EVERGREEN

by Shane Tourtellotte

Superhumans can come in many shapes and sizes, and for many reasons—which can cause unprecedented problems.

Andrew Crawford could tell an adult in a child’s body when he saw one.

He passed by this playground most days walking to work. Four kids were using it on this cool June morning, but only one caught his eye. He might have seen her before, but today she had given herself away.

She looked about eight, wearing a blue jumper, white tights, and high-top sneakers. She was swinging and tumbling around on monkey bars, her long brown hair sometimes falling over her face. She jumped down and ran over to a climbing wall, and there it became obvious.

Children always had a jerkiness in their movements, from never fully adjusting to their growing bodies. She, though, ran with a fluidity of motion that real kids never had, that came from living in a body that hadn’t grown for ten or twenty years. Closer to twenty, Andrew judged.

She had been “frozen,” her genes manipulated in the womb to halt her physical maturation partway to adulthood. Parents had been doing this, in varying numbers, for three decades now, for a variety of reasons that all cut no ice with Andrew. The worst of it was, she was probably a contemporary of Andrew’s, but was still behaving, playing, like the child that she wasn’t.

Revulsion uncoiled in the pit of his stomach. “Act your age,” he hissed. She was much too far away to hear.

Andrew quickened his pace past the playground, his little legs not carrying him fast enough to suit him. He did not look back. A few pedestrians gave him curious looks, but he was used to that, and paid no attention.

* * * *

Andrew had a busy morning, retooling a customer survey page on his company’s website. He had just drained his second mug of coffee when he spotted Jason McCarthy chatting up one of the women across the office. “Jason, can I see you?” he called, ruing for about the thousandth time not having a projecting, commanding, adult voice.

Jason sauntered over, already looking insufferable. He made an exaggerated lean over Andrew’s scaled-down desk. “Morning, Andy. What’s up?”

It’s Andrew, asshole, Andrew thought, but that running fight would have to wait. “I need that terms-of-use file for the new linked-appliance line.”

“Yeah, it’s coming along. I’ll have it done for you by the end of the day.”

“No, it has to be posted on-site by the end of today, so I need it earlier.”

“Oh. Shoulda told me earlier.”

“I did,” Andrew snapped. “Ms. Albano did, too, so don’t pull that.”

“All right, I’ll get it done. Don’t worry, Andy.”

Jason reached down to tousle Andrew’s hair. Andrew slapped at the hand. “Would you quit treating me like—” He quickly aborted the words I’m a child. “—you’re doing me a favor, rather than your job?”

The outburst froze a couple of workmates nearby. Jason looked shaken for a second, then broke out in a simper. “Aw, you’re so adorable when you get mad.”

Andrew grabbed his empty mug and reared back. “Okay,” Jason quickly said, “I take it back.” He smirked. “You’re always adorable, Andy.”

Someone tittered: Andrew couldn’t tell who. It was all he could do not to hurl the mug at Jason’s retreating head. The onlookers awkwardly drifted away, and Andrew got back to work after only a couple of minutes of steaming.

A quarter-hour later, a PM popped up on his screen. Come see me, it read, from Ms. Albano. Andrew locked down his terminal, walked to the webmaster’s office door, and entered after a single quick knock.

“Let me guess, Tiffany. You heard about Jason’s latest patronizing display, and not only are you going to fire him, but you’re letting me personally kick him out the door. Very considerate.”

Tiffany Albano stood up from her computer station, shaking her snowy head. “I’m not looking to fire anybody, Andrew.”

“C’mon, we both know Jason’s a douche. Let him fulfill his destiny. Make him a disposable douche.”

Tiffany held her composure. “He’s not the only problematic personality in the office.”

“Oh, right, I forgot. It’s a problem when I object to being treated like a nose-picking toddler. He’s a bigoted asshole, Tiffany. You should have canned him months ago.”

“I’d have to give cause. Whatever you think of him, he does good work, and a personality conflict is not sufficient cause for firing.”

“It should be.” With any decency in the world it would be, he thought, but the Supreme Court in its finite wisdom had ruled that freezing a person into perpetual childhood did not constitute a disability, and didn’t trigger the appropriate laws. Now the matter lay in Congress’s palsied hands. However quickly they addressed the issue, it wasn’t fast enough for Andrew.

“It’d be a lot easier if you let me work from home. Or made Jason work from his.”

Tiffany glanced upward, toward the executive floors. “The company likes having its associates in physical proximity,” she recited. “They find it helps them work together.”

“Yes, it’s doing a fabulous job of that,” Andrew said, and Tiffany had the decency to look embarrassed. “I don’t know how I’d get along working at a less enlightened company.”

“Well, before you update your resume, I did have business to discuss: a new assignment.”

“Tiffany, I’ve got a full load already.”

“It’ll get you out of the office,” she said. Andrew shut his mouth with a fresh complaint halfway out, and she hid a smile. “You recall the company planning to overhaul our customer service setup, phone and net.”

“Yeah, the AI stuff. Tough to forget a meeting that long.”

“Well, they’ve picked the woman to set up the new AI system, and it happens she lives here in the city, very close by. I’d like you to be our liaison with her, help her integrate her programs with what we have now. I was hoping you could meet her this afternoon.”

“The terms-of-use files. I can’t—”

“I’ll get them posted, Andrew. Can you finish up your other work by, say, three?” He nodded. “Good. Here’s her card.”

She handed Andrew a thin plug-in with print across one face:

Alice McGirt

Advanced Computer Applications

Her address was below, a mere few blocks from the office.

“She’ll want a longer session in the next couple days,” Tiffany said, “but today will be briefer, more informal. Once you’re done there, you can head home.”

“Okay,” said Andrew. “And while I’m gone, I assume you’ll be giving Jason a big piece of your mind.”

“Now, now. I wouldn’t want to spoil the surprise.” But behind that smile, Andrew could see he’d be getting no satisfaction on that score. What else was new?

* * * *

McGirt lived on the third floor of a high-end condominium building. The lobby did a fair imitation of a good hotel, with some brass mixed in with the other gleaming metals and looking like it was thoroughly polished every week. The elevator wanted ID, and after a baffled second he thought to wave the plug-in card past its scanner. That sufficed, and he got taken straight up.

He rechecked the number on the door, rang, and waited. Before long, an older woman opened the door. She was somewhere in her sixties, with a long, tired face, and brown hair that was plainly dyed. “Yes?” she said, a little tentative.

“Alice McGirt?”

“Oh. No, I’m Lauren, her mother. Are you Andrew Crawford?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Come right in. She’ll be with you in a second.”

He followed her into the living room, a tasteful display of bright earth tones much better appointed than his own apartment. Andrew liked Lauren right away. Having someone deal squarely with him on sight, without any condescension, was refreshing. Hopefully Alice took after her mother.

“Is that Mr. Crawford?”

The voice stopped Andrew short. It was high, pre-pubescently high, and now light footsteps followed it up. No wonder Lauren wasn’t ruffled by him—and no wonder Tiffany had given him this assignment.

Then Alice came into the living room, and Andrew could only stare. She was his apparent age and height, with her mother’s face and long brown hair. And though she was out of the jumper and high-tops, he knew her instantly. This was who was revamping their customer service? This—this girl?

He took a few seconds to recover, but Alice had been taking her own surprised look. A grin passed across her face. “Mr. Crawford? How do you do? I’m Alice.” She was business-like now, but still looked a bit smitten. He had that effect.

Andrew shook the hand she offered. “Good to meet you,” he said on auto-pilot, “and good to have you helping us out.” Put the right face on it, he told himself. He’d get through this meeting. That much he could manage.

* * * *

“It almost knocked me cold, Kaz. She plays on swings and see-saws, still lives with her mommy and daddy, and she’s doing our overhaul.”

Kazuo Ishii laughed. “You really have the luck sometimes, Andrew. Pass the ketchup.”

Andrew slid it over. Kazuo Ishii had discovered this pub a few years back. He commended it to Andrew because it served food in the back booths along with the alcohol, and because the staff didn’t hassle them about their apparent age. It had become their weekly dinner venue.

“So is she competent to do the job?” Kazuo asked, squeezing a fresh layer of ketchup onto his fries. “I can’t imagine even your company hiring a real infantile for something important.”

“I’m not sure yet. She seemed pretty well organized, asked some good questions about how our online help center works. Said she wanted a different perspective on the job the humans do there now.”

“She didn’t ask those humans?”

“She didn’t trust answers from people her system might be replacing. Guess that makes sense.” He spied their waitress passing. “Want a second round, Kaz?”

“I’ll just have a Coke, but you go ahead.”

Andrew got their order in, and drained his beer bottle to make room for the next. “Still, I’ve got to go back to her home office on Saturday to help her test the program, suggest adjustments. I’m worried about how much of her work she expects me to do. I’m in no mood to hold her hand through this.”

“Oh, holding her hand wouldn’t be bad. You never know what it might lead to.”

Andrew knew this leering tone from Kaz, too well. “I’ve got no such interest in her.”

“That’s right. You like older women.”

“No, older women like me. There’s a difference.” Jason’s barb about his being adorable doubly stung because it was true. Many adults just couldn’t get over him. He was tempted sometimes to blight his looks with outrageous haircuts, piercings, or tattoos, but he never did. It was an advantage in business sometimes to look sweet and angelic, and he was learning to exploit that to the limit.

“Well, sorry I can’t take this Alice off your hands, but one lady at a time’s enough for me.”

Andrew took Kazuo’s bragging with accustomed tolerance. “So, you and Luna are still good? Still, um—” He stuffed a crabcake into his mouth, but too late: the subject was already implied.

“Luna’s doing fine,” Kaz said, but he was frowning. “We still have our special nights, every week or so, but I can tell she’s still going through the motions.”

Even in frozen bodies like Kazuo’s and Luna’s, there was some sexual responsiveness, from the trickle of hormones pre-pubescent bodies produced. “Stronger than they like to admit,” Kaz once said of it, “and lots weaker than I like to admit.” Function was one thing, but desires and urges were another.

“She says she’s taking the pills,” Kazuo said, “but they aren’t helping. She tolerates doing it, may even like it, but it’s not all it’s supposed to be.” By his tone, he was feeling the same way.

Andrew shook his head. “I keep telling you, those people are charlatans. They’re selling snake oil, exploiting frozen people who are chasing after a sex life their bodies aren’t equipped to handle.”

“Well, who else is offering us hope?” Kazuo demanded. “What have I got to lose?”

