"For what?"

"For us coming to town. I'll bring the wife and kids. We'll rent out a couple hotel rooms and spend a week there. It'll be a blast."

"Tomorrow?"

"We could get the morning flight and be there for breakfast. You got a good hotel? Not a coffin hotel, not with the kids."

Perry's heart beat faster. He did miss these two, and they were so punchy, so gleeful. He'd love to see them. He muted his phone.

"Hey, Francis? That guesthouse down the road, is it still running?"

"Lulu's? Sure. They just built another storey and took over the top floor of the place next door."

"Perfect." He unmuted. "How'd you like to stay in a squatter guesthouse in the shantytown?"

"Um," Kettlewell said, but Suzanne laughed.

"Oh h.e.l.l *yes*," she said. "Get that look off your face, Kettlewell, this is an *adventure*."

"We'd love it," Kettlewell said.

"Great, I'll make you a reservation. How long are you staying?"

"Until we leave," Suzanne said.

"Right," Perry said and laughed himself. They were different people, these two, from the people he remembered, but they were also old friends. And they were coming to see him tomorrow. "OK, lemme go make your reservations."

Francis walked him over and the landlord fussed over the two of them like they were visiting dignitaries. Perry looked the place over and it was completely charming. He spotted what he thought was probably a hooker and a trick taking a room for the night, but you got that at the Hilton, too.

By the time he got home he was sure that he'd sleep like a log. He could barely keep his eyes open on the drive. But after he climbed into bed and closed his eyes, he found that he couldn't sleep at all. Something about being back in his own room in his own bed felt alien and exciting. He got up and paced the apartment and then Lester came home from his date with the fatkins nympho, full of improbable stories and covered in little hickeys.

"You won't believe who's coming for a visit," Perry said.

"Steve Jobs. He's come down from the lamasery and renounced Buddhism. He wants to give a free computer to every visitor."

"Close," Perry said. "Kettlebelly and Suzanne Church. Coming *tomorrow* for a stay of unspecified duration. It's a reunion. It's a *reunion* you big sonofab.i.t.c.h! Woot! Woot!" Perry did a little two-step. "A reunion!"

Lester looked confused for a second, and then for another second he looked, what, upset? and then he was grinning and jumping up and down with Perry. "Reunion!"

He felt like he'd barely gotten to sleep when his phone rang. The clock showed six AM, and it was Kettlebelly and Suzanne, bleary, jet-lagged and grouchy from their one-hour post-flight security processing.

"We want breakfast," Suzanne said.

"We've gotta open the ride, Suzanne."

"At six in the morning? Come on, you've got hours yet before you have to be at work. How about you and Lester meet us at the IHOP?"

"Jesus," he said.

"Come *on*! Kettlebelly's kids are dying for something to eat and his wife looks like she's ready to eat *him*. It's been years, dude! Get your a.s.s in the shower and down to the International House of Pancakes!"

Lester didn't rouse easy, but Perry knew all the tricks for getting his old pal out of bed, they were practically married after all.

They arrived just in time for the morning rush but Tony greeted them with a smile and sent them straight to the front of the line. Lester ordered his usual ("Bring me three pounds of candy with a side of ground animal parts and potatoes") and they waited nervously for Suzanne and the clan Kettlewell to turn up.

They arrived in a huge bustle of taxis and luggage and two wide-eyed, jet-lagged children hanging off of Kettlewell and Mrs Kettlewell, whom neither of them had ever met. She was a small, youthful woman in her mid-forties with artfully styled hair and big, abstract chunky silver jewelry. Suzanne had gone all Eurochic, rail-thin and smoking, with quiet, understated dark clothes. Kettlewell had a real daddy belly on him now, a little pot that his daughter thumped rhythmically from her perch on his hip.

"Sit, sit," Perry said to them, getting up to help them stack their luggage at either end of the long table down the middle of the IHOP. Big family groups with tons of luggage were par for the course in Florida, so they didn't really draw much attention beyond mild irritation from the patrons they jostled as they got everyone seated.

Perry was mildly amused to see that Lester and Suzanne ended up sitting next to one another and were already chatting avidly and close up, in soft voices that they had to lean in very tight to hear.

He was next to Mrs Kettlewell, whose name, it transpired, was Eva -- "As in Extra-Vehicular Activity," she said, geeking out with him. Kettlewell was in the bathroom with his daughter and son, and Mrs Kettlewell -- Eva -- seemed relieved at the chance for a little adult conversation.

"You must be a very patient woman," Perry said, laughing at all the ticklish noise and motion of their group.

"Oh, that's me all right," Eva said. "Patience is my virtue. And you?"

"Oh, patience is something I value very much in other people." Perry said. It made Eva laugh, which showed off her pretty laugh-lines and dimples. He could see how this woman and Kettlewell must complement each other.

She rocked her head from side to side and took a long swig of the coffee that their waiter had distributed around the table, topping up from the carafe he'd left behind. "Thank G.o.d for legal stimulants."

"Long flight?"

"Traveling with larvae is always a challenge," she said. "But they dug it hard. You should have seen them at the windows."

"They'd never been on a plane before?"

"I like to go camping," she said with a shrug. "Landon's always on me to take the kids to Hawaii or whatever, but I'm always like, 'Man, you spend half your f.u.c.king life in a tin can -- why do you want to start your holidays in one? Let's go to Yosemite and get muddy.' I haven't even taken them to Disneyland!"

Perry put the back of his hand to his forehead. "That's heresy around here," he said. "You going to take them to Disney World while you're in Florida? It's a lot bigger, you know -- and it's a different division. Really different feel, or so I'm told."

"You kidding? Perry, we came here for *your* ride. It's famous, you know."

"Net.famous, maybe. A little." He felt his cheeks burning. "Well, there will be one in your neck of the woods soon enough." He told her about the Burning Man collective and the plan to build one down the 101, south of San Francisco International.

Kettlebelly returned then with the kids, and he managed to get them into their seats while sucking back a coffee and eating a biscuit from the basket in the center of the table, breaking off bits to shove in the kids' mouths whenever they protested.

"These are some way tired kids," he said, leaning over to give his wife a kiss. Perry thought he saw Suzanne flick a look at them then, but it might have been his imagination. Suzanne and Lester were off in their own world, after all.

"The plane almost crashed," said the little girl next to Perry. She had a halo of curly hair like a dandelion clock and big solemn dark eyes and a big wet mouth set between apple-round cheeks.

"Did it really?" Perry said. She was seven or eight he thought, the bossy big sister who'd been giving orders to her little brother from the moment they came through the door.

She nodded solemnly. He looked at Eva, who shrugged.

"Really?" he said.

"Really," she said, nodding vigorously now. "There were terrists on the plane who wanted to blow it up, but the sky marshas stopped them."