Chapter 45.

 

Gina

 

 

Ann hugged Gina fiercely. "So long as you're all right," she said, and Gina hugged her back; it was so good to see Ann again, colorful, flamboyant Ann, who had showed up this morning while Gina was still asleep, driving her little car much too fast and skidding to a stop just short of Jared's car returning from the doctor's office. Jared swore their collision shields bumped.

But Gina had slept through it; she woke up late in the afternoon in Sofi and Issio's bed, with Sofi asleep beside her; she had been at the hospital, Issio told her, running between Willis and Lillian until Dr. Frank threatened to admit her too, and Clena and Evvie and Cara shoved her into the van and brought her home in spite of her protests. Phyllis was still there, and Al, and Mutai and Wundra and Ollie. Mimi was making a list of who should go to the hospital when, to relieve the Bahtan sisters and to be sure Lillian and Willis weren't alone.

Ann was on the list, but Gina was not, which upset her, but Issio said she had done more than enough and needed rest so she could be alert when Willis and Lillian came home. And Sofi said both of them were doing very well; Jared said he thought – hoped, he added – that they could come home tomorrow. "The sooner the better," he said. He and Dr. Frank had had, Gina saw, to tell some very serious lies to keep the hospital from calling in the authorities to investigate how Willis and Lillian were injured, and they were anxious about what Willis and Lillian might say if they weren't briefed in time. The hospital would lock them up in the psych ward, Jared said.

But Ann, of course, knew the whole story by the time Gina woke up. They had told her the truth, which was the right thing to do with Ann, and she accepted it as if she had seen it for herself; she was less disturbed than the people who really had been there. Gina herself had no idea how to feel about it. There was her, well, her father, and there was Maud, and the pendants, and that strange pink purple place with the delicate chimes in the mists. Passing through that place, they were home, where Gina wanted to be so badly that it seemed like an answer to her need, nothing more than that. So she hadn't asked questions when she should have. Nobody had.

Ann was extremely upset that she hadn't been in on it earlier; she had known something was wrong, she said, but she had always been told not to listen to these sorts of feelings. And there had been other things to do, so she had stayed home as long as she could stand it. Finally she couldn't wait any longer, so she drove over, thinking by that time in the morning people would be up, and there they were, Terry with the D'ubians and Jared with swollen knuckles and blood on his shirt getting out of his car, and Mimi running around with a beam pistol in her pocket and all the Bahtan sisters gone.

"So what were you doing?" asked Cara, and Ann blushed.

"But he left really early," she said, "got up and got dressed; he said there was something he had to take care of, and he said he would come back but he never did."

Cara got busy with the iced tea from the food keeper. Gina could see from her face that she thought it was funny, but also sad, and Jared, sprawled in the big armchair, was thinking about sex and love and how people confused them and thought one was the other and it was too bad.

It was pleasantly quiet in the neighborhood. Some people, like Sofi, were sleeping. The D'ubians probably were, although you couldn't be sure. They had taken Terry home with them. Since Lillian and Willis were in the hospital, and Phyllis wasn't about to be separated from them, Jared and Cara had offered to take Terry for the time being but Dural wouldn't hear of it.

And Issio and Sofi were keeping Gina with them. Cara and Jared had sent over a folding bed, which Cara had brought from her own house when she moved in with Jared; the night nurses who had taken care of Dr. Lindstrom had used it. Issio was setting it up in the small second bedroom which he had already started to clear for the nursery, and Cara had run into the Hardesty house and brought an armload of Gina's clothes, things she hadn't taken with her to Linden's World. All of their luggage had been left there, of course, and Gina was sorry to lose some of her readers and her favorite jeans, but she didn't want to go back for them.

She didn't ever want to see Linden's World again.

Leaving Ann to work out with Mimi when she would take a shift at the hospital – she was willing to go anytime, even in the middle of the night – Gina drifted through the study and out through Jared's screened porch to the back yard. It smelled like fresh-cut grass – the mower had just parked itself by the power outlet – and Mimi's latest batch of rolls; it smelled like home. She was still so deeply grateful to be here. The endless night on the farm wasn't real, she told herself. What was real was looking up from the hollow to see Jared, old jeans and black T-shirt and the morning sun on his dark skin, reaching out for her; what was real was feeling the gray-black body hair on Issio's shoulder and his arms around her as the D'ubians played and the Bahtan van rushed Willis and Lillian to the doctor.

What was real was her family here.

She drifted through the fresh-cut grass toward Issio's house, pausing behind the car port between the two houses to see the line of small blue flowers someone had planted there; she thought it was Cara, who hadn't much gardening experience but had, watching Mimi and Clyde, expressed a desire to learn. They were growing very nicely, she thought, and turned to find the man who said he was her father leaning against the half wall at the back of the car port and looking at her.

"You look better," he greeted her.

"I'm fine," she said. "Thank you for coming to get us."

