Free Boundaries by T.M. Wright

knowing that he was trying to distance himself from his purpose here.
    At last, he drove off.

TWELVE

    “ G oing to be a beautiful day," said the voice.
    David looked back. He saw a shadow, man-shaped, and behind it the pines, which were in great abundance here, and beyond the pines, wedges of pale blue sky. And above . . .
    Above .
    "No rain today," said the voice. "No darkness today."
    Above.
    "Today there is blue sky," said the voice. "Today is a beautiful day. All day."
    David reached for the shadow of the man. He had no real idea why; perhaps he wanted to test this place, find its reality. But his arm was unfamiliar to him, white and straight—a piece of wood. Then there were muscles in it, then the skin was pink, and he recognized it.
    But his arm was still a good distance from the shadow of the man, and David’s outstretched fingers touched only air.
    He felt a breeze tickle the hair on his arms.
    In awe, he whispered, "This is the earth."
    The shadow of the man said, "Going to be a beautiful day. No dark today. Beautiful day."
    David’s arm dropped. He moved forward, closer to the shadow of the man. The man receded. The shadow receded. Its movement was attended by a low, flat rustling sound, like paper being crumpled. It was the sound of distance being established, David realized.
    The shadow said aloud—louder, though still without urgency—"You can’t stay. How can you stay?"
    Then there was again the sound of paper being crumpled, and the shadow moved very quickly, as if it were the shadow of something very small that was being withdrawn by something very, very large. And so, in a moment, stillness was in the forest again, in the dust hanging in the air, in the silence.
    ~ * ~
    At the house, dust collected, settled, formed, dissipated, collected again.
    In the fields surrounding the house, people were picking fruit that grew on plants which hung close to the ground. The fruit was sweet, pungent, and red, like strawberries, and one of the people gathering the fruit straightened in the white light, held a piece of the fruit between his fingers, and smiled. "We could have whipped cream with this," he said.
    There were people around him, but they made no acknowledgment of him. And the man, having already forgotten what he had said, popped the fruit into his mouth, enjoyed the squish of it under his tongue, and continued picking.
    ~ * ~
    Christian Grieg and Karen Duffy had stayed at a motel outside Syracuse for the night following their visit with David, and they had made love. It was their first time; it had been awkward, self-conscious, unsure, and now, over breakfast at the motel’s tiny restaurant, they were mutually embarrassed but did not want to show it.
    Christian was thinking, as he and Karen talked, about the mistakes he had made in his life, the regrets he had fostered and sheltered now. This woman was one of those regrets, he had decided. He did not love her. How could he love her? She was like his sister, or his mother, so it would be wrong to love her in the way that he had.
    "I’m sorry, Karen," he cut in.
    She stopped talking. She had been talking about her work. "Sorry?" she said, not so he would repeat what he’d said, but because she simply hadn’t heard him.
    "I said nothing." He pushed a bit of scrambled egg around his plate. "Go on," meaning that she should go on talking about her work.
    Karen mentally played back the last half minute. "You’re sorry for last night, Christian? You needn’t be."
    A family came into the tiny restaurant. They were a family of four—mother, father, girl, boy—and they were all very fat. The father said in a high, squeaking voice to the mother, "Over there, Alice," and indicated a booth just behind the booth that Karen and Christian were in.
    Christian glanced around at the family; he grimaced a little as they sat down, the man with his back to Christian, so the seat Christian was in moved and shifted. Christian looked around again. He said to the back of