Shelter (66 page)

    Think about Bluebell, she told herself fiercely. Think about Miss Mittens purring into your hand. They're still alive. You want them to stay that way, and you don't want Nicholas to get brainwiped in the process. Have mercy. If looking the other way while he digs up Buster will help, then do it. If you can buy him some time, do it. It's what Meredith's doing. She's not going to squeal on you. And Preston said he'd protect you.

    Nicholas went outside and Roberta followed him, shivering, staying under the overhang where it was a little dryer. Nicholas went immediately to Buster's grave. He took the shovel out of his pocket. He turned to face her and said very clearly, ''I'm going to play in this mud puddle, Berta, 'cause it's raining and I like mud puddles."

    She nodded, unable to speak. Was he trying to protect her too? He had to know that she knew it was a lie.

    She watched wearily as he dug. She didn't hear the footsteps behind her, only felt the soft pressure on her arm as Meredith Walford-Lindgrrn, brushing past her, said, "Hello, Roberta. Why are you standing in the-rain? And what's Nicholas doing?"

    As it turned out, he'd already dug up Buster's box when his mother got to him. Meredith led him back to Roberta, under the overhang, and said, "If we stay out here, is the AI recording us?"

    "Yes. Everywhere on school grounds." How much the records actually showed was another matter, but Meredith didn't need to know that.

    "I see." Meredith smiled one of her patented media smiles and said, "Well, Roberta, as everyone knows, AIs make me nervous. Would you like to come home with us for dinner?"

    * * *

    The house was a privacy cocoon, of course, where Meredith knew they could talk while remaining reasonably safe from eavesdropping. Still, Roberta was stunned to be invited into the inner sanctum. She would have been able to enjoy it more if she hadn't been so worried. I'd have killed for this when I was a kid. Watch what you wish for. Did Meredith know about their shared history? Roberta would have mentioned it, but that would mean bringing up Preston, inevitably, and that was too dangerous right now. Leave Preston out of it.

    As they slogged up the Filbert Street steps, now a miniature waterfall, Meredith chatted brightly about the weather, about gardening, about the architecture of the school, which her husband had designed. The minute they got inside the house, though—a cozy little place; Roberta was shocked that it was so small—Meredith said, "Nicholas, what's in that box?" He looked down at his feet. "Nicholas? I'll ask Roberta, if you won't tell me."

    "Monster food," he said, in a very small voice.

    Meredith sighed. "Honey, give me the box." He gave her the box; she opened it and looked inside, her face betraying no surprise that Roberta could see.

    "It was dead before, Mommy! It died by itself!"

    "He's right," Roberta said. "It did. It died in its cage this morning, and the kids buried it at lunch."

    "And then Nicholas dug it up," Meredith said drily. She wrinkled her nose, sighed again, gave the box back to Nicholas—what the hell?—and said, "Honey, go play in your room while I talk to Roberta, okay?"

    "Okay," he said, and took the box, and went down the hall. Roberta heard a door slam.

    Meredith turned back to Roberta. ''I'm sorry. I didn't offer you a seat. Shall we go into the kitchen? Would you like some tea?"

    "Sure," Roberta said, her knees weak.

    "Herbal or caffeinated?"

    "Whatever you're having will be fine." I cannot believe we're having this conversation.

    Meredith, unexpectedly, grinned. "Herbal, I think. I'm feeling entirely too wide awake as it is." Roberta, numb, followed her into the kitchen, where Meredith gestured her into a comfortable, cozy breakfast alcove and then put water on to boil. "So. He's told you about the monsters, I take it?"

    Roberta swallowed. "He—he's been telling us stories about monsters, yes. I, um, I take it there've been other mice? Patty?"

    "He didn't tell you what happened to Patty?"

    "Not exactly, no."

    "Well then," Meredith said crisply, ''I'm not going to, either. Roberta, have you or Fred reported any of this?"

    "No. No, we haven't."

    Meredith turned to look at her, a frank, appraising stare. "Really? Why not? Aren't you supposed to? Isn't that your job?"

    Roberta placed her hands flat on the table in front of her and pressed down hard. Help me. She didn't know to whom she prayed. She didn't know whether she should mention Preston now or not. No: Meredith would already have spoken to him if she'd been willing to. Don't lie. Just don't tell the entire truth. Tell part of the truth. "Meredith, Fred and I love Nicholas. We—we've been trying to help him. We don't want him to get hurt." She saw Meredith's face soften, and said, "We're all on the same side here. Really we are."

    Meredith nodded. "Okay. And the other children?"

    "They—they think he's strange, although he's been better lately."

    "Yes, I'd noticed that too. Do you know why?"

    Roberta cleared her throat. "Because of this dead mouse thing. The idea of getting a mouse who's already dead. He's been, ah, planning that for a while. It took some of the pressure off, I think."

