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“Should we look in on your friend’s mother?”
    Seth considered it, but decided against it. “None of our business,” he responded.
    They entered the building. Five flights up, Seth rapped a coded beat on the door. There was a rustling in the apartment. Through the door a muffled voice sang, “The time has come, the Walrus said, to talk of many things: of shoes—and ships—and sealing wax—of cabbages—and kings…”
    “Open the fucking door, Earl,” Seth said, pounding.
    Earl, in his boxers and tank top, looked like he just awoke from a long sleep. He showed them into the kitchen while ringing out his ear with a finger and said, “You know … the code’s for everyone’s protection, man.”
    “Is the insignificant other around?” Seth asked.
    “At work. Who’s the chick?”
    “Nobody. Ignore her.”
    “This is my place of business, man. How do I know she’s clean?”
    “You don’t.”
    “You think with your dick, man.”
    “Hey, can we get on with it? I’ve got deadlines.”
    Earl disappeared into the back room. They heard a window open and then the clang of boots ascending a fire-escape ladder. Seth sat next to a peeling radiator pipe on a wiry kitchen table chair.
    Seth pointed to the other chair and said, “This may take a while.”
    “I’ll stand, thank you.”
    “Really, make yourself comfortable. He has to go up to the roof, across two buildings, and down three apartments. Most paranoid fucker I ever met.”
    “Paranoia is just another form of awareness. These chairs do not look sturdy.”
    “I’ve sat in them a dozen times. They’ve never let me down.”
    “You’re mocking me.”
    “Suit yourself.”
    “You think I’m strange.”
    “Well, you’re beautiful—that makes you crazy by default.”
    Lelani took her overcoat off, revealing an olive turtleneck knit, blue jeans, and black riding boots. The pattern of her shirt ran vertically, hugging the contours of her body. Seth took measure of her in his professional capacity—too meaty for the scrawny centerfolds in his third-rate periodicals, since the camera added pounds, but perfect in reality.
    “You find me comely?” she asked, smiling.
    Seth blushed, a first for him. His world was full of promiscuous women, desperate for money, for whom no breach in decorum was likely. Lelani, however, had him on the ropes. He got the impression she knew something he didn’t—something profound. A face like hers could land the cover of Playboy . Red could have any straight man she desired, and convert a few souls from the other team as well. What did she want from him?
    “You still think you know me from before the accident that killed my folks?” he asked.
    “I recognize many things about you.”
    “People change.”
    “So far, I haven’t been surprised by what I’ve found. Character stays constant, and you are who you are. Incidentally, what is your trade?”
    “‘Mr. Picture Man.’ I’m a photographer.”
    “An artist? No one at school expected you to succeed. At anything.”
    “We went to school together?”
    “The best in Aandor.”
    “So I am Canadian?”
    Lelani’s watch alarm went off. She pulled a pill case from her satchel. “Does your friend have any tea?”
    Seth checked the refrigerator and found a can of iced tea.
    “Cold tea?” Lelani said, examining the can.
    “Beggars and choosers…”
    She placed a purple pill into her mouth, then washed the pill down with the tea. Seth wondered if it was Prozac or some other mind-stabilizing substance.
    “Vitamins?” he asked, innocently enough.
    “Allergies.”
    “Right. So tell me about our school. Did the girls wear those plaid micro skirts?”
    “Why you were permitted into our school is a subject of much speculation. There was no evidence that you were intellectually gifted. And no, you are not Canadian.”
    “Did you search for me just so you could insult my intelligence?”
    “I found you because you have a duty to complete for some very important