I will when you will. The words were still fresh in Jazmine's mind when she got up the next morning, so she showered, got dressed, and went directly to Raleigh's room.

It took him long enough to answer her knock that she thought she might have missed him, but after a few long minutes he opened the door a crack so she could only see his face and peered out at her. "Uh...good morning? Did I forget we had plans?"

"Nope, I just wanted to talk to you about something, and I wanted to catch you before you got busy." Raleigh made no move to open the door any wider. "...Are you busy?"

"No, I'm not busy, just...now's not a good time." Jazmine could hear someone moving around in the room behind him, and Raleigh's agitation increased by about 50%. "Can you give me a few?"

"Oh my god, Raleigh, is that -" Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Do you have Mako in there?"

"Shhhhhh!" He gave a frantic glance back into the room behind him, and dropped his own voice to a whisper. "Jazmine, I am in the middle of something. I will come get you in a minute."

She almost shook with delight, but managed to keep her volume low. "She is in there! That is so exciting!"

Raleigh's glare could have burned a hole through her head. "I am not comfortable talking about this right now," he said through his teeth. "Go back to your room and I. will. come. get. you."

"OKAY," she whisper-yelled back, giving him an open-mouthed grin and a double thumbs up as he glared at her one last time and shut the door.

Half an hour later Raleigh knocked on her door. "Come iiii-iiiiin," she sing-songed at her brother, and he let himself in, studying her warily.

"Sorry that took so long," he said, waiting for the onslaught.

"No, I'M sorry," Jazmine gushed. "So was that Mako? Did she stay the night? Did you talk? When is the wedding?"

Her brother rolled his eyes. "Calm down."

"You calm down! This is important!" They stared at each other. "You're really not going to tell me anything?"

A tiny smile crept across Raleigh's face. "We talked. That's all. It's good."

She threw her pillow at him. "'It's good'? That's all I get?" He nodded, goofy smile firmly in place. "Well, good. I'm happy for you."

"Thanks." His expression sobered, and he tossed her pillow back onto the bed. "What did you want to talk to me about?"

"I've been thinking about what happens next," she said, and Raleigh tilted his head at her in confusion. "We're not staying here forever. I know this place is going to be shutting down for good in a few months."

His face dropped. "I didn't want you to worry about that yet."

"Raleigh, I'm not six. You don't have to shield me from everything." She picked at invisible lint on her pants. "It's been nice not having to look over my shoulder all the time, or constantly think about having a backup plan," she admitted, "but I actually feel like I have a future now, and I need to figure out what I'm doing with it."

"That's great, Jaz, I'm glad you feel that way." He leaned forward. "So what are you thinking?"

"Going back to school, for nursing. I don't know how realistic that is," she said, trying to gauge Raleigh's reaction, "but it's something I really want to do."

He was smiling again. "I think that's a great idea. You want me to ask around, see what I can find out?"

Jazmine nodded slowly, matching his smile with her own. "Yes. Yeah, I'd really appreciate that. Thank you."

"You're welcome." Raleigh made for the door, turning around at the last minute. "Don't say anything about me and Mako, okay?"

She made a zipping motion across her mouth. "My lips are sealed."

Jazmine felt surprisingly nervous as she rapped out "shave and a haircut" on Chuck's door. Tap tap ta-tap tap.

BWAHH BWAHHHH

The airhorn granted her entry, and she pushed the door open to find him sitting up in bed, sketching something into the pad on his lap and surrounded by papers and books. "Hey, looks like you've been busy," she said, surveying the sketches that lay around him. His only response was a shrug. "Don't be too excited to see me."

"It's not you that I'm not excited about," he said, not taking his eyes off the paper in front of him. "There's more surgery in my future. My ankle's not mending right."

"Oh, no, really?" She settled gently onto the bed next to him, pushing some papers to the side. "I'm sorry."

He still refused to look at her. "Not your fault."

Jazmine sat in awkward silence, trying to think of something to say. "What's this?" she asked finally, picking up one of the drawings to examine.

He lifted his eyes to the paper on her hands. "Gear mechanism. Just sketching out some ideas I have, so I won't forget them."

