The Gate to Women's Country by Sheri S. Tepper Page A

up to be like him?”
    â€œYech. A crowing hen! Cock-a-doodle-doo!” Beneda spread her right hand above her head like a comb and flapped the left arm like a wing.
    â€œThat’s what I thought. Since Myra’s thinking of it, though, Morgot’s got her on all kinds of dietary supplements.” She twiddled her fingers, then stretched, like a cat. “Myra will do what she wants, regardless.”
    Beneda put down the book she had been pretending to study and said, “Stavvy, talking about chickens reminded me. Mom asked me to go to market to pick up some eggs for the house.”
    â€œGo ahead,” Stavia said idly. “I’ll wait for you here.”
    â€œCome on with me.”
    â€œI don’t want to. You go on. You always get to talking and take an hour when it should only take ten minutes. If I wait for you here, I won’t be impatient.”
    â€œWhat will you do here by yourself?”
    â€œRead.” She looked at the scattered books around them. “Preconvulsion societies. I’ll read your anthropology book, then quiz you on it.”
    â€œIt’s dull. All about islands and tropical places and Laplanders.”
    â€œWhat are Laplanders?”
    â€œYou want to read it, you find out.” Beneda stood up and brushed herself off. “I’ll be back.”
    She went off, looking not too displeased to be going alone. Beneda liked to talk to people in the market and Stavia didn’t. But then Beneda’s mother wasn’t on the Council and Stavia’s was. Beneda could say anything that came into her head—and usually did—and no one thought anything of it, but if Stavia said, “It looks like rain,” everyone wondered if it had significance because of something Morgot had said at home. As though Morgot ever said anything at home! She was as closemouthed as a vinegar shaker.
    Left behind, Stavia picked up the red book Beneda had been reading. Preconvulsion societies. Tropical island tribes. Tribes based on trade. Migratory tribes—the Laplanders.
    Stavia read, entering the world of the Laplanders in their padded coats and tall boots (not unlike the winter wear in Women’s Country), picking the most docile reindeer to breed so they could lead their great herds from pasture to pasture without losing them. She could almost smell the huge rivers of animals moving north and south with the seasons, almost hear the lowing of the beasts,feel the bite of the snow, the weight of felted coats and boots, the tug of the leashed bull being led along so that all that river of beasts would follow. She lost herself in the words, becoming one of the migrants, feeling it….
    When Beneda came back, Stavia was sitting on the wall, the book open in her lap, tears running down her face.
    â€œStavvy! What happened?”
    â€œReindeer,” she said, half strangled by her own teary laughter,
    â€œWhat do you mean ‘reindeer’?”
    â€œJust… we don’t have them anymore.”
    Beneda’s mouth dropped open. “Stavvy, honestly. There’s lots of things we don’t have anymore. We don’t have… clothes-drying machines and mechanical transportation and furnaces that heat your whole house, and cotton and silk and… and cows and horses and… and all kinds of other animals and birds and—oh, lots of things.”
    â€œI miss them.”
    â€œYou’ve never
had
them!”
    â€œYes, but I know about them. That makes it different.”
    â€œYou’re weird.” Beneda threw her arms around Stavia and squeezed tight, half laughing. “I love you best, Stavvy, because you’re weird! Will you always be my best friend?”
    Stavia laughed at herself, drying her eyes on the hem of her shirt. “I’ll always be your best friend, Beneda. Forever. And I know I’m weird. That’s what Morgot says, too.”
    â€œI wish we were sisters.”
    â€œWhy? Sisters