Instead, we went to a little coffee house and talked for hours more. Now I won't deny I often let my eyes linger on the deep valley between her genero...us breasts or watched the shifting of her full shapely legs as she crossed and recrossed them. I enjoyed the way the buttons on her blouse straining to restrain the treasures hidden there and how her skirt rode up her smooth bare legs. Legs that I happily remembered touching and kissing while Nan and I were locked in that dressing room. Legs that. I reached out with my feelings, the way Thale had taught me. It came slow and awkwardly. I didn’t feel the whole ship at once, like I could sometimes. Instead, I felt fragments of it here and there. The whisper of the agrav engine. The crackling buzz of the comptech. Then the complex, clicking sound of Techne’s body. Her musculature. Then I found her mind – and I took the most intense image of Thale I had. The image of him when I’d first seen him, all those months ago, and I underhanded it into. ” Mr. Williams seemed to be fumbling before a flash of inspiration crossed his lined face. “That’s why he wanted us to meet, actually: he wants me to show you his new prototype.”“He doesn’t want to show me himself?”“I think he’s nervous,” Mr. Williams said. “And probably a little embarrassed about the first time, if I had to guess.”“Well, inventing is iterating.”“You would know,” Mr. Williams said. “Here, let me show you the latest iteration.”“O-kay,” Deborah said, click-clacking her midnight. .."Okay, this is new. I've seen Mom cry a time or two, usually over some loser disappearing up the highway, but this was different. I'm sure she could fake crying, but I wasn't sure she was up to faking tears. When she looked at me, there were tears."I screwed up. You. Bad. Turned my back on my own kid and left you." Mizz Helen's a wonderful person." I know she is. Told me how the cow ate the cabbage, too. Sort of pushed me into leaving you with 'er, you know, and me, stupid, starry-eyed me, I.