On the morning of the funeral Jill and I pampered mum, she hadn't loved the man, we knew that, but both she and Jill had been very fond of him so, lea...ing her asleep, we crept out of bed and made her favourite breakfast of coffee and croissants, I ran down to the flower shop in the precinct and bought her a huge bouquet of mixed flowers and it brought tears to Jill's eyes when I presented her with one too!"They're beautiful Tommy" she said softly, "But it's supposed to be your mum's day!"No" I. " It's still as well cared for as when Grandma and Grandpa lived here," Haydee answered then added, "though I still think you'll be a Grandma yourself before Aunt Adeline leaves America to move back here."Once in the house Haydee took Pam/Jen, Heather/Lisel and Ana/Patty to their rooms on the first floor; Adonai led Ron/Hannah, John/Debbie, Don/Jason and Lana/Katrina to rooms on the second floor; and the two youngest Abbots (Alexander and Margrit) led the Non-Children and The Dumas Kids to. But I'm tired of hate. Tiredin my bones."We sat quietly for a few moments. I looked at the bar's vid screen andnoticed that the game was in product placement mode, and the players nowresembled characters from some escapist sci-fi franchise."Do you like movies?" I wondered."What?" He sounded annoyed."Did you ever see _The Matrix_ trilogy?" I asked. "The originals, not theremakes."He snorted. "What, the pre-war version made by the two trannys? You knowdamn well that was on our ban list."I didn't. ‘…why don’t we ever have sex?’ Mrs. White looked up from her book and pulled the glasses from her eyes. She looked squarely at her husband with a blank look on her face. To a person watching, they could see that she was rewinding and playing this question over and over in her mind in an effort to find some solid ground to get her bearings. Mrs. White finally stalled. ‘What?’ She said, changing her expression from one of confusion to determination and challenge. Mr. White repeated the question.