“Besides your money? Not to mention dignity? Bad enough we suffered one injustice against our bodies: you’re letting them compound it.”

“I thought I was trying to undo it. Y’know, you’re the activist, Andrew. Get the drug companies to do some research, or make the politicians lift that ban on hormone treatments for us.”

“They’d never budge. And why don’t you petition them?”

“How about we do it? Just ‘cause you had a bad—okay, sorry, I won’t go there.”

Andrew’s glare faded away. “We wouldn’t affect anything. Sexualizing children is radioactive. Yes, I know we’re not children, but anything that worked on us would probably work on real kids. Hate to say, they’ve got a point.”

“Bull,” Kazuo said through a mouthful of cheeseburger. “They’re covering their butts, never mind serving the public, the adults—” He jerked a thumb at himself. “—demanding their help. Damn it, I’m an adult man, who deserves an adult sex life.” He was getting a little loud. “I have a Constitutional right to make girls scream in the sack, and it’s high time they delivered it!”

Andrew started telling Kaz to cool it, before a big man leaned over from the next booth. “Hey! Would you two little pervs knock it off? There are decent people who come here.”

Andrew looked up, scowling. “So, what’s that got to do with you?”

“I don’t gotta take this!”

“Well, there’s the door!” Andrew shot back, ignoring Kazuo’s warning tugs on his sleeve.

The man was halfway to Andrew when their waitress intervened. “Whoa, whoa,” she said, blocking the man’s path. “Why don’t we just find you a better table, sir, out of earshot?”

“My table’s fine,” he protested, but he soon let her argue him into taking her offer. He took a last look at Andrew and Kazuo, grimaced, and went up front.

Kazuo blew out a sigh. “You really gotta learn to fight in your weight class, pal.” The waitress came back with their drinks, hesitating a bit as she handed Andrew his beer.

Kazuo reached to pull it away. “Maybe you’ve had enough, Andrew.”

Andrew snatched it back, but he took Kaz’s hint. “I’ve been meaning to ask, how’s Evergreen coming?”

Kazuo politely made no mention of the sudden change in subject. “Still on schedule. Construction’s nearly done; inspections won’t be long after. We should be open in three months.” He eyed Andrew. “You’re still moving in, right?”

“You’ve got my money. Of course I’m moving in.”

“I have it as an investor. I wasn’t assuming—”

“Kaz, this complex is everything people should be doing to accommodate us. When you start taking on lessees—when do you, anyway?”

“End of the month, three weeks from today.”

“You’ll get my deposit that day.” Andrew took a swig, and grinned. “Did I ever tell you how lucky I am to have such an enlightened entrepreneur as a friend?”

“Nope, never. So I think you should start now, in cloying detail.” They both chuckled. “Or you could show your gratitude by aiming your Alice my way. I changed my mind about—ow!” Andrew’s half-strength punch in the shoulder only made him laugh harder.

* * * *

Andrew arrived at the condo early Saturday morning. This time, Mr. McGirt was there to let him in. Timothy McGirt was close to six feet, with retreating hair still holding a few streaks of its original black.

“You’re a little early yet,” he told Andrew, while flute music played somewhere within. “Have a seat. I’ll tell Alice you’re here.”

Andrew found a living room chair just his, or Alice’s, size and sat. Someone stopped the flute music, but it restarted a moment later, just as Timothy reappeared. “Give her ten minutes to finish her practice,” he said, “then she’ll be with you. Would you like something to drink while you’re waiting? Water? Juice?”

“No, thank you.” Andrew was left alone, to listen. He was no music expert, but the piece sounded Romantic, maybe Debussy. Or was that Impressionist? No, weren’t those painters? What was plainer was that Alice was no dabbler. Maybe not professional quality, but close to it.

Too soon, it ended, and a moment later Alice emerged from a nearby doorway. “Sorry, Mr. Crawford. I always get in an hour of practice, whatever work I’m doing that day. So, shall we get started?”

Andrew stood and followed her, though not to the room she had just left. This one was a real workroom, dominated by a mainframe computer that took up a good quarter of the space and hummed with cooling fans. “Wow,” Andrew breathed. “How’d you get that in here?”

“I had to partially disassemble it,” Alice said. “I’m in big trouble if I ever have to move.” She smiled at her joke. Andrew wondered whether it was a justification for herself.

Alice took a seat at the workstation, both sized for her. Andrew found a mismatched but well-proportioned chair for himself nearby. Alice tapped a keyboard button, then lifted an interface cap off its stand. A light flashed green on the monitor. “Good morning, Dinah,” she said.

“Good morning, Alice.” Faint lines faded into view on the screen, outlining a mouth that moved as the voice spoke. “Is this the appliance company gentleman with you?”

“Yes, Dinah. His name’s Andrew Crawford.” She leaned over, still fitting the mesh over her head. “Say hello so she’ll recognize you.”

“Um, good morning, Dinah.”

“Good morning, sir. Do you prefer Mr. Crawford or Andrew? Or some other name?”

His pause was longer this time. “Andrew is fine.”

“Very well, Andrew. I’m Dinah, Alice’s template AI program. A trained version of me will be handling your telephone and Internet customer service inquiries. I’m ready to receive your specific training.”

“All right. We’ll start soon.” He dropped his voice. “You mentioned your AI Thursday, Alice, but I didn’t realize it’d be this, er, all-purpose. You certainly didn’t create all this just for us.”

“Of course not. I started her my junior year at Purdue. I thought of making her my master’s thesis, before I realized the colleges couldn’t teach me anything I couldn’t teach myself. I bud off copies of Dinah and program them for whatever my clients need.”

“By yourself? No partners? No assistants?”

Alice smiled. “You’re my assistant today. Shall we put Dinah through her paces?”

“Yeah.” Andrew slipped his function-all out of its belt case. Alice went blank with concentration, and a copy of Dinah came up, announcing itself with a slightly different voice. Andrew dialed up a few training scripts he had borrowed from Customer Service, and started his drill.

Common service questions came first, often serious, sometimes clueless. Dinah fielded them without a hitch. He then switched to more unusual questions, and some rougher attitudes. He got snippy with Dinah, then rude, then outright abusive. Dinah had some trouble with those questions. Alice apparently didn’t: she never flinched as Andrew laced into her baby.

Andrew paused to make notes. “No offense to Dinah, Alice, but she wouldn’t pass a Turing test.”

“Really?” Alice finally seemed perturbed. “I programmed her specifically for social interaction. I thought she was cool and polite.”

“Exactly. I was loading on stressful situations, and it didn’t sound stressed, at all. It’s an inhuman reaction: people will pick up on that. Didn’t you consider the psychological effect that might have on the humans talking to it?”

“Actually, yes. I thought calmness would be better than pure human authenticity, to avoid feeding the anger.”

“Some callers won’t like the evident artificiality. Others might actually be scrapping for a fight.”

Alice eyed him. “I doubt your company is looking to fill those consumer needs. But yes, a different emotional shading might be in order.” A control board appeared on her main monitor. Sliders began moving left and right, numerical readouts tumbling up or down, all seemingly from Alice’s intent stare. “I also need to judge when an outright confrontation is breaking out,” she said with an air of distraction, “so Dinah can transfer a call to a human supervisor. Looks like you can help me find that threshold.”

“I can, if you don’t mind me abusing Dinah some more.”

Alice sighed and wiped her brow. “Not at all, Andrew. It’s the only way to find the failure points. Consider yourself a test pilot,” she said with a quirky smile, “only you’re guaranteed to walk away from your test.”

Her metaphor soon felt apt, as a few hours of feigning arguments left Andrew feeling like he’d been in a long dogfight. Alice was little fresher from her brain-interfacing. He finally asked to break for lunch, and pulled a brown bag out of his case.

Alice’s face fell. “My mother was making us something for lunch,” she said.

“I didn’t know.” He shrugged. “Sorry. And don’t let me stop you.”

“That’s okay. Maybe we can make dinner out of it instead.”

“I ... was hoping to finish the work here and get straight home.”

“Oh. I understand. Well, at least come out and eat with us.”

Andrew conceded that much, and sat through a tolerable lunch with Alice and her parents. Timothy brought out a chilled spinach salad, serving out a plateful for his daughter before helping himself. Lauren didn’t obviously condescend, but Andrew noted how she sat a little closer to Alice, her chair turned a little more her way, than necessary.

They both turned out to be lawyers, little surprise if they had been wealthy enough to have Alice frozen so soon after it became possible. He probed them on the Supreme Court’s recent disability ruling, and was irked to find them both on the opposing side. Perhaps they noticed the clash of ideas, because they finished up and excused themselves before either he or Alice was done eating.

He thought of something to ask Alice, both to clear the air and to help him figure her out. “Why haven’t I heard of you before?”

Alice scraped the remnants of her salad together. “Why should you have? I’m certainly not famous.”

“I try to know who in the city is frozen. There are several hundred of us adults here, about as many others still adolescent or younger. There’s strength in numbers.”

“You make yourself sound like an activist.”

“I am one, at least on the side. We need to band together to assert our rights. There’s no counting on full-growns to give us our due.”

His jab might have gone home, but Alice gave no sign. “I’ve never gotten much into politics. Too busy with work, maybe.”

Andrew didn’t mask his frown. “You’re never too busy to stand up for yourself. Or others.”

Alice didn’t, or couldn’t, meet his eyes. “Ready to get back to work?”

“Sure. Um, after I use your bathroom.” Alice pointed the way, and over he went.

He returned to the workroom a few minutes later, to find Alice looking over a news story on a personal computer to the side of her main workstation. He got close enough to read over her shoulder, and his guts lurched. A college student had been raped down in Kentucky. The victim was twenty—with a physical age of nine.

Alice gave a start, finally noticing Andrew was there. “Horrible,” she whispered.

“Hope they string him up,” Andrew said. He looked again, and did a double take. “Who would send you that as an e-mail?” he wondered. “Seems awfully creepy.”

“My parents,” she answered evenly. “They keep an eye out for violence against ... us.” She looked back at him. “Is this the kind of thing you fight against?”

“Yeah. Sometimes. Um, let’s get back to work.”

Andrew soon forgot that uncomfortable interlude in his persistent drilling of Dinah. He kept throwing out suggestions for improving it, which Alice kept implementing with a consistent grace. When she wasn’t tweaking program parameters by brain-interface, she was doing it by voice, speaking in gentle tones to Dinah. Her manner made Andrew uneasy somehow, but he didn’t dwell on it.

He lost track of the hours at some point, but Alice stayed more aware. “Maybe we should leave off for today,” she said, “and finish this up tomorrow morning.”

