“That’s either wonderful, or he’s grit. How do you feel?”
“He is so sincere and… he’s so sweet, I feel guilty not dropping my tanks and digging in.”
“Well, he’s your first, and that’s sweet alone. But you’re not telling Aunt Di how you feel. Do you love him?”
“I’m worried I’m going to hurt him.”
“Ah. I mean, uh-oh.”
“You sound experienced” I said testily, knotting my fingers.
“I wish I were. Casseia, stop pacing and relax. You’re giving me an ache.”
I sat.
“You went with him to Trés Haut Médoc. He wasn’t just climbing into your suit. You must have seen something special in him. Do you love him?”
“Yes,” I said.
“But you don’t want to lawbond.”
“Not right away.”
“Ever?”
I shook my head, neither yes nor no. “Don’t tell me I’m a fool not to, because he’s pretty and kind. I know that already.”
“No such, Casseia. Although I’m a bit envious. He is smart, he was good — I assume — ”
“He was very good,” I cried.
“And he’s willing to wait; So wait.”
I pressed my lips together and stared at her. “What if I decide not to lawbond? Would that be fair? He’d have wasted time on me…”
“God, Casseia, I hope no sophisticated Terrie ever hears this. We Martians are such serious folk. Love is never wasted. Do you want to dump him now and try someone else?”
“No!” I said angrily.
“Hey, it is an option. Nobody’s forcing you to do anything. Don’t forget that.”
Talking with her simply dropped me deeper. “I feel really terrible now,” I said. “I’d better go.”
“Not on your life. Why are you so charged about this?”
“Because if I love him, I should feel differently. I should feel all one way, not three ways. I should be happy and giving.”
“You’re ten years old, Casseia. Young love is never perfect.”
“He uses Earth years,” I lamented.
“Ah, a fault! What other faults does he have?”
“He’s so smart. I can’t understand anything about his work.”
“Take a course. He doesn’t want you for a lab assistant or fraulein arbeiter, does he?”
“When I’m away from him, I don’t know what to feel.”
Diane wrinkled her face is disgust. “All right, we’re running in circles. Who’s waiting in a side tunnel?”
“Nobody,” I said.
“You know how men react to you. You’re attractive. Charles isn’t the only slim and randy buck on Mars. You can afford to relax a bit. What do you know about him? You know his family isn’t rich… his BM is in trouble with Earth… he wants to be a physicist and understand everything. He’s pretty he’s gentle, he’s rugged on the Up… God, Casseia, I’m going to hit you if you just void him!”
I shook my hanging head. “I’ve got to go, Diane.”
“Sorry I’m not helping.”
“It’s okay.”
“Do you love him, Casseia?” she asked again, eyes sharp.
“No!” I fumbled to hit the vid off. I missed.
“Don’t cut me now, roomie,” Diane said. “You don’t love him at all?”
“I can’t. Not now. Not one hundred per.”
“You’re positive?”
I nodded.
“Could you come to love him, someday?”
I stared at her blankly. “He’s very persuasive,” I said.
“One hundred per?”
“Probably not. No. I don’t think so.”
“Be kind, then. Tell him honestly how you feel right now.”
“I will.”
She looked away for a moment, then brought up her slate. “You know me,” she said. “Always squirreling. Well, I have something interesting here, if you want to know about it.”
“What?” I asked.
“Charles may be ragged on the Up and good in bed, but he has plans, Casseia. Have you checked up on your friend?”
“No.”
“I always make sure I know as much as possible about my male friends. Men can be so tortuous.”
I wondered what she was going to throw at me now, and my shoulders tensed: that he was actually a Statist, that he had been spying for Caroline Connor in the trench domes.
“This doesn’t toss any sand on how nice a guy he is, but our good Charles wants to be a real physicist, Casseia. He’s applied to be a subject for enhancement research.”
“So? It’s the pro thing. Even Majumdar accepts it.”
“Yeah. And on Earth, everybody does it. But Charles has applied to be hooked to a Quantum Logic thinker.”
I fell silent for a moment. “Where d-did you learn that?”
“Open records, medically oriented research applications, UMS. He put in the request early last summer, before the trench domes.”
My insides sank. “Oh, God,” I said.
“Hey, we don’t know much about such a link.”
“Nobody can even talk to a QL thinker!” I said.
“I didn’t want to puddle your dust, Casseia, but I thought you’d want to know.”
“Oh.”
“When will you be back?”
I mumbled an answer and cut the vid. My head seemed filled with foam. I didn’t know whether to be angry or to cry.
On Mars, we had escaped most of the ferment of enhancements and transforms and nanomorphing commonplace on Earth. We were used to low-level enhancements, genetic correction, and therapy for serious mental disorders, but most Martians eschewed the extreme possibilities. Some weren’t available off Earth; some just didn’t suit our pragmatic, pioneer tastes. I think the cultural consensus was that Mars would let Earth and, to a lesser extent, the Moon try the radical treatments, and Mars would sit the revolution out for a decade or two and await the results.
If what Diane had learned was true — and I couldn’t think of any reason to doubt her — Charles seemed ready to zip right to the cutting edge.
What had been youthful ambivalence before ramped to near-panic now. How could I maintain any kind of normal relationship with Charles when he would spend much of his mental life listening to the vagaries of Quantum Logic? Why would he want that in the first place?
The answer was clear — to make him a better physicist. Quantum Logic reflected the way the universe operated at a deep level. Human logic — and the mathematical neural logic of most thinkers — worked best on the slippery surface of reality.
What I knew of these topics, I had picked from school studies and mass LitVid, where physically and mentally enhanced heroes dominated Terrie youth programming. But in truth, I understood very little about Quantum Logic or QL thinkers.
One last question chased me through the rest of the day, through dinner with my parents and brother, through the BM social hour and tea dance later in the evening, into a sleepless bed: Why didn’t Charles tell me?
He hadn’t given me everything, after all.
Early the next morning, my mother and I planned my education through the next few years. I wasn’t in the mood, but it had to be done, so I put on as brave and cheerful a face as I could manage. Father and Stan had gone to an inter-BM conference on off-Mars asset control; our branch of the family had traditionally served the Majumdar BM by directing the family’s involvement in Triple finances, and Stan was following that road. I was still interested in management and political theory, even more now that I had spend a few months away from such courses. The UMS action, and my time with Charles, had sharpened my resolve.
Mother was a patient woman, too patient I thought, but I was grateful to have her sympathy now. She had never approved of political process; my grandmother had left the Moon in protest when it had reshaped its constitution, and her daughter had retained a typical Lunar sense of rugged individualism.