Kafari’s father, reading much of what was in her heart, murmured, “Hold onto your hope, Kafari. And do what you can to let her know you care. One of these days she’ll wake up and that will mean something to her.”
Kafari stumbled on the way up the porch steps. “Thanks,” she managed, blinking hard.
He squeezed her arm gently, then they were inside and people were swarming past, most of them jabbering excitedly, with the little ones swirling around their ankles like the tide coming in at Merton Beach. Kafari snagged punch and cookies and handed a cup and plate to Yalena while dredging up the best smile she could muster. Yalena, scowling in deep suspicion, sniffed the punch, pulled a face, then condescended to taste it. She shrugged, as though indifferent, but drank every bit as much as her exuberant cousins. She fought for her share of the cookies, too, which were piled high and dusted with sugar, or smeared with frosting of various flavors, or drenched in a honey-and-nut coating that Kafari had forgotten tasted so heavenly. Simon went for the honey-nut ones too, managing a brilliant smile for Kafari as he snagged seconds.
Yalena’s cousin Anastasia, who was only six months younger than Yalena, took the bull by the horns, as it were, and walked up to stare at her older cousin. “That’s a nice dress,” she said, in the manner of someone who will be polite no matter the personal cost. “Where did you find it?”
“Madison,” Yalena answered with withering disdain.
“Huh. In that case, you paid too much for it.”
Yalena’s mouth fell open. Anastasia grinned, then said in a cuttingly impolite tone, “Those shoes are the stupidest things I’ve ever seen. You couldn’t outrun a hog in those things, let alone a jaglitch.”
“And why,” Yalena demanded in a scathing tone that bent the steel window frames, “would I want to outrun a jaglitch?”
“So it wouldn’t eat you, stupid.”
Anastasia rolled her eyes and simply stalked off. Her cousins, watching with preternatural interest, erupted into howling laughter. Yalena went red. Then white. Her fists tightened down, crunching the cookie in one hand and squashing the paper cup of punch in the other. Then her chin went up, in a heartbreaking mimicry of a gesture that Kafari knew only too well, in herself.
“Enough!” Kafari’s mother snapped, eyes crackling with dangerous anger. “I will not condone nasty manners in this house. Do I make myself clear? Yalena isn’t used to living where wild predators can snatch a grown man, let alone a child. Conduct yourselves with courtesy and respect. Or do you like living down to city standards?”
Silence fell, chilly and sullen.
Yalena, alone in the center of the room, stared from one to another of her cousins. Her chin quivered just once. Then she said coldly, “Don’t bother to try. I didn’t expect anything better of pig farmers.” She stalked out of the room, slamming doors on her way to somewhere — anywhere — else. When Kafari moved to follow, her father’s hand tightened down around her arm.
“No, let her go. That’s a young’un who needs to be alone for a few minutes. Minau, why don’t you follow her — discreetly — and make sure she doesn’t wander too far? It’s springtime and there are jaglitch out there, looking for a snack.”
Kafari started to shake. Simon wiped sweat off his forehead and gulped an entire cupful of punch as though wishing for something considerably stronger. Aunt Min just nodded, heading through the same door Yalena had taken during her exodus. Kafari leaned back into the couch cushions as a feeling of momentary relief settled across her. She had forgotten what it was like, having other capable adults around to share the burden of childcare. Anastasia, attempting to regain Iva Camar’s good graces, was busy cleaning up the spilled punch and cookie crumbs. Kafari’s mother ruffled the girl’s hair, then sat down beside Kafari on the sofa, speaking low enough the sound reached only her ears.
“You didn’t say how bad it was, honey.”
Kafari shook her head. “Would you have believed me?”
A sigh gusted loose. “No. I don’t think I realized just how serious things are in town, these days.”
Simon joined them on the couch. “It’s worse than that,” he nodded toward the door Yalena and Aunt Min had disappeared through. “Much worse, I’m afraid. Unlike these kids,” he nodded toward Yalena’s cousins, the younger ones entertaining themselves while the older ones listened intently to the adult discussion underway, “Yalena spends her after-school hours involved in town-style activities. Things like the Eco-Action Club, the Equality for Infants Discussion Group — no, I’m not making that up, I swear to God — and the ever-popular Children’s Rights Research Society, which spends its time studying bogus sociological hogwash churned out by Alva Mahault, the new Chair of Sociological Studies at Riverside University. Then they dream up new schemes to implement the sociology research’s ‘facts’ in ways beneficial to legal minors. This involves, for the most part, suggesting things like mandatory vacations off-world for every child, to be paid for by taxes, naturally, mandatory personal allowances and federal requirements for providing in-home snacks for every child. The ‘best’ ideas are presented to the Senate and House of Law for consideration as new legislation, most of which is immediately hailed as groundbreaking social brilliance and passed into law.”
Shocked silence greeted his bitter assessment. Kafari’s father spoke in a thoughtful, droll tone, “You have a gift, Simon, for stating things with great clarity. Ever think of running for president?”
Someone chuckled and the ghastly tension in the room ebbed away, allowing an abrupt and lively discussion about the best ways to counter such arrant nonsense. Kafari, who worked ten-hour days in a spaceport populated largely by rabid believers in anything and everything POPPA suggested, found it both refreshing and marvelously relaxing to listen to intelligent people who understood the basic way in which the universe works and weren’t afraid — yet — to say so. She was content, for now, to simply listen and bask in the warmth of feeling completely at home for the first time in many long months. When she drained the last of the punch from her cup, she caught Simon’s eye and nodded toward the door Yalena had gone through. She indicated with a gesture that he should remain where he was, then went in search of her daughter.
She found Aunt Min on the back porch, seated in a rocking chair, with a hunting rifle laid comfortably across her lap. Her aunt nodded past the well house. Kafari’s parents had installed a big bench-style swing that hung from the spreading branches of a genuine Terran oak. Kafari remembered the tree, which had supported a swing of one kind or another for as long as she could remember. In her childhood, it had been a big tractor tire. Kafari suspected her parents enjoyed the bench swing, particularly on warm summer evenings. Yalena was sitting on one end of the swing, staring across the nearest of the ponds, chin resting on tucked-up knees, swinging slowly by herself.
“She’s not having a very happy birthday,” Kafari said, sighing and keeping her voice low.
“No,” Aunt Min agreed, “but that’s largely her own doing.”
“I know. But it’s hard to see her hurting, like that, all the same. I wish…” She didn’t finish the thought. Wishes were for children. Kafari had reality to cope with, one agonizing day at a time. She stepped off the porch, heading for the swing. “Mind if I join you?” she asked, keeping her voice easy and casual.
Yalena shrugged.
Kafari perched on the other end. “Your cousins were very rude.”
Yalena looked up, surprise coloring her eyes, which were so achingly like Simon’s, it hurt, sometimes, looking into them. “Yes,” she said, voice quavering a little. “They were.”