“Already? It’s only—” To Andrew’s surprise, it was a few minutes past seven. “If it’s all the same, Alice, I’d like to keep going, get this done in one day. Wouldn’t you rather not have to work tomorrow?”

“I’ll be working tomorrow either way. I have to write whole new code for this version of Dinah, maybe some for the original too. How long do you think you’ll need?”

He gave it a second’s thought. “We should be done by nine-thirty, ten at the outside.” He caught her frown, and couldn’t resist some archness. “Am I keeping you up past your bedtime?”

Alice colored, then pulled herself up straight. “Actually, yes. I turn in at nine most nights.”

“What? Even on weekends?”

“Our bodies need the rest, whatever day it is. We can’t get by on seven or eight hours and function optimally.”

“Sure we can. That’s why God invented coffee.”

Alice turned back to the monitor, shaking her head. “Young bodies aren’t invulnerable. Not even ours.”

“Well, fine. I’ll try not to handle you too roughly and leave you bedridden in one night.”

There was a gasp, and it wasn’t Alice. Lauren McGirt was in the doorway, looking scandalized. “We’re working later than expected, Mother,” Alice told her. This relieved Lauren only a little. “Have dinner without me. I’ll eat later.”

“All right.” Lauren slipped out, leaving the door ajar.

Andrew was still looking after her, rudely amused, when Alice tapped him on the shoulder. “Come on, Andrew,” she said. “If this is going to take so much time, let’s not waste any.”

* * * *

Andrew shuffled into his apartment, tossed the briefcase onto his old sofa, and headed straight to the refrigerator. Alice had stuck it out, working till quarter past ten without a complaint. She could work long, and well. That made her that much more baffling.

He kicked a stool across the kitchen floor, over to the microwave. He threw a frozen dinner in to cook, then hopped down and got a beer out of the fridge to hold him for the eight minutes. As he took his first drink, he pondered the curious case of Alice McGirt.

She was more than that infantile he saw in the playground. She was very smart, probably a couple steps ahead of him, and plainly knew her work. Dinah was a real accomplishment, especially if it was as much a solo project as Alice suggested.

Dinah was also, he thought, a clue. It was always a “her” to Alice. While she would tolerate his verbal abuse of the program, her speech to it was gentle, soothing, as if placating a sensitive child. Was Dinah a surrogate, a Pinocchio for someone who could never have her own children?

That’s what her parents had done for her. They’d taken a full life away from her, then worked to keep her timid and fearful in the curtailed life she had left. They clung to her, and she to them—and she seemed glad for it. They kept her, in many ways, a child, and she didn’t know how to break free, or even that she should. Were there a way to reverse her freezing, she probably wouldn’t take it. It would seem ungrateful.

Andrew had known how to handle his own parents. Alice would need someone’s help in breaking her shackles. That someone was going to be him.

The microwave beeped. He hopped onto the stool to retrieve his dinner, nearly burning his hands, and sat down to eat. Before he could get his first bite, a yawn overcame him. Maybe it wasn’t her stamina he should have worried about.

Alice needed a friend like him, someone to act as her guide and mentor. He could awaken her consciousness, pull her away from the smothering grip of her parents for her own good. No, for all their good, even Timothy and Lauren. Convince Alice that her presence was inhibiting her parents’ lives as well as her own, and he would multiply his leverage.

Of course, the time-honored way of getting a young adult to leave the nest was to have her make her own nest with someone else. Andrew wasn’t inclined that way with Alice. She looked nice enough—not beautiful, but pleasant—but her personality had that flaw. Which was the point, of course: making her a better person.

Still, if he could cultivate an attraction in her, without any false promises, it might be worth it. He could play that by ear.

All this, of course, required more interaction with her. He was sure that opportunity would come, though. All he’d have to do was wait.

* * * *

He reported the weekend’s progress to Tiffany Albano on Monday morning. Albano had heard nothing from Alice, but promised to keep him in the loop. With that, Andrew headed back to his desk, and his usual work.

Jason walked up. Andrew tensed, but “Did things go well with McGirt on Saturday?” was all Jason said.

“They did, thanks,” Andrew replied, still wary.

“Any idea when the project will be done?”

“Not yet. Ms. Albano’s waiting to hear.”

“M-hm.” Jason walked three steps away before turning back. “Do you think you’ll get another play-date with her?”

Andrew thrust out an arm. “Get out, McCarthy!”

Jason chuckled. “Now, now, Andy, you won’t have any friends if you don’t play nice.” He bounded away, leaving Andrew to fume.

Nothing much new came from Tiffany. She reported that Alice was working on their program, and would report in at the appropriate time. Andrew let it go at that, and concentrated on his work, with only fleeting thoughts about Alice. Familiar patterns reasserted themselves, and by Wednesday it felt as though his contacts with Alice had never happened.

So seeing Alice walk into the office that afternoon was a bit of a shock.

She came in with a brisk gait, a satchel slung over one shoulder. She looked like a pupil carrying her backpack, though her business wear certainly wasn’t the current elementary school fashion. It did flatter her, though, and his eyes lingered a second longer than intended.

“Andrew.” Alice had turned his way, and he snapped out of it. “Could you point me toward—oh, there she is. Thanks anyway.”

Tiffany had appeared at her office doorway. Alice walked over, pulling a hard drive out of her satchel that was slightly bigger than a brick and looked like it weighed more, too. “Here’s the beta version, Ms. Albano. Didn’t care to trust it to an upload. It’s yours to test for—” Albano shut the door, and Andrew could hear no more.

Andrew didn’t even pretend to work for the next few minutes. He went over various plausible ways he could contrive another meeting with Alice, without making his purpose obvious and scaring her off. The best he could manage was to volunteer to do more testing at her home, whether Tiffany wanted him to or not.

Albano’s door opened. “—it upstairs to them right now.” Alice stepped out. Andrew prepared a line about how fast she had worked, and rose to intercept her.

Alice made it moot by walking right toward him. “Andrew, I have to get this other copy upstairs to one of your VP’s, but I wanted to talk first.”

“Um, sure. I...”

“Ms. Albano says she’ll be reviewing the program with you, and wants to keep getting your input, now that you have some experience with it. Might I suggest a working dinner tomorrow night, to go over it?”

So much for subtle plans. “That sounds fine, Alice. Would Bouchard’s be a good place?”

“Yes ... though it’s a little far. Could I ask you to pick me up?”

“Sure.” No comments about why she’d need a ride. He didn’t want to spoil this now.

“Thanks. I’ll make the reservation, say for six?” She nodded, hoisted her satchel, and went on her way.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” Andrew said after her. He dropped back into his chair, his head foggy. A couple of co-workers stood nearby, but wisely kept their comments down to whispers. Another was not as reserved.

“Boy, you move fast, Andy,” Jason McCarthy said. Andrew was still too muzzy to get immediately irate. “Lemme know what color panties she wears. I’m betting she’s partial to the Pooh-bear kind. Still, if you get nailed for statutory, don’t say you weren’t warned.”

That was too far. Andrew sprang up, ready to clobber him, heedless of consequences.

“Mr. McCarthy!”

The shout froze Andrew, before realizing Tiffany wasn’t calling him. She stood in her doorway, pointing right at Jason, then jabbing her thumb over her shoulder. “My office. Now!”

Looking more stunned than Andrew had just been feeling, Jason walked to his fate. The loitering co-workers scattered. Andrew slowly got back to his work, keeping the smile on his lips just half-formed. He wouldn’t let himself expect too much out of Jason’s trip to the principal’s office. That would be the one way to spoil what had become a very good day.

* * * *

“So, why did your parents freeze you?”

Andrew dropped that question just before the entrees arrived, figuring it would buffer his bluntness. He had nudged talk with Alice away from business, managing it earlier and easier than he’d expected. They had talked about their respective colleges, about friends—none of whom, oddly, they had in common—and he let her talk about her family while he ducked the matter.

Alice took a long first taste of her salmon, and Andrew began thinking she was doing her own dodging. “Oh, this is very good. You should try it next time.” He made some positive noise, figuring his gambit had failed. It hadn’t.

“They had two reasons,” Alice said. “Longevity was number one. With my physical development stopped where it was, all the infirmities of old age were going to be spared me. Telomeres, aging effects of sex hormones, all of that. They may have expected me to be immortal—they don’t say so now—but they definitely expected I’d have a greatly extended lifespan.”

Andrew nodded. “Extended, yes. Greatly, the jury’s still out. Aging may not be as genetically coded as we thought, and the hormone thing only goes so far, at least in full-growns. And we haven’t provided thorough data yet. The oldest of us is still only, what, thirty?”

“He’s thirty,” she echoed. “Born exactly a year and a day before I was.”

Andrew still wasn’t used to that. Guessing her age in the park was one thing; it was another matter to learn from her lips that she was two years his senior. He heard Kazuo’s voice inside his head, talking about older women.

“Whether this doubles my lifespan, or does more,” Alice continued, “I intend to live my extra years to the fullest. Otherwise, it’s a waste of what my parents did for me.”

To you, not for you, sprang to Andrew’s mind. “And second?” he asked instead.

“Intelligence. It really excited them, Mom especially, to think of the plasticity and receptivity of a young mind being maintained indefinitely.” A smile curled up, dimpling her face. “That theory’s turned out easier to confirm.”

“Yes,” Andrew said, “and a lot scarier to full-growns than a longer life.”

The dimples vanished. “How so?”

“You mean you’ve never noticed their reactions? How much do you get out, Alice?”

She gave him a blank look. “Humor me, Andrew. Pretend I’m as old as I look.”

Andrew ignored the veiled irony. “Well, if you’re an average adult, having someone who looks seven or so be plainly smarter than you is horrible enough. What’s worse is knowing that ‘kid’ is literally built to absorb new information faster and easier, and is going to become more intelligent and skillful faster than you can ever hope to, and probably have all those skills longer than you’ll be alive. They’re intimidated, feeling inferior—rightly so, in lots of cases—and they strike back. Sometimes it’s the petty, patronizing slights; sometimes it’s the systemic prejudices they throw up, and that we have to tear down brick by brick.” He sat back, not too tired to sum it up quick. “Living longer just disturbs them. Being smarter threatens them.”

He noticed a couple frowning heads tipping his way. Maybe it was time to throttle back the honesty a little. Getting thrown out of Bouchard’s as a disturbance to other diners was no textbook persuasion technique.

Alice chewed pensively, then winced. “What’s wrong?” Andrew asked.

