"Lawrence Watt - Evans - One of the Boys" - читать интересную книгу автора (Watt-Evans Lawrence)

weird, I mean, I wanted you so much and you aren’t interested, and you keep it so hot in here I can
hardly think, and there’s no place to sit, and there’s that smell, what is that?”

“Well, part of it is just the way I like my air,” he explained. “I suppose it’s like air freshener would be, for
you.”

“Part of it?” She wiped at her nose, which was beginning to drip. Sweat smeared her makeup.
“Well, there’s that,” he said, pointing to the tray sitting in the window to the kitchen.

She turned; her vision was beginning to blur, but she could see the tray and its contents.

“Oh, my God.” she said. “What is that?” She took a step closer.

“My dinner,” he said.

She gagged, and turned to stare at him. Her face was pale.

“Ms. Dutton,” he said gently, “if I really am Captain Cosmos, even given that I came from outer space,
have you ever wondered how I could be so strong? How I can see in the dark, and all the rest of it?”

“I thought… I thought it was fancy equipment, from your spaceship…”

He shook his head. “I was born with it,” he said. “I see deep in the infrared, I can bench-press about a
ton, and that’s just standing here in my regular clothes.”

She still stared.

For one thing, if she didn’t stare at him, she might see that dinner again.

“I’m not human, Ms. Dutton.” It hurt to state it outright like that, but he knew he had to.

“Then what are you?” she demanded desperately.

“I don’t know,” he replied soberly. “Nobody does. I was a foundling.”

“But you look human.” She could no longer see his face clearly; her head was swimming.

He shrugged.

“You act human,” she insisted. “I mean, you speak English and everything.”

“I grew up here,” he said. “I’ve lived among humans all my life, and I’ve tried very hard to be one of
you.” He sighed. “It’s been very hard, sometimes.”

She didn’t understand. He was a man, wasn’t he? She couldn’t think clearly. She tried to fight back to
the dream, to the lovely vision of the great handsome hero carrying her off to his bed. “Then can’t you…
I mean, if you grew up here, can’t you… don’t women…”

“Something’s missing,” he repeated. “Maybe it’s a smell or something, I don’t know. It took me years to
figure out what I should eat, you know that.” My parents tried, they gave me everything they could think