"No.

"No what."

"It isn't the same anymore."

"Is it someone else?"

"Will you believe me if I tell you?" At Barbara's affirmative nod Lexie said: "It isn't anyone else." A pause

invited the trill of a sparrow. In this pause Lexie leanod

over with a grunt and inserted the plug of the coffee porcolator into the wall plug. "It's simply that I've had lots on my mind." She wriggled her way back under covers. "What with that damned deadline I've got to meet. And then there's the research. You know how I hate research. And

the work on my teeth.

If there's anything I hate worse than doing research, it's having work done on my teeth."

Barbara watched a fly scale the wall. "That's not really what you mean, is it?" she said to the fly.

"I thought you said you'd believe me," Lexie said.

"I did. And I do. I mean, I believe you about not having found someone else. But there's more between us than a deadline or...or a dentist."

"Look," Lexie said, "it's like you say, what's black to me may be white to you. Or like vice versa." Lexie reached over and seized a cigarette off the nightstand.

"You like the razzamatazz," she said. "Life's become a big costume ball to you. There are times when I don't even know you. I don't know when the hell you're wearing the mask or when you're not."

Barbara listened to that for a long time in her thinking. "Lexio?" The name ended in the high swing of a question.

"Yes?"

Trying levity: "If I ever wear a mask like you say, how is it I got this green splotch on my forehead yesterday?"

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