“I guess I skipped a few things,” said Brian. “We turned around because I was getting low on air.” He looked at Caddie’s computer. “You have a ton left,” he said. “Not bad for your first dive. Did you have a good time?”

“What were those things we saw?” asked Caddie.

“The thing that looked like a flower is a kind of tube anemone,” Brian answered. “And that purple thing is a nudibranch.”

“Nudibranch,” Caddie repeated. She recognized the word from one of her father’s boring dinner conversations. “That’s what they are?”

“There are a lot of different kinds,” said Brian. “That one is Dendronotus iris. We call it the rainbow nudibranch because it comes in a couple of different colors. Little-known fact—it’s the only nudibranch that swims,” he added. “Although it’s not very good at it.”

“It was eating that anemone, right?” said Caddie.

“That’s it’s favorite food,” Brian explained. “It also lays its eggs around the anemone’s tube. I always imagine the anemone sit there looking at those eggs like the ones in Alien, just waiting for the babies to pop out and eat them.”

“Yeah,” Caddie said vaguely as they swam on their backs toward the beach. She couldn’t get the nudibranch out of her head. It was so beautiful. And that’s what her father studied. His work had never seemed interesting to her, but now that she’d seen one for herself, she thought she understood, at least a little bit, why he was into nudibranchs.

But he probably doesn’t even notice how pretty they are, she told herself. He’s just interested in what’s inside them.

She wasn’t like him, though. Where her father saw cold, hard science, she saw something more. Beauty. Magic. Wonder. Things he could never understand.

I’m not like him, she repeated to herself, and kicked for shore.

CHAPTER 24

CHAPTER 24

“The lasagna is just about done,” Angela said, shutting the oven door. “How’s that salad coming?”

“You know, when I invited you to dinner, I didn’t intend for you to make it,” Ben said as he chopped a carrot into thin rings.

“It’s lasagna,” said Angela, washing her hands at the sink. “You throw some stuff into a pan and let it cook. It’s no biggie.”

“Not for you,” said Ben. “I was just going to pick something up at Tilly Gort’s.”

Angela made a face. “The all-natural place?” she said.

“What?” said Ben, seeing her expression.

“Nothing,” Angela said quickly. “It’s just that it’s so ... all-natural.”

“I like their curried couscous,” Ben countered. “Besides, aren’t all of you hip young things supposed to be into health food?”

“Hip young things?” Angela said. “And what are you, withered and old?”

Ben set the knife down and swept the pile of carrots into the salad bowl. “You know what I mean,” he said.