Shion buckled his seat belt. Nezumi did not.

It was cluttered in the cab of Nezumi's truck. Books littered the dashboard, were stuffed down the sides of the seats and crammed the space behind the cab that was usually filled with a cozy bed. There was one sleeping bag and one blanket tucked by Shion's feet; he was careful to keep his damp boots away from them. He placed his backpack on top to protect them. A strangely sweet smell was rising from the glove compartment, which had caution tape wrapped around it, and dangling from the mirror was a small glass wasp that glittered in a rainbow of colors when the light hit it just right.

Shion glanced at Nezumi, who was glaring at a scrap of paper and seemed to be calculating a timetable under his breath, and then reached over carefully and picked up one of the books that had been chucked on top of the dashboard. He peered at the cover. A Midsummer Night's Dream. He picked up another book. Mourning Becomes Electra. Another one. Hamlet. Waiting for Godot. Julius Caesar. The Glass Menagerie. Medea. Shion opened one of the books without looking at the title and found it to be full of notes in a cramped, jerky hand. Lines were highlighted, then underlined, then highlighted again in a different color. One line that had been particularly abused was almost illegible, but Shion squinted and held the book close to his face. The margins said Building emotion, passion restrained in that cramped script. They seemed to be notes on how to act when reciting the lines. Shion's lips moved as he read the words. "You said to me when my hand was on another man's cheek that there were all types and shades of love-But what is it, then, this very particular way in which you love me? What color? What temperature? And please do not say: you are my wife, I am your husband—"

The book was smacked out of his hand. "Don't touch my stuff."

"Sorry!" Shion said, clasping his hands together and clamping them between his knees so they wouldn't be able to take anything else off the dashboard. All of the books he'd accumulated slid off his lap and slapped the floor softly. He could feel himself starting to turn red again.

Nezumi twisted the key and, as the engine woke up angrily, he reached over and stabbed the PLAY button on the radio. There was a slow whirring and then a click, and music filled the car. Shion looked up. "Oh! I know this song!"

"Yeah? Congratulations. You should get a fucking trophy."

Shion ducked his head again. After a few moments, he started humming along. "All my… life I've… watched you dance along…"

"Stop that."

"Sorry."

Nezumi sighed. "All right, just… sit there and be quiet, okay?"

Shion nodded. "Sure. I can do that."

"Good." Nezumi took the truck out of park and immediately slammed on the gas.

"What are you doing!" Shion screamed, grabbing for the oh-god handle above the door.

Nezumi gave him a strange look. "I'm driving—"

"Look at the road, look at the road!" Shion yelled. "Oh gosh, no wonder Inukashi's always mad!"

Nezumi started laughing. It was a strange bubbling sound that turned into a rich belly-laugh that didn't seem like it would ever stop. His eyes were closed as he shook with mirth and Shion kept himself tense, scanning the road ahead frantically. Despite his fear, though, Shion kept being drawn back to the sight of this man laughing. His bangs were getting in his eyes. Shion thought for a fleeting second about brushing them out of the way, then held on even more tightly to the oh-god handle.

Nezumi took a breath. "Look, Shion, I've been driving these roads a long time, I know how they work. Oh god, you're face…" Nezumi snickered again, then calmed down. His face smoothed out into something sarcastic. It looked much more natural than the laughter had. "Let go of the handle, you'll rip it off and then Inukashi'll be pissed at me for it."

"Slow down then!" Shion said, not letting go. "You're twenty over the speed limit and visibility isn't good! You should be five above the limit, max!"

"Don't tell me how to drive."

"We'll get pulled over!"

"Cops won't be out in this weather."

"We'll skid! We'll die!"

Nezumi shrugged. "I doubt it."

"We will!"

"Relax, Christ, you're giving me a headache. Look, let me tell you a thing about ice road trucking. This may help you someday. I mean, not at this job, because there's no way I'm keeping someone with the rules of the road crammed up his asshole in my truck, but maybe someday." Nezumi reached over and yanked Shion's parka, then turned the music down so it was just a soothing hum. Shion unclamped his hands.

