James pushed his glasses further up his face, and winced in the way he did when no one was taking him seriously enough.“ Have you seen the reports of how fast it spreads? None of the fungicides work on it ….”
Sylvia found her attention drifting, wondered if she could surreptitiously get the Clive Barker paperback out of her book and read it under the table without being disturbed. Lately she had found herself feeling more and more distanced from her friends. It wasn’ t that she didn’ t still like them, or enjoy their company, it was just that she found her attention more prone to wander, her conversations more ready to dry up mid flow. Sometimes she would find herself looking around at this room of strangers, her closest friends, and wonder what on earth they could possibly have in common. Someone called her name from the other end of the table. She looked up, smiled, sipped her beer, and tried to make herself fully present.
*
Sylvia tugged her coat more closely around her against the winter chill. It was so dark in Yrcalla in winter, now that the electric streetlights had been permanently shut off. The odd old fashioned gas lantern or wooden torch illuminated small circles of sidewalk, guttering in the wind, but with no electric lights on in the buildings, no glaring neon signs, no flashing advertisements, they were feeble oases of brightness in the overwhelming desert of night. Sylvia had lived in the city her entire life; the dark of the countryside frightened her, but it was preferable to the alternative.
Sylvia preferred the night shift, volunteered for it when she could. During winter, one could get away without ever seeing Yrcalla in daylight. The city in darkness was still transfigured, but in some ways the night made it feel less real, more dreamlike, its
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