But they weren't kids anymore, and the game couldn't go on. He would have to hang up first, even though he knew that it hurt her feelings a little bit that he was always the one who could hang up first. I wouldn't be, he told her once, if you'd just hang up for once. But she couldn't do that either, apparently.

He hung up.

"Fish Lady?" asked Glass.

Step could not believe he would be rude enough to admit so openly that he had been listening.

"Oh," said Step, "was I talking that loud? I hoped I'd be quiet enough that you wouldn't be forced to hear what I was saying."

"Naw," said Glass, oblivious to the implied rebuke. So much for the Miss Manners method.

"Give me a salted nut roll," said Step.

"I thought you hated them," said Glass.

Oh, yes, thought Step. I'm not eating them. "Yeah, I didn't want to eat it, I wanted to break it into pieces and jam them into every aperture of your body."

"Kinky," said Glass.

"If you don't listen in to my phone calls, I won't listen in to yours."

"But that's hardly fair," said Glass. "I don't have anybody to call."

"Not your mom?"

"Dad would never let her accept the charges."

"I thought you made more money than God."

"But God doesn't own the credit card companies," said Glass. "No sweat, Mom knows I'm OK. How are the kids?"

"Fine," said Step.

"Must be tough on the two of you, having three kids and all that."

"Sometimes," said Step.

"You need some time together," said Glass.

"Marriage counseling now?"

"Everybody does."

"Your mom and dad?"

"Sure. She needs to have a chance to cry over his grave for an hour on Sundays." Glass grinned at Step's look of embarrassment. "A joke, son, a joke."

"Son?"

"OK, then, Dad. I really meant my offer to tend for you so you two can have some time together."

"I know you did."

"Yeah, but you blew it off," said Glass. "I know you did, and I want you to know I mean it. I love kids, I get along great with kids. I never had any younger brothers or sisters, and so I really like to take care of them now. Never had a baby in the house-but don't get me wrong, I'm real good with babies. I've tended a lot. There was this neighbor family I watched their kids all the time when I was a kid myself- not that I'm, like, grown up or anything now. But you know what I mean."

"Yeah," said Step. What he was thinking was, Am I going to sleep in my clothes on the top of the bed? Or try to undress real fast and hope Glass doesn't notice my underwear. That wasn't too likely-Glass was apparently in a mood to notice everything. And he'd ask, and there'd be a long conversation, and it made Step tired to think about it. Besides, Glass must have known what they were doing with Hacker Snack. He must have provided the other programmers with a copy of his commented disassembly of Step's Atari code for the program, as a basis for their work. So it wasn't as if Step could trust him.

"I used to do everything for those kids. They had a little girl in diapers-Lulu, I called her, but I can't remember why, her name was something like Gladys or something, a stinker name for a little girl, anyway, so I called her Lulu-and she'd be dragging her pants around her ankles, you know how diapers get so heavy when they're wet, so she'd be running around in just her shirt and those wet diapers mopping every speck of dust off the floor."

"You're making me gag here," said Step. "Urine everywhere, my favorite nighty- night vision."

"Come on, little girls don't wet their panties with urine, they wet it with angel rain."

"Now I will puke," said Step.

Glass laughed in delight. "I thought that was funny, too, but that's what Mrs. Greenwood said, angel rain, I swear it."

"I got to tell you, Glass, I need my sleep. It's almost one Eastern time."

"But you aren't even undressed," said Glass, "and we don't have to be over at the show till nine, so we've got plenty of time."

"I have a mild sleep disorder," said Step, making it up as he went along but trying to come somewhere near the truth. "I have a hard time getting to sleep, which means I have to start calming down and stuff fairly early in order to get to sleep fairly late."

"And then, just as you're dozing off, you get up and change your clothes."

This was all too complicated and too infuriating. Step could handle being involved with people and paying attention to them and being polite and all for hours and hours at a stretch, but then he needed time to himself, time where nobody was making demands on him, and right at this moment he wanted Glass to get up and go to the window and jump out and die. Nothing personal, Step just wanted to be alone.

"Glass, is everything I do or don't do so fascinating to you?"

"I was just telling you why I'd be a good babysitter for your kids."

"I'm sure you would."

"I can change the diapers, that's what I was telling you. Wipe their little bottomses. I know that's not a man's job, but I can do it anyway.

"It's a man's job all right," said Step, surrendering to Glass's conversation. "I pity any man who doesn't have the sense to help with the diaper changing. That's how you bond with the baby -- that's how you come to love the kid, for pete's sake-doing intimate personal service like that, doing something disgusting but necessary, and the kid knows it. I mean, a man can't nurse the baby, can he? He needs some point of contact."

"That's a pretty good sermon."

"Yeah, I gave the same speech to my older brother and he said, What, is she turning you gay or something?"

Glass hooted and laughed and slapped his thigh. Too much reaction, too much laughter, not at all appropriate. What's going on here, wondered Step. Why is he so keyed up?

"That's just it," said Glass. "The kid loves you for it, you're doing a service, cleaning up her little privates for her, she loves it."

Now it really did sound disgusting. Not the idea, but the way he said it, the words, the coy way he said "her little privates." This was making Step faintly ill. The boy simply didn't know how to talk about this, that was all.

In his eagerness to be of service, he didn't realize that this wasn't exactly the way a father wanted to hear a would-be babysitter talking about changing his little girl's diapers.

"I even gave her a bath once," said Glass.

"Mm?"

"Lulu. Gladys. You know. She got herself all covered with honey. Not that I wasn't watching her, you know, but I'd had to do something with the boys, I can't remember what, and she just got into the honey, it was out on the table, and she poured it all over in her hair, and I couldn't think of anything to do except take off her little doll-clothes and splash her into the tub. And there she was in the tub and I washed her hair and everything and then she gives me the washcloth and she says, 'Better wash down there, Rolly' Like her mom must have taught her you always wash your little privates."

In that moment Step realized that never, never would Glass be left alone with any of his children, even for a moment, and most especially not Betsy. No, if Step had his way Glass would never even see Betsy, with her beautiful blond hair and her sweet smile and her perfect, perfect innocence.

"Rolly," said Step quietly. "Let's drop the subject, OK?"

"Sure," said Glass. "I didn't mean anything by it, you know. Just that I'm willing to tend, and I know how to take care of little kids, don't you see."

"Right, Glass. Look, here's five bucks, go to the coffee shop and have something on me so I can get to sleep.'

Step was reaching for his wallet.

"Why not just slap my face?" said Glass.

"What do you mean?"

"Here's five dollars," said Glass. "Like I'm some beggar who's been panhandling you on the street or something. I've got money, you know."