Thanks to everyone who read, and as always reviews are appreciated.

Note: This chapter starts to cross over with What Strange Creatures (chapter 22), but both stories can be read standalone.


Barry bit back his eye roll until he was facing away from his work partner—don't be stupid; don't pick fights—but seriously, he'd be better off working this stretch of highway alone.

Most of what they were picking up was random litter, bits of plastic and paper wrappers that people had for some idiot reason thrown clear of their cars, and while the weather was borderline lousy, complaining about it wasn't going to change anything. At least they were outside and moving, and the typical Portland drizzle wasn't anywhere near as bad as real rain would have been.

Friday volunteer shifts were the easiest to get when it came to trash pickup, probably because most of the people who could volunteer during the week were off getting ready for weekends while the people who worked weekdays were still stuck there, and Barry was willing enough to take advantage of the situation and grab every one he could. He'd actually managed to snag a shift this morning, too, which had been kind of cool although he wished that the sun that had been threatening had actually managed to break through before this shift had started. Not that he was going to admit that to his current work partner and encourage any more complaining.

Said work partner—David or Derek or something with a D, Barry hadn't recognized him from any previous shifts when they'd been paired up and hadn't exactly spent a lot of time trying to get to know him given that he'd done nothing but complain since they'd gotten out here—whined again, and Barry might have felt bad for him if he hadn't been dressed for the weather or something like that. But he was wearing a sweatshirt and rain jacket under his vest just like Barry was, his rain jacket looked just as sturdy as Barry's, and everyone involved was wearing boots.

"Do you want to take this back to the pickup spot, and I'll start on the next one?" Barry offered, holding out the bag they'd been filling when the guy finally paused for breath. It wasn't quite full, but it wasn't far off either, and it was as good an excuse to get himself a few minutes of peace and quiet as anything else.

The guy actually muttered a complaint about the weight, and Barry gritted his teeth. They were picking up scraps and the thing was maybe twenty-five pounds. Max. Even lighter than the one they'd filled up before this, and the only reason that any of them had any real weight at all was because the paper litter was so waterlogged.

"Or I can take it back, and you can keep going, if you want?" he suggested as politely as he could manage under the circumstances.

Before the guy could argue about that too, there was a honk, and Barry turned back to find that the bus had pulled into the cutout behind them. He swiveled and shifted his grip on the bag, heading back towards it a little more quickly than was strictly polite. David-Derek-whoever was only a few inches shorter than he was, but once Barry was stretching his legs it wasn't too hard to leave him behind even if Barry was the one carrying the bag.

Everyone else working along this section of highway was hurrying back too, though, so it wasn't completely obvious, and Barry was just as glad to tie off the top of the bag and toss it into the back of the bus with the stuff that everyone else had gathered, toss in a few more already-filled bags behind it, and then grab one of the few remaining empty seats. They were the second-to-last group to be picked up, and the bus was starting to get fragrant, doubly so for Barry since his nose was better than any human's could be, but after a year in prison he'd learned to ignore a lot. And soon enough they were unloading the bags into a dumpster and making the last stretch of the trip back to the parole offices where they'd met at the start of the shift.

The offices had closed half an hour ago so Barry he had no chance of catching Mr. Marin in passing, and with a shake of his head Barry tossed his safety vest into the box the shift supervisor directed them to and then headed back to his truck. It was nice that he'd been able to get two shifts almost back-to-back today, but he wasn't very happy about the continuing lack of response from Mr. Marin about approving him for other volunteer opportunities. He'd send the first email a week and a half ago and a second after a week without a response, but as of this morning he'd still heard nothing in reply, and he'd started mentally debating whether he should call or just wait until Mr. Marin came by the house again. There was no good reason that he shouldn't be approved, but since he'd still prefer that the guy forget that he existed most of the time, he didn't want to make a nuisance of himself.

