“It’s different.” Black and pearl checkerboard.

“Everything’s different.” She pushed the lift button twice. “Everything’s the same.”

“A philosopher this morning.”

“Just crabby about the goddamn meeting.” The door opened and they shared a short ride with two men in coveralls who stared sideways at Evelyn.

There was a bench built into the wall by the lift on Level 1. They sat down and watched the two men walk away muttering. “You with Dan last night?” O’Hara asked.

“Yes and no. I was asleep before he came in and he got up and left before I woke up.”

“Could have been anybody, then.”

“He needs a lot more sleep than he’s been getting. I don’t think it’s been more than four or five hours a night since we left.”

“Don’t worry about that. I’ve seen him go through it a dozen times before.”

“Wise old momma. Really?”

O’Hara nodded. “Every job change. Another couple of weeks and he’ll break loose, get real drunk, sleep around the clock, and then go back to normal. Maybe a day off for moaning through a hangover.”

“Job change.”

“You know him. The job change is more profound than the planet change.”

“Just like you?”

“You’ve got me there.” O’Hara smiled but suddenly looked away.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean …”

“I know what you meant.” She patted the younger woman’s arm. “John’s the only sensible one in the family, you included. He doesn’t let work take over his life.”

The lift opened and the sensible one swung out on his crutches. “Jesus. One of you ladies turn down the gravity?” Dan held the door and followed him out.

“Only a couple of blocks,” O’Hara said.

“Could have held the meeting in the gym. Eliot doesn’t like gravity any more than I do.” Eliot Smith, Engineering Coordinator, was hugely overweight and had only one flesh limb, his right arm; the rest of them lost in a mining accident when he was a teenager. “You do know the way, don’t you?”

“Nothing to it.” O’Hara did know her way around the ship better than most adults. The designers had done a good job of providing special “interest,” structural variety, but for some months most conversations between strangers would start out “Where the hell am I?”