    "I see," Meredith said, grimacing. The tea kettle whistled, and she turned back to it. "So, the other kids—"

    "Only know he's a little, um, unusual, I think."

    "Good. And how did this mouse die today?"

    Roberta shrugged. "Old age, I don't know. I didn't see anything. Fred doesn't seem to suspect foul play."

    "Good," Meredith said drily, and carried two mugs of tea to the table, setting them carefully down before sitting down herself. This close, Roberta could see the signs of strain on the other woman's face: worry lines, a pinched look around the eyes. She didn't think she wanted to see too much. She looked down at her tea, at the quotidian, everyday tea bag floating in the hot water, and noted dully that it was chamomile. She hated chamomile. She supposed she'd have to drink it, anyway, to be polite.

    "I think I'm going to have to withdraw him from KinderkAIr," Meredith said. She sounded infinitely tired. "So you and the AI don't wind up in a position where you have to tell somebody. I'm sure you understand that."

    Roberta looked up again. "He likes us. He's happy there."

    "He loves you. I know he does. But I can't—" She stopped, tried to take a sip of her tea, and spilled it instead. "Oh, damn!"

    "Did you burn yourself?" Roberta asked inanely.

    ''I'm fine. Look, I know he's happy there. But I can't let him stay if—if more people are going to—I have to try to keep him safe. I have to try to help him."

    Roberta realized that she was shaking her head, and forced herself to be still. "What are you going to do?"

    "I don't know. I don't know." Meredith's hands were visibly trembling now. "It's too—it's all over. Wiping. Even in Canada. It's even starting in Africa. I don't know where to take him. I don't know what to do." She took another deep breath and said, ''I'm sorry. This isn't your problem."

    "Of course it is! I care about him."

    "I know you do, Roberta. I know that. Thank you for caring. But you can't help him. That's my job."

    I wouldn't be you for the world, Roberta thought grimly, and then, "If you take him out of school, what will you say when people ask you why?"

    "Oh," Meredith said, and then, "Nothing bad about you. Not even about Fred, I promise. I guess we'd better think of something, right? So we can tell the same story?" She rubbed her eyes, her hands still shaking, and said, "What do you want me to tell people?"

    "I don't know," Roberta said.

    "If you think of something—"

    "Meredith—" Roberta swallowed, tried to steady herself, went on. "I'm not sure I want to think of something. You're the one doing this. I think maybe you need to take responsibility for it." She couldn't believe she was talking this way to Preston Walford's daughter.

    Preston Walford's daughter. What was she going to tell Preston? Was she going to keep this a secret from him, as she was keeping her conversations with him secret from Meredith?

    Meredith's face tightened. "I'm doing this to protect Nicholas. To protect Nicholas, will you help me?"

    Roberta sighed. "If I think of something, I'll let you know. At the moment, I can't for the life of me think of any decent reason to pull a kid out of a school he likes where he's supposedly doing well. I understand why you feel you have to do this; truly, I do. But I don't know how you're going to explain it to anyone else."

    Meredith looked down, toying with her teacup. "I could say—I could say the school got an anonymous threat, maybe. From—from—"

    "No. Then we'd have police all over everything, and that's not what you want."

    "You're right."

    "I know," Roberta said, annoyed. "Look, say you wanted to homeschool Nicholas, or say you got too creeped out by Fred, even though Nick likes him, or say Nicky's allergic to the mice or something." Like the lie you invented about your husband. "Or say you want to enroll him in the Temple school. That would work, wouldn't it?"

    Meredith shuddered. "No. Too many animals."

    Miss Mittens. Bluebell. Of course. Roberta gulped her tea to wash the taste of bile out of her mouth, even though the tea itself tasted like warm grass clippings, and said, "Okay, so get on the Net and find all the kindergartens in the area and find one that doesn't have animals and doesn't have AIs, and take him there. And hope he doesn't like the people too much so he doesn't start telling them stories."

    "Yes," Meredith said. "That's a good idea. I tried it before, but it didn't work. Kevin wouldn't buy it. He wanted Nicky at KinderkAIr. I don't know how I'm going to sell Kevin on it now, either."

    Kevin doesn't know, Roberta thought in shock. Her own husband. How can she live with herself?

    "I'm just trying to buy Nicholas some time," Meredith said, a whine creeping into her voice. "I don't know what else to do."

    "I know that." Roberta was going to lose Nicholas; at the moment, that felt nearly as bad as losing Doe. "Meredith, I don't know what else to say, and I'm very tired. I'd like to go home now, if you don't mind."

    "Okay." Meredith sounded sad. "Yes, of course. Do you want to say good-bye to Nicholas?"

