Hailey looks around warily as she steps onto Galileo High's campus. So far her gambit's worked. She was enrolled as a girl. All it took was enduring a year and a half of doubled beatings and refusing to reveal a single damned thing about where she was keeping her hormones or how she was paying for them or who she was getting them from.

Chump change compared to getting to be herself. S'not like there's a no beatings option, yeah?

Now all she has to do is pass. Let no one figure out she's actually trans. Or at least no one who'll tell Uncle Carter. She has yet to meet anyone trustworthy and doesn't expect that to change.

Starting her hormones before she turned thirteen will help.

At least Byron didn't have the grades for Galileo, so she doesn't have to keep hers below his anymore.

There are some upsides here, at least. 

She has a list of classes in her hand but she'll have to get her schedule in homeroom. She's supposed to go to room 103 in the math building. Her homeroom teacher is apparently Mr. Franklin. Part of the introductory materials included a map. She also has a locker in the same building if she wants to use it.

She'll use it for her textbooks, at least. Nothing personal, though. And not until she's gotten her schedule, no point in making an extra trip.

She heads for homeroom, picks a seat at random, sinks down into it, backpack thumping down beside her. She's wearing a black t-shirt printed with a ribcage in white, black jeans, and army surplus boots.

Elemi makes her own way into the homeroom. She has a bright red turtleneck shirt paired with a light blue skirt long enough to cover the top of her rainbow crew socks. She doesn't have any reason to pick a particular seat but they're both on the early side so she'll sit next to Hailey, maybe she can make firends. "Hello."

Oh damn someone's trying to befriend her? She probably should've expected this, but nobody's tried since Byron beat the inclination out of everyone in elementary school. Forgive her for being surprised.

"...Hi," she manages after a moment. There, she greeted someone. After a delay. With a suspicious and anxious look on her face. She's amazing at this.

She has no idea how to make friends or if she should even try.

Elemi's mother trained her to recognize emotions even without her powers so she catches both of the undercurrents. A bit of uncertainty graces her own face. Neither of those emotions is a reason to stop trying to reach out though. "I'm Elemi, what's your name?"

"Hailey."

Fuck. What does she say? 

"What classes do you have?"

Oh good, "I've got Stars and Planets with Mrs. Galacia, Intro to Proofs with Mr. Franklin, Honors composition with Mr. Parker, Pre-Modern History with Ms. Diggle, Myriad Visual Arts with Mr. Branch, Accounting with Mr. Row, Drama with Ms. Schwartz and of course Exercise, that one doesn't have a teacher listed so I think they must rotate or have multiple teachers."

She looks at her own paper. "Looks like I've got the same teachers for Stars and Planets, Proofs, and History. No clue on gym until we get our schedules, of course."

Oh that'll be fun. Hopefully she can change in the bathroom?

"Other than those, I've got Mr. Jones for Composition, Ms. Michaels for Art, Ms. Williams for Shop, and Mr. Kennedy for Python."

"Oh cool, hopefully we have those together. Do you already speak some French or are you starting fresh?"

More kids are starting to trickle in but since Hailey and Elemi are already talking the others give them space. A few people are walking in with friends but others seem alone. Occasionally someone will enter spot someone they know and go to sit next to them.

"I speak a little. Had it in middle school."

Wow this girl is actually trying to fucking befriend her? Weird. No accounting for taste, she guesses.

"Where'd you go before this?"

"I speak fluently. If you need help, you need but ask." She says in French.

"I was homeschooled," she says a bit shyly. "I'm really looking forward to meeting so many people and making friends."

"Thank you," she manages in reply. "I hope making friends works out for you. So far my experience has been that people suck, but maybe high school will be better."

She looks a bit shocked and then a little sad at Hailey's declaration. For just a moment her control slips. She finds Hailey's eyes and in the split second before she gets back control Hailey can sense those emotions and the tiniest moment of chagrin and panic. It's easy enough to dismiss as just seeing the emotions on her face, because they are there too. Elemi blushes for a second though which might be a clue to something different.