He was in the truck and about to start it when the obvious occurred to him, and he shot a quick text to Dad saying that he'd pick up dinner on the way home. Dad's latest trial was still going on—this was a civil one through his office where more than a week was a little weird but not unheard of—and he always needed to swing by his office after the judge released them in the evenings, but at least Barry could save him one errand. Barry spent a few minutes flipping through the list of restaurants for something that they hadn't had recently, but there were only so many options on the route between here and home, and a few minutes later he gave up and put in an order for pizza. He'd heard enough listening to the other guys on the community service shifts to know that he had a minimum of half an hour's leeway on top of 'typical' travel time since no one wanted to waste time hauling someone in only to debate traffic, but there was only so much risk that he was willing to take.

Pizza ordered, he was starting to swipe over to his music for the drive when one of the numbers below Dad's caught his eye, and he hesitated. He hadn't talked to Roddy since Nick had brought him by, but Roddy had said that he'd be willing to come over again, and since Dad's trial had been eating up so much of his workday he'd probably be making up for it this weekend with regards to his other clients and too busy to do much hanging out.

After a minute, Barry tapped the line on the screen and put the phone to his ear.

There were a couple rings, and then, "Hello?"

"Hey. Uh, it's Barry."

"Yeah," Roddy said. "Hey."

Right, even if he had a weirdly simple phone, it would still have had Barry's name associated with his number. "Hey," Barry repeated, and then shook himself. "So, uh, what's up?"

"Not much." There was some rustling, and then, "School just got out, so I'm waiting for the bus."

"Now? It's after five-thirty."

"Well, technically the orchestra plays after school, but it's a music school so it's not really something that anyone is going to skip."

"Oh, right, you told me that." And there was no good reason that Barry shouldn't have remembered it given the number of people that he didn't talk to these days. Oops.

"So what's up with you?" Roddy asked.

Barry felt his shoulders relax a little, a tension that he hadn't even recognized easing. At least Roddy seemed willing to talk to him. "Killing time until I can pick up dinner."

"I thought you were stuck at home?"

"Well, I'm allowed to go out for community service stuff, and since I just finished a shift no one will care if I stop to pick something up as long as it's on the way home."

"Ah." Roddy seemed to hesitate, but before Barry could say anything he continued. "Interesting community service?"

"Nah, mostly just picking up trash along the highway. Which beats scrubbing graffiti, for the record."

"Does that actually do anything? I've always thought it'd be easier to just paint over it."

Barry snorted. "My knuckles would agree with you, believe me."

That got a laugh from Roddy, and Barry grinned in response.

"I'm trying to get some shifts to try different stuff, but I need an okay for those and so far it hasn't come through," he admitted. "But anyway, I was calling to see if you wanted to come over sometime this weekend. Whenever works for you would be fine, I don't exactly have any plans."

"This weekend should be good," Roddy said after a minute. "I've got a concert next Tuesday and then a gig on Friday, but I don't need any more prep for either of those so it's just my history paper that has to get done, and that won't take two days. Does tomorrow work for you?"

Barry hadn't been sure that he'd be willing to come over again at all regardless of his willingness to swap numbers, especially without Nick with him, and he felt his shoulders relaxing a little more. "Tomorrow would be great."

"Cool. I don't know what the exact bus schedule is, but there's probably something that could get me there maybe early afternoon?"

"Sure. And if you send me a text when you're close, I can't meet you at the bottom of the driveway. I'd offer to meet you at the stop," wherever it was, "but…." He trailed off, wincing a little.

"Yeah, I got it. It's cool, I looked before and there's a route that stops at the little shopping plaza a mile or two down the road from your place. I just don't know the arrival times."

"Text me whenever you're close," Barry repeated. "Really, all I'll be doing is calculus homework or working on my next history report so anytime is fine." He hesitated. "What's yours about?"

"Sixteenth century Japanese trade. Although I—"

Something squeaked, and Barry frowned, but before he could ask Roddy continued.

"Hey, sorry, that's my bus so I'm going to have to go. This thing won't hold a signal once I'm moving."

"No worries," Barry said. "I ought to get going too, anyway. See you tomorrow."

"See you."

