Enders In Exile

I
always watch out for you."
    "And Ender didn't
humiliate me. Or reject me. He rejected
you.
He
rejected the way
you
made me act!"
    "What happened to, 'Oh
thank you, Mother! Now I shall have the man I love'?"
    "I never said that."
    "You thanked me and
giggled and thanked me again. You stood there and let me make you up
like a whore to entice him. At what point did I force you to do
something against your will?"
    "You told me what I had
to do if I wanted Ender to love me. Only a man like Ender doesn't fall
for tricks like yours!"
    "A
man
?
A
boy
is what you mean. The only reason he didn't
fall for that 'trick' was because he probably
hasn't reached sexual maturity.
If
he's even a
heterosexual."
    "Listen to yourself,
Mother," said Alessandra. "One minute Ender is the beginning and end of
the world, the best chance for a great man that I'll ever have a chance
to find. The next minute, he's a gay little boy who shamed me. You
judge him according to whether he's useful to you."
    "No, my pet. Whether
he's useful to my little girl."
    "Well, he isn't," said
Alessandra.
    "That was my point,"
said Dorabella. "And yet you gave me a tongue-lashing for saying so. Do
make up your mind, my little Caliban." Then Dorabella burst into
laughter, and, completely against her will, so did Alessandra. The girl
was so angry at herself for laughing, or at Dorabella for making her
laugh, that she fled from the room, slamming the door behind her. Or
trying to—the pneumatics caught it and it closed quite gently.
    Poor Alessandra.
Nothing went the way she wanted.
    Welcome to the real
world, my child. Someday you'll see that my getting dear Quincy to fall
in love with me was the best thing I ever did for you. Because I do
everything for you. And all I ask in return is that you hold up your
end and
take
the opportunities I get for you.

    * * * * *
    Valentine tried to walk
normally into the room, to remain perfectly calm. But she was so
disgusted with Ender that she could hardly contain herself. The boy was
so busy making himself "available" to all the new colonists and old
settlers, answering questions, chatting about things that he could not
possibly remember from half-hour interviews two years ago, when he was
so tired he could hardly speak. Yet when someone with whom he had a
genuine personal relationship was looking for him, he was nowhere to be
found.
    It was just like the
way he had refused to write to their parents. Well, he hadn't refused.
He had always promised to do it. Then he simply never did.
    For the past two years,
he had promised—by implication, if not by word—that
if the poor Toscano girl fell in love with him, it would not be
unwelcome. Now she and her mother had come down to the planet's
surface, to do some "sightseeing." The girl was obviously looking for
only one sight: Ender Wiggin. And he was nowhere.
    Valentine was fed up.
The boy could be bold and brave indeed, except when there was something
emotionally demanding that he didn't actually
have
to do. He
could
evade this girl, and maybe he
thought that was some kind of clear message, but he owed her words. He
owed her at least a good-bye. It didn't have to be a fond one, it just
had to
happen.
    She finally found him
in the XB's ansible room, writing something—probably a letter
to Graff or someone equally irrelevant to their life on this new world.
    "The fact that you're
here," said Valentine, "leaves you without any excuse at all."
    Ender looked up at her,
seeming to be genuinely puzzled. Well, he probably wasn't faking
it—he probably blocked the girl out of his mind so thoroughly
that he had no clue what Valentine was talking about.
    "You're looking through
your mail. That means you got the passenger log for this shuttle trip."
    "I already met the new
colonists."
    "Except one."
    Ender raised an
eyebrow. "Alessandra isn't a colonist anymore."
    "She's looking for you."
    "She could ask anybody
where I am and they'll tell her. It's no secret."
    "She can't
ask.
"
    "Well, then, how does
she expect to find me?"
    "Don't put on this
stupid act. I'm not so stupid as to believe you're stupid, even if
you're
acting
as stupid as can be."
    "OK, I've got the
stupid part. Can you be more specific?"
    "
Extremely
stupid."
    "Not the degree, dear
sister."
    "Emotionally
insensitive."
    "Valentine," said
Ender, "doesn't it occur to you that I actually know what I'm doing?
Can't you have a little faith in me?"
    "I think you're evading
an emotionally difficult confrontation."
    "Then why