"I hope your experience of people gets better." Elemi forcibly clears the blush from her cheeks and tries to pretend nothing happened.

For that moment of connection, Hailey's mind bubbles with bitterness, resignation, and old hurts, before a brief spark of surprise.

That... is clearer than people's emotions normally are for her, and she pays a lot of attention to people's emotions (it's the best way to know when someone's about to take a swing at her, you see). Huh.

It's probably nothing though.

"Yeah, that'd be nice. Maybe I'll get lucky. You seem nice, at least."

Left unsaid is her immense doubt that this possibly-good luck will continue. It never does.

She smiles genuinely at being called nice. "You seem nice too. I wish the world was better for you."

Calling Hailey nice earns a skeptical look. "Me? Nice? Sure you don't have me mixed up with someone else?"

"You're trying your best even though you're not used to this. And you're doing that for someone you just met."

"Heaping pile of ulterior motives." Yeah, making sure her scheme to get her name change and attend as herself doesn't fall apart.

She probably shouldn't be arguing this. This is dumb. But her competitive streak doesn't exactly listen. Besides, the sooner Elemi figures out she's an awful bitch, the sooner she can find friends that are actually nice.

"You could have just ignored me, and I'm pretty sure you don't have any reason to think I'm more important than any other classmate."

"I could have. Maybe I have some shred of hope left in me after all." She arches an eyebrow. "Are you?"

"I might be," she says mysteriously. She's enrolled as Elemi Brooks instead of under her name but she doesn't know how long that will hold up.

She sighs hard and shakes her head.

Then something that might be a wry smile stretches across her lips.

"Ugh, stars, a mystery. Now I've got to figure you out."

There's a short moment of real alarm on her face... she didn't really think this through. But then she steadies herself, it's at least partially a joke. "I wish you the best of luck with that."

Okay that alarm is a sign she is important. This girl is not good at this.

"Oh relax," she half-teases, half-reassures. "I don't want money or power or whatever it is you've got."

She doubts the girl has a convenient way to never go back to the Walston home. That's the only thing she's got on her realistic wishlist.

"I'm just bad at not digging into things. If I tried, it'd keep poking at me."

She gives a small smile, "You'll have to tell me what you figure out then." Hopefully she'll stop at the more mundane secrets like her name. Elemi reaches over and fiddles with her braids a little. "What about you? Any secrets I should be trying to figure out?"

"Oh definitely not. Nope."

She's obviously lying. Not remotely trying to hide the fact.

Maybe it's the fact that she's secretly been desperate for an actual friend, or maybe it's the fact that this girl seems weirdly harmless, but she doesn't feel like living a lie with her. At least not fully.

If she turns out to suck, she can just make sure she only knows red herring secrets. And if that doesn't work she was doomed anyway.

"I won't dig if you don't want me to. And if I notice something anyway, I'm not in the habit of sharing people's secrets."

Before Hailey has a chance to respond the bell rings and the teacher stands up from his desk. He gives the students a few seconds to settle down before he speaks. "Hello everyone and welcome to Galileo High. I'm Mr. Franklin."

There's a brief rush of fear at the thought of being outed to the school, and what her aunt and uncle might do about that, but she doesn't let it show on her face.

Instead, she tilts her head ambiguously at Elemi, and pays attention to her homeroom teacher.

The rest of the students settle down quickly enough. "Alright, I'll be taking attendance and passing out your schedules. Please pass the schedules backwards until they reach the right student. Then I'll explain some of the quirks of the school here." He picks up an attendance sheet. "Abbot"

A girl somewhere behind them calls "Here."

Attendance continues from there. Mr. Franklin passes schedules to kids in the first row based on where each student is sitting. There's twenty students here so it takes a while.

