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out his cell phone. “You must be tired of hearing me blather on. I’ll call you a cab.”
    “No rush.” It was relaxing, in that dim kitchen with the moonlight streaming in. No noise, no music, just someone to talk to and the heavenly smell and taste of that coffee.
    John was staring at his phone. “Good, because the damned thing is dead. Let me put it in the charger for a bit.” He pulled over what Ryan had thought was an abstract sculpture, and set the phone into it, plugging in a jack. Ryan leaned forward to take a closer look. The piece was made of wood, in long swooping curves that looked abstract. Until you put the phone in it, and then the shape resolved into a pair of hands, cradling the phone as if it were precious.
    Ryan ran a finger over the luster of the wood. “Wow, that’s cool too. Same artist that did the lamp, right?”
    When John didn’t answer, he looked up to see the man was…blushing?
    “You made this?”
    “It’s just a hobby. I pick up the stray bits of wood I find and fiddle with them in my spare time. It’s just for fun.”
    “Well, I’ve seen worse in fancy galleries with major price tags. If you’re ever short of cash, let me know. My sister-in-law would love this.” Grace had a thing for melding form and function. When it was done right.
    “It’s just a hobby,” John said firmly, almost angrily.
    “Okay.” Ryan took his hands off the piece and sat back.
    “Let me have your phone. I’ve got a number for the taxi company somewhere. I’ll call you that cab and they can charge it to me. It’s the least I can do.”
    Somehow the easy comfort had disappeared. Ryan pulled out his cell and passed it over.  

Chapter Three
     
    The air was warm and pleasant on campus in the middle of the day. Ryan had a sandwich, a soda and a lovely biochemistry chart of the Krebs Cycle to study. He headed across the grass, looking for a shady spot to enjoy them. Down the hill, there was a stand of old pines. He vaguely remembered seeing a bench set under them. Sitting on something raised was always a little easier than getting himself back up off the ground.
    As he approached the trees he heard women’s voices raised anxiously. Two girls stood under the tallest pine, looking up. One blonde, one brunette, young enough to definitely be undergraduates, and both looking anxious.
    “Come on now. This is silly,” the blonde was saying as he reached her.
    “What’s up?” He looked up, following her gaze. About fifteen feet up in the tree, another girl with long brown hair was climbing slowly.
    “Come on, Alice,” the brunette at the foot of the tree called. “That’s high enough.”
    Ryan looked at the tree. Like many old pines, it had a veritable ladder of side branches running up its trunk. The girl had another twenty or thirty feet before the branches got too thin to be safe. Although she wasn’t wearing good shoes for climbing. “What’s she up to?” he asked the blonde.
    “We don’t know. She’s been odd all morning, not really there. Then after poetry class she got spacey, talked about the squirrels of the air. Nancy and I figured we’d better keep an eye on her. She just marched down here and started climbing.”
    “Her name’s Alice?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Hey, Alice,” he called up. “What are your plans? How high are you going to go?”
    “Squirrels climb,” the girl’s voice floated down. “The trees are their highways, to reach the realms of sky.” She pulled herself up another rung.
    Not a good answer. “Alice. Your friends are worried about you. We’d like you to stop there for a bit.”
    “But the sky is above me.” He could see what they meant by spacey. The girl’s voice seemed to float on a breath with no emotion behind it. “Up, up and up. To real lightness of being.” Another branch up.
    “What should we do?” the brunette asked.
    “Does she do drugs?”
    “I wouldn’t have said so,” the blonde said slowly. “But lately she’s