Barry stuck his phone back into his pocket and started the truck, feeling suddenly lighter as he pulled away from the curb. Not that he'd been in a bad mood after his shift or anything, it was just... It was kind of nice to have plans beyond what they were having for dinner or what his next work shift was going to be. And maybe to be around someone who wasn't Dad or one of his generally-unsocial work partners among whom he still hadn't managed to make any connections beyond the most superficial.

Dad's text of 'Thanks, running late so go ahead and eat without me,' reached Barry just as he got home, and Barry went through most of one of the pizzas—after all, he'd done a lot of walking today—before putting the rest in the refrigerator and heading downstairs. Sunday at midnight was the official deadline for his Writing for the Humanities portfolio submission, but he'd finished it a couple days ago, and with one last quick read-through he went ahead and sent it in.

Jordan was nowhere near as ready with hers per the email that came in while he was waiting for it to submit, but she assured him that she'd have it to him by tomorrow afternoon for proofreading. It wasn't exactly the tutoring in the way that he'd thought that it would be, but since she was willing to work with his limitations he was willing to give it a try. This would be the first assignment since they'd made their agreement, and he was kind of curious himself to see how it would go. And what her writing really looked like

He leaned back when the 'submission successful' screen came up, hearing his back pop as he stretched. He should probably get started on his next set of calc problems too, especially since there was another test due next Friday and he could really use a solid grade at this point, but history sounded so much more interesting right now.


"Good morning," Dad greeted when Barry came down to the kitchen, looking up from a pile of papers stacked in front of him on the table. "Eggs and bacon are on the stove."

"Thanks," Barry said. "Are you still working on your trial case?" It had been late when Dad had gotten home last night, and he'd looked tired enough that when he'd declined Barry's offer to heat up some of the leftover pizza that Barry had simply wished him goodnight and let him escape up to his room.

"Taking a break from that one," Dad said with a shake of his head. "At least for now."

"Is it bad?" he asked hesitantly as he served himself some breakfast. Dad's firm only handled civil cases, but even if Dad never talked about the details Barry knew perfectly well that some of them were counterparts to pretty ugly criminal prosecutions.

"No, but we're currently caught in a battle of the experts, and after a few hours it gets incredibly headache-inducing. Besides, there are some filings for other cases that I need to get sent in before next week, so..." He waved a hand vaguely. "I'm sorry, but I'm afraid it's going to be another busy weekend for me."

"It's okay, I figured it would be," Barry admitted, joining him at the table. "Um, I sort of invited Roddy over today, though. I mean, I can call him back and tell him it doesn't work if you think we'll bother you or anything, but—"

"No, no, that's fine," Dad said immediately, cutting off his offer. "That's a good idea. Does he need a ride?"

"I don't think so, he said there's a bus that'll drop him off by the grocery store down the road, and I told him to text so I could pick him up when he gets to the driveway. And we'll probably be downstairs most of the afternoon so you shouldn't even hear us."

"I'm not worried. Oh, but did you get a reply to your email to Mr. Marin, or were you able to talk to to him yesterday?"

"No. To both since he was out of his office probably doing visits all morning, and then by the time we got back at the end of the afternoon shift the offices were closed. I don't think I should keep emailing since he hasn't answered the ones I've already sent, though."

"No, if you haven't heard from him, it might better to wait for your next appointment when you have a reason speak in person," Dad agreed after a moment. "I wish I could say otherwise, and if he doesn't sign off on the request it might be something worth bringing up with Kevin to see if he has any recommendations, but two emails is reasonable where three may not be. And annoying Mr. Marin would not be the wisest idea at this point."

Barry nodded. Kevin was the lawyer who'd arranged his plea agreement after everything, and because of that he was one of the people that Barry would like to avoid, but he was also the one that Barry would have to talk to if there was a problem with his parole. But Barry only had two weeks and change to wait anyway—two weeks and change max since Mr. Marin should be showing up at the house again at some point before then even if it was a totally perfunctory thing—and he'd certainly waited longer for other things. "Yeah, if I don't hear back from him, I'll wait."