“Nothing,” she said, quickly rubbing her jaw. “An old—nothing.”

Andrew guessed at what something it was. The earliest freezing manipulations hadn’t fully tweaked the genes for tooth development, among a few other slips. All the secondary teeth developed, for which there was no room in a child-sized mouth. Alice probably had eight molars extracted during her teens, maybe from inside the gums before they could erupt. She hadn’t been sheltered from everything, he had to admit.

Alice had recovered by now. “There’s nothing guaranteed about our intelligence and skills. You’ve got to work on them, no matter who you are. And honestly, Andrew, people haven’t reacted that way in my experience. Not generally, at least.”

Good she has some general experience. “But you’ll admit to specific instances. Count them up some time, Alice. You may find it more general than you think.”

“Fine. I can tell you about one general instance. I’ve been playing with a local chamber orchestra for four years now. I have never had a fellow player show me a bit of envy. If I’m becoming a better musician, it gives them joy, not fear.”

“Oh, I’m sure it doesn’t threaten your violinists. If your orchestra has another flutist, though—”

“Max semi-retired to make room for me. He still plays piccolo when we need one. I think he’s a bigger fan than my parents. And now it’s turnabout time,” she said, with not too much haste. “Why did your parents freeze you, Andrew?”

“Oh, out of pure, selfless enlightenment,” Andrew said, the sarcasm heavy. “Mom and Dad were committed Greens—still are, I assume—and took personal responsibility in not overburdening the planet with excess population. Not having any children at all was the optimal choice, but a close second was having a child who, by design, could never himself reproduce. So they got to have their family, and only needed to defer their sacrifice one generation.”

Alice nodded slowly. “I know some parents have ecological motivations,” she said, “but maybe you’re filling in the blanks more harshly than is merited.”

“Oh, no, I’m inferring nothing. They were right up front with me about what a wise thing they had done. Told me I should be glad to be so short, too.” He took a drink of wine, then held up the glass. “Smaller people consume fewer resources. Unless they’re really thirsty.” With that, he drained it.

“Please don’t order a second,” she said. “You are driving.”

“I know, I know. You should take advantage of that, and have a couple yourself.”

“I don’t drink,” she said. Andrew wasn’t remotely surprised. Any excuse to act like a child, and she took it. “Anyway,” she continued, “whatever their mistakes may have been, they’re still your parents. I hope you’ve reconciled with them.”

“Don’t need to. Haven’t seen them since college, except by phone a couple times. They’re behind me.”

Alice shook her head. “Our parents are never behind us, as long as they’re alive. I hope you come to see that before they’re gone.” He said nothing, and she took a moment to eat and think. “Do your other frozen friends, like Kazuo, feel that way about their parents?”

“Oh, Kazuo’s different. He’s so active, always moving forward, never back. Not that he’s forgotten who he is: far from it. I told you he’s in real estate, right?”

“Yes.”

Perfect, Andrew thought. He couldn’t have had a better way of bringing this up. “Have you heard of Evergreen?”

“Can’t say that I have.”

“It’s a new development he’s building in town. One for us, the frozen, built for our needs. Everything sized down to the right proportions, security measures to discourage the usual predators.” He let the last item sink in. “You’ve really never heard of it? He’s been advertising, narrow-spotting to local frozen people.”

“Well, something may have been sent to me, and gotten strained out. I’ve got strong filters for all my computers. Very strong.” She sipped her water. “This project is all your friend’s doing?”

“It’s his concept, but not all his money.”

“Really. Kazuo sounds like someone worth knowing, worth emulating.”

What luck. Andrew had thought it would be hard teasing her out of her parents’ clutches and among her own. Instead, she sounded almost eager. He dug out one of Kazuo’s plug-in cards for her. “I’ll be taking one of the units myself. Who knows, we might be neighbors some day.”

“Could be,” Alice said, slipping the card into her bag without a look.

The rest of dinner passed quite pleasantly for Andrew. He got to unburden himself a little about the cluelessness of his employers, and listened to some of her work experiences with attention that grew beyond the polite. Alice really was smart, capable, successful. It made him want that much more to break her out of the narrow, juvenile compass of her personal life.

He saw her into his two-seater velomobile to drive her home. The vehicle was cheap compared to cars, efficient on power, and most important, could be adjusted fairly easily for someone his size to drive. It also made him self-conscious around big folk, especially certain co-workers. Alice didn’t show a smirk, didn’t raise an eyebrow.

Maybe he was connecting with her. But maybe he wasn’t the only one.

Her interest in Kazuo was nagging at him. Andrew wanted to be the one raising her consciousness, but Kaz was muscling in, without even being there. Didn’t the guy have enough success with women, even if a different kind? Setting Alice straight was Andrew’s project. He wanted no accomplice, no competition.

He was probably going to have to kiss Alice.

It might be risky, but he needed some kind of bond with her, something he could build on. Kissing a woman who liked to pretend she was eight wasn’t his usual style, but it was the best idea he could think of on the quick drive back to her condo.

He pulled up in the driveway and walked her to the door, making pleasant talk while planning how to make his move. He had never exactly honed this skill.

They stopped at the door. “This wasn’t as much a working dinner as we’d planned,” he said. “If you want to meet again—” He stopped, cursing himself. You didn’t get a woman thinking about work before kissing her. How to retrieve this?

“Oh, we’ll definitely get together again.” And with the barest hesitation, Alice came forward, threw her arms around his neck, and kissed him full on the lips. Andrew gasped for air as they parted. Alice grinned like a mischievous girl. “Soon. Good night, Andrew.”

“Good night,” he echoed, the sound lost somewhere in his throat. Alice went inside, literally skipping across the lobby to the elevators. After a moment, Andrew got back into his velo and drove for home.

Two blocks along, he had to pull over and wait for the spinning of his head to run down.

* * * *

Kazuo Ishii spread his arms wide. “So how do you like it, Andrew?”

Andrew looked it over, nodding. The building itself took up three sides of the block, surrounding a courtyard. He counted five stories of windows, though the structure didn’t seem that tall. Where the main courtyard path met the sidewalk stood a freshly mounted brick and wood sign. “Evergreen,” it read in recessed gold lettering on russet brown, with a modest “MMLVII” incised near the bottom.

“Your landscaping needs work,” Andrew gibed. Most of the courtyard was churned-up dirt, shimmering with the heat.

“That’s all the heavy machinery. We’ve got months to fix that up. So, ready for the grand tour?”

“Why else would I be here?”

They walked inside, Kazuo greeting a security guard by name in the lobby. He led Andrew to one of the elevators. “Notice anything yet?” he said.

“You mean this?” He pushed the elevator call button that sat just above waist height: his waist, not the average adult’s. “Nice. And if we took the stairs, they’d be shorter, right?”

“Uh, no.” The door dinged open, and they got in. “Fire codes, for one thing. For another, we ran a couple ergonomic tests, and people our size kept stumbling on short stairs. We’re just too used to the standard size in some things.”

On the third floor, Kazuo led Andrew down a corridor. Andrew looked up and smiled. The ceiling didn’t tower above him nearly as much as usual. “How high is that, Kaz? Two and a quarter meters?”

“Two even. A meter eighty in the doorways.” Kazuo flashed him a grin. “Gene-tweaked basketball players need not apply.”

“Course not. Those poor bastards would need someplace with round-the-clock nursing service.”

Kazuo’s grin melted. Genetic alteration’s failures were a grisly subject, even for his friend. “Well, here we go, three-sixteen.” He slid one card into a slot, waved a second past a scanner, and opened the door. Andrew breasted the wave of muggy heat rushing out at him and followed his friend inside. Kazuo tapped a control panel on the wall, set at the perfect height, and lights came on.

Andrew took it all in. The place still smelled faintly of paint and drywall dust, with an undertone of machine oil. “Is this going to be mine?”

“One like it. This is the very first unit completed. Most of the others will have the same dimensions, just with different room orientations. Take a look around.”

One thing Andrew noticed early was how the living and dining rooms had chairs in two sizes. Full-grown guests were anticipated. Seats for smaller people well outnumbered them, though, and the tables were all at three-quarter height. Time for them to adjust, Andrew though, liking how that turnaround felt.

The kitchen was even a better fit. Counters were lower, cabinets and the microwave were placed within unaided reach, and the oven was a shorter model that let him reach the back of the stovetop without straining. It wasn’t his company’s oven, but that just served them right for not catering to his market.

“No more stools in the kitchen,” Andrew said.

“Not for you, maybe,” said Kazuo. “Tenants who got frozen younger, around five or six, might still need them. We’ve got a few different building scales at Evergreen, but you can only reduce things so far.”

“Still, it’d be a big improvement for them.” A new thought struck Andrew. He scooted past Kazuo, and found the bathroom. A few seconds later he emerged, pumping his fist.

“Yes! Perfect height, Kaz! For that alone, you should sell this place out.”

Kazuo matched his friend’s smile. “We’re working on it. Want to see more?”

“Sure, let’s check out the bedroom. Seriously, this is great. You have to take pictures, post them on your site.”

“The photographer was in yesterday. We’ll have the walk-through posted by Monday. I have some business smarts, remember.”

Andrew was ahead of him, in the main bedroom. The bed was lower to the floor, but otherwise the same as any adult’s bed. Andrew hopped on, laying himself out on the comforter. Andrew despised futons, and disliked adult-height stuff on principle. You could get beds this low, but usually at extortionate custom prices, a problem Kazuo’s bulk ordering for Evergreen alleviated, and not only for beds.

When he sat up, he looked more thoughtful. “Kaz, could you send me copies of those walk-through photos? I want to show them to a potential customer, one who might not be checking Evergreen’s page.”

Kazuo leaned into the doorframe. “Would this potential customer happen to be a certain computer prodigy who sometimes goes swinging, though not in the interesting sense?”

“Umm, yes, it’s Alice McGirt,” Andrew said, aiming for nonchalance. “I’ve told her about Evergreen a couple times, in, er, the few times we’ve met since she started working with us.”

“Met a few times. Uh-huh. Doing what?”

“Consulting. On her work.”

“Oh. Consulting.” Kazuo strolled over. “I’m a connoisseur of double entendres, but that one’s new to me.”

Andrew’s hands clenched. “Kazuo! You’re acting like McCarthy did before he got transferred to home officing.”

“And you’re acting like I’m not your friend, and like I’ve got no sense. That Thursday dinner you cancelled a month ago didn’t sound like it was for strictly business.” He sat beside Andrew on the bed. “So how about letting me in on the real story?”

