Memorymakers by Brian Herbert, Marie Landis Read Free Book Online Page B

candy,” she said. “The sugarless kind that won’t rot your teeth. Before you leave, Emily, comb your hair, and Thomas, change your shirt.”
    Victoria slipped through the back door. Her body glided like a cat’s, soundlessly.
    “She never listens to anyone,” complained Emily.
    “She’s all right” came her brother’s cheerful reply, muffled by a mouthful of toast. “You just have to understand her.”
    “I don’t want to,” Emily said.
    She heard the familiar whine of her grandparents’ car outside, and dumped her cereal down the garbage disposal. Grandfather Harvey was lumbering up the front-porch steps when the children got there. He had bright green eyes and a thick thatched roof of white hair that hung over his forehead.
    He hugged the children. “Ready to go? Nonna’s in the car.”
    “Are we gonna have an adventure today, Panona?” Thomas asked, as they walked to the car. Panona was a name the boy selected, coined with nonna, the Italian word for grandmother. His grandfather didn’t object, asserting that creativity should never be stifled.
    “You bet,” Panona promised.
    “Where are we going?” Thomas asked.
    “Exploring. So much to see in this world!”
    Nonna, a tall woman in blue jeans and an oversized man’s shirt, slipped the car’s voice command unit over her mouth, and the rubber of it adhered to her skin. She spoke destination and speed commands into the unit. The vehicle accelerated and merged into traffic. With automatic controls activated, the steering wheel spun back and forth in front of her without being touched.
    Emily sat in the front beside her grandmother, with Thomas and Panona in the back. It was warm in the car, and Emily touched a button to iris open the round window of her door. She looked up at her grandmother.
    Nonna’s hair was dark gray and her face covered with a fine web of wrinkles, but her eyes were childlike, large and dark. The sandals on her feet had been handcrafted from scraps of leather and wood into an elegant design. A turquoise Indian necklace hung around her neck like a collection of blue-green teeth, and on her hand a marvelous ring sparkled family history in each pearl, diamond and piece of gold. She looked slightly foreign.
    Emily thought about values, of the things that were important to her.
    “I like to drive manually,” Nonna said when they were out of town. She removed the voice command unit from her mouth, slipped the device into a dashboard bracket and took the steering wheel in hand, her movements fluid. “Not in traffic, but out here on the highway to who-knows-where.”
    “Destination unknown,” Panona said.
    “Yippee!” Thomas squealed.
    “A car is like a little nest,” Nonna said. “Here we are, four birds all cozy and safe.” She glanced at Emily and asked why she was frowning.
    “Values. Victoria said we ought to get some.”
    Nonna arched an eyebrow, “I suppose she meant the qualities everyone should have. Honesty, compassion, a sense of responsibility. Things like that.”
    “She didn’t mention those,” Thomas said. “She talked about my T-shirt and Emily’s hair.” Thomas still wore the dreaded shirt, and Emily hadn’t combed.
    Signs along the road with black letters against white tempted and coaxed: “See the thunder beasts-five kilometers to the Jabu Smith Amusement Park.” And then, farther along, another sign with a monster pictured on it and the words “Only one more kilometer.”
    In the distance Emily saw a giant statue at the side of the road.
    The car slid to a stop by the statue, one of the thunder beasts, and the Harveys got out. The crude cement creature was massive, towering high overhead in bright sunlight at the park entrance. The ferocious head was beaded with small aggregate rocks, and the body of the statue, including its tail, extended a distance several times its height.
    “Bal-u-chi-ther-ium.” Nonna pronounced the word slowly, reading from a plaque. She wiped perspiration from her