"Big U, The" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stephenson Neal)

skinny. Also, many slippers, too many of them high-heeled. Once
she was sure her brain was okay, she edged up to a nearby wingmate
and mumbled, "Did I miss something? Everyone's in bathrobes!"
"Shit, don't ask me!" hissed the woman firmly. "I just took a
shower, nwself."
Looking down, Sarah saw that the woman was indeed clean of
face and wet of hair. She was shorter than average and compact but
not overweight, with pleasant strong features and black-brown hair
that fell to her shoulders. Her bathrobe was short, old and plain, with
a clothesline for a sash.
"Oh, sorry," said Sarah. "So you did. Uh, I'm Sarah, and my
bathrobe is blue."
"I know. President of the Student Government."
Sarah shrugged and tried not to look stuck-up.
"What's the story, you've never lived on one of these floors?"
The other woman seemed surprised.
"What do you mean, 'one of these floors?'"
She sighed. "Ah, look. I'm Hyacinth. I'll explain all this later.
You want to sit down? It'll be a long meeting." Hyacinth grasped
Sarah's belt loop and led her politely to the back row of chairs,
where they sat a row behind the next people up. Hyacinth turned
sideways in her chair and examined Sarah minutely.
The Study Lounge was not a pretty place. Designed to be as
cheery as a breath mint commercial, it had aged into something not
quite so nice. Windows ran along one wall and looked out into the
elevator lobby, where the four wings of E12S came together. It was
furnished with the standard public-area furniture of the Plex: cubical
chairs and cracker-box sofas made of rectangular beams and slabs of
foam covered in brilliant scratchy polyester. The carpet was a
membrane of compressed fibers, covered with the tats and cigarette-
burns and barfstains of years. Overhead, the ubiquitous banks of
fluorescent lights cheerfully beamed thousands of watts of pure
bluish energy down onto the inhabitants. Someone was always
decorating the lounge, and this week the theme was football; the
decorations were cardboard cutouts of well-known cartoon
characters cavorting with footballs.
The only other nonrobed person in the place was the RA, Mitzi,
who sat bolt upright at the lace-covered card table in front, left hand
still as a dead bird In her lap, right hand three inches to the side of
her jaw and bent back parallel to the tabletop, fingers curled upward
holding a ballpoint pen at a jaunty but not vulgar forty-five-degree
angle. She bore a fixed, almost manic smile which as far as Sarah
could tell had nothing to do with anything—charm school, perhaps,
or strychnine poisoning. Mitzi wore an overly formal dress and a
kilogram of jewelry, and when she spoke, though not even her
jawbone moved, one mighty earring began to swing violently.
Among other things, Mitzi welcomed new "members." There
were three: another woman, Hyacinth and Sarah, introduced in that
order. The first woman explained that she was Sandi and she was
into like education and stuff. Then came Hyacinth; she was into