They meandered around the cafeteria for a little while longer, checking out the various tables and displays for every kind of club imaginable. Mack was thrilled when they stopped by to see him at the AV club table, as if Skye would ever pass up on a chance to be in a club that was not only an excuse to watch movies at school, but also filled with and run by some of her favorite people.

"So is this just a social visit, or can I also convince the four of you to sign up?" he grinned.

"You don't have to convince us," Skye said with a laugh. "Watching movies at school sounds awesome."

"Bobbi always talks about how much fun it is," Jemma added, carefully writing her name on the paper under Skye's scrawl. "She made a lot of friends in the club."

"Plus Phil would be totally sad if we didn't come," Skye finished. "He pouts sometimes."

Mack let out a surprised laugh. He had a good laugh, rich and full and very contagious. "You know, honestly, I can see it. I love Mr. C., but he's definitely got that 'young at heart' vibe."

"You have no idea."

"So what kind of movies do you guys watch?" Trip wanted to know. He hadn't hesitated to sign up, either, but he seemed curious to hear Mack's answer.

"All kinds. A lot of older ones, mostly. Last year we were on kind of a sci-fi kick, and we did some monster movies around Halloween, some old-Hollywood romances around Valentine's Day, that kind of stuff. We try to talk about the filmmaking after we watch something – the directing and acting and design, you know – but some club members are… more easily distracted than others." Skye glanced up in time to catch a twinkle in Mack's eye. She wasn't the only one.

"You're talking about Lance, aren't you?" Fitz asked. Mack laughed again.

"I'm not naming names, but I'm also not going to tell you you're wrong."

Their last stop, once they'd finished their survey of the activities fair and said goodbye to Fitz and Trip, was at the Spanish club table, where Bobbi greeted them with a wave and a much cheerier look on her face than she'd had in the car an hour ago.

"Hey guys. How'd everything go?"

"Good," Skye supplied, offering a small nod. "Mack was our group leader."

"Lucky," smiled Bobbi. "He showed you where everything is? You feel ready to start next week?"

"We saw all of the rooms we'll need for our classes," Jemma said. "It's bigger than the middle school, but I think I figured out how best to go from class to class so we can maximize our travel time and not get lost."

"Sounds like it was a productive morning," Bobbi said. She glanced around the cafeteria, which was starting to empty slowly as the activities fair began to wind down. She shuffled some of the papers on her table into a stack and set the list of people interested in Spanish club on top. "Did you guys find some clubs to sign up for?"

"Fitz found a robotics club that he wanted us all to sign up for," Jemma told her, a little breathy with excitement. "They compete against other schools and there's a research and report-writing component."

"That sounds like it was made for you," Bobbi chuckled. "What about you, Skye? I don't suppose I could get you to sign up for Spanish club?"

"I can barely read and write in English, I don't think adding a whole new language is a smart move," Skye joked. It wasn't exactly true, of course. She had come a long way with her reading in the last year, once she and Mrs. Hinton had started working on some strategies to help with her dyslexia, and her spelling, while still not great, was much improved too, thanks to all the extra practice she had done with Natasha in tutoring. Still, she was only half-kidding about thinking she wasn't quite cut out for Spanish club. She was supposed to take the introductory level Spanish class this year for part of her foreign language requirement and the prospect was already making her nervous.

"You're plenty good enough at reading and writing for Spanish club," Bobbi said kindly. "But it's okay if you don't want to sign up; I wasn't really expecting either of you to join. I know you both have other stuff you like better. Did you find anything interesting, Skye?"

"The robotics team needs somebody who can do coding, so I said I'd give it a try," she shrugged. Secretly, Skye was more than a little excited at the prospect of getting to write some real code for a change, not just stuff for school assignments or little side projects she made up for herself, but she didn't want to seem too enthusiastic. If it turned out to be too hard for her, or if the rest of the team was too smart for her to keep up, she didn't want to be too disappointed if she had to quit, and she definitely didn't want anybody else to be disappointed that it didn't work out, either. "And we all signed up for AV club, too."

