Year's Best Science Fiction 02 # 1985

by Gardner Dozois (ed)

  I turned to her, held her shoulders in my hands so I could look into her face. For some reason I was on the verge of tears. She was too open.

  “No,” I said.

  She embraced me, and I held her tightly, feeling the strength in her arms and mine. She would not leave until she had given herself to me, and I am ashamed to admit that I didn’t try to stop her. It was the first time that I ever broke the rules of Friendship. This was not the political coupling that I had had with Brenda: I wanted Leila, my feelings were involved, and for an hour there were no other passengers aboard the Le Corbusier.

  I lay beside her, listening to her soft breathing. Her body was relaxed, without the taut-wire strength of the dancer I knew her to be. I whispered a plea that she not tell anyone about our meeting. She left some minutes before I did. I knew I was on shaky ground, but it didn’t matter. Despite my broken vows, despite the fact that I had lost myself with Leila, as I waited in the darkness until the viewer showed the corridor outside was empty, I can remember feeling nothing but triumph.

  I went to Goodson’s sleeper and leaned on the call button until he appeared.

  “What?” His eyes were bleary and he was wearing a sleepgown. “I’m napping.”

  “I have to come in, Goodson.”

  He blinked and stepped out of the doorway. The ceiling shimmered on. Goodson folded up his bed to make room for the two of us on the cushioned deck. He sat cross-legged in front of the computer terminal and gazed blankly at the console.

  “So you’ve heard a rumor?” His voice rasped.

  “Is it true?”

  “Some are, some aren’t.”

  “Don’t play games, Phillip. Hitchhiking is illegal.”

  Goodson was punching out a code on the keyboard; he miscued and jabbed at the erase button. “Quite right. But this is hardly a case of hitchhiking. Leila is going to win a grant from Dance Terra. She’ll be our visiting artist next year. Don’t tell her; I want it to be a surprise.”

  “Dance Terra? Isn’t there supposed to be a competition? And a committee; I know there’s a committee.”

  Goodson smiled. “A committee appointed by the board of directors.”

  “She’ll hate you when she finds out.” I felt some dismay—but I had my position to consider. “All right. I won’t make trouble over this if you agree to take all responsibility back in IPT City. I just want to be sure of your intentions. But I will say this: if you go through with it, there’ll be hell to pay on crossings for years to come. For you especially; you’ll be mobbed the moment you board a ship. And think of the press if Leila is a success.”

  “But no one will know but Leila and I. And of course you, Jake.” The computer buzzed, indicating that it had accepted Goodson’s program for new clothes. He stripped off the sleepgown and stuffed it into the access bin for recycling. A second buzz; the lid rolled back. Inside the bin was a crisp suit of gray and blue with a gold chain to close the collar.

  “I like to wear this once in a while. I get nostalgic for the simpler days when I was a Friend.”

  I mastered my surprise. “You’ve already disrupted this passage,” I said. “If the others see you in that, you will seriously undermine my authority.”

  He began to put the suit on. “Your authority … yes. Is your authority a matter of a uniform?”

  “You know, you have a reputation for doing this. You enjoy testing onduty Friends. I can accept that—as long as you take that uniform off. The uniform is a symbol, and symbols are important. You were a Friend once. I can’t believe that it means nothing to you now.”

  Goodson fastened the chain. “You Friends are all alike. You think.you have the most glamorous job in space. Jake, Jake, there’s no duty or honor in being a Friend. It’s a sham to sweeten the lousiest job in IPT. It means nothing, nothing at all. And I think you know it.”

  There was a hard silence. My mind raced, trying to catch the realization that had flashed by as he spoke: Goodson was trying too hard. Why would he go to such lengths to make trouble?

  “You resent me, don’t you, Jake?” he continued. “You disliked me years ago, and now, because of this woman, you resent me. Maybe you can hide your feelings from the crossers, but not from another Friend.”

  “I detest the way you’re using Leila to support your own ego. But my feelings are irrelevant. I just need to know what you are going to do about her.”