Andrew looked away, sulking, as long as he could bear to. It wasn’t long. “I had it all planned,” he said, and started spilling his guts about his intent to reform Alice. “And before I could figure out how to lay that kiss on her, she beat me to it.” A wolfish grin came over Kazuo, but he hid it when Andrew looked his way. “And I felt like ... I don’t know. I’ve been seeing her since then, and I’ve still got my plan, but ... I also know I really feel something for her.”

Kazuo turned sober, banishing the merry lecher. “How serious is this?”

“Well, we’ve gotten to making out a couple times—kid stuff, really.”

“That’s not quite what I meant.”

“Yeah.” Andrew’s head drooped. “I’m not using the ‘L’ word here, and God knows I still get annoyed at these ways she doesn’t act quite adult ... but I just want to be around her. Ugh!” he cried, putting his face in his hands. “It was never like this in college.”

Kazuo needed no clarification. Andrew had had a couple of full-grown girlfriends in college. The young women had treated Andrew as an exotic ornament, a symbol of their broad-minded bona fides, and one with no undertone of sexual danger. They did gladly accept, even encourage, the improvised efforts Andrew could make for them erotically, until they grew jaded. Andrew had confessed these warped and demeaning relationships to Kazuo years ago, and it had been the last Andrew had dabbled in romantic matters. Until now.

“I don’t know how to go about this,” Andrew said. “I’m searching for something in a pitch-black room. Every move I make, I’m afraid I’ll crash into something.”

“All right. First, let’s figure out what it is you’re looking for. Are you trying to rescue Alice, or to have a real relationship with her?”

Andrew took a long time answering. “I want both. I’m trying to do both. But if I have to choose ... it’s more important to make her a better person.”

Kazuo smiled sadly. “Gotcha. One cynical game plan coming up. First off, women like it when you listen to them.”

“I manage that fine. Can’t say I’m always interested in what she’s saying.”

“That’s okay, for your purposes. Another way to get closer to her is shared interests, and I mean beyond better customer service.”

“M-hm. I can do a couple things in that department. But how does that pull her out of the ranks of the infantile, Kaz?”

“Reciprocity. You can start bringing her into a couple of your interests. Pick those right, and you’re getting somewhere.” Andrew digested that one. “The next one will be tougher in your position.”

“What is it?”

“Honesty,” Kazuo said. “Openness. Women, at least in my experience, always know when you’re holding something back. It may be only a subconscious sense, but it’ll color the whole relationship, leave them dissatisfied. And it’ll always boomerang on you eventually.”

“I can deal with that, when the time comes.” Andrew caught Kazuo’s dubious look. “Besides, I’m being open with Alice now, on certain things. Emotional things.” His mouth twisted. “Maybe too honest about some stuff. I’ll have to watch that.”

“Fine. Now that you’ve gotten the lesson, here comes the lecture. Just how is what you’re doing with Alice different from what those couple of girls did with you in college?”

Andrew glared at Kazuo, his cheeks coloring. “It is different. I have Alice’s interests at heart, the interests of all of us. She shouldn’t live such a degraded life. We shouldn’t be stigmatized as worthy of being treated like children, the way she treats herself—at least sometimes.”

“Is Alice going to see it that way?”

“Alice isn’t going to know about it. Unless you ... Kazuo—”

Kazuo lifted his hands. “I won’t go and tell her anything, Andrew. But if she comes and asks me, unsolicited, that might be a different matter. So, are you sure you want her coming to ask me about Evergreen now?”

Andrew gave Kazuo a friendly shake on the shoulder. “Would you stop worrying? It’s under control. If you can handle building this whole complex, I think I can handle one semi-mature woman.”

“Right.” Kazuo stood up from the bed. “Lemme show you my office downstairs now.”

“What’s there?”

Kazuo ticked off fingers. “Air-conditioning; beer in the mini-fridge. Yeah, thought you’d like that.” Andrew sprang off the bed, and they headed for the door. “God knows I could use one too.”

* * * *

“So did you enjoy it?”

Andrew kept hold of Alice’s hand as they moved slowly up the theater aisle, and considered her question. He had a serious problem with the casting, but ... “Yeah. Yeah, I did. Funny, I usually think public theaters do better with spectacles, oughta leave romantic movies like that for home release.”

“They had to run this in theaters. It’s a remake of a classic.”

“That movie’s over sixty years old. It—” He was doing it again, indulging his argumentative side. He had to keep catching himself, but he did stop. “I won’t quibble. Good movie, Alice. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.” She met him halfway for a kiss. A snort and grumble from behind interrupted them. Some tall man pushed by them, shooting back a censorious look as he passed. Andrew felt like starting up a tongue-lashing, but forbearance won out one more time, and he just pulled Alice a little closer.

“Heh. Little freaks.”

That voice was farther behind, and younger. Nasty laughs followed it. A clutch of teenagers had been talking throughout the movie, never quite disruptive enough to get ejected. They had new targets.

“Go on, Bill. Do it.”

Andrew started to turn back, ready to ask exactly what they thought they were going to do to him. Alice’s sharp tug on his hand stopped him. “Let’s go,” she whispered. “Out of here.”

He relented, hanging on to her through the lobby and into daylight on the sidewalk. He began to relax, until he heard that laugh again, not as close, but still threatening. “Wish we’d taken my velomobile instead of walking,” he said.

“Never mind. Keep moving.”

They kept up a hurried pace for two blocks, until Andrew took a look back and saw the kids were nowhere near them. “It’s okay,” he told Alice. “They gave up on us.”

He felt Alice’s hand tremble in his. “Why do people have to be that way to others? I’ve never understood.”

Andrew felt a lecture welling up inside him. He diverted it into a pointed joke. “They’re just ticked that child admission prices got eliminated when people like us started confusing cashiers.”

Alice gave him a jaundiced look. “They’re too old to have gotten child admissions.”

“Yeah, but they were still that age when the admissions got changed. Some people hang onto grudges forever.”

Alice rolled her eyes. “Andrew, sometimes I don’t know when you’re kidding or being serious.”

“Who says it’s one at a time?” He started to cross the street, but stopped when Alice didn’t follow. “We’re heading to my place, right?”

“Mine,” Alice said. “Those last adjustments with Dinah, remember?” Andrew walked back to the corner. “And yes, I know why you wanted me at your place.”

“If I had a real car, we could go park in that,” he said. “Maybe it’s time I traded in my velo.”

Alice gave him a playful swat. “Stop being silly. Besides, I can always borrow my parents’ car.”

“Wait, you don’t drive.”

“Occasional business trips. It’s awkward, but I manage.” Alice took his hand again. “Anyway, let’s talk about something else.”

They discussed the movie for a few blocks. Alice gushed over a couple of the actors, notably the one playing the widower’s young son: Hector Price was frozen, twenty-three years old in real life. Andrew itched to tee off, but merely said Price had done a good job, and there was no telling he wasn’t really seven. He even walked like a kid, but Andrew didn’t bring that up.

They walked past the local playground, across the street and rather empty for a Saturday afternoon. Alice gave Andrew’s hand a tug. “Wanna go over?”

Andrew froze up, barely able to get out a “Huh?”

“To the playground. Get a little exercise, have a little fun. C’mon.”

“No!” He pulled his hand out of hers, hard. “I’d ... really rather not.”

Alice obviously was disappointed, but didn’t push. “All right,” she said, and they resumed their walk. “Personally, I can’t see how people can tolerate walking on treadmills or lifting weights for their exercise. It’s awfully dull.”

Andrew could contain his aversion no more. “So you enjoy monkeying around on a kids’ playground?”

Alice regarded him for a moment. “Yes,” she finally said.

Andrew turned away, shaking his head. “I couldn’t do that. It’d be like—like Hector Price.”

“What? How?”

“He’s an adult, but he keeps playing the child. It gets him some fame and fortune, but it costs him his development as an actor. He’s being stereotyped into forever playing the juvenile. He could try to play frozen adults instead, but of course there aren’t the roles. Maybe the screenwriters think if they ignore us, we’ll go away.”

“That’s not so,” Alice said. “Frozen people get portrayed.”

“In low-budget, low-profile, direct-to-home stuff. The big money for Price is in playing kids, so he takes the easy way. And someday, when he wants adult roles, it’ll be too late. Everyone will expect him to be the kid—and worse, by then he’ll be so used to being a boy, he won’t have the skills to be a man.”

Alice was looking at the ground. “You might have something,” she allowed, “but maybe he’s just exploiting an opportunity that’s never been there before.”

Andrew frowned. “How’s that?”

“Well, before now, you could only play a child for so long before nature made it impossible. Now, an actor can hone his talent in that niche for years, decades, become better at portraying a child than a Temple, an Osment, or a Chen ever could. And remember, he’s got a young, plastic brain. If he ever wants to shift into other roles, it’ll be easier for him than most.”

“I have my doubts,” Andrew said. “Would you consider playing one composer’s music sufficient practice to keep you proficient in playing all the others?”

“Well, music is ... it’s not acting. Oh, I did tell you about the concert, right?”

“What concert?” Andrew said, forgetting the change of subject.

“My orchestra’s performing at Wilson Hall this week. Thursday, seven-thirty. Interested?”

“Of course!” He didn’t have to suppress or fake anything here. This was one of Alice’s interests he was ready to share. “Will I have to go rent a tuxedo?”

Alice laughed. “You can get away with a little less.”

“Good. They never have my size anyway.”

* * * *

He had to cancel his weekly dinner with Kazuo to make time for the recital. Kaz was more amused than put out. “I guess that’s one of my suggestions taken,” he said over the function-all, smiling wryly. “Well, enjoy yourself, or is this music gonna be too serious to enjoy?”

“I’ll let you know. And I’ll make it up to you for canceling.”

“How about Friday dinner instead? Or will you be busy with Alice again?”

“I don’t know yet, actually. And don’t look at me that way. There are so many reasons why the dirty old man routine doesn’t work for you.” They laughed.

The workweek skimmed by fast, leading up to Thursday. Andrew dreaded work far less, now that Jason McCarthy was reduced to a distant presence, doing his jobs without extraneous comments. Co-workers still in the office had skirted Andrew for a couple weeks after that final incident, but things had since swung, not back to normal, but to an even more relaxed and comfortable level. He’d have to put the fear of firing into people more often—except that no one was getting in his hair and making him wish that on them.

