The Best of Connie Willis Read Online Free

opened up the envelope and took out the letter.
    “ ‘Dear Janice and Todd and everybody,’ ” I read. “ ‘How are things in the glorious West? We’re raring to come out and see you, though we may not make it quite as soon as we hoped. How are Carla and David and the baby? I can’t wait to see little David. Is he walking yet? I bet Grandma Janice is so proud she’s busting her britches. Is that right? Do you Westerners wear britches or have you all gone to designer jeans?’ ”
    David was standing by the fireplace. He put his head down across his arms on the mantelpiece.
    “ ‘I’m sorry I haven’t written, but we were very busy with Rick’s graduation and anyway I thought we would beat the letter out to Colorado, but now it looks like there’s going to be a slight change in plans. Rick has definitely decided to join the Army. Richard and I have talked ourselves blue in the face, but I guess we’ve just made matters worse. We can’t even get him to wait to join until after the trip to Colorado. He says we’d spend the whole trip trying to talk him out of it, which is true, I guess. I’m just so worried about him. The Army! Rick says I worry too much, which is true, too, I guess, but what if there was a war?’ ”
    Mom bent over and picked up the log that David had dropped and laid it on the couch beside her.
    “ ‘If it’s okay with you out there in the Golden West, we’ll wait until Rick is done with basic the first week in July and then all come out. Please write and let us know if this is okay. I’m sorry to switch plans on you like this at the last minute, but look at it this way: You have a whole extra month to get into shape for hiking up Pikes Peak. I don’t know about you, but I sure can use it.’ ”
    Mrs. Talbot had dropped her end of the plastic. It hadn’t landed onthe stove this time, but it was so close to it, it was curling from the heat. Dad just stood there watching it. He didn’t even try to pick it up.
    “ ‘How are the girls? Sonja is growing like a weed. She’s out for track this year and bringing home lots of medals and dirty sweat socks. And you should see her knees! They’re so banged up I almost took her to the doctor. She says she scrapes them on the hurdles, and her coach says there’s nothing to worry about, but it does worry me a little. They just don’t seem to heal. Do you ever have problems like that with Lynn and Melissa?
    “ ‘I know, I know. I worry too much. Sonja’s fine. Rick’s fine. Nothing awful’s going to happen between now and the first week in July, and we’ll see you then. Love, the Clearys. P.S. Has anybody ever fallen off Pikes Peak?’ ”
    Nobody said anything. I folded up the letter and put it back in the envelope.
    “I should have written them,” Mom said. “I should have told them, ‘Come now.’ Then they would have been here.”
    “And we would probably have climbed up Pikes Peak that day and gotten to see it all go blooey and us with it,” David said, lifting his head up. He laughed and his voice caught on the laugh and kind of cracked. “I guess we should be glad they didn’t come.”
    “Glad?” Mom said. She was rubbing her hands on the legs of her jeans. “I suppose we should be glad Carla took Melissa and the baby to Colorado Springs that day so we didn’t have so many mouths to feed.” She was rubbing her jeans so hard she was going to rub a hole right through them. “I suppose we should be glad those looters shot Mr. Talbot.”
    “No,” Dad said. “But we should be glad the looters didn’t shoot the rest of us. We should be glad they only took the canned goods and not the seeds. We should be glad the fires didn’t get this far. We should be glad …”
    “That we still have mail delivery?” David said. “Should we be glad about that, too?” He went outside and shut the door behind him.
    “When I didn’t hear from them I should have called or something,” Mom said.
    Dad was still looking