and slept with my head down on my desk--so what? Every man has got to have something all his own, or he isn’t a man. That bug-infested office was it for me.

I was sweating, but not just from the dream. Even though it was early and the sun had just come up, the office was already hot. Outside the window, the sunlight stabbed at the rooftops. It was going to be another real scorcher.

I let my eyes wander to the big calendar on the wall, over the worn black leather sofa beside the door. The calendar was cheap, the kind merchants give away for promo purposes. July, 2034. The name of a store that sold things to protect people from sunlight and air pollution. The address was right here in Wichita. I’d been to the store.

But it was the woman on the calendar that got me.

She was a hologram. She wore a wrapper that covered her entire body, shapeless, except where the lightweight fabric draped in pleats from her prominent nipples. Islamic fashion had become all the rage in the last few years, and there was more to it than just protection from the sun. Those crafty old Arabs really had something; seeing less instead of more was a definite turn-on. Her face was hidden by a stylish respirator, but from behind clear plastic, her green eyes smoldered.

Some things never change.

“Mornin’, darlin’,” I said.

“Good morning, Bob.”

Her voice was gentle and soothing, the way a woman sounded after you’d had a great night together, and done all those important little things just right. She’d been there when I moved into the office. Too bad she’d been programmed for some guy named Bob.

“Today is Wednesday, July 17, 2034. It is 8:35 A.M.”

The sound of her voice made me feel better.

I glanced out the small, dirty window. The sunlight was like a knife blade slicing along the top of The Wall. My office was south of Osage Park, about as close to The Wall as you could get and still be INside. Not a prestige address, but worlds better than being OUTside. I knew that. I’d been OUTside, and I never wanted to go back.

The Wall. Built by Montrose, around the year 2010, during the Great Migration, it completely surrounded the old city of Wichita. Built to keep out the hordes fleeing the rising seas. Who told us there was no such thing as global warming? Bye-bye L.A. Bye-bye New York, San Francisco, Miami--all the coastal cities gone, and the Gulf of Mexico up the Mississippi