"Come stay overnight with me and Zev," she said. "Would you?"
"I'd like that," Victoria said. "Satoshi and Stephen Thomas and I have some things to work out, first. But soon."
"Is everything okay?"
Victoria shrugged, and smiled as well as she could manage. "Changing into a diver is more disorienting than Stephen Thomas expected. Not just for him."
Stephen Thomas started dinner. He was a lousy cook, but he needed to pretend everything was normal. He boiled water and stirred in the rice.
At that point, both his imagination and the household's supplies failed him.
He could go over to the central cafeteria and get bento boxes . . . except if he did, he would have to face Florrie Brown.
Outside, Victoria and Satoshi crossed the garden, laughing. Stephen Thomas opened the door.
"Stephen Thomas! The algorithm's finished!"
Victoria fairly glowed with the success of her work. She showed off the algorithm's new pattern.
Stephen Thomas was glad to see her happy, after so much stress and despair, after this morning's fiasco in the ocean. Satoshi acted more content, too, though Stephen Thomas felt an inexplicable distance separating him from his partner.
Inexplicable? he thought. How would you like it, if Satoshi's skin started peeling off?
He could not answer the question. He wanted to think he would take the changes in stride, if they were happening to Satoshi, or if something comparable were happening to Victoria. But he distressed himself, with his battered toes, his raw penis, the swollen flesh redesigning itself to hold his genitals within his body. At the moment he did not want anyone to look at him, much
less touch him. How could he be sure he would accept it any better if it were happening to one of his partners?
Victoria came up behind him, slid her hands around his waist, and leaned her cheek against his shoulder. His body balanced on a narrow line between pleasure and pain. One step farther would take Stephen Thomas wholly into one or the other, but he could not tell which. He wanted to fling himself around and take her in his arms and never let go. But he was afraid. Afraid of the pain, afraid of losing someone else he loved.
He put his hands over hers, stilled her.
"I talked to Zev," he said. "When the changes are done . . ." He felt awkward, discussing what had happened. He had never felt awkward discussing sex. He had never hurt anyone during sex, either. Not until today. "I won't hurt you again," he said.
"It didn't exactly hurt, " Victoria said.
He laughed, harsh and skeptical.
"A little," she admitted. "I was more surprised-"
"It won't happen again," he said, with more intensity than he intended.
He pushed her hands away. She stepped back.
"People weren't built to screw in the ocean," Satoshi said.
"Human people," Stephen Thomas said, his voice sharp. "It'll work after-" "Maybe for you. Where does that leave me?"
Victoria glanced uncomfortably from Stephen Thomas to Satoshi.
"I didn't intend to make a big deal out of this, eh?" she said. "I thought it would be fun."
"Yeah," Stephen Thomas said. "I know."
He and Satoshi gazed at each other. Stephen Thomas looked away.
"I'd better drop by the lab. Don't worry if you don't see me till late." "It's already late," Victoria said.
"Are you coming back?" Satoshi asked.
"What?"
"Are you coming back?" Satoshi repeated himself, emphasizing each word. "What kind of a question is that?" Victoria cried.
Satoshi did not answer her. He glanced down, then stared at Stephen Thomas, into his eyes. Stephen Thomas wondered if he could get out the door before Satoshi said anything else.
Satoshi kept his expression neutral.
"Are you going to tell us . . ."
He stopped. The careful, neutral tone caught in his throat. When he spoke again, his voice shook.
"Are you leaving us? If you are, do you plan to tell us?"
Hurt by Satoshi's unfairness, shocked into anger, Stephen Thomas replied without thinking.
"I don't know."
He fled.
STEPHEN THOMAS PLUNGED DOWN THE dark curved stripe of path, through the pale glow of flowers and the carnationspiced air. He stopped at the garden gate, his breathing hard and shaky.
He had nowhere to go. He did not want to spend the night in the lab. He was too tired to get any work done. He was damned if he would sleep on the couch in the student lounge, in public; he had no idea how his body would betray him next. His makeshift office was too small to sleep in.
He should turn around, go back inside, and tell Victoria and Satoshi he wanted to go to bed and go to sleep
alone. But nothing would be that easy, not after what he and Satoshi had said to each other. Satoshi's question had struck painfully at what Stephen Thomas feared might be the truth.
Is he right? Stephen Thomas wondered. He leaned against the steep bank that formed the garden wall. It was cool and damp. Ivy crinkled against his hands.
What would it be like to live apart from Victoria and Satoshi? A couple of weeks ago the idea would have been unimaginable. Now, strain showed between them all. Stephen Thomas had said things to Victoria that he regretted; and he had felt so disconnected from Satoshi since the changes began that he hardly felt like they were living together at all.
He glanced back at the house. In the main room, Victoria and Satoshi held each other. Stephen Thomas felt excluded and exhausted, unable to face talking to his partners, or anyone else, tonight.
Lots of people on campus would give him a place to sleep. Some of them would not even ask why he needed somewhere to stay. But Starfarer had many of the attributes, positive and negative, of a small town. Including the gossip.
What about the guest house? Stephen Thomas thought.
It was where Feral had been planning to stay, till Stephen Thomas invited him to use Merry's room. As far as Stephen Thomas knew, no one was staying there at all. A solitary retreat where he could get his bearings was exactly what he needed.
A vile smell rolled out of Kolya's oven. Not the odor of tobacco smoke, but the poisonous scent of crushed nightshade leaves: Nicotine, nicotinic acid, tobacco boiled and abused into a useless mush.
Griffith recoiled and hurried to open the front door.
"Don't do that!" Kolya said.
"But-"
"Someone might smell it."
Griffith bolted outside and slammed the door behind him.
Kolya glanced regretfully into the dish. One of the tobacco leaves lay steaming in its own juice.
"This is not a success," Kolya said.
He joined Griffith on the front porch.
"Petrovich, you look positively green."
"I feel negatively green."
Kolya chuckled.
"I tried smoking once," Griffith said. "I didn't like it."
,,The leaves need preparation. That green tobacco was not tasty."
"I know," Griffith said.
Kolya gave him a questioning glance. Griffith shrugged.
"I've tried a lot of things . . . at least once. I didn't like chewing tobacco any more than I liked smoking."
"It smells better when it's cured," Kolya said.
"You need to dry the stuff. And ferment it."
"Ferment it? Like beer?"
Griffith shrugged. "The refs say you ferment it. They don't say how."
"I was trying to dry it, I thought that would be adequate."
"You don't cook much, do you?" Griffith asked.
"Rarely. Why? Do you?"
"Yeah. Some. A little. I don't think microwaving is a good way to dry something out."
"Why didn't you say so before?"
"I didn't want . . . I don't know."
Kolya smiled wryly. "I'm not always right," he said. "Haven't you learned that yet, Petrovich?"
"I guess not."
"What would you suggest we try?"