The problem was-as with Claudia and Nudger-things would never be quite the same for Hammersmith. That's what life seemed to come down to, losing some small part of yourself here, another there, inching toward icy darkness.
Claudia was standing hipshot in her Levi's, buttoning a white cotton blouse. Nudger liked her best when she dressed plainly to set off her subtle beauty. Simply looking at her gave him a sensation of contentment and wholeness. He needed her more than he'd planned. So much more. He thought about Candy Ann and Curtis Colt, and wondered if love was a trap for everyone. His and Claudia's lives wouldn't go on forever; was it any wonder he was selfish about her? Okay, more than selfish. Downright greedy and possessive.
"Why don't we get away this weekend?" he suggested. "Drive somewhere and find blissful isolation? Maybe rent a cabin."
She missed a button. "I can't. I've got plans for this weekend."
"The entire weekend?"
She nodded, turned away from him, and began brushing her hair. Their eyes met in the dresser mirror. She looked away.
"With someone of my gender?" Nudger asked.
"Yes."
Nudger's heart suddenly weighed so much he didn't think he could budge. Claudia's image in the mirror seemed to recede, change, as if he were watching her through wavering, distorting glass.
"I really don't understand how you can stay beneath that sheet and blanket," she said, "as hot as it is. You must be crazy."
He listened to the sighing, faintly crackling strains of the brush passing through her long hair. It was almost like the sound of sizzling, high-voltage current, of dwindling time.
"Not crazy," Nudger said, "cold. Colder than before."
But he threw back the covers and struggled out of bed into his world.
Some people you couldn't crush.