“I take it that’s their main slugger,” she says.
“Yeah. He’s just eighteen. I bet he gets picked up by los grandes before the season gets over.”
The smooth way Jimmy takes his cuts, the contemptuous confidence with which he looks at the pitcher makes Lacey agree that this kids is on the way to the bigs. In a minute or two, most likely, it’s going to be five to nothing Big Shots. The first pitch is both low and outside, as if the pitcher is terrified of getting anything in the strike zone, and rightly so, as it turns out, because on the next pitch Jimmy reaches a little, gets good wood on it, and smokes it in the air toward the gap between third and short. The third baseman leaps, falls empty-handed, but Mulligan is there, improbably right there to jump, spear it, come down turning, and make a perfect throw to second for the force. The Big Shot fans fall silent in disbelief: double play. Inning’s over. Lacey cheers along with the rest of the Marauder supporters as Mulligan lopes in toward the dug-out.
“That Jack’s sure something, huh?” the business type says. “Wait till you see him hit. He can do it all.”
“Jack?”
“Jack Mulligan, yeah.”
With a sense of profound shock Lacey realizes that she’s never heard his first name before, never even thought about it, really.
As the game goes on, Lacey realizes that the business type has told her nothing but the truth: Mulligan can indeed do it all. By his last at bat he’s gone two for four with a sacrifice fly that scored the game-winning run. As the crowd clears the stadium, she waits, looking at the empty field and wondering if she has the courage to go through with the strange proposal that she’s got in mind. Finally, when a cleaningbot whirs up and bumps her leg, she stands and puffs up the steep steps to the main gate.
Around back near the Metro stop is a metal door into the stadium and a dirty alley, where a small crowd spreads out in a straggly bunch and line to wait for the teams. Since this is the Park and Rec league, Lacey can assume that they’re wives, girlfriends, and lovers rather than fans, especially since a couple of the women have babies or toddlers with them. Even though no one notices her walk up, she stops off to one side where she can lean against a metal railing and watch from a distance. A few at a time, either laughing at their victory or dour at their loss, the players hurry out, their hair still wet from the showers, their street clothes sticking to damp bodies, and yell greetings at one or another of the waiting crowd. And a few at a time they drift off, some to the Metro, some to the parking lot, until Lacey is standing there alone under the kaleidoscoping northern lights, wondering if Mulligan’s left by another door and cursing herself for not calling him and telling him she was coming to the game.
Just as she’s thinking she’d better leave before a guardbot runs her off, he trots out, dressed in a pair of reasonably clean jeans and a fresh red and white jersey that says Marauders on the front and Mulligan, 26, on the back. He looks around, sees her, and comes jogging over.
“Sorry, Lacey, I just picked up that you were here.” He is smiling, a little shy, mostly pleased. “I would’ve hurried if I’d, like, read you earlier.”
She feels one last stab of doubt, wondering why she wants to get involved with a man who can feel her presence through solid walls and do God knows what other mental tricks, but his smile is making her smile in return, and without even thinking about it she finds herself moving closer to him.
“Can I buy you a beer?” Mulligan continues. “I just got five bucks, y’know.”
“Sure. Where you want to go?” She fishes in her pocket, finds the skimmer keys, and tosses them to him. “And I got a surprise for you, in the car.”
“Yeah?” He catches them automatically. “Hey, far out.” For a moment he stares at the keys in a bewildered kind of pleasure. “You going to let me drive?”
“Sure, if you want to.”
He nods yes, and she doesn’t need psionics to see him wondering in a kind of disbelieving hope what this gesture may mean.
“Car’s over that way.” She points out into the parking lot. “You done here?”
“Oh yeah. Let’s go. Did you see the game?”
“Sure did. You know, Jack, you’re some kind of ball player.”
“Think so?” The smile he gives her makes her feel warm all over, a suspicious kind of warmth that starts at the base of her spine and moves up. “Like, thanks.”
Close but not quite touching they walk out into the stretch of pale gray plastophalt, empty except for Lacey’s beaten-up blue skimmer, dark except for the crackling rainbow glimmer of the northern lights. At the car she presses her thumb on the keyed lock and opens the passenger side, then gets in and slides over to let him in at the other door. While he gets in she busies herself with taking the package out of the glove compartment.
“Is that the surprise?” He sounds as charmingly greedy as a young child.
“Sure is. Here.”
