“Renaissance,” Alice’s husband said casually. “A rebirth? Like you guys have been able to start again now that you’re together?”Cali shook her head. “No. We haven’t started again. The Renaissance was about maturity,” she explained, using the words Kent had spoken to her in the Landon Industries vault more than a year ago. “So, instead of a rebirth, this is us growing into ourselves. It’s the culmination of all the years we lived before we decided to live them together.”

“Oh, I see. You’re horny.”Kent cleared his throat. “I believe we’ve had more than one discussion about that adjective.”“Right,” Cali corrected, frowning as she peered at the cellulite on the top of the back of her thighs. “You’re not horny. You’re lascivious.”

“Admit it. You just had sex,” Alice hissed.Cali’s jaw dropped open. “That’s none of your business,” she replied in outrage, “and how the hell did you know?”Alice shook her head “You’re glowing orgasmically. It’s disgustingly sweet. And Kent looks ridiculously relaxed and possessive.”Brushing her best friend away and flushing a little, Cali pretended to look for her salad tongs. “Mind your own business.”“Fine,” Alice grumbled. “Don’t tell me all the dirty details.” She paused for a beat. Then added, “It was rear entry, wasn’t it?”Cali almost strangled on her shock and indignation. “It was not.”Alice chuckled maliciously. “Don’t lie to me. He has that macho glint in his eyes. I’d know that look anywhere. I’m an anthropologist, remember? And mating rituals are one of my specialties.”

“Got you all hot and bothered, did I?”He sneered. “Exactly as you intended.”“Well, in a few hours, we can fuck until we’re both limp and exhausted,” she promised, giving him an exaggerated leer.Kent wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her barely clothed body back against him. “I’m not waiting for a few hours,” he countered huskily, his mouth against the side of her throat and the vibrations making her shiver.She shook her head, although she’d felt tingling pleasure between her legs at his words. “You’ll have to. I’m all fixed up and pretty now and you’re not going to get me sweaty and mess up my makeup before everyone arrives.”His other arm went around her too and his hands moved up to cup her breasts over the lace of her bra. Then his pelvis pushed into the top of her ass and she felt the hard evidence of his arousal. “I won’t mess up your makeup.”

“I’m late.”He blinked and glanced instinctively at his wrist, where he usually wore his watch.Despite her anxiety, Cali snickered. “Not late like that. My period is late.”He blinked again, but was otherwise frozen in place. His expression was unreadable and it made Cali’s heart sink a little.”

“After a moment or two a man in brown crimplene looked in at us, did not at all like the look of us and asked us if we were transit passengers. We said we were. He shook his head with infinite weariness and told us that if we were transit passengers then we were supposed to be in the other of the two rooms. We were obviously very crazy and stupid not to have realized this. He stayed there slumped against the door jamb, raising his eyebrows pointedly at us until we eventually gathered our gear together and dragged it off down thecorridor to the other room. He watched us go past him shaking his head in wonder and sorrow at the stupid futility of the human condition in general and ours in particular, and then closed the door behind us.The second room was identical to the first. Identical in all respects other than one, which was that it had a hatchway let into one wall. A large vacant-looking girl was leaning through it with her elbows on the counter and her fists jammed up into her cheekbones. She was watching some flies crawling up the wall, not with any great interest because they were not doing anything unexpected, but at least they were doing something. Behind her was a table stacked with biscuits, chocolate bars, cola, and a pot of coffee, and we headed straight towards this like a pack of stoats. Just before we reached it, however, we were suddenly headed off by a man in blue crimplene, who asked us what we thought we were doing in there. We explained that we were transit passengers on our way to Zaire, and he looked at us as if we had completely taken leave of our senses.'Transit passengers? he said. 'It is not allowed for transit passengers to be in here.' He waved us magnificently away from the snack counter, made us pick up all our gear again, and herded us back through the door and away into the first room where, a minute later, the man in the brown crimplene found us again.He looked at us. Slow incomprehension engulfed him, followed by sadness, anger, deep frustration and a sense that the world had been created specifically to cause him vexation. He leaned back against the wall, frowned, closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.'You are in the wrong room,' he said simply. `You are transit passengers. Please go to the other room.'There is a wonderful calm that comes over you in such situations, particularly when there is a refreshment kiosk involved. We nodded, picked up our gear in a Zen-like manner and made our way back down the corridor to the second room. Here the man in blue crimplene accosted us once more but we patiently explained to him that he could fuck off.”

“You should have felt the buzz the moment all five of us got together in the same room for the first time again. We all started laughin'—it was like the five years had never passed. We knew we'd made the right move.”