"Oh, that'll make Phil's day."

Bobbi was right, of course. Once the last clusters of ninth graders had drifted out of the cafeteria and Skye and Jemma helped Bobbi clean up the Spanish club's table, all three trod the now very familiar path up to Phil's classroom, where he was sifting through stacks of old textbooks, organizing them into piles based on categories that Skye couldn't quite discern. He grinned like a little kid who just learned he could eat ice cream for dinner when Skye and Jemma told him that they had signed up for AV club.

"That's fantastic news," he beamed. "I didn't want to pressure you, of course, and it wouldn't have hurt my feelings if you wanted to try some other clubs instead, but I'm really excited to hear that I'll get to have all three of my girls in AV. I'm going to have to pick some really outstanding movies for us to watch this year, now that I've got such a distinguished audience."

They told him about how the rest of orientation had gone, caught him up to speed on the news from Fitz and Trip about their summers, and told him about the robotics club that Fitz wanted them all to sign up for, too.

"I think that sounds like a great idea," he said encouragingly. "I'm proud of you two for trying something new. I've heard good things about the team, and I think it could be a really good fit for you two."

"You don't think it would be too… hard for us?" Skye asked, a little hesitation tripping up her voice. She left the "too hard for me" part of her question unspoken, but she knew Phil would understand her meaning. Besides, nobody would ever make the mistake of thinking something like robotics club would be too hard for Jemma.

"I don't," Phil assured her. "I'm sure there will be some things about it that are challenging, but I've never known any of you to not rise to a challenge." He flashed them all a little wink. "Besides, building and coding and researching are all things that are right up your alley. And if it turns out that it is too hard, which I doubt, or you don't like it, there's nothing wrong with trying a different club instead. You don't have to stick with the same clubs for four years just because you put your name on a list at freshman orientation."

"I quit playing softball after my freshman season," Bobbi shrugged. "I liked it okay, but it made my schedule really hectic, and I wanted to spend more time focusing on soccer. Nobody at school got mad that I stopped playing after the season was over."

"Exactly," nodded Phil. "High school is a great time to try out lots of different things. See what you like, what you don't like, what you're good at and passionate about. It's all good life experience."

"Because we all need a lot more life experience," Skye cracked with a smirk. As far as she was concerned, she'd had enough substantial life experiences already to last her several lifetimes' worth. She'd be more than happy to let life be a little boring for a bit – not forever, of course, because she hated being bored, but for a little while, at least.

Phil laughed. "Fair point, but you know what I meant. Regular life experience. The average, everyday stuff that helps you grow up into a well-rounded young adult."

"What kinds of clubs were you in when you were in high school?" Jemma asked Phil. "Did they help you grow into a well-rounded adult?" Phil was quiet for a second, continuing to sort and stack textbooks as he thought. His stacks were large enough now that Skye could tell he was separating them by book condition.

"Let's see… well, I was on the baseball team for four years. I loved playing ball," he said, a fond, faraway look in his eye as he thought back to his high school days. "My dad was the football coach here before he got sick, so he wanted me to play football, too, but I didn't really like it that much, and he was supportive when I finally got up the courage to tell him I liked baseball much better. We had an AV club back then, too, although it was pretty different. Our AV club was more about running slides for school assemblies and cataloguing film reels and geeky stuff like that, but I had fun with it. Oh, and I was in the chess club for a couple years, too."

"So you were basically Captain Cool," Skye teased. She and Jemma and Bobbi began to help Phil sort, now that they had figured out his system, and Skye added a dogeared book with a cracked spine to the medium-sized pile of especially worn-out books.

"I was totally cool," Phil protested with a laugh. "I got the best of both worlds. I got to hang out with my jock friends on the baseball team and got the social status of being a varsity athlete, but I also got to run projectors and talk about Captain America comics with my other friends in the other clubs."

