Finally he looked up at her and said quietly, "You knew this was coming."

She wrapped her arms around herself. The real fear was just starting to set in, and she didn't want him to see how bad it was.

With a sigh he dropped the pile of papers down on the bed and came over to her. She was stiff when his arms first went around her, but then the fear gave way to a need for comfort, and she relaxed against him, trembling. She'd been trying not to think about the Order all day, but now . . . seeing him read it made it more frightening, somehow. More real.

"You've been lucky," he said softly. "Ca.s.sie's taken care of this for years . . . how many people get a judgment like that? Normally both of you would have been involved from the start.

Now she's gone, and you're the only child left ... it was only a question of time, Mari."

"I know, I know, but" . . . I'd hoped it would never come to this, she wanted to say. What terrible words those were! He'd think she meant that her mother should have died already, when what she really meant was . . . something less concrete. Something about wishing the world would change before it sucked her down into this, or at least the law would change, or ... something.

"I don't know if I can go through with this," she whispered. His arms about her tightened. "I know, honey. It's a scary thing."

But did he really know? His parents had died in an accident when he was young, before Time technology was anything more than a few theoretical scribbles on a university drawing board Long before something like the Filial Obligation Act was even being discussed, much less voted on by Congress. She found that she was trembling violently, and couldn't seem to stop it. The government had just announced it was going to take away part of her life. It would never do that to him. How could he possibly know what that felt like?

She heard him sigh, like he did when he saw her hurting and didn't know how to help.

"Look, we'll go down to the DFO and talk to one of their counselors, all right? Maybe there's some way ... I don't know . . . appeal the terms of the appraisal. Or something."

Or help you come to terms with it. The words went unspoken.

"All right," she whispered. It meant she could put off the matter for another day, at least.

Pretend there was some way out of it, for a few precious hours.

That night she dreamed of her mother.Frankly, I find the whole thing . . . wrong." Her mother whipped the eggs as she spoke, the rhythm of her strokes not wavering even as her eyes narrowed slightly in disapproval. "We have children because we want them, and we take care of them because we love them, not . . . not ..." She poured the mixture into a pan and began to beat in more ingredients. "Not because we expect something in return."

"Do you think it's going to pa.s.s Congress?" Marian asked.

"I don't know." She picked up a handful of diced onions and scattered them into the pan.

"I hope not. The day we start "paying" parents for their services is the day . . . well, that will say a lot about how much is wrong with our society, won't it?"

The state offices of the DFO were on Main Street, in an old building that had once been the county courthouse. Marion's eyes narrowed as she studied the place, first from the outside, then pa.s.sing through its great double doors. You expected something a.s.sociated with modern science to be in a building that was . . . well, modern. Gleaming sterile floors instead of ancient hardwood, minimalistic cubicles instead of scarred wooden desks. Something. This was all wrong.

Or maybe anything would have seemed wrong today.

She paused in the outer lobby where approved vendors were allowed to showcase their wares, and Steve waited quietly beside her. The vast bank of brochures against one wall seemed more appropriate for a tourist resort than a government office, and the brochures themselves were likewise colorful and sunny, promising services in perky catchphrases that were meant to make the alien seem reasonable. Give your parents the Time of their lives and have more time for your own. That one was from a travel agency which specialized in Time-intensive vacations, on the theory that people might be willing to accept less Time if the quality of the experience was outstanding. Wonder where your Time is going? another beckoned. That one was a lively color brochure which promised peace of mind in the form of special investigative services, which would track your parent's actions and provide a complete report when you . . . when you . . . well, when you could read it. And Time after Time offered counselors for parents, to help them organize the fragments of their "second life" into a meaningful whole.

She suddenly felt sick inside. Steve must have seen it in her face, for he whispered, "Shhh, it's all right," and quietly took her hand.

It wasn't all right. It wasn't going to become all right either. But she'd be d.a.m.ned if she'd start crying about it all over again * * . least of all here. "I'm okay." Wiping some moisture from her eyes she nodded toward the door to the DFO office. He took the hint and opened it for her. Sometimes little things like that helped. Just little signs that you weren't alone in all this. Thank G.o.d he had been willing to come down here with her.

The wait was long, but the place seemed well-organized and things were kept moving.

Most of the people waiting were sitting m a common area reading brochures, or whispering fearful questions to their spouses, siblings, friends. A few were just staring into s.p.a.ce, like a child who knows that he's going to be given some unpleasant medicine, and that there's no way to get out of it. Most of them seemed to be holding numbers, spit out from a machine as ancientas the building itself, and small plastic pails near each of the desks were full of the little paper tabs.