Nezumi stared out the windshield for a moment. "You get really weird nightmares on this job, okay? Like… what would happen if you fell asleep driving and then you wake up when you're already in a skid? Or you think the road's fine but it turns out to be ice. Thin ice. That's the kind of shit I—you start dreaming about. All these hypotheticals. Go ahead and let those scenarios play out in your head. Let the worst of the worst come at you. It stops scaring you after a while."

Shion remembered to close his mouth after a moment. "When does it stop scaring you?"

Nezumi looked like he hadn't heard for a moment. Then the song changed, he blinked, and he said, "I'll let you know when it happens. Mostly, you stay alive because you want to be alive. That's all I've got." He slapped the REWIND button on the radio now and, after a few second whirring, the CD skipped back. The song played again. And again. Nezumi played it five more times before he banged on the eject button and slid the CD into a book on his dashboard. Shion tolerated the silence a few more minutes. He noticed they were going seven miles over the speed limit but decided not to bring it up. He really, really needed this job, and he supposed that this meant he had to make Nezumi like him. He thought of what else they could talk about. Then, a small black rat appeared on the dashboard and saved Shion from having to make conversation.

"Who's that?" Shion asked. The rat was staring at him. Shion stared back.

"It's one of my rats," Nezumi said.

"One of them?"

"The others are around here somewhere." As Nezumi spoke, a pale brown rat appeared. Its color reminded Shion of some of the pastries his mother made. This one joined the black rat and the two of them now stared at him with their dark inkspot eyes.

Shion smiled at them. "Are they your pets?"

Nezumi smirked. "I guess. They take care of themselves for the most part."

"What are their names?" Shion reached a finger out to this second rat, who sniffed at his nail.

"I never gave them names."

Shion gaped at Nezumi. "Why not? They're so cute!" He moved to carefully pet the brown one's head. "This one looks like a cravat."

"Like a necktie?"

"It's a kind of pastry, actually. My mom makes them." Shion moved to petting the black rat. "This one looks like moonlight."

Nezumi was looking at Shion like this was the stupidest thing he had ever heard. "He's a black rat, he doesn't look like moonlight."

"Where's the third one?"

"He likes books. He's probably gnawing my copy of Macbeth or something," Nezumi sighed.

"Oh, I see him," Shion said. This rat was completely white. He was indeed gnawing on the Scottish play, red eyes focused intently on destroying the corner of the book. Shion reached down slowly and nudged him away from the play. The rat sniffed Shion's finger, then nipped at it and fled.

"Don't bother them," Nezumi muttered.

"Sorry."

"Don't apologize either— Look, just chill out, okay?"

"Okay." Shion wove his fingers together and looked out the window again. The snow was lighter now, which was good. There were only a few hours until it got dark. There was a light weight on Shion's leg suddenly, and he looked down as he felt whiskers on his hand. He giggled as the brown rat Shion was privately calling Cravat nuzzled at his fingers. Shion opened his hands into a nest. Cravat curled up there and Shion smiled, then looked over at Nezumi, who was glaring out the window. The rats liked him, why not their owner? Shion thought of what else the two of them could talk about.

"I haven't seen you in town. When did you move there?"

"Didn't."

Shion blinked. "Where are you living then?"

Nezumi smirked and waved a hand. "Here."

Shion looked around. "Oh. Uh. It's nice?"

Nezumi darted a glance at him. "It's a place to sleep and keep my books, that's all I really need. How's living with Mommy?"

"I feel bad," Shion said. "She used to rent my room out and she could make a little extra money to keep the bakery nice, but now I'm there and I'm unemployed, so I'm not a lot of help. And Rikaga always glares at me now like he knows I'm useless—"

"Ha!" Nezumi coughed out a laugh that sounded slightly painful. "Oh god, that creep. Your mom's well rid of him. Goddamn."