The moment he touches it he grins, running his long fingers over the wrapping.
“Oh hey, Lacey, you no should’ve wasted all this dinero on me. I’ll bet something this old cost bucks.”
“Hey! You’ve no even opened it yet.”
“No need to. It’s tear-oh cards, right?”
“Sure is. Jeez, man, you can be scary sometimes.”
Abruptly solemn, he lays the packet down on the comp mount and turns in his seat to face her.
“Never meant to scare you. Guess I was just being dumb, trying to impress you or something. I mean, like, I no can figure out what’s in most packages and stuff. It’s just these cards are, like, heavy. Y’know?”
“Well, I guess so. But you like’em?”
“Oh say, I’ve never liked a present more. Thanks. I mean, like, really thanks. I’m just waiting to open it till we get somewhere with some light, y’know?”
The colored shadows dance across his face and hide his eyes, but she knows that he’s studying her with his usual hopeless longing. She remembers then that she had a speech all planned out, some clever way of telling him that she loves him, but search her mind though she might, it’s completely gone.
“Where do you want to go for that beer?” he says at last. “Are you hungry? I got a few bucks from the cops today, too, for that reading I did, I mean, like, the one when we were going to the Rat Yard that day. Y’know?”
“Yeah, I remember. I could chip in, if you want to get some slice ’n’ fry or something.”
“Well, hell, I kind of wanted to treat, y’know. You got me these cards and stuff.”
“What about your landlord and the rent?”
“Ah, well, y’know.” He looks away, staring out the windshield at the light show in the sky. “I mean, like.”
“He kicked you out already, so it no matter if you got anything to give him.”
“Uh yeah. You sure dunt stay a hero long in this town. Y’know? And even if I gave him all the bucks I got, it still no add up to a week’s rent, anyway.” With a sigh he runs long fingers down the joystick. “One of the guys on the team said I could sleep on her couch tonight, like her old man no minds as long as it’s just one night, y’know? She’s our second baseman, and so, like, she no want me tired out for tomorrow’s game. She’s going to look bad if I no can turn the double plays.”
“Ah hell, you can come stay at the warehouse.”
“For sure? Oh hey, Lacey, like thanks. I mean, I might need Linda’s sofa even more later on, y’know? I no want to piss off her old man so early in the season.”
“Well, tell you, I’ve been thinking about that. You could come stay with me permanently, if you wanted.”
“Oh, far out!” He slews around to grin at her. “That’s right—Rick’s gone. So you got a room open.” The smile disappears. “But I no can pay you much.”
“Jerk. I no want rent from you. Uh, and about that room...” Here, at the crux, her words stick and fail her. “Uh, Maria might want that one.”
“Hell, I can take hers. I no fussy, like, I mean, if you�
��re going to take me in off the street. And I can work in the garden a lot, or do whatever you and Nunks want me to.”
“Okay, that sounds good, yeah.”
For a moment they sit silently, while he looks out the windshield with an exhausted sort of smile, as if he still can’t believe his good fortune in finding a permanent place to sleep, and Lacey curses herself for a jerk or worse, because she’s forgotten how to flirt. Then all at once she remembers what Mulligan’s psionics mean, that with him, at least, hints and coy glances are not in the least necessary. She merely lets herself think how much she wants him, just how nice it would be to feel his arms around her and his mouth on hers, thinks about it steadily and watches his smile disappear as he turns toward her wide-eyed and doubtful, as he starts to move toward her, then hesitates, frozen by disbelief.
“I mean it, yeah,” she says.
With one last shyness—his beautiful child-like smile—he moves closer and takes her face between his hands. When he kisses her, it becomes hard to think about anything.
oOo
About an hour before sunset Lacey wakes up to find the comm link beside her bed beeping at her. For a moment she has trouble identifying the comfortable warm weight pressing along her back; then she remembers Jack and the day just past. Even though she got far too little actual sleep, she’s smiling to herself as she punches into the comm link.
“What’s the message, Buddy?”
“Programmer, Doctor Carol is here. She is currently writing you a note after telling me that she will return later.”
“Tell her to stop writing and leaving, then. I’m getting up.”
