The road ran flat across the dark stretches of Long Island, but Dominique feltas if she were driving uphill. That was the only abnormal sensation: thesensation of rising, as if her car were speeding vertically. She kept her eyeson the road, but the dashboard on the rim of her vision looked like the panel ofan airplane. The clock on the dashboard said 11:10.She was amused, thinking: I’ve never learned to fly a plane and now I know howit feels; just like this, the unobstructed space and no effort. And no weight.That’s supposed to happen in the stratosphere--or is it the interplanetaryspace?--where one begins to float and there’s no law of gravity. No law of anykind of gravity at all. She heard herself laughing aloud.Just the sense of rising....Otherwise, she felt normal. She had never driven acar so well. She thought: It’s a dry, mechanical job, to drive a car, so I knowI’m very clearheaded; because driving seemed easy, like breathing or swallowing,an immediate function requiring no attention. She stopped for red lights thathung in the air over crossings of anonymous streets in unknown suburbs, sheturned corners, she passed other cars, and she was certain that no accidentcould happen to her tonight; her car was directed by remote control--one ofthose automatic rays she’d read about--was it a beacon or a radio beam?--and sheonly sat at the wheel