"I'm sorry I was late," he said. He looked toward Jared's back porch, as if making sure no one was there. He was still in that red jogging outfit, looking, Gina thought, a little silly. "I've been at the hospital," he said. "Willis is healing. And Terry –"

"He's with the D'ubians," she said, and he nodded, with a faint smile.

"The music," he murmured. "And you?" he said. "You're not alone tonight?"

"I'm staying with Issio and Sofi."

"That's good," he said. "That's good." They stood in silence for a moment. "I should have been there," he said. "It didn't occur to me – we thought the danger was here. I'm sorry. That shouldn't have happened to you, any of you."

She could almost read him, thoughts sliding over the hard white surface of his mind; she thought that what he was actually feeling was guilt. He had been doing something for his own pleasure and not thinking of them, and he was upset about it now. "But you helped us get away," she said, "and get home again, and that's what matters the most."

"You did well," he said, "getting yourself out, hiding Willis. Willis did well, getting Terry to safety. And it was a good idea you had, to get your phone, to call here. Your friends here, at the very worst, could have advised you, and as it happened, one of us was on watch. So we were able to take action."

"Why," said Gina, "was Maud watching? And how?"

He smiled faintly. "That fly was bad enough, once we understood what it was doing. The thing you call the D'ubian It," he said, "it scared us; it nearly killed Jared. So she was on watch. We have," he said thoughtfully, "a great deal invested in this neighborhood."

"How did she know what happened?" asked Gina, trying again to touch his mind, held off again by the hard white surface. He and Maud could perhaps communicate with each other, though.

If so, he wasn't going to talk about it. "We have ways," he said.

Gina tried again, but she couldn't get past the surface feelings, although he was not as remote as she had usually found him. "What do you mean?" she asked him.

"Very – mundane ways," he said, looking uncomfortable. He studied the circle of trees at the end of the yard, either seeking words or wishing he were out of sight in the woods, and Gina thought he was about to say something more when she heard Ann and Cara laughing about something back in the study. "And Clena said it was the one with the polished horns," said Cara, and the back door rattled as one of them began to open it.

"I'll be back another time," said the man in the red jogging suit, and touched his pendant and vanished. It was very strange, not quite comfortable, to see it.

She turned back to join Cara and Ann, stepping out into the back yard sunshine. Ann was not going to go into the woods today, she said; she was going to go home and get ready for the first night shift, split between Lillian and Willis, and she hoped she could talk Phyllis into coming home just long enough to get some sleep. "And Al, too," said Cara. "At least he should get better dressed. He was still in those flowered shorts when I saw him last."

 

"It has occurred to your father," Jared said to Gina, "that he barely knows you. He claims you as his daughter, but you and he have exchanged, what, fifty words, maybe, in your whole life. It has occurred to him that he is missing out on something."

Issio, sitting with Sofi on the couch, flipped his tail impatiently and Sofi snorted. "This is not an intelligent species, I see," she said. "They leave their children in any passing hands; they look in only at odd moments; they speak to them rarely and reluctantly; and they are disappointed that their children show no interest in them. Thirteen devils!" she said. "If I could do no better, I would die of shame."

"Maud said," Jared commented, glancing at Cara, by the breakfast bar, "that they are not very good parents."

"That's an understatement," she murmured, and Gina wondered what Cara was feeling; as usual she couldn't read her. Neither could Jared, who was trying very hard. She must be having problems with the whole idea of Maud, as a mother, as Jared's former girlfriend, as whatever-she-was that could move freely between worlds and move others, too, just like the man who claimed to be Gina's father. Gina, out of her own mixed feelings, could sympathize.

"You have done much research," said Issio to Jared. "Other things have distracted us, but you have made some progress."

"I still have Tim Andes at the hospital looking for the tissue samples Maud left. He thinks they were misfiled," said Jared. "I think someone got rid of them."

"Did anyone actually take the samples in the first place?" asked Cara.

"We have the paperwork," said Jared. "I saw that on the computer. What I don't have are the samples, and I don't really expect to get them. Why would they leave a clue like that where we could find it? They must know what it would show about them."

"You said," said Issio, "that Maud stated her blood and her tissues were genetically abnormal."

"Genetic kinks," said Jared. "That's how she phrased it."

They all sat, thinking about it. "Maybe," said Gina hesitantly, and they all looked at her. "If he –" She had trouble calling him by his name, which was silly; she knew it, after all. "Chazaerte," she said, "if he is my father, maybe my blood and tissues are kinked too."

Sofi put an arm around her. "Which would be useful for comparison," she said, "but by itself, I think it not very helpful."

"I think," said Jared, "that we ought to take a nice weekend jaunt to Wark's Ferry. There is a doctor living there who we might visit. I am positive she knows something about a certain death certificate, and I would swear, looking at her picture, that she knows a lot more than that. I doubt she will tell us anything, but then again she might. And there's more than one way of getting information." He grinned at Sofi and Issio and Gina; you would have thought, Gina mused, that he himself had no talents whatsoever.

