Sasha said, hesitating over every word, "is . . . okay. You talk and talk about
wanting me to be able to make decisions for myself, but you basically made all of my decisions for me,
didn't you? I mean, when you took me off into the mountains. I didn't decide that. My mother didn't
decide that. You did. You took away sixteen years' worth of decisions, and you want me to believe that
this one moment when I can choose is worth it."

Norman was silent for a while. "We've had this discussion before," he said, mostly to buy time to gather
his thoughts.

"And you say the same thing every time. I know, you did what you thought was right."

"It was right," Norman said. He floundered, mouth open, wondering what he could say that hadn't
already been said. What he could say that would convince Sasha once and for all.

Remember, he told himself. When you have to move a skid of paper, and it's so cold and icy that the
pallet jack's wheels won't grip, you break the skid down and horse the paper two boxes per trip. No
man can move a ton at once, but just about anyone can do it a hundred pounds at a time. Norman
looked at his son, so like himself. A little taller, a little leaner, framed more like his mother but with
Norman's blond hair and Norman's face.

Sixteen years I've spent trying to teach you, he thought, and now the day my teaching stops, we're back
to the very first lesson.

"Your mother," he began.

"No, Dad. I don't want to talk about her. I know her better than you do."

"You haven't -- " Norman broke off, unable to speak the question.

Had Sasha sent her a message, spoken to her? Left a note in some dumpster somewhere, during one of
the winters when weather had forced them closer to the cities?