She registered with the main desk, telling the receptionist that she had an appointment for Appraisal adjustment, then took a seat to wait. Steve just took her hand and waited with her.

There wasn't anything more he could do to help, and they both knew it.

After some time their number was called and they were ushered into a small office in the back of the building. The counselor greeted them with a smile that seemed genuinely warm, though surely it was no more than a professional courtesy. How could you do a job like this all day and keep smiling to the end of it? She was a small black woman with threads of silver overlaying the tight jet braids of her hair, and Marian guessed her to be about 50. Too old to be doing Time, if there was an alternative, and still too young to be needing it. The lines of her face bore witness to a caring nature, and Marian felt a spark of hope in her chest.

"I'm Madeline Francis," she said, and she had that kind of voice which seemed pleasant no matter what the subject matter was. "Please have a seat." She had a screen on the desk in front of her, and they waited while she looked over the files on Marian's case. "It seems to me everything is in order," she said at last. "So why don't you tell me what you're here for?"

"I'd like the Appraisal reconsidered," Marian said. She could feel her hands starting to tremble as she said the words, and wrapped them tightly about the arms of the chair so that it wouldn't show. What she really wanted was for this whole nightmare to be over, the Order rescinded, and her life back to normal. But she knew she wasn't going to get that, not if she asked for it outright. Indirectly . . . well, one could still hope.

A finger tap on the computer screen brought up the Appraisal. "6.4. You are the only surviving child, yes? That's not a very high number, considering."

It's 6.4% of my life! She wanted to scream the words, to rage, to cry . . . but instead she just gripped the arms of her chair tighter, until her knuckles were bloodless. "There are . . .

circ.u.mstances."

The black woman raised an eyebrow and waited.

"I'm the primary caregiver for three children. Young children. Steve's job takes him out of the state a lot, while he's gone . I'm the only one there for them."

"We've never let strangers care for them," Steve offered.

Was that argument of any value here? Marian couldn't read the counselor's face at all. "To lose their parenting two days a month at this time in their lives could affect their development."

"Ms. Stiller." The counselor's voice was soft, but beneath that softness was a stillness and a certainty that made Marian's heart pound even louder. "There are millions of families in this country who employ caregiver a.s.sistance. Most of them aren't even doing it for Time, merely gaining the freedom they need to take care of life's necessities. If you don't have relatives who can help out, then I'm sure in the coming months you can find someone to help you." She held up a hand to forestall the next objection. "Let me ask you a few questions if I may. All right?"

Marian hesitated, then nodded. Where were all the neat arguments she'd prepared for this meeting? All the proper words? She couldn't seem to find them.

"Did you have a good childhood, Ms. Stiller?"

She hesitated. "That's a very general question, isn't it? There were good times and bad times-""Of course, of course. Perfectly normal. But, overall, do you feel that you and Ca.s.sandra got the attention you deserved? Were your parents there for you when you needed them?"

"I guess . . . yes." She knew the answer was the wrong one to give, but she didn't want to lie outright. The woman had all her files, and probably Ca.s.sie's testimonies as well. She'd know.

For one dizzying moment she wished that her mother had been more distant, more harsh, so that she'd have some more concrete complaints to offer to this woman, something that would justify a lesser Appraisal. Then her face flushed with shame for even thinking that.

"She was a full-time caregiver also, wasn't she? Rare in that age." The woman's eyes met Marian's and held them. Warm eyes, caring eyes, but with a core of inner strength and conviction that no easy argument would shake. "You appreciated that, even at the time. Enough so that when your own children were born you decided to raise them the same way. Is that right, Ms. Stiller?"

She whispered it. "Yes. But-" Nothing. There was nothing to s ay. She twisted her hands in her lap as she listened, knowing the battle was already lost. Feeling sick inside.

"She was there for you when you were sick, wasn't she? When your sister was in a car accident and needed physical therapy to get back on her feet again, didn't your mother take care of all that herself?"

"I ... I don't know. I was away at college by then."

"She took a cla.s.s in physical therapy at the local college, just to be able to help Ca.s.sandra herself. So that strangers wouldn't have to do it." She glanced at the computer screen for a moment, her expression softening. "Your sister appreciated that a lot, Ms. Stiller. She attributed her complete recovery to the attention she got back then. To the fact that your mother put aside her own life for a time, to take care of her. She never protested her Appraisal, did you know that? Or the fact that the initial Appraisal a.s.signed Time to her alone, and didn't divide it up between the two of you."

