Women in Deep Time Read Online Free PDF Page B

my family,” Reena said.
    Without thinking, Letitia said, “But you’re beautiful.” And she meant it. Reena was beautiful; with her Levantine darkness and long black hair, small sharp chin, large hazelcolored almond eyes and thin, ever-so-slightly bowed nose, she was simply lovely, with the kind of face and bearing and intelligence that two or three generations before would have moved her into entertainment, or pushed her into the social circles of the rich and famous. Behind the physical beauty was a sparkle of reserved wit, and something gentle. PPCs were healthier, felt better, and their minds, on the average, were more subtle, more balanced. Letitia did not feel inferior, however; not this time.
    Something magic touched them. The previous awkwardness, and her deft destruction of that awkwardness, had moved them into a period of charmed conversation. Neither could offend the other; without words, that was a given.
    “My parents are beautiful, too. I’m second generation,” Reena said.
    “Why would you want to look any different?”
    “I don’t, I suppose. I’m happy with the way I look. But I don’t look much like my mother or my father. Oh, color, hair, eyes, that sort of thing…Still, my mother wasn’t happy with her own face. She didn’t get along well with my grandmother…She blamed her for not matching her face with her personality.” Reena smiled. “It’s all rather silly.”
    “Some people are never happy,” Letitia observed.
    Reena stepped forward and leaned over slightly to face
    Letitia’s mirror image. “How do you feel, looking like your grandmother?”
    Letitia bit her lip. “Until you asked me to join, I don’t think I ever knew.” she told about her mother giving her the album, and looking at herself in the mirror—though she did not describe being naked—and comparing herself with the old pictures.
    “I think that’s called an epiphany,” Reena said. “It must have been nice. I’m glad I asked you, then, even if I was stupid.”
    “Were you…” Letitia paused. The period of charm was fading, regrettably; she did not know whether this question would be taken as she meant it. “Did you ask me to give me a chance to stop being so silly and stand-offish?”
    “No,” Reena said steadily. “I asked you because we needed an old lady.”
    Looking at each other, they laughed suddenly, and the charmed moment was gone, replaced by something steadier and longer-lasting: friendship. Letitia took Reena’s hand and pressed it. “Thank you,” she said.
    “You’re welcome.” Then, with hardly a pause, Reena said, “At least you don’t have to worry.”
    Letitia stared up at her, mouth open, eyes searching.
    “Got to go home now,” Reena said. She squeezed Letitia’s shoulder with more than gentle strength, revealing a physical anger or jealousy that ran counter to all they had said and done thus far. She turned and walked through the green room door, leavingLetitia alone to pick off a few scraps of latex and adhesive.
    The disaster grew. Letitia listened to the news in her room late that night, whispers in her ear, projected ghosts of newscasters and doctors and scientists dancing before her eyes, telling her things she did not really understand, could only feel.
    A monster walked through her generation, but it would not touch her.
    Going to school on Monday, she saw students clustered in hallways before the bell, somber, talking in low voices, glancing at her as she passed. In her second period class, she learned from overheard conversation that Leroux had died during the weekend. “He was superwhiz,” a tall, athletic girl told her neighbor. “They don’t die, usually, they just blitz. But he died.”
    Letitia retreated to the old lavatory at the beginning of lunch break, found it empty, but did not stare into the mirror. She knew what she looked like and accepted it.
    What she found difficult to accept was a new feeling inside her. The young Letitia was gone. She