Free The Sunspacers Trilogy by George Zebrowski Page A

never grow up. Maybe no one ever did, and all the adults were faking it; and Morey was faking the nonexistent wisdom of old age. He had done it all through high school. I knew his feelings about politics, and that he held his views honestly. I understood what he meant, but the way he applied it to the Mercury situation rubbed me the wrong way. I couldn’t shake the suspicion that Morey really wanted to be Christopher Van Cott.
    I punched up 1088.
    Linda’s face appeared in the screen. “Oh, hello,” she said, surprised. To me it sounded as if she had said, “O hollow,” which showed what kind of state I was in. Morey and I had often disagreed, but it had always been friendly. Linda’s smile was a welcome relief.
    “Say,” I croaked, “like to go out?”
    “What?”
    I cleared my throat. “Would you like to go out?”
    “Oh.” I thought she was going to laugh at me.
    “Would you like to go out this evening, with me?” I managed to say.
    She stared at me for a moment. “Say, how tall are you?”
    “Uh, about a hundred and seventy-five centimeters. Do you want to or not?”
    “I’ll meet you in the courtyard of your dorm.”
    She smiled and blanked the screen.
    The night was a bright lunar twilight with a million stars scattered across the blue-green inner surface. The polar Sun rings were a soft blue-white. I stepped closer to the rock garden in the courtyard and read that the minerals and sand were all from the Moon. Then I gazed upward, picking out the roads leading in and out of the town on the other side of the world.
    “Hello.”
    I turned around. Linda stood in front of me. “Hi,” I said. She was about my height, maybe a half inch taller.
    She stepped close to me. I felt her breath on my cheek. “People from Earth grow slower,” she said, smiling.
    “I hope you weren’t busy, when I called, I mean.”
    “Just about to wash my hair.”
    I took in a deeper breath. The knots in her braids looked even more complicated than I remembered. She looked delicious, and she seemed to like me. I felt my pulse quicken.
    “I was going to take it out,” she said. “Would you like it long?”
    “Sure.”
    She smiled again. “Do you like it like this, with the braids piled on top?”
    “Sure.”
    She touched my cheek gently. “You’ll say anything. Where do you want to go?”
    “How do you know people from Earth grow slower?” I asked feebly.
    “Higher gravity to overcome. You know that. Where are we going?”
    “How about the movie museum?” I asked, happy at my good luck.
    “What’s playing?”
    “Let’s go and see.”
    “Okay, Sorby, let’s go.” Her use of my last name surprised me.
    She hooked her arm in mine, and we marched across the courtyard. I glanced at her, and she smiled as we started on the path to the student center.
    “You’re making fun of me,” I said.
    “I call everyone by their last name until I know them better.” She gave my arm a squeeze.
    We circled the big white cake of the student center. The museum came into view—a one-story circular building tucked away among some pine trees. We came closer and saw what they were showing: WAR OF THE WORLDS
THE TIME MACHINE
    “Old stuff,” she said. “Over a hundred years old. Flat screen, messy sound.”
    “It’s probably been cleaned up and in 3-D, but we can always ask for something else.” I stopped and looked at her. “Were you expecting me to call?”
    “Well—”
    I could see that she was tempted to lie about it. “No, Joe,” she said finally, “honestly, I wasn’t.”
    Maybe someone else had stood her up. She was at least using my first name now.
    “But I wanted you to call,” she added, startling me.
    “What would you really like to see?” I asked, recovering.
    She put a finger to her temple and closed her eyes in mock concentration. Her tight-fitting tan denim suit revealed that she was small breasted and thin, but her small waist made her hips seem rounder.
    “Maybe if they have a Bergman, she