Her voice was a whisper. "She was much closer to our mother than I was."

"Recently, perhaps." She glanced at the monitor. "About how long would you say that's been the case, Ms. Stiller? How long since you've, say, visited your mother on a regular basis."

"A few years." She looked down, unable to meet the woman's eyes. "Maybe . . . two."

"Maybe five?"

She didn't say anything. Five was when Ca.s.sie had started doing Time. Mom hadn't needed Marian much after that ... or so it had seemed.

"Did you know she had a second stroke?"

Marian nodded, still not meeting her eyes. "It was a small one."

"When your life is reduced by so much, every small one whittles away another precious portion." Softly, she said, "The doctors don't think she'll live very much longer. A few years at most. You know that, too, don't you?"

She said nothing.

The counselor leaned forward on her desk, her hands steepled before her. "I'm going to be honest with you, Ms. Stiller. You could appeal this thing, if you wanted. I don't think any judge in this country will alter the Appraisal for you, but you could tie it up in litigation if you wanted, long enough to gain some time.

The law's still new enough for that. Maybe if you tried hard enough you could even delayjudgment until there wasn't an issue any more. You understand me?"

She felt a flush rise to her face as she nodded.

"I don't think you're the kind of person who would do that, Ms. Stiller. I think in your own way you care about your mother, as much as your sister did. You're just a bit scared, that's all."

She sat back in her chair; the steepled fingers folded flat onto the desk's surface. "That's only human. It's a scary technology."

"That's not it," she whispered. But there was no conviction in her voice this time.

"We grow up in our bodies, regard them as ours. Mind, soul, flesh, it's all one creature.

Then suddenly science comes along and makes us question that neat little package. What would happen if you could divide mind from body? What would that make of us? The thing is, after all the questioning, it turns out the answer hasn't changed. We are who we are, and even this scary little bit of technology can't really break up the package." She paused for a moment, her dark eyes fixed on Marian, studying her. How many times had she given the same pep talk? What cues was she looking for, that would tell her how to proceed? "Anything else is just an illusion, Ms. Stiller. You know that, don't you? A very precious illusion, for those whose own lives have failed them."

"Yes," she whispered. "But . . ." Marian had prepared a thousand words, it seemed, but now she couldn't seem to find any of them. Was it just fear she felt, fear of a technology that seemed to belong more in science fiction vids than in her real life? Or was there a shadow of selfishness there as well, something she should feel guilty about? The woman gave her time to speak, and when she did not, finally said quietly, "Ms. Stiller, I want you to do something for me."

The words startled her out of her reverie. "What?"

"I want you to go see your mother. Not for Time, just a visit. You haven't seen her since this Order was a.s.signed. Tell me you'll do that. Just visit with her. And then, if you want . . . come back here and we'll talk about the Appraisal. Or we can arrange for counseling for you, if you feel that's what you need." She paused. "All right?"

She drew in a deep breath, trembling, and said the words because they had to be said. "All right."

The woman handed her something. A business card. She gave it her thumbprint, watched it hum as it sent the woman's contact information to her account.

High technology. What a blessing.

"Thank you," she whispered. Not because she felt any grat.i.tude, but because . . . that's what you said when a meeting was over. Wasn't it?

Her husband led her out.

Amy was having trouble with arithmetic. Little wonder, since she'd rather play with her crayons than work with the computer to memorize her numbers. Marian printed up flash cards on paper, using one of Amy's drawings on the backs. The girl was fascinated with them, and had to be told at least three times about how flash cards used to be in every house, way back before computers, before she would settle down to work.

It was good to do such little things, if only as a distraction. She would have liked to think that she could lose herself in the task, but the sideways glances her daughter kept giving hermade it clear that Amy sensed the wrongncss in the air. She kept waiting for her to ask about it and dreaded having to come up with an answer-any attempt at honesty would only frighten the girl, but surely she'd sense it if her mother was hiding something-yet the moment never came.

Maybe Amy sensed, with a child's intuitive certainty, that there were no answers to give. She'd most likely wait a day or two and then blurt out questions when they were least expected. That was her way.

That was fine with Marian. Give her a few more days, and she might be able to think of some answers.

