* * *

On the sixth day in the homearium, she was particularly tired. Her head hurt from the interrupted sleep, and several of the cuts on her legs were infected, red and hot. Junior did not seem to be speaking humanoid with any greater frequency than he had that first day. When she asked him to talk, he still consistently started off by clicking or squealing. Mostly what he appeared to have learned so far in the homearium was how to bop the ball exactly where he wanted and how to weave around her feet to make her stumble.

So she climbed out of the water, put on her hearing glasses and walked out onto the lawn to try to muster the energy for another lesson. She sat on the grass, thinking she just needed to dry off for a moment, to hear normally, to be in the sun. In her gut, she knew this was a failed experiment, that she was making a fool of herself, that she should give up. Perhaps her thoughts were obvious from the way she sat there, staring at her hands.

Tibbet stepped out of the building to talk with her. He hardly ever came to talk to her, except when he needed her help running his experiment with Mother and Kat.

He sat down next to her on the ground. This was also surprising, since he preferred chairs. Still, he sat there, close enough that she could hear him. He was careful to face her so she could see his mouth. He spoke each word distinctly.

He said he had seen how difficult it was to live in the pool. They had all been impressed at what she was attempting, how hard she was working.

She nodded, touched by this unexpected sympathy.

Junior, jealous, squealed loudly at them from the homearium.

Tibbet said—If you need to take a break for a while, none of us would blame you. We’d understand.

She could feel how much she wanted this, to take a hot shower in a bathroom with a door that closed, to dry off and pull on real clothes, her skin clean and not sticky with salt, to wear her hearing glasses all the time and be able to hear again, to be with humans. To sleep on a dry bed and not be woken up, not once all night long. To walk around, not wading through water. To stop being observed all day long.

He said—None of us would think less of you.

Something about the way he worded this made her pause. She looked from his mouth to his eyes. He had his eyebrows knotted with sympathy, but the eyes themselves were cold.

He added—These conditions are not made for a woman.

She paused and her jaw moved sideways.—I’m staying.

* * *

That afternoon, she began to walk around holding a broom. Each time Junior got in the way of her feet or nipped at her, she jabbed him in the side with the broom’s bristles. He didn’t like the bristles on his sensitive skin and would jerk away.