Simple enough. She participates in the rituals of homeroom. What classes does she have before lunch, and when's gym?

Her schedule doesn't seem to align with days of the week, but the teacher soon resolves any confusion on that front.

"For today we'll be running a modified Day 2 Schedule with homeroom moved to the start of the day. The schedule will rotate as normal from there with the Day 3 Schedule tomorrow. As a reminder, attendance will be taken at study halls. And you are required to remain on school grounds even during I blocks.

That means her schedule for today is: Composition, Python, Gym, Lunch, History, Stars and Planets.

Interesting. Okay, she can work with that. She takes some notes about her schedule. Does Elemi seem to have any interesting schedule reactions?

If she reads it at all she reads it very quickly. Then she puts it away. She doesn't have much of a reaction. She already knew what classes she was taking so when isn't too important.

Is this the kind of homeroom where they talk, or are they mostly getting a briefing on what school is like?

This time it seems more of the latter.

"I Block is an exercise in trust that the school is placing in you. You're expected to use it either under faculty supervision or working quietly in one of the various common areas. Some school clubs schedule meetings during I Blocks. As long as you use it responsibly you'll continue to have the freedom to use it however you want. If we find that trust is misplaced you will be assigned a study hall during that time.

"For the most part this homeroom will be time that you can use however you want but attendance is again mandatory, and if you get too loud I will have to enforce stricter rules. Also when I do have important announcements I'll need you to pay attention. Does anyone have any questions?"

Hailey does not have questions about any of this. Hailey wants to know if she'll be able to change in the bathroom instead of the locker room for gym, or whether the locker room has stalls, but that is not a question she can just ask. 

She also wants to know if any of the counselors are going to ask her questions that will require answers that lead to more beatings. Again, not a question she can ask.

She'll have to wait and see, she guesses.

Elemi doesn't ask any questions either.

A couple other students have clarifying questions that Mr. Franklin answers. Then after there's no questions for a time.

"Okay, feel free to talk quietly amongst yourselves. Next block will be soon."

She looks over to Elemi. "Wanna compare?"

"Sure." She takes her schedule back out and hands it over.

They have the same blocks for Proofs, Stars And Planets, Exercise and Pre-modern history.

"Looks like we've got some classes together," she remarks when she gets her schedule back. "That's neat."

"It is, and we even have a few of them today."

"We do. If they go well enough, maybe I'll even tell you about how I'm secretly a witch."

She's not a witch. Life would be so much easier if she was. Also why the fuck is she cracking jokes about this, Aunt Eloise would throw a pan at her.

"Somehow I don't believe you."

"Wise," she replies with a laugh.

Elemi giggles.

The bell rings again.

"I'll see you in Exercise class."

"See you then."

Off she goes to Composition. Probably first day classes are all very introductory?

Yep, lots of teachers talking about course outlines and in some cases handing out books.

Outlines and handbooks are accepted and noted down.  Soon enough it's time for gym. What's the deal with the locker rooms? Does she have an option for "discreetly change without outing herself" here? Are they even changing today?

It looks like they aren't changing today. To start off with they're being assigned gym lockers.

The locker rooms have individual shower stalls for the people who want to shower after class. If you're shy about your body you can use one of those or a toilet stall. Towels are provided and they need to be returned before you leave the locker room. They are expected to ensure they have gym clothes for each class and to take them home and clean them regularly.

If they show up for class without appropriate clothes then they will be marked with a zero for that period. Here's what we mean by appropriate clothes. Also here's an outline of what we're going to be covering this semester. It's an overview of the other offerings. In subsequent semesters you get to focus on what you're most interested in.

Huh. This may actually not suck. She's pleased. Hooray for not getting outed in the first week?

And the gym clothes she has seem to be appropriate. Amazing.

Maybe she'll stand with Elemi while all this crap is explained.

Elemi is happy to stay close. "Hi." She whispers.

"Hi. How were your earlier classes?" she whispers back.