Moving as quietly as she can, Lacey slides out of bed and picks up her cut-off jeans from the floor, which sports a remarkably far-flung litter of clothing. At her movement Mulligan sighs, but he stays asleep, turning over to grab the pillow and wrap his arms around it. Now that he has the room, she supposes, he will doubtless end up in one of his break-neck twists. She is just zipping up her jeans when Carol appears in the open doorway, starts to smile, sees Mulligan, and stares open-mouthed instead. All at once, Lacey remembers that Carol’s opinion of her new lover is less than high.
“Jeezus! Just sweet jeezus!” Carol turns on her heel and stalks down the hall.
Lacey grabs the nearest shirt, which turns out to be Mulligan’s Marauders jersey, but pulls it on anyway as she hurries after, catching up in the living room, where Carol is methodically ripping the piece of notepaper into tiny shreds.
“Okay. Why are you so pissed off about me and Mulligan?”
“He’s a jerk.”
“Hey!”
“Oh, okay. Sorry. He’s no jerk, then. Just a loser.”
“Carol, Goddamn it!”
“Well you’ve always had lousy taste in men. No, okay, sorry again. It’s no him, really. It’s just that you deserve better, that’s all. Some dude who’s got a lot going for him, someone who’s together and strong and—”
“You no understand.” Lacey works at keeping her voice level. “I no want some dude who thinks he can tell me what to do. I took enough orders in the Fleet, thanks.”
“That’s not what I mean, and you know it.”
“Yeah, maybe, but you still mean someone to look up to, right? I had enough of that, too.”
“Well, you’ve got a point there.” Carol pauses to throw the scraps of notepaper into the recycler chute. “Old Jorgé or Hermie or whatever his name was did have the biggest lousy ego in the Mapped Sector, like I remember trying to point out at the time. Him and his Goddamn tight trousers. I think they cut down the circulation of the blood to the brain.”
In spite of herself, Lacey has to laugh.
“So okay, Carol, you know what I want now? I want someone to look up to me for a change. Something wrong with that?”
“Well, guess not.”
“Okay then. Besides, I want to have someone around to take care of and...and, well, spoil, I guess I mean, make a fuss over.”
“Well, he’ll be that, for sure. Jeez, Lacey, he’s just a kid! I mean, what is he? Twenty-two? Twenty-three?”
“About that, yeah, and I know, I know, I’m old enough to be his lousy mother. Know something? I dunt give one sweet damn as long as he dunt.”
“Huh. Can he even subtract twenty-three from forty-eight without a comp unit?”
“Man, would you shut up?”
Carol looks intensely sour.
“Ah lay off, Doc! I got the dinero to keep him if I want him, and I do. You’ve got to admit he’s a damn good-looking dude for a Blanco, and besides, he’s a fantastic shortstop.”
“Okay, okay. So maybe I’m wrong.”
“Ohmigawd! Buddy, call the telenews! Never thought I’d live to see the day when Carol would admit such a thing.”
“I take it my programmer is making a joke.” Buddy sounds as sour as Carol looks. “You may wish to know that my housecomp subfunction informs me that the Mulligan unit is approaching this room.”
Wearing only a pair of jeans Mulligan wanders in, sees Carol, and freezes dramatically but sincerely. Although Lacey feels that the moment demands some sort of gesture on her part, a public kiss or some such thing, her dislike of display keeps her standing where she is.
“You want some breakfast?” she says.
He turns his head and smiles at her, and as always his expression of innocent delight makes her want to throw herself into his arms. Instead she sits down at her comp desk.
“Sure,” he says. “I’ll go make it. You going to stay, Carol? You’re welcome to, man.”
Carol stares, then mutters out a graceless thanks and flops onto the couch. Mulligan smiles again, impartially round the room, then wanders out, whistling under his breath, to head for the kitchen.
“Jeez,” Carol says. “He’s sure made himself at home in a hurry.”
“Why shouldn’t he?” Lacey leans back, puts her feet on the desk, and grins at the ceiling. “He lives here now.”
Copyright & Credits
Polar City Blues
Katharine Kerr
Copyright © 1990 Katharine Kerr
ISBN: 9781611380637
Visit Katharine Kerr’s BVC Bookshelf
http://www.bookviewcafe.com/The-Katherine-Kerr-Bookshelf/
Cover image courtesy NASA
Cover Design by Pati Nagle
V20110524vnm
First published by Bantam Books
eBook Publication: Book View Café
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Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
First Interlude: The Hunter
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Second Interlude: The Hunted
Chapter Six
Third Interlude: the Prey
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Copyright & Credits
FAQ
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