"A lot of people do it, you'd be surprised at the number of people on the Rogers' Syndrome mailing circle that do it for a living. There's a big draw for it, out in Europe anyway. And it's good money, having people pay you just to stand in front of them."
    "Yeah, but it's nothing to do to a kid."
    "All the JoJo the Dog Faced Boys? It's a perfectly... I'm not going to condemn it," she stated, "because I know too many people in it. But he grew up being... stared at, and he wanted to stop being stared at. He needs to be in water every four hours. He breathes through his lungs, but they're just bellows. They shrunk up, they don't actually absorb oxygen, he needs water for that," she explained. "He can keep oxygen in his blood for up to four hours at a time."
    "Impressive."
    "Isn't it? But... what would you do if you were told that you had to be within four hours of the coast at any time in your life? Or have a tank of salt water waiting for you?"
    "It sounds workable." Not exactly fun, but something that could be lived with.
    "It does, it is."
    "Especially if he likes living on the coast."
    "And he could get another job," she concluded.
    "What's he doing now?"
    "Helping here," she shrugged. "Honestly, he is amazingly good. He can build damn near anything. Strong, tough. Just..."
    "Strange," I supplied.
    "Antisocial, reclusive, and aquatic," she finished.
    "Hell, I'm two out of the three," I tried to joke.
    She gave me a look. "I know who you are," she said quietly.
    I sighed. "I'm on vacation."
    "I know. I wouldn't have known, Steven mentioned it."
    "Ah."
    "He pays attention to all of that stuff."
    "I figured he'd doped me out, so to speak."
    "I don't think Marshall knows. I don't think Marshall would care," she mused. "You're on vacation, that's fine."
    "I'm not sure I care."
    "Would you do me a favor?" she said after a moment.
    "Yeah?"
    "He needs somewhere to go." She glanced at the stair.
    "I'll see what I can do," I told her. It certainly wouldn't hurt to look around. "We're being looked at in a fairly positive light back home at the moment, I have a few contacts." Quiet. "Would it help if I talked to him?" Not that I had any idea what I might say. I'm not really good at this sort of thing, but she seemed to expect it.
    "Maybe. He might be back already. He has his own little widow's walk above the cliff, he dives down. There's a rope he uses to get back up."
    That was an impressive mental image. "Very dramatic."
    "He's watched a lot of my silents," she smiled.
    "There are worse things in life than having a dramatic streak, I'll tell you that much. It actually seems to help in some aspects of 'the business.'"
    "The business?" she commented on the audible quotes I'd put around it.
    I shrugged. "I don't have much of a knack for it, myself." Heck, I don't even have a costume. "Well, why not."
    "I'll show you upstairs."
    We went up, Lisa's dress rustling at every step. She tapped at his door. "Steven?"
    An audible sigh. "Yeah, I know. I'm sorry, okay?"
    "She wants to talk to you."
    A quiet moment. "Hold on a second." He opened the door, having donned a robe, looking at both of us warily. "Hi."
    We went in. I gave Lisa a glance; she took her cue and exited quietly. "Hi." We looked at each other. "You've got a very good eye. I don't get my picture in the paper very often."
    "Couple times." Silence. "Can I do something for you?" There was that antagonistic edge, again.
    "I thought you might want to talk."
    Don't think that I am not cognizant of the irony in me saying that.
    "About?"
    He wasn't planning on making this easy. "Anything."
    "I see. Lisa asked you to come up here so you could talk some sense into the stupid fish-boy." He sounded bitter.
    "Very far from the case," I replied mildly.
    "Or Marshall just finding someone else to tell me I have to get the hell out of the house, 'cause I don't fit their happy little 'Leave it to Beaver' freak family?"
    "It's been suggested that you're not entirely happy here." I shrugged.
    "I have to be happy, right? This is my home."
    "Oh, no," I shook my head with a wry smile. Only the young think that way. "You don't have to stay here."
    "Where the hell am I supposed to go?"
    "There's a lot of places out there in the world."
    "Yeah, Nahal came from one of those places. They would have stoned him. If the state didn't find him and pump something into his veins first, to cause him to stop breathing, since he was both a variant and a nigger and that wasn't good at all." Silence. "Here, nobody messes with me. Nobody sees me. I don't have to deal."
    "That's fine, if that's what you want."
    "What else do I get?" he snapped. "Jesus, you have it so easy."
    To his credit, he realized he'd made a mistake immediately. Must have been the way my mild expression turned into a laser-like glare. "You have no idea what you're talking about, kid," I told him quietly. After a moment, I relented. "Now, if ranting for a while will make you feel better, go ahead and rant."
    He scowled, looking down for a long, silent moment. "How do you not be stared at, and not be trapped?" The question was almost plaintive.
    I sighed. "Scott doesn't seem to mind being stared at, so I can't really answer that. You stop noticing. At least I have. It's part of who you are."
    "For nine years other people paid to stare at me. For the first four they painted my skin green." His expression was far away.
    "There's a little bit of a difference," I suggested carefully. "I don't know." I couldn't pretend to have answers I didn't.

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