Free Sleepside: The Collected Fantasies by Greg Bear Page B

get that fixed, Thomas told himself. Oh, God, we’ll get that fixed, let him be alive and it’ll work out fine.
    The water splashed across his chest. Some of it entered his mouth and he gagged at the fishy taste. He reached out for the boy’s closest foot but couldn’t quite reach it. The sand shifted beneath him and he ducked under the surface, swallowing more water. Bobbing up again, kicking to keep his mouth clear, he wiped his eyes with one hand and saw the boy’s arms making small, sinuous motions, like the fins of a fish.
    Swimming away from Thomas.
    â€œRichie!” Thomas shouted. His wet tennis shoes, tapping against the bottom, seemed to make it resound, as if it were hollow. Then he felt the bottom lift slightly until his feet pressed flat against it, fall away until he tread water, lift again...
    He looked down. The sand, distorted by ripples in the pool, was receding. Thomas struggled with his hands, trying to swim to the edge. Beneath him waited black water like a pool of crude oil, and in it something long and white, insistent. His feet kicked furiously to keep him from ducking under again, but the water swirled.
    Thomas shut his mouth after taking a deep breath. The water throbbed like a bell, drawing him deeper, still struggling. He looked up and saw the sky, gray-blue above the ripples. There was still a chance. He kicked his shoes off, watching them spiral down. Heavy shoes, wet, gone now, he could swim better.
    He spun with the water and the surface darkened. His lungs ached. He clenched his teeth to keep his mouth shut. There seemed to be progress. The surface seemed brighter. But three hazy-edged triangles converged and he could not fool himself any more, the surface was black and he had to let his breath out, hands straining up.
    He touched a hard rasping shell.
    The pool rippled for a few minutes, then grew still. Richie let loose of the pool’s side and climbed up the edge, out of the water. His skin was pale, eyes almost milky.
    The hunger had been bad for a few months. Now they were almost content. The meals were more frequent and larger—but who knew about the months to come? Best to take advantage of the good times. He pulled the limp dummy from its hiding place beneath the flat boulder and dragged it to the pool’s edge, dumping it over and jumping in after. For a brief moment he smiled and hugged it; it was so much like himself, a final lure to make things more certain. Most of the time, it was all the human-shaped company he needed. He arranged its arms and legs in a natural position, spread out, and adjusted the drift of the Mackinaw in the water. The dummy drifted to the center of the pool and stayed there.
    A fleshy ribbon thick as his arm waved in the water and he pulled up the back of his shirt to let it touch him on the hump and fasten. This was the best time. His limbs shrank and his face sunk inward. His skin became the color of the rocks and his eyes grew large and golden. Energy—food—pulsed into him and he felt a great love for this clever other part of him, so adaptable.
    It was mother and brother at once, and if there were times when Richie felt there might be a life beyond it, an existence like that of the people he mimicked, it was only because the mimicry was so fine.
    He would never actually leave.
    He couldn’t. Eventually he would starve; he wasn’t very good at digesting.
    He wriggled until he hugged smooth against the rim, with only his head sticking out of the water. He waited.
    â€œTom!” a voice called, not very far away. It was Karen.
    â€œMrs. Harker!” Richie screamed. “Help!”

Sleepside Story
    Oliver Jones differed from his brothers as wheat from chaff. He didn’t grudge them their blind wildness; he loaned them money until he had none, and regretted it, but not deeply. His needs were not simple, but they did not hang on the sharp signs of dollars. He worked at the jobs of youth without