things you should know about rheya

things you should know about rheya

I was terribly hungry; it was at least twenty hours since my last meal. When Rheya had finished her ministrations I got up. Two dresses, draped over the back of a chair caught my eye -- two absolutely identical white dresses, each decorated with a row of red buttons. I myself had helped Rheya out of one of them, and she had reappeared, yesterday evening, dressed in the second.
She followed my glance.
"I had to cut the seam open with scissors." she said. "I think the zip fastener must have got stuck."
The sight of the two identical dresses filled me with a horror which exceeded anything I had felt hitherto. Rheya was busy tidying up the medicine chest. I turned my back and bit my knuckles. Unable to take my eyes off the two dresses - or rather the original dress and its double - I backed towards the door.

pg 93 Solaris, Stanislaw Lem 1961 © English translation - Joanna Kilmartin & Steve Cox

She jumped to her feet.
I opened the locker and selected a suit for each of us. Then I asked:
" Why are you bare-foot?"
She answered hesitantly:
" I don’t know ... I must have left my shoes somewhere."
I did not pursue the matter. "You’ll have to take your dress off to put this on."
"Flying-overalls? What for?"
As she tried to take off her dress, an extraordinary fact became apparent: there were no zips, or fastenings of any sort; the red buttons down the front were merely decorative. Rheya smiled, embarrassed.
As though it were the most normal way of going about it, I picked up some kind of scalpel from the floor and slit the dress down the back from neck to waist, so that she could pull it over her head.

rheya
Imitation of the original juunta, a simplified form. Picture of purses "The Village" from 2001. No new designs planned.