Jazmine had no idea what a gear mechanism was, but the level of detail in the pencil drawing fascinated her. She picked up another sketch of what looked like a robotic foot. "These are really good. I mean, I don't know what they are, but I can tell you know what you're doing."

"Since I was fourteen, I never went a single day without a wrench in my hand, working on something." The pencil in his hand stopped moving, and Chuck looked out at the piles of sketches around him. "This is the closest I can get, for now."

"Where did you learn how to do this?"

"Nowhere. My mum, a little bit. She went to art school." The pencil was in motion again. "It's just something I do when I'm bored."

Sitting on top of one of the piles was a picture that didn't look like a mechanical subject, and Jazmine reached across him for it. "What are these?"

"No, don't!" Chuck went to grab her hand, but instead smacked it into the pile, sending images sliding across his lap and legs.

"Oh, god, I'm sorry!" She started picking up the papers, trying to shuffle them back into a stack, while Chuck continued to try to smack her hands away. An errant sheet with a familiar shape fell from her hands, and despite his protests, she lifted it up to study it. A face with feminine features, darkly shaded hair falling away from it in waves over shoulders that faded out into the rich texture of the paper. Jazmine drew in a sharp breath when she recognized it, and Chuck went still.

"Is this me?" she asked.

He couldn't seem to decide where to look - his eyes darted from her face, to the paper in her hands, to his lap, back to her eyes. "Yeah. It's just a sketch."

"It's beautiful," she said, studying it, then meeting his eyes again. "I mean...you really think I look like this?"

"Come off it," he scoffed, but his tone was gentle. "It's nothing. I just wanted to see if I could draw something that wasn't a machine."

"Obviously you can." Chuck didn't respond, only reached out to take the paper back, and she handed it to him without argument. "Maybe this is your thing." He rolled his eyes. "Hey, you said you'd start figuring out what you're doing when I do, and I am, so you're up, slugger."

"What are you talking about?" he asked, gathering up the mess around him into one large pile.

"I talked to Raleigh this morning about going to school to be a nurse." Jazmine put her hands on her hips with smug confidence. "Your turn."

For the first time since she'd arrived Chuck looked at her, really looked at her, and his eyes were full of surprise and something that resembled admiration but his brow was furrowed. "Really," he said, and she nodded. "That's great. I'm happy for you. When are you going?"

The total lack of enthusiasm in his voice threw her off. "I know you're eager to get rid of me, but I literally just talked to him a couple of hours ago, so I don't know yet."

"I'm not eager to get rid of you, why do you always assume the worst of me?" he asked, irritated.

"I don't assume the worst of you, you're just horrible at saying what you mean," she fired back.

"I always say exactly what I mean," he countered.

"No, you don't. What you just said - 'oh, that's great, I'm happy.'" She mimicked his words with the same indifferent tone he'd used. "You don't sound happy. You sound like you don't care at all."

"I care," he protested weakly, but Jazmine was already storming out of his room. She slammed the door behind her. It didn't make her feel any better.

Twenty minutes later he knocked on her door. She opened it and stared down at him, but didn't say a word.

"You know, it's really rude to run away from someone who's not in any shape to go chasing after you," he said from his chair. She didn't answer, just left the door open and plopped down on her bed so she was closer to eye level with him. He studied her for a moment, then grabbed a folder off of his lap and held it out. Wordlessly she took it from him and sat back down, opening it to find three sketches of her, including the one she'd found earlier.

"Does that look like the work of someone who doesn't care?" he asked her.

Jazmine pressed her lips together, stared at the sketches so she wouldn't have to look at him. "You said it was nothing."

"I lied," he said softly.

"You only like me because I put up with your bullshit," she said.

He smirked. "You only like me because your brother can't stand me."

"That's at least partially true," Jazmine admitted.

They fell silent again, but it felt easy and relaxed this time. "They're working on my ankle in two days," Chuck said. "Come visit me when I'm out of surgery?"

"Of course," she said, handing him back the folder. He gave a small wave and wheeled off down the hallway, leaving Jazmine to wonder what exactly they were doing.