"A little boring but the teachers seemed nice enough and the other students were reasonably friendly."

"Same but I didn't bother trying with the students."

She nods. "I'm not surprised."

"You looking forward to any particular unit of gym?"

"The games ones. I'm already familiar with stretching and how to use weight machines."

"Yeah, the games will at least be more active and fast-paced. Yoga counts as exercise, sure, but I don't think it's gonna be very fun."

"Do you have any favorite games?"

She takes a moment to respond.

"Feel like I've got a better shot at them now, so we'll find out together."

"I'll look forward to that then. Are there any classes you're looking forward to?"

She hums for a moment. "Shop. Make things, and gain skills I could use soon."

"Oh? Do you have particular projects in mind?"

"Not really. Maybe a little personal lockbox? Maybe something to seal a notebook? Probably can't make anything durable enough, though."

"Anything made with tools can be unmade. Not always without destroying whatever it's protecting though." She agrees.

She nods and sighs. "Hard problem."

"Yep, that's why banks exist. And security guards. It's definitely not as convenient though. And it's not as cool as making something yourself either."

"Unfortunately, fourteen-year-olds cannot independently rent deposit boxes."

"A lot of things are like that. It's downstream of contract law. Well some of it is at least. This one probably is."

"It also seems to be a consequence of the fact that we're considered the property of our parents or guardians. Or at least treated that way."

She huffs.

"I try not to think about that."

"I wish I had that option," she replies with a scowl at the world.

"I wasn't allowed to leave home except when closely supervised until this year. School is a new opportunity. I don't know what you're dealing with but maybe it can be a refuge for you too. At least for a while."

"Maybe this school will be different. That would be nice."

"I hope it is."

The teachers finish their spiel and tell everyone they can go to lunch early or hang around until their next class. They'll be available to answer questions if people still have them.

She does not have questions. "Wanna head to lunch?"

"Sure. I figured I would try what the school is offering at least once before I start packing lunches."

She nods. It would be nice if she had the option of packing lunches without a troublesome risk. Her relatives suck.

"Yeah, I'm really glad there's free lunch. Hope it's good."

"Me too."

The lunch lines aren't yet open for the second block when they get there. Apparently they close to do some restocking and cleaning between official lunch periods.

Valid of them. She finds someplace to sit with a wall on one side so she's less exposed.

Elemi starts to scooch in next to her.

Um.

Shit how close is Elemi going to sit fuck fuck fuck.

If she's not too close than maybe this is an advantage but fuck.

Hailey watches how close Elemi sits.

Elemi will stop with a good 35cm or so of margin. (1'2" for people more comfortable with imperial units.) Close enough that they could touch arms if they moved in the right ways but not close enough that touch is inevitable.

Shit.

She tries to keep it together but nope.

Aaaaaa.

She murmurs quietly and rapidly to Elemi, trying to avoid how obvious whispering can be, but trying to be hard to overhear, and not remotely doing a good job of avoiding run-ons. "Okay fuck I do not want to have to explain but touching people hurts and I don't know why well I know why why but I don't know the how and someone sitting this close is makin' me anxious but sitting on my side like that could block off more people I don't know fuck."

"Oh, sorry." She moves further away to about 60cm (A bit less than 2') "I'll be careful. We could wait outside instead if you wanted."

She takes careful breaths, trying to slow down. "Ugh fuck I overshared that."

Pant, pant, sloooooower, c'mon.

"Yeah, that might be good, or at least after we get the food," she replies after she gets her breathing a little more under control.

"I already said I would keep your secrets. And being outside is nice. It's a warm September."

"You did, but I've known you for one day. If I'm already oversharing I clearly need to get my shit together or half the school will know everything inside a month."

Elemi pauses to think about that. "Is the over sharing you telling me that being touched hurts or the partial explanation or both?"

"Both."

Any exposure is a potential risk. Anything could get back to her aunt and uncle.

