“We used to be able to.”

“We used to keep up a charade.”

“And while we were doing that no kids were getting chopped up into wriggling pieces!”

That seemed to give Tattletale pause.

“Point,” she said.

“Thank you.”

“But I think your take is a romantic, fragile one. We can’t go back there.”

“Believe me, I’m coming to terms with that. All I’m saying is I miss those days, and I’m going to respect anyone who holds themselves to those standards. Holding back while doing what needs to be done.”

“I was never good at that,” Tattletale said. “Surface level. It’s a good way of putting it, but the tool I was handed is a backhoe.”

Her entire tone had changed, and… if I tracked backward in the conversation, it felt like it had turned around when I’d dropped the ‘wriggling pieces’ line. Like she respected me more because I’d turned to using a backhoe.

I wasn’t sure I liked that. That the only way to deal with her was to be an utter bitch. Where did that take me in the long run?

“Thpeaking of romantic thuff,” Ratcatcher said. She held up her phone, now all folded up. “Thtarting with rat factth and ending with putting thnakes up boy’th pooperth—”

“Yeah,” I said. “No. No. You need a friend to give you advice on crafting a better approach.”

“I had advithe from Rathtputin, Templeton, Duthty Rothe and Turnaround.”

“Your rats?”

“Rat, rat, mouse, and booze,” Tattletale clarified. Ratcatcher nodded vigorously.

“But you guyth thtarted arguing and the thing ith, I don’t care about that thtuff. I don’t do thecreth. What thuckth ith that I’ve alwayth thtayed thurfathe level, like you thaid, and that’th why until today, I didn’t think anybody hated me that much.”

Always playing nice, and then someone turns around and delivers a low blow.

I couldn’t say the situation lined up perfectly with my own experiences… or maybe it was better to say that I couldn’t say it lined up perfectly with me, but I felt like we’d—collectively, pre-Gold Morning—tried, and we’d been dealt a low blow.

Part of that dealing had come from someone with a backhoe.

“Sorry,” I said. “Hopefully our investigation will do something to clear your name.”

Ratcatcher shrugged.

“We should go,” Tattletale said. “I’m thinking about things and I’m worried.”

I nodded.

“I’m free to go?” Ratcatcher asked.

“Be good, okay?” I told her. “Whatever you were running from us for—”

“Petty theft,” Tattletale said. “Grand theft. Vandalism. Criminal mischief. Bit of a backslide since the regular thinker work dried up.”

“…Don’t do that,” I said, a little exasperated, staring past the holes in the paper mask at the eyes behind, wet, large, and guileless.