This Perfect Day Read Online Free PDF

escalator and was taken smoothly upward.
    In the car going back Chip sat silently, thinking that he would miss Papa Jan and his Sunday-and-holiday visits. It was strange, because he was such an odd and different old member. Yet that was exactly why he would miss him, Chip suddenly realized; because he was odd and different, and nobody else would fill his place.
    “What’s the matter, Chip?” his mother asked.
    “I’m going to miss Papa Jan,” he said.
    “So am I,” she said, “but we’ll see him on the phone once in a while.”
    “It’s a good thing he’s going,” Chip’s father said.
    “I want him not to go,” Chip said. “I want him to be transferred back here.”
    “He’s not very likely to be,” his father said, “and it’s a good thing. He was a bad influence on you.”
    “Mike,” Chip’s mother said.
    “Don’t you start that cloth,” Chip’s father said. “My name is Jesus, and his is Li.”
    “And mine is Peace,” Peace said.

3
    C HIP REMEMBERED what Papa Jan had told him, and in the weeks and months that followed, thought often about wanting something, wanting to do something, as Papa Jan at ten had wanted to help build Uni. He lay awake for an hour or so every few nights, considering all the different assignments there were, all the different classifications he knew of—construction supervisor like Papa Jan, lab technician like his father, plasmaphysicist like his mother, photographer like a friend’s father; doctor, adviser, dentist, cosmonaut, actor, musician. They all seemed pretty much the same, but before he could really want one he had to pick one. It was a strange thought to think about—to pick, to choose, to decide. It made him feel small, yet it made him feel big too, both at the same time.
    One night he thought it might be interesting to plan big buildings, like the little ones he had built with a construction set he had had a long time before (winking red no from Uni). That was the night before a treatment, which Papa Jan had said was a good time for wanting things. The next night big-building planner didn’t seem any different from any other classification. In fact, the whole idea of wanting one particular classification seemed silly and pre-U that night, and he went straight to sleep.
    The night before his next treatment he thought about planning buildings again—buildings of all different shapes, not just the three usual ones—and he wondered why the interestingness of the idea had disappeared the month before. Treatments were to prevent diseases and to relax members who were tense and to keep women from having too many babies and men from having hair on their faces; why should they make an interesting idea seem not interesting? But that was what they did, one month, and the next month, and the next.
    Thinking such thoughts might be a form of selfishness, he suspected; but if it was, it was such a minor form—involving only an hour or two of sleep time, never of school or TV time—that he didn’t bother to mention it to Bob NE, just as he wouldn’t have mentioned a moment’s nervousness or an occasional dream. Each week when Bob asked if everything was okay, he said yes it was: top speed, no friction. He took care not to “think wanting” too often or too long, so that he always got all the sleep he needed, and mornings, while washing, he checked his face in the mirror to make sure he still looked right. He did—except of course for his eye.
    In 146 Chip and his family, along with most of the members in their building, were transferred to AFR71680. The building they were housed in was a brand-new one, with green carpet instead of gray in the hallways, larger TV screens, and furniture that was upholstered though nonadjustable.
    There was much to get used to in ’71680. The climate was somewhat warmer, and the coveralls lighter in weight and color; the monorail was old and slow and had frequent breakdowns; and the totalcakes were wrapped in greenish foil