  His eyebrows arched. “She’s much more important to you than I am, isn’t she? More important than your job, perhaps? To me she’s nothing; she had nothing to give. That’s why I can do what I want with her, for no better reason than because it pleases me.” He turned to the computer and punched out a transfer of funds to IPT Reservations on Brown. Leila’s fare had been paid by the Magic Lamp Institute. “My emergency fund,” Goodson said.

  I rose to go. As I reached the door he directed a parting shot.

  “What you really want, old friend, is to blow her off yourself. Isn’t that it?”

  No, Goodson, I said to myself, I already have. The door slid shut behind me. I retreated to Surveillance and switched on all the monitors. I loathed Goodson. He could not have made things more difficult for me if he had taken this trip to do exactly that. And that was what I realized: the problems were not merely a result of the natural antipathy I felt for Goodson, and his testing was not just the habit that gossip among Friends made it out to be. It had to be a formal test by IPT. Goodson was going to file a report on me when we reached Earth, I was sure, and everything he had done was in the service of that test. Dumping Brenda on me. Wearing that uniform. Defaming Friendship. Seducing Leila into hitchhiking.

  And Leila, Leila the fool, was making it even more difficult, despite all the warnings I had given her, by walking right into it.

  It would be another week before we reached Brown. Before then Goodson would expect me to file a hitchhiking complaint against Leila. But perhaps I could hold out longer than he, for I couldn’t believe he would leave the reservation for Leila on the books as the starcrossing approached and he tired of her. A vice-president would know the importance of the Vagrant Solicitation regulation.

  For the next few days I avoided both Goodson and Leila as best I could without giving offense. I was alone with Leila only once; we sat down to lunch by ourselves in the commons. She asked me right away what was bothering me. I would have liked to tell her what a fool Goodson was making of her, how he was not going to keep his promise, but I was too much a Friend. In the corporation’s eyes it was none of my business. I did not want to bring my own feelings into the conversation. She couldn’t help but know how I felt.

  To the passengers I remained the calm Friend, but daily, and later hourly, I was checking IPT Reservations, waiting for Goodson to cancel Leila’s booking. From moment to moment I expected the gossip to bring me news that Leila had been rejected by Goodson and was secluded in her room in tears. Instead, on the night before we reached Brown orbit, I heard different news.

  It was a well-kept secret right until the last day. The rumors of a public sex display in the dancepod started just as we began the final approach sequence. Although only a few were invited to attend this spectacle, all were soon discussing it with great anticipation. I had the right to call it off, but no reasons except my own. Public sexual intercourse is an accepted practice on most planets. Nevertheless, despite its acceptance, for most people public sex is something that someone else does.

  Goodson himself invited me to attend. When I turned him down he smiled and told me to enjoy it anyway.

  It started with Leila dancing. She launched herself from the observation platform at the entrance of the pod. She wore one of those long gossamer gowns designed specifically for free-fall dance. It trailed behind her like the contrail of a flyer knifing through the dusk. She rose to the top of the pod, caromed off a wall, and begin to spin. Her dress was a vortex of white. A streak of it flew off and fluttered across the pod. She broke out of rotation with a flourish and swooped to the opposi
te wall, leaving another wisp of white behind her.

  She played among the floating pieces of her costume, weaving intricate patterns with her body and looking always toward Goodson. Eventually he stood amid scattered applause from the spectators.

  I turned them off. I knew they were expecting me to watch, but I fooled them. I let them get whatever satisfaction they could get from one another.

  How could I love Leila? I had seen no vulnerability in her face as she waited for Goodson; only coarseness, cheapness, and a stupid refusal to see him for what he was. I still felt sorry for her, but that was not enough. I saw that neither of them would stop until my career was wrecked.

  I sat in Surveillance, staring at the dark screen, wondering if the show was still going on. Late, late into the sleep period, I filed a hitchhiking complaint against Leila. I felt as if I had broken the surface of a deep black pond after an eternity of panicky suffocation. I felt released from every constraint. When the monitors showed everyone asleep, I went to the pod and danced my own free-fall dance, along among the stars.