"How do you handle hallways without letting on? I guess showing something on your face is different from saying it out loud."

"Mostly I just brace myself before leaving the classroom, grit my teeth, and suffer."

"I'm sorry, that sounds awful." She wishes she could help but even if she was being open about her powers that sounds like the kind of deep work that would need changevine or mind bees. And she doesn't have a lot of practice with those. Maybe she should practice more.

"Yeah, it kind of is."

Elemi already knows she's weird and broken, this much getting back to her aunt and uncle would already earn her more time with his belt, maybe she can afford to say a tiny bit more.

"It might get a little easier if I managed to move out."

Can she help with that? If she pitches it as a practice project her mother might let her use some family resources.

"Do you have any more specific goals than just out? I might have some way of helping but I can't make any promises."

Does she dare hope?

"Never see my relatives again," she murmurs.

She has other goals than that, but that makes everything else easier, and she doesn't know how Elemi feels about trans people.

Practicing blackmail and manipulation is absolutely something her mother would support. She's not entirely sure it would work in this case and she's a little reluctant to commit to hurting people she hasn't met but it's a better chance than framing it as helping Hailey.

Her mother will absolutely see right through her but she'll appreciate it if it Elemi makes the attempt. She does want Elemi to be better at lying.

How much of this can she say? If she's going to talk to her mother having shared family secrets will make everything worse.

"I can't explain, at least not yet. And if I do try... I don't know quite what it will turn into. It's hard to keep secrets from my mother and she and I don't always see eye to eye." And isn't that an understatement. "I guess it comes down to what you're willing to tell me, what you're willing to risk and how much you're willing to pay... probably as a debt for that last one."

She arches an eyebrow in surprise for a moment, not having expected an offer, then frowns suspiciously. "I... don't know how to feel about that. Last time I tried only made things worse."

Worse how? She wonders but doesn't ask. "I won't do anything for now then. Maybe I'll get better at keeping things from my mother. Or find other ways to try helping. I won't do anything without your permission though."

She scowls and looks down at her hands, shoulders tensing.

"All that needs to be said about last time is that I still live with them, and my back paid the price for trying."

Elemi's eyes widen at that. If she was looking in Hailey's eyes she might have lost control again. So the abuse is physical. That... doesn't actually make it worse, easier to prove maybe but not worse. And it is clearer that it's abuse. She wasn't sure before. That makes her more willing to do something.

"Are you willing to tell me what you tried before?"

She takes a slow breath.

When she eventually speaks, it's slow and quiet and toneless. "Tried three times. Once, first-grade teacher turned out to be a member of Aunt Eloise's bridge club, asked her about what I'd said. Second-grade math teacher actually asked me about it, reported to a social worker, but Uncle Carter somehow got word about when the social worker was coming and made me clean everything up. They "passed". Last time, third-grade thought he could reason with them. This obviously failed."

"My mother says official channels are unreliable." That's... edging towards a secret but mother also says it's a widely held belief.

She huffs and nods. "Your mother's right about that, at least."

"I hope I can find a way to help."

"If you think you can get something done without them finding out until it's too late to stop you, if you're sure of that, you can try."

"I'll see what I can figure out." Them not being allowed to find out might rule out blackmail. Her mother says people react unpredictably to blackmail. She would need to have a backup plan.

"We'll see what happens."

She'll see how many new scars she gets for trying this.

Elemi lapses into silence for a bit. She was hoping her mother was presenting the world as being worse than it was. Of course, Hailey's relatives might not be representative. She still doesn't agree with her family's priorities but if they're right they at least make more sense.

Hailey's fine sitting in silence as well. There may be good people in the world, but she sure as fuck doesn't live with any of them.

Enough moping, "What do you do for fun? I do a bunch of reading and watch TV but I also like dancing."

She arches an eyebrow. "Well, once in a while I manage to make it to the library despite my aunt and uncle's best efforts. I've never had a chance to watch TV before. Haven't danced either. Walks are maybe nice."