It didn't really surprise Skye that Phil had been a social chameleon, now that she thought about it. He was so personable and easy to get along with that it made sense for him to have connections and friends in a bunch of different groups, and she thought she knew him well enough by now to know that he wouldn't have been the kind of guy to stay rigidly stuck in one social box.

"How'd you become friends with May?" Bobbi wanted to know. "Don't tell me she was in AV or chess club…" Phil laughed again.

"No, she wasn't. She moved here our sophomore year, and she wasn't really into a lot of extracurriculars."

That didn't surprise Skye, either. May had told them before that she moved around a lot growing up, and her parents had just gotten divorced before she moved to Manitowoc with her mom. Skye knew from experience that moving from school to school all the time made it hard to find after school activities to get invested in, and she also understood how difficult it was to pretend to be interested in things like clubs and sports when most of your time and energy was spent being angry at the world and the hand life had dealt you.

"She did some stuff outside of school – ice skating, martial arts – and I think she eventually ended up joining this club we used to have at school that was called a 'multicultural club,'" Phil continued. "Some elements of it are kind of outdated nowadays," he added with a slight wince, "but the general idea was people got together to learn about different cultures, share customs and traditions, that sort of thing. Not a bad premise for a club, by any means, although I think a lot of nuance has been added to the concept over the years. Dr. Garner was in that club, that's how those two met. And then Andrew managed to introduce Melinda to some of his other friends, including me, and that's how we met," he finished with a flourish.

"And the rest is history," Jemma said, a happy little sigh fluttering away from her as she tapped cheerfully on a stack of newer-looking books. She always got gooey over romance, a fact which never ceased to amuse Skye.

"We got there eventually," Phil smiled. "It only took us six years after getting to know each other to decide we wanted to date, and four more after that to decide to get married."

"And then twenty more before you decided to add some kids to the mix," Skye teased. Phil's eyes crinkled up in delight, one of his happiest, most Phil-like faces. The kind that always gave Skye that warm, honey feeling in her chest.

"One of the best decisions of our lives," he glowed. "We had no idea we'd get so lucky, but Victoria really hooked us up."

Hearing Miss Hand's name reminded Skye of a question she'd been meaning to ask. Their earlier conversation with Trip and Fitz about her name and their adoption process had gotten her thinking. "Do you know when Miss Hand is coming over for our next meeting? Has she said if anything's gotten closer to being ready?"

"As a matter of fact, I do know when she's coming." Phil finished stacking up the last of his textbooks and began to arrange all the books from the largest stack – the books that were a little careworn, but still in pretty good shape – neatly back on his bookshelves. Seeing what he was doing, Skye, Bobbi, and Jemma followed his lead. "We were trying to get a meeting scheduled for sometime this week, and it worked out that today was the best with Miss Hand's schedule. She's coming over for dinner tonight—"

"Is she bringing Izzy, too?" Oftentimes, if Miss Hand came for her meeting during dinnertime, Izzy would accompany her, much to Skye's delight. She liked Izzy a lot.

"I imagine Izzy'll come, too," nodded Phil. "We'll do eating and then meeting, probably. I don't know what kind of updates Victoria might have, though. Hopefully good ones. And I know there's probably going to be something else she'll want to talk about with all of us, too."

Skye felt her brow furrow at Phil's cryptic words.

"What is it?"

"We'll talk about it tonight," was all Phil would say. "When we're all together. It's nothing bad," he added quickly, seeing the concern flash across their faces. "I don't want you to worry. It's hopefully something you'll all be excited about, but it's something we're going to discuss as a whole family."

"Come on, Phil, give us a hint," Skye wheedled. Phil shook his head and pantomimed zipping his lips.

"That's all you're getting out of me. Melinda would say I've told you too much already."

With all of them helping, it didn't take long to replace the newly sorted books back on Phil's shelves. The smallest pile – the one with the books in the best condition – got added to the shelf last, near the front where they would be grabbed first, while the medium pile of more battered and tattered books got tucked up on top of the shelf by Phil and Bobbi, who were able to reach all the way up there without much trouble.

