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Will looked him over. The lines on Itori’s face seemed less deep today, and his scales were more iridescent. Even his hair appeared more damp, like it was holding onto moisture better.

“So it helped?” The hope of that was intoxicating.

“Yes.”

“If–if we do the same tonight, how many more days until you can leave the water?” Will asked.

Itori pet over his hair, running his claw tips through it. He seemed to have a fascination with Will’s hair. “Three more nights? I do not know exactly, I have never done this before.”

“Walked on dryland?”

Itori inclined his head. “It is not something we were meant to do. But our ancestors gave us the ability, in case we needed to.”

Will wondered at that. He’d seen Itori’s feet–clawed and scaled just like the rest of him. He was more similar to an alligator than a fish. Being out of the water should have been easier.

Then again, Itori talked of things that sounded fantastical to Will. He had access to energy exchanges that Will couldn’t begin to comprehend.

“Three days, okay,” Will said, and hoped he didn’t sound upset about that. He wanted Itori to go to safety, he really did.

“If the humans come again, it may take longer. Their carving is… it is a wound in me that bleeds.”

Will hugged Itori tightly. “The people in town are working on it,” Will said. “I heard there’s a Town Hall meeting on Friday. Some officials are supposed to be there. Maybe they can, I don’t know, make them stop?”

“What is a Town Hall?”

“Oh, um. It’s like a meeting place. A building in the center of town. You know how I said the men wouldn’t listen to someone like me?”

Itori nodded.

“Well if a whole community protests, sometimes that can make change. The will of the many.”

“I see,” Itori said. “I do not understand how your world works,” Itori said. “How outsiders can come, claim your home, and do something to it that no one wants to happen.”

Will didn’t understand either.

“Do you not have leaders who make decisions for the rest of you?” Will asked.

“No. We are not collective like that,” Itori said. “When we are old enough to leave our parents, we do. There is no center of town. No place we must stay because someone tells us to.”

“That sounds nice,” Will said. “To just come and go whenever you want. I wish I could–” he stopped, the words ash in his mouth.

Itori tilted closer, touching his forehead to Will’s. “Wish you could what?”

“Leave,” Will said, voice small. “I–this place. This town. This state.”

“Why?”

There were a dozen reasons. There was one reason. There was no way to explain it to someone without explaining all the nuances of human society.

“Living here is like your spring,” Will said slowly, crafting the analogy. “It’s a prison. It’s like–like sometimes I feel like I’m the monster of the town. Like everyone here can see it on me. They tolerate it because I’ve always been here, but if I got too close–”

Will had a sudden, vivid memory of a snake his father had found once in their trailer. It had been a harmless black racer, but his father had hauled it outside and cut off its head with a shovel for seeking refuge during the rainy season.

“I can’t be myself,” Will said finally. “Who I really am. That’s why when I’m here, with you, it’s–”

He swallowed hard, angry at the emotion in his chest. Itori nuzzled him, making a low, rumbling, hiss sound.

“It is good?” Itori asked.