Chapter 50 Chapter Twelve

"Your Excellency..." Sol shrank his shoulders and twisted the hand of the first person, crying to the bishop.The three remaining exorcists stepped forward to help, while the equally burly reciters circled around Thor.The bishop had turned his back, as if staring into the darkness. The sanctuary outside echoed with Thor's groans and the scraping of heels on the ground, and finally Thor's foot hit the most unholy spot on the lead exorcist, and he let out a loud gasp.The outcome of the struggle was not affected by this.Saul was thrown into the street.The last janitor turned his face away and tossed Thor's tattered hat back to him.

Thor stayed in Luthers for another ten days, but he found nothing but a growing weariness under the intense gravity.Church officials ignored his calls.He couldn't enter the temple mansion at all.The exorcists were all waiting for him at the entrance of the hall. Sol teleported to Xindi and Fuxingzhi, to Fuji Star and Whale Heart, to Tianjin Sibing and Tianjin Siding, but no matter where the Shrike Temple was, he was rejected. Exhausted, disheartened, and broke, Sol teleports back to his hometown of Bana, pulls the electromagnetic car out of the long-term parking lot, and arrives home an hour before Rachel's birthday.

"Did you bring me any present, Daddy?" cried the ten-year-old girl excitedly.Sarai told her that Saul had gone out of town that day. Sol took out the wrapped package.A complete set of series.It was not something he had intended to bring to her. "Can I open it?" "Wait a little longer, sweetie. Open it with the rest." "Well, Daddy, please. That's all there is for now. Wait until Nikki and the other kids come over?" Sol looked into Sarai's eyes.She shook her head.Rachel remembered that she had invited Nikki, Li Na, and other friends to her birthday party just a few days earlier.Sarai hadn't come up with a suitable excuse yet.

"Well, Rachel," he said, "there's only one present before the party begins." As Rachel tore open the small package, Sol saw the larger package in the living room, tied with a red ribbon.It's a new bike, of course. For the entire year leading up to her tenth birthday, Rachel wanted a new bike.Saul wondered wearily if she would be surprised tomorrow if she found out she had a new bike before her tenth birthday.Or they could have disposed of the bike that night while Rachel was asleep. Thor slumped on the couch.The red ribbon reminded him of a bishop's robe. Sarai never felt better when she surrendered to the past.Every time she cleans a set of baby clothes that Rachel can't wear, folds it, and puts it away, she weeps silently, but Sol somehow always knows.Sarai cherished every phase of Rachel's childhood, enjoying the normal, day-to-day evolution of things; a normalcy that she accepted with equanimity, and which she saw as the happiest time of her life.She has always felt that the essence of human experience lies not only in those peak moments, such as the wedding day or the arrival of success, which stand out in memory, like the days circled in red pen in an old calendar; Ordinary trifles that have gone through—on weekend afternoons, every member of the family focused on what they were pursuing, they met and contacted by chance in their respective jobs, and the short conversations would not remain in memory for a long time, but such The synergistic effect accumulated over time is extremely important and eternal.

Sol found Sarai in the attic, she was going through the boxes one by one, sobbing softly.These aren't the tender tears once shed for the little ones who exit the family scene.Sale?Winterberg was throwing a fit. "What are you doing, old man?" "Rachel has no clothes. Everything is too big. What an eight-year-old can wear won't fit a seven-year-old. I remember putting some of her stuff somewhere." "Leave it alone," Saul said, "we'll just buy some new ones." Sally shook her head. "And make her wonder every day where her favorite clothes are? Nope. I left some things. They must be here somewhere."

"Let's look for it later." "Damn it, it's not too long!" Sarai yelled, then turned her back to Sol, and covered her face with her hands and wept. "Sorry." Thor put his arms around her.Her bare arms were much thinner than he remembered, despite the limited Paulson physical therapy they had received.The rough skin is full of black dots and blood vessels.He hugged her tightly. "I'm sorry," she said again, crying loudly, "this is so unfair." "Yes," Saul agreed, "it's not fair." Sunlight filtered through the dusty lattice windows of the attic, which looked like a gloomy church.Sol had always liked the smell of attics—places that smelled of heat and rotten wood, underutilized, and full of future treasures.Today that feeling is ruined.