"For backup," Phil explained. "I try not to dip into the falling apart books unless I have to, but I know better than to just get rid of them, either."

"Is this what you've been doing all the days you've had to come to work this summer?" Jemma asked as they filed out of Phil's room and began walking down the hall towards the back staircase that would lead them to the staff parking lot. It had surprised Skye when, last month, Phil had started coming up to the school for work. She didn't realize teachers still had to work in the summer.

"It's certainly a part of it," said Phil.

He held the heavy exterior door open for them as they left the school. The August sun scorched across the blacktop of the parking lot, making the heat radiate up from the ground in waves that Skye could practically see materializing in front of them. She was glad she didn't have to go play soccer or football in this weather, the way Bobbi and Trip did. She wasn't sure she'd make it to the car without melting into a puddle of Skye-sweat.

"I've been getting my room ready, working on my lesson plans, attending faculty meetings. Lots of stuff. Last week we had some seminars about changes in state guidelines and testing policies, and the week before was a session on supporting student wellness. Principal Mace likes that kind of thing – continuing education, team building. And the summer is when we have time to fit a lot of it in."

"So you really don't get a summer break, do you?" Skye said, lamenting on his behalf.

"Sure I do," he smiled. "We got to go to the lake, got to spend time with your grandparents when they each came to visit. We caught up on the latest season of the Avengers, watched the Brewers games on TV, got to see that cool movie about Pluto and the Kuiper Belt at the science museum… I had some nice time off, and we got to do plenty of fun things. My break's just a little shorter than yours."

They all piled into the car then, Jemma stopping to rap her knuckles against the handle of her door. She knocked five times before she opened it, something she had started doing since last year. Skye wasn't exactly sure why Jemma had started knocking on the car before she got in, and she had never asked. Sometimes Jemma didn't mind explaining some of the little habits and routines she had, especially back when it was sometimes up to Skye to act as a go-between for Jemma and grownups who didn't understand her, but the one time Skye had remarked upon the new knocking trick with a casual observation, Jemma had gotten kind of flustered, so Skye let it go.

After all, it wasn't like Jemma was the only one of them who had acquired some new behavioral quirks since last year, and Skye knew she herself wasn't always all that interested in talking about leaving doors open or her poor sleeping habits, so she figured Jemma might not be too keen on talking about the knocking. Besides, it wasn't bothering anybody, and if it helped Jemma get into the car, then as far as Skye was concerned, it didn't really matter one way or another why Jemma had picked up the custom.

It also wasn't the first time Jemma had developed a new habit, Skye remembered. Some of Jemma's quirks were a pretty constant piece of her – Jemma had always tapped as long as Skye had known her, and she'd always been quiet, some days never talking at all – but other bits and pieces came and went. When they were much smaller, maybe eight or nine, Jemma had flapped her hands a lot more than she did now, but after staying with Mrs. Patrick, she hardly ever flapped anymore, opting instead to press her thumbs hard against her fingers if she needed to do something with her hands beyond tapping. And while Jemma had always been inclined to pick up on numbers and patterns, Skye knew that it wasn't until after coming back from the Walkers that Jemma started counting things around her as a way of calming herself down.

A few years ago, Jemma had gone through a phase where she picked and chewed at the skin around her fingernails, but after a while she didn't need to do that anymore, much to Skye's relief. She didn't like it when Jemma was hurt, and it was hard for her to just wrap Jemma's fingers in Band-Aids every night without saying anything about it. She kept her mouth shut, though, mostly because she didn't want to make Jemma feel bad or self-conscious, especially when so many of her other behaviors drew negative attention from other kids and the nuns at St. Agnes. Still, Skye had been glad when Jemma had found less painful alternatives, and compared to that or the self-punishment the Williamses had forced Jemma to adopt, knocking on the car door was pretty low on Skye's list of concerns.

