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that.”
    “Can I see a picture?”
    “We only have a few minutes—”
    Rose clasped Ms. Pratt’s hands. “Please?”
    “Oh, all right.” Ms. Pratt had several pictures on her phone, actually. “That’s my wife, holding Ethan—she took an extended leave to take care of him.”
    “She’s keeping him safe and sound.” Rose gazed at Ms. Pratt’s beautiful son.
    “Now let’s get back to you and Mr. Slocum,” Ms. Pratt said.
    “Today’s my last day of school service, and Mr. Slocum and I are going to have a nice, long talk. We’ll be peachy after that.”
    “Peachy, huh?”
    “My dad used to say that. Ask him, how are you, he’d say, peachy. I’d get mad and tell him, you can’t feel like a piece offruit! Anyway, why a peach? Why not an apple, or a tangerine?”
    “I have a feeling you weren’t the easiest child.”
    “Maybe so. But my dad never complained.” Rose leaned forward eagerly. “Ethan—what a great name. So what was he like on the plane ride home? Does he sleep through the night? I’d love to see him in person. Will you bring him to school?” Rose had more questions after that, and then the free period was over.
    At the end of her final day of school service, Rose plunged right in. Last chance! “Mr. Slocum, why don’t you tell me about yourself?”
    He glanced up from behind his computer. “Whatever for?”
    “You think I don’t listen—”
    “I don’t think it, Miss Hartel. I know it. Lately there’s been improvement, I’ll admit. But for all of September and most of October, you were off in la-la land.”
    “Not true. I’m sorry it looked that way.”
    “I had to send you to Ms. Pratt. Nothing personal,” he added.
    Nothing personal? He’d singled her out in front of the whole class for a trip to the school psychologist. “I’m here now—you can talk to me.”
    “Why should I want to talk to you now?”
    Mr. Slocum wasn’t making this easy. “Well, you’re a science teacher. Maybe you could tell me about . . . Mount Vesuvius.” She wasn’t sure why she’d said that; she’d never thought much about volcanoes, but for some reason it was there in her mind.
    Mr. Slocum glared at her; his big, round, shiny head turnedpurple. “I wasn’t an eyewitness to the destruction of Pompeii, if that’s what you’re implying.”
    “Of course not!”
    “Miss Hartel, you need six hours of school service. That’s the tenth-grade requirement, unless I’m such an old ruin I’m remembering it wrong.”
    Rose was afraid she might trigger another eruption here in the lab, but she pushed on. “Maybe you can tell me where you were born, why you became a teacher, that kind of thing?”
    He looked at her intently. “You’re quite full of yourself.”
    “Not true! I’m modest!”
    “Don’t sound so proud of it.”
    Maybe Rose should leave it alone, as Evelyn had suggested. Clearly Mr. Slocum wanted nothing to do with her. Still, it was important to try to get through, reach out to the humanity within. The best thing was probably to be direct. “You must be very lonely,” she said.
    But Mr. Slocum looked at her as if she was the one to be pitied.
    That night Rose and Evelyn went to work transforming the apartment. Selena had suggested battery-operated dancing skeletons and glow-in-the-dark pumpkins from Party-A-Rama. Rose had thought they could go shopping together, but Selena said, “Sorry, no time!”
    Evelyn was hanging a disco ball from the ceiling light. At lunch Astrid had said disco balls add atmosphere; they’d goneto a Caribbean place. Rose made a point of telling them that next time they really had to bring more cash.
    “Did you call the psychic?” Rose asked.
    “I did,” Evelyn replied.
    “I want to pay for her. Now that I have a job, I think that’s only right.” Evelyn really ought to get some sleep, Rose thought. Those bags under her eyes—she looked almost bruised. Evelyn was still relatively young and undeniably beautiful, and to look older and