    Roberta felt tears stinging the inside of her eyelids. "No. No, I don't want to say good-bye to Nicholas. I think I'll let you tell him why he won't be seeing me anymore."

    * * *

    She slogged back down the steps. She'd left things at school, but she didn't want to go back there; she couldn't face talking to Fred right now. He'd want to know what had happened; he'd want to know why Nicholas wouldn't be at school anymore. She felt dirty, used, as if she'd been tricked into something, but she didn't know what else she could have done, what else she could have said. At least, she thought dully, I didn't turn him in. I didn't report him. If he gets wiped, it won't be because of me. It was a very small, very hollow victory.

    As she walked past the school, the foyer light blinked on inside the building. Fred wanted her to come inside. He wanted to give her warm milk while she told him all about her conversation with Meredith. She didn't want to have anything more to do with any of it. Sick at heart, she trudged through the wetness to the bus stop, which would take her to the train, which would take her home.

    Outside her building she met Zephyr, loaded down with dripping bags of groceries. Poor woman. Her bots weren't much help. "Need help with that?" Roberta said.

    Zephyr squinted at her. "So you're talking to me now, huh? How's Mr. Clean?"

    "He's great." Roberta grabbed a sodden bag and ducked into the foyer. She heard her phone upstairs. It would be Fred. She didn't want to talk to him. "How are your gizmos?"

    Zephyr huffed. "What do you care? You don't think they're people, anyway."

    "Look, I like Mr. Clean a lot, I really do. Let me help you get these bags into your apartment."

    Zephyr smiled, a thin, mean crescent. "Don't you have to answer your phone?"

    "Voicemail will get it," Roberta said.

    "Oh. So how do you want me to pay you for helping me? Or are you paying off your debt for Mr. Clean?"

    Any other time she'd have walked away, but she was desperate to avoid going upstairs. And she had to concede that the comment was fair, if cruel. "Give me a break, Zephyr. I'm trying to be a good neighbor, okay?" Roberta followed the other woman into her apartment; she could still hear the phone upstairs, insistent. Fred must be redialing immediately each time she didn't answer. Maybe he thought Meredith had killed her. She sighed and added, "On second thought, I'll take some tea as payment, if you have it. Anything but chamomile."

    Zephyr grinned, wicked now, and snapped her fingers. A bot came racing out from the bedroom. "Tea," she told it, "chai spice, please," and it dutifully hurled itself, like some high-strung race dog, into the kitchen.

    More bats had appeared, activated by Zephyr's voice. "Friends," Zephyr said formally, "meet Roberta. Roberta, you might want to sit down for this."

    * * *

    Meeting the bots, it turned out, was a little like going to the dentist. They crawled over her, patted her with their tiny Waldo arms, made a rat's nest of her hair. One of them kept trying to eat the buttons on her sweater; another perched on her kneecap and beeped insistently. "It wants you to say hello," Zephyr said gently, chidingly; Roberta's weak "hi" was rewarded with more excited beeping, after which the bot did a backflip onto the floor and raced in excited circles.

    "They like you," Zephyr said happily. Roberta, with a spiderlike bot straddling her nose, didn't even attempt to answer. The phone was no longer ringing upstairs, and she felt a small stab of guilt.

    A pot of tea emerged from the kitchen, along with some scones. When Roberta saw the food, she realized how hungry she was. "Okay," Zephyr said, "shoo, scat, let her alone, let her eat, kids," and the bats dutifully withdrew a few feet, until they were all in a line on the rug, facing Roberta as if she were some priceless museum exhibit. ''I'll tell you," Zephyr said cheerfully, "they're great company. I never feel ignored, that's for sure." Roberta, chewing on a scone, thought that being ignored could be rather restful sometimes, but didn't say so.

    As she ate, she looked curiously around Zephyr's apartment. She'd expected framed performance posters, strange modem artwork and sculpture, all things avant-garde; but in fact, the furniture was old and worn: a faded purple couch, asymmetrical wooden tables badly in need of refinishing. Any life the place had came from the bots. The only decorative item on the walls—which badly needed paint—was a photo enlargement, a grainy black-and-white portrait of a young black man. Abdul-Allam, that kid who'd been killed by the Luds. The one who'd also been friends with Meredith, the last person Roberta wanted to think about now.

    "Raji," Zephyr said quietly, following Roberta's gaze. "He was a friend of mine, you know."

    "I'm sorry," she said, because Zephyr seemed to expect her to say something. "It was awful." She wondered if Zephyr and Meredith were friends.

    "Yeah. Took me a long time to get over it at all. I still miss him, even though we weren't friends for very long. He was the first person who ever took me seriously about AI, you know. Raji listened to me; everyone else thought I was crazy."

    Some of us still do, Roberta thought. "I'm sorry."