"Can you drop me off at Hunter's?" Bobbi asked, looking up from her phone, an old one of May's that she'd been using since last spring. "He DVR'd the Liverpool preseason game from this weekend and wants to know if I want to watch it with him before we both have to go to afternoon practice."

"Sure," Phil said. He flicked on his blinker and turned, changing direction seamlessly away from the route to their house to Hunter and Fitz's instead. "Do you want me to drop off your soccer gear in a little bit, or do you think you'll stop back by the house before practice?"

"We'll stop by," Bobbi told him, firing off a quick reply to Hunter on her phone. She smiled at Phil. "Thanks."

"Sure thing," he smiled back. "I'm glad you're doing something fun today in between all your practices."

"Are your other friends coming too?" Skye asked. She leaned forward a little from the backseat and flashed Bobbi a sly, teasing grin. "Or is it just you and Hunter?"

Bobbi hadn't ever come out and said that she and Hunter were dating, not to Skye and Jemma at least, but it had definitely not escaped Skye's notice that there was something going on between Bobbi and Hunter that didn't exist between Bobbi and her other friends. As a younger sister, Skye considered it her duty to gently rib Bobbi about the whole thing every so often, and the half-happy, half-bashful look on Bobbi's face just now told Skye she had succeeded for the day.

"Just me and Hunter," Bobbi said. "Not that it's any of your business."

"Well, have fun," Phil said, as he pulled up outside of Hunter and Fitz's house a few minutes later. "We'll see you later this afternoon. Be safe, call me if you need anything."

"Anything. I will," Bobbi promised, swinging herself out of the car. "Thanks, Phil."

"And don't forget Victoria and Izzy are coming over for dinner tonight," he reminded her. "Try to come home right after practice if you can."

"If you can, if you can," Bobbi echoed, nodding to signal that she was agreeing to what Phil asked. She didn't get so embarrassed about her echoes anymore, which Skye thought was nice. It made her happy to know that Bobbi could echo when she was excited or happy or just liked the sounds of words, and not just when she was stressed out or anxious.

Phil waited until Bobbi had disappeared through the front door of the house before easing the car back onto the road and driving the rest of the way home. He fiddled with the radio so that some chipper, old-sounding music floated lightly out of the speakers, then glanced back at Skye and Jemma in the rearview mirror as he struck up conversation.

"What about the two of you? Any plans for the rest of the day I should know about?"

They both shook their heads.

"Just enjoying the last few days of freedom, I guess," Skye shrugged. "Trying not to melt."

"It's definitely gotten warm," agreed Phil. "Not nearly as hot as somewhere like Arizona, out where Grandad lives, but the humidity…"

"I expect it's all the moisture from the lake," Jemma said. "There's more water in the air than in Arizona."

"Exactly. The humidity is what gets you," Phil nodded. "At least, that's what my dad always said."

He turned onto their street, and soon the house came into view and they were pulling into the driveway. Phil turned off the engine, then twisted around in his seat to look at them, a big grin on his face.

"Well, since we're on the subject of melting, and you're not doing anything this afternoon, how would you two like to help me make something special for our dinner tonight?"

"What is it?" Skye asked as they began piling out of the car. Jemma knocked five times on the handle before shutting her car door and following them up the walk towards the house.

"Have you ever made ice cream by hand before?"

Skye felt her eyes go wide, and a quick glance Jemma's way revealed that she was feeling the same excited amazement as Skye. "No, never."

"My mom and I used to make ice cream in the summers all the time when I was growing up," Phil said. "We had one of those ice cream churners that you crank by hand for a while, but before we got that fancy contraption, we had to do it old school."

"What do you mean 'old school?'" Jemma wanted to know. "Isn't it terribly hard to make ice cream by hand?"

"It takes a little elbow grease," acknowledged Phil. Catching the confused look on Jemma's face at his figure of speech, he corrected himself. "It takes some hard work, but it's not anything we can't do if we stick with it. And it's definitely worth it to get ice cream at the end. What do you say? Willing to give it a try after we have some lunch?"