He squatted down next to a box. "Come on, dear," he said, "let's find it together." Rachel is still happy and enjoying life, but wakes up every morning slightly confused by what is wrong around her.She was getting younger and it was getting easier to explain to her the changes that had happened - they all happened overnight - the old elm tree at the front door was gone, the old colonial where Mr Nesbitt used to live around the corner Her home has been converted into a new apartment, her friends are gone—and for the first time, Sol sees a resilience that he doesn't have in a child.He imagined that Rachel was living on the verge of the collapse of the tide of time. She couldn't see the deep ocean behind her, and she used her few memories to maintain peace? , to spend the twelve to fifteen hours she can have every day—her weird present.

Neither Saul nor Sarai wanted their daughter to be separated from the other children, but it was difficult to find a way to socialize with others.Rachel was happy to play with the "new girl" and "new boy" in the neighborhood - all the kids of other lecturers, grandkids of friends, and for a while playing with Nicky's daughter - but the other The children have to learn to get used to Rachel greeting them every day as if they were meeting for the first time, without remembering their common past at all, so only a small number of sensitive children can continue to play because she is a playmate" First time meeting! Please take care of me!" game.

Of course, the story about Rachel's strange disease is no secret in Clover.The story had spread throughout the university since Rachel's first year back, and soon throughout the town.Clover's response to this was a long-standing custom in small towns—some gossiping women gossip, and some people can't hide their sympathy and schadenfreude in their words and eyes when they talk about it—but everyone Most members wrap their protective wings around the Wentborough family, like a clumsy mother bird protecting her young. So they can still live a peaceful life.Even when Saul had to abruptly suspend classes and retire early to seek medical advice for Rachel, no one ever brought up the real reason.

But it didn't last long, and when Saul stepped onto the porch one spring day, he saw his seven-year-old daughter returning from the park weeping, surrounded by a swarm of journalists, their implanted cameras flashing, comlogs Stretching out, at that moment, he knew that the quiet phase of their lives was over for good.Saul jumped off the porch and ran to Rachel's side. "Mr. Winterberg, is it true that your daughter has contracted the time disease and is in an advanced stage? What will happen in seven years? Will she disappear out of thin air?" "Mr. Winterberg! Mr. Winterberg! Rachel said she thought Raben? Dowell was the chief executive of the House, and this year is AD 2711. Is she completely lost thirty-four years of memory, or is this Just a hallucination caused by Merlin's disease?"

"Rachel! Do you remember being an adult? How was it like being a kid again?" "Mr. Winterberg! Mr. Winterberg! One more still picture please. Can you provide a picture of Rachel when she was older, you and the baby standing looking at the picture, let us take a picture?" "Mr. Winterborough! Is this really the curse of the Time Tombs? Did Rachel see the Shrike boss?" "Hey, Winterberg! Sol! Hey, old Sol! What will you and your wife do when the child disappears?" There's a news reporter blocking Sol's way to the front door.The man leans forward, the omni-directional lenses of his eyes poking forward to focus on a close-up of Rachel.Saul grabbed the man's long hair—the guy had braided it for convenience—and tossed him aside. The crowd screamed and roared outside the house for seven weeks.Saul realized that he had forgotten the characteristics of the small group he used to be so familiar with: they were always harassing frequently, not widely, and sometimes engaged in one-on-one stalking, but they never used the most vicious line. The so-called "public right to know" principle. But the ring will do it.Saul was not about to make his family a permanent prisoner of the reporter's ring, so he took the initiative.He arranged interviews for the widest telecast news program, participated in big-picture discussions, and participated in the Central Plaza Medical Research Conclave himself.In ten standard months, he posted on eighty planets seeking help for his daughter. Thousands of individuals and organizations offered to help them, submissions poured in, but the subjects who sent these messages were almost all from faith healers, project developers, research institutions and freelance researchers, who were willing to help in exchange for exclusive Right to Report, Shrike worshipers and other religious devotees pointed out that Rachel deserved what she deserved. Several advertising agencies sent invitations asking Rachel to endorse products, and media agencies also offered to help Rachel " handle" these endorsement invitations, and the sympathetic messages from ordinary people -- or the frequent flashes of credit chips, or skeptical articles from scientists, or holographic filmmakers and booksellers There was a request to buy out the copyright of Rachel's life, as well as the services provided by real estate developers one after another.