Double Helix by Nancy Werlin Read Free Book Online Page B

choice. Just in neurons.
    â€œAha,” said Dr. Wyatt. Then he smiled. “I see. Well, you and I needn’t use the made-up worlds of fiction in order to talk about humans creating life.”
    â€œRobots are real,” I said. “Cloning of animals is viable. Human cloning—it’s going to happen.”
    â€œYes. Exactly! We’re living in the most exciting period of human history. Incredible control, incredible power over our own destiny, is almost within our grasp. There’s a wonderful world ahead—new mysteries unlock to our eyes every day. God created man?” His chin jerked up. “So what? We are going to be able to do that, too. And eventually—it will all take time—we’ll do a better job at it.”
    I stared at him. Of course the idea wasn’t new—but hearing it . . . hearing it from Quincy Wyatt . . . hearing it aloud . . . Do a better job than God?
    â€œThere’s just so much wrong,” Dr. Wyatt added quietly. “Disease. Suffering.” His eyes were intense, but I had the sense he was looking inward. His voice was low. Sad.
    â€œThere so much wrong, Eli. There’s so much human pain and anguish in this world that I believe needn’t happen at all.”

CHAPTER 9
    IT WAS 9:30 WHEN I returned home from dinner, usually a time at which my father could be found in the living room, his feet propped on the coffee table as, simultaneously, he watched television and read. Tonight, however, the apartment was silent and almost completely dark. Almost. There was a sliver of light beneath the door of my parents’—my father’s—bed-room at the far end of the hall.
    I stood at the other end, next to the living room, and for some minutes looked at the crack of light spilling onto the dreary brown carpet. Then I turned away and went into the kitchen, flipping the light switch on, dumping my backpack on a chair, and opening and closing the refrigerator. I knew I was just moving around for the sake of moving around. I was still pretty wired from having that incredible dinner and conversation with Dr. Wyatt.
    I opened the refrigerator a second time. Then I shoved the refrigerator door shut with my elbow. I knew the noise would be audible throughout the apartment—as had the noise of my key in the lock when I got home, and of my footsteps moving about ever since.
    I was being ignored. And even though we’d been living very carefully together, my father and I, these past years, more roommates than family at times—I suddenly realized that never before had I come home and not gotten some kind of greeting. Even on the few occasions in the last year when I’d stayed out very late at Viv’s. I’d come home those nights—trying to be quiet—and my father would always hear me. He would stick his head out into the hall, and say, “Good, you’re home. Now go to bed.”
    He’d stayed up waiting those nights, I now let myself understand. He’d stayed up, with the light under his bedroom door like tonight, and he’d done that even though I wouldn’t ever tell him where I was. Even though all I would say to him was, “It’s nothing to worry about, not drugs or wild parties or drinking or anything.”
    I sat down heavily on a kitchen chair. I closed my eyes briefly and saw my father as he had been this afternoon, at the graduation, with his fury boiling off him as he strode up the aisle and away.
    Dr. Wyatt had said how much he looked forward to my starting work on Monday. He had driven me home just now. Had my father heard his Lexus idling outside when I got out of it? Had he heard my voice saying good-bye, see you Monday ?
    It was a warm, pleasant evening. My father’s bedroom windows faced the street.
    I ought to have called him. I always called when I was going to be at Viv’s.
    Okay. I could go knock on his door now. I could just say—
    Then I saw the note on the