I don’t want to know. I want her to let me be an animatronic theme park host, smiling and delighting with my falseness until my battery pack powers down. But it’s Saxim, who loves me, and I love her, so I bite my tongue. We stare at each other until she speaks.

“We were strange and lonely kids,” she starts. “You and Manon rarely left Stökéwood, and you always kept to yourselves at school. We became friends because I was a loner, too, and you needed someone else to play one of your invented schoolyard games when Manon didn’t overlap with you during breaks. Your mother had you homeschooled for a bit, don’t you remember? I guess we spoke to that genius intern your dad kept around, some. What was his name? He must have been in his twenties, though.”

I shiver and drink down the grassy dregs in my cup of tea to keep myself from looking at her. “I mean, there were obviously speed bumps when it came to integrating, but Dad and Mama were good at handling them. You have to remember that. They made me feel special and loved, and I think every child needs that,” I say, the words spilling out like sparkling tangled balls of thread that blacken as soon as they fall. “And I’m sorry if Manon never felt that way, you know? But I felt it. That’s why I am who I am today. That’s why I found White Fox.”

The air between us, thick with upset dust, wavers in my vision. And Saxim says nothing, because she knows I’m full of shit. I sip at my teacup again, and a shred of loose tea lumps into my mouth. It’s sour. I spit it out, pawing at my tongue like a cat, and Saxim watches me still.

“Tai,” she says calmly, doing and undoing her cuff button with her fingers.

“Yeah,” I say hastily, knowing full well I’m doing it again. Rationalizing. Lying. “Okay. I’m sorry.” I’ve begun to sweat through the cotton T-shirt. It feels as if Stökéwood is expanding and contracting around us in the library, like a heart.

“They were kind, but they were very busy, Tai. I remember your mother working on that project, I suppose, in the library, and kissing us on the head and shooing us away when we interrupted her. Your father, I…” She stops, watching for pain in my eyes. “There were a few different nannies, though, and the intern, and your uncle, too, of course, who took us to polo games.”