  When we arrived in Brown orbit the next day, there was an urgent message from Reservations. They were submitting a revised exit roster for my confirmation. Jahiz, Leila, SHA223-44-7907, was now on it. I could still have withdrawn the complaint, but I didn’t. I simply confirmed and took the message to Goodson’s sleeper.

  “Jake,” he said as the door slid open. “We missed you last night. Come in.”

  He offered his hand in greeting. I pushed the message into it and stepped past him into the sleeper. He glanced at it, frowned, and tossed it across the little room at me. The sheet fluttered to the deck between us.

  “You not going to confirm, are you?”

  “I already have.”

  “Then there’s nothing I can do.”

  “No.”

  He stood staring, waiting. Suddenly I was very angry.

  “Aren’t you satisfied yet, you son of a bitch! How can you stand to live with yourself? You say being a Friend is merde—but what do you call the kind of work you’re doing? Well, I’ve shown you what a Friend is. I’ve passed your test.”

  “Test? What test?”

  I wanted to punch his complacent face in. “Don’t treat me like a fool, Phillip. You’ve been testing my performance from the moment we left Blue orbit. Why else would you draw Leila into this hitchhiking attempt? You admitted yourself that you didn’t care about her.”

  He looked at me skeptically, and then his expression changed to something like awe.

  “You reported her.”

  “Yes. Of couurse I did. It’s my job.”

  He sat down on the bed, silent for a moment. When he spoke again, he had regained some of his cynicism. “You’re an amazing man, Jake. But if you think this upsets me, you’re wrong. There was no test. The deal I offered Leila was on the level. She’s an ambitious woman trying to trade sex for an opportunity—for a little consideration. But what you said the other day about this causing trouble for IPT was right. I should have been more discreet.

  “You’ve saved me some embarrassment. Thank you.”

  I was stunned. “But …”

  “Now if you would do me one more favor. I’m sure that you don’t want any trouble off-loading passengers, and I’ll have to arrange a reconciliation with Brenda. I think you ought to be the one to pass this information on to Leila.”

  “She’ll want to see you.”

  “Which I will surely refuse to do,” he said. “You can explain to her that her misfortune was not my doing. Tell her about this ‘test.’”

  Everything was crumbling. “You used me just like you used Leila!” “If you will allow me to make an observation, this problem might not have arisen if you didn’t love this woman as much as you do. Very un-Friendlike. And your ego is colossal. To think that I would take the time and trouble to concoct some test just for you … .”

  I couldn’t stand it anymore. I hit him and he fell back against the wall. Instead of fighting back, he rubbed his chin amusedly.

  “If I were the Friend on this crossing, I’d put you into the freezer for that.”

  The members of the Motessier Company were giving Leila a send-off party. I tucked the message into my pocket and joined them. The party had a prickly edge to it, as if everyone were trying to avoid saying the wrong thing. I drew Leila away on the pretense of some last-minute paper work.

  As we walked down the corridor to my suite, I said, “They seem to resent you.”

  “Yes.” She nodded thoughtfully. “I can’t understand it, really. I mean, I understand the professional jealousy. They would all love to perform with Dance Terra. But I thought I had at least a few friends in there. I thought they might be happy for me despite themselves.” She chuckled humorlessly. “I guess they disapprove of my methods.”

  We entered my rooms.

  “Leila, there’s something … I have bad news for you. You’re going to have to off-load with the other dancers on Brown.”

  She sat down, her face pale but composed.

  “I want to see Phillip.”

  “He doesn’t want to see you.”

  She seemed to shrink a little. “He told me it was all arranged.”

  “I’m sorry. He had no say in the matter. Your ticket was purchased in violation of the Vagrant Solicitation regulation.”

  “Hitchhiking? But that means someone had to report me.”