Tiffany Albano came to his desk on Wednesday with an extra task: adjusting the webpages to reflect the final version of Alice’s customer assistance AI. Andrew accepted the work gladly, which made Tiffany look at him oddly. “You seem pretty happy about it.”

“Sure. It’s good to get this finally nailed down, and it’ll only take a few hours.”

“I see.” She inched in. “Will you miss your time working with Alice?”

“Huh? I’ll see her plenty, even without work. We’ve ... become friends.”

“Good. I’d rather hoped you would,” Tiffany said, and walked away.

Andrew watched her go, wondering what he should make of that. Had she thought he needed a friend, and that only a frozen one would do? Had she been aiming at something more? Part of him thought he should resent her presumption. More of him thought he should thank her. Silence was his compromise, and he got working.

Thursday evening, it was a shower and a quick bite at home, then on with his best coat and tie and out to Wilson Hall. It was half-full when he arrived, and he got to his middle-row seat with no problem. He glanced over the single-sheet program, glad to recognize all the composers. The performers were listed on the reverse, and his eyes lingered over one name. Tuning sounds rose and fell behind the stage curtain, and he strained to hear the flute.

He noticed Alice’s parents in the aisle just as they passed, and caught their attention with a wave. He still didn’t approve of the hold they had on their daughter, but at that moment it seemed no excuse not to be civil, even friendly. They exchanged pleasant words before the McGirts headed down to their second-row seats. Could’ve been your row, Andrew told himself, if you’d found out about this earlier.

The curtain parted to applause. Andrew craned his head until he spotted her, almost dead center. She was in a long dress of dark purple, easily the smallest figure on stage. He tried to catch her eye, but she was intent on her instrument and the screen on her music stand.

The conductor gave his introduction, and led the orchestra into some Brahms. Andrew liked the piece, but there wasn’t that much for the flute to do. The next piece was Vivaldi, and Alice didn’t even take part. Andrew didn’t fret: her turn was coming.

Next, as the flyer promised, was Mozart’s Concerto for Flute and Orchestra Number Two. The conductor singled out “our rising star” as the featured performer, and Andrew couldn’t help a grin. That grin began to waver as the first movement began to unfold, without a hint of the flute. What was going on?

Then Alice began to play, and carried Andrew aloft with her.

It reminded him of a birdsong, or a bird in flight: sometimes the wings fluttering too fast to see, sometimes soaring effortlessly. Was that Mozart’s doing, or Alice’s? A few minutes more of it, and he forgot about Mozart. It was all Alice, and as beautiful as anything he’d ever heard.

He needed the more sedate second movement to catch his breath and start digesting the performance. By the return to allegro in the third movement, he was watching as well as listening. Her music swooped and fluttered again, but just as impressive was how fast and precisely her fingers moved across a flute made for hands twice the size of hers. A few more decades—no, a century of practice, with reflexes undiminished, and how accomplished would she be? A good question, but one he couldn’t care about long, when the now was so good.

Andrew let himself fly with her until the rest of the players carried the concerto to its end. He could barely join the applause, still feeling like he was floating in midair. It took the rest of the recital, through the von Weber and Mendelssohn, for him to settle back to earth.

He had told Kazuo he wasn’t using the “L” word. Now, he wondered.

He was up with the rest of the audience, applauding at the end—and couldn’t see Alice over the bodies in front of him. He stretched, stood tiptoe, but caught only a flash of purple before the curtain rang down. He would have muttered curses at them, but didn’t have it in him right then.

Andrew made his way backstage to find Alice. He found her with her parents, and hung back, giving polite compliments to other musicians who came by. Alice spied him after a moment, and excused herself.

Andrew would have kissed her, had not her parents been so nearby. Instead, he took both her hands in his. “Alice, I—” He laughed at himself for being so tongue-tied. “That was the best music I’ve ever heard.”

Alice looked down. “You must not listen to much classical,” she said.

“Maybe not,” he allowed, giving her hands a squeeze, “but I know what I like.”

Alice looked back up at him, and he saw the blush. It should have looked childish on her, but didn’t. He felt the urge to kiss her again.

No, he thought. More.

He leaned close to her ear. “Can you come home with me for a while?” he whispered.

A giggle caught in her throat, and she reddened more. “A little while,” she answered. “Give me a moment.” She disengaged and walked back to her parents. Andrew turned away, granting a bit of privacy.

What was he planning? To deepen their relationship, or take a step in turning Alice the child into Alice the woman? He tried to ignore that question. He could serve both ends at once, couldn’t he?

Alice came back, her father’s disapproving gaze following her. “Let’s go,” she said, linking an arm with his. “I told them to expect me home in an hour.”

“Okay.” Well, maybe a little longer...

* * * *

The lights in Andrew’s living room were down to their faintest glow. He could barely see Alice’s face in front of him, in the brief moments when he opened his eyes. Much of her was lost in darkness, but that was no problem. He knew where everything was.

“Andrew, stop that.”

Her hand pulled his back, settling it on her knee again. Andrew was amused. Okay, he could play this game. He concentrated on their more standard caresses for a few minutes. Then, with his lips working at her throat, he made his move again.

This time she jerked his hand back. “No, Andrew,” she said firmly.

“Come on, Alice.” He shifted legs, and resumed the advance. “What’s the harm?”

“Stop it!” She slapped his arm away.

The tone stung as much as the blow. “Alice, what’s your problem?”

“What’s yours?” She pushed herself away and stood up. He got up to follow, but heard her move away, then bang against something. “Ow! Lights up!” The lights brightened, showing Alice barefoot and trying to straighten her rumpled dress. She gave him a hurt look. “Why would you do that, Andrew?”

Andrew let himself fall back onto the couch. “I thought it was the right time between us,” he said. “Time to do what adults do when—”

“We’re not that kind of adult,” Alice said. “We’re not going to consummate things that way.”

“C’mon, even if I wasn’t fully responsive, some good heavy petting—”

“No, stop it! Stop ... trying to be something you aren’t!”

Andrew felt like something had scooped out his insides. When the shock faded, anger rushed into the void. “Look who’s talking! You’ve got no place accusing me, you and your ilk.”

Alice didn’t look as wounded as he’d hoped. “Leave ‘my ilk’ out of it. What am I trying to be that I’m not?”

“A little girl!” Andrew sprang up. “The perfect little Goody Two-Shoes, who doesn’t drink, doesn’t swear, doesn’t have an impure thought, doesn’t go out after dark without letting Mommy and Daddy know, and doesn’t ever, ever have to grow up!”

Alice gaped. “Is that how you really think of me? Of everyone who’s frozen? That if they don’t follow your example in all the details, they’re really just children?” She shook her head hard. “Being an adult is about being responsible for yourself, your decisions. I’m satisfied with the decisions I’ve made for my life—and I’m comfortable within my skin, Andrew, even if you aren’t.”

Now it was Andrew’s turn to goggle. “What’s that supposed to mean? I’m great with who I am!”

“You’re great with half of who you are. You go to exaggerated lengths to prove you’re a regular grown-up, including loathing the part of yourself that isn’t.” She sniffed, and wiped at an eye. “Would it really so unbearably humiliate you to let go of your resentments for a while, and let yourself experience the simple pleasures of being eight years old?”

“I don’t want infantile pleasures, Alice. I want to take you to bed the way a regular man would, to want you the way a man does.” His hand reached for her, but she flinched back. “But since our parents were so much wiser than us, we get a shadow of the real thing, or less. But even that frustration beats—” He threw up his hands. “—teeter-totters and puppet shows!”

“Fine. Being frozen denied you some things, but you respond by scorning the things it offers in return. Extended life: doesn’t that mean anything to you?”

“Being half a man for twice as long is no bargain to me. I guess you’re different.”

“I guess I am. A longer life, a youthful body, an agile brain: I think those things compensate, but you turn your back on them for nothing.”

“Because I never had a choice. Because this was imposed on me before I was born, and for all time, no matter what I might want. If I resent that, that’s my right.”

“But it’s so pointless,” she lamented. “I’ve tried to show you what you’ve been rejecting, to unbend your—”

“Hold it!” Andrew looked long and hard at her, silently stoking his indignation. Alice began to draw back. “Showing me what I’m missing, huh? Is that what this relationship has been to you? Is that what you were doing all along?”

“No.” She began stammering. “I mean, sometimes, partly, because—”

“Because you believed you could reform me,” he said, ominously softly. “Because you thought I needed reforming, whether I thought so or not.” He snorted a laugh. “Not like you’re the first person to make me some kind of reclamation project. But I didn’t need it then, and I don’t need it now. Damn it, I’m—I’m sick of people pretending to do things for my own good, when it’s really for their own purposes!”

“Andrew, that’s unfair. Or, or maybe it is fair, but it’s not—”

Andrew’s voice turned back to quiet ice. “I think you should leave now, Alice. Go home to Mommy and Daddy.” She choked off a sob, and a tear trickled from her eye. “And don’t cry,” he added in a cruel hiss.

His last words roused something within Alice. She straightened, and fought down the tears. “No,” she rasped. “No, I wouldn’t dream of discomforting you that way.” She walked back to the couch, picking up her shoes tumbled to one side. “You’ve got your worldview, and you’re welcome to it.” She looked around, growing frustrated. “Stockings. Where’d they go?”

“Hang on. They’ve gotta be around. I’ll find—”

“No, forget it,” she said, jamming on her shoes. “Doesn’t matter.” She got halfway to the door, and turned, her face burning red. “I’m sorry I was such a disappointment to you, Andrew. Good-bye.”

Andrew stared dumbly after her for a second. “Wait, let me drive—” The slamming door cut him off like a slap in the face. “Fine!” he shouted.

He stormed into the kitchen, hoisted a half-full bottle of vodka out of its cabinet, and grabbed a nearby glass. To think he’d been taken in by that—that girl so easily. All this time he thought Alice genuinely cared for him, she was really treating him like some hapless, deluded soul, needing her care and instruction to make a better person of him. What arrogance! What—

With the glass halfway to his lips, Andrew finally acknowledged a certain parallel.

He slapped the glass down on the countertop, splashing his fingers. It wasn’t the same thing, of course, not by a long stretch. He wanted Alice to be a better person. All Alice wanted was, what? Another playmate? No, he didn’t really believe that. What, then? To make him happy? He was happy—and if he wasn’t, it was because he saw how society treated him and his kind. The frozen had to hang together, watch out for each other, care about each other.

And how had he just cared about Alice?

He found himself staring into the glass, and the distorted self-image in the vodka. He pushed the glass down the counter and left the kitchen. Once he got his clothes in order and found his keys, he dashed out of the apartment, heading to the garage.