"I'm in," Skye grinned. Making ice cream by hand sounded fun, even if it did turn out to be hard work. Jemma nodded along with her, and Phil beamed at the both of them.


They ate a quick lunch, and soon Phil had them all set up in the kitchen with a small collection of ingredients, some mixing bowls and spoons, a big box of rock salt, and, to Skye's confusion, two old coffee cans and a roll of duct tape.

"What does duct tape have to do with ice cream?" she asked as they all washed their hands and Phil rolled up his sleeves.

"We'll get to that in a little bit," he said mysteriously, waggling his eyebrows in their direction. "First we have to mix up the base."

He guided them through measuring out and mixing together some heavy cream, sugar, salt, and vanilla. Jemma handled the measuring and pouring, her keen eye and attention to detail serving her well as she ensured precise amounts of everything went into the bowl as Skye stirred vigorously.

"Looks good," Phil told them, once everything had been combined. "Now for coffee can number one." At his instruction, they poured the whole mixture into the smaller of the two coffee cans, then Phil popped on the lid and sealed the whole thing up with a generous wrapping of duct tape.

"No leaks," he explained with a wink.

After that, they used the rock salt and practically every ice cube from the freezer to pack the inside of the second, bigger coffee can, so that when they put the first can in, there were several layers of ice and salt all insulating the whole thing. The other lid and another round of duct tape sealed the entire thing up tight.

"What's the salt for?" Skye asked. Phil opened his mouth to answer, but Jemma wiggled a little, her fingers fluttering with the excitement she got when she knew the answer to something, and Phil promptly ceded the floor to her.

"Salt lowers the freezing temperature of water," she said eagerly. "Normally ice from the freezer is 0 degrees Celsius, but the salt causes freezing point depression and makes it so that the ice actually has to drop in temperature in order to stay frozen."

"So it makes the ice in the can extra cold?"

"Exactly," Jemma nodded. She glanced up at Phil. "I suppose that's useful for the ice cream. A super-cooled exterior helps to freeze the mixture inside the first can?"

"You got it," Phil smiled. "Now that we've got it cold, all we have to do now is start shaking it to really get it mixed."

They took turns shaking the can, and when their arms got tired of that, Skye got the idea to start rolling the can around across the kitchen floor. It was probably a good thing Phil had double-duct taped the cans, with all the back and forth they were inflicting on them. Eventually, Phil decided that they had probably mixed the ice cream enough, and he stuck the can in the freezer to keep the ice cream cold until it was time for them to eat it.

"Arms good and sore?" he asked, teasing.

"They feel like noodles." Skye stuck out her tongue at him and giggled slightly. "You just wanted to wear us out so we'd want to be still and quiet the rest of the day, didn't you?"

"That was always my mother's strategy," he chuckled. "But honestly, it doesn't matter to me if you're still and quiet or raucous and rowdy. I like you both any way you want to be. I'm just glad to have some company around the house in the summertime."

The rest of the afternoon passed slowly – a little too slowly for Skye's taste, since most of her time was spent waiting for the evening to arrive and ruminating on what mysterious conversation they were all going to have once Miss Hand was there. She and Jemma tried to distract themselves, but Jemma had a much easier time becoming absorbed in her book than Skye had in focusing on the loose circuits and wires she was fiddling with.

She had finished building her computer last month – a years-long project that was finally completed when Ma Lian had given her the last piece she needed (a good GPU to get her graphics systems up and running) for her birthday – but now she sometimes found she wasn't really sure what to do with herself, now that the computer was actually finished and working.

Giving up on turning the wires into anything interesting, Skye flopped herself in the desk chair and punched the button to wake up the computer that now sat on her and Jemma's desk. It hummed to life, and the screen blinked on. The monitor, keyboard, and mouse were all a little outdated, having been purchased by Skye at a garage sale in June. The man who was selling it, an old guy with hardly any hair and knobby fingers named Mr. Kranholtz who lived down the street from them, had explained that his grownup daughter was making him get rid of his dusty old computer to upgrade to a fancy new laptop so that they could video chat on the weekends. He gave Skye a good deal on the parts, since she seemed like a "reliable young woman" to him.