The Home was much as she remembered it: neatly manicured lawns surrounding wide, low buildings, flowers brushing up against sun-baked bricks in carefully measured bunches, benches set along the sides of the path at precise intervals to receive those whose legs could not sustain them. There were several people about, enjoying the morning sun, and at first she a.s.sumed they were staff. But as she pa.s.sed a young woman, it suddenly occurred to her that maybe they weren't. She found herself staring at the back of the woman's head and had to force her eyes away before others took notice. The contacts were almost invisible, she'd been told. Easily hidden beneath a full head of hair. Ca.s.sie had offered to show her what hers looked like up close, but Marian hadn't wanted to see them. Were any of these normal-looking people doing Time?

She suddenly felt sick inside, and would have sat down on one of the benches if she wasn't afraid that if she did so she might never get up again. What was she doing here? This was crazy. Even her mother had said it was crazy. Didn't that count for anything?

"Can I help you?"

She found her voice with effort. "I'm here to see my mother. Rosalmde Stiller."

"Ah, yes." The aide was young, her face still beaming with the freshness of teenage enthusiasm. Too young to even understand what Time was, much less have to worry about it.

"Come with me."

They'd moved her mother. Ca.s.sie hadn't told her that. Out of the ward where cases of moderate dependency were kept, into a place where things were . . . worse. Marian could feel her chest tightening as she followed the aide down the sterile white corridors of the new ward.

No pretense of normal life here, no attempt to disguise the nature of the place. It looked and felt like a place where people died. Why hadn't Ca.s.sie told her?

Became you didn't want to hear it, an inner voice whispered. She knew.

"In here, Ms. Stiller." The room was small, a private one. They'd seen to that. Steve and Ca.s.sie and Marian, they'd made sure her mother had all the best things. Except that after a while * * * how much did it mean? She looked about at the bright curtains, fresh flowers, net screen . . . anywhere but at the bed. Anywhere but where she needed to be looking.

"Are you all right, Ms. Stiller?"

Her mother was frail. So frail. She had forgotten that. Sickness robs a body not only of strength, but of substance. She remembered her mother as a bundle of strength, of energy, always restless, always moving. Always doing something. It was hard for her to reconcile that image with the woman who lay before her. Hard for her to cling to her memories, when the very source of them had become so changed.

Slowly she sat down on the edge of the bed, and took her mother's hand. The skin wa.s.strangely silken, thin to the touch and blue veins throbbed softly beneath her fingertips. Not a hand she recognized. She looked up slowly to find blue eyes fixed on her. Clear, bright, almost a stranger to the wrinkled flesh surrounding them. There was some emotion in those eyes, but Marian couldn't read what it was. The expressions she remembered from her youth were all gone, stolen away muscle by muscle, as age severed the link between mind and body. Where was her mother, inside that flesh? She gazed into the clear blue eyes with all her might, trying to make contact with the soul behind them. Did her mother feel the same sense of dislocation when she looked in a mirror? Did she wonder whose this stranger's face was, that looked so drained and pale? Surely not her own. Surely.

The counselor was wrong, she thought. You can divorce mind from body, even when they share the same flesh.

"She can't really speak any more." A nurse spoke quietly from behind her. "With great effort, a few words, perhaps. No more." Marian must have looked surprised, because the nurse asked, "You didn't know?"

"No, I ... no. Ca.s.sie didn't tell me."

Ca.s.sie didn't tell me a lot.

She squeezed her mother's hand as she leaned down slowly to kiss her on the forehead.

This close she could catch the scent or her familiar perfume, and she ignored the tang of medications and ointments that breezed in its wake, losing herself for a moment in the mother she remembered. Nothing like this. But the human soul doesn't fade with age, does it? Only the flesh.

It's only two days. She forced herself to digest the words, forced her soul to absorb them.

Two days a month, and the rest of your life stays the same as it always was. Surely you can do that much for her, she told herself, trembling. Surely she deserves that much.

She would have done it for you.

Remembering: Her mother's fingers folding tissues into a neat little fan, just so, each fold perfect. Binding them around the center with another twist of tissue, tight enough to bunch the layers together. Finely manicured nails prodding the layers apart, separating each fragile ply, spreading them carefully one after the other, until the whole is a delicate rose, wonderfully perfect.

"Getting harder to do," her mother says. "My close-up vision's not what it used to be, soon I won't be able to make these at all-" She puts the rose down in front of Marian and indicates the pile of tissues next to it. "Now you try."