Andrew had no idea what to say to Alice once he caught up with her. Whatever it took to make her get inside, let him drive her home safe. He’d probably even tell her he was sorry: he was going to have to admit that eventually.

He drove his velomobile toward her condo, looking as far down the roads as he could without plowing into the light traffic. The few people he saw walking were all full-sizes. He turned onto a side street, and a hundred meters down the sidewalk he saw someone else.

Running. And being chased down. And tackled.

Andrew floored it as the plainly bigger assailant threw a hard punch. Fending off blows, he dragged his victim—and now there was no doubt who—toward a nearby alleyway.

But Andrew would get there first. Turning and braking, he brought his velo to a hard stop at the alley’s entrance, a second before the attacker would have gotten inside. Andrew groped under his seat for the tire iron he kept there, then swung the door open with a yell, flourishing his weapon.

It worked. The attacker didn’t see another kid: he saw his easy prey turning into a fight, and bolted. Alice managed to cuff him as he turned to run. Then she looked at Andrew, panted twice, and slumped to the sidewalk.

Andrew dropped the tire iron and knelt by her. Her dress was torn at the shoulder, one leg was scraped up, and a bruise was darkening on her cheek. Her eyes were staring at nothing.

“Alice, are you all right? Alice? He’s gone, Alice. Where did he hurt you?”

She blinked, and her head turned a little his way. “Take me home,” she droned.

“You sure? Maybe a hospital should look—”

Her voice rose toward a shriek. “Home!”

Andrew bundled her into the back seat, and drove as fast as he dared. He scanned the streets once or twice for a fleeing figure, hoping for the chance to run him over. He babbled to Alice, saying it’d just be a couple minutes. He hadn’t the nerve to say more.

He walked her into the lobby, supporting her on one arm. At the elevator bank, she fished her ID card out of a pocket and swiped it. “He didn’t search my pockets,” she said, still toneless. “He wasn’t robbing me. He wasn’t going to rob me.”

“He didn’t get to do anything else,” Andrew said. The doors opened, and he got her inside the car. She gave the voice interface her floor, and hung onto him hard on the way up.

Four steps from her door, her feet slowed. “You—you came after me.”

Andrew said nothing. Only when Alice had her door open could he reply. “I’m sorry I had to.”

Alice’s look held all the trauma of that night. She slipped through the door, not opening it wide. Inside, she gave a trembling “Mom.”

“Alice! What ha—”

The door shut in Andrew’s face. He made as to knock and follow her in, but he heard the rising adult voices inside. His nerve failed, and he was back in the elevator almost before he could think. The miseries of the last half hour crowded upon him, and his only consolation was that he had a big drink poured and ready when he got home.

* * * *

Andrew awoke with a hangover, or what felt like one. He had slept, in fits and starts, but felt as bad as he had last night. He called in sick to work, then threw himself back down on the bed, hoping to drift off. Ten minutes later he gave up, put on a robe, and went to the kitchen for coffee and something resembling breakfast.

The doorbell gave him a start. He went to the door, standing on his toes to look through the peephole, and saw Timothy McGirt there. Andrew opened right up, forgetting any enmity. “Mr. McGirt, how’s Alice?”

Timothy stalked in, backing Andrew up. “She’s got nothing worse than bruises and scrapes, physically. Emotionally, it’s too soon to judge the damage you did.”

Andrew stopped his retreat. “Me!?”

“You, Crawford, and you won’t be doing it again. You’re not going to see Alice any more.”

“First off, take a step back. Overbearing me with your height doesn’t impress me, so pull the bully act on someone else.”

“Don’t you play the poor little victim with me,” Timothy said. “I would have decked you already, if I didn’t have to bend over to do it.”

“I can always stand on a chair. Anyway, how about saving some of your venom for the guy who actually attacked her?”

“No, mister, you don’t get off that easily. Lauren and I have been trying for years to shield Alice from something like this.”

“Yes, I’ve noticed that,” Andrew broke in. “Nice racket you had, keeping her in constant fear.”

“And now she’s experienced some of what she had a right to fear. Do you—” He grunted, fighting off pain. “You saw her last night. Do you really think she’s better off now?”

Andrew’s mouth stood agape. He had no good answer.

Timothy’s voice began rising. “Do you really think she should expose herself to the world like anyone else? Ordinary predators are bad enough, but now we’ve got the perverts, multiplying like some disease. All these pushes to awaken the libidos of the frozen, the erosion of taboos against sexualizing the child-like, and they come flooding in, ready to use ... to abuse...”

The anguish came over him again. Andrew exploited the chance. “Then how could you have ever frozen her,” he demanded, “knowing what you’d be putting her through?”

Timothy looked stunned. “We didn’t know. We thought the world would be different for her. It’s so terrible how people have reacted.” He recovered, and glared down at Andrew. “But you? One of her own? How heartless could you be, sending her out into the night that way? I know: the fight. I heard. Alice won’t say why that fight brewed up, but I’ve got an idea.”

Andrew saw Timothy bunching up a fist. “That’s between us. And I’ll say it again: you can’t protect her forever. She’s got to face the world some day.”

“I know that! And she has to know why she needs to protect herself, from muggers, from rapists, from you!”

He was drawing his arm back, and Andrew was wondering whether to fight back or play the martyr, when his function-all rang from the living room. Andrew went to get it, not quite at a run. “No, this isn’t over yet!” Timothy said as he pursued.

Andrew picked up the function-all, read the ID on the screen, and froze in place. Before Timothy could catch him, he answered it. “Alice! Alice, I’m—”

“Is my father there?”

Andrew looked up at Timothy’s fuming face. “Matter of fact, he is.”

“Let me talk to him,” she said, as clipped as before.

With an ironic smile, Andrew offered the device. “It’s for you.”

Timothy snatched it away, his glare unaltered. “Alice, what is it? What’s wrong?” Andrew couldn’t make out Alice’s end, and he wasn’t going to get any closer to eavesdrop. He stayed still, following Timothy’s side of the conversation.

“Except that he threw you out to walk the streets alone at night.”

“Not before you got beaten, almost—”

“No, you’re not all right now, Alice! Wait, hold on.”

Timothy marched through Andrew’s apartment, finding the bathroom and going inside. Andrew arrived behind in time to hear the door lock. He reared back to pound on the door, then decided to listen. He caught snatches, when Timothy’s voice rose.

“—just luck that you weren’t hurt worse—”

“—move somewhere safer.”

“—can’t talk this way. I’ll—”

Andrew backed away from the door before Timothy opened it. He stormed straight out of the apartment, slamming the door just as Andrew exclaimed “Hey, my function-all!” He went into the bathroom and found it there, screen-down in the sink.

He wiped it down and called Alice’s number, but got only her veemail. He switched off without leaving a message, and briefly thought of chasing her father down to rebuke him. But no, he had an obligation to take care of. Timothy could wait: he’d still be a jerk later.

It had been years since Andrew had been inside a police station, but if anyone there remembered running him in from that protest, they said nothing. He filled out a report on the attack, giving the best description of the attacker he could piece together from memory. Then the officers began with their questions.

No, he couldn’t describe the attacker better. It was dark, and he hadn’t thought to bring his function-all to take pictures. Yes, she’s age twenty-nine, and frozen like him. And precisely what the hell business is it of yours what our “relationship” is?

His righteous offense was refreshing. He could finally vent some anger, make someone else uncomfortable. The officers did some gratifying cringing, and he let them off the hook before they thought about returning the indignation. He felt better, for a few minutes.

Back at home, he steeled himself to call Kazuo, and felt relief when he got his veemail. “Kazuo, it’s Andrew. I can’t go out to dinner tonight. There was ... trouble with Alice. The recital was great, but after ... maybe I should tell you about it another time. I really screwed this one up, Kaz. I—oh, hell.”

He confessed everything, trying to purge himself of the poisons inside him. He ended up feeling as he usually did after a bout of vomiting. “Anyway, I’d be no fun at dinner tonight, so I’ll spare you. Sorry to fill up your veemail file with all this. Talk to you later: maybe tomorrow, maybe ... well, bye.”

He stared a moment at his function-all, wishing he could take that outburst back, then put the device away in his bedroom. He didn’t want it near him, to be tempted into a similar performance. He got to the threshold, then ran back and called Alice again, but cut off before her end could even ring.

He spent the afternoon in a fugue. He nibbled a bit of lunch, watched a couple of programs, even did a bit of work when a guilty mood struck him. He never even looked at his alcohol cabinet, or touched the beer in the fridge. He wanted to save himself for a proper binge in the evening, so he could pass out and sleep through the night.

Just before six, as the call of beer began to sing in his ears, his doorbell rang. He was halfway to the door before thinking to dread who it might be. He had almost decided not to be at home when the knock and the voice came. “Andrew, you home?”

Andrew opened up. “Kazuo? What are you—”

“Didn’t eat already, did you?” Kazuo flourished his big takeout bag from Rajdhani’s.

“Um, no, but...” Kazuo was past him before he could say he wasn’t hungry. Then the first whiff caught him. “Didn’t you get my message?”

“Sure. You didn’t want to go out, so I brought dinner in.” Kazuo began unpacking the bag. “Are you going to stay miserable on principle, or are you going to eat?”

Andrew liked his principles, but he liked Indian better. He fetched plates and silverware. “What can I get you to drink?”

“I bought mango lassis. One’s for you, unless you’re going for something stronger.”

Andrew paused by the refrigerator, but the beer had quit singing by now. “I’ll take it.” He set up the tableware and pulled over the lamb saagwala. “This is really great, Kaz. You didn’t have to do this.”

Kazuo’s smile weakened. “Well, I kinda did, to start setting matters right. Naan, basmati, or saffron rice?”

“Basmati, of course. Give it. And set what right?”

Kazuo had trouble looking him in the eye. “My advice on women. I really messed that up, Andrew. I played along with your whole cynical take on things. That might’ve been okay for you, but I should have been thinking about Alice’s side.”

Andrew plopped down a last scoop of rice. “As I recall, you followed that advice with a serious plea for me to treat Alice differently. I don’t see how it’s your fault.”

“Because I didn’t start and end with that lecture. I was giving you two messages.”

“And who picked the wrong one to listen to? Besides, you never told me to, well, go for broke the way I did.”

Kazuo grimaced. “Given that I was reeling off ‘how to score with women’ pointers, it was kinda implicit.” He leaned his head on his hand. “I wish I knew how to apologize to Alice.”

