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It was the greatest thing in the universe, as far as I was concerned You took all the colorful little resistors and capacitors, mounted them on the main circuit board, installed the oscillator coils, and the next you knew you were rocking out

I drooled over it on the way to the cash register, begging ed some more All the way to Ki her to keep it, until I was forced to dryI really could do:

I pulled out one of the transistors and shoved it in my pocket

If I couldn’t buildto either Not a working one, anyway Later that year I’d get the same kit for my birthday, and I’d assemble it perfectly down to every last meticulous detail All the way to that one extra transistor I still had, from the kit Kim probably threw over her shoulder the moment her party ended

I learned two lessons back then One, that I could sometimes be a vindictive bitch But two, that there were other radio kits as well Bigger and better ones Crystal radio kits

Ham radio kits…

All those hours spent inin useful now Especially now that I had a th of copper wire, stripped from the walls and wrapped into a nal

If we ever got a transnal, that is

“Warh?”

I glanced back to where Boone was still feeding the fire The big lobby was i more and more tolerable Especially at the little table and workbench we’d brought up froed before the fireplace

“I’ood, thanks”

Boone stood there before the flaonna check the upper roo”

I tried h In the last hour or so he’d called theer and Fries, Tom and Jerry, and Dumb and Dumber He’d also called therowled at him for

I pulled out the next resistor and inspected it in the dying light It looked untarnished but I cleaned it anyway before inserting it back into the circuit board

So far the storm hadn’t let up In fact, it was even worse The once doorway-sized opening behind us