"I guess that wasn't the best question. Maybe I can teach you some dancing or take you to a movie sometime. If you can spend that much time away from home."

"I will happily spend every second away from that house I can get away with. And many I can't."

"You're more able to avoid going home now that you're in high school then?"

"Slightly. Mostly I'm resigned to the fact that they'll make up an additional chore to punish me for not having done if it seems like I had fun, or if I complain too much about not having fun. Might as well have the fun if they're gonna punish me anyway."

"I can agree with that. I have my own reasons to spend more time away so I'll be happy to spend it with you."

"Huh. Maybe I'm actually managing to make a friend. Fuckin' weird."

"Oh good, I thought that was happening."

"I guess getting to try again is a perk of going to a different school from Byron now."

She does not like her cousin at all.

"I'm glad you're trying."

She smiles slightly back at Elemi. "Yeah."

How's the cafeteria setup looking?

Now that it's opened it looks like there's trays and a few different stations. There's some hand fruit, a couple prepared salads, a selection of pre-made sandwiches and a buffet section which today has mac & cheese, some kind of breaded chicken, roasted vegetables, and tomato soup. Everything seems to be self-serve though there are cafeteria workers standing behind the stations.

All this and it's free???

This maybe solves her food problems.

"Okay the cafeteria looks seriously promising."

The school is very well funded. The cafeteria is also open for breakfast.

It's nothing fancy but that's honestly part of the charm. Not everything need to be perfectly nutritionally balanced. Elemi takes a little of everything.

"Yeah it looks well made. Hopefully it tastes good too."

She laughs as she loads up a tray with a bigger helping of everything. She's going to try everything, and get herself well and truly full for once in her life.

"This much free food for lunch and breakfast makes my life a lot easier," she murmurs as she grabs food.

Elemi carefully balances her tray as they leave the serving area. "So, outside then?" There are some picnic tables outside a nearby door along with various places they could sit on the ground or on stone walls. In theory they could also go back to the main outdoor area but that would require going past more people in a rapidly filling cafeteria.

She nods, still smiling at the thought of getting to eat well on the regular. "Yeah, outside." She leads the way toward the nearest door, carefully dodging anyone they pass close to, and looks for the least-exposed option she can manage. If there isn't a table that looks particularly good, she'll try for a particularly comfy wall to sit on or against.

That probably rules out the proper tables they're all placed with plenty of space on all sides. They could sit on the top of a small wall on the elevated patio that extends from the building, next to a small tree or at the bottom of one of the patio walls where it's at ground level.

Perched on a wall? She likes perching. To the wall.

She hops up lightly and settles atop it.

Elemi balances her tray on the wall and sits facing Hailey. She starts to eat her food. No need to talk right away.

She starts with a sandwich, digging into it with the ferocity of long food insecurity. She's not going to say much until she's asked a question, probably. Food is the priority.

Om nom sandwich.

Then they can eat in companionable silence for a while. Elemi has only had a few sandwiches before now so it's a relatively novel experience. The salad is well made if not quite as good as she's used to. The fruit tastes about the same maybe not quite as perfectly ripe. Everything else is fairly novel and she savors the novelty more than the quality.

She does also notice Hailey's eating. It's at least mild evidence in favor of food deprivation being another element of her abuse. She really didn't expect to be using what her mother taught her about identifying signs of abuse this soon. She suppressed a grimaces at her mother's reasons for teaching her those.

The sandwich doesn't last long, nor does the chicken, nor do the roasted vegetables. She finally starts slowing down a little by the time she gets to the salad, and patiently works through that and the mac. 

It looks like she's not going to leave any crumbs.

At some point along the way, she mumbles, "Better'n anything I've eaten that I didn't make."

"I'm glad you liked it. The food here is good. Much better than TV says school food is supposed to be." She supresses another frown at this additional clue. Hailey apparently cooks a lot but also seems like she's not getting enough food at home. That's a weird combination.

