Igor laughed. “You sound like you sounded when we first met.”

“Sorry. I’m a little cranky. Home stuff.”

“How’s work?” he asked.

“Coming along. My grad students are pretty good. The undergraduates are going to kill me.”

“You got any hot ones?”

“Come on. They all look like they’re thirteen.”

“Except the ones that look nineteen.” He laughed at himself. “I’m a dirty old paleontologist.”

“You’d run for the hills if one of them looked twice at you.”

“No doubt. But you, you’re a young man.”

“I should point out to you that forty-two is still twice their age.”

“I hate math.”

“Hey, I want you to look at something.” I took the slip of paper from my pocket. “I found this in my jacket.”

“What is it?”

“I don’t know.” I handed it to him.

“Help me,” he translated it. “What is this?”

“I found it in my jacket pocket.”

“So?”

“What do you make of it?”

“Somebody’s fucking with you.”

“New jacket. Well, used new. eBay.”

“Help with what? Homework? The laundry?”

“It’s just weird, that’s all.”

“Weird is the new dean.”

I pointed to my half-eaten muffin. “You want any of this?”

He waved it off.

“Do you think I should talk to Hilary again?” I asked.

“No. What could you say?”

“Thought you could help me out.”

Igor finished his coffee and nodded toward a young woman walking past.

“What?”

“Don’t tell me you didn’t see her.”

“You know you can count on me to come visit you on every third Sunday,” I said. “Now, I’m going to prepare for class.”

“I know you. You’re going to take a nap in your office.”

“As I said.”

Fulica americana. Five individuals, represented by twelve bones, were located in pack rat middens. The requirements of this species are very like those of ducks discovered in the cave deposit.

It seemed odd, but right, that Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles should be a cheery place. The lobby was lively and colorful. Bright colors, not pastels. A couple of clowns strolled through. Children laughed in the corners with their laughing parents. We checked in at the desk with a smiling young man who already knew our names and which doctor we were there to see. He instructed us to follow the light blue line to the east wing. On our way we passed a giant aquarium filled with angelfish and black ghosts; the angelfish actually had wings. This made me pause, and I stood there staring, a fish staring back at me.

“What is it with doctors and fish?” Sarah asked.

“Fish are supposed to be calming,” Meg said. “Fish calm everyone down. They use fish in prisons during riots.”

That’s not true, I thought, but I said nothing. In what prison were they using fish and how?