"Keeping track of that must be a big job," I say slowly.

"You can say that again." Dr. Hanta stands up and straightens her white coat. "It takes at least three of me to keep track of everything!" Another errant curl gets tucked behind her collar. "Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to leave you. You're ready for discharge whenever you want to go home; just tell the nurse on the front desk that you're leaving. Is there anything else?"

"Yes," I say hastily. Then I pause for a moment. "When I was having my crisis, were you tempted to . . . you know, change anything? Apart from administering the fixative algorithm, that is?"

Hanta stares at me with her big brown eyes. She looks thoughtful. "You know, if I tried to change the minds of everyone who I thought needed changing, I'd never have time to do anything else." She smiles at me, and her expression turns chilly. "And besides, what you're asking about is highly questionable behavior, ethically questionable, Mrs. Brown. To which I have two responses. Firstly, whatever I might think of a patient, I would never act in a manner contrary to their best interests. And secondly, I expected better of you. Good day."

She turns and stalks away. I've really put my foot in it now , I think, feeling sick with embarrassment. Me and my big mouth  . . . I want to run after her and apologize, but that would be asking to compound the misunderstanding, wouldn't it? Idiot, I tell myself. She's right, they couldn't run the polity without having a medical supervisor who has the subjects' best interests in mind; and I've just pissed off the only member of the experimental team who might be on my side. She could have helped me figure out how to fit in better, and instead . . . Shit. Shit. Shit.

There's really nothing left to do here. I stand up and rummage through the carrier bag Sam left for me last night. There's underwear, a floral print dress, and a pair of strappy sandals, but he forgot my handbag. Oh well, he gets high marks for trying. I make myself decent then, after waiting long enough for Dr. Hanta to leave the ward, I head down to reception. On the way I pass the other ward, signposted MATERNITY. I guess it'll be getting busy in a few months, but right now it's depressingly empty. There's a spring in my step as I reach the front desk. "Checking out," I say.

The zombie on the desk nods. "Mrs. Reeve Brown leaving the institution of her own volition," she drones. "Have a nice day."

The hospital faces onto Main Street, sandwiched between a run of shops and a stretch zoned for offices. It's a sunny, warm day, and my spirits rise as I go outside. I feel airy and empty, light as a feather, not a care in the world! At least, not for now , a stubborn part of me mutters darkly. Then I get the impression that even the part of me that's always alert shrugs its shoulders and sighs. Still, might as well take the day off to recover. Fiore has actually let me off the hook, for which I can thank Dr. Hanta; so I've got an actual choice. I'm free to keep on kicking and struggling against the inevitable, or I can go home and relax for a few days, just play the game and settle down. (It'll avoid attracting unwelcome attention from Fiore or the score whores, and I can pretend I'm having fun while I'm about it; I'll treat it like a game. Plus, it occurs to me that if I want to get back at Jen, the best way to do it is to defeat her on her own terms. I can always go back to figuring out how to escape later.) Meanwhile, I really ought to try to sort things out with Sam because I don't like the way paranoia and dread seems to have been levering us apart.

It takes me three hours to catch a taxi home, mostly because I pass the Lady's Lodge Beauty Parlor and stop to get my hair tidied up, and then the department store. The staff in the salon and the store are still all zombies, which is annoying, but at least they don't get in the way. I need some more clothes, anyway—I have no idea what happened to what I was wearing the other day, plus, dressing à la mode is a good, easy way to boost your score, and I can use that right now—and in between buying a couple of new outfits I fetch up at the cosmetics counter. The store is deserted, and I figure I'll give Sam a surprise, so I wait while the zombie assistant applies a makeover with inhuman speed. Those dark ages folks may not have had much by way of reconstructive nano, but they knew a lot about using natural products to change they way they looked: I barely recognize myself in the mirror by the time she's finished.

I'm still not very well, and find myself flagging much sooner than I expected. So I finish off in the shop, arrange to have my purchases delivered, and catch a taxi home. Home is much as I expected—a mess. The cleaning service I commissioned when I got the library job has been round, but they only come once a week, and Sam has been letting the dirty dishes pile up in the kitchen and leaving the glasses in the living room. I try to ignore it and put my feet up, but after half an hour it's too much. If I'm going to settle down a bit, I need to take care of that—it's part of the role I'm playing—so I move everything to the kitchen and start cycling them through the dishwasher. Then I go and lie down for a while. But a pernicious demon of dissatisfaction has gotten into my head, so I get up and start on the living room. It comes to me that I really don't like the way the furniture is laid out, and there's something about the sofa that annoys me unaccountably. The sofa will have to go.In the meantime I can rearrange where everything is, and then I realize it's nearly six. Sam will be home soon.

I'm a very poor cook, but I manage to puzzle my way through the instructions on the cartons, and I'm just laying out the cutlery on the dining table in the dayroom when I hear the door rattle.

"Sam?" I call. "I'm home!"

"Reeve?" He calls back.

I step into the hall, and he does a double take. "Reeve?" He gapes at me: It's a priceless moment.

"I had a little accident at the cosmetics counter," I say. "Like it?"

He goes cross-eyed for a moment, then manages to nod. In addition to the makeover I'm wearing the sexiest, most revealing dress I could find. I'll take my praise where I find it. Sam's never been a great one for expressing his emotions, and this is going pretty far for him. Come to think of it, he looks tired, sagging inside his suit jacket.

"Hard day?" I ask.

He nods again. "I, uh"—he draws breath—"I thought you were ill."

"I am." I'm more tired than I want to admit in front of him. "But I'm glad to be home, and Dr. Hanta's given me the next week off work, so I figured I'd lay on a little surprise for you. Are you hungry yet?"

"I missed lunch. Didn't feel much like eating back then." He looks thoughtful. "That wasn't such a good idea, was it?"

"Come with me." I lead him into the dayroom and sit him down, then go back to the kitchen and switch on the microwave, then pick up the two glasses of wine I'd poured and take them back to the table. He doesn't say anything, but he's agog, eyes tracking me like an incoming missile. "Here. A toast—to our future?"

"Our . . . future?" He looks puzzled for a moment, then something seems to clear in his mind, and he raises his glass and finally smiles at me, surrendering some inner doubt. "Yes."

I hurry back to sort out our supper, and we eat. I don't taste much of the food because, to tell the truth, I'm watching Sam. I came so close to losing him that every moment feels delicate, like glass. A huge and complex tenderness is crystallizing in me. "Tell me about your day," I ask, to draw him out, and he mumbles through an incoherent story about missing papers for a deed of attainder or something, watching my face all the time. I have to prompt him to eat. When he's done, I walk round the table to fetch his plate, and I can feel the heat of his gaze on me. "We need to talk," I say.