“Soon we're both frowning hard at the paperwork. "Middle name?" Noah says. "Does Gideon even have a middle name?""I don't know"Noah turns to me and says, "Do you have a middle name?" his glare implying that, if I do, this whole thing is somehow my fault."I...have no idea.""Primary language spoken at home." Noah makes a face. "What does this mean? Our primary language? Gideon's? That's sort of why we're here...""Um, it's under family, so I'm guessing ours?""Well..." Noah lowers his pen. The paperwork has defeated him. "What's our primary language?""English? ASL? Physical affection?""Food?" Noah says."Food's a good guess."He picks up the pen. "I'm writing food, comma passive aggressive.""Good call.”

“I want to tell her not to speak, want to say it, but her lips are on mine again and I taste me and I taste her and I don't taste what we're saying and I don't taste Noah. I taste Camus—I owe to such evenings the idea I have of innocence.”

“And I know, by Noah's face, that even though he knew it, he didn't believe it, even though we all knew it, we were all holding on, somehow, hoping they'd keep trying, that they could just keep on living and fighting. We trusted them to do that.”

“Craig,” he says, in that tone that’s like, I’m one step away from middle-naming you.”

“I hold my finger up to his lips. He flicks his eyes down to look at it."You're absolved," I tell him.He brings his eyes back up to mine. There's no fucking way he knows what that word means. That's a word I dream someone will say to me.So I put it in his language. "You're free.”

“Will coos, “Jo.” I pretend he’s saying my name. I pretend he’s calling me back.”

“He says, "But it is really whatever, you know? You've saved me way more times. And we call ourselves friends."It doesn't matter what we call ourselves, really. "You already saved me," I say."That was nothing.""I'm not talking about the cave."He wrinkles his nose."That first day," I say, "When you got up on the rocks to flirt with a human boy."He smiles big, with all his ground-down teeth shining.”