Cara, who could not be read and could not, as far as Gina could feel, read others, regarded them with curiosity, but she didn't ask. Gina didn't know if Jared had ever told her what he could do. She didn't think she had ever heard him talking about it with anyone.

"We should go," said Issio, nodding, "all five of us." This meant her, too, Gina realized, and that made her happy, being counted among them. "Because you," Issio pointed out to Gina, having caught her thought, "have also some questions, I am sure, and you have the right to answers."

"Anyone got anything scheduled for this weekend?" asked Jared.

"The sooner the better," said Cara. "Before this doctor realizes we're looking for her, and transports herself to some other universe."

 

Willis and Lillian came home in the Bahtan van the next day, and settled in their rooms in the Hardesty house. Lillian was only partly conscious, still in a lot of pain; they had her shoulder and her knee both immobilized while the clone lab worked on a new knee and the new tendons and ligaments in her shoulder set into place. Willis was conscious but very tired. They wanted to see Phyllis and Terry and Gina, mostly to be sure they were all right, Gina saw, and once reassured Lillian lapsed back into her dreams and Willis dozed off again.

Evvie and Ollie took over nursing duties, and Phyllis spent most of the day on the phone to their insurance company, which had policies on Willis and Gina and Terry as well as Lillian and Phyllis. They had been very happy to take their credits all these years, Phyllis said, but they weren't a bit interested in paying any of the bills. While Gina was upstairs with Willis and Lillian, she could hear Phyllis in the living room, shouting about co-payments and deductibles. Ann said insurance companies never changed; it was as bad now as it had been centuries ago.

Because the household was still in such chaos, it was agreed that Terry should stay with the D'ubians, who seemed really happy about it. And Sofi and Issio flatly refused to give Gina up. They felt best, Gina realized, when she was actually with them; they wanted to be sure at every moment that she was all right, and so did Jared and Cara.

This suited her. She looked away from the memory of those faces and those hands at the farm, didn't let them come out where they could upset her, but she still could hear the hectoring tones of what Jared and Cara called the Fathervoice; it still frightened her, like any bad dream. Being with Sofi and Issio and Jared and Cara made her feel that the voice was less important; she felt safe with them.

As long as Willis and Lillian were all right, and she had faith in the Bahtan sisters, and as long as there was someone to take care of Terry, and she had faith in the D'ubians, she could relax again, even look forward to the weekend trip. She had never been on a supertrain before; that was going to be fun. Sofi went on the screen to make train reservations for them, and Cara was arranging for rooms at a hotel for Saturday night.

Jared went to the Institute, because he hadn't gone to work Thursday; he told the people there that he was having leg trouble, not, he said, telling them exactly whose legs were giving him trouble.

Gina's new carry-on bag had been abandoned with her other things on Linden's World, but her old one was in her room at the Hardesty house, and after dinner she and Jared and Cara went up to visit Willis and Lillian and pick up her bag for the trip. Lillian was awake, lying in bed cursing at her knee. Al sat beside her, as he had most of the day, telling her how the new knee would fix her up as good as new. "I'll bet," she snorted. But she was pleased to see her visitors, and thanked Jared and Cara for the rescue work. "I don't understand exactly how you did it, but thank you anyway," she said, "and especially getting Gina and Willis out of that nut house."

Willis was only partially awake; he smiled tiredly at everyone and went back to sleep. Ollie was staying with him; she said she and her sisters were taking turns. "And Phyllis says she does not know how she will pay us," said Ollie, "and I wish you would please tell her we do not charge family; this we are doing because we want to. She will not listen to me."

But Phyllis, sprawled in the old rocker in the living room, was in a much better mood; she had just heard, she said, from Dr. Frank, who had told her there was a foundation funding studies on reconstruction of joints, bones and muscles, who had volunteered to pick up all of Lillian's medical expenses, including nursing at home and rehab. "They search the hospitals for the right kinds of cases," she said. "That's what Dr. Frank told me, and they called him asking if we would be interested in taking part. And he suggested I check with the estate about the expenses for Willis, which I must say sounds appropriate. I'm going to see if I can get our lawyer to find out what the situation there is, who the executor is. I'll call him on Monday."

"That's got to be a relief," said Cara.

"It is," admitted Phyllis. "I was starting to get worried about it, but now I can relax again. They've both got to have the best care available, but that damned insurance company – excuse me, Gina," she added quickly, and Jared and Cara laughed, and in that small unguarded moment Gina got a flash from Jared, something that had to do with the foundation, something that touched briefly on Maud and a lawyer and phone calls he had made from the Institute this afternoon, arrangements he had set up; it was only a flash and it vanished at once, so that she might not have even seen it.

He didn't want it to be seen, anyway; at the slightest hint she might have touched him, he closed it off right away.