  I prayed she would let it go at that. “Anyone aboard could have.”

  “God. Goddamnit! You know who it was? Rudi Limin. He wanted me, I could tell.”

  “It could have been anyone, Leila.”

  She seemed dazed. “You said that Phillip didn’t want to see me. I don’t understand. How can he not see me?”

  “He said no.”

  “Why?”

  “He said you were using him.”

  “Using him.” She looked at me as if she didn’t quite understand what I was getting at. “Of course I was using him. I still don’t get it. I know he didn’t think that I loved him. I told him that.”

  “Maybe … maybe he was hurt.” I felt empty inside.

  She shook her head, and her composure started to break. Tears formed in the corners of her eyes and overflowed. She hunched forward and would not let me see her face.

  “Jake. Jake, do you know how old I am?” Her voice was choked.

  “Twenty-eight. I’m ready now, right now. I wanted to take my chance when it still meant something. This is wrong, so wrong!” She looked up at me. “Please let me see him. He can still do something. He can give me credits for the next crossing.”

  “He’ll humiliate you.”

  “I don’t care about that.”

  I put my arms around her; her face smelled like tears. “I can’t let you do it,” I said.

  She caught her breath and looked deep within me. I could not be sure then what she had guessed; I still don’t know.

  The crossing from Brown to Titan was relatively uneventful. Though I chafed under Goodson’s unflinching gaze, I did a professional job of managing the affairs of the passengers. It was only when we returned to IPT City that the trouble began, when Goodson reported charges of unFriendly behavior to the company. I fought the action bitterly, but in the ensuing investigation the suspicion that I had fraternized with the passengers unprofessionally were borne out by an affidavit obtained from Leila on Brown, and a psychoprobe to which I had no choice but to submit. I was cashiered.

  I have since then painfully created an entirely new career for myself, forming Brotherhood Incorporated—for I saw that a discipline analogous to Friendship might prove very useful in Earthside industry. Brotherhood has been quite successful. I can now afford to pay for a starcrossing on my own, if I should choose to make one. I do not so choose. I cannot forget.

  And Leila … she finally did make it to Earth. Ten years have gone by, and I don’t know how she managed it, but she got her chance. She applied and was accepted by Dance Terra—as a member of the c
orps de ballet. She is thirty-eight now, and although she is not the dancer I remember, she is still magnificent.

  I went tonight to her first performance. When I saw her dance, weightless within the crystal sphere, I could scarcely bear my loss—of my position as a Friend, I mean.

  TANITH LEE

  Foreign Skins

  One of the best-known and most prolific of modern fantasists, Tanith Lee has well over a dozen books to her credit, including (among many others) The Birthgrave, Drinking Sapphire Wine, Don’t Bite the Sun, Night’s Master, The Storm Lord, Sung in Shadow, Volkhavaar, and Anackire. Her short story “Elle Est Trois (La Mort)” won a World Fantasy Award in 1984; her sly and brilliant collection of retold folk-tales, Red As Blood, was also a finalist for the World Fantasy Award that year, in the Best Collection Category. Her story “Nunc Dimittis,” another World Fantasy Award finalist, was in our First Annual Collection. Her most recent book is Tamastara, or the Indian Nights, a collection of tales with Indian motifs, from which the following story is taken.

  In “Foreign Skins,” Lee takes us to the colonial British India of the nineteenth century, to witness what happens when a stiff and proper British family is brought into contact with something wise and strange, beautiful and terrifying, compassionate and inimical—and very, very old.

  I

  After the summer rains, the road up to the bungalow was for a while a river of red mud. As the mud dried, drowned things came to light: rats, a long-tailed bird, a mongoose.

  “There was also the body of an old woman,” said the man, uncaringly at his breakfast in the veranda. “A corpse some of them made a whole lot of fuss about.”

  “David,” said the woman.

  The man, her husband, glanced at her in silent though exaggerated inquiry. “What about David?”

  “He’s listening, dear.”

  “Let him listen.”