"What are you doing?" Jemma asked, peering up from Pride and Prejudice. Skye didn't know why Jemma was reading that one again. She must have read it fifty times already, but she never seemed to get tired of it.

"Dunno," Skye shrugged. She started to poke around on the desktop. "Anything. I'm bored."

"Have you gone further on Pandora yet?"

"No." Skye frowned and opened up the menu to Pandora's Box, an old computer game she'd installed a few weeks ago that had quickly become one of her favorites. It was supposed to be like the story of Pandora from Greek Mythology, only when your character, Pandora, opened the box at the beginning of the game, she got sucked inside the box, instead of letting all the monsters out. You were supposed to go level by level, figuring out the mazes and fighting all the monsters, like Greed and Envy and Hunger, so that you could escape the box at the end of the game without releasing all the bad stuff into the real world, but Skye hadn't been able to get past Pain yet. "I got three valiance bonuses in a row last time, but it still wasn't enough. I don't know how a person is supposed to navigate the fourth maze and do enough damage against Pain before your HP and sand timer runs out."

"Lots of practice, I suppose," Jemma hummed. She turned a page.

Skye began plugging away at the level, mashing keys quickly as she tried to vaporize a Fury that appeared in her path. She made conversation as she played:

"What part of the book are you on this time?"

Jemma had recounted the plot enough times to Skye that she figured she'd never have to actually read the book herself, but Jemma always got excited when she could talk about what she was reading.

"Elizabeth is staying with Lady Catherine," Jemma said, smiling. "She's about to turn down Mr. Darcy's proposal. 'You could not have made the offer of your hand in any possible way that would have tempted me to accept it.'" She tapped in time on the spine of the book as she recited.

"I bet you could quote that whole thing without even having the book in your hand," Skye teased gently. "You know Phil said he would take you to the library if you ever wanted to get some new books to read." Jemma used to devour books at a frankly alarming rate, relishing every new page she could get her hands on. These days, Skye hadn't seen her pick up anything that wasn't a biology or astronomy book, or a novel she already knew back to front.

"I know," Jemma said quietly. "I don't want new books, though. I like the ones I have. I like knowing how they're all going to end. Everything always works out in my books. I don't know if I'll like the endings of new ones."

Skye was silent for a minute, letting only the plinky sounds of monster-slaying fill the room. She mistimed the swing of her sword and Pain's poison-tipped arrow plunged into Pandora's digital side and depleted the last few pixels of her health bar. A dejected little doodly-doo sounded off, signaling the end of her attempt. Still no luck against Pain.

"I guess that makes sense, reading what you already know," she finally said. "You don't have to worry so much about the characters if you already know they're going to get a happily-ever-after."

"Exactly. I don't like worrying, I like happy endings."

"I know. Me too."


May came home from work a little before five, and Skye nearly bounded up from her spot at the computer when May poked her head around their open bedroom door to greet her and Jemma.

"Hi, my loves," she said warmly, smiling at their enthusiasm and stepping more fully into the room.

"Phil said Miss Hand and Izzy are coming for dinner tonight and we're talking about something important," Skye said in a rush. She crashed into May's side for a hug and turned wide, gooey eyes on May, batting her lashes for good measure. "What's the important thing we're talking about?"

May smirked slightly and pressed a kiss onto the top of Skye's head. Skye had to duck a little for May to reach, since they were basically the same height now. "Oh, Phil's in trouble," she chuckled. "And you're not getting anything out of me, no matter what faces you pull. I'm not as easily broken as Phil is."

"Worth a shot."

Skye released May from her hug, so that she could go and give Jemma a similar kiss on the top of her own head. Jemma smiled, tucking a bookmark between the pages of her novel, and gave May a few light taps on the wrist before May perched herself on the foot of Jemma's bed.

"Well, how was orientation today? I want to hear all about it."

