Shria grinned. “Of course, the agents do a lot of the hard stuff,” ve said. “I just do the fun part: the ideas . . .”

Fift had no idea what that meant in the context of genital design. “So the whole Cirque has . . . or, that chapter, I mean . . . they have, um, identical . . .”

“Ugh, no.” Shria’s faces had identical looks of horror. “Are you kidding? This isn’t Uncle Foolu’s One-Stop Body Shop, you know. Genitals are not hats! Our experience of the world is deeply rooted in our genitals! You have to do the matchup very carefully. The wrong set of genitals can make a person miserable.”

“Oh,” Fift said.

“But they do, you know, sort of work together,” ve added. “They’re not identical, but they are coordinated. That was . . . the fun part.” Ve grinned mischievously.

Fift felt zir face flushing. The fun part?

“Anyway,” Shria said, “we don’t need to talk about my work. You’re finally here!”

“Finally?” It was an odd thought, Shria waiting for zir . . .

“Yeah! I’ve known you were coming for a week! I shifted my schedule around so we . . . I planned this!” Ve grinned. In the center of the room, standing, ve put vir hands on vir hips.

“Oh,” Fift said, a little perplexed. What was so special about meeting Shria at work? Ve could have just come over to the apartment . . .

Shria cocked one of vir fiery red eyebrows, crossed both sets of vir arms. Ve was waiting for zir to notice something . . .

{What’s going on here?} Fift asked zir agents. {What am I missing?}

But zir agents were silent, plunged into a dreamless slumber by the total privacy regime of Stiffwaddle Somatic Fashions.

Of course! The bauble’s elite patrons valued their privacy. Fift remembered the praise in the weave ze’d stumbled through for the extreme measures Pom Politigus took to preserve the secrets, protect the surprises, planned by those who had themselves altered here . . .

“So no one outside the bauble can see us?” Fift said, frowning. “Even our agents are . . .”

“Outside the bauble? No, Fift, outside the room! Pom and Pip can’t hear a word we’re saying. No agents can record or remember a thing—I mean, our parents could still read our send logs later; but if we speak aloud, no one will know a thing we . . . We can talk about anything we want!” Ve was practically dancing with excitement.

In the supper garden, Fift stood shoulder to shoulder with Arevio, scoring the vines. Spice-gnats swarmed around the knife blades. Fift paused in zir slicing, glanced over at Arevio. Zir Father showed no horror at vir staidchild’s disappearance into an abyss of privacy. Arevio chewed vir lip, deciding whether to remove a low-hanging loop of vine.