“Vir name is Vvonda.” Ve flushed, vir violet skin darkening to plum. “Ve’s this big, beautiful, tough . . . Ve’s our age, but you don’t know vem; ve’s from the other side of Foo. We hang out and we, you know, had sex a few times, but then . . . I stopped asking, because I thought it was getting weird. I didn’t want vem to think I was always following vem around. There’s no reason for vem to think about me. Ve’s nice enough, but I’m not . . .” Ve looked down at vir folded hands. “I haven’t . . . done anything.”

Now Fift did touch Shria; ze put zir hand on vir back, resting it between vir shoulder blades. Fift could feel the muffled echo of vir heartbeat.

“But what about your work here?” ze said. “I mean, everybody’s so impressed with you—”

“Oh.” Shria shrugged. “I don’t think Vvonda would care about that. I don’t know.” Ve scowled.

“Oh.”

“Anyway.” Shria’s standing body began to pace again, slapping vemself on the abdomen; vir sitting body was still against Fift’s hand. “Anyway, it’s stupid. I mean, that’s not really a big secret. About Vvonda. It doesn’t mean anything. I just meant it as an example of how—how things get complicated. Sex sounds like a fun game, but then . . . Anyway.” Ve took a deep breath.

“Well,” Fift said. “You said you had another secret. A big one.”

“Want to see my new genitals?” Shria said.

Fift yanked zir hand away from Shria’s back. “Do they have . . . something to do with your . . .”

“Of course not,” Shria said. “I’m just stalling.”

Fift snorted. “Fine,” ze said, feeling a sudden, tiny, guttering flame of bravery catch at the edge of a tangled mossy underbrush of caution. “Show me your fucking genitals.”

“Is there another kind?” Shria said sweetly. In vir standing body, ve started unbuttoning vir smoky-gray uniform. It had twenty-seven buttons, which ran from vir right knee, crossing vir body to end under vir left arm.

Fift swallowed.

“Fift?” Arevio was holding out vir hand, and Fift handed vem zir knife. “Thank you.” Ve hung up the knives. “I’m off to play snapjump in Wallacomp now, Fift. Will you be all right here? I must say, you seem very distracted.”

“Oh,” Fift said. “Yes, I’m all right. I need to review things. For school. I mean, that’s what I was thinking about. Assignments. From my scholastic agents. Even though . . .” Ze swallowed. Of course Arevio could see perfectly well from zir logs that ze wasn’t doing homework. “Even though I didn’t look them up just now or anything. I just remembered that there were some. Many. Actually. So I should do that now. Look them up. And then, um, do them.”

The uniform fell to the floor. Shria unwrapped vir undersarong. “Ta da!”