"What?" Shion blinked. "I thought he was a newspaper man…"

Nezumi was shaking his head and smiling. The smile wasn't a nice one. "No, Shion, he's a pimp."

Shion felt his eyes growing huge. "He— he what?"

"He sells girls. To guys. Or guys to guys, or whatever flavors you feel like combining in your ice cream sundae. At least, he used to. He's a little down on his luck. His ladies don't like him very much. Most of them left. And he was rooming with your mom… Shit, that's just bad luck."

"I didn't know that," Shion said softly, blinking as the windshield wipers flicked back and forth. He ran a finger over Cravat and felt the rat twitch before Shion settled into a rhythmic petting that the rat could predict.

Nezumi snorted. "Damn, you're sheltered aren't you? College boy, am I right?"

"Yeah," Shion said, "botany." He looked up and found Nezumi frowning at him. "Watch the road! What?"

"Don't tell me how to drive," Nezumi said. "What the fuck are you doing in Alaska with a botany degree?"

"My mom lives here," Shion said. "I grew up here. I didn't… I wasn't quite sure where else to go."

"Where's your dad living? Anywhere's got to be better for botany than Alaska."

Shion shrugged. "I don't know who my father is."

Nezumi raised both eyebrows. "Ah. Well then. Even better. Opens up the possibilities. Just go off wandering."

"I didn't know where to go," Shion repeated. "I came back here because I thought I'd find something to do with my life. I wasn't sure what. I don't make friends easily, so I wouldn't have done well anywhere else."

"You are really way too honest, you know that?" Nezumi said. "Shit, you're an open book. Be careful with that. It's not safe."

"What do you mean?"

Nezumi looked at him with the same princess-like exasperation Shion had seen him use in Inukashi's office earlier that day. "I mean don't give yourself away to strangers. Not even whores do that."

Shion felt a twisting in his gut. "I don't see why it's a bad thing. I'm just telling the truth about myself."

"Start becoming a better liar," Nezumi said. "And pass me the radio."

"What?"

Nezumi reached over Shion's head, leaning out dangerously far, and snagged a small microphone attached to a CB radio. "Gotta figure out what the road's like." He turned the radio on and twisted the dial, listening to a chatter of voices arising from the static. Cravat darted from Shion's hands and vanished into the back of the cab as Nezumi spoke into the microphone. "Break, break, break. Eve here. Over." The chatter died down. "Traveling the Richardson highway, looking to avoid trouble. What's the weather like? Over."

Shion couldn't stop grinning. "Oh my gosh, are we real truckers now? On the radio and everything, oh my gosh!"

"Okay, shut up," Nezumi said. He listened to the scratchy voices speaking in rough code. "Ten four from Eve, see some of you at the West Block. Back out." He hung up the microphone. "We're set for tonight I think. Storm won't be a bad one."

"There'll be a storm?" Shion said.

"I said it won't be bad."

Shion stared up at the radio. "You call yourself Eve on the radio?"

Nezumi kept looking at the road this time. "You pick a handle or you're given one."

"Can I pick mine?"

Nezumi thought for a moment. "No."

"Why not?"

"You're not a trucker. You're a kid riding shotgun."

Shion blinked. "But Inukashi hired me."

"Yeah, and you only get this job with my say-so. And I don't like company."

"Oh."

Nezumi glanced at him. "Jesus, put the sad eyes away. It's creepy. What's that thing on your face, by the way?"

Shion reached up automatically and touched the end of his scar. "Something I got a while ago. It was a really weird illness. A lot of kids in my school got it. I'm, um. I'm the only one who lived. They did an experimental surgery and this was the result."

Nezumi blinked. "Shit. That's pretty badass, I guess."

Shion thought about it for a moment. "I guess it was."

"You lived. That's badass."

"Can I have a trucker name then?"

"No."