“Oh, it would if I really pushed it. But the cells are still alive, and parts of it work great. And to tell the truth, I think my body’s relieved and at peace with me out of it, and not bugging it all the time. As long as I’m busy and happy, I suppose I shouldn’t begrudge it that.”

“And bodies change, too,” Mariah said. “Thank heavens. The cells and the awareness in them; bodies want their own fulfillment. Strange, even with mine, eating those lousy chocolate cookies all the time. I’ve felt it, yearning to return to the Earth again, unorganized for a change, free to be anything. I mean, just scatter…. And it’s amazing, the vitality of bodies. The ones we have now are great, of course; they don’t age—but they also make you appreciate your physical bodies even more, with all the stresses they go through.”

“I think I’m going to cry,” Lydia said. “I don’t even know where mine is.”

Lawrence grinned. “Roger has the ashes in a mayonnaise jar. I don’t know how he worked that.”

“Larry, that’s awful. Before I do anything else I’m going to unplug that jar and let the ashes out, scatter them someplace where they can be free. Oh, I never even liked mayonnaise.” Suddenly she broke off. “Why, if I’m alive though I died, then I must have a soul. I always thought that that was just a big bunch of nonsense—”

“Listen to that racket,” Mariah cried.

The Sunday services were winding up. Just as Lydia finished speaking, and Mariah interrupted, the band broke into an resounding off-key rendition of “Nearer My God To Thee.”

Lydia glowered and said, “That’s what I mean. That … stuff!” But in the meantime, just as Lydia said, “… I must have a soul,” Oversoul Seven appeared. Now Lydia turned and saw him. In his eyes she saw all of her memories from the day of her birth as Lydia. She knew who she was, and who Seven was. She saw the love and order that had always been beneath her days. And the hospital disappeared, and Lawrence, and Mariah, and Cromwell.

Chapter Twenty-Five

In Which Lydia Meets Tweety, Discusses the Meaning of Life with Oversoul Seven, and Stakes Out Her Future Parents

Tenderly, actually with crafty tenderness, Josef eyed Bianka while she lay next to him with her back turned. A while ago her body had just been a buxom, tasty one (mmmmm, he grinned). Somewhere along the line it had become her body, a natural, joyous expression of her … Biankaness, so that sometimes he actually got embarrassed (him!) when he touched her.