"But we're totally gonna work out and be together forever," he adds.

She laughs and kisses him.

"It's not like you couldn't pay them back if they'd let you," she points out. "We're going to be insanely rich, we just have some awkward intermediate time."

"I suppose," he sighs.

"I hear you, I wouldn't be super comfortable with the reverse even if it weren't profoundly inadvisable for other reasons."

"Well a lot of my unease about the time between school and being able to blink someone into health stems from said reasons."

"When you're eighteen you can, if you have to, just take out a personal loan from a bank at a predatory interest rate. Some eclipsed do that. It's not the way to optimize your medium to long term earnings but it'll get your rent paid on a place while you learn your stuff."

"I'm not sure I don't prefer just going to college somewhere and then using my untold riches from future magery to pay off whatever student loans I need to. So far sounds like the best option, although working with that sex change company wouldn't be half bad for the interim either."

"Difference between college and a bank loan is that college expects time investment, spreads out the entire shebang. Plastic magery company doesn't look like they want your soul for twenty years signed in blood so they're a solid option too."

"Yeah but college is also fun and lets me get to know new people so there's that. And if we're still together by then—and we will be—whatever you end up doing will probably influence that a lot."

"What kind of influence do you mean?"

"Well, like, if you decide to go to college that will be incentive for me to also do that, if I can do it near you, because long-distance relationships are nnnnot ideal and no one's figured teleportation out yet."

"I'm pretty undecided on college but if I do go I'll probably pick someplace dense and urban, maybe New York."

"Oooh, New York!"

"Because I've never had a good chance to learn to drive, mostly, what with being at school away from home."

"Well, it can't be that hard, but big cities are definitely my thing."

"I'm not sure I inherited Renée's inherent love of cities but I may have her boredom with small towns."

"Isn't that in practice pretty much the same thing?"

"Not necessarily. Somebody could hate both and want to live in the middle of nowhere herding sheep."

"Oh, I'd kinda been lumping that one together with 'small town.'"

"Totally different aesthetic."

"I suppose. The only reason I can say I wouldn't die of boredom in either situation is that I have demonstrably not."

"Awww, pet." She ruffles his hair. "Are you done looking at booths?"