Mona Lisa Overdrive

How it was supposed to have made her feel was a way she hadn't ever felt. She knew you could get to a place where doing it hurt a little but still felt good, but she knew that wasn't it. What Eddy wanted to hear was that it hurt a lot and made her feel bad, but she liked it anyway. Which made no sense at all to Mona, but she'd learned to tell it the way he wanted her to.

Because anyway it worked, and now Eddy rolled over with the blanket bunched up across his back and got in between her legs. She figured he must be seeing it in his head, like a cartoon, what she was telling him, and at the same time he got to be that faceless pumping big guy. He had her wrists now, pi

And when he was done, curled on his side asleep, Mona lay awake in the stale dark, turning the dream of leaving around and around, bright and wonderful.

And please let it be true.

5 - Portobello

Kumiko woke in the enormous bed and lay very still, listening. There was a faint continuous murmur of distant traffic.

The air in the room was cold; she drew the rose duvet around her like a tent and climbed out. The small windows were patterned with bright frost. She went to the tub and nudged one of the swan's gilded wings. The bird coughed, gargled, began to fill the tub. Still huddled in the quilt, she opened her cases and began to select the day's garments, laying the chosen articles out on the bed.

When her bath was ready, she let the quilt slide to the floor and climbed over the marble parapet, stoically lowering herself into the painfully hot water. Steam from the tub had melted the frost; now the windows ran with condensation. Did all British bedrooms contain tubs like this? She wondered. She rubbed herself methodically with an oval bar of French soap, stood up, sluiced the suds off as best she could, wrapped herself in a large black towel, and, after some initial fumbling, discovered a sink, toilet, and bidet. These were hidden in a very small room that might once have been a closet, its walls fitted with dark veneer.

The theatrical-looking telephone chimed twice.

"Yes?"

"Petal here. Care for breakfast? Roger's here. Eager to meet you."

"Thank you," she said. "I'm dressing now."

She pulled on her best and baggiest pair of leather slacks, then burrowed into a hairy blue sweater so large that it would easily have fit Petal. When she opened her purse for her makeup, she saw the Maas-Neotek unit. Her hand closed on it automatically. She hadn't intended to summon him, but touch was enough; he was there, craning his neck comically and gaping at the low, mirrored ceiling.

"I take it we aren't in the Dorchester?"

"I'll ask the questions," she said. "What is this place?"

"A bedroom," he said. "In rather dubious taste."

"Answer my question, please."

"Well," he said, surveying the bed and tub, "by the decor, it could be a brothel. I can access historical data on most buildings in London, but there's nothing notable about this one. Built in 1848. Solid example of the prevalent classical Victorian style. The neighborhood's expensive without being fashionable, popular with lawyers of a certain sort." He shrugged; she could see the edge of the bed through the burnished gleam of his riding boots.

She dropped the unit into her purse and he was gone.

She managed the lift easily enough; once in the white-painted foyer, she followed the sound of voices. Along a sort of hallway. Around a corner.

"Good morning," said Petal, lifting the silver cover from a platter. Steam rose. "Here's the elusive Mr. Swain, Roger to you, and here's your breakfast."

"Hello," the man said, stepping forward, his hand extended. Pale eyes in a long, strong-boned face. Lank mouse-colored hair was brushed diagonally across his forehead. Kumiko found it impossible to guess his age; it was a young man's face, but there were deep wrinkles under the grayish eyes. He was tall, with the look of an athlete about his arms and shoulders. "Welcome to London." He took her hand, squeezed and released it.

"Thank you."

He wore a collarless shirt, very fine red stripes against a pale blue ground, the cuffs fastened with plain ovals of dull gold; open at the neck, it displayed a dark triangle of tattooed flesh. "I spoke with your father this morning, told him you'd arrived safely."

"You are a man of rank."

The pale eyes narrowed. "Pardon?"

"The dragons."

Petal laughed.

"Let her eat," someone said, a woman's voice.

Kumiko turned, discovering the slim dark figure against tall, mullioned windows; beyond the windows, a walled garden sheathed in snow. The woman's eyes were concealed by silver glasses that reflected the room and its occupants.

"Another of our guests," said Petal.

"Sally," the woman said, "Sally Shears. Eat up, honey. If you're as bored as I am, you feel like a walk." As Kumiko stared, her hand came up to touch the glasses, as though she were about to remove them. "Portobello Road's a couple blocks. I need some air." The mirrored lenses seemed to have no frames, no earpieces.

"Roger," Petal said, forking pink slices of bacon from a silver platter, "do you suppose Kumiko will be safe with our Sally?"

"Safer than I'd be, given the mood she's in," Swain said. "I'm afraid there isn't much here to amuse you," he said to Kumiko, leading her to the table, "but we'll try to make you as comfortable as possible and arrange for you to see a bit of the city. It isn't Tokyo, though."

"Not yet, anyway," said Petal, but Swain seemed not to hear.

"Thank you," Kumiko said, as Swain held her chair.

"An honor," Swain said. "Our respect for your father -- "

"Hey," the woman said, "she's too young to need that bullshit. Spare us."

"Sally's in something of a mood, you see," Petal said, as he put a poached egg on Kumiko's plate.

Sally Shears's mood, it developed, was one of barely suppressed rage, a fury that made itself known in her stride, in the angry gunshot crack of her black bootheels on icy pavement.

Kumiko had to scramble to keep up, as the woman stalked away from Swain's house in the crescent, her glasses flashing coldly in directionless winter sunlight. She wore narrow trousers of dark brown suede and a bulky black jacket, its collar turned up high; expensive clothing. With her short black hair, she might have been taken for a boy.

For the first time since leaving Tokyo, Kumiko felt fear.

The energy pent in the woman was almost tangible, a knot of anger that might slip at any moment.

Kumiko slid her hand into her purse and squeezed the Maas-Neotek unit; Colin was instantly beside her, strolling briskly along, his hands tucked in the pockets of his jacket, his boots leaving no imprint in the dirty snow. She released the unit then, and he was gone, but she felt reassured. She needn't fear losing Sally Shears, whose pace she found difficult; the ghost could certainly guide her back to Swain's. And if I run from her, she thought, he will help me. The woman dodged through moving traffic at an intersection, absently tugging Kumiko out of the path of a fat black Honda taxi and somehow managing to kick the fender as it slid past.

"You drink?" she asked, her hand around Kumiko's forearm.

Kumiko shook her head. "Please, you're hurting my arm."

Sally's grip loosened, but Kumiko was steered through doors of ornate frosted glass, into noise and warmth, a sort of crowded burrow lined in dark wood and worn fawn velour.

Soon they faced each other across a small marble table that supported a Bass ashtray, a mug of dark ale, the whiskey glass Sally had emptied on her way from the bar, and a glass of orange squash.