"There are step pads to your right. Step on one to travel as quickly as 5 miles per hour." On the floor to my right as soon as I entered the room were... four plastic pads, each about four feet wide, which were lit up and stood out from the rest of the floor. I stepped onto one of them and it lifted from the floor. "Could you turn the lights up? I can't see." "Of course." And finally, I could see it. The room was about half the size of the bridge, but shaped basically the same way. All the walls. Jen had brought in the stepladder; she stood on top and hooked the far end of the cable over the tip of the tree, and then she and Julie, under Mum’s supervision, looped the lights artistically around the tree. I have to admit that it looked very good. We left the girls doing the tinsel and baubles while Hamish and I went out in the garage and chopped some sticks for kindling wood.Dad had of course booked a trip to the steak house that evening (sadly there was no “Doctor Who” over the Christmas. Itwas weird and upsetting. They had re-decorated my room into a girlyretreat. Pink walls and lacy pastel drapes. A large canopy bed withsatin sheets and covers; even a make-up table to boot! My brother Derekcouldn't get over his trip to visit me in Paris and all of thegirlfriends he'd made because of me. He wanted me to go back to being amodel.In a month's time I would be starting my job assignment as a paralegalsecretary in Janet's chambers near the big London law courts. Since Iwould be. ‘A kid we know and grew up with is dead. Doesn’t that bother you at all?’ ‘Practice is only another hour,’ he argued. ‘One hour isn’t going to make your friend come back to life and the team we’re playing this week is tough.’ ‘Wow,’ I said, shaking my head. I was unable to resist adding, ‘I guess I’ve always known you were a selfish bully, but I didn’t expect this.’ ‘What!’ he cried and started coming toward me. The other coaches moved to intercept him. Coach Riley was bright red and nearly.