Andrew hiked an eyebrow. “I thought that was my problem.” He chewed his first mouthful. “Are you gonna eat, or do I have to start cheering you up?”

Kazuo gave in and started on his chicken vindaloo. “Serious, though, I’ll go to Alice, take as much heat as you’d like, if that’ll help patch things up.”

“Just eat, Kaz. We’ll save the miracle working for a little later.”

* * * *

He awoke Saturday morning feeling almost as bad as the morning before. He got halfway through his first cup of coffee before getting the urge to call Alice again. A second later, he recalled his luck the last time he called, after Kazuo left the previous night. No veemail; not even a ring tone on her end. Her phone was shut off. He was shut out.

Andrew got through coffee and a slice of toast before his stomach rebelled and he abandoned breakfast. He got cleaned up in the bathroom, then stood staring at nothing for a few minutes, wondering what to do with the day. Each time his eyes drifted toward the mirror, he turned them violently away. He wouldn’t say so to Kazuo, especially after last night, but his friend’s gesture hadn’t helped that much.

Finally he walked out of the apartment, into a warm, overcast morning that felt like rain. His intent, as far as he had one, was to walk to Alice’s condo and force some kind of resolution there. It would probably end up a worse debacle than yesterday, but he had no better ideas.

Somewhere along the way, he realized his feet had carried him off the path to Alice’s. He was about to change course, when he heard a child’s playful shout nearby. It was from the neighborhood park, right across the street, almost empty from the early hour and threat of rain.

Andrew stared that way for a moment, then headed over. The few kids and one adult paid him no attention as he walked across the grass and onto the packed dirt of the playground. Finding an empty swing set, he sat leadenly in one of them, motionless. When he began pumping his legs, it came awkwardly, a motion long abandoned, almost forgotten.

He concentrated on the sensation of swinging, waiting for some new feeling. He gave it a few minutes, but it would not come. He didn’t feel his cares falling away, didn’t feel the simple joy of the moment wash over him. He didn’t feel eight. He didn’t even feel a mere twenty-seven.

He let his momentum give out, then rocked himself in place with his toes. He stayed there a long time, even during a drizzle that cleared out the rest of the playground. He kept rocking, and waiting.

Andrew heard the footsteps, but didn’t look up. He was sure—and he had no idea how to start. He said nothing until a pair of sneakers came into view right next to him: low-tops today.

“Did you know I’d come here?” Alice asked him.

He finally raised his head. A bruise still disfigured her left cheek, and gloom tarnished the rest of her face. “I thought ... I guess it seemed the right place to find you,” he said. “Are you feeling better?”

Alice shrugged. “No pain that aspirin doesn’t help.” She eased herself onto the swing next to his, on his left so he only saw her unblemished side. “Andrew—”

“No, don’t say anything yet. I have a lot of apologizing to get through first.” He watched his scuffing feet. “I should have listened the first time you warded off my advances. I should never have said you were being a child. And I should have seen you home safely if I had to tie you up and put you in the back seat to do it. I’m terribly sorry for all those things, and more.”

“Not driving me home wasn’t your fault, Andrew,” Alice said. “I walked out. If you didn’t stop me, it’s because I upset you so much over wanting to reform you.”

“No. You didn’t.”

“Don’t deny it. I saw how much I wounded you. If anyone should apologize—”

“It was an act!” he cried. “The only reason I lashed out that viciously is because I was doing all the things I accused you of doing. I was trying to remake you, Alice.”

Alice fell silent. Andrew made himself look at her, though it made his heart wither.

“The first time I saw you wasn’t at your home. It was here in this park. I saw you while I walked to work. I could tell you were an adult, and I thought it so ... so beneath you to act like a child. Every time afterward that I’ve seen you, it’s been through that lens.

“I wanted something better than this—” He waved his arm across the playground. “—for you. I still do, God help me, even after getting to know other aspects of you.” He heaved a sigh. “It’s tough to reconcile the Alice who programs AIs and whose flute makes me want to weep with joy, and the Alice who climbs monkey bars and lives with her parents. I haven’t managed it, and I’m sorry.” His eyes sank back to the dirt. “So sorry.”

Alice took her time speaking. “How long are we supposed to live, Andrew?”

“Hm? Nobody really knows. A minimum hundred and fifty years, likelier two hundred.”

“I’ve heard as much as three hundred. In all of those years ahead, we’re going to see more medical advances. Odds are, one of them will extend our lives again, probably long enough that we’ll be able to exploit the next big advance, and the next, and so on. We may not get actual immortality, but there’s a half-decent chance we’ll outlive the millennium.”

Andrew stirred his head enough to see Alice. She was strangely somber for someone with a thousand years to live.

“From the articles I’ve read, the next big leap should come within fifty years, easily soon enough for our benefit.” She paused. “But not soon enough for my parents. Within a few decades, I’m going to see both of them die, Andrew. And then, I will have to live the rest of my years—of my centuries—without them.” A mist came over her eyes, then passed. “Maybe that explains why I’m holding on so tightly to them, while I can.”

Andrew took a while digesting this. “No offense,” he said carefully, “but from what I’ve seen, they’re the ones with a tight grip.”

Alice nodded. “I think they really expected me to live forever. I know they expected the world to re-order itself around our existence. Neither one happened, not yet, so they’ve put a lot of effort into keeping me safe and sound, doing what they thought freezing me would accomplish.”

“They were wrong. The world never adjusts itself to you. You have to go and adjust the world.”

“Or adjust yourself.” She had started to swing herself, and Andrew unconsciously kept pace. “I’ve never known what to make of you, Andrew. You’ve got a strength of personality I admire, but you never seem to notice when it goes from helping to hurting. I want to be like you sometimes. Other times, I feel like I need to save you, from yourself.”

Andrew smiled lopsidedly. “So it was my forceful personality that attracted you.”

“Partly. That and ... other reasons, not as profound.”

He felt a prickle of embarrassment. People couldn’t help falling for a pretty face. For once, he didn’t mind so much.

“What’s going to happen between us, Alice?”

Alice pulled up her legs, letting her momentum run down. Andrew let his feet scuff the dirt to stop his swinging. When Alice replied, she was looking up at the sky, as though hoping some better answer would fall from the clouds.

“We’re going to walk away from each other. We’re going to figure out who we are, where we’re going with our lives, without the distraction of considering how it will affect someone else. Once that’s done, maybe we’ll feel different about each other, or maybe we won’t. We can go from there.”

Andrew swallowed. “How long?”

“Whatever we need. Weeks, months, more. We have a lot of time.”

She hopped off her swing, with Andrew a beat behind. He struggled to say something, until she gently took his hand. “Goodbye, Andrew,” she said, and started to walk away.

“Wait. Can I at least walk you home?”

“I’m okay,” she said without turning. “I’ve never felt in danger going home from the park.”

“Still, I—”

Now she turned. “Andrew, don’t make it harder. Goodbye.”

He stood watching her walk away for a long while. She was at the corner, about to cross, when she looked back. He couldn’t see her expression for the distance, and she quickly turned away to cross the street.

He felt too brittle and hollowed-out to move. The swings beckoned, at least as somewhere to sit for a while. Then a boy ran up and jumped onto the swing he’d been occupying. The moment had passed. He started for home, giving Alice’s swing a parting push.

* * * *

That was three months ago. Time enough for some pains to fade; time enough for many things to change.

Andrew had spent most of that Saturday morning tracking down faults on an order form at his company’s website. He hadn’t done any work on Saturdays until recently. Neither had he been doing it from home.

The company was rethinking its policy on telecommuting, and office rumors had it that Tiffany Albano had spurred their reassessment. While she said nothing about that, she was dropping hints about looking forward to retirement in a few years. Andrew would have a shot at taking her place as webmaster, if he proved his worth. That meant putting in a few extra hours a week, to lay some groundwork.

But he had laid enough for today. The order form had stopped acting up, so he could knock off with a clear conscience. He shut down the machine and left his bedroom office, to fix himself an early lunch.

Midway through making his sandwich, he stopped. He hadn’t once thought about how the placing of the refrigerator or the cabinets was different, because it hadn’t felt different. He’d been living at Evergreen just over a month now, and finally it was feeling like home. Kazuo’s vision had come true.

That thought made lunch quite jolly for him. He’d have to mention that to Kaz today sometime. Indeed, he’d probably mention it when he called his parents in half an hour.

He had made the first contact two months ago. They were both in reasonable health: his father had had no sequel to that mild heart attack four years ago. Andrew hadn’t expected to feel as relieved as he was—at least that he wouldn’t have to feel too guilty.

They talked every other weekend now, as awkward as that usually felt. There was a notion of meeting, but his parents weren’t inclined to travel the several hundred miles from Connecticut. Less wasteful for him to make the trip east, they hinted. The old tensions were still there, and Andrew’s lone concession was not to push things to a blow-up.

Andrew dodged their questions about why he had ended the estrangement. He didn’t mention her name once. All he admitted was that he had been seeing a frozen woman for a while. “Didn’t really work out,” closed the topic, and they hadn’t tried to reopen it.

He didn’t reopen it now, even in his own thoughts. He pulled over a magazine to skim, occupying his mind while he finished his sandwich.

One bite from the end, he heard a commotion in the hallway. “New tenant,” he guessed. Plenty of people were still moving into the half-full Evergreen. He carried his crust to the door, thinking of greeting a new neighbor.

Several movers were in the corridor, handling large boxes on dollies. A pair of them carried one through the door two units down, barely squeezing it inside. Andrew squinted to read the label on the nearest box. Computer Parts.

Another loaded dolly arrived. Whoever was moving in owned a lot of computers, Andrew thought, or one really big one.

Something clicked in his head. No. It couldn’t be.

But then he heard it, around the corner, probably by the service elevator. It was a girl’s voice with an adult cadence, no rarity here. And it was much more.

He slipped back inside before she could appear, and downed the last of his sandwich with a hard gulp. Kazuo, he thought. Their last two dinners, he’d been making a show of keeping some secret. Andrew thought it had involved Luna, and Kazuo had seemed to encourage the assumption. That sneaky SOB.

So she’d moved to Evergreen. If nothing else, she had pried herself out of the death-grip. What else it meant wasn’t at all clear, save for one thing. She knew he lived here, and came.

Andrew dropped himself into his softest chair. He was excited, and scared—and somewhere beneath that, he thought he was glad. She didn’t despise him, not enough to stay away. Whether she still held some of those old feelings, he couldn’t say. He wasn’t even sure about himself.

But he was going to find out, soon enough.