"Kristine Kathryn Rusch - Dancers Like Children" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rusch Kristine Kathryn)

resigned from psychology, let my licenses lapse, and bought back my contract.
I had had the money then. I hadn't had to serve out my time on Minar Base, the
planet hovering in my viewscreen like an ugly reminder. Instead I stayed,
wrote abstracts and papers, conducted studies, and worked with an intensity
that I hadn't known I had. My colleagues ignored me, and I tried to ignore
myself. Just before she left me, Carol accused me of idolizing the Minarans.
She said that I had buried my emotions in the search for the cause of my own
flaws. Perhaps I did idolize the Minarans, and I knew that I had stored my
emotions far away from myself. But I thought I knew the cause of my own flaws.
I didn't hide in my work. I liked to think that I was atoning.
 I rolled over. The sheets were cool on the far side of the bed. Maybe
my sense of guilt allowed me to let my contract safeguards lapse so that
someone like Netta could buy my services for the next Earth year. The darkness
seemed to close around me, press on me. When I closed my eyes, I saw the
Minarans.
I could, I supposed, cancel the contract and head to Lina Base for
reeducation, never to practice psychology again. But the work was all I had.
Perhaps I was atoning. Or perhaps I hadn't learned.
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V
I rose early and drank my coffee outside, watching the colony wake up.
I sat on the stoop of the apartment building, looking over some sort of
evergreen bush at the street beyond. The apartments were clearly for guests of
the colony. I had heard no one in the building during the night, and no one
passed me on the way to work.
The streets were full, however. Adults carrying satchels and briefcases
walked by, chatting. Others wore grubby clothes and carried nothing. A few
wore sand scarves and helped each other apply reflective cream. Work seemed to
start at the same time. I would have wagered that the workday ended at the
same time, too.
In my wanderings I had noticed no taverns and no restaurants, no place
for the colonists to gather and socialize after the workday had ended. I
wondered what the colonists did for recreation besides garden.
I got up, went inside, and put my mug into the washer. Then I went back
outside. The last of the stragglers had gone up the street, and in the near
silence, I heard a squeal of laughter, followed by a child's voice. I followed
the sound. It didn't seem too far away. The laughter came again, and again,
guiding me to it. I walked the opposite direction of the workers, past
terraplastic homes with no windows, large gardens that passed for lawns, and
fences dividing property. The laughter grew closer. I turned and saw a small
corner park, marked off by three weeping willows. Flowers grew like a fence
along the walkway, and inside, on the grass, about ten children sat in a
circle, playing the game I had seen them play on the hologram.
One child stood back, leaning on the gate. He was tall for his age, but
the longing expression on his face made him seem even younger than he was. I
wondered if my face used to look like that on nights after the Minar trial,
when I used to pass my colleagues in the middle of heated roundtable
discussions. I suppressed a sigh and stood beside the boy. It took a moment
for me to recall his name. Michael Dengler.
"What are they playing?"