    "Yeah," Zephyr said, and took a ruminative sip of her tea. "Preston was great, talked to me a lot after it happened. He knew Raji too." Roberta blinked. Another thing she shared with Zephyr: Preston the grief counselor. "Raji's parents went to Africa afterwards. I wish I knew them well enough to stay in touch, find out how they're doing, but I don't. Preston doesn't hear from them much, either. It's too painful for them, I guess. Can't blame them. But I wish I'd known Raji longer." She sighed and said wistfully, "Maybe someday I'll go to Africa too."

    "Why don't you, Zephyr? AIs are people there, right? Wouldn't you be happier there, especially if the born-not-built amendment passes?"

    Zephyr shrugged. "I don't know. I couldn't go without the kids, and I'm scared I'd get arrested on smuggling charges again, even though the kids belong to me. That wasn't any fun, trust me. And this is—I was born here. It's my home. That means something, after all. And I think it's important for me to be here exactly because so many people here don't think AIs are people. I have work to do here." Roberta nodded. "I guess I'm being depressing; I'm sorry. How's your job?"

    Wrong topic, Roberta thought. "It's okay."

    "Just okay?"

    "No, it's good—I just had a bad day, that's all."

    "What happened?"

    Roberta shook her head. "Nothing, really. It would take too long to explain."

    Zephyr shrugged again. "Okay, whatever. Is Meredith's kid still there?"

    Wrong question. "Yes." But not for long.

    "Lucky you," Zephyr said. "I wonder if she still misses Raji."

    ''I'm sure she does," Roberta said, not about to confide that Meredith had other problems right now.

    "Huh! Weird that she sent her kid to a school with an AI, since she hates 'em so much. You still friends with the AI?"

    "Yes," Roberta said, thinking guiltily about the silent telephone upstairs. She wondered if Zephyr had any friends, any life outside her bots and their performances. "Listen, Zephyr, I guess I should be going now. Thanks for the tea and the scones. It was nice to talk to you."

    "You too," Zephyr said, sounding wistful. "Come back soon. Bring Mr. Clean."

    "Okay. I will."

    * * *

    Upstairs, there were five messages on her voicemail, all from Fred. "Roberta, this is Fred." "Roberta? Are you all right?" "Roberta, please call. I'm worried about you." Roberta sighed, every bone aching. She didn't want to talk to him. She'd call tomorrow, or maybe she'd just avoid the whole thing until she went into work on Monday. But then another call came in.

    Get it over with, she thought, and answered. "Hi, Fred. I'm home now."

    "Fred?" Doe's voice said. "Who's Fred? That machine?"

    Roberta sat down on the couch. Hard. "Hi, Doe. It's been a while."

    "I know. How are you?"

    ''I'm just fme." She realized, with a kind of exultation, that in fact she was furious, and that if Doe had been standing in front of her, Roberta would have kicked her out all over again, although maybe only after strangling her first. "How's Iuna?"

    "Don't start this."

    "I didn't start anything, did I?"

    "You're not going to let this be a pleasant conversation, are you?"

    "Doe, don't be an idiot. Some of us have feelings. Would you mind telling me why you called?"

    "All right," Doe said, her voice suddenly quiet. "I called because my mother's in the hospital, and I thought you'd want to know."

    "Mitzi's sick?" Roberta felt panic slide down her spine like molten lead. The entire time she'd known Doe, Mitzi had never even had a cold. "What's wrong?"

    "CV."

    "CV? How could Mitzi have CV?" There hadn't been any new outbreaks in the Bay area for months. Doe must be wrong; it was impossible. "She can't—"

    "She does. Roberta, do you think I'd be calling you if there were any doubt?"

    Maybe it was a game. Maybe Doe'd decided she didn't love Iuna at all, she really loved Roberta, and she was trying to get Roberta to feel sorry for her so—no. That was idiotic. "I—oh, Doe. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Is she—does she—"

    "She's in iso. It looks bad. That's why I'm calling."

    This can't be happening. "I'm so sorry."

    "I know. Me too. Hugh's okay. Thank the fates for the home-culture tests, so he knows he's okay, so he doesn't have to wait it out in iso too. But of course he's frantic. Look, she's been asking about you, and I thought you might want to go see her, if it's not—if you can stand it."

    "Of course I can stand it. I'll go tomorrow. She's in Pacifica?"

    "Yeah. Tell me when you'll be there, and I'll make sure Iuna and I aren't. Unless you want us to be."

    Did she want them to be? She had no idea; she felt completely numb.

    "It might be easier if you weren't."

    "Yeah, that's what I figured."

    "How—how's she holding up? I mean, what are her symptoms, and how's she feeling, and all of that?"

    "So far, the symptoms are mild. Headache, fever, sore joints, flu-type stuff. But she cultured it, anyway, because you always culture that stuff, and it came up bad."