They filled her in, briefly touching on their tour with Mack and the different clubs they checked out. May seemed pleased to hear that they had agreed to try some things this year.

"I was never much of a joiner in high school, but I think it'll be really good for the both of you to get involved in some activities. A good way to spend time with your friends, too."

"Phil told us about how you didn't do clubs in high school," Skye teased. "You were a grumpy loner until Dr. Garner made you make friends."

May pretended to be offended, swatting a soft hand in Skye's direction, but she was already laughing, so Skye knew she appreciated the joke.

"I was not a grumpy loner," May protested, still laughing. "Well, maybe I was a little grumpy. And maybe I didn't have many friends at first, but I was new in town. I came around eventually. I was perfectly pleasant and sociable by the end of high school."

"Because Dr. Garner helped you make friends?" Jemma asked.

May smiled. "It only takes one person to make a friend, and one friend to make a difference. Andrew helped me come out of my shell, helped me connect with other kids. That's true. He's always been good at that kind of thing."

"So Phil was right?" Skye wanted to know.

"I suppose he was," said May. A sly look spread across her face. "But don't let it go to his head. He's not the only one who has stories from high school. Did he tell you about chess club? Or how he and his first girlfriend got their braces stuck together sophomore year and had to get unstuck by the town orthodontist, who also happened to be the girl's father?"

"No way," Skye grinned. "You made that up."

"I did not," May said. "No matter how hard Phil will deny it if you ask him."

"Did it hurt?" Jemma asked nervously. "Their teeth…"

"I imagine it was pretty uncomfortable," May shrugged. "But I think it was more painful for Phil to be sitting in front of Dr. Nathan with his lips literally locked to Dr. Nathan's daughter. Audrey, was her name. She was nice. Played the cello."

"What happened to her?"

"Oh, she's doing very well for herself," May said quickly, alleviating the concern from Skye and Jemma's faces. "Last I heard she was playing for the Madison Symphony Orchestra and teaching music on the side. She's married to an oboe player named Greg; I think. Or maybe it's Craig. I'm not sure, we haven't seen her since our last high school reunion, and the details at those things get a little fuzzy…"

Just then, the sound of footsteps came on the stairs, and soon Phil's face appeared in the doorway.

"Hi, honey. I thought I heard you come in."

"Hi," May greeted him, getting up to kiss him on the cheek. "Just checking in with the girls. They told me about orientation."

"And May told us about you getting stuck to your girlfriend's braces," Skye said mischievously. Phil's face went red.

"Not my finest moment," he said, more than a little bashful. "And not a story I expected to have told to my daughters," he added, making a face at May. "Traitor."

"Consider us even," May retorted playfully.

"Okay, fair." Phil gave a small chuckle, and leaned in closer to May. "At least now I can kiss a beautiful woman and not have to worry about a trip to the orthodontist's office." He planted a kiss right on May's mouth, and Skye felt her nose crinkle in embarrassment.

"Gross, Phil."

"Mel, Bobbi should be getting home before too long, and Vic and Izzy are coming at 6," he said, finally pulling away from the kiss and checking his watch. "If you want to get cleaned up before they get here, I'd say do it now before Bobbi comes in from practice and uses up all the hot water."

"Sounds good," May nodded. "I won't be long."

"You two want to help me get a few things ready for dinner?" Phil asked, turning to Skye and Jemma. "I've got the grill heating up for the chicken, but I could use a hand making the salad and setting the table."

"Okay," Skye agreed. She got to her feet and Jemma followed suit. "And we can check on our ice cream too, right?"

"Ice cream?" May asked, peeking back around the door with a curious eyebrow raised.

"Phil taught us to make ice cream in a coffee can," Jemma explained eagerly. "We altered the freezing point of the ice with salt and then left it in the freezer. It should be ready soon, shouldn't it, Phil?"

"It should be," he said with a smile. "We've had a pretty busy day today."

"So I can see," said May, returning his smile. "And it's not even over yet."