218
d a r r e n g r ot h
front of the line she changes her mind. Two minutes
later, we are suspended high above the
pne
, the two of
us together in a cage, defying gravity, looking out over a
city that doesn’t know it is being watched.
v
“Are you afraid of earthquakes, Leonie?”
“A little. Probably no more than the average person
living in this city, I would say.”
“No lie, seismologists believe there’s a
37
percent
chance of an
8.2
-plus event and a
10
to
15
percent chance
of a
9.0
-plus event in the Pacific Northwest sometime in
the next fifty years.”
“And what does Extrasensory Perry believe?”
I shrug. “I can never be sure whether something will
happen or not. Nobody can, not even the best seismolo-
gists. I know one thing definitely, though: if it happens,
living in a world of one is not an option. People will need
each other.”
On the ground, I notice a man in a wheelchair on
the path below the West Coast Wheel. An overweight
woman pushes the chair with one hand; the other hand
shoves a melting ice-cream cone into her mouth. When
they reach the end of the path, the woman loses her grip.