"Oh," nom nomf, "do TV schools usually have shitty food? Food at my last school costs money, so I never tried it."

Om nom macaroni.

"They do... it's a joke sometimes. Food being completely inedible. I assume that it doesn't actually get that bad even at schools that aren't as well funded as Galileo."

She shrugs and keeps eating. "Wouldn't know. Avoided the cafeteria. Ate on the roof when I had something."

"I'm assuming that you're saying that because you trust me but just in case if you're trying to hide the fact that you're being abused saying you sometimes didn't have lunch is probably something you shouldn't share."

She smiles thinly, wryly, and humorlessly. "You know enough to wreck me, no harm in telling you more. Either telling you was safe or I'm already fucked."

"I just wanted to make sure." It's not the best basis for trust but everything has to start somewhere. "Any particular highlights in your cooking journey? I haven't really cooked myself." It's possible this is another bad thing to ask about but Hailey did describe her food as well made so it seems worth the risk.

"Think I might like it if it was for people I didn't hate," she replies with a shrug. "Pretty good at roasts, fuckers like those a lot."

She nods at that. "Those can be good." She would mention letting Hailey cook at her house but she's not sure the staff would be okay with that and it would mean revealing the secret that she has staff at home. That's not a family secret but it would change things.

Having Hailey over would also tempt her into trying to help Hailey in ways that would absolutely reveal family secrets.

TV shows and books make it seem a lot easier to sustain conversation than she's finding it.

Hailey's honestly hard to converse with, what with being a damaged, inconsistent, bitter mess of a girl.

She sighs softly and polishes off the last of her food. "Hope I got lucky with you. We'll see."

She's probably fucked.

Too late to prevent it if so.

Right... Hailey doesn't actually trust her yet. And well maybe she's right to worry. If she gets tangled up in Elemi's mother's efforts it'll be a lot harder to escape than just waiting to turn 18.

"I hope so too."

"What're TV shows like, anyway?" she asks after a long moment.

"Well there's a lot of them. So they vary a lot, but they tend to be more fast-paced than books, like they're always trying to fit things in. The news is usually very serious, and I love watching interviews because it lets me practice figuring out what people are feeling. The more stressful ones are also a good way of practicing figuring out if people are lying.

"With fiction there's different levels of realism, some actors and actresses are really good at actually looking like they're feeling what their character is supposed to but others have kinda obvious tells. It makes it harder to watch shows with people our age in them. They don't have as much practice usually.

"Cartoons are better for that because it's more about voices and most people are better at controlling their voice than their face."

"Huh. Might be neat to see sometime."

She won't get the chance, but. Eh.

"Got a favorite?"

"It's hard to pick there's so many interesting shows, if I have to pick just one though... I think it's A Day In The Life. They interview so many kinds of people and show bits of what their lives are like. It's obvious that some of it's a bit staged and forced but a lot of it is genuine. And they're kind to the people they're featuring."

Kindness sounds fake.

But the show's maybe neat.

"Interesting. Maybe you can show me sometime."

"I'd like that, maybe I can bring in a tablet sometime."

"Let me know if you manage it."

She sips her drink, then asks, "Do you actually think you can manage something? What can you tell me about your plan?"

That... is a valid question. "Lemme think." What would it be okay for her to say? "You could call my mother a lobbyist. There's probably a better term for what she does specifically, but it's in the right neighborhood. And she wants me to follow in her footsteps. A big part of what that involves is finding ways to convince people to do what you want.

"I think she might see me trying to help you as a reasonable way to practice the skills she's trying to teach me but if she's treating it as a lesson she won't care if I succeed. And if she decides to take it seriously then she'll probably consider you to owe her for her help and I don't really know how seriously she would take that or what she would expect you to do. Either way if I tell her, or if she figures it out then I can't control what she'll do."