Fred Williams levered his body off the dentist's chair and stood unsteadily. The girl took his arm. She was smaller than he, the top of her head reaching to his mouth, small, delicate and scented with heather.
"There's a lounge next door—you may not have noticed it on the way out—and there's always a bowl of fruit and some cheese and biscuits there. Let's go in."
He followed her.
Even the short walk helped accustom himself to his body again. And the room was large and airy, overlooking the central park of the city and the clouds beyond the tall buildings in the distance.
He stood looking out at the view and eating an apple while she sliced cheese and laid the pieces on a plate with some biscuits for him. Then she sat down, folded her hands in her lap and looked at him. She was wearing a white-and-blue-check dress. She looked young and fresh and alive. The room was clean and fresh. He could not think of Elsie and that apartment as being in the same world.
"Did the doc say you followed me?" Fred asked eventually.
"One of us always goes with a new Diver on the first trip."
"What did I look like? I mean was there anything to see?"
"Oh, yes." Pat laughed. "As a matter of fact, our minds look like the inside of eggs out there."
"But a plane went through me. And I shot for some reason into the Sun."