Grandfather looks at the plate where it clattered from the tray onto the floor. I move to pick it up, but he stops me. “No,” he says, his voice sharp, and then he bends creakily. As if he were made of old wood, an old tree, stiff wooden joints. He pushes the last pieces of food back onto the plate and then he looks at me with his clear eyes. Nothing stiff about them; they are alive, ful of movement. “I don’t like it,” he says. “Why would someone change your microcard?”
“Grandfather,” I say. “Please, sit down. It’s a prank, and they’l find out who did it and take care of everything. An Official from the Matching Department said so herself.” I wish I hadn’t told him. Why did I think there would be comfort in the tel ing?
But now there is. “That poor boy,” Grandfather says, his voice sad. “He’s been marked through no fault of his own. Do you know him wel ?”
“We’re friendly, but we’re not close. I see him sometimes during free-rec hours on Saturdays,” I explain. “He received his permanent work position a year ago and so I don’t see him much anymore.”
“And what is his work position?”
I hesitate to tel Grandfather because it is such a dismal one. We were al surprised when Ky received such a lowly assignment, since Patrick and Aida are wel respected. “He works at the nutrition disposal center.”
Grandfather makes a grimace. “That’s hard, unfulfil ing work.”
“I know,” I say. I’ve noticed that, in spite of the gloves the workers wear, Ky’s hands are permanently red from the heat of the water, the machines.
But he does not complain.
“And the Official let you tel me this?” Grandfather asks.
“Yes,” I say. “I asked her if I could tel one person. You.”
Grandfather’s eyes gleam mischievously. “Because the dead can’t talk?”
“No,” I say. I love Grandfather’s jokes, but I can’t joke back, not about this. It’s coming too quickly. I wil miss him too much. “I wanted to tel you because I knew you would understand.”
“Ah,” Grandfather says, raising his eyebrows in a wry expression. “And did I?”
Now I am laughing, a little. “Not as wel as I’d hoped. You acted like my parents would have, if I’d told them.”
“Of course I did,” he says. “I want to protect you.”
Not always, I think, raising my eyebrows back at him. Grandfather is the one who final y made me stop sitting at the edge of the pool.
He joined us there one summer day and asked, “What is she doing?”
“That’s what she always does,” Xander said.
“Can’t she swim?” Grandfather asked, and I glared at him because I could speak for myself. He knew that.
“She can,” Xander said. “She just doesn’t like to do it.”
“I don’t like the jumping-in part,” I informed Grandfather.
“I see,” he said. “What about the diving board?”
“Especial y not that.”
“Al right,” he told me. He sat next to me on the edge. Even back then, when he was younger and stronger, I remember thinking how old he looked compared to my friends’ grandparents. My grandparents were one of the last couples who chose to be Matched later in life. They were thirty-five when they Matched. My father, their one child, wasn’t born until four years later. Now, no one is al owed to have a child after they turn thirty-one.
The sun shone right through his silver hair and made me see each strand even when I wasn’t looking for such detail. It made me sad, even though he made me angry. “This is exciting,” he said, kicking his feet in the water. “I can see how you’d never want to do anything but sit.” I heard the teasing in his voice and turned away.
Then he stood up and walked toward the diving board. “Sir,” said the waterguard in charge of the pool. “Sir?”
“I have a recreational pass,” Grandfather told her, not stopping. “I’m in excel ent health.” Then he climbed up the ladder to the diving board, looking stronger and stronger the higher he climbed.
He didn’t look over at me before he jumped; he went right in, and before he broke through the surface of the water I was on my feet, walking across the hot wet cement to the high-dive ladder, the soles of my feet and my pride both on fire.
And I jumped.
“You’re thinking of the pool, aren’t you?” he asks me now.
“Yes,” I say, laughing a little. “You didn’t keep me safe then. You practical y dared me to leap to my death,” and then I cringe, because I didn’t mean to say that word. I don’t know why I’m afraid of it. Grandfather isn’t. The Society isn’t. I shouldn’t be.
Grandfather doesn’t seem to notice. “You were ready to jump,” he says. “You just weren’t sure of it yet.”
We both fal silent, remembering. I try not to look at the timepiece on the wal . I have to leave soon so I can make curfew, but I don’t want Grandfather to think that I am marking the minutes. Marking time until our visit is over. Marking time until his life is over. Although, if you think about it, I am marking time for my own life, too. Every minute you spend with someone gives them a part of your life and takes part of theirs.
Grandfather senses my distraction and asks me what is on my mind. I tel him, because I won’t have many more chances to do so, and he reaches out and grips my hand. “I’m glad to give you part of my life,” he says, and it is such a nice thing to say and he says it so kindly that I say it back. Even though he is almost eighty, even though his body seemed frail earlier, his grip feels strong, and again I feel sad.
“There’s something else I wanted to tel you,” I say to Grandfather. “I signed up for hiking as my summer leisure activity.”
He looks pleased. “They’ve brought that back?” Grandfather used to hike as one of his leisure activities years ago, and he’s talked about it ever since.
“It’s new this summer. I’ve never seen it offered before.”
“I wonder who the instructor is,” he says, thoughtful y. Then he looks out the window. “I wonder where they’l take you to hike.” I fol ow his gaze again. There isn’t much wildness out there, though we have plenty of greenspace—parks and recreation fields. “Maybe to one of the larger recreation areas,” I say.
“Maybe to the Hil ,” he says, the light returning to his eyes.
The Hil is the last place in the City that has been left forested and wild. I can see it now, its prickly green back rising out of the Arboretum where my mother works. It was once mostly used for Army training, but since most of the Army has been moved to the Outer Provinces, there isn’t as much need for it anymore.
“Do you think so?” I ask, excited. “I’ve never been there before. I mean, I’ve been to the Arboretum lots of times, of course, but I’ve never had permission to go on the Hil .”
“You’l love it if they let you hike the Hil ,” Grandfather says, his face animated. “There’s something about climbing to the highest point you can see, and there’s no one clearing a path for you, no simulator. Everything’s real—”
“Do you real y think they’l let us hike there?” I ask. His enthusiasm is contagious.
“I hope so.” Grandfather gazes out the window in the direction of the Arboretum, and I wonder if the reason he spends so much time looking out lately is because he likes to remember what he carries within.
It is as though he can read my mind. “I’m nothing but an old man sitting here thinking about his memories, aren’t I?”
I smile. “There’s nothing wrong with doing that.” In fact, at the end of a life, it’s encouraged.
“That’s not exactly what I’m doing,” Grandfather said.
“Oh?”